March, 1918.
Rear-guard actions. — The Somme crossings. — Bennett relieved by the 20th Division at Voyennes. — Davenport with mixed troops ordered to counter-attack at Ham. — Davenport killed. — The enemy crosses the Somme. — The stand by the 184th Infantry Brigade at Nesle. — Colonel Wetherall wounded. — Counter-attack against La Motte. — Bennett captured. — The Battalion's sacrifice in the great battle.
After the battle for the Beauvoir Line the 184th Infantry Brigade was ordered back to Nesle. At Languevoisin on March 23 we find the relics of the 2/4th Oxfords under the command of Major Bennett, who with a force including other members of the Battalion had been providing rear-guards at the crossings of the Somme. What force was this? To understand the story it is necessary to go back a little and see what had been happening behind the line since March 21.
When the attack was known to have commenced, all transport, quartermasters' stores, and men left out of the line were ordered back to Ugny, where Bennett as senior Major present formed all our divisional details into a composite Battalion some 900 strong. Early on March 22 Colonel Wetherall, limping and tired, arrived. He bore the tale of his adventure. During the 21st we saw him disappear from Enghien Redoubt to go on a reconnaissance. Near Holnon he was surrounded by an enemy patrol and led a prisoner towards St. Quentin; but when the fire of 6-inch howitzers scared his escort into shell-holes, the Colonel escaped, and the same night, choosing his opportunity to slip between the German digging parties, contrived to reach our lines.
As March 22 lengthened out, the tide of battle rolled nearer and nearer towards Ugny, above which air fighting at only a few hundred feet from the ground was taking place. At 7 p.m. Bennett had orders to move his men westwards across the Somme. Soon afterwards a runner came post-haste. He told of the fighting on the Beauvoir line; the intrepid General had been wounded in the head while with his shrapnel helmet in his hand he waved encouragement to his men. Colonel Wetherall had already started on the way to Languevoisin but was caught up at Matigny. He the same night (22nd) regained the Beauvoir line and took command of the Brigade. As we have seen, he moved back with the Brigade on the next day.
Further developments soon diverted Bennett's force, whose fortunes we are following. At Matigny he was ordered by the Major-General with half his force to guard the Offoy bridgehead and with the other half to hold Voyennes. The Offoy garrison was despatched under Moberly, who was commanding the details of the 184th Brigade, including a hundred Oxfords. Moberly's force comprised many administrative personnel. 'What your men lack in numbers they must make up in courage,' was the Major-General's encouragement.
But the men were not at once put to the test. The 20th Division, which was covering the retreat across the Somme, relieved the Offoy rear-guard, of which Davenport had now assumed command, early in the morning of March 23, and Bennett was likewise relieved in his duties at Voyennes, where the bridge was blown up. Though the Offoy bridgehead had been taken over by the 20th Division, Davenport's troops were kept in support along the railway embankment at Hombleux, for it was feared that the enemy had already commenced to cross the Somme at Ham. During the morning of the 23rd Davenport received peremptory orders to make a counter-attack against the town with the object of regaining possession of its bridgehead. Considerable success resulted; Verlaines was cleared of the enemy's patrols, and the advance reached the ridge east of that village.
With fresh troops acting on a concerted plan something might have been accomplished. Davenport's men were a disorganised mixture of many battalions, including, besides the Oxfords and other representatives of the 184th Brigade, a number of Cornwalls and King's Liverpools. They were unfed, and the demoralisation of the retreat was beginning to do its work. As always on these occasions, when officers of different services were thrown together, divided counsels were the result. Moberly, an officer who could have been relied upon to make the best of the situation, was wounded in the leg during a moonlight reconnaissance with Davenport.