VCs of the First World War: Somme 1916 E-Book

Gerald Gliddon

• Herausgeber: The History Press
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2012

Beschreibung

The Battle of the Somme, which lasted from 1 July to 18 November 1916, is remembered as one of the most horrific and tragic battles of the First World War. On the first day alone nearly 19,000 British troops were killed – the greatest one-day loss in the history of the British Army. By November the death toll from the armies of Britain, France and Germany had risen to over a million. This book tells the stories of fifty-one soldiers from the Commonwealth and Empire armies whose bravery on the battlefield was rewarded by the Victoria Cross, the highest military honour – men like Private Billy McFadzean, who was blown up by two grenades which he smothered in order to save the lives of his comrades, and Private 'Todger' Jones, who single-handedly rounded up 102 German soldiers. Not only do we learn of heroic endeavours of these men at the height of battle, but we also read of their lives before 1914, ranging from the backstreets of Glasgow to a country house in Cheshire, and of what life was like after the war for the thirty-three survivors.

Leseprobe

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to thank the following institutions and individuals for their very kind co-operation and assistance during the preparation of this book: Australian National Memorial Canberra, Commonwealth War Graves Commission, Gallahers, Imperial War Museum, National Archives of Canada, National Army Museum, Public Record Office, now The National Archives, and the Western Front Association. Peter Batchelor, the late Lady Joan Carton de Wiart, Richard Denyer, Denis Pillinger, Steve Snelling, the late Tony Spagnoly, Martin Staunton, Iain Stewart, Ian Uys and Lieutenant Colonel R.J. Wyatt. My wife Winifred has, as always, been of great support.

CONTENTS

Title

Acknowledgements

Preface

Introduction

Introduction to the 2011 edition

E.N.F. Bell

G.S. Cather

J.L. Green

S.W. Loudoun-Shand

W.F. McFadzean

R. Quigg

W. Ritchie

G. Sanders

J.Y. Turnbull

A Carton de Wiart

T.G. Turrall

T.O.L. Wilkinson

D.S. Bell

W.E. Boulter

W.F. Faulds

W. La T. Congreve

J.J. Davies

A. Hill

T.W.H. Veale

J. Leak

A.S. Blackburn

T. Cooke

A. Gill

C.C. Castleton

W.J.G. Evans

J. Miller

W.H. Short

G.G. Coury

N.G. Chavasse

M. O’Meara

W.B. Allen

T. Hughes

J.V. Holland

D. Jones

L. Clarke

D.F. Brown

F. McNess

J.V. Campbell

J.C. Kerr

T.A. Jones

F.J. Edwards and R.E. Ryder

T.E. Adlam

A.C.T. White

R.B. Bradford

H. Kelly

J.C. Richardson

R. Downie

E.P. Bennett

J. Cunningham

B.C. Freyberg

Appendices

Bibliography

Plates

Copyright

PREFACE

This book grew out of my earlier book on the Battle of the Somme called When the Barrage Lifts in which all fifty-one Somme VCs make a brief appearance.

I decided to explore the lives of this group of men who won for themselves the highest award for gallantry that their country could bestow. I wanted to try and find out what sort of men they were, and also if they survived the war, what sort of lives that they led after it was over.

The first place to start was with the Canon Lummis collection of material on the lives of all VC holders, which is held at the National Army Museum under the stewardship of the Military Historical Society. Although these files are by no means complete, they do point researchers in the right direction. I wrote to all the regiments associated with the men and to all the local newspapers in their home towns. I contacted the Imperial War Museum, Commonwealth War Graves Commission and Public Record Office (now National Archives, Kew) in addition to the appropriate agencies in Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. I also, of course, read all that I could get hold of about the lives of these men that had been already published and contacted the families where possible.

I have only set out to write a biographical portrait of each man and not a full blown life story and the average entry is roughly 1,250 words. I have tried to expand on all previous biographical accounts and in most cases I have written more than has been published before. However a number of the men have had whole books devoted to them, i.e. Second Lieutenant D.S. Bell, Sergeant W.E. Boulter, Lieutenant Colonel R.B. Bradford, Captain N.G. Chavasse, Lieutenant Colonel Carton de Wiart, Major W. La T. Congreve, Lieutenant Colonel B.C. Freyberg and Private T.A. Jones. Each section begins with the appropriate action in 1916 when the deed for which the Victoria Cross was awarded took place, and then the story reverts to the soldier’s early life.

I have listed my main sources at the back of the book under bibliography and appendices. The bibliography covers all the men that I have written about and the appendices with sources give some details of where I obtained much of the rest of the information.

I would be very grateful to hear from any reader who may have any suggested corrections to make or who might have additional information.

INTRODUCTION

British troops first began to arrive in the Somme region in July 1915 when they took over from the French Army who had been in the area since 1914. At the beginning of 1916 General J. Joffre, Commander-in-Chief of the French Army and General Sir Douglas Haig agreed that the British and French armies should carry out a joint offensive north of the River Somme at the beginning of July.

After a two-day postponement caused by poor weather, the Battle of the Somme began at 7.30am on 1 July after a massive seven-day Allied bombardment. Fourteen British divisions with two French divisions on their right climbed out of their trenches on an 18 mile front to the north of the River Somme, and slowly advanced on the strongly held German positions. By the end of the day the advance on the British front had failed everywhere except for small gains at the southern end of the battlefield. There had been 57,000 British casualties either killed or wounded on that disastrous first day and by 18 November, when the battle officially ended, nearly a million men from the Allied and German armies had become casualties.

The Victoria Cross was instituted in 1856 and is still made from Russian cannons captured at Sebastopol. The decoration weighs 430 grams and is 1½ inches square.

During the Great War no less than 634 awards of the VC were made, of which fifty-one were for the Battle of the Somme. The spread of ranks who won the medal is a fairly wide one, with twenty going to officers, twelve to non-commissioned officers, and nineteen going to privates or their equivalent. In order to qualify for a medal it was of course very important to be seen carrying out the deed itself. No doubt there were many cases when a man deserved a Victoria Cross, yet went unrewarded. However, I have no qualms about the merits of the Somme VC holders, although it is true to say that many of the men did not feel themselves justified in accepting such a high honour when they had seen similar acts of bravery performed around them on the battlefield.

Many of the awards were for the saving of life and not just for rushing forward in the heat of battle with a Lewis gun to an enemy-held trench and spraying it with fire. Indeed many VC winners did both, killing Germans and saving their compatriots’ lives in equal measure. Surely the most heroic figure was Pte W.F. McFadzean who in smothering some grenades that had spilt their pins truly gave his life for those of his friends. On the other hand it can be argued that no battle could possibly be won if the momentum was to be continually interrupted by the saving of the lives of casualties. As the Somme battle progressed, the job of saving lives was reserved for the stretcher bearers who accompanied the advance or battle.

I am not going to speculate here on the meaning of bravery and where a line can be drawn between heroism and foolhardiness, all I will say is that valour and personal sacrifice are two of the good things that come out of any war.

A third of the Somme VCs were awarded posthumously and only thirty-three men survived the war. If the VC holder survived then very often he received a considerable amount of what was probably unwanted publicity. He was often invited back to his home town by the local council who then presented him with gifts or an Illuminated Address, among other things. Some men were also given a gift of money until the War Office cracked down on the practice. It is difficult not to regard all this local attention as an exercise in exploitation and one that helped to encourage local belief in the war effort and in turn help with industrial output in the form of munitions and other vital war materiel. There are many photographs of men who have won the VC looking downright embarrassed by the whole business.

The winning of the coveted award also brought other problems in that each man was marked out as something special, and if he digressed then it would almost certainly be written up by the press, for example Cunningham and Kelly. Others too, could never settle down after the war, although the award of the VC could not be given as the reason but rather the effect of the war itself. Captain W.B. Allen’s health was permanently destroyed and he had to resort to alcohol and opium, Private T. Hughes took to the bottle, Private M. O’Meara never regained his sanity, Private J. Cunningham beat up his wife and Lieutenant Sergeant F. McNess committed suicide.

On the other hand, several men seemed almost to qualify for the award of the decoration as if by right, men such as Lieutenant Colonel A. Carton de Wiart, Major W. La T. Congreve, Lieutenant Colonel R.B. Bradford and Lieutenant Colonel B.C. Freyberg, who were all brilliant and courageous soldiers. It would surely only be a matter of time before they qualified for the highest of military honours? Others had no problems with the award and took its ownership in their stride. I am thinking here of men like Second Lieutenant T.E. Adlam, Captain A.C.T. White, Private R.E. Ryder and Private T.A. Jones. ‘Todger’ Jones, who rounded up 102 Germans single handed, even had correspondence with a film company based in Wardour Street about plans to make a film out of the heroes of the Somme. He wasn’t expecting to co-operate without payment either!

I cannot pretend to have got ‘inside’ every man that I have attempted to write about, and only a fuller biography could achieve this. This book is meant to be a biographical portrait of the fifty-one men who won the Victoria Cross on the Somme, and I am afraid that all too often readers will be left to guess the inner man from the external circumstances. I only hope that I have left enough clues.

INTRODUCTIONTOTHE 2011 EDITION

The History Press have decided to reissue VCs of the First World War: Somme1916 and plan to re-publish the rest of the VC series in new editions and I have taken advantage of this decision by revising and updating the text. Indeed many of the biographical portraits have been completely re-written.

Since the initial research for this book was carried out more than twenty years ago, there has been an increasing amount of interest and awareness of the stories and lives of the men who were awarded the nation’s highest military honour. Evidence of this can be found in the amount of new books being published on the subject; the reissuing of servicemen’s records by the National Archives and the accessibility of other records of family history which are now available through Ancestry, the family history magazine. The Internet has also played a very significant role, although such material can be very varied and if used should always be verified by cross-checking with a reliable source.

In 2002, the Victoria Cross enthusiast, Brian Best, founded The Victoria Cross Society which has encouraged further research and publication of important and informative articles. Finally the Victoria Cross gallery at the Imperial War Museum was opened as the Lord Ashcroft Gallery on 11 November 2010 by the Princess Royal. This collection houses 164 VCs which at the the time of writing are worth at least £30 million and were put on display together with forty-eight in the ownership of the museum and with the thirty-one George Crosses which are also in the museum’s care.

One of the really heartening consequences of this renewed interest in the subject is in the erection of new or replacement headstones on some of the graves of these brave men, and it is hoped that in time every man who has a grave should have it properly marked.

When dealing with the first day of the Battle of the Somme the author could have arranged the appropriate deeds of gallantry in an order of right to left of the line, but he felt that this would only confuse the reader and instead a straight forward alphabetical choice has been followed, as with many other books written about Victoria Cross heroes.

Gerald Gliddon, Brooke, Norfolk, May 2011

E.N.F. BELL

No fewer than nine men were to win a Victoria Cross on 1 July 1916, the first day of the Battle of the Somme, and four of these were members of the 36th (Ulster) Division which was formed in October 1914. The great majority of the members of this new division had already formed themselves into a Northern Ireland group called the Ulster Volunteer Force.

The year of 1914 was a dangerous and volatile one in the province with two groups threatening to split the country into two factions. The dispute between the two sides was of those who wished to break away from London-based control and to join the south in a unified Ireland and those, usually Protestants, who remained loyal to the King and to Great Britain. What was known as the Home Rule Bill was going through its various stages in the Houses of Parliament but after the assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne and inspector of the army in Sarajevo, Serbia on 28 June 1914, events in Europe moved downhill fast and led to any dreams of self-government being put on hold for the foreseeable future until the end of hostilities.

Initially the Ulster Division was formed as a result of the Secretary of State for War, Lord Kitchener’s appeal for volunteers to form a ‘New Army’ to supplement the small professional army which Great Britain possessed. This appeal for volunteers was aimed at the average man in the street and the response in Ulster was similar to that on the British mainland when a large number of men came forward from all ranks of society including city clerks, factory workers, miners and university students. The main areas associated with volunteers and their military formation was Belfast in County Antrim, together with the other eight counties of the province. A strong factor in the forming of an Ulster Division was the Orange Order, a Protestant organisation with its origins in the Battle of the Boyne in 1690. Basically this conflict had been a battle for the possession of the thrones which made up the countries of Great Britain. In 1688 the Protestant William of Orange had deposed the Catholic King James from the English throne and later made an unsuccessful comeback in Ireland.

In 1914 Catholic or Nationalist supporters of a Dublin-based government in the south mainly joined the 16th (Irish) Division, while a third Irish division, the 10th was soon to be formed.

Thirteen battalions were raised for the three Irish regiments, including the Ulster-based Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers, Royal Irish Fusiliers and Royal Irish Rifles, and they were formed into three infantry brigades: the 107th, 108th and 109th. After initial training the 36th (Ulster) Division, mostly formed of the newly formed battalions, set foot on the continent for the first time in 1915.

The 9th (Service) Battalion, Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers from County Tyrone were formed from the Tyrone Volunteers in Omagh in September 1914, and in early November were sent to Finner Camp for training and became part of the 109th Brigade. After further training they arrived in France in early October 1915, with the first members of the Ulster Division arriving in the Somme region on the 4th.

Nine months later, on 1 July, the 9th Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers of the 109th Brigade were the right-hand attacking battalion on the edge of Thiepval Wood. They faced the Thiepval Road and beyond was their objective, the German-held Schwaben Redoubt – a defensive position on high ground with an excellent view overlooking the Ancre Valley below it. The redoubt was shaped like a parallelogram and consisted of dugouts, trenches and fortified machine-gun posts.

Temporary Captain Eric Bell was an officer with the 9th Battalion and on 1 July was attached to the Trench Mortar Battery, 109th Brigade and led this battery with particular courage, losing his life and gaining a posthumous VC in the process. The citation for the Somme decoration was one of the earliest to be announced and was published in the London Gazette of 26 September 1916. It tells the story of Bell’s gallantry as well as any other source does:

For most conspicuous bravery. He was in command of a Trench Mortar Battery, and advanced with the infantry in attack. When our frontline was hung up by enfilading machine-gun fire Captain Bell crept forward and shot the machine-gunner.

Later, on no less than three occasions, when our bombing parties, which were clearing the enemy’s trenches, were unable to advance, he went forward alone and threw trenchmortar bombs among the enemy. When he had no more bombs available he stood on the parapet, under intense fire, and used a rifle with great coolness and effect on the enemy advancing to counter-attack.

Finally he was killed rallying and reorganising infantry parties which had lost their officers.

All this was outside the scope of his normal duties with his battery. He gave his life in his supreme devotion to duty.

Bell’s body was never found and his name is listed on the panels of the Thiepval Memorial to the Missing, Pier 4-5, Face D-B. He was 20 years of age.

Eric Norman Frankland Bell was born at Alma Terrace, Enniskillen, County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland on 28 August 1895. He was the youngest of three sons of Edward Henry Bell and of Dora Algeo Bell, née Crowder. At the time of Eric’s birth his father was serving with the 2nd Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers at Thayetmyo, Burma as a lieutenant quartermaster, and when his battalion returned home the family were reunited in Warrington, Cheshire. Eric began his education at an elementary school named the ‘People’s College’ in Arpley, Warrington. Later the family moved to 114 Huskisson Street, Liverpool. On 18 August 1902 Eric joined St Margaret’s School in Prince’s Road, Toxteth, Liverpool as by then the family had moved to 18 Prince’s Avenue. Later they upped sticks once more and moved to Bootle where they lived at 22 University Road. At this point Eric continued his education at the Liverpool Institute and then switched to Liverpool University where he began training for a career in architecture under the guidance of Professor Sir Charles Reilly. At the time it was noted that he was a student who ‘made rapid progress in his studies’. He also became a keen musician and linguist and was described as ‘being reserved and unpretentious’.

On the outbreak of war in 1914 Bell joined the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers and applied for a commission on 28 August with the written support of a reference from the head of the Liverpool Institute. Three weeks later he was commissioned as a second lieutenant on 22 September as an officer in the 6th Battalion. He was later transferred to the 8th Battalion and then to the 9th where his father was adjutant. He was 19 years of age. Eric had two brothers, Alan George Frankland Bell and Haldane Frankland Bell who came respectively from Australia and America to join up. So Captain Bell, their father, had three sons in the same regiment.

After the VC award was published in the London Gazette the King wrote a letter of commiseration to Captain Bell, concerning his younger son:

It is a matter of sincere regret to me that the death of Captain E.N.F. Bell deprived me of the pride of personally conferring on him the Victoria Cross, the greatest of all rewards for bravery and devotion to duty.

The decoration was presented to Captain Bell senior on 29 November 1916 at Buckingham Palace. Colonel Ambrose Ricardo, leader of the Tyrone Volunteers and CO of the 9th Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers also wrote a letter of sympathy to Bell’s parents.

Both Alan and Haldane Bell were seriously wounded in the war, but after the war was over they were able to return to Australia and America respectively. Alan was his dead brother’s executor and there was a fourth member of the family, Irene, who lived in Wellington, New Zealand. Eric had died intestate and his records show that his father was credited with £198 from his estate. Dora Bell, their mother, died in 1919 and Edward, their father, in 1920.

On 19 November 1921 the by now Brigadier General Ambrose Ricardo planted one of the tress at Ulster Tower in memory of members of his former battalion. Having survived the war Ricardo died a mysterious death and was found floating in a reservoir by his wife in 1923.

According to Bell’s file in the National Archives (WO339/14809) his memorial plaque had to be claimed, as by 1931 it still hadn’t been issued to the family. His brother Alan lived in Sydney at the time, but the error was pointed out to the War Office by Irene when she wrote to them in 1930 informing them that she had her late brother’s VC and Mons Star but none of his other campaign medals.

Apart from the Thiepval Memorial, Bell’s memory is commemorated in a number of ways including being listed on the Regimental Memorial at St Anne’s Cathedral, Belfast. He is also remembered on the King’s Garden Memorial in Bootle, Liverpool, which was his parents’ home town, and with a plaque on his parent’s home at 22 University Road. Together with those of other men in his regiment, the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers, his name is also listed on the County Fermanagh War Memorial (Enniskillen War Memorial) in Belmore Street in County Fermanagh. The memorial, dedicated to the 650 fallen County Fermanagh Servicemen, was blown up by the IRA on 8 November 1987 at a service of remembrance, killing eleven and badly wounding many others. It was rebuilt four years later and rededicated in 1991. Never one to be scared of the threats of Irish terrorists, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher attended the service. Eleven doves representing the dead and wounded from the 1987 tragedy had been added to the design of the rebuilt memorial. In addition an extra inscription was also added to ‘Our Glorious Dead, 1914–1918’. Bell’s name is the very first listed in the section which lists the dead from the 9th Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers. His name is also the first mentioned on the VC Memorial Stone at Ulster Tower, unveiled by the Duke of Kent in July 1991.

Bell’s VC remained for seventy years with Bell family relatives in New Zealand until 2001. It was then transferred to the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers Museum in the Castle Keep of Enniskillen Castle.

G.S. CATHER

The 36th (Ulster) Division won four VCs on 1 July 1916; two of them went to the 109th Brigade and two to the 108th Brigade. Three out of the four winners were not to survive the first days of the Somme battle and Lieutenant Geoffrey St George Shillington Cather of the 9th (Service) Battalion, The Royal Irish Fusiliers (County Armagh), 108th Brigade was one of them.

This brigade was the furthest left of the Ulster Division and was also on the north side of the River Ancre. The brigade objective was Beaucourt Station and to the north of it towards Beaucourt village. The station building was, and still is, at the fork of Station Road and Railway Road, with the railway line running parallel to the river. Though some elements of the Ulster Division were to make great progress on this otherwise disastrous day, they were on the south side of the Ancre and then only forced to withdraw through lack of support in their attempts even to reach Grandcourt.

With the 12th Royal Irish Rifles on their left, the 9th Royal Irish Fusiliers began their advance over some 600 yards of no man’s land at 7.28am, two minutes before zero hour. Tragically they suffered high casualties even before reaching the gaps in their own wire and following waves faired no better as they were mown down when their turn came to attempt to reach the ravine. The 12th Royal Irish Rifles were also met with murderous fire in their bid to capture Beaucourt Station. Within two hours the enemy had been restored to their original positions and the battlefield was strewn with the Irish dead and wounded of the 108th Brigade. According to a footnote in the Official History:

It was subsequently discovered that a machine-gun which had done much damage was used from the top of a shaft, entered by a tunnel from the bank alongside the railway line in the Ancre valley, like many others, this emplacement was not unmasked until the attack had been launched.

The abortive attack had come to a halt even by 8.00am and it withdrew to its starting positions. It was for his supreme efforts to retrieve wounded men lying out in no man’s land and his subsequent death while carrying out this work that 25-year-old Temporary Lieutenant Geoffrey St George Shillingon Cather was later to be awarded a posthumous Victoria Cross. At roll call there were no officers left and only eighty men to respond. Nine officers and 244 other ranks had been either killed or wounded and those who survived returned to Martinsart the next day.

Lt Cather, the battalion adjutant, had gone out in no man’s land at night to bring in the wounded. While he worked, heavy German fire continued but by midnight he had brought three men into safety. The next morning he went out again in order to give succour and comfort, but this time was killed at around 10.30am by machine-gun fire. He was buried where he fell, but his body was not recovered after the war and his name is listed on the Thiepval Memorial to the Missing on Pier and Face 15A.

His citation which appeared in the London Gazette of 9 September 1916 read as follows:

For most conspicuous bravery. From 7pm till midnight he searched ‘No Man’s Land’, and brought in three wounded men.

Next morning at 8am he continued his search, brought in another wounded man, and gave water to others, arranging for their rescue later. Finally, at 10.30 am, he took out water to another man, and was proceeding further when he was himself killed.

All this was carried out in full view of the enemy, and under direct machine-gun fire and intermittent artillery fire.

He set a splendid example of courage and self-sacrifice.

George Cather was the son of Mr R.G. Cather of Limpsfield, Surrey and Mrs Margaret Matilda Cather of 26 Priory Road, West Hampstead, NW6. He was born at Christchurch Road, Streatham Hill on 11 October 1890. He attended Hazelwood School, Limpsfield in September 1900 and after about three years his academic record improved before he went on to Rugby in 1905. He was never prominent at the school and in 1908, when in the Upper Fifth, he had to leave the school when his father died and was unable to complete his studies. The impression that he left was of a shy, retiring and earnest young man. He joined the firm of Joseph Tetley and Co. in the City of London where his father had been a partner.

In January 1909 Cather enlisted as a private in B Company of the 19th (2nd Public Schools) Royal Fusiliers, but resigned in February 1911 having bought himself out as he wished to travel to America for business reasons, and in the following year he visited the United States and Canada and returned in May 1914. On 3 September he was attested and gave his profession as tea planter and was posted to the 2/28th (County of London) Battalion (Artists Rifles). However, as his parents were both from Northern Ireland he applied for a temporary commission on 3 May 1915 with the 9th Battalion, Royal Irish Fusiliers and on the 22nd was discharged having been awarded a commission. The 9th Battalion had originally been The Armagh, Monaghan and Cavan Volunteers and he left with them for France as part of the 36th (Ulster) Division, arriving in Boulogne in October. In November, by now a lieutenant, he became assistant adjutant and full adjutant in December.

By the end of June 1916 his battalion, as part of the 107th Brigade to the north of the River Ancre was in position in front of the village of Hamel.

After his death Cather’s colonel wrote to the family as follows:

He heard a man calling out and went over the parapet in broad daylight, gave him water, called out to see if there was anyone else within hail, saw a hand waving feebly, went on and was shot through the head by a machine-gun and killed instantaneously.

So brave and fearless: such a fine character. As an adjutant he was perfectly wonderful, and the battalion has sustained a severe loss by his death....

The battalion chaplain wrote:

...He was one who lived on a very high level, and yet he was always in full sympathy with his fellow creatures, and ready at all times to extend a kindly hand.... We all very much hope that his name will be added to the list of gallant heroes who have gained the VC.

On 31 March 1917 at Buckingham Palace the King presented the decoration to Cather’s widowed mother, who was also her son’s executrix, and in 1979 Cather’s brother, retired Captain Dermot Cather (RN) presented his brother’s VC and medals to the Regimental Museum in Armagh. Cather’s name was commemorated at Hazelwood School on a plaque in the school chapel until the building was destroyed in the October Hurricane of 1987. The plaque has now been remounted on the wall of the main school building where the chapel once stood. Hazelwood School also has another holder of the VC amongst its former pupils, Captain Percy Howard Hansen who won a VC during the Gallipoli Campaign in August 1915.

Apart from at Hazelwood School, Limpsfield, Surrey, George Cather’s memory is also honoured on the VC Memorial in the grounds of the Ulster Tower in Thiepval, the Regimental Memorial in St Anne’s Cathedral, Belfast and his VC and medals are held in The Royal Irish Fusiliers Museum.

J.L. GREEN

Going from right to left of the Somme battlefield, Captain John Leslie Green was the last man to be awarded the VC for a deed carried out during the first thirty-six hours of the battle. Green was a medical officer who was attached to the 1/5th Battalion (TF), The Sherwood Foresters (Nottinghamshire & Derbyshire Regiment), 139th (Notts and Derby) Brigade, 46th (North Midland) Division (TF).

The task of the division was to capture Gommecourt Wood on the northern side of Gommecourt village. At the same time the 56th (1/1st London) Division (TF) was to take Gommecourt Park to the south. The two divisions were then to meet up. Although this was the plan, the whole attack was in fact a diversionary attack in order to relieve enemy pressure on the battlefield further southwards. Like most British attacks on 1 July 1916 it ended in total disaster.

On the eve of the battle the 1/5th Sherwood Foresters left Pommier for Fonquevillers, and at midnight moved up into the muddy assembly trenches. On 1 July at 6.25am they moved up to advance trenches and after throwing smoke bombs at 7.25am the battalion moved off in three waves. The fourth wave was delayed, partly because of the density of the smoke and partly because of the withering enemy machine-gun fire from the wood. On the right were the 1/6 Battalion (TF), The Prince of Wales’s (North Staffordshire) Regiment and on the left was the 1/7th (Robin Hood) Battalion (TF), The Sherwood Foresters (Nottinghamshire & Derbyshire) Regiment and the two battalions had great difficulty in advancing at all. Many men in the three lines of the 1/5th Sherwood Foresters reached the second line but as the first line had not been cleared it meant that the troops could be shot from behind as well as from the front. Captain Green advanced in the rear of his battalion and on reaching the German wire found a brother officer lying seriously wounded. The officer’s name was Captain Robinson and he was the 139th Brigade machine-gun officer. His task was to be responsible for two machine-gun sections of the 1/5th Sherwood Foresters attached to the 139th Machine Gun Company. The machine-gunners were wiped out before covering more than 150 yards and Robinson had gone on and reached the enemy wire where he was wounded and became entangled. Green moved Robinson when they were both under very heavy fire and dragged him into a shell hole where he dressed his wounds. He then carried him back to the British positions and on reaching the advanced trench Robinson was hit again. Once more Green dressed his wounds when he himself was shot in the head and killed. Robinson was eventually brought in but was to die two days later. The 1/5th Sherwood Foresters were relieved at 6.10pm after a day of disaster, their casualties being 491 out of the 734 men that they began the day with. Those men remaining returned to Bienvillers and were in the Bellacourt area for the rest of July.

The chief witness of Green’s heroism was Captain Frank Bradbury Robinson of the 1/6th Battalion (TF), The Sherwood Foresters before he died of his wounds on 3 July. He was buried at Warlincourt Halte British Cemetery in Plot I, Row F, Grave 6. The citation for Green’s VC was published only five weeks later in the London Gazette of 5 August and read:

For most conspicuous devotion to duty. Although himself wounded, he went to the assistance of an officer who had been wounded and was hung up on the enemy’s wire entanglements, and succeeded in dragging him to a shell hole, where he dressed his wounds, notwithstanding that bombs and rifle grenades were thrown at him the whole time.

Captain Green then endeavoured to bring the wounded officer into safe cover, and had nearly succeeded in doing so when he was killed himself.

Detail from OS sheet 57D N.E. The 56th Division attacked between the southern edge of Gommecourt Park and the Sunken Road, south of Nameless Farm. (TM 453)

The general commanding 139th Brigade wrote to Green’s widow:

Dear Mrs Green,

I have seen the letter you wrote to the officer commanding the 5th Sherwood Foresters, asking for news of your husband. I am deeply grieved to have to tell you that I am afraid that there is no doubt that your husband was killed on 1 July, and that I should like to say how much I feel for you in your sorrow, but at the same time I must express my intense admiration for the manner in which he met his death....

Green was 27 years old when he was killed and his body was buried in Fonquevillers Cemetery Plot III, Row D, Grave 15. His widow, who had been on the staff of Nottingham Hospital, collected the VC from the hands of the King on 7 October. She later remarried and presented her first husband’s medals to the RAMC in Aldershot.

Green had a sister and a younger brother, Second Lieutenant Edward Alan Green, who was with the 1/5th South Staffs. He had been killed the previous year on 2 October during the Battle of Loos.

John Leslie Green was born in a house named Coneygarths, which is in the High Street at Buckden in the former county of Huntingdonshire, now part of Cambridgeshire. He was the son of Mr John George Green and Florence May Green. John George was a local landowner and Justice of the Peace.

St Mary’s Church, Buckden contains the tombs of many of the Green family. John Leslie Junior was baptised in Buckden Church on 12 January 1889 and was known as Leslie in order to distinguish him from his father. Leslie attended Felsted School (1902–1906) in north Essex and then went up to Cambridge where he studied at Downing College. He obtained Honours in Part 1 of the Natural Sciences Tripos in 1910. He was a keen rower who rowed for his college and an all-round sportsman. He trained for a career in medicine at St Bartholomew’s Hospital, London and became house surgeon at Huntingdon County Hospital. In 1913 he qualified and on the outbreak of war in 1914 was commissioned into the Royal Army Medical Corps. He was at first attached to the 1/5th South Staffs and then the Field Ambulance, before transferring to the Sherwood Foresters. On 1 January 1916 he married Miss Edith Mary Nesbitt Moss, who was a fellow doctor and daughter of Mr F.J. Moss of Stainfield Hall, Lincolnshire.

In 1920 Green’s father wrote to the Buckden Parish Council and suggested that he would freely donate a memorial to the men of the village who had been killed in the war. For some reason this offer was rejected, but Green went ahead anyway and on land that he owned next to Coneygarths, the family home, he erected a memorial stone in 1921 dedicated to his two sons and also the dead of the village, although only the two names are listed. This memorial fell into decay but was later ‘rediscovered’ and repaired in time for a service of rededication on 1 July 1986, the 70th anniversary of the Battle of the Somme and Green’s death. Opposite the memorial stone and birthplace of Green is Buckden Towers, a former home for the use of the bishops of Lincoln. In the Great War it was used as a military hospital, St Mary’s Church where Green was christened has a memorial to the village dead of both wars and so the Green brothers are commemorated twice in the village. Leslie is also listed on the memorial at Downing College, Cambridge.

Felsted School has two former pupils who gained the VC, Walter Hamilton from the Afghan War in 1879 and Leslie Green. There used to be a plaque to their memory in the school chapel, but when the building was modernised in the 1960s the plaque, along with part of the wooden school war memorial, was lost. In the mid-1980s it was felt that the two Felsted VCs should once more be remembered and funds were collected and a new plaque to both men was rededicated on Remembrance Sunday in 1986. One other reminder of Green is the former Huntingdon County Hospital building, which has changed its use but still stands on the outskirts of the town. A plaque to his memory was also put up in the RAMC College, Millbank, London.

S.W. LOUDOUN-SHAND

On 1 July 1916 the 10th (Service) Battalion, The Princess of Wales’s Own (Yorkshire) Regiment, 62nd Brigade, 21st Division, known as the Green Howards, was to take part in attempts to capture the enemy-held village of Fricourt. They had been billeted for two days in Buire, south-west of Dernancourt, and on the night before the attack were in reserve positions in front of a copse called Queen’s Redoubt, south of Bécourt Wood.

In the initial advance at 7.30am the 62nd Brigade was in frontal positions ready to move forward, but taking part in the second wave of attack was B Company of the 10th Green Howards, led by Temporary Major S.W. Loudoun-Shand. He realised that his men were in difficulty or perhaps plainly reluctant to leave their trenches, and so he immediately leapt onto the parapet to assist them over the top. Moving forward under heavy machine-gun fire Shand helped and cajoled his men, but was soon mortally wounded himself in what were very congested conditions. B Company suffered very heavily during this abortive attack close to Queen’s Redoubt, and of five officers and 117 other ranks who had gone into action, only one officer and twenty-seven other ranks survived being killed or wounded. The 12th (Service) Battalion, The Northumberland Fusiliers, a sister battalion of the 10th Green Howards, was ordered forward at midday when they found the ground full of casualties from B Company. The surviving Green Howards moved north-eastwards towards Crucifix Trench where they were to be relieved in the early evening by the 15th (Service) Battalion, Durham Light Infantry, 52nd Brigade, 17th (Northern) Division in Shelter Wood. No real progress had been made on the left of the 21st Division, with the 63rd Brigade failing in their attacks against the enemy line to the north of Fricourt and leaving their flanks in the air. However, in the end it made no real difference as on the following day the 17th (Northern) Division entered Fricourt unopposed, only to find the enemy had flown.

Detail from OS Montauban map, corrected to 2 June 1916. The British frontline runs south from La Boiselle and Sausage Valley to turn east before Fricourt. Montauban is in square S27 (upper right area of the map), Mametz Wood is in S19, and Bernafay Wood is in S28. (TM 442.6[3])

In an article which appeared in The Legion, former Corporal Harry Fellows of the 12th Northumberland Fusiliers paid tribute to the deeds of Loudoun-Shand:

The Green Howards led the attack north of Fricourt, with my own battalion in support, some 400 yards to the rear. When the barrage lifted, the German machine-gunners had scrambled from their dugouts, manned the guns and swept a murderous hail of fire across no man’s land. With such a savage fire overhead the Green Howards had shown a reluctance to leave the trench. But the major mounted the parapet and urged his men over the top.

Had the Green Howards faltered we should certainly have been called into action to advance over the open ground. It was then that we Northumberland Fusiliers realised the great debt we owed to that one gallant officer. Since that day he has remained my hero of the Great War.

With the circumstances of the day it would have come as no surprise for Loudoun-Shand to be awarded what was a posthumous VC, and the citation for it was published in the London Gazette of 9 September 1916: