Battle of Messines

“ In 1917 we evolved, and applied for the first time at the battle of Messines, an effective answer to such tactics. Close on the heels of our first line of assaulting troops came a second line, whose rôle was to occupy the captured trench immediately, and to "mop it up." This meant the killing or disarming of all enemy found in hiding, the picketing of the entrances and exits of all dug-outs, and laying siege to them until their occupants surrendered, a course to which they were encouraged by a liberal use of phosphorus bombs or Mills's grenades. ”

“ It shines in the eyes of our officers and men to-day up in the fighting zone and in the fields and woods below Wytschaete and Messines, where they are resting and sleeping after the [160] battle, regardless of the great noise of gun-fire which is still about them. Our men have a sense of great achievement, something big and definite and complete, in this capture of Messines Ridge. They knew how formidable it was to attack, and they count their cost—the price of victory—as extraordinarily light. ”

“ Messines was a singularly complete and satisfactory affair, including some seven thousand prisoners and, better still, a multitude of dead, killed off in counter-attacks. It opened the road for the Third Battle of Ypres which was to win more breathing-space round the wreck of the city. Unlike Arras, where there was almost unlimited space for assembly in subterranean caves and cellars, every preparation in the Salient had to be carried out under [212] the enemy’s eyes on known and registered ground lacking shelter above or below. ”

“ The battle of Wytschaete and Messines was a model in organization and method, and worked in its frightful destructiveness like the clockwork of a death machine. Even the battles of Flanders in the autumn of '17, ghastly as they were in the losses of our men in the state of the ground through which they had to fight, and in futile results, were well organized by the Second Army headquarters, compared with the abominable mismanagement of other troops, the contrast being visible to every battalion officer and even to the private soldier. ”

“ The New Zealand and Australian contingents have corresponding achievements to their credit in their share of the battle of Messines and in the long sustained and bitterly contested fights in the Ypres salient from July [102] to November. The South African brigade sustained the brilliant reputation which it won last year at Delville Wood by the devoted services it rendered on the battlefields of Arras and Ypres. Finally, the Newfoundland Regiment took a glorious and costly part in the same two battles. ”

“ The despatch of 25th December, 1917, paragraph 33 (Dent’s edition) , contains an account of the Messines battle on 7th June, 1917. “Heavy fighting took place in Wytschaete and further north. London troops (47th Division, Major-General Sir G. F. Gorringe) encountered a serious obstacle in another strong point known as the White Château. This redoubt was captured while the morning was yet young.” The 41st and 47th had further resistance in Ravine Wood, “killing many Germans.” In this battle the 47th Division was in the X. Corps, Second Army. ”

“ There is fierce fighting on the Messines Ridge, where the British 9th Division repulses strong enemy attacks; below Armentières the Germans rapidly deepen and widen the salient they have created; they capture Armentières and Merville, and force back the British to a line behind Ploegsteert, Steenwerck, and Estaires; German attacks on the lines covering Béthune are repulsed with heavy loss; the Germans claim 20,000 prisoners and over 200 guns in this battle to date. ”

“ The British capture Messines and the Messines Ridge; Dixmude is occupied by the Belgians; the Allied front is carried to the neighbourhood of Roulers, Courtrai, and Menin, an important salient being thus driven into the enemy's northern front which endangers his positions on the Belgian coast: this ends the Fourth Battle of Ypres.
Cambrai—St. Quentin Front:—The British, assisted by the 2nd American Corps, reach the outskirts of Cambrai and carry an important section of the Hindenburg defences between Cambrai and St. ”

“ Round about the salient a network of railways had been built with great speed under the very eyes of the enemy, and though he had shelled our tracks and engines he could never stop the work of those engineers who laboured with fine courage and industry so that the guns might not lack for shells nor the men for supplies on the day of attack. The battle of Wytschaete and Messines was a fine victory for us, breaking the evil spell of the Ypres salient in which our [11] men had sat down so long under direct observation of the enemy on that ridge above them. ”

“ ENTRANCE TO WYTSCHAETE
The motor takes the right-hand road to Oosttaverne (see p. 47) .
On November 3, 1914, during the First Battle of Ypres, it fell into the hands of the enemy. At four o'clock on the following day, the ground between this village and Hollebeke (some four miles to the north) was the scene of several furious attacks (see p. 8) .
Messines was destroyed by the British bombardment during the offensive of June, 1917. The New Zealanders captured it on June 7, in spite of a stubborn defence. They also took the neighbouring village of Wytschaete (see p. 20) . ”

“ This they know, but they do not know the state of mind and body to which those men were reduced. It was better that they fled, for they were not fit to hold positions of responsibility; few of us were; we were too much broken. No one who has not seen Messina, who has not known the survivors, can understand; it was not like a battle, where men go in prepared for death, it was quite another thing!{54}”
While the King was at Messina martial law was proclaimed. General Mazza, who was at home on sick leave, left his bed and hurried to Messina to take command of the troops. ”

“ Hill 60, which had dealt such deadly damage to the British, was rent asunder and collapsed. It was probably the greatest explosion man ever heard on earth up to that time. Then the guns began anew to prepare for the attack and a carefully planned barrage dropped just in front of the English battalions as they advanced. As the men came forward, the barrage was lifted step by step and dropped just ahead of them, to pulverize the enemy and protect the British troops. By five o'clock Messines itself was captured by the fearless Australians. ”

“ Messines, with its memories of four years’ fighting, passed into British hands again, and this time for good. There was, indeed, little else than memories, save the jagged cairn which had been the church, the ruined houses which had been made into concrete blockhouses, some of them left intact, or nearly so, and a few broken tombstones on the site of the cemetery. The Messines Ridge in the chill of a misty, late September morning, when you have been fighting since dawn the day before, and do not know where in the mist the enemy is hidden, provides neither time nor the place for philosophising. ”

“ If it be true that casualties in killed and wounded are the barometer of a regiment's intrepidity, then they indeed register high in the scale, for they lost 9 officers and 400 men in that first night's fighting. In any event they rendered very valuable service in an acute emergency, and it is on record that in a hand to hand bayonet encounter with the Bavarians, they actually drove those noted warriors back. The odds, however, were altogether too great against the little British force, and on the morning of November 1st Messines passed into the hands of the enemy. ”

“ The New-Zealanders reached and captured Messines in an hour and forty minutes after the moment of attack, in spite of heavy fighting in German trenches, where many of the enemy were killed. Irish troops, Nationalists and Ulstermen, not divided in politics on the battlefield, but vying with each other in courage and self-sacrifice, stormed their way up to Wytschaete, and after desperate resistance from the enemy captured all that is left of the famous White Château, which for years our soldiers have watched through hidden glasses as a far high place like the castle of a dream. ”

“ Messines was recaptured by the South Africans, but had to be abandoned when the enemy's advance in the south pushed almost as far as Neuve Eglise. On the 11th, when the enemy continued to extend his gains with seemingly endless reinforcements, and had crossed the Lawe, a tributary of the Lys, Sir Douglas Haig issued his famous Order of the Day to his troops, which, while it reflected the gravity of the situation, inspired them to fight it out:
"Every position must be held to the last man.... ”

“ The first disposition in the Messines area was to strengthen the line of resistance by pushing up the three battalions of the 108th Brigade, the 1st Irish Fusiliers on the left near Pick House, the 9th Irish Fusiliers west of Messines, and the 12th Irish Rifles in the Wulverghem line. The {255} attack on the morning of April 11 was not heavy in this direction, but was rather directed against the Twenty-fifth Division in the Ploegsteert district, where it came ominously close to Hill 63, a commanding point from which the Messines position of the British would be taken in reverse. ”

“ The exasperation of the Messinese reached a height that terrified the legate, who made his escape, after placing the city under interdict. The proposals he took to Charles [596] were "the immediate raising of the siege, and return of the army to the Continent; taxes as in the time of William the Good; and, finally, a formal engagement that the island should no longer be garrisoned by French or Provençals, but by Italians or Latins. "If these conditions are refused," said the bold Messinese, "we will resist till death, though we should eat our children!" ”

“ Many of the inhabitants fled into other countries; but those who remained were reduced to the condition of Helots, and were compelled to pay to their masters half of the produce of their lands.
For thirty-nine years the Messenians endured this degrading yoke. At the end of this time they took up arms against their oppressors. The SECOND MESSENIAN WAR lasted from B.C. 685 to 668. Its hero is Aristomenes, whose wonderful exploits form the great subject of this war. It would appear that most of the states in Peloponnesus took part in the struggle. ”

“ The relieved troops moved back to the comparative comfort of the old British trenches. The night was very disturbed. On more than one occasion the S.O.S. rocket went up on the right of the Division, and at 10 p.m. a counter-attack on Messines was reported. If counter-attack there was, it was of small account. No big attack could, in fact, have been carried out in the darkness. Morning dawned, leaving the British in secure occupation of the battlefield and all their objectives. ”

“ There are a number of large, well-built houses in Messines, which the enemy had turned into a succession of strongholds, but they were rapidly blown up by our sappers. The convent looked especially impregnable with its walls a yard thick, and strong towers from which machine-guns and rifles fired frantically. Captain Heinrich’s Würtemburg battery of the 65th Field Artillery Regiment was therefore brought up, the men dragging the guns through the streets, as horses could not move along them, and the infantry carrying up the ammunition. ”

“ The Spartans, indignant at this conduct, flew to arms, and one night, led by their king, attacked the Messenian town of Am-phe ́a.
As no one expected them, they soon became masters of the place, and in their anger killed all the inhabitants. The other Messenians, hearing of this cruel deed, quickly made ready to fight, and bravely began the struggle which is known as the First Messenian War. ”

“ Charles's knights and officers were clamorous for an instant assault; but he preferred a blockade, not wishing, he said, to punish the innocent with the guilty. M. de St Priest discredits the motive, and attributes such unusual forbearance on the part of the Lion of Anjou to the fear of losing, by the indiscriminate pillage that would follow a successful assault, the great riches Messina was known to contain.
The foe's decision published, Messina threw away the scabbard. A life of freedom, or a glorious death, was the unanimous resolve of its heroic inhabitants. Every man became a warrior ”

“ General Jeffreys of the Nineteenth Division determined none the less to stand his ground, but he threw out a defensive flank along the Messines-Wulverghem Road, and mounted machine-guns to hold any attack from the south. Meanwhile the 57th, South African, and 108th Brigades, in spite of this menace to their right rear continued to hold the Messines front. ”

“ It looked fairly regular for the most part, except where the trenches cut it. Beyond the scrap-heap that once was Pozières two enormous quarries dipped into [Pg 113] the earth on either side of the road. Until the Messines explosion they were the largest mine craters on the western front. Farther along the road was the scene of the first tank raids, where on September 16 the metal monsters waddled across to the gaping enemy and ate up his pet machine-gun emplacements before he had time to recover from his surprise. At the road's end was the forlorn stronghold of Bapaume. ”

“ Meanwhile, finding that strong forces of the Allies had been ranged against them, the Germans to the south of Messines tried to open up a road for their columns with an artillery fire of great intensity. On the other side the British and French ranged a powerful force of guns in a wide arc, and concentrating the fire of these towards one comparatively limited fire-zone on the German front, moved that fire-swept area up and down the hostile line. ”