THE 7TH (GUARDS) ENTRENCHING BATTALION
Entrenching Battalion. 1915-18.
The enormous amount of spade work, required for the long and intricate network of trenches, rendered some measures necessary for supplementing the work, usually done by the fighting forces; and thus entrenching battalions were formed, composed of drafts for the front, awaiting absorption in their respective units; but the system of detaching men from Battalions of Guards and sending them to fill any vacancies that might occur in one of the entrenching battalions was not at all satisfactory. In the first place, to allow men on arrival in France at once to go to an entrenching battalion, where the discipline was more lax, and the habits and customs different from those which obtained in the regiments of Guards was a measure hardly calculated to improve them as fighting men. And in the second place, it was contrary to the regulations for men of the Guards to be commanded by any but their own officers.
Frederic Robinson. Camberley. photographerEmery Walker ph. sc.Brigadier-General A.F.A.N. Thorne, D.S.O.
Frederic Robinson. Camberley. photographerEmery Walker ph. sc.
Brigadier-General A.F.A.N. Thorne, D.S.O.
The idea of forming a Guards Entrenching Battalion seems to have come from certainofficers at the base. Shortly before the arrival of the new battalions of the Guards in France, rumours were afloat that an entrenching battalion for the Guards Division was about to be formed. Captain Viscount Lascelles wrote a letter to the effect that a platoon from the reinforcements of every battalion of Guards was to be diverted to an entrenching battalion. The platoon from the 2nd Battalion Grenadiers had already been told off, and was to be commanded by an officer of the Connaught Rangers, while the Battalion itself was to be placed under a cavalry captain. Captain Viscount Lascelles deplored the fact that there was no one of sufficient seniority at the base, to combat these proposals, and thought the whole matter should be referred to the Lieutenant-Colonel rather than let it lapse, on the judgment of half a dozen ensigns at the base.
Nothing, however, appears to have been done until November, when a Guards Entrenching Battalion was formed, and Major E. C. Ellice, Grenadier Guards, was sent out to take command. He arrived at Chipilly on the Somme, about five miles from Bray, on December 1, 1915, and took over the Battalion from Major Clutterbuck, who had been temporarily in command. The Battalion consisted of 230 Grenadiers, 300 Coldstream, 250 Scots Guards, and 200 Irish Guards, with 40 tunnellers from the Royal Engineers.
Major Ellice, having made the acquaintance of his new Battalion, appointed Lieutenant Ian Bullough, Coldstream Guards, to be Adjutant, while Captain Jones, who had hitherto occupied that post, became Quartermaster. The Battalionwas divided up into four companies: No. 1 Company Grenadiers under Captain M. Lloyd, No. 2 Coldstream under Lieutenant Viand, No. 3 Scots Guards under Lieutenant Maitland, and No. 4 Irish Guards under Lieutenant Hanbury. The billets in which the men lived were not only uncomfortable but also extremely inconvenient, being sometimes over a mile apart, and so cramped were the men for room that pigsties even were made use of to house them: it was therefore with pleasure that Major Ellice received instructions to move the men to Wood Camp, which was no paradise, but still preferable to the pigsties, and much nearer the trenches. An old stone quarry, worked by a gang of twelve quarry-men under a Lieutenant in the Royal Engineers, provided the material for draining the camp and improving the roads. Water carts were obtained to provide sufficient water for cooking parties, and fatigue parties were sent every evening to draw water for other purposes from the Somme.
The great advantage of an entrenching battalion was quickly seen by the rest of the Army, since the battalions that came out of the front line were relieved of working during their rest. It had formerly been the custom for resting battalions to dig reserve lines, but now this duty was taken over by the entrenching battalion. All reserve trenches were made by it; emplacements for field-guns, howitzers, and machine-guns constructed, brushwood cut for revetting, roads repaired, carrying parties for all materials necessary for trench warfare supplied.
The staff of the Battalion was kept as permanent as possible, but the Battalion itself was used as a stepping-stone from the base battalion to the Battalions in the front line. The training the officers received was invaluable, as it accustomed them to shell-fire. One or two shells invariably fell near the working-parties; sometimes as many as thirty to forty shells would explode in the neighbourhood. This showed the officers that the effect was local, unless the shell happened to strike a hard surface. It gave them confidence, and they gradually became used to unaimed shell-fire.
At the end of December 1915 Captain Bullough was ordered to join his Battalion, and Captain M. K. A. Lloyd, Grenadier Guards, succeeded him as Adjutant.
1916.
In January 1916 the Entrenching Battalion was employed on the second-line trenches, and in constructing gun emplacements for the artillery. This latter duty involved technical knowledge on the part of the officers, who had to work from plans supplied to them by the gunners. About this time it was found that the Amiens—Somme Canal afforded better means of transport for rations and road-making material than the lorries, which had hitherto been used for that purpose; and it was necessary to make a light railway across some marshy ground between Bray road and the Canal. The Entrenching Battalion was employed in making 3000 fascines for this purpose, and the men became so expert at their work that there was keen competition between the various companies as to which should turn out the most fascines.
In April 1916 preparations for the offensive operations on the Somme were begun, and the Entrenching Battalion played a great part during this battle, which lasted six months. The Guards Division was not employed in the initial stages of the battle, and it was therefore not until July that the Entrenching Battalion moved up to the vicinity of Fricourt, to take over the forward roads in the battle area. The constant shelling, combined with the heavy traffic, made it peculiarly difficult to keep the roads in sufficiently good repair for constant use, but in spite of all difficulties the roads were kept open all the time, and this was entirely due to the ability and energy of the officers and the efficiency and discipline of the men. Throughout the year the duties of the Entrenching Battalion were many and various, and at times the work was very heavy, but it was always cheerfully undertaken, because the men prided themselves on being part of the Guards Division, and knew that more than the average amount of work done by the other entrenching battalions was expected from them.
1917.
In January 1917 the Battalion was employed in strengthening the defences of Ginchy and Combles, and in the successful operations against the Germans early that year it participated in the various works, on which all arms were engaged. In April it was encamped for some months in the neighbourhood of Havrincourt Wood, and was employed in preparations for the offensive in the direction of Cambrai, which, however, did not take place till November. In June the Battalion made a farther move to Roisel, where for some monthsit was busily employed in digging a line of trenches some nine miles long, from Epeley to within three miles of St. Quentin. The strength of the Battalion had now risen to over 2000 men. The work on these trenches was very interesting, as it was in sight of the Hindenburg line, and although works of some importance were undertaken, Major Ellice and his Entrenching Battalion were given complete charge of this area.
Although the Guards Entrenching Battalion had constantly worked in the forward areas, the other entrenching battalions had been employed mostly in rear on work which could as easily have been done by labour battalions or Chinese, and they had consequently diminished in strength. In September 1917 the attention of the military authorities was directed to these entrenching battalions, with the result that it was decided to disband them. General Feilding asked that the Guards Entrenching Battalion might be maintained, but this was not considered possible. In October the final disbandment took place.