A
History of the 66th (2nd East Lancashire) Division During the Great War
8 June 1917 – The 2/5 Manchester Raid
Another important factor of the BEF’s approach to trench warfare
was the constant stress on taking the offensive, and in the trenchlock
conditions that prevailed on the Western Front that meant raids. Raids
were carried out by any number of men from just 2 or 3 up to an entire
battalion. They were conducted mainly for four reasons:
1) To reconnoitre enemy positions and take prisoners for identification
and interrogation purposes.
2) To destroy specific enemy strongpoints.
3) To maintain the ‘offensive spirit’ and counter the stagnation
of trench warfare.
4) To act as a diversion in order to fix enemy troops whilst operations
took place elsewhere.
In fact GHQ were so obsessed with raiding that they issued a pamphlet
to all officers called ‘Are you offensive enough?’ The response
to this I’ll leave to your imagination!
On 8 June the 66th carried out its first major raid –Operation TABASCO
- with the honour falling to 2/5 Manchester Regiment (199 Brigade) under
Lt.-Col. Hewlett, though the raid itself was carried out by ‘A’
and ‘B’ Companies under Capt. Walmesley Cotham.
Conducting a raid of this magnitude is not a simple case of hopping the
parapet, throwing some grenades, and grabbing some prisoners, but is in
fact a highly complex ‘miniaturised’ operation containing
the same elements and requiring the same skills as any large operation.
Planning for this particular raid began in earnest 8 days before the due
date and required co-operation with Engineers, Machine Gunners, Artillery,
other infantry units, signals, casualty evacuation, and trench mortars.
Specialised equipment had to be prepared and distributed, attack lanes
through our own wire had to be cut, and trenches allocated and policed
for assembly and attack. The artillery barrage alone consisted of a creeping
barrage, howitzer fire, enfilade and flanking fire, counter-battery fire
aimed at German mortars, specific fire on trenches and communication routes,
a general box barrage to enclose the area, and the cutting of German wire.
All of this was co-ordinated with equally complex barrages delivered by
light and heavy trench mortars, with Vickers machine guns laying down
barrages on the German support and reserve lines as well as enfilade fire
on German communication trenches.
Lt-Col. Wilson of 2/6th Manchesters also provided 5 Lewis guns for immediate
support. Finally No.4 Special Company RE were to put down a smoke cloud
at Zero hour and at Zero + 40 to cover the attack and withdrawal. Split
second timing for the operation given the complexity of the artillery
arrangements was crucial. The 2/5 Manchesters had to be in position by
Zero minus 40.
The German lines consisted of:
1) FRONT LINE – 1st objective
2) FIRST LINE – 3rd objective
3) SECOND LINE – 2nd objective
By attacking in this order the FIRST line (the strongest line) could be
isolated
The operation began at 8:25 p.m. when the guns opened fire bang on time
and with excellent accuracy.
At 8:30 the first wave moved off covered by the RE’s smoke screen.
At 8:31 the guns moved off the German FRONT line whilst the first wave
rushed the trenches leaving behind moppers up. The first wave and moppers
up accounted for 7 Germans amongst the shattered trenches.
At 8:33 the barrage crept up to the German FIRST line where it remained
for 4 minutes. At this point 7 members of a German MG team attempted to
surrender. 5 were shot whilst 2 managed to escape into the confusion.
Prisoners were a low priority.
At 8:38 the barrage moved on, as did the first wave once more leaving
moppers up to deal with the Germans. And deal with them they did! 1 German
officer and 5 men emerged from a dug out. The officer was instantly killed,
as were 3 of his men, the other 2 escaping down a tunnel complex. The
tunnels were blocked and guarded whilst the troops awaited the arrival
of 5 sappers of 432 Field Company under the command of Cpl. Perkins all
of whom carried mobile demolition charges.
At 8:48 the troops arrived at their final objective exactly on time.
Between 8:38 and 8:48 the 2nd and 3rd wave of troops swarmed over the
German system creating havoc and destruction as dazed Germans emerged
from their dug outs. 14 prisoners were taken “9 of whom showed fight
on the way back and were bayoneted.” 5 prisoners in total were brought
back, 4 of them wounded. One them attempted to throw a concealed bomb
at their captors but was promptly shot.
By this time the sappers had arrived and had more work to do than they
could possibly cope with. Sappers Huddart, Knight, Hollerton, Ashworth,
and Partington, together with L/Cpl. Sharpe and Cpl. Perkins damaged or
destroyed 12 dugouts and tunnels between them before running out of charges.
Sapper Ashworth was unfortunate in that one of his charges failed to explode,
despite firing 4 shots into it. Having failed to ignite his charge he
also found that his escort riflemen had disappeared leaving him completely
alone! Luckily he found Partington who had also lost his escort and the
2 of them continued their destructive work before helping the infantry
repel a German counter-attack.
The infantry withdrew under cover of smoke 7 minutes before time quite
simply because without more mobile charges all that could be done had
been done.
A moderate estimate of the number of German casualties overall would be
between 125-150. Casualties amongst the 66th amounted to 5 dead, 46 wounded
(mostly slight) and 4 missing.
The operation was a total success, almost a textbook case that earned
the praise of the Divisional Commander, Lawrence and Lt.-Gen. Haking of
XI Corps. It was also important because it was the Division’s first
taste of operational co-ordination and co-operation, even if only on a
small scale.
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