Trench Warfare from 3rd November, 1914 to 30th June, 1915.

Between the Battles of La Bassée and Armentières ( which closed on 2nd November), and the Battle of Neuve Chapelle (20th March, 1915), no Battalion of the Middlesex Regiment in France or Flanders made any direct attack upon the enemy. The only operation (referred to later) of any importance in which the Regiment was involved was the attack on Wytschaete, on 14th December, during which the 4th Battalion supported the attack of other battalions of the 8th Infantry Brigade, and subsequently relieved the Gordon Highlanders in the front line.

The intervening period-a little over four months-cannot, however, be dismissed without a brief description of that first terrible winter in the trenches: how all ranks endured it; how they "won through" is an essential part of the history of any unit which served in France or Flanders during the first year of the war. Moreover, certain items of purely Regimental interest occur in the Diaries.

Both the 1st and 4th Battalions at the close of the two battles mentioned above had begun to settle down on that line, which was gradually becoming stabilised; the former in the forward trenches in front of La Boutillerie, north-west of Le Maisnil, the latter south-west of Baquerot, where it was occupying support trenches in the Fauquissart area. The two Battalions were from 4½ to 5 miles, one from the other.

3rd November 1914

From the 3rd of November onwards until the 14th, when the Battalion was relieved in the line and marched back to billets in Sailly-sur-Oise, the Diary of the 1st Middlesex contains an almost daily roll of casualties. The Diary of the 3rd states:-"Battalion very weak, and "B" Company send 60 to assist "D" every night." The constant shelling by day, to which the trenches were subjected, was gradually reducing the Battalion to a mere skeleton. For it must be remembered that trenches in those early days were primitive, mere excavations in the ground compared with the scientific earthworks of later periods. Often dug on soft ground, the parapets and traverses crumbled away under the heavy rains, or were blown to bits by the enemy's shell and trench-mortar fire. Terrible in the extreme was the condition of officers and men as they stood in the trenches, often knee-deep in filthy mud and slush. For many days they had not taken off their clothes, which had become caked with mud, blood-stained and verminous; indeed, it was with difficulty that many of them remembered there had been a time when they were clean and warm, when the concentrated misery of the trenches was unknown to them. But if their feet and hands were icy cold and numbed, if their clothes were soaked and clung like sodden rags about them, limbs racked with rheumatics, if they stood in three feet of water peering cautiously over the parapets across No Man's Land, dotted here and there with the rotting carcases of what had once been brave men and their "pals," there still burned within them the old "die-hard" spirit which made light of their troubles and their discomforts, for they were British soldiers.

8th November 1914

On the 8th November, "D" and "C" Companies suffered, so the Diary records, a "fearful shelling." Two officers were wounded; 11 other ranks were killed and 38 wounded. On the 14th, the day the Battalion was relieved, Captain G.R.K. Evatt was killed by a sniper's bullet. (Casualties between 3rd and 54th November-1 officer killed, 2 officers wounded, 72 other ranks killed and 70 wounded.) At the end of three days‘ rest the Battalion (in Brigade) marched off to relieve the 20th Brigade in the trenches at Houplines, the 1st Middlesex remaining in Brigade Reserve, billeted in a factory. On the 25th the Battalion relieved the Royal Welch Fusiliers in the front line east and north-east of, and about 800 yards from, Houplines, all companies manning the fire trenches, which are described as "very bad". Major Ash took over command of the Battalion on 29th November.

20th December 1914

Until 20th December the 1st Middlesex held the Houplines trenches, during which period there were constant casualties, and the conditions in the line became more and more terrible. On 17th, 2nd Lieut. S.C. Opaque was shot by a sniper and died shortly afterwards. Three days later the Battalion was relieved and marched off to billets in Armentières, where the close of the year still found the men quartered.

So far as casualties were concerned, the 4th Battalion seems to have been more fortunate than the 1st, though it is obvious that the conditions under which the former lived in the trenches were not less uncomfortable. Mud was everywhere, and a footnote to the 1st Battalion Diary records:- "Great difficulty was experienced with the rifles in the trenches. They got grit into the leads and the cases stuck in the breeches, with the result that the bolts would not open. This was overcome with careful cleaning and oiling of the bolt actions and leads."

2nd January to 9th March 1915

On the 2nd January, 1915, the 19th Infantry Brigade marched from Armentières, three miles south, to relieve the 16th Infantry Brigade in front-line trenches running between Touquet and Rue du Bois. The 1st Middlesex relieved a battalion of the Leicestershire Regiment, three Companies ("B", "C" and "D") in the front line, "A" Company in support. The relief was completed by 9.30 p.m.

Until the 18th of the month the 1st Battalion remained in the trenches, ekeing out an existence terrible in the extreme. On the 3rd January (the day following the relief of the Leicesters) the Battalion Diary records: "Still in trenches, which are very bad, full of mud and water up to the men's knees in many places. Raining all day." And for several days the same note of misery is contained in the Diary: "Still in trenches, weather terrible, mud and water dreadful... Working all day to try and keep the trenches standing. Rain causes dug-outs to fall in, and parapets to disappear. Fascines and sand-bags all sink into the mud... Raining hard again. Trenches very bad "-and so on! Relief came on the 18th, but only four days were spent out of the line. February was spent much in the same way, no attacks were made on or by the enemy. Shelling, machine-gun and rifle fire and sniping went on day and night, though casualties appear to be small. On 5th of the month Captain G. H. Hastings was wounded by a sniper and died of his wounds. The 29th Brigade Diary for the first nine days of March contains the best summary of trench life at that period: "The situation remains the same in our front; daily registration of our own and hostile artillery, but no organised bombardment on either side. Sniping by day active; by night little sniping except in front of our left. A great improvement in the weather makes the trenches drier, and there is more to show for work and material put into them. In addition to general strengthening of the front line, work in connection with supporting points and defence of the main second line is carried out by battalions in reserve."

13th March to 27th May 1915

Trench Warfare and Items of Interest. Between the Battle of Aubers Ridge, 9th May, and the beginning of the Actions of Hooge on 19th July, no one Battalion of the Middlesex Regiment was engaged in active operations other than the usual round of trench warfare. On the 13th March, the 1st Middlesex relieved the Leicestershire Regiment in the front line in Rue du Bois. It was a quiet part of the line and the activities of the opposing sides were turned mostly to sniping, the firing of rifle grenades and occasional bomb throwing. Shelling was intermittent, but rarely severe, and only a very few casualties are recorded in the Battalion Diaries. Colonel Ingle, commanding the 11th (S) Battalion of the Regiment, then in England, but soon to cross the water to France, paid a visit to the 1st Battalion on 17th March, staying 24 hours. He had a good look round the trenches, and on his return was, no doubt, able to give his officers and men a much clearer vision of what was before them. Quiet days in the trenches or routine work and drill in billets, occupied the Battalion during the remainder of March and the months of April and May, though some excitement prevailed in the front line on the 16th of the latter month, the Middlesex men having received orders to maintain heavy rifle fire on the enemy's trenches with a view to holding him to his ground: the Battle of Festubert was in progress. On this day, the anniversary of the greatest Battle Honour of the Regiment-Albuhera-the Brigadier sent the Die-Hards a "most inspiriting message". (Quotation from the 1st Battalion Diary, but the message is not given.)

28th May to 30 June 1915

On the 28th May, the 19th Infantry Brigade (in which the 1st Middlesex was contained), which from October, 1914, had served with the 6th Division, was transferred to the 27th Division. The change is not referred to in the Battalion Diary, but at this period Brigades, and indeed Battalions of the old Regular Army, were transferred from their original formation to Divisions of the New Armies, which had begun to arrive in France and Flanders. It was thought necessary to "stiffen" the ranks of the New Army Divisions by introducing units from the original Expeditionary Force, which were now looked upon as veteran soldiers, as, indeed, they were. Not only officers, but N.C.Os. and men who had weathered the storm from August, 1914, to the Spring of 1915, were of priceless value in the training of the New Armies. Thus it came about that the 1st Battalion of the Die-Hards, with other units of the 19th Infantry Brigade, was transferred to the 27th Division; the 1st Middlesex, however, still remained in the same sector of the line, either in the Rue du Bois trenches or in billets in Gris Pot throughout June. The remainder of May (from the Battle of Aubers Ridge) and the whole of June were uneventful, and casualties were small. One officer was killed-2nd Lieut. W. W. Hardwick-who was shot and died of wounds on 11th June. On the last day of the latter month, the 2nd Middlesex were in Divisional Reserve, occupying billets one mile west of Sailly on the Estaires Road.

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