On November 7 the Battalion did an hour's steady drill. There was something very fine and at the same time pathetic in the remnants of this decimated Battalion going through their drill with the determination to maintain the high standard of discipline no matter how small their numbers might be. Next day the whole Brigade attended divine service for the first time since they had left England, and as there was no chaplain, the Brigadier, Major Cator, read the service. In the afternoon the Brigade was drawn up in square facing inwards, and General Capper addressed it. He expressed his admiration of the way in which it had fought round Ypres, and told the men that they had upheld the splendid traditions of their regiments.
The fact that the flower of the German Army was defeated by the British Expeditionary Force, that is to say, the original army that existed before the war, will always make the first battle of Ypres particularly interesting to students of military history. Although it can hardly be claimed as a decisive victory, there is small doubt that the result influenced the whole course of the war, for had the Germans, when they turned their whole strength on Ypres, been able to force their way to the coast, the subsequent operations of the British Army would have been considerably affected.
Two battalions of the Grenadiers fought at Ypres, and each covered itself with imperishable glory. Never before in the long history of the regiment had so many casualties befallen them in a single action; never before had so large a force of the Grenadiers been almost annihilated.
Each battalion had gone into battle with a great reputation to maintain—a reputation won in centuries of fighting, carried forward in almost every campaign in which the British Army has taken part, and all the officers and men were fully conscious of their responsibility. Old Grenadiers well knew that every nerve would be strained to uphold the traditions of the regiment; but no one dared to hope that the illustrious past could be enhanced, and that these two battalions of the regiment would increase their fame in divisions in which every battalion distinguished itself.
The part taken by the 1st Battalion in the defence of Ypres, when with the Seventh Division they repelled attacks from forces eight times their number, will ever remain a precious memory to be handed down to future generations.
Major-General Sir Henry Rawlinson, in an order which he issued to the Seventh Division, said:
After the deprivations and tension of being pursued day and night by an infinitely stronger force, the Division had to pass through the worst ordeal of all. It was left to a little force of 30,000 to keep the German Army at bay while the other British Corps were being brought up from the Aisne. Here they clung on like grim death with almost every man in the trenches, holding a line which of necessity was a great deal too long—a thin exhausted line—against which the prime of the German first-line troops were hurling themselves with fury. The odds against them were eight to one, and when once the enemy found the range of a trench, the shells dropped into it from one end to the other with terrible effect. Yet the men stood firm and defended Ypres in such a manner that a German officer afterwards described their action as a brilliant feat of arms, and said that they were under the impression that there had been four British Army Corps against them at this point. When the Division was afterwards withdrawn from the firing line to refit, it was found that out of 400 officers who set out from England there were only 44 left, and out of 12,000 men only 2336.
Major-General Capper, in a report on the 1st Battalion Grenadiers, which he sent later to Lieut.-General Pulteney, commanding the Fourth Corps, wrote as follows:
This Battalion fought with the utmost tenacity and determination in a most exposed position at Kruiseik in front of Ypres, being subjected to an almost ceaseless heavy artillery fire and repeated attacks by the enemy for a week. Owing to the length of front to be held, no relief could be found for troops in the trenches. During this fighting Major Colby's Company of this Battalion counter-attacked the enemy, who had almost successfully attacked the line. In the counter-attack this Company lost four officers killed and wounded, only one officer and forty-five men returning unhurt, but this Company succeeded in driving back a very much larger hostile force. This Battalion lost very heavily in the three weeks' fighting before Ypres. I consider that the resolution and gallantry of this Battalion, obliged to take its share in holding a height which was the pivot of all the operations in this part of the field, was most noble and devoted and worthy of its highest traditions.
Later on, in the same operations, though weakened in numbers, and with few officers, the Battalion exhibited gallantry in a counter-attack near Gheluvelt, where it was mainly instrumental in restoring the battle south of the main Ypres—Menin road; and subsequently the same tenacity as it had shown at Kruiseik in holding a very difficult and exposed part of the Brigade line in the final position in front of Ypres.