The Stokes trench mortar batteries were numbered 167th, 168th, and 169th; the medium trench mortar batteries as X, Y, and Z. They were posted in numerical or alphabetical order to the infantry
brigades. There was also a heavy trench mortar battery designated V Battery, which was formed in May 1916.
The pioneer battalion was the 1/5th Battalion Cheshire Regt. The veterinary unit was the 1/1st London Mobile Veterinary Section.
These were the bits of machinery forming the 56th Division.
The first divisional conference was held on the 11th February, when most of the officers attending had their first introduction to Gen. Hull. He was a tall, good-looking man with an abrupt manner, but of singular charm. It did not take him long to win the complete confidence of his division.
In the midst of the work of getting the machine properly fitted together, there were the usual rumours and warning orders which came to nothing. The first information Gen. Hull received was that the VI Corps, of which his division formed a part, would relieve the XVII French Corps and would move to the area Domart-en-Ponthieu. The move took place on the 27th February, in the midst of a heavy fall of snow, which made the roads very heavy for transport. And a further move was made on the 12th March to the Doullens area, between that town and St. Pol.
Whenever units were behind the line they trained. It did not matter how long the individual soldier had been in France and Belgium, he was never excused as a “fully trained soldier.” Even instructors were sent from time to time to receive fresh instruction at Divisional, Corps, or Army schools. And so, during the period of assembly, the units of the 56th Division trained. Some were attached for ten days or
a fortnight to the 14th Division for work in a “forward position” round about Dainville—infantry, artillery, engineers, and field ambulance took their turn at this work; others carried on the routine of exercise on the training-grounds in the neighbourhood of their billets. The Commander-in-Chief, Sir Douglas Haig, visited the divisional area and the school at Givenchy on the 30th March.
In studying the adventures of a division, whether it is holding the line or whether it is in a reserve area, one must always visualise a great deal more than the twelve battalions of infantry which make or repel the final charge in any engagement. A division occupies and works over a large area, and depends, of course, on a base of supplies. When a person is told of the front taken up by a division, he will look at the map and measure off the width of the front line. “There,” he says, “is the division”! But the division covers quite a big area in depth as well. Not only do the billets of troops not actually employed in the front line go back a long way in successive stages, but the wagons and lorries of the Royal Army Service Corps work back many miles. The narrowest measurement of a divisional area is usually the front line.
Perhaps the following list, showing the dispositions of the division in billets during March, will give those with no experience some idea of what is meant by the word “division”: