The Diggers 5

The Diggers 5

CHAPTER IV

 

MONT ST. QUENTIN

 

 

It was on the bank of the Somme Canal in the early morning, Peronne

in the distance, and a light railway track at our feet. The place was

Brie. We had arrived there the previous night.

 

The railway track was torn and twisted, rails sticking into the air

at oblique angles, sleepers charred, chairs smashed, the bed of the

four-foot way churned and broken, with the waggons and trucks which

once ran along them smashed to fragments, thrown hither and thither,

out into the canal on the right or into the fields on the left side

of the line. Looking at the riverscape one could see in the near

distance a broken bridge with the sluggish water rippling lazily

round the buttresses which yet remained, and near at hand, though

the day was chilly, three naked soldiers stood on a boat making ready

to dive into the oily water.

 

On the other side of the Somme canal was a spread of marshland

on which could be seen lines of duckboards running hither and

thither, round pools and clumps of osiers, but all going in the same

direction, towards the town of Peronne. It was on August 29 that

the German rearguards were driven back across this portion of the

Somme. British troops then seized several crossings of the canal in

this locality, but the marshes beyond being impassable it was found

impracticable to cross and seize Peronne.

 

It was therefore decided to turn the Somme barrier by an attack from

the north, and to do this entailed seizing the steep promontory of

Mont St. Quentin. It was from the north across a thousand yards of

level pasture land pitted with shell holes and criss-crossed with

trenches and lines of wire entanglements that the Australians made a

famous advance, fighting all the way and seizing Mont St. Quentin.

The task was a herculean one, adding undying glory to the men who

accomplished it.

 

Our party was allowed to visit Mont St. Quentin and standing on

its summit I saw the field across which the Australians made their

advance. Looking from a German observation post on the promontory

I could see the green field, smooth as the cover of a book, lying

in front of me. Nothing could escape a vigilant eye on its broad

expanse. Shorn of grass a rabbit could be seen if it crawled across

the levels. It was here that the German machine gunners had their

nests, and it was here that an observation post sunk into the rock

gave a complete field of observation to the watcher. The post was

cunningly made with a ladder leading down a shaft ten feet in

depth. At the bottom was a field telephone with wires running back

to battalion headquarters. All that the observer had to do was to

clamber up the ladder, take stock of the field in front, go back

again and 'phone his report to headquarters in Peronne.

 

The town, although of little industrial import, has a history dating

back to the days of Clovis II. It is the burial-place of Charles the

Simple, who died of starvation in a dungeon in the castle of Peronne,

which castle was also the prison of Louis XI for some time. But the

castle is now no more, the Germans have slashed it to pieces. The

church of St. Jean, built in 1509, is also ground to dust. In 1870 it

was greatly damaged by the Boche when he laid siege to the place, but

it was restored afterwards. Now, however, it is beyond restoration.

 

A famous incident was still, prior to this war, celebrated by the

natives of Peronne. The town was once besieged by Charles V, and

a woman named Marie Fouré greatly distinguished herself in the

defence of the place. After a period of stiff fighting the siege was

raised and Charles V departed. The anniversary of the raising of the

siege was, until 1914, annually celebrated by the inhabitants, and

offerings were laid at the feet of Marie Fouré, whose statue stood

in the town. But now the statue, like the Castle of Peronne and the

church of St. Jean, is no more.

 

The present war, however, has given something to replace the memory

of Marie Fouré. Outside the town at the foot of Mont St. Quentin can

be seen a tract of ground set apart as a site for the memorial which

is to be raised to the second Australian Division in commemoration

of the men who fought and died for a great cause under the ramparts

of Peronne. And in the days to come it is probable that once a year,

on August 31, the townsfolk will repair thither and lay garlands of

flowers at the base of the memorial that will remind them of the

brave boys who fought and died for the freedom of France and for a

yet greater freedom--the freedom of the world.

 

The capture of Mont St. Quentin was an operation second to none in

the great summer drive of 1918. This natural fortress, strong as

any on the Western Front, stands high over the Somme marshland and

dominates all the surrounding country. On its south-eastern slope is

a dense wood, now stumped and shivered, but at that time its trees

stood high and green, burdened with a dense foliage that made it a

splendid hiding-place for machine-gun nests. Though at that time

the Germans were falling back at several points of the line it was

unbelievable that they would give up Mont St. Quentin, a point of the

utmost strategical value, as key to the whole Peronne area, without a

bitter struggle.

 

That they prepared themselves to hold it is shown by the fact that

the place was garrisoned by a force of 1500 men, and after the

battle captured Germans stated that they specially volunteered to

hold the line against an Australian advance.

 

On August 29, at noon, the British held all the southern banks of the

Somme, but the Australians, fired with a long chain of victories,

decided to advance further. Up till then in the Somme fighting they

had recovered over 125 square miles of country and forty villages.

Fifteen thousand prisoners had fallen to them, 301 officers, two

regimental commanders, five battalion commanders and staffs, 161

guns, 3,000 machine guns, the whole transport of one battalion and

miles of light railway trackage.

 

On the night of August 29, when darkness fell the Australian

engineers busied themselves throwing bridges across the Somme canal,

south of Peronne, and some of these bridges, broken and battered,

are to be seen there yet. Working hard in the gloom, despite the

continuous rifle and machine gun fire of the enemy, the engineers

completed their task, and in the morning of the 30th patrols essayed

to cross the canal and advance through the marshes towards Peronne.

No practicable path could be found across the swampy morass; the

enemy kept up a stubborn resistance and the Diggers had to desist

from attempting further headway at the moment.

 

Meanwhile, fighting was proceeding elsewhere, and at every point the

Australians were making gradual headway towards the ancient town. In

the forenoon of August 30 the Omiecourt peninsula east of the village

of Clery had been cleared and a bridge head held by the Germans was

taken. This opening a route to the town, it was decided to advance in

this direction and lay siege to Mont St. Quentin, attacking it from

the north and west instead of the south.

 

By three o'clock in the afternoon the Australians came into contact

with the German advanced positions and fierce hand-to-hand fighting

took place and continued far into the night. Every inch of the ground

was disputed, every path, every gully and bank became the scene of

desperate fighting. Brave men went forth to meet death calmly and

proudly, doing their duty with the consciousness of Right to sustain

them, enduring all the risks of the night with a grim fortitude and

bearing all its discomforts as if they loved war solely for its own

sake.

 

But it is too much to say that the men love war. No man of normal

pattern loves war as it is fought here, hip deep in slush all through

the day and night in an atmosphere suffocating and gaseous. If a

man loves war, he is no more to be complimented on fighting than a

man who loves a good dish is to be complimented on eating. But one

thing is true. The Australians, certain of the cause for which they

are fighting, are keen on keeping at it until a successful finish is

reached, knowing that the German method of warfare, waged with all

its attendant despotism and tyranny, has for its aim, not alone the

breaking of the Allies, but the shattering of the moral frontier of

civilization. The Australians are out, not so much to make war for

its own sake as to wage it for something that is straight and clean.

And never was this purpose made more manifest than at the taking of

Mont St. Quentin.

 

In the early morning of August 31, the infantry from New South Wales,

Victoria and Tasmania, got orders to attack. The men were then in

the locality of Clery-sur-Somme, and by a strange coincidence

rations came to hand just as the attack was about to start. The mail

also arrived with letters and parcels from home, but war cannot

stop for matters of such little import as the reading of letters

and the filling of hungry stomachs. Leaving the hot steaming dixies

of tea behind them and stuffing their letters in their pockets the

Australians in the cold damp morning, unaided by tanks or barrage,

set out to attack. Peronne was in flames, Mont St. Quentin was

impregnable, the Germans were offering a stubborn resistance. But no

faltering for the "Diggers" when they were "up against it"!

 

The day cleared as they swept out from Clery-sur-Somme and made their

way across the level stretch of land that lies between that village

and their objective, fighting all the road and clearing the enemy

from the old Somme trenches which lined the way. And as they fought

they could see a hillock in the distance standing blank and bald, and

to all seeming, impregnable. This was the steep promontory of Mont

St. Quentin, the summit of which the brave soldiers of the New South

Wales Brigade had to take. And to-day it presented a most formidable

appearance and inaccessible front. But the men knew no stay, they

prepared their hearts for a sublime suicide. Letters as yet unread

were taken from their pockets, torn to shreds and flung to the winds.

Though confronted with an almost certain death they were not going to

give any information to the enemy.

 

Wire entanglements unbroken by shell-fire blocked the way of the

soldiers of New South Wales, but undaunted, they sought for openings

and wormed their way through. Some took off their coats, their packs,

lifted props and sandbags that lay by the way, threw these on the

wires and clambered over. The promontory was stormed, the ready

bayonet brought into play and the enemy was cleared off Mont St.

Quentin. At this one swift assault they scooped in most of the whole

German rearguard north of Peronne, and captured the great natural

position overlooking the city and took 1,500 prisoners.

 

It was here that 250 Australians captured 800 Germans, big soldiers

of the Prussian Guards. In addition to the men the colonel of the

battalion was taken prisoner, an irate individual who was exceedingly

annoyed because the Australians had dared to capture him or his men.

Bristling with arrogance he blustered and swore at the Australian

officer who questioned him. How dared the Australians, the common

Australian soldier, order him about, prod him with a bayonet when he

refused to move and catch him by the collar of his coat and shove

him in front of them towards the cages in the back area. He was a

colonel, a scion of a noble house, an aristocrat.

 

"If you don't behave yourself," said the officer, "I'll pass you on

to the Diggers. At the present moment you're not with the slaves in

Germany."

 

The Colonel blazed into another round of abuse, and the officer,

losing his temper, handed the Colonel over to the Diggers, giving

them orders to search the man.

 

And they searched him, thrust miry hands into his pockets, felt under

his shirt to see if he had any papers on his person. This amused the

men, but did in no way ease the temper of the Prussian aristocrat and tyrant.