At 07:30 on the 1st July 2016 I stood at the Tyneside Memorial dedicated to the men of the Tyneside Scottish and Irish, exactly 100 years after they went over the top.
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| La Boisselle 1st July 2016 |
Tyneside Scottish 1st July 1916
In 1916 after a winter of stalemate in the trenches an offensive on the Somme was envisaged in order to defeat the German Army on the Western Front .
The aim was to break through the enemy defences with infantry , create a breach for cavalry to exploit and penetrate deep into German held territory.
The plan was to attack along a broad front of 22km and would involve over 100,000 soldiers in the initial assault.
The 4,500 men of the Tyneside Scottish Brigade were tasked to assault on the axis of the Albert -Bapaume Road to secure objectives around Contalmaison.
The Tyneside Irish Brigade would then exploit beyond the village.
The attack on the German lines was to be preceded by a massive bombardment. Over 1,400 guns of all calibres and 1.6 million shells were made available.
Expectations were high. It was envisaged that this amount of firepower would destroy the German defences, General Sir Henry Rawlinson informed his subordinates that
"nothing could exist at the conclusion of the bombardment in the area covered by it".
Artillery Plan - La Boisselle
To deal with two specific strong points tunnellers of the Royal Engineers had been working since October 1915 to place mines underneath the German lines at Y-Sap and Lochnagar.
La Boisselle Mines
At 07:28 a.m. 1st July 1916 the two huge mines in the vicinity of La Boisselle were detonated. The concussion shook the ground for miles around, the air was filled with dust and debris.
Two minutes later the Tyneside Scottish left their trenches and advanced towards the German front line.
The preliminary bombardment had not been successful. From the higher ground above the valleys of ‘Sausage’ and ‘Mash’ German machine gunners emerged from camouflaged positions. The machine guns together with German artillery, which the preliminary bombardment failed to destroy, began to bring down murderous fire on the Tyneside Scots.
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| La Boisselle 1st July 1916 34 Division Troops take cover |
“The attack had been pushed on with
extraordinary heroism , but with no avail.
Officers and men had been literally mowed down, but in rapidly diminishing numbers they resolutely pushed on yo meet their deaths close to the enemy wire.
No mans land was reported to be heaped with dead."
“While the enemy’s Artillery caused
many casualties our losses were mainly due to the intensity of the enemy’s
machine gun fire”
THE STORY OF THE TYNESIDE SCOTTISH
BRIGADIER-GENERAL TREVOR TERNAN
As night fell on the Tyneside Scottish sector the remnants of the Brigade withdrew to the trenches they had left that morning, no mans land strewn with dead and wounded.
Losses were such that the Tyneside Scottish, together with the Tyneside Irish who had suffered similar heavy losses, were withdrawn from the line a few days later.
