"Things were looking as black as conceivable. I suppose it would be about 7-30 a.m. when the attack came. We heard shouting straight behind us and saw about a dozen men a mile away, coming towards us in a line.[52] One waved a white flag and they all shouted. Some said they were English, and we were relieved; some said they looked like French; and I said that any way we would fire on them—which we did. They were perfectly good Huns! They took cover when we opened, and then, when we were really interested in them, the real attack came from Erches. He swarmed on to the road and came down the trench. This looked like the finish of it. There was a general movement backwards, but Evans prevented the machine-gunners from dismounting the one machine-gun with the 107th Brigade, and got it into action on the top of the trench. This changed the aspect of things, as the Huns checked. We all got out of our trench (most people with the idea of clearing over the open, I fancy), and there we stood for quite a while, our people firing towards Erches, and the Huns hesitating. Seeing this latter tendency, Gilmour and I moved slowly towards Erches, trying to urge the troops to attack, but they were too undecided.... Then we saw a Hun in the trench just below us. I fired my revolver at him and he ran back. So we chased him. This settled matters! The Huns turned tail and our men followed. As my particular Hun turned round traverses I got in another couple of shots, but didn't bring him down. When we reached the road—which was sunken— ... the bank came up to his waist, and he looked scared—horribly—but I fired again.... I distinctly saw what I thought was a puff of smoke go out from his pack. Any way he at once went down behind the bank, and Gilmour rushed up with his bayonet. I said 'Leave him,' but I don't know whether he did or not. And now I didn't know what to do. Fritz was legging it for Erches hard enough, and by this time indeed they had all reached it. I don't know how big the village was, but we might have rushed it. On the other hand, I didn't know what had happened on the left, or in what strength the enemy was.... At this stage I was delighted to see an infantry officer with an M.C. come up. I asked him if he thought it was any use trying to go on, and he said it would be better to make a line there."
Eventually Captain Walker, surrounded, except on the north-west, withdrew. He adds:
"I think on the whole the Erches scrap went in our favour. We were few in numbers compared with the Huns. They were backed up by victory, while our men were terribly tired, hungry, and dispirited.... Our ammunition was about gone. For our M.G. we had three belts left when we retired. We were entirely surrounded, if only by Hun patrols, and we only knew hazily what direction to make for. In the circumstances, to delay a force superior in numbers and moral for half a day after it attacked our position, was as much as could be expected. I reckon the Boche should have wiped out our party at Erches, but we turned on him severely enough to persuade him to let us go quietly."[53]
It was, then, at Erches that the enemy first broke the line on a serious scale. On the right, south of the Avre, the French posts were withdrawing. The 109th Brigade had no alternative but to cross. It was impossible to retire along the right bank. The crossing was superintended by the Brigade Major, Captain G. J. Bruce, and carried out in orderly fashion, with covering fire from successive sections. The line then fell back with the French outposts through the wood north of Lignières, which was heavily shelled by the enemy.
North of Erches, Captain Miller held his ground till noon, when his trenches were being blown in. On his left what remained of the 1st and 2nd Rifles had fallen back a little after Colonel McCarthy-O'Leary had been wounded—for the second time. Captain Miller therefore withdrew upon Arvillers, when he gained touch with Captain Patton, who had about sixty officers and men of the two other battalions. Finally, on the order of General Withycombe, the whole line withdrew upon Hangest-en-Santerre, since large columns of the enemy could be seen advancing towards Davenescourt, and disappearing in the wooded country in its rear. This withdrawal was complete at 5 p.m. By evening a French Division had moved up, and the remnant of the 107th Brigade was ordered to march back on relief, and rejoin the rest of the Division at Sourdon. One party of three officers and sixty-eight other ranks, however, out of touch with the Brigade, remained in action north-west of Arvillers till the morning of the 28th. Constantly pressed by the enemy, they kept him stationary by their rifle fire. Not till 11 a.m. were they relieved by the French.
The achievement of the troops of the 36th Division, a mere handful at this time, almost broken by fatigue, in many cases without food, must take a high place, not alone in the annals of the March retreat, but in that of the war. That men here and there, bowed beneath the weight of a burden almost unbearable, showed weakness, is not controverted. The account of Captain Walker has been purposely inserted—as an instance, to which many might be added—to show in what fashion weakness was overcome by leadership and example. It is the finest type of courage that, in the slang phrase, "comes up to scratch" again and again, beating down in the breast the inevitable weakness as it arises. The individual Briton is at least as brave as the individual of any other race; but men in the mass are not naturally heroic. It is discipline, training, pride in a unit or a formation, and, above all, in such crises as these, leadership alone which can instil into men who have undergone the strain these men had undergone, the courage to stand firm in the plight wherein they found themselves. These men had stood. Not only to the officers and picked men among them, who made the stand possible, but to the whole group spirit which they created for their weaker brethren in adversity, the adjective "heroic" may fairly be applied. Best of all, their object had been achieved. There can be no suggestion of hyperbole if that object be described in a phrase from Lord Haig's Despatch. The resistance, he said, of the 36th Division near Andechy played "no small part in preventing the enemy from breaking through between the Allied Armies." If we ponder that phrase and its inferences we shall have small need of further testimony.
After their long and trying march to Sourdon the troops had one more call to answer. An enemy column had found a gap at Montdidier and taken advantage of it. By 8 a.m. on the morning of the 28th it was over two miles west of the town. At 12-30 p.m. General Nugent received an order signed by General Débeney, commanding the First French Army, to the effect that he was massing artillery at Coullemelle, and that he required all infantry at his disposal to cover it. All troops of the 107th and 109th Brigades that could be collected were moved down to Coullemelle, and took up a position covering the French batteries. They were in position at about five in the evening. Subsequently came a message from the French requesting that they should be moved to Villers-Tournelle, two miles south-east of Coullemelle. But the French troops on the spot informed our men that the situation had improved, the enemy having been counter-attacked and driven back. Patrols sent out to Cantigny, another mile and a half east of Villers-Tournelle, found the French infantry solidly placed and unattacked. The night being very wet and cold, the majority of the force was therefore withdrawn into the houses of Coullemelle, piquets being posted south-east of the village, and patrols keeping touch through the night with the French in front.
The following day the march was continued. And now the weary troops saw heartening sights upon the route. Column after column of lorries, little Annamite drivers at the wheel, packed with the dark blue uniforms of the Chasseurs Alpins, roared by them. At some points there were serious blocks in the traffic. At Essertaux, where General Nugent had his headquarters for a few hours, he was succeeded by General Mangin, commanding the IX. French Corps. The French were really now in strength. Attack and counter-attack were to rage here a few days longer. Up north, upon the Scarpe, Below's great final thrust had been heavily defeated. The German advance was stayed at last.
On the morning of the 30th, after a night spent in the open in cold and wet, the troops of the 36th Division were entrained at Saleux, south of Amiens, now half-deserted and racked by bomb and shell, and moved north to the area of Gamaches, on the Norman coast, for reorganization.
Remains only to be related the last actions of the Artillery. On the evening of the 25th it had withdrawn with the 62nd French Division through the forest south of the Roye-Noyon Road, coming under the orders of a new French Division, the 77th, on the morrow. On that day, when the infantry was beginning its grapple at Andechy, an important battle opened against the Germans debouching from Noyon, upon the line Cannectancourt—Canny-sur-Matz. Here the Germans made little progress. Attack after attack on the afternoon of the 27th was beaten off, the barrage fire being very effective and earning high praise from the French commanders. On the 28th the Germans succeeded in entering Canny, but made no progress elsewhere. On the morning of the 30th desperate German attacks penetrated some distance into the French positions, taking the vital height of Plémont Hill. In the afternoon, however, a brilliant counter-attack was carried out, splendidly supported by our artillery. The whole line was restored, and over seven hundred prisoners taken.