Writing this book has been one of the most exciting projects I have ever undertaken. When I started I was a bit worried, I'd had lots of problems writing Aces Falling and I wasn't sure that I was up to the job of writing another large book so soon. Like most Great War enthusiasts I was also conscious of gaps in my understanding of the 1918 fighting. I've always been far more fascinated by the Somme, Passchendaele or even, whisper it, Loos!
But when I started the detailed research I began to realise that our communal understanding of the whole of the First World War has a strangely 'unfinished' aspect to it; why have the great battles of the earlier years seemed so futile in the public imagination and why are British High Command so denigrated? It is because most books aimed at the popular market concentrate on the disasters and setbacks of the first four years of the war. Even those that cover 1918 seem to concentrate on the wonders of the German offensives commencing on 21 March. When a book does deign to cover the Hundred Days, the British Advance to Victory, it seems to be a quick blast on the role of the tanks at the Battle of Amiens on 8 August 1918, a bit of musing on what was a 'Black Day for the German Army', then a turkey trot to victory, swiftly referenced, before turning to the Armistice on 11 November. It is usually implied that the British never really won the war 'fair and square', that it was all down to the fresh injection of hordes of young Americans or that anyway they cheated by undermining the German Army using the naval blockade to starve them out, thereby underhandedly promoting the revolution that stabbed the undefeatable German Army 'in the back'.
Now, ignoring the self-evident fact that Total War is strangely all-encompassing, this approach to 1918 is rubbish. The more I read the more it was apparent that the German offensives that year weren't that brilliant - their tactics not that far advanced and they were carried out with a minimal grasp of strategic priorities. But what about the reality of the British 'All Arms Battle' that was finally unveiled in all its glory on 8 August. Here were the tanks true, but more important they were seamlessly welded into a greater whole. Here were the infantry: well armed with light Lewis machine guns and rifle grenades deploying sophisticated tactics that minimised losses. In immediate support were the heavy Vickers machine guns banded together to provide lethal firepower in attack or defence, the light and heavy mortars hurling high explosives, deadly thermite or poisonous gas canisters. Concealing them were dense smoke barrages that veiled from the Germans what was coming towards them. Trundling along into action alongside the infantry were the heavy tanks to crush the wire and assault German strongpoints, behind them came the supply tanks bringing forward huge quantities of ammunition, then there were the lighter tanks and armoured cars held ready to push through and cause chaos in the rear areas in the event of a rupture in the German lines. Aircraft flew above them, now not just photographing or carrying out artillery observation functions, but diving down to spray machine gun fire and small bombs to harass and disrupt the German army every step of the way. Aerial bombing had progressed to such a level that it was not only used to kill on, or near, the battlefield, but also to try and sever the German strategic rail communications which they needed to bring up reinforcements. Behind everything there was the artillery: truly, as the Royal Artillery motto suggests, the guns were ubique – everywhere – on the Western Front. Within the whole murderous conglomeration that was the ‘All Arms Battle’ they were still the supreme weapons system.
And what about the other ninety-nine of the Hundred Days. The German Army did not just roll over, they fought every step of the way - well most of them anyway! Retiring in good order they inflicted dreadful casualties, but they were losing even more themselves. Battle after battle was fought, German last-ditch defensive lines were breached, culminating in the fall of the Hindenburg Line in late September. Even then the Germans used river lines to try and stem the inexorable Allied advance. Both sides were approaching the limits of human endurance but it was the Germans that finally broke. The Armistice was not just an Armistice - it was an utter surrender, read the stringent all-embracing conditions and see how the German military services, all of them, were systematically stripped of their ability to resume the conflict. And that was just to obtain the Armistice, never mind peace itself.
And what about the quality of the personal experience quotes I discovered lovingly tended, not lost or forgotten, by archivists at the Imperial War Museum? Judge for yourself from a few examples the type of vicarious excitement mixed with horror that I feel burns it's way off the page
War is the most ruthless system of organised murder that the animal ‘man’ has invented, and the most horrible. Wars are fought by young men, inexperienced and impressionable - to whom in large part the thing is seen in the light of an adventure. Indeed, it is in some degree an adventure, and no adventure is worth calling such without a degree of risk to life and limb. But its results are so ghastly that inevitably there comes a time when war ceases to be an adventure, and the young regard it cynically, disillusioned and disenchanted. I do not suppose any generation ever marched to war with the stars in their eyes as my generation did, but after the Somme and the even worse slaughter at Third Ypres there were no more stars. Lieutenant Richard Dixon, 251 Battery, 53rd Brigade, Royal Artillery
We awoke to the thunder of a thousand guns and the shattering crash of a storm of shells upstairs. The place was in darkness and the gas curtain already hung in shreds. A shower of dirt descended on my face. Scared stiff we all tumbled out of our bunks, scrabbled round for tin hats and respirators, looking at the roof, now showing signs of bulging ominously in parts, in spite of being 20 feet underground. I remember hoping that the French sappers who had built our underground home had done a good job of it. Like the rest I dreaded being buried alive. Private James Brady, 43rd Field Ambulance, Royal Army Medical Corps, 14th Division
At a critical stage in battle the British soldier is not a silent man. Cursing and blaspheming, the Jocks were exposing themselves recklessly and they fired round after round at the enemy. Major Robert Johnston, 16th Battalion, Royal Scots, 101st Brigade, 34th Division
I came to paralysed, breathing shallowly. There was a little gap in the haze and sunlight. I could see the blood dripping down from the end of my nose into the clay, but I couldn’t move. At the edge of the haze was a pair of boots. He said, “You’re not dead!” He pulled me to my feet and he got a field dressing, put it on me bound it up, handed me my tin hat and said, “You lucky beggar!” Corporal Edmund Williams, 19th Battalion, King’s Liverpool Regiment, 89th Brigade, 30th Division
One solitary shell of large calibre came whistling trough the air and burst just behind us, practically wiping out the rear platoon. I went back the few paces to where the men and bits of men lay and have never forgotten one poor fellow, who with blood pouring down his face and dreadful wounds in his body, pointed to my pistol holster and said, “Put me out, Sir, please”. Captain George Brett, 23rd Battalion, London Regiment, 142nd Brigade, 47th Division
The order was to stay put as long as we could - we were not to retire! We stayed where we were. We shot and shot and shot till the fellows in the trenches could hardly hold their rifles. They killed thousands; I have never seen so many dead in front of out trenches. Captain Ulick Burke, 2nd Battalion, Devonshire Regiment, 23rd Brigade, 8th Division
Poor old Lieutenant Ferguson, absolutely fearless and exceedingly popular among the boys of No. 2 Company. I can picture him now as he was that day, so unlike his natural self. He had a sort of dejected look about him and told us that he was going to "get his" that day. How he knew is something we don't quite understand. He got it all right, a piece of shrapnel through the head. I was with him at the time; just another ‘C-R-R-UMP’ and he slumped to the ground - dying instantly. Lance Corporal Kenneth Foster, 2nd (Eastern Ontario) Battalion, 1st Brigade, 1st Canadian Division
Some of the graves dotting a battlefield had inscriptions, often macabre as in the case of one I saw – that of a German killed during an Australian advance. To the man’s rifle had been pinned a sheet of cardboard on which was scrawled in chalk:
Here you lie, brother Bosche
Your Pals won’t bury you, Hindenburg won’t bury you, your Kaiser won’t bury you; they can’t
But the poor bloody Aussie will bury you, because YOU STINK!
Second Lieutenant John Fleming, U Bty, 16th Brigade, Royal Horse Artillery
We are in a place made immortal by Americans – and they are not unusual or extraordinary supermen, but simply Americans. I am with the infantry in the line and if the Bosche gets this place back, it will be because none of us is left alive. You would be very proud of America if you could see the things that are here now. I am very glad you can’t though. Squads lying where they fell, charging in perfect formation against a Bosche machine gun – pitiful shattered helmets, letters from home, bayonets no longer shiny near the end – everything bloody and stained. Lieutenant Kenneth Walser, 101st Field Artillery, 51st Brigade, 26th Division, American Expeditionary Force
Fear is a man's biggest individual enemy. Not in the battle when there is action and movement and sport and excitement; but in the recesses of his little pit which he dug by dint of scratching maybe with his jack-knife and mess pan using them as pick and shovel, when the damp misting whistling wind is blowing through the shattered trees around, and groaning of the wounded becomes unbearable and hunger and thirst seem to drag vitality from you inch by inch, and the shells big and little are pulling one more from among the few men you have left, and you shiver-from cold and the thoughts of some horrible death you've seen some fellow die that day, his one game hand trying to stuff his entrails back into his belly maybe some of his brains in his helmet and the pain from a shinbone bent double toe touching knee, spasmodically making his last breath a gurgled curse of pent up hatred! God in heaven knows that if it doesn't cast a spell of fear over you I don't know what will. Lieutenant Eugene West, 5th Marine Regiment, 2nd Division, AEF
The racket was awe-inspiring, it was impossible to hear, even if orders were given. Over we went, slipping and sliding down the canal bank to the cold water below. The opposite bank was pitted with machine gun nests, in tunnels dug into the 30 feet high sloping bank. How any of us even reached the water beats me, but a surprising number did. The water was up to armpits, and holding that gun above my head was bad enough without being machine gunned as well. Clawing our way on to the bank we were underneath some of the machine guns making it more difficult to hit us, so my team and many others flung Mills grenades into the various tunnels nearest to us, while clinging for dear life to any scrap of projection on the bank. After many years I still don’t know how we got away with it. Corporal George Parker, 1/8th Battalion Sherwood Foresters, 139th Brigade, 46th Division
I hope no terms will be granted that don’t make the Huns absolutely grovel. We have the Bosche so beat that if he won’t grovel now, it is only a matter of hanging on a little bit more, when he positively won’t be able to help himself. What one has seen and heard makes one hate and loathe the Bosche just more than ever as the most unutterable of all brute beasts. Brigadier-General George Stevens, Headquarters, 90th Brigade, 30th Division
Our job is to make the miserable Bosche climb on his chair and be a good boy. So far as we can see he has not as yet shown any very wholesome haste to get on the chair without a considerable amount of assistance from our part, so I guess we will carry on for a bit yet. Colonel Leland Garretson, 315th Machine Gun Battalion, 80th Division, AEF
We automatically mounted the machine gun for action. Then like animals we burrowed into the earth as if trying to find protection deep in its bosom. Something struck my back where I carried my gas mask, but I did not pay attention to it. A steel splinter broke the handle of my spade and another knocked the remains out of my hand. I kept digging with my bare hands, ducking my head every time a shell exploded nearby. A boy to my side was hit in the arm and cried out for help. I crawled over to him, ripped the sleeves of his coat and shirt open and started to bind the bleeding part. The gas was so thick now I could hardly discern what I was doing. My eyes began to water and I felt as if I would choke. I reached for my gas mask, pulled it out of its container - then noticed to my horror that a splinter had gone through it leaving a large hole. I had seen death thousands of times, stared it in the face, but never experienced the fear I felt then. Immediately I reverted to the primitive. I felt like an animal cornered by hunters. With the instinct of self-preservations uppermost, my eyes fell on the boy whose arm I had bandaged. Somehow he had managed to put the gas mask on his face with his one good arm. I leapt at him and in the next moment had ripped the gas mask from his face. With a feeble gesture he tried to wrench it from my grasp; then fell back exhausted. The last thing I saw before putting on the mask were his pleading eyes. Corporal Frederick Meisel, 371 Infantry Regiment, 43rd Ersatz Brigade, 10th Ersatz Division, German Army
One of our men received a terrible stomach wound - I don’t think I’ll say what I saw. But I do remember this poor wretch rolling over and over and the steam from his blood rising up. It was obvious he was not going to live. From the first to the last days of the war men were dying. But those who so nearly finished the course and fell at the last fence, these are the ones we most feel sorry for. To think another day and he should have been safe. But it wasn’t to be. Private Harold Bashford, 2nd Battalion, Bedfordshire Regiment, 54th Brigade, 18th Division
No more slaughter, no more maiming, no more mud and blood, no more killing and disembowelling of horses and mules. No more of those hopeless dawns, with the rain chilling the spirits, no more crouching in inadequate dugouts scooped out of trench walls, no more dodging snipers’ bullets, no more of that terrible shell fire. No more shovelling up of bits of men’s bodies and dumping them into sandbags, no more cries of, “Stretcher-bearers!” Lieutenant Richard Dixon, 251 Battery, 53rd Brigade, Royal Artillery
We were told that this was ‘the war to end war’ and some of us at least believed it. It may sound extraordinarily naïve, but I think one had to believe it. All the mud, blood and bestiality only made sense on the assumption that it was the last time civilised man would ever have to suffer it. I could not believe that anyone who had been through it could ever allow it to happen again. I thought that the ordinary man on both sides would rise up as one and kick any politician in the teeth who even mentioned the possibility of war. Lieutenant John Nettleton, 2nd Battalion, Rifle Brigade, 25thBrigade, 8th Division
So there it is: writing 1918 A Very British Victory was the best experience I have ever had as a writer. Then the editorial team led by Keith Lowe added their input, all helpful and spot on in unearthing my many errors of omission and commission! The result is what I hope is my best book by a long street. Interesting material, a good narrative drive, bone-shaking battles, vigorous controversy and, whisper it, the right side win! I think it deserves to sell more than the Somme and if it does I will be a happy man! If it doesn't I will sulk!
The book will be out and about in mid-July and I can't wait. I feel as excited as I did on my first book some 14 years ago! If you want to preorder, a very good thing for me, then please use the Amazon link attached and my Polly will be happy as she gets to keep the extra pennies earned to pay for this site! Me too of course and I will be delighted to sign any copies you bring along to my Western Front Association talks. But I ought to warn you book collectors - it's the unsigned ones that are rare!
Thank you anyway,
Peter Hart
March 2008