CHAPTER III
OPERATIONS FOLLOWING NEUVE CHAPELLE
There was very little activity on the western front after the fighting at Neuve Chapelle and St. Eloi until the beginning of a renewal of the campaign between La Bassée and the sea. The importance of success in this region was appreciated by both sides. The Germans north of the Lys planned to cross the Comines-Ypres, Yperlee, and Yser Canals, capture Ypres, take all of the ridge of the Mont-des-Cats, and then continue west and take Dunkirk, Calais, and Boulogne. The Allies in their plan included an advance south of the Lys on two sides of Lille, the taking of the Aubers Ridge, and the turning from the north the German salient at La Bassée. This much of the Allies' plan was to be executed by the British. The work of the French was to drive the Germans from the vicinity of Lens and threaten La Bassée from the south and west. The reasons for making these plans are obvious. The German salient was a source of much danger to the joining of the British and French armies, and the possibility of the Germans forcing their way through to Boulogne meant a possibility of a cutting off of the entire British army and the French and Belgian forces between Ypres and the sea near Nieuport. However, if La Bassée was isolated and the Aubers Ridge taken by the British, the chances that the Germans could retain Lille were materially lessened; and if the British got Lille they might start to drive their enemy from Belgium.
During the lull in the fighting on land, to which reference has been made, there was much activity in the air. Reconnaissances and raids were of almost daily occurrence. A Zeppelin dropped twenty bombs on Calais, slaying seven workmen at the railroad station on March 18, 1915. Three days later another, or possibly the same Zeppelin, flew over the town, but this time it was driven away before it could do any harm. "Taubes" bombarded the railroad junction of St. Omer and made a similar attack on Estaires on March 23. Four days after another attack was made on Estaires, and on the same day, March 27, the German airmen did some damage to Sailly, Calais, and Dunkirk. The next day a "Taube" made an attack on Calais, Estaires, and Hazebrouck. A Zeppelin closed the month's warfare in the air for the Germans by making a dash over Bailleul.
Aviators of the Allies, too, were busy. One of their aerial squadrons proceeded along the coast on March 16 and attacked the military posts at Ostend and Knocke. These aviators had as one of their main objective points the German coast batteries at the latter place. But the squadron was seen from a German observation balloon at Zeebrugge, and a flock of "Taubes" made a dash for their enemy's craft. The Germans were not as skillful airmen, however, and they found it necessary to retire. Five British aviators made an attack on the German submarine base at Hoboken, southwest of Antwerp, and destroyed a submarine and wrecked two others. This raid was made without injury to the aviators, the only accident being the necessity of one of the aircraft to descend, which it did, only to find it had landed on Dutch territory and must be interned. The excellence of the Allies' flying was not confined to the English. Belgian and French airmen, as well as British, flew almost constantly over Ostend, Zeebrugge, Roulers, Aubers, and such other places as German soldiers and their supplies were in evidence. The Belgian airmen dropped bombs on the aviation field at Ghistelles on March 27, and on the following day a Zeppelin hangar was destroyed at Berchem-Sainte-Agathe, near Brussels. On March 30, 1915, ten British and some French aviators flew along the coast from Nieuport to Zeebrugge and dropped bombs on magazines and submarine bases. The last day of the month saw the destruction of the German captive balloon at Zeebrugge and the death of its two observers. The Belgian aviators on the same day threw bombs on the aviation field at Handzaeme and the railroad junction at Cortemarck, and, south of Dixmude, the famous birdman, Garros, fought a successful duel in the air with a German aviator.
An aviator of the Allies flew over the aerodrome at Lille on April 1, 1915, and dropped a football. The Germans hastened to cover. When the ball bounced prodigiously as a result of being dropped from such a height, the Teutons thought it was some new kind of death dealer, and remained in their places of safety. In fact, they remained there quite a few minutes after the football had ceased to bounce. When they finally emerged most cautiously and approached the object of their terror, they read this inscription on it: "April Fool—Gott strafe England."
Though the antiaircraft guns, or "Archibalds," as the soldiers called them, were not especially effective except in keeping the flyers at such a height that it was not easy for them to make effective observations, a "Taube" was brought down at Pervyse, and near Ypres another was damaged on April 8. But on April 12 a German flyer inflicted some loss on the Allies' lines and escaped without being even hit. On the following day, presumably emboldened by that success, German aeroplanes threw flares and smoke balls over the British trenches east of Ypres, with the result that the soldiers of King George were subjected to a severe bombardment. All things considered, however, the Allies had ground for their belief that they more than held their own in the air.
Afloat the Allies continued to maintain the supremacy which had been theirs. The French and British battleships held the left of the Allies' line. Their great guns proved their effectiveness on the Germans who were advancing from Ostend on Nieuport. They repeatedly bombarded the position of the kaiser's men at Westende, east of Nieuport. The Germans had trained one of their mammoth pieces of artillery against that town presumably because it held the sluices and locks which regulated the overflowing of the Yser territory. If the means of flooding the land could not be seized, the next best thing to do was to wreck them.
The Belgians, in the meantime, assumed the offensive, their left being protected by the Allied fleet and the French forces in the neighborhood of Nieuport. These troops captured one of the smaller forts east of Lombartzyde on March 11, 1915. There was also fighting at Schoorbakke, north of the Yser loop, where the German trenches were shelled by French artillery. This was on the eastern border of the inundated section. After destroying the German front in the graveyard at Dixmude, the French artillerists battered a German convoy on its way between Dixmude and Essen on March 17, 1915. By March 23 the east bank of the Yser held a Belgian division. In fact, from Dixmude to the sea the Allied troops were advancing.
The Germans, however, advanced south of Dixmude. On April 1, 1915, they shelled the farms and villages west of the Yser and the Yperlee Canals, and took the Driegrachten farm. Thereupon the Germans crossed the canal with three machine guns. Their plan was to proceed along the border of the inundated district to Furnes. But the French balked the plan by shelling the farm, and the Belgians finished the work by driving the Germans back to Mercken on April 6, 1915.