The History of the 36th (Ulster) Division

by Cyril Falls

The exploits of the troops of the Fifth Army are great enough without straining the note. Some writers had made it appear as though the men were of triple brass. Men are of less durable material. Each has what may be called his "weakening-point," which is arrived at sooner in some men than in others. There were cases of weakness in the days that followed among troops of the 36th Division, as among other troops. But their achievements must be measured by the standard of their cruel and heart-breaking task. With that as gauge, these achievements, viewed as a whole, stand out in their magnificence, a shining monument to the spirit of the race that bred them.

The 21st Entrenching Battalion, interposed on the left of the 108th Brigade to find touch with the troops of the 30th Division, had not succeeded in its object. It was discovered at dawn that the line of the 30th Division turned back from the Canal about Verlaines. The 23rd Entrenching Battalion, consisting of men of disbanded battalions of the 36th Division, under the orders of the 30th, beat off all hostile attempts to cross the Canal in the neighbourhood of Offoy. Lieutenant-Colonel the Hon. Odo Vivian, the officer commanding that battalion, reports that at 7 a.m. troops fell back on his right from Ham, saying that they had been driven out by the enemy. About eleven, two Canadians informed him that they had slept the night in the town and seen no sign of the Germans. Be this as it may, it seems certain that the crossings at Ham, of all places on the front, were least effectively guarded, and that the enemy had some troops over the Canal here by noon. To cover the left flank, the dismounted sections of the Engineers and a battalion of divisional details were put into position north of Golancourt.

It was, however, on the other flank that danger first appeared. The enemy, according to the reports of the 14th Division, effected a crossing at Jussy at 3-30 a.m., but was counter-attacked and driven back by the 7th K.R.R.C. This respite was temporary only. By 11-15 a.m. the enemy was over the Canal de St. Quentin at many points, though the 7th Somerset L.I. clung stoutly to its position. Half an hour earlier the 2nd Rifles had been ordered to take up a defensive line east of Cugny, in touch with troops of the 14th Division, which had fallen back astride the road from that village to Flavy-le-Martel. By noon the troops on the right were falling back from Flavy-le-Martel and Annois, hard pressed by the enemy. The retirement continuing, the 1st Rifles was moved up on the right flank of the 2nd Battalion. On its right were at first no British troops, but a line was hastily taken up by dismounted French dragoons. In this position the line remained on this flank for some hours. The 1st Rifles was constantly engaged and managed to hold its ground. The 2nd Battalion did not come into action till later in the afternoon, as there were still in front of it a few men of the 14th Division who had retired from Flavy.

Meanwhile, in the centre, the line from Sommette-Eaucourt to Ollézy, and that of the 61st Brigade upon the Canals, held in splendid fashion. It was now the turn of the left flank. The 9th Inniskillings was heavily attacked from the north-west at Aubigny. One company fell back in disorder from the village. Thereupon the Brigade-Major, Captain G. J. Bruce, rode forward, rallied the men, and galloped into the village at their head. The Germans were driven out. It was a wonderful example of the inspiration of personal gallantry and leadership upon weary and disheartened men. Gradually, however, the line at this point fell back under severe pressure. Sommette-Eaucourt was lost, and a little later Brouchy. Both flanks of the Division were now completely turned.

At 4-30 p.m. General Cochrane, commanding the 61st Brigade, ordered the 7th D.C.L.I. and the 7th Somersets to withdraw to the line of the Ham-Terguier Railway, from the brook west of Annois to the Ollézy-Eaucourt Road. The Somersets, however, upon the Canal de St. Quentin, lost the better part of three companies, which fought on when surrounded till all their ammunition was gone ere surrendering. The D.C.L.I. extricated itself under great pressure, and took up position upon the new line.

And now upon the right the attack was renewed in great force. Enemy battalions passed through Flavy and deployed on either side of the Cugny Road. At about 5 p.m. the Germans attacked that village, using trench mortars to cover the advance, to be repulsed by the 2nd Rifles. A gap had now formed between this battalion and the 1st, through which the enemy pushed at dusk. The 1st Rifles was also attacked at 7 p.m., and also drove off the enemy, but this mere handful of brave men was now menaced both from south-east and north-west, and, to avoid being surrounded, withdrew towards Beaulieu, a mile south-east of Cugny. The 2nd Rifles also was compelled to evacuate the village, taking up a position astride the Villeselve Road at its western outskirts.

When night fell the line ran east of Beaulieu, to the western edge of Cugny, to the railway south-east of Ollézy, and along it to the Ollézy-Eaucourt Road, thence along the road, including the village of Eaucourt, a thousand yards south of Brouchy, to north of Golancourt. Behind it was a line of French infantry, pushed up hurriedly, without artillery or more ammunition than was carried on the men, roughly from Esmery-Hallon, through Flavy-le-Meldeux and Villeselve, to Beaumont-en-Beine. The Headquarters of the 36th Division were withdrawn from Fréniches to Beaulieu-les-Fontaines, north of the Roye-Noyon Road, at six in the evening.

In the course of the day all arms of the Division had been constantly in action. The 16th Rifles, which had been put at the disposal of the officer commanding the 9th Irish Fusiliers, had been fighting all day upon the Somme, and had fallen back in the general withdrawal on the left flank. Details of the Machine-Gun Battalion, under the second-in-command, Major Low, had, as has previously been recorded, also been in action on the left. All details, men returning from courses and leave, had been pushed into the battle. The clerks and runners of the 109th Brigade Headquarters had fought at Brouchy.

Great steadiness and devotion to duty had been shown by the Artillery. Two batteries of the 91st Brigade (from the 20th Divisional Artillery), A/91st and C/91st, are specially mentioned in the report of the C.R.A. When infantry, in the first case that of the 109th Brigade, in the second that of the 61st Brigade, fell back upon their positions, the battery officers rallied the men, and the gunners aided them to dig in in front of the guns.

Amid all the confusion food supplies had not failed, though no rations could be distributed to the troops in line till the small hours of the morning of March the 24th. The 107th Brigade was able, besides keeping its own troops supplied with tools for entrenching, to send a number of picks and shovels to Rifle Brigade battalions of the 14th Division in the neighbourhood of Cugny. On this day and throughout the retreat the work of the Train and Supply Column was most praiseworthy, while the Staff Captains of Brigades showed forethought in their arrangements. The medical services, under great difficulties, had done all that was possible in the evacuation of wounded.