Of course the attack was really no more than a ruse, daringly conceived and successfully executed. Binche could not have been held even if it had been recaptured. But it is not difficult to imagine the enemy's astonishment at finding an Army Corps, which they had fondly imagined as good as wiped out, coming to life again and actually having the cheek to attack them. Kipling's remark about the Fuzzy-wuzzy who is "generally shamming when 'e's dead" was an excellent motto for that morning's work.
When the attack was well launched General Lomax began to withdraw very carefully some of his regiments from the supporting 1st Division. The task of the British guns of the two divisions (working together) was to lower such a curtain of fire in front of the 2nd Division as to make it as difficult as possible for the enemy to counter-attack or, indeed, to advance at all. As soon as the 1st Division have retired a little, it will be the turn of the division which has made that excellent sortie.
It is easy enough to say "the guns will check an enemy advance," but think for a moment what that means. There is already a big enemy superiority in guns, and, what is more, these have already got the ranges to a nicety.
Our batteries, or most of them, were in quite good positions, but at this early date we had not yet learned the art of concealing them sufficiently. The enemy aircraft were very active, and against them our own aircraft were hopelessly outnumbered. And so it was not long before our guns were "spotted," with the inevitable result.
Imagine, then, how gloriously those gun detachments must have worked to have accomplished what they did that day, "enabling Sir Douglas Haig, with the First Corps, to reach the new line without much further loss about 7 P.M." For it was undoubtedly the devotion of the guns which made possible this and succeeding retirements. Unless facts like this are realised, the astonishing work of the Force in its retreat can never be appreciated.
The Second Corps
If that Monday was an anxious day for Sir Douglas Haig, what must it have been for General Smith-Dorrien and his men? One looks hopelessly at the blank writing-pad in despair of giving even the most primitive description of the anxiety, the work, and the accomplishment of it.
Here is a Corps which has gone through, for the first time, the awful ordeal of a day's modern shell-fire and massed infantry attack. The men have supped full of horrors, and, at 3 A.M., hungry, weary and with nerves stretched to their utmost tension, they have received orders to move. There is not a regiment which has not lost heavily, especially in officers, and there is not a man but receives the command with his senses tangled in bewilderment.
Now it should be remembered that up to this time all our dispositions had been made for an advance. The impedimenta to the rear of the firing-line were so arranged that they might the more easily follow up a British attack. There was no real thought of retiring. The British were in the place of honour on the left of the line, and intended, with our French comrades, to drive the enemy back again through Belgium. I will not say that all this was a foregone conclusion, but at least it was "confidently anticipated." Remembering this, you will perhaps realise more vividly how staggering were the contents of that telegram from French G.H.Q. The work, therefore, of clearing the roads of the transport was exceedingly difficult. This devolves upon the Q.M.G.'s department, and General Smith-Dorrien has placed on record the wholly admirable way in which it was accomplished by General Ryecroft and his Staff. But proper Staff work for all the retiring troops during the hours of darkness was even more complicated.
Thus some few of the companies, with no one to guide them, start off in the wrong direction and march straight into the German lines; they are shot or captured. Others wander off to the east, struggle painfully through the shell-fire on Mons, and drift into their comrade ranks of the First Corps. Others, again, march off to the west, and are hopelessly lost; they are either captured by the flanking German corps or they get through and meet with friendly peasants, to turn up eventually at base ports or other towns.