Captain. Henry Armstrong MC. (known as Hal) was born
on the 19th May 1886, son of Henry Armstrong, and Phoebe Hannah Armstrong (nee
Alexander) at 1 North Terrace, Newcastle - on - Tyne.
He was educated at Royal Grammar School,
Newcastle-on-Tyne, and left school in 1902, at the age of 16. He immediately started work,
as a shipping manager, (now known as a broker) at Messrs Cairns, Noble & Co Ltd, where
he was employed from 1902 until 1928.
World War 1 1914-1918
He joined the ranks of the 19th Bn Northumberland
Fusiliers, becoming Quarter Master Sargeant.
Hal Armstrong, front row on the left
CQMS 19th Bn Northumberland Fusiliers cc. 1914
(A note on this photograph from Graham
Stewart: I believe the officer in the photo (centre) is one Lt & QM H.Perry, who left
the 19th Bn in May 1915, to become Adjutant of the 19th D.L.I.)
He served in the UK with Group A, 3rd Line
Northumbrian Division, (* See Note below) and promoted to 2nd Lieutent, from October 1915,
he was attached to Headquarters, Northern Command. He had been applying for release to
serve in France, and in March 1916, this request had been granted. In a letter on the 10th
March 1916, The Brigadier general wrote, releasing him, but went to much pains to point
out what a useful and difficult to replace officer he had been to Northern Command HQ.
He transferred to the 3/5th Bn Northumberland
Fusiliers as a 2nd Lieutenant, and duly proceeded to France, and the 50th Division.
He won the M.C. on the 14th November 1916, in a
joint attack by the 50th Division, on Hook Sap and the GIRD Line (on the right of the
Butte de Warlencourt), with the 7th Bn NF on the left, and the 5th NF on the right. The
5th NF fared better than the 7th, with Lieut Armstrong and his men taking and holding the
GIRD Line, and defending it against strong counter attack.
_________________
His citation in the London Gazette on the 10th
January 1917 reads;
2nd Lt.Henry Armstrong, North'd Fus. For
conspicuous gallantry in action. He displayed great courage and ability in reorganising
his men. Later he held 150 yards of the captured enemy trench for 36 hours until he was
relieved.
_________________
Unfortunately, due to the exposed position and
failure of the 7th NF on the left, (one company dissapeared without trace), the position
had to be abandoned.
Link (Goto description of attack on
Hook Sap on the 14th Nov 1916) Link
Later he transferred again, to the 6th
Northumberland Fusiliers and being promoted to Captain Adjutant.
He was severely wounded on the 29th March 1918, at
the Battle of Rosierès, while
taking over command. (See Below)
Hal Armstrong, seated centre
at Rouen Hospital in 1918
And standing on right
After the War
After the war he returned to work at Messrs Cairns,
Noble & Co Ltd, in 1919, and was put in charge at Middlesborough.
At Messrs Cairns, Noble & Co Ltd, he met his
wife Linda Kathleen (Kath) Sutherland, daughter of Sir Arthur Sutherland of Newcastle upon
Tyne, They were married on the 19th March 1928 at Holy Trinity Church, Jesmond, Newcastle
upon Tyne. (Incidentally Sir Arthur Sutherland who made his fortune in shipping, went on
to own Aston Martin, the car makers, prior to its sale to David Brown).
He worked for the Tyne-Tees Shipping Company from
1928 to 1948 as manager.
He was reprasentative of shipowners, Tyne
improvement commission 1931 - 1951, and became deputy chairman of the Tyne-Tees Shipping
Company in 1948.
On the 26th May 1936, he received a letter from the
Lt. Col commander of the 5th Bn Royal Northumberland Fusiliers.TA. relinquishing his
commission as a reserve officer, and Hal was said to have taken this very hard indeed.
Hal was also Govenor of the Royal Grammar School from 1936 to 1952. He
retired from all business after a severe illness in 1951.
Hal died very suddenly after a further short illness on November the 27th
1955.
Hal in 1950
The Battle of
Rosierès 1918
Three Years ago
By Captain Hal Armstrong M.C.
(This eye
witness account of the gallant part played by the Sixth Battalion Northumberland Fusiliers
in the retreat of the Fifth Army in March 1918, was published in 1921)
Three years ago, the British Empire was
approaching one of the most terrible crises in its history. The collapse of Russia a year
previously had relieved the enemy in the East and freed sufficient troops for the great
offensive in the West, which it was essential Germany should launch before the full
strength of America could be brought into the field.
The situation at that time can be crystallized in
the stirring words addressed later to the troops in France by Sir Douglas Haig: “With
our backs to the wall and believing in the justice of our cause, each one of us must fight
to the end. The safety of our homes and the freedom of mankind depend alike upon the
conduct of each one of us at the critical moment.” When the German onslaught on the
21st March, 1918 broke like a tidal wave against the infantry of the Fifth
Army, The Sixth Battalion Northumberland Fusiliers (149th Infantry Brigade, 50th
(Northumbrian) Division) was in billets in the Mezieres in Fifth Army reserve. The
Sixth Battalion had been out of the line for about five weeks.
The first part of this rest was spent at
Moringhem, in the vicinity of St. Omer, and about a fortnight before the great attack the
battalion, together with the rest of the 50th Division, was moved to the
district south-east of Amiens.
The battalion was in splendid condition.
Lieut.-Colonel Frank Robinson, D.S.O., was in command, and as all who served under him
know, a period of “rest” under Colonel Robinson was about three times as
strenuous as an average tour in the trenches. Life was one breathless round of manoeuvres,
drill, spick-and-span guard mountings, and “strafings” on the subject of
smartness – combined, it is true, with quite a good proportion of recreation in the
way of sports (only a shade less strenuous than the work of training), battalion concerts
and cinema shows. But this tireless commanding officer, who worked himself even harder
than he worked his officers and men, had his reward, and, when the call came, the Sixth
were ready, and what is more fit.
For a fortnight before the fateful 21st,
the weather conditions had been more like July than March. The sun shone from a cloudless
sky. Dust lay white and thick upon the long, straight, poplar-lined roads, and early
butterflies flitted about the gardens of the village.
The Company Commanders, if the writer’s
memory serves, were Captain Leathart, “A” Company; Captain Dawson, “B”
Company; Captain Davis, “C” Company; and Captain Drummond (fated, alas, to be
killed a few days later), “D” Company. The Second-in-Command of the battalion
was Major Eric Temperley, and the Adjutant Captain Armstrong.
Captain Henry Armstrong MC
Dame rumour had whispered for some time that the
great German offensive would start on the 21st March, and in the meantime all
officers had reconnoitred the front line areas, with special regard to certain points,
which it was the battalion’s particular job to recapture if they were seized by the
enemy. Alas when he did attack, Brother Boche took these points in his stride, and nothing
more was heard of them.
After dinner in the Battalion Headquarters Mess,
on the night of the 20th, the Colonel was heard to remark that he thought it
would be a sound scheme to go early to bed. “For,” he said, “it may be the
last chance of a comfortable night’s sleep which we shall have for many a long
day.”
He spoke half in jest, for nobody, at any rate no
mere regimental officer, knew the exact date planned by the Boche for the assault. But his
words proved true. Although Mezieres lay some forty miles from the front line, early next
morning the battalion heard the tremendous bombardment commence, and even at that distance
from the line, felt the far-off vibration of the terrific barrage which fell on the Fifth
Army front. Before seven o’clock orders were received from Brigade that the battalion
was to move at six o’clock that evening.
The long expected attack had commenced and Germany
was making her last desperate bid for victory.
Forthwith the leave warrant of the Battalion
Transport Officer was cancelled – the unfortunate youth was to have proceeded on
leave that day, and expressed considerable annoyance at being prevented by such triviality
as an enemy offensive, and the battalion set to work upon its blankets, “to be
tightly rolled into bundles of ten”, and all the other multifarious details of
packing up.
That evening the battalion paraded ready to move
into the line. Packs, blankets and service caps were stored with the Quartermaster, and
the troops wore fighting order. Very smart and efficient they looked. Not a strap was out
of place. Each haversack, carried on the shoulders, showed the waterproof sheet neatly
folded under the flap. Every steel helmet had the “blue oblong” newly painted on
the side. Buttons shone and trenching tool helves were spotlessly white. Colonel and
Company Commanders viewed with pardonable pride the result of their labours.
The Sixth was sometimes accused of being addicted
to”eye-wash” by other battalions of the Division. But in the infantry
”eye-wash” often spells discipline.
Night of
21/22 March.
Prompt on the stroke of six, the battalion set out
on its eight-mile march to Guillaucourt, where it was to entrain. Night had fallen before
the battalion passed through Caix, but the entrainment at Guillaucourt was carried out
smoothly, and, before dawn, Brie, on the Somme Canal, was reached. Here the battalion was
to detrain. Brie lies on the Canal where the latter is crossed by the long, straight main
road which runs eastward from Amiens, through Villers Brettoneux, to Vermand. Orders were
received that the battalion was to take up a position astride this road at Poeuilly, about
eight miles east of the Canal. The Colonel and Company Commanders left Brie immediately by
motor lorry to reconnoitre the line and arrange dispositions, leaving the battalion to
detrain and march to Poueilly under the Adjutant (Captain Hal Armstrong).
At this time no one in the battalion knew that any
advance had been made by the enemy, but on the line of march the situation became only too
clear. Fifteen miles from what had been the front line, aerodromes, Corps laundries, and
Lines of Communication units of all sorts, were packing up and moving rearwards.
The pathetic remnants of one abandoned laundry
were seen, where thousands of clean shirts were stacked by the roadside. Normally clean
shirts were not too plentiful when wanted. Now, when nobody had time to bother about such
trivialities, there was, so to speak, a glut of clean shirts.
The sullen, resentful appearance of the details
moving to the rear was particularly noticeable. One began to realize that something was
wrong. For two years the British Army had held the initiative, and it was with a strange,
almost uncanny feeling of depression that one saw so unusual a spectacle as preparation
for withdrawal.
22nd
March
By nine o’clock in the morning of the 22nd
March the battalion arrived, somewhat footsore and weary, at Poeuilly; the village, on the
forward crest of a slight slope, was a mere heap of bricks and mortar through which ran
the line allotted to the battalion. “A” Company held the left of the front in
touch with the 150th Brigade. “D” Company held the village itself,
and the other companies held the remainder of the battalion front as far as the crest of a
wooded cliff on the right, where the ground rose abruptly to a high plateau. On this
plateau the Fourth Battalion held the line, in touch with the Sixth Battalion right.
Meantime, the fighting could be heard drawing nearer. About noon, information was received
that the 24th Division, in contact with the enemy, would retire through the 50th
Division, leaving the Northumbrians in the front line. This was duly carried out and the
Sixth Battalion watched the haggard, weary, battle worn men stagger through their lines.
About this time the Sixth was reinforced by a company of the Fifth Battalion.
Very soon the Sixth Battalion positions, quite
peaceful; when they were first occupied, were subject to heavy rifle and machine-gun fire,
and enemy skirmishers were in touch with the forward posts. During the afternoon and
evening the Sixth Battalion absolutely held the enemy, broke up their attacks, and took a
number of prisoners.
The speed of the German advance was evidenced by
the fact that the pockets of all these prisoners were stuffed with packets of English
cigarettes looted from canteens which had been captured before arrangements could be made
to move them.
As night fell the German attacks became more
determined and there was heavy shelling by the enemy. But the Sixth held on. Between ten
o’clock and midnight, however, it became increasingly evident that something was
seriously wrong on the right, and at midnight orders came that, as the enemy had advanced
fully half a mile past the right of the Sixth Battalion, a retirement of about two miles
to a new line was to be effected at 2.a.m. (23rd March).
This retirement was carried out successfully.
Every precaution was taken to prevent the enemy becoming aware of it, and Lewis gunners
were left in the line for about 20 minutes to carry on desultory fire, after the main body
of the battalion had evacuated the positions. By this time the Germans had ceased
attacking, apparently for the night, but the weather was so fine, and the roads and open
country in such excellent condition that the enemy transport and artillery were being
brought up practically with his infantry. A heavy trench mortar was shelling the main road
as “A” Company, the last company to leave, passed through the village.
23rd
March
About 4 a.m. the new position was reached. The
cookers were waiting with hot tea, rum and food, which the cold, hungry men thoroughly
enjoyed. The new trenches were, so to speak, skeleton trenches only. They were dug to a
depth of about six inches to mark the line, and the troops took up their positions and
proceeded to complete them. The new line was not a good one. It was in flat, open country,
and without any tactical features to give the defence any chance whatsoever.
Doubtless, however, there were some other very
excellent reasons for occupying it, which were not apparent.
At 7.30 a.m. the enemy again attacked in force,
his machine gunners, as usual, advancing with his infantry. The German machine gunners
were magnificently trained troops, and extraordinarily dashing and gallant. The wonderful
initiative and tactical ability displayed by their N.C.O.s contributed more than anything
else to the German successes during this period, and this branch of the enemy forces was
the admiration of the British troops – officers and men alike.
On the 23rd March, as on the two
preceding days, a mist in the early morning covered the first movements of the attackers.
At 8 a.m. the commanding Officer received orders that the Sixth Battalion would again
retire. The reason for this order the writer does not know definitely. Most probably it
was to conform to some retirement on the far left. By the time the order reached the
companies, the advanced platoons were heavily engaged with overwhelming hordes of the
enemy. No orders for retirement could reach them, and all through those terrible days not
a man of the Sixth Battalion ever fell back except under definite command.
Second-Lieutenant Hamilton was one of those who was never heard of again, and there is no
doubt that he and his men died, enormously outnumbered, fighting gallantly to the last.
Once again, sorely against its will, the Sixth
Battalion fell back, this time over flat, open country, in broad daylight and in full view
of the enemy. Once more the value of tireless, persistent training was proved. The
discipline was perfect. A writer in the Nineteenth
Century, who wrote a history of the disaster to the Fifth Army, saw and described the
movements of the Sixth Battalion at this point, watching from high ground in the
neighbourhood of Athies. He says that the troops behaved as if part of a set piece on an
Aldershot field day, each company falling back in perfect order, covered by the fire of
another company, an officer controlling the field with a whistle. Half a dozen Boche
aeroplanes swooped low over the battalion, inflicting heavy casualties with machine guns,
and obviously giving the range to the enemy artillery, for stage by stage in the
retirement the troops were heavily shelled. And
so, once more, the Sixth came to Brie, which they had left but thirty hours before. Troops
and transports of all sorts were pouring across the bridges, the crossing being covered by
troops of the Devons. Headquarters (which crossed last) and various details of the Sixth
Battalion took up position close by the bridge, on the western side of the canal, the
companies being on the same side, but further south, and about two o’clock in the
afternoon (23rd March) the brie bridges were blown up by the sappers.
During the night of the 23rd-24th
March, the enemy made a half-hearted attempt to cross the canal by the remnants of a
bridge a mile or two south of Brie, but was unsuccessful, and the night passed more or
less quietly except for shelling, although the Sixth Battalion were standing-to or on the
move from point to point practically the whole time.
The battalion had now been without rest or sleep,
night or day, from the morning of the 21st to the morning of the 24th,
marching, fighting or digging almost incessantly during that time. About 8.a.m. on the 24th
(the Eighth Division then holding the line on the canal), the Sixth Battalion were ordered
back to Foucaucourt for a few hours’ rest. The main Amiens road (on which Foucaucourt
lies about seven miles from the canal) runs due west from Brie, but orders were given that
the battalion should make a detour round Villers Carbronnel, as the enemy’s heavies
were bombarding the latter place with high explosive. The battalion moved off, so to
speak, tail first. “D” Company leading, Captain Drummond following in the rear
of his company.
The troops duly “fetched a compass”
round about Villers Carbronnel and rejoined the main road west of the village, where all
seemed quiet. Alas! Just as the rear of “D” Company scrambled over the hedge
onto the road, a solitary shell droned from the eastward and burst by the roadside.
Captain Drummond fell mortally wounded and died shortly afterwards. He was one of the most
popular officers in the battalion-gallant, soldierly and energetic. At an earlier stage in
the war he had been severely wounded, but had recovered sufficiently to rejoin his
battalion, and do further excellent work both on the Arras front and in the fighting round
Houthulst Forest.
Two miles west of Villers Carbronnel, the cookers
and water-carts were waiting, and tea was issued to the men during a welcome halt. The
country here was quite familiar to the troops, as close to the spot chosen for the halt
was the old front line held by the 149th Brigade in February 1917, just prior
to the German retirement.
After a short rest, the battalion pushed on and
arrived at Foucaucourt about noon. Here food was issued, and officers and men were
informed that they might sleep for five hours, as the battalion would move forward again
that evening. Immediately after foot-inspection and the issue of much needed fresh socks,
everyone flung themselves on the floor of the huts and slept like logs.
At five o’clock the same evening (24th
March) the battalion paraded once more. Even one short afternoon’s rest had worked a
wonderful change in the men. Certain small deficiencies of kit and equipment (inevitable
after the three strenuous preceding days) had been made good, and the battalion looked
quite smart and eminently workmanlike. The orders were to take up a defensive position
east of the village of Assevillers. This village lies about two miles north of the
Amiens-Vermand road, and about four miles west of the canal. To reach it entailed a short
march of four miles from Foucaucourt. The Colonel and Company Commanders preceded the
troops to reconnoitre the new positions, leaving the battalion to march up under the
Adjutant (Captain Hal Armstrong). By about 8 p.m. the companies had all taken up their
positions, Battalion Headquarters occupying a cellar in Assevillers itself. In the new
position, the troops were merely in reserve, the 66th Division occupying the
front line on the canal north of the Amiens-Vermand road, and the Eighth Division south of
the road.
Next morning the Sixth Battalion moved forward
across country in artillery formation to reinforce the troops holding the high ground
overlooking the Somme Canal to the north of Barleux. During the afternoon the enemy
crossed the Canal south of Peronne, but a dashing charge by a battalion of the Cheshire
Regiment drove them back temporarily. However, the pressure increased, and the nature of
the country gave the Germans every chance of approaching the canal bank without being
observed.
Orders were received that the Sixth Battalion
should fall back that night (25th) to the Assevillers line, conforming with the
66th Division, and, accordingly, shortly after midnight, the battalion retired
to the defensive positions east of Assevillers, which they had left that morning. The
Sixth Battalion were the left flank troops of the 50th Division and were in
touch on the left with troops of the 66th Division.
The position appeared to be an excellent one. The
Commanding Officer went carefully round the companies and the various posts before dawn.
There seemed no point which was capable of improvement, and contact with troops of the 66th
Division was close.
At 7.30 a.m. (26th March) the enemy
attacked again. A storm of machine-gun bullets swept the Sixth Battalion and the troops of
the 66th Division, and once again hordes of Germans flung themselves upon the
thin lines of British soldiers. The Sixth Battalion stood fast but alas! The 66th
Division were compelled to fall back. In justice to the Lancashire men, it must be said
that their retirement was not due to any lack of courage. They had fought desperately
through the whole attack since the 21st, and were reduced to a mere remnant.
They had lost almost ball their officers, and their companies were about the strength of
ordinary platoons. But the river Somme, which runs here from east to west parallel with
and about four miles to the north of the Amiens-Vermand road, was between the 66th
Division and the troops on their left, and there seems little doubt that a sudden advance
of the enemy along the Somme valley, due to a British retirement north of the Somme, was
the cause of the 66th Division falling back.
To hold Assevillers now was hopeless. At 9 a.m. orders came to withdraw to a
line between Rosierès and Vauvillers, and the battalion accordingly retired. A pause was
made in Foucaucourt, after the first stage of the retirement, which took place over rough
country, much broken by wire and old trenches. Rolls were called and stragglers rejoined
their sections, and in perfect order, although much reduced by casualties, the battalion
took up its new position.
As the battalion passed through Foucaucourt, huts and stores were blazing. If the place could not
be held, at any rate nothing of value was to be permitted to fall into the hands of the
enemy.
At Foucaucourt cross-roads two runners had been
left with a message for an officer who had not yet passed through. Later in the day the
writer learned that these runners had waited at the cross-roads with the military
policeman on duty until the Germans were entering the village a couple of hundred yards
away. The policeman then ordered the runners to leave. When they came away the policeman
remained. He was standing at his post as cool and calm as a constable who stands at the
foot of Northumberland Street.
Shells were bursting round him, and the
approaching enemy were but a stone’s throw from him. Apparently he had no orders to
quit his post, and he stood fast. One wonders if by any chance he is alive to-day, or
whether, as seems probable, he died heroically at his post.
In the new position between Rosierès and Vauvillers all was quiet on the
immediate front of the Sixth Battalion. A scratch force of labour troops and details of
some of the 150th brigade were holding a series of posts in front, and were to
be relieved by Sixth and other battalions of the Brigade after nightfall.
The afternoon was fine, but rather cold, and an
abandoned casualty clearing station, about six hundred yards in front of the new line, was
a veritable treasure mine to the tired troops, who found blankets and wraps of all kinds.
These they carried back to the trenches and posts they were occupying, and made themselves
thoroughly comfortable. The R.S.M. was observed taking a well earned nap attired in a
many-hued dressing gown of thick, comfortable wool, and of ample proportions. The
excellent Warrant Officer was reclining on a couch of blankets, and altogether had an air
of almost oriental dignity and luxury.
Darkness came on, and the Sixth took over the
advanced posts, with other troops of the 50th Division on the right and left.
The night passed away quietly. Tentative advances by enemy patrols were
easily repulsed. Dawn of the 27th March came and with it the usual stand-to,
but on the Sixth Battalion front the enemy did not make his customary morning attack.
During the day, however, two fierce assaults accompanied by heavy artillery bombardments
were delivered by the Germans against the town of Rosierès on the immediate right. Far
away, almost out of rifle range, the Sixth could see large numbers of Germans moving to
the assault of Rosierès and did what they could with rifles and Lewis guns to help their
comrades on the right. The village of Vauvillers, just south of the Amiens – Vermand
road, was approximately the left boundary of the 5oth Divisional front and, though the
Northumbrian troops did not at the time know it, the enemy was making rapid advance in the
region of the Somme and the country north of the main road.
Early in the afternoon of the 27th March, a telephone message from
Brigade Headquarters informed the Sixth Battalion that all was well. The enemy had been
definitely repulsed from Rosierès on the right. But almost immediately afterwards another
message was received which put a very different complexion upon the whole situation.
The Germans had broken through the troops on the left and, advancing rapidly,
would soon be behind the left flank of the Northumbrians. The Sixth Battalion, the message
continued, was to retire, conforming with the battalion on the left.
Once more, sullenly and unwillingly, the Sixth fell back. They had been
holding the forward slope of a slight eminence, and they retired over the ridge behind
them. A rearguard, consisting of the Colonel, the Adjutant, (Captain Hal Armstrong) about
four subalterns and some seventy men, crossed the ridge and a light railway just west of
the ridge about ten minutes after the main body of the battalion had done so. The Germans
were close on their heels.
The crest of the rise lay some forty yards behind a rough trench which had
been occupied by Battalion Headquarters, and the light railway lay a further forty yards
west of the crest. Troops lying behind the low bank of this railway were invisible to
anyone who occupied the recent Battalion Headquarters position.
Almost immediately after the rearguard crossed the railway, Colonel Anstey,
the gallant G.S.O. (1) of the 50th Division, galloped up. He informed the
rearguard that the order for retirement would not be carried out, and that an immediate
counter-attack would be made to recover the vacated position. The main body of the
battalion was by now nearly a mile away. Units
on the right and left probably also consisted of rearguards only actually on the spot. The
Sixth rearguard turned about and moved up to the light railway preparatory to charge.
Rifle fire was opened to keep the heads of the enemy down, and on the right Lieutenant
Waugh and a platoon were detailed to rush up and seize a point on the crest of the ridge
to get direct observation and to bring Lewis gun fire to bear on the enemy. The writer
(Captain Hal Armstrong) watched this movement carried out under intense rifle and machine
gun fire from the enemy. Two-thirds of Waugh’s men dropped dead in that short rush of
forty yards, but the officer and a handful of survivors gained their objective.
Meantime the remainder of the available men of the Sixth lined the light
railway. Discipline was perfect. Section
commanders were giving their orders as if they were on a musketry instruction parade.
A sergeant was heard to rebuke a lance-corporal, who had given a fire order
in incorrect sequence. “It should have been,” said the sergeant, “range
first, not indication!” Ammunition, however, was running short. In a few minutes
literally not a round remained. There was left the bayonet. On the left of his mere
skeleton of a battalion, Colonel Robinson rose to his feet and gave the order to charge,
leading his men forward under a withering hail of bullets. The right flank conformed. The
line was perfect, alignment exact, and the rifles carried at the “high port”.
Forty yards, and the crest of the ridge was passed. Forty yards below and beyond were
lines of field grey Germans digging-in for bare life.
The Sixth were passing through a perfect storm of bullets from front and
right. But the lines of the enemy were wavering. They broke and fled, and the Sixth
Battalion held again, with a number of prisoners, the position they had left but half an
hour before.
There had been a price to pay, however. The eighty yards of ground over which
the troops had charged were strewn with dead and wounded men. Lieutenant Allen (the
Battalion Signalling Officer) was killed. The Colonel and the Adjutant (Captain Hal
Armstrong) were both seriously wounded, and another subaltern named Davis was also
wounded. But, as was learned later, that swift counter-stroke, carried out not only by the
Sixth but by other infantry units of the Division on the right and left, saved from
annihilation one, if not two, British Divisions and delayed the enemy on that portion of
the line for at least twelve hours.
So ended the first seven days of the great German attack in March 1918. Still
more exciting times were in store for the Sixth Battalion, not only on the Amiens front,
but on the Aisne and elsewhere.
But the writer’s personal acquaintance with events ceased on the 27th
March, and at that point he is content to break off his short and incomplete record of
occurrences. It may be of interest in conclusion to give the text of a message issued that
day to his men by General Gough, commanding the Fifth Army.
“I wish to express to all officers and men of the Fifth Army my immense
admiration for the truly magnificent way all ranks have fought in the desperate battle
against immense hordes. The very grandest tradition of British soldiers and of the British
race have been maintained. We are fighting for our lives, our existence, our honour, and
in your hands all these are safe”.
Captain Hal Armstrong M.C.
Newcastle Daily Journal, March 1921.
