The primary cause of the repulse was the failure of the artillery to cut the enemy’s wire. During the preliminary bombardment that wire ought to have been examined nightly by patrols, and the neglect to do so was a cardinal blunder for which the brigade had to pay a heavy price. The extravagant hopes entertained of the power of gas to demoralise the enemy had been rudely shattered; it was a hindrance and not a help, and its baneful effects were confined to our own men. In face of uncut wire and the enemy’s intact defences the attack could be no more than a forlorn hope, although with well-nigh incredible courage the men did all that men could do to achieve the impossible. It was a failure, but one that shed lustre on the men that failed.
The second attack was an offence against a well-understood military principle that was too often neglected in the warfare in France. When men have failed in an attack, it is generally futile to send other men to make another attack in the same way; it encourages the defenders and doubles the losses of the assailants. The hope of smashing, by an artillery bombardment of thirty minutes, defences that had remained intact after four days’ bombardment, betrayed an almost unbelievable optimism. The most feasible way was to send a part of the 27th Brigade to follow behind the 26th, and attack the enemy in Madagascar Trench from the south. But if no units of the 27th Brigade were available, it would have been wiser to send round some of the 11th H.L.I. and 9th Scottish Rifles to the Dump, from which point they could have assaulted the German positions from flank and rear. Persistence in a frontal attack showed a serious lack of flexibility in the Higher Command in making use of the resources of the Division.
On the front of the right brigade, Brig.-General Ritchie decided to attack with the 7th Seaforths on the right and the 5th Camerons on the left; these were supported respectively by the 8th Gordons and 8th Black Watch. The task of the leading battalions was to secure the first objective, which included the Hohenzollern Redoubt, the German main trench beyond it, and Fosse 8 with the Three Cabarets and the Corons de Pekin. When this was accomplished the Gordons and the Black Watch were to pass through, and, swinging in a south-easterly direction, capture the second objective. The assembly of the brigade and the units attached, the 90th R.E., “B” Coy. 9th Seaforths, and the trench mortar batteries, was completed on the evening of the 24th without a hitch, the two assaulting battalions being in position in the front and support trenches, and the support battalions in the reserve trenches.
The period prior to an attack is always a trying time, and the men welcomed the crash of guns that announced the hour of zero. At the same moment the gas and smoke were discharged, and the 2-inch trench mortars smothered Big Willie and the South Face of the Hohenzollern Redoubt with phosphorous smoke-balls.
At 6.29 A.M. the assaulting battalions jumped out of their trenches, and were marshalled for the assault in front of our own wire, screened by the smoke from the candles. This had the effect of steadying the men and allowed the advance to be made without confusion or disorder.
Between Fosse 8 and the Redoubt there was a hog-back ridge; the Seaforths and the Camerons advanced south and north of it respectively. At the very beginning the former lost touch with the latter, who were delayed for ten minutes by gas hanging in the front trenches. The Seaforths made straight for the Hohenzollern Redoubt, suffering considerable losses from rifle and machine-gun fire from the right flank, and captured the southern portion of it after a brisk fight, in which a good many officers were killed or wounded. Then the battalion bombed its way up the communication trenches to the German main trench, and without waiting for the Camerons, pushed forward past Fosse 8, clearing all the miners’ cottages and seizing the Three Cabarets. At this point the battalion, after being reorganised, lined the Corons Trench immediately east of Fosse 8 about 7.30 A.M. A few of the men slightly lost direction and wandered up the trench that led from the Corons to the ridge in front of Cité St Elie and Haisnes. The battalion had accomplished its job in very fine style and in good time.
On their left the Camerons had a ghastly experience. When, after a ten minutes’ wait to allow the gas to pass on, the men began to advance, they were shot down by a galling fire from the left, the first two lines of the battalion being almost annihilated. To cross that fatal field was a task that even the stoutest of men might have shirked without shame. But the Camerons were inspired by a compelling sense of duty, and undeterred by the fear or spectacle of death, they made of danger the spring-board of a leaping hardihood. With superb heroism they pressed doggedly through the fatal zone, where lay the greater part of the battalion. Nothing but death could stop such men. After capturing the Redoubt they moved on to Fosse 8 and, having made their way through the miners’ cottages, halted at the north edge of the Corons de Pekin about 7.45 A.M. The Camerons had reached their objective, but at a terrible cost; of the 800 men and 20 officers who crossed our line, only 2 officers and 70 men were left. It was a thrilling feat of arms, which men of the 5th Camerons will ever remember, and the very story of which served to inspire future drafts with the courage of the glorious dead.
Thus by 8 A.M. the Seaforths and Camerons had established themselves on the east of Fosse 8, and the men began to consolidate their positions. But there was a gap between the battalions, and the troops were heavily shelled from the Cemetery that lay south of Auchy.
Meantime the supporting battalions were advancing rapidly. At 6.30 A.M. the Gordons and Black Watch moved up from their positions in the reserve line to the front trenches. They crossed our parapet at 7 A.M., and with praiseworthy steadiness pressed through the hostile barrage, which was falling on our front line. The Black Watch lost greatly through heavy machine-gun fire from the north, their gallant C.O., Lieut.-Colonel Lord Sempill, being badly wounded. The Gordons, on reaching the Redoubt, took prisoner a number of Germans who had concealed themselves in shelter when the Seaforths passed over. At Dump Trench the Black Watch had a sharp fight with some of the enemy, who had been overlooked by the Camerons, and captured a number of prisoners. On their right a party of the Gordons bombed down to the Window in the German main trench, in order to clear the front for the Seventh Division.
After passing the main trench the bulk of the Black Watch, instead of swinging to the south-east, pushed on through the Corons and came into line between the Seaforths and Camerons beyond the miners’ cottages. The remainder of the battalion, roughly about a company, went on with the Gordons, who at 7.40 A.M. moved down Fosse Trench and then diverted their attack in an easterly direction on Cité St Elie and Haisnes. They carried and went over Fosse Alley and reached Pekin Trench a few hundred yards short of Haisnes soon after 8 A.M., but they had lost many of their number and could go no farther. The enemy’s resistance was far from being broken and the advance had been made under continuous shell and machine-gun fire. Haisnes was at that time lightly held and would have fallen to fresh troops, but by the time the leading ranks of the 27th Brigade arrived the village had been strongly reinforced.