In this manner the dangerous thrust was parried. The Black Watch, moving up from Ouderdom, crossed the Cheapside line, and engaging the enemy captured 67 prisoners at small cost to themselves. The K.O.S.B. in a brilliant counter-attack directed by Captain Cundle, now in command of the battalion, inflicted severe losses and secured 58 prisoners.
Throughout the action our machine-gunners earned noteworthy distinction by the doggedness with which they kept their guns in action till the last possible moment. Most of the company with the 27th Brigade shared the fate of the 12th Royal Scots, but made the enemy pay a heavy price for his victory. One gun directed on the Steenbeek valley, fired 1500 rounds before it was put out of action; other two were silent until the Germans reached the wire in front of them, when the crews suddenly opened fire and mowed them down. Only after one gun was knocked out, and the other withdrawn through lack of ammunition, did the enemy succeed in penetrating the wire. Of the teams at Vandamme no man returned; at Vandenberghe the guns were kept in action until the last belt was fired and were then destroyed, since it was impossible to withdraw them. In the Vierstraat line, a whole section became casualties. Two sections of another machine-gun company supporting the 1st East Yorks opened fire on the valley of the Wytschaete Beck with three guns between 5 and 6 A.M., and continued firing at intervals, until 9 A.M., when two of the guns were withdrawn to cover the right flank of the infantry, and remained in action for two hours without tripods. Of these sections there were only six unwounded men at the end of the day.
On the left of our line the storm beat violently against the Dammstrasse, but failed to break the defence of the Highlanders, who held the position with the Camerons and the Seaforths. Up to half an hour before noon all hostile attacks were repulsed, our infantry, machine-gunners and the personnel of the 26th L.T.M.B. co-operating most effectively. When ammunition began to run short, several of the men dashed forward to deserted dumps in full view of the enemy, and brought back bandoliers of cartridges. Between 11.30 and 1.30 P.M. shells fell without ceasing, and the Camerons in the forward posts were practically wiped out, but our position through Piccadilly Farm-The Mound proved invulnerable to every attack for the remaining part of the day. Under Captain H. E. Bennet the men of the 26th L.T.M.B. fired off all their Stokes ammunition into the dense masses of the Germans, and after destroying the mortars used their rifles with deadly effect against the hostile infantry and transport. The machine-gunners with the Highlanders handled their weapons with such skill and enterprise that the infantry voluntarily collected ammunition and kept up the supply, while parties of the “Rifles” in the Vierstraat-Snipers’ Barn line were organised for belt filling.
After darkness fell, a line in rear of the Highlanders having been established and manned by fresh troops of the Twenty-first Division, the Camerons and Seaforths with the other detachments extricated themselves and were drawn back to a camp 700 yards north-east of Ouderdom. The stone-wall defence of the Highlanders had put a final stop to the enemy’s northern onrush, which had rolled up the front and immediate supports of three brigades, and threatened our hold on Ypres.
The shattered fragments of the Ninth, with the exception of the South African Brigade and the artillery, were relieved by the Forty-ninth Division at 11 A.M. on the 26th. The brigade remained in the sector until the night of the 5th/6th May, and all three battalions, though constantly harassed by artillery-fire, inflicted enormous casualties on the enemy when on the 29th he strove to take advantage of his possession of Mount Kemmel. Rarely has heavier artillery-fire heralded an attack. On that day, the Royal Scots Fusiliers signally distinguished themselves. They were deployed in, in front of, and behind the Cheapside line, and suffered horribly from the bombardment; but of their eight Lewis Guns, which were out in front of their position, only one was knocked out, so that when the enemy’s infantry advanced they were immediately checked, and then our barrage came down on the top of them. First a few rose up and bolted, and then the remainder fled in panic, whereupon the Royal Scots Fusiliers fairly took toll of them with their rifles and Lewis Guns. The enemy’s attack was utterly defeated.
That date marks the failure of the German designs in Flanders. The value of Kemmel proved to be less vital than had been anticipated; the enemy failed to carry the valleys that separated it from Scherpenberg, and here, as in front of Amiens, the battle line became stabilised. The diversion had caused anxious tremors at G.H.Q., and for some time our organisation showed signs of giving way. The situation was too critical to be glossed over by misleading communiqués, and Sir Douglas Haig’s famous “Backs to the Wall” Order,[115] issued to all ranks on the 12th April, was a bracing and salutary warning to the British Army of what had to be done to deprive the Germans of victory. But Ludendorff, by using too much strength to exploit his initial success, had converted the diversion into a major operation, and had been unable to turn it into account in front of Amiens. The Flanders offensive instead of supplementing had supplanted the enemy’s main scheme of the year, and from this moment the projects of the German Higher Command show both uncertainty and nervousness.
Considering how sadly the Ninth had been depleted as a result of the Somme retreat, the unwavering resistance it offered in April is little short of marvellous. Since the 21st March it had enjoyed virtually no rest, and yet it had retained all its high fighting qualities unimpaired; this was largely due to the excellent spirit shown by the young boys who formed a large proportion of each unit. The Ninth’s protracted defence of Wytschaete had not merely added another glorious record to its lengthy list, but had helped almost as much as the retention of Givenchy by the Fifty-fifth Division to set a limit to the German gains in Flanders, and earned for it another “mention”[116] from G.H.Q. It is worth noting that here, as during the Somme retreat, the enemy never succeeded in wresting any ground from the Ninth by a frontal attack, and it was only when its flanks were turned that any territory was surrendered. The infantry had shown throughout incomparable tenacity and endurance, and the work of the trench-mortar batteries and the machine-gun battalion was invaluable. It is doubtful if the 26th L.T.M.B. ever did finer work than on the 25th April, while no reputation was more thoroughly established than that of the 9th Machine-gun Battalion, and the prestige won in these turbulent April days gave a tremendous stimulus to the esprit of this recently formed unit.
The successful resistance of the Ninth was due to sound generalship as well as the valour of its troops. On the critical 25th April the Highland Brigade being on the inner flank had time to send two companies up from the reserve to form a defensive flank facing south, and it was this measure that stopped the spread northward of the German turning movement until the troops along the Dammstrasse could be withdrawn to the Piccadilly Farm-Mound position, and then at night behind the Vierstraat-Snipers’ Barn line. In holding up the onslaught on the Cheapside line and eventually in consolidating themselves in it, when Mount Kemmel, which looked right along it, was in the hands of the enemy, the men of the Ninth accomplished an almost incredible performance. The action is a conspicuous example of the value of defence deployed in depth; for the fact that the Germans never broke through the Division, although their first attack completely outflanked the front and support lines and even the front reserve line (Vierstraat line), was due, apart from the courage of the troops, to the great depth of the original deployment of the Division.
By its prowess in March and April the Ninth thoroughly earned the flattering message[117] received later from Sir Douglas Haig. It was now widely known even beyond Scotland, and shared with the Fifty-first Highland Territorial Division, the rare distinction of appearing in a leading article of The Times. This publicity was the theme of an amusing conversation between the popular Padre Brown and a Padre of another division.
“Oh, you belong to the Ninth Division, do you?”