On this day in military history…
On 31 July 1917, before daylight had fully broken over the battered landscape around Ypres, one of the largest British offensives of the First World War began. At 3.50 in the morning thousands of British and French guns opened a tremendous moving barrage and infantrymen climbed from their assembly positions to begin the Battle of Pilckem Ridge, the opening action of the Third Battle of Ypres. The campaign would eventually become remembered above all by the name Passchendaele, but on that first morning the immediate objective was the line of ridges and German defensive positions stretching east and north-east of Ypres towards Pilckem, Langemarck and the Steenbeek.
The main assault was entrusted to the British Fifth Army under General Sir Hubert Gough. Gough, an experienced cavalry officer who had commanded formations at Mons, on the Somme and elsewhere on the Western Front, had been given the difficult task of breaking through the German Fourth Army defending the Ypres Salient. Overall strategic direction came from the British Commander-in-Chief, Field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig, who believed that a major offensive in Flanders could force the Germans from the dominating ridges around Ypres and eventually threaten their positions and naval facilities along the Belgian coast.
The importance of the coast went far beyond simply capturing Belgian territory. German submarines operating from bases at Ostend and Zeebrugge were conducting an increasingly dangerous campaign against Allied shipping. Britain depended upon overseas imports of food, fuel and military supplies, and unrestricted submarine warfare had become one of the greatest strategic threats facing the country. Haig hoped that a breakthrough from Ypres might eventually help force the Germans away from these bases, although the immediate task facing Gough's soldiers was simply to penetrate an immensely powerful defensive system.
The Fifth Army's attack involved II Corps, XIX Corps, XVIII Corps and XIV Corps, while elements of General Sir Herbert Plumer's Second Army attacked farther south to protect Gough's right flank. The French First Army under General François Anthoine supported the offensive on the northern end of the battlefield. Altogether around thirteen Allied divisions were involved in the opening operations, with the great majority being British and Commonwealth formations.
A British infantry division theoretically contained around 18,000 men when fully established earlier in the war, but by 1917 many formations were considerably below their paper strength. Individual infantry battalions that theoretically might once have numbered close to 1,000 officers and men could sometimes field only around 500 to 700 for operations. Consequently, although well over 100,000 British and Allied troops belonged to the formations committed to the opening battle, only a proportion of those men formed the first assault waves. Tens of thousands of infantrymen nevertheless moved forward during the opening stages, followed by supporting battalions, engineers, machine-gunners, artillerymen, stretcher-bearers, signallers and supply troops.
On the right of Gough's Fifth Army, II Corps under Lieutenant-General Claud Jacob faced some of the most difficult ground. Its attacking formations included the 24th Division, 30th Division and 8th Division. Their advance took them through areas such as Sanctuary Wood, Shrewsbury Forest, Hooge and Bellewaarde, ground that had already been fought over repeatedly since 1914. German machine-gun positions, concrete shelters and strongpoints made progress particularly difficult. The 8th Division included units such as the 2nd Battalion Lincolnshire Regiment, Royal Irish Rifles, Rifle Brigade and Royal Berkshire Regiment, while battalions of the King's Liverpool Regiment were among those committed farther south during the day's fighting.
Farther north XIX Corps included the 15th (Scottish) Division and the 55th (West Lancashire) Division. The latter was a Territorial formation largely recruited from Lancashire and contained battalions of regiments including the King's Own Royal Lancaster Regiment, Liverpool Regiment, South Lancashire Regiment and Loyal North Lancashire Regiment. The division attacked with its 165th and 166th Infantry Brigades leading, while the 164th Brigade was initially available in support. The first battalions were expected to capture the German forward positions before following battalions passed through them towards deeper objectives. It was a carefully planned system intended to maintain momentum without exhausting the same infantrymen by forcing them to fight continuously through several defensive lines.
XVIII Corps included the 39th Division and 51st (Highland) Division. The Highland Division had already developed an excellent fighting reputation and contained battalions drawn from famous Scottish regiments including the Black Watch, Gordon Highlanders, Seaforth Highlanders and Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders. Its soldiers advanced across difficult ground towards the German positions around Pilckem and the Steenbeek.
The 38th (Welsh) Division was also heavily involved and was given one of the most important tasks of the entire attack. Its men were to take the German positions on Pilckem Ridge, push towards Iron Cross Ridge and then descend towards the Steenbeek. The division contained battalions of the Welsh Regiment, Royal Welsh Fusiliers and South Wales Borderers. Many of its soldiers had already experienced terrible fighting during the attack on Mametz Wood on the Somme the previous year. On 31 July they were again asked to assault prepared German positions under intense artillery and machine-gun fire.
The Guards Division also went forward during the battle, bringing together battalions of the Grenadier Guards, Coldstream Guards, Scots Guards and Irish Guards. Contemporary photographs taken after the fighting famously show Irish Guardsmen examining captured German equipment at Pilckem, evidence of how far sections of the British advance had penetrated.
Opposing them was the German Fourth Army commanded by General Friedrich Sixt von Armin, operating under Army Group Crown Prince Rupprecht of Bavaria. The Germans had spent years turning the Ypres region into a formidable fortified zone. Instead of relying entirely upon one continuous front trench, German defensive doctrine increasingly used dispersed concrete pillboxes, machine-gun posts and fortified shell holes supported by deeper positions and counter-attack formations.
Hundreds of reinforced concrete shelters and strongpoints covered sections of the battlefield. Some protected machine-gun crews, others acted as command posts or infantry shelters. Their thick concrete walls could survive artillery fire that would have destroyed conventional trenches. British infantry might pass one strongpoint only to receive machine-gun fire from another position behind or on their flank. German reserve formations were then expected to counter-attack once the British advance had lost momentum.
Preparing the offensive required an extraordinary concentration of artillery. More than 3,000 British and French guns and howitzers were assembled for the wider attack, including hundreds of heavy pieces capable of striking German artillery positions, command posts, roads and strongpoints far behind the front line. During the preliminary bombardment millions of shells were fired. German positions were pounded continuously while British aircraft attempted to locate enemy batteries and observe the results.
The bombardment was intended not simply to destroy trenches but also to cut barbed wire, suppress German artillery and prevent reinforcements from reaching the battlefield. When the infantry attacked, a creeping barrage moved ahead of them according to a carefully calculated timetable. Soldiers were trained to remain close behind this wall of exploding shells because once the barrage passed a German position its defenders might have only minutes, sometimes seconds, to emerge from cover and man their machine guns.
The price of such enormous artillery preparation was the destruction of the countryside itself. The ground around Ypres had a high water table and depended upon drainage ditches and channels. Years of shelling had already damaged much of this system, and the new bombardment smashed it still further. Millions of shell holes covered the battlefield. When rain arrived, they rapidly filled with water and the churned soil began turning into the mud for which Third Ypres would become infamous.
At 3.50 a.m. on 31 July the assault began. The British infantry advanced behind the creeping barrage through mist, smoke and the flashes of thousands of exploding shells. In many sectors the first German positions were captured surprisingly quickly. German defenders who survived the bombardment emerged from dugouts to find British troops already close upon them.
The 38th Welsh Division made particularly impressive progress. Its battalions fought across the Pilckem position, captured German strongpoints and pushed forward towards Iron Cross Ridge and the Steenbeek. The advance represented a significant recovery for a formation that had suffered terribly at Mametz Wood the previous year.
The 51st Highland Division also pushed forward successfully, overcoming fortified positions and maintaining contact with neighbouring formations. Highland troops became involved in fierce local fighting around German concrete shelters where machine guns could hold up entire sections of the advance until small groups worked around their flanks using rifles, grenades and Lewis guns.
Elsewhere progress was much more difficult. II Corps met strong resistance around the Menin Road sector, Sanctuary Wood and Inverness Copse. German machine guns survived the artillery preparation and inflicted serious casualties. Some British tanks attempted to assist the infantry, but the devastated terrain created enormous difficulties. Shell holes, broken trees and soft ground could immobilise machines, while others were knocked out by artillery.
The 55th West Lancashire Division achieved important early gains but later suffered heavily when German counter-attacks struck parts of its newly captured positions. German Eingreif, or intervention, formations had been held farther behind the battlefield specifically for this purpose. Once the direction of the British attack became clear they moved forward to restore the situation.
Communications quickly became one of the greatest problems. Telephone cables laid across the battlefield were repeatedly cut by artillery fire. Runners carrying handwritten messages had to cross exposed ground under shelling, sometimes taking hours to reach headquarters. Commanders behind the front therefore often received information that was already outdated by the time it arrived.
British artillery observers faced similar difficulties. Smoke, mist and eventually rain obscured the battlefield, while advancing troops could disappear among shell holes and ruined trenches. Aircraft provided valuable information, but weather conditions increasingly restricted observation. Without reliable knowledge of exactly where the infantry had reached, artillerymen risked either firing too far ahead to provide useful protection or dropping shells dangerously close to their own men.
The weather began deteriorating during the day. Rain fell heavily and continued into the following days. The carefully prepared tracks and communication routes started breaking apart under the constant movement of troops, horses, guns and supply wagons. Shell holes filled with water and the battlefield became increasingly difficult to cross.
For wounded men the conditions were particularly grim. Stretcher-bearers sometimes required several men simply to move one casualty through the mud. A journey of a few hundred yards could become exhausting. Wounded soldiers who slipped from duckboards or tracks could become trapped in water-filled shell holes, and the difficulty of bringing forward food, ammunition and medical supplies increased with every hour of rain.
Despite these difficulties the opening day was not the complete failure that later popular images of Passchendaele sometimes suggest. Considerable ground was captured. Pilckem Ridge fell, British and French forces advanced several thousand yards in places, thousands of German soldiers were taken prisoner and numerous machine guns and artillery pieces were captured. Some formations reached or approached the Steenbeek, giving the Allies possession of important sections of the German defensive system.
The breakthrough Haig and Gough hoped for, however, did not occur. German resistance stiffened as the British advance moved beyond the protection of its original artillery positions. German counter-attacks regained some ground and the increasingly poor weather made exploiting the gains extremely difficult.
The battle continued through 1 and 2 August as British troops consolidated captured positions and German forces attempted to recover them. The opening phase eventually became officially known as the Battle of Pilckem Ridge, although it formed only the beginning of a much longer struggle.
British casualties during the opening days were enormous. Figures vary depending upon the precise dates used, but the Fifth Army and supporting British formations suffered approximately 30,000 casualties during the opening phase surrounding Pilckem Ridge. German losses were also severe, with thousands killed, wounded or captured. Some German formations holding the forward defensive zone were badly damaged by the combination of artillery bombardment and infantry assault.
The battle also produced numerous examples of individual bravery. Infantrymen attacked machine-gun positions at close range, runners crossed artillery-swept ground carrying messages, engineers attempted to repair roads and bridges under fire and stretcher-bearers repeatedly entered exposed areas to recover wounded men. Several Victoria Crosses were awarded for actions during the opening fighting.
The men who went forward represented almost every part of Britain. Welsh battalions advanced around Pilckem, Highlanders fought through German strongpoints, Lancashire Territorials attacked farther south and Guards battalions moved forward alongside them. English, Scottish, Welsh and Irish soldiers fought alongside troops from across the British Empire, while French troops advanced on their northern flank.
Behind them stood an immense logistical organisation. Hundreds of thousands of artillery shells had to be transported forward along roads under German observation. Horses dragged ammunition wagons towards gun positions while engineers constructed tracks, bridges and light railways. Royal Flying Corps aircraft flew reconnaissance and artillery observation missions above the battlefield while German fighters attempted to drive them away.
For General Hubert Gough, Pilckem Ridge was intended to be the opening blow of a fast-moving offensive rather than the beginning of months of attritional fighting. He hoped that once German forward positions had been broken, British troops could continue towards the higher ground around Passchendaele and beyond. The German defensive system, the destruction of the landscape, determined counter-attacks and deteriorating weather prevented that vision from becoming reality.
The offensive continued throughout August, September and October and eventually into November. Names including Langemarck, Menin Road, Polygon Wood, Broodseinde, Poelcappelle and Passchendaele would become associated with the campaign. Canadian troops eventually captured the shattered village of Passchendaele in November, by which time both sides had suffered enormous losses.
Yet the story of Third Ypres began before dawn on 31 July 1917, when the guns opened at 3.50 a.m. and British soldiers emerged from their positions behind a moving wall of artillery fire. The Battle of Pilckem Ridge demonstrated both the increasing sophistication and the terrible limitations of industrial warfare. Artillery, aircraft, tanks, carefully timed infantry movements and complex communications had been assembled on an enormous scale, but success could still be decided by a handful of men defending a concrete pillbox with a machine gun, a broken telephone cable, an unexpected counter-attack or the mud beneath a soldier's boots.
For the soldiers of the Fifth Army there was little knowledge of the months of fighting that lay ahead. Their concern on that July morning was the next shell hole, the next trench and the next German strongpoint. Thousands succeeded in reaching objectives that had seemed almost impossible from the British lines, while thousands of others were killed or wounded before the first day was over. Pilckem Ridge was a substantial British and Allied advance, but it was also the opening chapter of a campaign whose mud, shell holes and exhausted infantrymen would become some of the most haunting images of the First World War.
