The 48th Battalion had not as yet any experience of life in the immediate front line trenches on the western front. Whilst it lay near Fleurbaix in reserve or in the support trenches, duty had taken some members of the battalion to the front line. Others were induced by curiosity to make stolen excursions. The sight did not impress or interest them over much. The construction of the defence works was interesting in that marshy country where the spade so readily struck water, a deep wall of sandbags rising some eight feet above the ground had to take the place of the impracticable trench. Mounting the fire-step of its deep traverses, they could see over the parapet to where the enemy's wire entanglements began some 80 yards away. The dull grey wall stretched further north and away towards the south, and the enemy's defences maintained their parallel course with it.
The enemy contained himself within his strong line, secure in its power of defence and confident in its advantage as a jumping-off ground for further advance. That strong line entered the department de la Somme on the north of Beaumont Hamel. It then crossed to the left bank of the Ancre and enveloped in its course the high and advantageous ground around Thiepval, which stretched to Pozieres some two miles eastward and there reached its greatest altitude. From Thiepval the enemy's line ran south. Passing through the western outskirts of Fricourt it made the village the apex of a formidable salient by running sharply eastward beyond Maricourt before it again veered towards the south. Up to this point the British trenches ran parallel with it from the north. Here, a short distance north of the Somme, the British garrison linked up with the French. By the latter the Allies' long line of defence was carried across the river and followed on towards the south in its work of resistance.
The task of dislodging the enemy from the high country cut by the Ancre had seemed an impossible one, and he was left in comparatively peaceful occupation of it for nearly two years. During that time he constructed defences with an elaboration never previously conceived. The future was to show how elaborate those defences were - the villages and woods, themselves bristling fortresses, that formed part of or lay immediately behind them to form yet other systems of defence, the winding dug-outs 30 feet under the ground, the concrete machine-gun emplacements and trench-mortar positions, and the miniature forts that defied artillery.
Whilst the enemy was content to remain quiet for the time being in these formidable entrenchments, he was very active in another part of the line. Verdun was being heavily pressed by him, and the French longed for some diversion of his mighty strength. To cause that diversion an attack was at this time determined on against the line so long immune north of the Somme. So the Australian soldiers who had fretted on the sands of Egypt with impatience to participate in the war in France before its finish, had apparently come in time for its real beginning.
At 7.30 on the morning of the first day of July, the great diversion - the first battle of the Somme - commenced. The British main attack was made from that part of its front which extended from Maricourt north of the Somme to a point about a mile north of Beaumont Hamel. The French forces at the same time engaged the enemy both north and south of the Somme. For a week previous to the assault the heaviest artillery fire had been directed against the enemy's defences. The infantry's advance to them on the 1st was preceded by an hour's concentrated bombardment. Some progress was made by the French on the first day's battle as well as by the extreme right wing of the British. North of this any initial success was not maintained, and by nightfall the assaulting troops to the most northern point of the front of attack were forced back to their original trenches. The high ground around Thiepval and further north had proved too formidable an obstacle. On that part of the front any further attempt at advance was for the time being abandoned, and the line there entrusted to General Gough. General Rawlinson, under whom the Australians afterwards achieved such success, proceeded with the attack and immediately set about developing such progress as he had made during the first day on the British right wing.
As a first step to its subsequent success the British attack was limited to a front of six miles. It is a strong testimony to the severity of the task, that after four days fighting on this limited front the attack had only penetrated to a depth of one mile. In the face of its difficulties and of the limitations of the tactics of those days, this was rightly considered a great achievement.
This fighting was directed towards the north. Pozieres lay near the eastern summit of the impregnable ridge, against which attack from the west had so signally failed. Rawlinson, however, was gradually pressing towards it from a southern and south-eastern direction. The advance of a mile during the first four days fighting was at a rate of speed not sustained in the subsequent advance on the ridge, whose possession had become for the time being the great objective of the British in the Somme battle. Repeatedly were weary troops relieved and fresh troops brought to the assault. Yards of ground were gained and lost and regained. Only towards the end of July was the village of Pozieres cleared of the enemy. Even then the highest part of the ridge, which lay north of the village, seemed as unattainable as ever. Thiepval still lay secure and menacing on its western side.
It was at this stage of the struggle for Pozieres ridge and as one of many Australian units sharing in that struggle, that the 48th Battalion played its part in the battle of the Somme. Shortly after the capture of Pozieres, it was on its way through Albert to do battle with the enemy for the higher altitude of the coveted ridge. The battalion bivouacked for the night some two miles north-east of Albert, at a place known on the war map as Tara Hill. From its high ground the men could watch an intense bombardment by our artillery. The whole valley beneath them was lit up by blinding flashes of fire. The big guns thundered all around them. The monster howitzer at Albert every now and then fired its massive shell, which travelled slowly over their heads with the noise of a passing train. Near to the ridge the field-batteries constantly barked. Great volumes of smoke swept along the valley, whilst the air was filled with acrid-smelling fumes. It was the night of August 4, and another attack was being made on the ridge above them by Australian troops.
Next day the operation order was issued that told them what their task should be on the ridge, which they had seen burn like a Vesuvius on the proceeding night. The substance of the order was briefly contained in one part of the instructions, stating that the ground which had been gained was to be held at all costs. That evening they set out for their post. The path they followed was known at different parts by as many names - names which appeared and disappeared from the trench maps of the day, but which are deeply engraved on the memories of those who survived the course and end of that brief journey. Moving in single file and at intervals, platoon followed platoon up through Sausage Valley where the cookers of many Australian battalions were ranged like the stalls at a country fair; around the angle appropriately called Casualty Corner; along the Sunken Road and then stuck close to the comparative safety of Pioneer Trench. Near the junction of Pioneer Trench with Corpse Avenue was the Chalk Pit, and there "D" Company left the column to take up a position in reserve. The other companies continued along Copse Avenue till Tramway Trench was reached. At Tramway Trench "B" and "C" Companies moved yet forward to do first shift on the main work of the battalion.
The work consisted in relieving the unit holding O.G. 1 and O.G. 2, names of tragic reminiscence, that represented on the war map trenches which had been captured on the previous night. Their capture had cost the unit heavily, so heavily as to make its relief necessary as soon as darkness should come to render relief possible. The new garrison could find but little protection in their gaping walls. These had been wrecked and battered by our own artillery in the original attack on them. They were now subject to the fire of the enemy who knew the line of them only too accurately. But those trenches were to be defended "at all costs." To secure this defence much work was necessitated and well outlined beforehand, not only of active defence with the rifle and Lewis gun, but equally important work with the spade to make the rifle and Lewis gun effective or possible.
Use was to be made of the large shell-holes in front of O.G. 2. They were to be scooped out and put in a rough state of defence as strong-points to meet the enemy half way in any attempt he made against the trenches. These outposts were to be manned during the night by Lewis gun teams. Their garrisons were to steal out to them under cover of the darkness and return to O.G. 2 before dawn. Strong fighting patrols were to work between them. Digging was to go on continually in both trenches, that they might be made to afford more protection against the enemy's fire.
The relief did not work out according to programme. The two companies got as far as O.G. 1 and positions were relieved there; but the most difficult part of the task lay in finding O.G. 2. Scouting parties went forward on the right and on the left of the battalion front. There was no answering shout from the trench ahead to give them guidance in the black darkness. Those on the right at last saw a great mound but a short distance in front. They knew it must be what remained of a windmill that had been given to them as a landmark. They had indeed already crossed over O.G.2, no longer recognisable or of use as a trench; so there in front of the windmill they selected a position and constructed a strong-point, by means of which they continued to hold this wing of the battalion front. The party on the left fared better, for there the trench was in parts deep and well dug. The silence of its garrison was soon explained when it was found that all were either dead or badly wounded.
That night the battalion was finally in position about 11 o'clock; not the battalion as it left Tara Hill a few hours previously, but a battalion which had already suffered heavy casualties. Throughout the whole evening the terrible drum-fire of the enemy had been incessant. It still continued with unabated fury. Men who afterwards had experience of many enemy barrages ever recalled that bombardment as the most remarkable, remarkable not only for its intensity but for its long continuity and local concentration. All through the night of the 5th, all through the 6th it lasted, a great impersonal horror, until noon on the 7th, when it abated so suddenly that one felt as if the world had just been freed from the influence of some foul and demoniac oppression.
In the front trenches were men digging for their lives. Shrapnel burst over their heads. High-explosive shells stove in their wretched parapets. The wounded with the parching thirst of hemorrhage upon them called piteously for water. Ever and anon rang out that weird cry of the trenches, "Stretcher-bearers wanted!" Less and pitifully less became the number of those who dug.
There was a communication sap leading from Tramway Trench to the jumping-off trench used in the preceding attack, and for some distance beyond it. But a great part of it had been rendered useless for its purpose by the heavy shell- fire. The immediate approach to the front trenches was made over open ground subject to a withering fire. Along the shallow sap, over the open ground, rations and ammunition had to be carried. By that route came back the wounded, some carried, some walking, some struggling along in agonies of torture. Ever did the German artillery play on it, taking toll of all its traffic, of runners, ration-carriers, stretcher-bearers, wounded. The grey fog of the morning mercifully concealed from enemy eyes the stretcher-bearers, on their mournful journey to and fro between the fatal line and Tramway Trench. But the fog availed not against the shells that required no sight. Time and again was enacted the climax of tragedy, when sufferers and their succourers were hurtled to simultaneous death.
It was thought that the sustained heavy shelling could have but one ending, a counter-attack of the enemy. The battalion commander therefore made all preparations for it on the evening of the 6th. The company that had been in reserve now took over the trenches O.G. 1 and O.G. 2 from the very reduced companies that were holding them. The support company was still kept in close support, for a bitter lesson had been learnt as to the inadvisability of crowding men in the trenches. It was rightly considered better to risk a temporary set-back than to make casualties certain.
At 5 o'clock the next morning the expected counter-attack was made. The S.O.S. was immediately sent up for artillery protection. Messages were also sent to the rear by pigeon service and by runners, for in that area of concentrated shelling no one could trust the telephone wires. But before these messages brought their redeeming help, the first wave of the advancing enemy appeared over the crest of the ridge. On the left side of the trench the enemy succeeded in penetrating our line, not evenly and regularly but in small groups here and there.
The position for a time was a dangerous one and it looked as if the Germans would not only regain the ground but also make easy capture of a few prisoners. But with the unit on the left flank of the 48th was a soldier who had a good head for an emergency, Jacka, V.C. of the 14th. With a small body of men he cleverly attacked the enemy from the rear even as two platoons of the support company of the 48th rushed forward. The Germans, so lately enjoying a partial success, were thus made prisoners. Just then down came our artillery barrage. It caught great numbers of the enemy who were lying on the other side of the ridge, waiting to exploit the success of the preceding waves in the advance. The havoc wrought among the enemy was very great, and they made no further attempts to regain the much disputed trenches.
After that terrible ordeal the same work of getting away the wounded recommenced, the same congestion of the narrow sap at battalion headquarters where was the medical officer with his many helpers. Along that narrow trench the wounded lay whilst one dreaded the tragedy that a chance shell might cause among them.
Even as those wounded were being taken away one of those tragedies of ill-chance was being enacted further down the sap. Some details of the two companies of the 48th which had been relieved on the preceding evening were gathered around a battalion cooker in the cold raw morning waiting for a drink of tea. A shell fell near the cooker and killed 26 men immediately and wounded 16. The memory of this disaster remained long with men in the 48th. The great destruction of human life caused by one shell and the hard ill-fortune overwhelming the victims who had already survived so much were the outstanding features that made it an incident not easily forgotten in the battalion.
There was no possibility of relieving the small garrison until darkness should come to cover their movements, so the men settled down to another day. Still the shells rained upon them and still their numbers grew less, until noon when the intense bombardment suddenly abated. Then it was these survivors had some hope of getting away from that death-trap. For the remainder of the day they were in comfort by contrast with the conditions they had hitherto been experiencing.
At night relief came. It was not a battalion that marched out of the trenches but more like a jaded, tired, worn-out working-party making its way to the rear before dawn after a night spent in digging a jumping-off trench for some fresh advance, but presenting such a picture of war-worn weariness as no working-party has ever shown. One by one the men filed down Pioneer Trench along the sunken road and back again through Sausage Gully.
What had they done since they went up that gully two nights previously? Apparently very little; it looks but very little on the war map. Their work had been to hold Old German Trench No. 1 and Old German Trench No. 2 at all costs. They delivered over those trenches to the relieving unit. They had done their work.