The conditions British Troops faced in Flanders and Passchendaele.

British Troops in Flanders

The British Troops in Flanders have had to contend with almost incredible difficulties, owing to the autumn and winter rains, which have converted the ground into a morass of bogs and swamps. The photograph shows a domestic scene behind the lines. Some of the men are washing in the floods, while others are shaving and dressing before the day's work begins.

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CS 684. Wt. 7685 - 74m. - 12/17/C. & S. E2202

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Friday, October 12, 1917

"That evening Gough phoned Plumer and asked him to postpone the attack. Sir Herbert declined. It took place at dawn along a six-mile front and gained an average of four hundred yards. For lack of a better name it was called 'The First Battle of Passchendaele,' though in that direction the crater front was pushed forward only a hundred yards. The New Zealanders were badly mauled. The 2nd Brigade, especially, had been trapped astride the Gravenstafel road as they pressed on to the entanglements under a torrent of small arms and machine-gun fire. This wire was totally unbreached except for a single land along the sunken road. Through it the men poured . . .

. . . After the war an official historian coldly asked whether 'any of the higher commanders [were] aware that in these operations the infantry attacked virtually without protection.' The episode had, in fact, almost crossed the line which divides war from murder. Thirteen thousand men were lost in a few hours . . ."

Quotation Context

British General Hubert Gough had commanded the opening attacks in the first three weeks of the Third Battle of Ypres, but Commander Douglas Haig, disappointed in Gough's results, transferred responsibility to General Herbert Plumer. Plumer was initially successful with actions in which the artillery were adequate to support the infantry, but became less so with each action, as he curtailed the time between attacks, leaving the artillery unable to move into position for adequate preliminary bombardments. He ignored the rain, the murderous mud it created on the battlefield, and Gough's advice, and went ahead on October 12 with the First Battle of Passchendaele.

Source

In Flanders Fields, the 1917 Campaign by Leon Wolff, pp. 237 and 238, copyright © 1958 by Leon Wolff, publisher: The Viking Press, publication date: 1958

Tags

1917-10-12, 1917, October, First Battle of Passchendaele, First Passchendaele, Passchendaele, Third Battle of Ypres, Third Ypres