The Retreat from Mons

INTRODUCTORY

The first quality of British military operations in the present war-and so it will strike the future historian-is their astonishing variety and range. Beginning on the ancient battlefields of France and Flanders, they have spread, in a series of expanding and apparently inevitable waves, over a good part of three continents, so that, wherever the enemy was to be found, – whether in Europe, or Asia, or Africa, or in the islands of the high seas, – there also, sooner or later, were the British arms. There was a time when one or two campaigns were thought amply sufficient for the military energies of the most warlike nation. We have never pretended to be warlike, meeting our emergencies always, with a certain reluctance, as they arose; but in the present war we have seldom had fewer than six considerable campaigns on our hands at one time, and these in areas separated often by thousands of miles from one another and from us. It is one of the obligations of a great empire at war that it should be so; it is one of the privileges of a great maritime empire that it should be possible. It is undoubtedly the grand characteristic of the operations of the British Army in this war, and gives the only true perspective of our military effort in the field. To our share in the Allied front must always be added the fighting frontiers of the Empire.

The British Army, now grown out of all recognition, was small, and known to be small, when the war began. It was a voluntary army, numbering approximately 700,000 men, of whom about 450,000 (including reservists) were trained soldiers, liable for service abroad, and the remainder, a half-trained Territorial Force, enrolled for service at home. Besides being small, it was, from the nature of its duties, widely scattered. Over 100,000 of our best troops were serving at the time in India or on foreign stations. For all purposes, therefore, when war broke out, we had in this country a mobilizable army of something under 600,000 trained and half-trained men, 250,000 of whom were liable only for service at home. The striking or Expeditionary Force of this army was a fully equipped and highly professional body of six infantry divisions and one division of cavalry, and with this force we entered the war. Intended primarily, as its name implied, for protective or punitive operations within the Empire, it was on a scale proportionate to its purpose and to the size of our army. Our army, judged by a European standard, being small, our Expeditionary Force, judged by that standard, was diminutive; and the chief problem which confronted the Government, when it was decided to send this force to France, was how to support and supplement it. The story of how this problem was faced and overcome, of how "Home Service" men became "Foreign Service" in a day, and our little army of 700,000, by a gigantic effort of British determination and Imperial good-will, was expanded into an army of millions-all this is a separate narrative, to be related elsewhere; but we cannot afford to overlook it as we follow the fortunes of the Expeditionary Force in France and Flanders. It is the military background of all their triumphs and vicissitudes, and had an effect upon the tone of the war almost from the first. Even to our Expeditionary Force itself, with all its cheerful self-confidence and efficiency, it meant something to know that the country was in earnest; that as early as August 23, while they were still fighting among the coal-pits of Mons, the first 100,000 volunteers had been enrolled, and were already deep in the mysteries of forming fours.

THE RETREAT FROM MONS

When a country goes to war the first test of its military efficiency is the mobilization of its army. This is a stage in the history of wars which the public is apt to overlook, because the arrangements are necessarily secret and complex, and are carried out in that first hush which precedes communiqués and great conflicts in the field. It is nevertheless true that every war starts in the Department of the Quartermaster General, and that by the nature of this start the issue of a war may be decided. We started well. From August 5, when mobilization began, – in spite of bank holidays and Territorials en routefor summer camps, – the whole scheme of concentration and despatch was carried out almost exactly to schedule, and without a hitch. It is calculated that, during the busiest period, the railway companies, now under Government control and brilliantly directed by an executive committee of general managers, were able to run as many as eighteen hundred special trains in five days, an average of three hundred and sixty trains a day, and all up to time. The concentration of the Home Forces and of the Expeditionary Force proceeded concurrently. On August 9 the first elements of the Force embarked, and nine days later the greater part of it had been landed in France, and was moving by way of Amiens to its unknown fortunes. The smoothness, rapidity, above all the secrecy with which the transportation was carried out, made a great impression at the time, and will always be admired. The question of how it was done excited, characteristically enough, less interest. We are a people accustomed to happy improvisations, and it was generally assumed that this national talent had once more come to our rescue; the truth being that in these matters improvisation can seldom be happy, and that for instant and complete success the only method is long and careful preparation in time of peace. For several years the military, naval, and civilian authorities concerned had been engaged upon such a scheme of preparation, and had, indeed, concluded their labours not many months before war broke out. When the day came all railway and naval transport officers were at their posts, and the Railway Executive Committee, in its offices in Parliament Street, was calmly carrying out a time-table with every detail of which it had long been familiar. Such perfect preparedness is rare in our history, and worthy of note. Amidst the vast unreadiness of the nation for war the despatch of the Expeditionary Force, and the magnificent readiness of the fleet which made it possible, stand out in grand relief, not to be lost sight of or forgotten.

The Expeditionary Force was commanded by Field Marshal Sir John French, and consisted, up to August 23, of four complete divisions of infantry (the First, Second, Third, and Fifth) and five brigades of cavalry; that is to say, about 80,000 men. On August 24 it was joined by the Nineteenth Infantry Brigade, which added 4000 more; and on August 25 by the Fourth Division, which added another 17,000. Our total strength, therefore, during the fighting at Mons and in the Retreat, varied from 80,000 to a little over 100,000 men. It was a small force, but of a quality rarely seen. No finer fighting unit ever entered the field. In physique and equipment, in professional training and experience of war, in that quality of skilful and cheerful tenacity against odds which distinguishes the veteran, it was probably unrivalled by any body of troops of its time. The French, who gave our men a warm welcome, dwell always on their youth and good spirits, their wonderful cleanness and healthiness, the excellence of their equipment, and their universal courtesy.

"À Argenteuil-Triage," writes a French infantryman who fought in the Retreat and on the Marne, "nous croisons un train de fantassins anglais; figures rasées, ouvertes, enfantines, riant de toutes leurs dents. Ils sont reluisants de propreté. Nous nous acclamons réciproquement." (Sept. 2/14: Garnet de Route; Roujons.)

At Bucy-le-long the French relieve the English. It is a matter of outposts. "De deux cents mètres en deux cents mètres, un groupe de six Anglais est couché à plat ventre dans les betteraves, en bordure d'un chemin. Ils se dressent et nous allons prendre leurs places en admirant ces beaux soldats, bien équipés, silencieux, et qui ont des couvertures." (Ibid., Oct. 6/14.)

Such opinions were worth much. For though it is a great thing to be welcomed, as our men were welcomed, by a whole people, to have the hearty professional approval of its soldiers is a greater thing still.

The Expeditionary Force, thus landed in France, was organized in two army corps-the First, consisting of the First and Second Divisions, under Lieutenant-General Sir Douglas Haig; the second, consisting of the Third and Fifth Divisions, under Lieutenant-General Sir James Grierson, who was succeeded, on his sudden and much lamented death, by General Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien. General Allenby commanded the cavalry division, consisting of the First, Second, Third, and Fourth Cavalry Brigades, and the Fifth Cavalry Brigade was commanded independently by Brigadier-General Sir Philip Chetwode. By the evening of Friday, August 21, the concentration was practically complete, and during Saturday the 22d the Force moved up to its position on the left or western extremity of the French line. (Plan 1.)

The general situation in this region, as it was known at the moment to the leaders of the Allies, may be briefly stated. It was at last plain, after much uncertainty, that the first great shock and collision of forces was destined to take place in this northern area. It was plain, also, that Belgium, for some time to come, was out of the scheme. Liège had fallen, and with it how many hopes and predictions of the engineer! Brussels was occupied; and the Belgian field army was retiring to shelter under the ramparts of Antwerp. Except for Namur, there was nothing in Belgium north of the Allied line to stop the German advance. Von Kluck and Von Buelow, with the First and Second German Armies, were marching without opposition towards the French frontier-Von Kluck towards the south-west and Von Buelow towards the crossings of the Sambre. By the evening of the 20th, Von Buelow's guns were bombarding Namur. So much was known to the leaders of the Allies: of the strength of the advancing armies they knew little.

To oppose these two armies-for of the seven German armies already in position we shall consider only these two-the Allies were disposed as follows: Directly in the route of Von Buelow's army, should he pass Namur, lay the Fifth French Army, under General Lanrezac, with its left resting on the river Sambre at Charleroi, and its right in the fork of the Meuse and the Sambre. This army, it should be noted, made a junction in the river fork with another French Army, the Fourth, under General Ruffey, which lay off to the south along the Middle Meuse, watching the Ardennes. On the left of the Fifth French Army, along a line presently to be defined, lay the British Expeditionary Force, facing, as it seemed, with equal directness, the line of advance of the army of Von Kluck. Subsidiary to the Fifth French Army and the British Force were two formations, available for support: a cavalry corps of three divisions under General Sordet, stationed to the south of Maubeuge, and, out to the west, with its base at Arras, a corps of two reserve divisions under General D'Amade. Both these formations will be heard of during the subsequent operations, and it is important to remark that General D'Amade's two divisions were at this time, and throughout the first days of the fighting, the only considerable body of Allied troops in the eighty miles of territory between the British and the sea.

The line occupied by the British ran due east from the neighbourhood of Condé along the straight of the Condé-Mons Canal, round the loop which the canal makes north of Mons, and then, with a break, patrolled by cavalry, turned back at almost a right angle towards the southeast of the direction of the Mons-Beaumont road. The whole of the canal line, including the loop round Mons, – a front of nearly twenty miles, – was held by the Second Army Corps, and the First Army Corps lay off to its right, holding the southeastern line to a point about nine miles from Mons. There being no infantry reserves available in this small force, General Allenby's cavalry division was employed to act on the flank or in support of any threatened part of the line. The forward reconnaissance was entrusted to the Fifth Cavalry Brigade, assisted by some squadrons from General Allenby's division, and some of its detachments penetrated as far north as Soignies, nine miles on the way to Brussels. In the occasional encounters which took place with the enemy's Uhlans, to the north and east, our cavalry had always the best of it; then, as always in this war, when the opportunity has occurred, mounted or dismounted, they have proved themselves the better arm. Their reconnaissance was more than supplemented by four squadrons of the Royal Flying Corps under the direction of Major-General Sir David Henderson.

Throughout the Saturday our men entrenched themselves, the North-Countrymen among them finding in the chimney-stacks and slag-heaps of this mining district much to remind them of home. The line they held was clearly not an easy line to defend. No salient ever is, and a glance at the map will show that this was no common salient. To the sharp apex of Mons was added, as an aggravation, the loop of the canal. It was nevertheless the best line available, and, once adopted, had been occupied with that double view both to defence and to attack which a good commander has always before him. The first object, when an enemy of unknown strength attacks, is to hold him and gain time; the line of the canal supplies just the obstacle required; it was therefore held, in spite of the salient, and arrangements made for a withdrawal of the Second Corps should the salient become untenable. If, on the other hand, the enemy should be beaten back, the Second Corps, pivoting northeast on Mons, could cross the canal and move forward in line with the First Corps, already in position for such an advance. If, finally, – for a commander, like a good parent, must provide for everything, – a general retirement should become necessary, the British Commander-in-Chief had decided to rest his right flank on Maubeuge, twelve miles south of Mons: and here was his First Corps ready for it, clustered about the roads that lead towards Maubeuge, and able, from this advantage, to cover the retirement of the Second Corps, which had fewer facilities in this way, and would have farther to travel. Tactically the arrangements were as good as could be made.

When we come to the strength and direction of the enemy's attack, we are on more doubtful ground. His strength on the British front was estimated at the time, according to all the available information, both French and English, to be at most two army corps, with perhaps one cavalry division, which would have made an equal battle; and it was not unnaturally supposed that he would attack in the general direction of his advance; that is, from the northeast. From an attack in this strength and from this direction we had nothing to fear. As it turned out, however, both the estimate of strength and the supposition of direction were inaccurate. The enemy, making full use of the wooded country in these parts, which gave excellent concealment, and strong enough to throw his forces wide, was, as we shall see, engaged on something much more ambitious; a movement which, had it succeeded (as against any other troops it might well have succeeded), would have brought disaster on the whole Allied army.

At what hour precisely the Germans began their attack on the Mons position is uncertain. Some say at dawn, others just after noon. What is certain is that between 12 and 1 P.M. on Sunday the 23d, some of the men of the Royal West Kents, in support on the outskirts of Mons, were having a sing-song and watching the people home from church, and, feeling quite at their ease, had sent their shirts and socks out to wash, for all the world as if on manoeuvres. It is an interesting little scene, and one which would have seemed incomprehensible to the Germans, who by this time pictured our little army cowering in its positions. The abruptness with which the scene changed is no less characteristic. When it was reported that the enemy had turned up "at last" and that "A" company was hard-pressed at the canal, there was no more thought of sing-songs nor even of the dinner "which the orderlies had just gone to fetch"; socks and shirts appeared as if by miracle; and when the "fall-in" went, every man was there, equipped and ready for anything. It is an ordinary incident, and for that reason important; in any institution, whether it be an army or a household, it is the ordinary incidents that count. It is typical of the spirit of an army which has puzzled many even of its admirers by its strange combination of qualities: boyish ease and hilarity coupled with manly fortitude and discipline, and a most perfect and unassailable confidence in its weapons, its leaders, and itself.

The attack had most certainly begun; and it began, as was expected, at the weakest and most critical point of the line, the canal loop, which was held by the Third Division. This division had the heaviest share of the fighting throughout the day, maintaining, longer than seemed humanly possible, a hopeless position against hopeless odds, the Second Royal Irish and Fourth Middlesex of the Eighth Brigade, and the Fourth Royal Fusiliers of the Ninth Brigade, particularly distinguishing themselves. The bridges over the canal, which our men held, after some preliminary shelling, were attacked by infantry debouching from the low woods which at this point came down to within three hundred or four hundred yards of the canal. These woods were of great assistance to the enemy, both here and at other points of the canal, in providing cover for their infantry and machine-guns. The odds were very heavy. One company of the Royal Fusiliers, holding the Nimy Bridge, was attacked at one time by as many as four battalions. The enemy at first came on in masses, and suffered severely in consequence. It was their first experience of the British "fifteen rounds a minute," and it told. They went down in bundles-our men delighting in a form of musketry never contemplated in the Regulations. To men accustomed to hitting bobbing heads at eight hundred yards there was something monstrous and incredible in the German advance. They could scarcely believe their eyes; such targets had never appeared to them even in their dreams. Nor were our machine-guns idle. In this, as in many other actions that day and in the days that followed, our machine-guns were handled with a skill and devotion which no one appreciated more than the enemy. Two of the first Victoria Crosses of the war were won by machine-gunners in this action of the bridges: Lieutenant Dease, of the Royal Fusiliers, who, though five times wounded, – and, as it turned out, mortally wounded, – continued to work his gun on the Nimy Bridge until the order came for retirement, and he was carried off; and Private Godley, of the Royal Scots Fusiliers, who, lower down the loop, at the Ghlin Bridge, in the face of repeated assaults, kept his gun in action throughout.

The attack had now spread along the whole line of the canal; but except at the loop the enemy could make no impression. There, however, numbers told at last, and about the middle of the afternoon the Third Division was ordered to retire from the salient, and the Fifth Division on its left directed to conform. Bridges were blown up-the Royal Engineers vying with the other services in the race for glory: and by the night of the 23d, after various vicissitudes, the Second Army Corps had fallen back as far as the line Montreuil-Wasmes-Paturages-Frameries. That the retirement, though successful, was expensive, is not to be wondered at, when it is remembered that throughout this action, as we now know, the Second Army Corps was outnumbered by three to one. All ranks, however, were in excellent spirits. Allowing for handicaps, they felt that they had proved themselves the better men.

It was a feeling which was to be severely tried in the next few days. At 5 P.M. on Sunday the 23d, as the Second Corps was withdrawing from the canal, the British Commander-in-Chief received a most unexpected telegraph from General Joffre, the Generalissimo of the Allied armies, to the effect that at least three German army corps were moving against the British front, and that a fourth corps was endeavouring to outflank him from the west. He was also informed that the Germans had on the previous day captured the crossings of the Sambre between Charleroi and Namur, and that the French on his right were retiring. In other words, Namur, the defensive pivot of the Anglo-French line, on the resistance of which-if only for a few days-the Allied strategy had depended, had fallen almost at a blow. By Saturday the Germans had left Namur behind, and in numbers far exceeding French predictions had seized the crossings of the Sambre and Middle Meuse and were hammering at the junction of the Fifth and Fourth French Armies in the river-fork. The junction was pierced, and the French, unexpectedly and overwhelmingly assaulted both in front and flank, could do nothing but retire. By 5 P.M. on the Sunday, when the message was received at British Headquarters, the French had been retiring for anywhere from ten to twelve hours. The British Army was for the moment isolated. Standing forward a day's march from the French on its right, faced and engaged by three German corps in front, and already threatened by a fourth corps on its left, it seemed a force marked out for destruction.