Location 12 – Trônes Wood and Guillemont

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Directions – Return to the crossroads in Mamtez village and turn left heading along the D64 to Montauban. As you pass Danzig Alley CWGC Cemetery on your left, you are coming into the area captured by the 18th (Eastern) Division and 30th Division of XIII Corps in what was the most successful advance of 1st July. As you enter Montauban, look to the right and you will see a memorial to the Liverpool and Manchester Pals which furnished eight battalions of the 30th Division that took Montauban on the morning of 1st July.

The Liverpool and Manchester Pals Memorial, Montauban. Photo: Mark Sluman. Click on image for full size (417 KB).

Continue through the village and soon, on the left, just past the crossroads with the D197, Bernafay Wood comes into view. This was taken on the evening of 3rd July by the 30th Division at the cost of just six casualties, the Germans having left it almost entirely undefended. Continue on the D64 and the next wood on the left is Trônes. You will pass the 18th (Eastern) Division Memorial at the southernmost apex of the wood. Guillemont Road CWGC Cemetery is on the left just as you exit the bend.

Practical Information – If you stop by the 18th Division Memorial park the car on the concrete strip next to it. The memorial is located at the apex of two blind bends and cars come through here at high speed. Guillemont Road Cemetery, further along the road, is a superb site from which to view all the action that unfolded at Guillemont during August and September 1916.

Panorama of the Guillemont Battlefield from Guillemont Road Cemetery The dark mass of Trônes Wood is on the left of the picture with Delville Wood, reached in the Night Attack of 14th July in the centre horizon. Longueval's church spire can be seen between them. Waterlot Farm lay roughly where the modern day farm out-buildings are, in front of Delville Wood. The German forward positions at the beginning of the battle for Guillemont were located just in front of the slight ridge formed by the road and went from right to left. The exposed position of the British in this sector can be readily appreciated as they moved out of Trônes Wood to attack Guillemont. The British made it into Guillemont on a number of occasions only to be hit by concentrated German artillery and machine-gun fire from positions hidden behind the village. Photo: Mark Sluman. Click on image for full size (111 KB).

Historical Notes – The actions at Trônes Wood, like those at Mametz, were designed to clear the way for the main attack on the German second defensive line scheduled for the early morning of 14th July 1916. As with Mametz the fighting here was vicious and bloody. The attempt to take the wood began on 8th July when the 21st Brigade of the 30th Division, preceded by XIII Corps heavy artillery and all the field batteries of the 18th and 30th Divisions, advanced out of Bernafay Wood. They were met by heavy fire. Some made it to the edge of the wood whilst, to the south, supported by French heavy artillery fire, French and British units made it to Maltz Horn trench on the higher ground due south.

For the next three days more and more units of 30th Division entered the fray and gained a foothold in the south-western corner but strong German positions to the north and east of the wood prevented further progress. On the 10th July the 16th Manchesters actually made it to the eastern tree line but were immediately counter-attacked by German forces from the direction of Waterlot Farm and ejected. On the 11th the British began an enormous artillery bombardment to literally blow the Germans out of the wood. The subsequent advance by the 2nd Bedfords and 20th Kings (Liverpool Pals) made some progress in the southern part of the wood to the south-eastern corner but the shelling had made going very difficult and the upended trees, shattered stumps and splintered branches presented the defenders with ready-made sniping positions.

With the attack seemingly stalled and zero-hour for the commencement of the Night Attack approaching, attempts to capture the wood suddenly took on a sense of real urgency. The 9th Division tasked with taking Longueval and Delville Wood would be terribly exposed to flanking fire if it remained unconquered. General Ivor Maxse's 18th (Eastern) Division was brought up. The 55th Brigade was the first in at 7pm on 13th July and its battalions, the 7th Buffs, 7th Royal West Kents and 7th Queens made some progress before again being halted by determined German resistance in the northern and eastern sectors of Trônes. It was now the turn of 54th Brigade consisting of the 6th Northants and 12th Middlesex. The Northants succeeded in reaching and securing the central part of the wood but were too disorganised to make any further advances.

As the only fresh battalion within Trônes it was now up to the 12th Middlesex to take the remainder of the wood. In what was one of the most extraordinary events of the entire Somme offensive, the battalion commander, Lieutenant Colonel Frank Maxwell, formed his men into one long line and, shoulder to shoulder, led them northwards through the shattered trees and carnage of the previous days' fighting. His men were going to flush out the remaining Germans once and for all at the point of the bayonet. Maxwell himself takes up the story in a letter to his wife after the action:

"...I made them advance with fixed bayonets, and ordered them, by way of encouraging themselves, to fire ahead of them into the tangle all the way. This was a good move, and gave them confidence… The Germans couldn't face a long line offering no scattered groups to be killed, and they began to bolt, first back, then, as the wood became narrow, they bolted out to the sides, and with rifle and automatic guns we slew them."

By 9:30am British troops stood at the northern corner of Trônes Wood. Their heroic actions here had occupied the attention of the Germans to such an extent that they never interfered with the 14th July Night Attack from this quarter. Moreover, the events in Trônes Wood had demonstrated the quality of the 18th (Eastern) Division, the creation of General Ivor Maxse – a division that could get things done. It was a fact not lost on Haig and Rawlinson who were to use the 18th Division as the spearhead of the assault on Thiepval in September which is covered later in this tour.

I have already explained the main phases of the struggle for Guillemont village which followed the capture of Trônes Wood in the accompanying Brief History, so will not elaborate here. Only to say that, for those searching for a different angle on the fighting at Guillemont, an excellent and very graphic personal account is given by the German, Ernst Jünger, in his book Storm of Steel. Ernst was wounded at Guillemont and describes the strain and abject terror of living day after day under crushing, concentrated British artillery fire.

Guillemont Road CWGC Cemetery was begun after the village was captured. After the Armistice it became a concentration cemetery for isolated graves in the area. It now contains 2,259 graves, almost all of whom are from Great Britain and is the third largest cemetery on the Somme in terms of land area. One notable grave here is that of Lieutenant Raymond Asquith of the Grenadier Guards and son of the Prime Minister, Herbert Asquith, who was killed leading his company during the famous Tank Attack of 15th September 1916. His father was grief-stricken by the loss as can be imagined.

It is also worth noting that Captain Noel Chavasse of the Royal Army Medical Corps, won the first of his two Victoria Crosses tending to wounded men whilst under fire during the struggle for Guillemont. He is buried in Brandhoek New Military Cemetery in the Ypres Salient.