British Army during the First World War
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The British Army during the First World War fought the largest and most costly war in its
During
The war also posed problems for the army commanders, given that, prior to 1914, the largest formation any serving General in the BEF had commanded on operations was a division. The expansion of the British Army saw some officers promoted from brigade to corps commander in less than a year. Army commanders also had to cope with the new tactics and weapons that were developed. With the move from manoeuvre to trench warfare, both the infantry and the artillery had to learn how to work together. During an offensive, and when in defence, they learned how to combine forces to defend the front line. Later in the war, when the Machine Gun Corps and the Tank Corps were added to the order of battle, they were also included in the new tactical doctrine.
The men at the front had to struggle with supply problems–there was a shortage of food; and disease was rife in the damp, rat-infested conditions. Along with enemy action, many soldiers had to contend with new diseases: trench foot, trench fever and trench nephritis. When the war ended in November 1918, British Army casualties, as the result of enemy action and disease, were recorded as 673,375 killed and missing, with another 1,643,469 wounded. The rush to demobilise at the end of the conflict substantially decreased the strength of the British Army, from its peak strength of 3,820,000 men in 1918 to 370,000 men by 1920.
Organization
The British Army was created after the
The British Army during World War I could trace its organisation to the increasing demands of imperial expansion. The framework was the voluntary system of recruitment and the
At the outbreak of the war in August 1914, the British regular army was a small professional force. It consisted of 247,432 regular troops organised in four regiments of
The regular army was supported by the
The regulars and reserves—at least on paper—totalled a mobilised force of almost 700,000 men, although only 150,000 men were immediately available to be formed into the
Britain, therefore, began the war with six regular and fourteen territorial infantry divisions. During the war, a further six regular, 14 Territorial, 36 Kitchener's Army and six other divisions, including the Naval Division from the Royal Navy were formed.[24]
Divisions
In 1914, each British infantry division consisted of three infantry brigades, each of four battalions, with two machine guns per battalion, (24 in the division). They also had three field
The single cavalry division assigned to the BEF in 1914 consisted of 15 cavalry regiments in five brigades. They were armed with rifles, unlike their French and German counterparts, who were only armed with the shorter range
Over the course of the war, the composition of the infantry division gradually changed, and there was an increased emphasis on providing the infantry divisions with
British Expeditionary Force
Under the terms of the
By the end of 1914 (after the battles of Mons, Le Cateau, the Aisne and Ypres), the old regular British Army had been virtually wiped out; although it managed to stop the German advance.[29]
In October 1914, the
Recruitment and conscription
In August 1914, 300,000 men had signed up to fight, and another 450,000 had joined-up by the end of September.[31] A prominent feature of the early months of volunteering was the formation of Pals battalions.[32] These were men who had lived and worked together, and who as an incentive to recruitment were allowed to train together and serve in the same units. The policy ensured that, when the Pals battalions suffered casualties, whole communities back in Britain were to suffer disproportionate losses. With the introduction of conscription in January 1916, no further Pals battalions were raised.[15]
Conscription for single men was introduced in January 1916.[33] The Military Service Act 1916 specified that men from the ages of 18 to 41 were liable to be called up for service in the army, unless they were married (or widowed with children), or served in one of a number of reserved occupations, which were usually industrial but which also included clergymen and teachers. This legislation did not apply to Ireland, despite its then status as part of the United Kingdom (but see Conscription Crisis of 1918).[15] Conscription was extended to married men in May 1916.[33] By January 1916, when conscription was introduced, 2.6 million men had volunteered for service, a further 2.3 million were conscripted before the end of the war; by the end of 1918, the army had reached its peak strength of four million men.[15]
Analysis of death records from the Hundred Days (August - November 1918) suggests that around 60% of those who died were conscripts (many of the men "combed out" from rear echelon jobs and posted to the front lines in 1917-18 had volunteered earlier in the war), and that despite the recent lowering of the age limit for service on the Western Front from nineteen to eighteen-and-a-half, the average age of the dead was still in the mid-twenties. Alison Hine comments that although incompleteness of records makes it hard to say whether these dead men were a representative sample of the BEF as a whole, assertions that the late-war BEF consisted largely of conscripted "boys" should therefore be treated with caution. Furthermore, although there were certainly many cases of men being sent to regiments from parts of the country other than their own, many battalions were still filled with men from their traditional local areas, the same as earlier in the war. Caution therefore should be employed before accepting claims that there was a deliberate attempt to "destroy the Regiment … and nationalise the Army" (e.g. by Dunn in The War The Infantry Knew (1938)).[34]
Women also volunteered and served in a non-combatant role; by the end of the war, 80,000 had enlisted.
Commanders
In 1914, no serving British officer of the
The commander of the
After the failed offensive at the
General Plumer was eventually appointed to command II Corps in December 1914, and succeeded Smith-Dorrien in command of the
In 1914, General
Allenby was replaced as Third Army commander by General Julian Byng, who began the war as commander of the 3rd Cavalry Division. After performing well during the First Battle of Ypres, he succeeded Allenby in command of the Cavalry Corps. He was sent to the Dardanelles in August 1915, to command the British IX Corps. He planned the highly successful evacuation of 105,000 Allied troops and the majority of the equipment of the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force (MEF). The withdrawal was successfully completed in January 1916, without the loss of a single man.[52] Byng had already returned to the western front, where he was given command of the Canadian Corps. His most notable battle was the Battle of Vimy Ridge in April 1917, which was carried out by the Canadian Corps with British support.[52]
General
General
On the
Back in Britain,
Officer selection
In August 1914, there were 28,060 officers in the British Army, of which 12,738 were regular officers, the rest were in the reserves.[64] The number of officers in the army had increased to 164,255 by November 1918. These were survivors among the 247,061 officers who had been granted a commission during the war.[65]
Most pre-war officers came from families with military connections, the
In September 1914, Lord Kitchener announced that he was looking for volunteers and regular NCOs to provide officers for the expanding army.[68] Most of the volunteers came from the middle class, with the largest group from commercial and clerical occupations (27%), followed by teachers and students (18%) and professional men (15%).[69] In March 1915, it was discovered that 12,290 men serving in the ranks had been members of a university or public school Officers' Training Corps (OTC). Most applied for and were granted commissions, while others who did not apply were also commissioned.[70] Direct commissioning largely ceased early in 1916, from then most new officers had served in the ranks first, even if in a unit of potential officers.[71][72]
Once a candidate was selected as an officer, promotion could be rapid. A. S. Smeltzer was commissioned as a
Along with rapid promotion, the war also noticeably lowered the age of battalion commanding officers. In 1914, they were aged over 50, while the average age for a battalion commanding officer in the BEF between 1917 and 1918 was 28.[74] By this stage, it was official policy that men over 35 were no longer eligible to command battalions.[75] This trend was reflected amongst the junior officers. Anthony Eden was the Adjutant of a battalion when aged 18, and served as the brigade major in the 198th Brigade while still only aged 20.[76]
The war also provided opportunities for advancement onto the General Staff, especially in the early days, when many former senior officers were recalled from retirement. Some of these were found wanting, due to their advanced age, their unwillingness to serve, or a lack of competence and fitness; most were sent back into retirement before the first year of the war was over, leaving a gap that had to be filled by lower-ranking officers.
During the course of the war, 78 British and
Doctrine
British official historian Brigadier
The Second Boer War had alerted the army to the dangers posed by fire zones that were covered by long-range,
The cavalry practised reconnaissance and fighting dismounted more regularly, and in January 1910, the decision was made at the General Staff Conference that dismounted cavalry should be taught infantry tactics in attack and defence.
The infantry's marksmanship, and fire and movement techniques, had been inspired by Boer tactics and was established as formal doctrine by Colonel Charles Monro when he was in charge of the School of Musketry at Hythe. In 1914, British rifle fire was so effective that there were some reports to the effect that the Germans believed they were facing huge numbers of machine guns.[82] The Army concentrated on rifle practice, with days spent on the ranges dedicated to improving marksmanship and obtaining a rate of fire of 15 effective rounds a minute at 300 yd (270 m); one sergeant set a record of 38 rounds into a 12 in (300 mm) target set at 300 yd (270 m) in 30 seconds.[83] In their 1914 skill-at-arms meeting, the 1st Battalion Black Watch recorded 184 marksmen, 263 first-class shots, 89-second-class shots and four third-class shots, at ranges from 300–600 yd (270–550 m).[84] The infantry also practised squad and section attacks and fire from cover, often without orders from officers or NCOs, so that soldiers would be able to act on their own initiative.[85] In the last exercise before the war, it was noted that the "infantry made wonderful use of ground, advances in short rushes and always at the double and almost invariably fires from a prone position".[85]
Weapons
The British Army was armed with the
The lighter Lewis gun was adopted for land and aircraft use in October 1915.[88] The Lewis gun had the advantage of being about 80% faster to build than the Vickers, and far more portable.[89] By the end of the First World War, over 50,000 Lewis Guns had been produced; they were nearly ubiquitous on the Western Front, outnumbering the Vickers gun by a ratio of about 3:1.[90]
The British used improvised mortars as a stop-gap, with the
Finally, the
Infantry tactics
After the "race to the sea",
By 1918, experience had led to a change in tactics; the infantry no longer advanced in rigid lines, but formed a series of flexible waves.
Each platoon now had a Lewis gun section and a section that specialised in throwing hand-grenades (then known as bombs), each section was compelled to provide two scouts to carry out reconnaissance duties.
Tank tactics
The tank was designed to break the deadlock of trench warfare.[94] In their first use on the Somme, they were placed under command of the infantry and ordered to attack their given targets in groups or pairs. They were also assigned small groups of troops, who served as an escort while providing close defence against enemy attacks.[96] Only nine tanks reached the German lines to engage machine gun emplacements and troop concentrations. On the way, 14 broke down or were ditched, another 10 were damaged by enemy fire.[96]
In 1917, during the
The situation had changed again by 1918, when tank attacks would have one tank every 100 or 200 yd (180 m), with a tank company of 12–16 tanks per objective. One section of each company would be out in front, with the remainder of the company following behind and each tank providing protection for an infantry platoon, who were instructed to advance, making use of available cover and supported by machine gun fire.[103] When the tanks came across an enemy strong point, they would engage the defenders, forcing them into shelter and leaving them to the devices of the following infantry.[103]
Artillery tactics
Prior to the war, the artillery worked independently and was taught to support the infantry to ensure a successful attack.[80] In 1914, the heaviest artillery gun was the 60-pounder, four in each heavy battery. The Royal Horse Artillery employed the 13-pounder, while the Royal Field Artillery used the 18-pounder gun. By 1918, the situation had changed; the artillery were the dominant force on the battlefield. Between 1914 and 1918, the Royal Field Artillery had increased from 45 field brigades to 173 field brigades,[104] while the heavy and siege artillery of the Royal Garrison Artillery had increased from 32 heavy and six siege batteries to 117 heavy and 401 siege batteries.[105]
With this increase in the number of batteries of heavier guns, the armies needed to find a more efficient method of moving the heavier guns around. (It was proving difficult to find the number of
Until 1914, artillery generally fired over
The
Once the infantry had reached the German trenches, the artillery shifted from the creeping barrage to the
With the introduction of the tank the artillery was no longer required to aid the infantry by destroying obstacles and machine gun positions. Instead, the artillery assisted by neutralising the German artillery with
Communications
The
Civilian telephones were used at the outset of the war, but they were found to be unreliable in the damp, muddy conditions that prevailed. Consequently, the field telephone was designed; a device that operated with its own switchboard. Apart from voice communication, it featured a buzzer unit with a Morse code key, so that it could be used to send and receive coded messages. This facility proved useful when, in the midst of bombardment, exploding shells drowned out voice communication. The telephones were connected by lines that sustained continual damage as a result of shell fire and the movement of troops. The lines were generally buried, with redundant lines set in place to compensate for breakages.[121]
The primary types of visual signalling were Semaphore flags, lamps and flags, lamps and lights, and the heliograph. In open warfare, visual signalling (employing signal flags and the heliograph) was the norm. A competent signaller could transmit 12 words a minute with signal flags (during daylight) and signal lights (at night). Signal lights, which were secured in a wooden case, employed a battery-operated Morse code key.[121] These signalling techniques had certain disadvantages, however. In trench warfare, operators using these methods were forced to expose themselves to enemy fire; while messages sent to the rear by signal lights could not be seen by enemy forces, replies to such messages were readily spotted, and operators were, once again, exposed to enemy fire.[121]
During the war, the Army also trained animals for use in the trenches. Dogs carried messages; horses, mules and dogs were used to lay telephone and telegraph cables.[121] Carrier pigeons, who transported messages back from the front line, were also carried in tanks so that they could deliver messages during an attack.[121] Over 20,000 pigeons and 370 handlers were used during the war, and at times, they were the sole means of communication.[121]
Royal Flying Corps
At the start of the war, the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) in the Field, commanded by
On 17 August 1917, General Jan Smuts presented a report to the War Council concerning the future of air power. Given its potential for the 'devastation of enemy lands and the destruction of industrial targets and centres of population on a vast scale'. He recommended a new air service be formed that would be on a level with the Army and Royal Navy. The formation of the new service, however, would make use of the under-utilised men and machines of the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS), as well as ending the inter-service rivalries that at times had adversely affected aircraft procurement. On 1 April 1918, the RFC and the RNAS were amalgamated to form a new service, the Royal Air Force (RAF). The RAF was under the control of the equally new Air Ministry. By 1918, photographic images could be taken from 15,000 ft (4,600 m) and interpreted by over 3,000 personnel. Planes did not carry parachutes until 1918, though they had been available since before the war.[124] After starting with some 2,073 personnel in 1914, the RAF had 4,000 combat aircraft and 114,000 personnel by the beginning of 1919.
Corps of Royal Engineers
On 1 August 1914, the Royal Engineers consisted of 25,000 officers and men in the regular army and reserves; by the same date in 1917, it had grown to a total of 250,000.[125] In 1914, when the BEF arrived in France, there were two Engineer field companies attached to each infantry division, which was increased to three companies by September 1914.[126] Each division also had a Signals company, which was responsible for communications between Corps, Division and Brigade headquarters.[127]
Twenty-one companies were eventually formed and were employed digging subways, cable trenches, Sapping, dugouts as well as offensive or defensive mining.[128] At the end of the war, Engineers were directly responsible for maintaining buildings and designing the infantry front-line fortifications and artillery positions, the telephones, wireless and other signalling equipment, railways, roads, water supply, bridges and transport. They also operated the railways and inland waterways.[125]
Machine Gun Corps
In September 1915, the Machine Gun Corps (MGC) was formed to provide heavy machine-gun teams after a proposal was made to the War Office for the formation of a single specialist machine-gun company for each infantry brigade—a goal to be achieved by withdrawing guns and gun teams from the battalions.[129] Created in October 1915, the MGC consisted of infantry machine-gun companies, cavalry machine-gun squadrons and motor machine-gun batteries.[129] In the trenches, the Corps' guns were deployed with an interlocking field of fire and proved to be a devastating defensive weapon against attacking infantry.[129] They were also used in an indirect fire support role, in which they fired over the heads[129] and from the flanks[130] of the advancing infantry and behind the German trenches to stop reinforcements and supplies from getting to the front.[129]
Tank Corps
The Tank Corps was formed as the Heavy Section Machine Gun Corps in 1916.[131] Tanks were used for the first time in action in the battle of the Somme on 15 September 1916. The intention being that they would crush the barbed wire for the infantry, then cross the trenches and exploit any breakthrough behind the German lines.[132] In November 1916, they were renamed the Heavy Branch MGC and in June 1917, the Tank Corps.[133]
Originally formed in Companies of the Heavy Branch MGC, designated A, B, C and D; each company of four sections had six tanks, three male and three female versions (artillery or machine guns), with one tank held as a company reserve.[134] In November 1916, each company was reformed as a battalion of three companies, with plans to increase the Corps to 20 battalions, each Tank Battalion had a complement of 32 officers and 374 men.[134]
Tanks were primarily used on the Western Front. The first offensive of the war in which tanks were used en masse was the battle of Cambrai in 1917; 476 tanks started the attack, and the German front collapsed. At midday the British had advanced five miles behind the German line.[135] The battle of Amiens in 1918 saw the value of the tank being appreciated; 10 heavy and two light battalions of 414 tanks were included in the assault. 342 Mark Vs and 72 Whippets were backed up by a further 120 tanks designed to carry forward supplies for the armour and infantry. By the end of the first day of the attack, they had penetrated the German line by 6–8 mi (9.7–12.9 km), 16,000 prisoners were taken.[136] In September 1918, the British Army was the most mechanised army in the world. Some 22,000 men had served in the Tank Corps by the end of the war.[137]
A detachment of eight obsolescent Mark I tanks was sent to Southern Palestine in early 1917 and saw action against Turkish forces there.[138]
Army Service Corps
The Army Service Corps (ASC) operated the transport system to deliver men, ammunition and matériel to the front. From 12,000 men at the start of the war, the Corps increased in size to over 300,000 by November 1918.[139] In addition they had under command Indian, Egyptian, Chinese (Chinese Labour Corps) and other native labourers, carriers and stores men.[139] They provided horsed and mechanical transport companies, the Army Remount Service and ASC Labour companies.[139] In August 1914, they delivered 4,500,000 lb (2,000,000 kg) of bread to the front which increased to 90,000,000 lb (41,000,000 kg) by November 1918.[139]
Royal Army Medical Corps
The
The only person to be awarded the Victoria Cross twice during the war was a doctor in the RAMC, Captain Noel Godfrey Chavasse, VC and Bar, MC.[141]
While not strictly a member of the RAMC, stretcher bearer
Life in the trenches
By the end of 1914, the war on the Western Front had reached stalemate and the trench lines extended from the Belgian coast to the Swiss frontier.[143] By September 1915, the length of the British front line stretched some 70 mi (110 km). Soldiers were in the front or reserve line trenches for about eight days at a time, before being relieved.[143]
There were three trenches in a typical front line sector; the fire trench, the support trench and the reserve trench, all joined by communication trenches.
At the front, soldiers were in constant danger from artillery shells, mortar bombs and bullets and as the war progressed they also faced aerial attack.[145] Some sectors of the front saw little activity throughout the war, making life comparatively easy. Other sectors were in a perpetual state of violent activity. However, quiet sectors still amassed daily casualties through snipers, artillery fire and disease. The harsh conditions, where trenches were often wet and muddy and the constant company of lice and rats which fed on unburied bodies, often carried disease.[143] Many troops suffered from trench foot, trench fever and trench nephritis. They could also contract frostbite in the winter months and heat exhaustion in the summer. The men were frequently wet and extremely muddy, or dry and exceedingly dusty.[143][145] Food could not usually be cooked in the front line trenches as any smoke would draw enemy fire, hot food had to be carried along communication trenches in clumsy "hayboxes", sometimes arriving late or not at all.
Daily routine
Daily routine of life in the trenches began with the morning 'stand-to'. An hour before dawn everyone was roused and ordered to man their positions to guard against a dawn raid by the Germans.[146] With stand-to over, it was time for the men to have breakfast and perform ablutions. Once complete, the NCOs would assign daily chores, before the men attended to the cleaning of rifles and equipment, filling sandbags, repairing trenches or digging latrines.[146] Once the daily tasks had been completed the men who were off-duty would find a place to sleep.[146] Due to the constant bombardments and the sheer effort of trying to stay alive, sleep deprivation was common. Soldiers also had to take it in turns to be on sentry duty, watching for enemy movements.[147]
Each side's front line was constantly under observation by snipers and lookouts during daylight; movement was therefore restricted until after the dusk stand-to and night had fallen.[146] Under the cover of darkness, troops attended to vital maintenance and resupply, with rations and water being brought to the front line, fresh units swapped places with troops moving to the rear for rest and recuperation.[146] Trench raiding was also carried out and construction parties formed to repair trenches and fortifications, while wiring parties were sent out to repair or renew the barbed wire in no man's land.[146] An hour before dawn, everyone would stand-to once more.[146]
Moving into the front line
A set procedure was used by a division that was moving into the front line. Once they had been informed that they were moving forward, the brigadiers and battalion commanders would be taken to the forward areas to reconnoiter the sections of the front that were to be occupied by their troops.[148] Meanwhile, the battalion transport officers would be taken to the headquarters of the division that they were relieving to observe the methods used for drawing rations and ammunition, and the manner in which they were supplied to the troops at the front. Detachments from the divisional artillery group would move forward and were attached to the artillery batteries of the division they were relieving.[148] Five days later, the infantry battalions that were destined for the front line sent forward their specialists from the Lewis gun teams, and the grenade officer, the machine gun officer, the four company commanders, and some of the signallers to take over the trench stores and settle into the trench routine before the battalions moved in.[148] Overnight, the battalions would move into the line, and the artillery would take over the guns that were already in position, leaving theirs behind to be taken over by the batteries that had been relieved.[148]
Discipline
Legal authority
The Army was ultimately under political authority. Since the Glorious Revolution of 1688 the Crown has not been permitted a standing army in the United Kingdom – it derives its existence from the Army Act, passed by Parliament each year (every five years since the late 1950s). The House of Commons took these responsibilities seriously: a letter from Haig clarifying the position on shell-shock had to be read out in the House of Commons on 14 March 1918.[149][150] Most disciplinary regulations in the First World War derived from the 1881 Army Act, although some offences were more severely dealt with on active service, e.g. in principle looting or wilful disobedience carried the death penalty.[151]
Lesser offences
Lesser offences were dealt with by commanding officers.[152] For petty offences, a company commander could have men fined or confined to barracks for fatigue duty[153] A battalion Commanding Officer could give detention, order up to 28 days Field Punishment, or demote corporals to the ranks (officers and senior NCOs were dealt with by court martial other than for very trivial offences).[154] Other ranks could also lose leave or seniority.[155]
Field punishment (FP) had replaced flogging (abolished at home in 1868 and on active service in 1881, although still used in military prisons until 1907). FP No.1 (in which the man was shackled to fixed object, e.g. a large wheel) was awarded to 60,210 cases, equivalent to one man in 50 (although in practice there were many repeat offenders).[154] FP No.1 could be very unpleasant depending on the weather, was abhorred by some as barbaric, and in some units was ritualised (e.g. by locking a man in a shed and throwing the handcuffs in with him); there were also cases of Australian troops releasing British troops whom they found tied up, although in other units it was regarded as a necessary sanction for serious offences.[156] FP No.2 meant that a man was shackled but not fixed in place.[157]
Striking an inferior was an offence but it was not uncommon in some units for officers to turn a blind eye to NCOs keeping discipline by violence, or even to do so themselves.[158]
Courts martial
Men who committed serious offences were tried by Field General Court Martial, sometimes resulting in execution. Despite "assertions" that these were "kangaroo courts" (e.g. in the book "Shot at Dawn" which says that men "did not receive even the rudiments of a just hearing") the release of records in 1990-4 showed this to be untrue.[159] They in fact had strict rules of procedure and a duty to uncover the facts.[160] Unlike a General Court Martial in peacetime, there was no legally qualified Judge-Advocate to advise the court, but from the start of 1916 a "Court Martial Officer" – usually an officer with legal experience in civilian life – was often present to do so.[161]
The accused was entitled to object to the composition of the panel (e.g. if one of the officers was connected with the case or enjoyed a poor relationship with the accused) and to present his case, defended by an officer (a "Prisoner's Friend") if he chose, although "Prisoners Friends" became more common as the war went on.[162] The officer who convened a court martial could not sit on it, and the most junior officer voted first (to lessen the chance of his deferring to a superior's opinion).[161] However, the courts were explicitly intended to be "speedy" and were sometimes encouraged by higher authority to make an example of certain offences, and in practice the leniency of the court and the ability of the accused to defend himself varied widely.[160] Some pleaded guilty or chose not to present a defence or call witnesses, and in most cases the offence was "so blatant that little defence could be put forward".[163]
Eighty-nine per cent of courts martial returned a guilty verdict,[157] the vast majority of cases being for offences such as Absence Without Leave (the most common offence), drunkenness and insubordination. Terms of imprisonment were often suspended, to discourage soldiers from committing an offence to escape the front lines, but also to give a convicted man a chance to earn a reprieve for good conduct.[164]
Of the 252 officers tried, 76 per cent were found guilty, the most common offence (52 per cent of cases) being drunkenness. Although three officers were executed, an officer was most likely to receive a severe reprimand (60 per cent of cases – a severe blow to his career) or be cashiered (30 per cent of cases – stripped of his commission, which brought total social disgrace and barred him from any employment under the Crown, even working for the local council – but a cashiered officer could still be conscripted as a private to a different unit).[165]
Executions
A death sentence had to be passed unanimously, and confirmed in writing by various officers as the verdict passed up the chain of command. A man's battalion and brigade commander tended to comment on his own record, but senior generals tended to be more concerned with the type of offence and the state of discipline in that unit.[166] The Judge Advocate General at GHQ also checked the records for irregularities,[162] before final confirmation (or otherwise) by the Commander-in-Chief of the relevant theatre.[167]
Of the 3,080 men sentenced to death,[168] 346 men were actually executed, the vast majority of these (266) for desertion, the next largest reasons for execution being murder (37 — these men would probably have been hanged under civilian law at the time) and cowardice (18).[169] Convictions for mutiny were rare — only one man was shot for the Etaples disturbances in 1917.[166] Of the men shot, 91 were already under a previous suspended sentence, and nine under two sentences. Of the 91, 40 were already under a suspended death sentence, 38 of them for desertion, and one man had already been "sentenced to death" twice for desertion.[170]
It was felt at the time that, precisely because most soldiers in combat were afraid, an example needed to be made of men who deserted.[171] Front line soldiers also sometimes felt that those who left their mates "in the lurch" by deserting "deserved to be shot".[172] One historian writes that there is "virtually no evidence" that soldiers thought the death penalty unjust,[173] although another writes that some soldiers deplored the death penalty, while most thought it justified.[172] Desertion normally meant an absence of 21 days or other evidence to indicate intent of not returning, e.g. wearing civilian clothes or failing to report for a key deployment. Those executed were normally not boys – the average age was in the mid-twenties and 40 percent had been in serious trouble before. Thirty percent were regulars or reservists, 40 percent were Kitchener volunteers, 19 percent were Irish, Canadian or New Zealand volunteers, but only nine percent were conscripts, suggesting indulgence to the conscripts, many of them under 21, who made up the bulk of the army by late in the war. Only executed men's records survive, so it is hard to comment on the reasons why men were reprieved,[174] but it has been suggested that the policy of commuting 90 percent of death sentences may well have been deliberate mercy in the application of military law designed for a small regular army recruited from the rougher elements of society.[175] Only 7,361 of the 38,630 desertions were in the field. Most were away from the front line — 14 of the executed deserters were arrested in the United Kingdom — and many deserters had never served in the front line at all.[176][177]
In the latter part of the war, executed men's families were usually told white lies by the authorities; their families received pensions, and the men were buried in the same graves as other dead soldiers.[178]
Death for desertion was abolished in 1930 over objections in the House of Lords from Lords Allenby and Plumer, two of the most distinguished British commanders of World War One; calls for its restoration in World War Two were vetoed on political grounds.[179]
By contrast, of 393 men sentenced to death for falling asleep on sentry duty in all theatres in the First World War, only two were executed (sentries were usually posted in pairs to keep one another awake; these two, who served in Mesopotamia, were made an example of because they were found sitting asleep together, suggesting that they had colluded).[167]
Australians made up seven percent of the British Expeditionary Force but 25 percent of deserters, while an Australian was nine times more likely to be imprisoned than a British soldier. Haig asked for permission to shoot Australians, but their government refused.[169][180]
British discipline of the First World War was not especially severe compared to most other armies of the time (e.g. the Russians and Italians). The French admitted to only 133 executions and the Germans 48, but these figures may not be reliable as both armies had problems with discipline.[181]
Shell shock and pardons
At the time
There were enquiries in 1919, 1922, 1925 and 1938, which examined documents now lost and witnesses now dead.[185] The books "For the Sake of Example" (1983) by Babington and "Shot at Dawn" (1989) by Sykes & Putkowski were openly intended to start a campaign for pardons. This campaign was rejected in February 1993 because there was no evidence of procedural error (i.e. they had been correctly convicted according to the law at the time) and it was felt not right to impose modern values on to the past.[186][187] The case was rejected again in 1998 after a detailed two-year review, which found "no white cases, very many black cases and a handful of grey cases" in which medical evidence was ignored or not called.[188] The decisions were reversed by the Government in 2006 and all men given pardons and recognised as victims of the First World War. However, their sentences were not overturned as it was impossible after this length of time to re-examine the evidence in every case.[189]
Other discipline
It has been pointed out that there are only anecdotal accounts, and no figures, for men who were shot on the spot by officers and NCOs for "cowardice in the face of the enemy".[190]
There were over 13,000 Royal Military Police ("redcaps"). They were unpopular, at a time when the police were often unpopular with young men from big cities. Besides policing, a large part of their job was maintaining discipline on the march and keeping roads running smoothly, and collecting stragglers from a battle. During the March 1918 retreat 25,000 stragglers were rounded up and sent back to fighting units. Royal Military Police also fought on occasion if headquarters areas were threatened by an enemy advance.[191]
Soldiers sometimes told lurid tales of men who refused to fight being shot by Military Police.[a] Historian Richard Holmes wrote that no reliable first-hand accounts exist of such events happening.[191]
There were occasional examples of men making unwanted homosexual advances, homosexuality being then criminal under both military and civil law, to escape the front lines, but prosecutions for this crime were rare, and there is also evidence of men turning a blind eye to homosexual relationships.[193]
Positive motivation
Men were also motivated by positive means. New medals were instituted: the Military Cross was created in December 1914 for warrant officers and officers up to captain, the Military Medal for other ranks in March 1916 (although to the regret of some men, it did not carry a cash bounty like the Distinguished Conduct Medal). The Order of the British Empire (of which the MBE is one grade) was instituted in 1917. By 1918, medals for bravery were often awarded within a week to ensure that the man lived long enough to receive it.[194]
Race meetings, concert parties (including drag acts – good drag queens were in great demand), trips to the seaside and football matches were organised to keep men entertained.[195] There were various unofficial publications, including the "Wipers Times" – these give an insight into the views of ordinary soldiers and junior officers. Overt patriotism was rare, and politicians such as (Prime Minister) H. H. Asquith and Ramsay MacDonald (an opponent of the war, later Labour Prime Minister) were satirised.[196]
Morale Fragility 1917-18
By the end of 1917 - after the horrific conditions of the Battle of Passchendaele and the disappointing results of the Battle of Cambrai, and with neither victory nor an end to the war in sight - there was some evidence of morale problems in the BEF. By the end of 1917 the Cabinet Committee on Manpower were hearing about an alarming rise in drunkenness, desertions and psychological disorders, and reports of soldiers' returning from the front grumbling about "the waste of life" at Ypres.[197] General Aylmer Hunter-Weston warned Haig (Haig Diary 25 February 1918) that some of his men had asked some visiting MPs if they were "Labour MPs" and had complained to them about the horrors of war and asked what they were fighting for.[198]
Martin Middlebrook wrote that whereas officers who cracked up under the strain were often quietly reposted to duties away from the front line, this outlet was seldom available to "other ranks". By the end of 1917 there was a noticeable rise in the number of self-inflicted wounds and of men making themselves ill by sleeping in wet sheets or chewing cordite. It is hard to estimate the number of suicides as such men were generally listed as "Killed In Action". A veteran of the 7th
Western Front
Under the command of Field Marshal Sir John French,[38] the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) began to deploy to France within days of the declaration of war.[201] The first encounter with the Germans came at Mons on 23 August 1914,[201] after which the Allies began the Great Retreat, the BEF was involved in the Battle of Le Cateau.[202] The BEF had a small role in halting the German advance at the First Battle of the Marne, before participating in the Aisne counter-offensive, in September which was followed by a period known as the "Race to the Sea" during which the BEF redeployed to Flanders.[203][b] For the BEF, 1914 ended with "First Ypres" which marked the beginning of a long struggle for the Ypres Salient.[205] British casualties in the fighting between 14 October and 30 November were 58,155 (7,960 dead, 29,562 wounded and 17,873 missing). It is often said that the pre-war professional army died at the First Battle of Ypres.[205] The British Army had arrived in France with some 84,000 infantrymen. By the end of the battle, the BEF had suffered 86,237 casualties, mostly to the infantry.[205]
For the British Army, the year of 1916 was dominated by the Battle of the Somme which started disastrously on 1 July. The first day on the Somme remains the bloodiest day in the history of the British Army, with 19,240 British soldiers killed and 38,470 wounded or missing, all for little or no gain.[212] The only real success was in the south where, using imaginative tactics and helped by the French, the New Army 18th and 30th Divisions took all their objectives, including Montauban, and the Regular 7th Division captured Mametz.[212] At Thiepval, the 36th (Ulster) Division seized the Schwaben Redoubt but was forced to withdraw because of lack of progress elsewhere.[212] There followed four-and-a-half months of attrition during which the Fourth Army of General Henry Rawlinson and the Fifth Army of General Hubert Gough advanced an average of 5 miles (8.0 km) at a cost of 420,000 casualties.[213]
In February 1917, the German Army began to withdraw to the
The final year of the war—1918—started with disaster and ended in triumph. On 21 March 1918, General Erich Ludendorff, Germany's Chief Quartermaster-General,[218] launched the Spring Offensive, which was intended to defeat the Allies on the Western Front before the strength of the American Expeditionary Force (AEF) could become overwhelming. The main weight of the first blow—Operation Michael—fell on General Gough' s Fifth Army which was forced to retreat. In response to the crisis facing the Allies, French General Ferdinand Foch was made Generalissimo (Supreme Commander) of the Allied forces on the Western Front, placing the BEF under his strategic direction. The next German attack came south of Ypres in the Battle of the Lys river and here too the BEF fell back. Field Marshal Haig issued his famous Order of the Day, "With our backs to the wall and believing in the justice of our cause, each one of us must fight on to the end." A third major German offensive, falling mainly on the French, was finally halted on the Marne in June.[219][220] On 8 August, General Rawlinson's Fourth Army launched the Battle of Amiens which marked the start of the Hundred Days Offensive, the final Allied offensive on the Western Front. Over the following weeks, all five armies of the BEF went on the offensive from the Somme to Flanders.[221] Fighting continued right up until the Armistice with Germany came into effect at 11:00 am on 11 November 1918.[222]
In the final offensives, the BEF had captured 188,700 prisoners and 2,840 guns which was only 7,800 prisoners and 935 guns less than those taken by the French, Belgian and American armies combined.[223]
Other campaigns
Ireland
The Easter Rising was a
Army reinforcements were moved into Dublin and, by 28 April, the 1,600 rebels were facing 18 to 20,000 soldiers,
Salonika
A new front was opened in
With the objective of destroying the Bulgarian Army, the French and British launched a new offensive in April 1917, without any significant success. A stalemate ensued without any movement by either side; the front became known as Europe's biggest internment camp for the Allies by the Germans.
Italy
Italy joined the war on the Allies' side on 5 May 1915, declaring war on
China
In 1914, the British Army was involved in what became known as the Siege of Tsingtao when the 2nd Battalion South Wales Borderers landed in China in support of Japanese forces in the capture of the German port of Tsingtao.[229] The British were part of a 23,000-strong task force which included a mixed British–Indian Brigade of 1,500 troops and the battleship HMS Triumph. A bombardment of the port started on 31 October 1914, and by 7 November, the Japanese 18th Division, 29th Infantry Brigade and the British–Indian Brigade, had stormed and captured the garrison and its 4,000 troops.[228]
East Africa
1914 also witnessed the commencement of the
The casualty rate amongst British and Empire troops, excluding the Africans, was 6,000 dead and 3,000 wounded. More troops died from diseases than from enemy action, and illness accounted for 70% of the total casualties.[228]
Gallipoli
Turkey had entered the war on the German side on 31 October 1914. One of its first acts was to close the
Estimates of casualties vary enormously, but of the around 480,000 Allied troops involved in the campaign, 180,000 were wounded and 44,000 died, 20,000 of the dead being British.[228]
Mesopotamia
The British force fighting in
Sinai and Palestine
The Sinai and Palestine Campaign was fuelled by criticism of the policy of a static defence of the
The British Army in the Sinai and Palestine subsequently included the
Murray made steady progress against the Turkish forces, which were defeated in the battles of
Allenby reorganised his forces along more conventional lines. The EEF now included the
In February and April 1918, Australian mounted troops took part in two raids east across the Jordan River near Es Salt, a village in Palestine 14 mi (23 km) west of Amman. Although these raids were unsuccessful, they encouraged Turkish commanders to believe that the main British effort would be launched across the Jordan, when in fact it would be launched along the coastal plain.[239] The EEF was greatly weakened at this time by the crisis in France, which led to the despatch of the 52nd and 74th Divisions to the Western Front, the breaking up of the Yeomanry Mounted Division, and the replacement of most of the British infantry in four of the remaining divisions with Indian troops.[240] In September 1918, Allenby's forces won the decisive Megiddo Offensive, which precipitated the Armistice of Mudros with the Ottoman Empire, which was signed on 31 October 1918.[241]
Total Allied casualties in the Sinai and Palestine campaign were 60,000 of which 20,000 were killed. Some 15,000 of the dead were British.[228]
Persia
Following the
Fighting the Senussi Arabs
In late November 1915, in response to the growing threat from a pro-Turkish Islamic Arab sect known as the
Aftermath
The British Army during the First World War was the largest military force that Britain had put into the field up to that point.[244] On the Western Front, the British Expeditionary Force ended the war as the strongest fighting force, more experienced than the United States Army and its morale was in better shape than the French Army.[244][c]
The cost of victory, however, was high. The official "final and corrected" casualty figures for the British Army—including the
The Ten Year Rule was introduced in August 1919, which stipulated that the British Armed Forces should draft their estimates "on the assumption that the British Empire would not be engaged in any great war during the next ten years". In 1928, Winston Churchill, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, successfully urged the Cabinet to make the rule self-perpetuating and hence it was in force unless specifically countermanded.[248] There were cuts in defence spending as a result of this rule, falling from £766 million in 1919–1920, to £189 million in 1921–1922, and to £102 million in 1932.[249] The British Army tried to learn the lessons of the First World War, and adopt them into its pre-war doctrine.[250] In the 1920s, and much of the 1930s, the General Staff tried to establish a small, mechanised, professional army and formed the Experimental Mechanized Force but, with the lack of any identified threat, its main function reverted to garrison duties around the British Empire.[251]
Notes
- First Day on the Somme, he passed two young soldiers who had been too terrified to attack. Two Royal Military Police with revolvers let him pass when he showed his wound, but behind him he heard two shots and was "sure" that the RMP had executed the youths.[192]
- ^ This name, the "Race to the Sea," which has stuck, nonetheless is actually something of a misnomer; because it was not so much a race to the sea as a succession of attempts to turn the flank of the other side, until ultimately, without a decision the front simply reached the English Channel and the North Sea.[204]
- ^ By November 1918, the U.S. Army, with ration strength of 2 million men, exceeded the BEF both in size and percentage of the front occupied.(Stevenson 2011 pp. 245, 249, 269) BEF ration strength peaked at 1.9 million at the start of September 1918 (after the redeployment of troops from Palestine and Italy after the German spring offensives), but had dropped to 1.86 million at the war's end. Following the extension of the British line early in 1918, the BEF occupied 24.8% of the front in March, but after the deployment of U.S. troops this dropped to 17.3% in July and remained at 17.6% in November. The U.S. sector was 3.7% of the front in March, 11.7% in July and 20.9% in November. The French sector was 66.6% in March and July, but had dropped to 55.3% in November, freeing up French reserves for an offensive into Lorraine, which was cancelled because of the armistice.(Boff 2012 pp. 40–422) Many of an Army's ration strength were labourers and logistical personnel, and just over half were combat troops (of whom a decreasing proportion were infantry as the war progressed). By the end of the war, the BEF "field strength", at 1.202m, still fractionally exceeded the U.S. (1.175m), but was still less than the French 1.554m (French field strength was down from a peak of over 2.2m in July 1916).(Watson 2008, p. 157)
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Further reading
- Addington, Larry H (1984). The Patterns of War Since the Eighteenth Century. Taylor & Francis. ISBN 0-7099-0561-0.
- Army Council (1921). General Annual Report of the British Army 1912–1919. Parliamentary Paper 1921, XX, Cmd.1193. Parliament United Kingdom.
- Ashworth, Tony (2000). Trench Warfare 1914–1918. Macmillan Press, London. ISBN 0-330-48068-5.
- Badsey, Stephen (2008). Doctrine and Reform in the British Cavalry 1880–1918. Ashgate Publishing. ISBN 978-0-7546-6467-3.
- Bailey, Jonathan B A (1989). Field Artillery and Firepower. Taylor & Francis. ISBN 0-85066-811-5.
- Barthorp, Michael (2002). Afghan Wars and the North-West Frontier 1839–1947. London: Cassell. ISBN 0-304-36294-8.
- Bean, C.E.W. (1929). The AIF in France: 1916. Official History of Australia in the War of 1914–1918. Vol. III (12th ed.). Canberra: Australian War Memorial. Retrieved 10 May 2009.
- Bean, C.E.W. (1937). The Australian Imperial Force in France December 1917 – May 1918 (PDF). Official History of Australia in the War of 1914–1918. Vol. V. Canberra: Australian War Memorial.
- Beckett, Ian Frederick William (2008). Territorials: A Century of Service. Plymouth: DRA Publishing. ISBN 9780955781315.
- Beckett, Ian Frederick William (2011). Britain's Part-Time Soldiers: The Amateur Military Tradition: 1558–1945. Barnsley, South Yorkshire: Pen & Sword Military. ISBN 9781848843950.
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