herakles
28-05-2008, 02:18
An excavation at Fromelles has just uncovered a mass grave where up to 170 Australian soldiers were buried in World War I. Excavations have now stopped pending supporting data being collected such as DNA.
Before the infamous battle of the Somme, Haig decided to create a feint to stop the Germans reinforcing the Somme area with troops from the Fromelles area and to give the impression of a large scale attack being mounted here.. In 1915, British troops had failed completely in an attack there. It was heavily defended. Fromelles is near to Armentières.
The objectives of the Australian 5th Division and the British 61st Division on their right were to capture the village and the ridge. Overall command was given to British General Richard Haking.
The commander of the Australian 15th Brigade, Brigadier General H.E. "Pompey" Elliott, argued strongly against the plan. He called it a "tactical abortion". His reasons were that the Australians had just arrived in the sector so preparations would be rushed, the artillery was inexperienced (they also had no maps) and no man's land was too wide (400 metres in places). Elliott's men would also have to advance opposite the formidable German strongpoint known as the Sugarloaf, an elevated concrete bastion bristling with machine-guns. His complaints resulted only in a delay from the 16th to the 19th.
The attack was centred around a point known as the Sugar Loaf and at 11:00 hours on 19 July 1916 the British artillery put down a bombardment on the German front line as the infantry made their way up to their jumping off points. It was not successful. What happened was exactly as Elliott predicted.
The 8th and 14th Brigades on the flanks moved through the German lines with much success but the 15th, making a frontal attack, was overwhelmed. A counter attack drove the Allies off.
The Holts in their Battlefield Guide to the Western Front - North report that one regiment of the 61st Division had 75 concrete protected positions in front of it, and they were largely undamaged by the preliminary bombardment.
The Australians suffered 5,533 casualties in one night with over 2000 killed. The Australian toll at Fromelles was equivalent to the total Australian casualties in the Boer War, Korean War and Vietnam War put together. It was a staggering disaster. One-third of the Australian casualties at Fromelles were in Elliott's 15th Brigade. "If you had gathered the stock of a thousand butcher-shops, cut it into small pieces and strewn it about, it would give you a faint conception of the shambles those trenches were." wrote a 59th Battalion corporal, Hugh Knyvett. Decades later, Lieutenant Neil Freeman remembered seeing Elliott "with tears streaming down his face"; as he shook hands with the "pitiful remnant of his brigade". Other survivors were struck by the intensity of his anguish. At one stage Elliott called out to Captain Bill Trainor, "Good God Bill, what's happened to my brigade?" The ghastliness of Fromelles seared Elliott's soul. More than 1,800 officers and men in the 15th Brigade obeyed orders, did their best, and became casualties in a catastrophe that Elliott had predicted and tried to prevent. Elliott tried to arrange a case-fire but English High Command refused to sanction it.
Later in the war, Elliott would have a huge success at Villers-Bretonneux when the Australian turned the German advance.
Next morning, hundreds of wounded lay in no-man's land unable to be rescued. Snipers picked them off as they moved.
Next day, British GHQ issued this: Yesterday evening, south of Armentières, we carried out some important raids on a front of two miles in which Australian troops took part. About 140 German prisoners were captured." The German communique said: "Considerable British (sic) forces attacked our positions north and west of Fromelles. They were repulsed, and wherever they succeeded in penetrating our trenches they were ejected by counter-attacks, in which we captured over 300 prisoners, among them being some officers".
The Australian losses and conduct of the high command significantly damaged relations between the AIF and the British. Military historians do not mince words about Fromelles. The attack is considered to have been a fiasco.
It is believed that one of the German soldiers involved in the battle was Adolf Hitler. Here he won the Iron Cross for rescuing a wounded comrade.
Today the site is very peaceful and is isolated and difficult to find. In the middle of the Park stands a bronze statue of an Australian soldier bringing in a wounded comrade. The statue is entitled "Cobbers", was sculpted by Peter Corlett and was unveiled in 1998.
Just a short distance from the Memorial Park, continuing north on the D22, is VC Corner Australian Cemetery and Memorial. This is an interesting and unusual cemetery, for several reasons. Firstly, it is the only wholly Australian cemetery in France. The name itself is also interesting - "VC Corner". The origin of the name VC Corner (the cemetery itself is not at VC Corner) probably dates from May 1915 - with four VCs being won on the 9th of May, 1915, and another on the 16th of May. Perhaps the most interesting point about this cemetery is that there are no headstones here. Rather than mark these graves with the usual "known Unto God" headstones for unidentified soldiers, the names of all the Australian soldiers killed in the Fromelles attack but with no known grave were instead inscribed on the wall at the rear of the cemetery.
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,23771448-5006922,00.html
Before the infamous battle of the Somme, Haig decided to create a feint to stop the Germans reinforcing the Somme area with troops from the Fromelles area and to give the impression of a large scale attack being mounted here.. In 1915, British troops had failed completely in an attack there. It was heavily defended. Fromelles is near to Armentières.
The objectives of the Australian 5th Division and the British 61st Division on their right were to capture the village and the ridge. Overall command was given to British General Richard Haking.
The commander of the Australian 15th Brigade, Brigadier General H.E. "Pompey" Elliott, argued strongly against the plan. He called it a "tactical abortion". His reasons were that the Australians had just arrived in the sector so preparations would be rushed, the artillery was inexperienced (they also had no maps) and no man's land was too wide (400 metres in places). Elliott's men would also have to advance opposite the formidable German strongpoint known as the Sugarloaf, an elevated concrete bastion bristling with machine-guns. His complaints resulted only in a delay from the 16th to the 19th.
The attack was centred around a point known as the Sugar Loaf and at 11:00 hours on 19 July 1916 the British artillery put down a bombardment on the German front line as the infantry made their way up to their jumping off points. It was not successful. What happened was exactly as Elliott predicted.
The 8th and 14th Brigades on the flanks moved through the German lines with much success but the 15th, making a frontal attack, was overwhelmed. A counter attack drove the Allies off.
The Holts in their Battlefield Guide to the Western Front - North report that one regiment of the 61st Division had 75 concrete protected positions in front of it, and they were largely undamaged by the preliminary bombardment.
The Australians suffered 5,533 casualties in one night with over 2000 killed. The Australian toll at Fromelles was equivalent to the total Australian casualties in the Boer War, Korean War and Vietnam War put together. It was a staggering disaster. One-third of the Australian casualties at Fromelles were in Elliott's 15th Brigade. "If you had gathered the stock of a thousand butcher-shops, cut it into small pieces and strewn it about, it would give you a faint conception of the shambles those trenches were." wrote a 59th Battalion corporal, Hugh Knyvett. Decades later, Lieutenant Neil Freeman remembered seeing Elliott "with tears streaming down his face"; as he shook hands with the "pitiful remnant of his brigade". Other survivors were struck by the intensity of his anguish. At one stage Elliott called out to Captain Bill Trainor, "Good God Bill, what's happened to my brigade?" The ghastliness of Fromelles seared Elliott's soul. More than 1,800 officers and men in the 15th Brigade obeyed orders, did their best, and became casualties in a catastrophe that Elliott had predicted and tried to prevent. Elliott tried to arrange a case-fire but English High Command refused to sanction it.
Later in the war, Elliott would have a huge success at Villers-Bretonneux when the Australian turned the German advance.
Next morning, hundreds of wounded lay in no-man's land unable to be rescued. Snipers picked them off as they moved.
Next day, British GHQ issued this: Yesterday evening, south of Armentières, we carried out some important raids on a front of two miles in which Australian troops took part. About 140 German prisoners were captured." The German communique said: "Considerable British (sic) forces attacked our positions north and west of Fromelles. They were repulsed, and wherever they succeeded in penetrating our trenches they were ejected by counter-attacks, in which we captured over 300 prisoners, among them being some officers".
The Australian losses and conduct of the high command significantly damaged relations between the AIF and the British. Military historians do not mince words about Fromelles. The attack is considered to have been a fiasco.
It is believed that one of the German soldiers involved in the battle was Adolf Hitler. Here he won the Iron Cross for rescuing a wounded comrade.
Today the site is very peaceful and is isolated and difficult to find. In the middle of the Park stands a bronze statue of an Australian soldier bringing in a wounded comrade. The statue is entitled "Cobbers", was sculpted by Peter Corlett and was unveiled in 1998.
Just a short distance from the Memorial Park, continuing north on the D22, is VC Corner Australian Cemetery and Memorial. This is an interesting and unusual cemetery, for several reasons. Firstly, it is the only wholly Australian cemetery in France. The name itself is also interesting - "VC Corner". The origin of the name VC Corner (the cemetery itself is not at VC Corner) probably dates from May 1915 - with four VCs being won on the 9th of May, 1915, and another on the 16th of May. Perhaps the most interesting point about this cemetery is that there are no headstones here. Rather than mark these graves with the usual "known Unto God" headstones for unidentified soldiers, the names of all the Australian soldiers killed in the Fromelles attack but with no known grave were instead inscribed on the wall at the rear of the cemetery.
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,23771448-5006922,00.html