The British Campaign in France and Flanders, 1917Doyle, Arthur Conan
History
The British Campaign in France and Flanders, 1917
Doyle, Arthur Conan
World War, 1914-1918 -- Campaigns -- Western Front
north of Farbus Wood, which they did successfully with slight losses.
{43}
[Sidenote: April 10]
During the night of the 9/10th April there was fighting at several
points, notably at the north end of the Vimy Ridge. Here the Fourth
Canadian Division had some difficulty in holding its ground against
several strong counter-attacks of the Germans. It is probable that
no body of troops in the whole battle had a harder task, or stuck to
it more tenaciously, than this Fourth Canadian Division. Hill 145,
which was an outlier of the Ridge, was very strongly held and
desperately defended, so that it would have turned any but
first-class troops. The final clearing of this point was effected
upon April 10, and led to further operations in conjunction with
British troops to the north, which will be afterwards described.
The second day of the Battle of Arras, April 10, was spent partly in
the consolidation of the ground gained and partly in increasing the
area now occupied. The troops were in high heart, for although the
full extent of the victory had not yet been realised, it was already
known that at least 10,000 prisoners and 100 guns had fallen into
their hands, figures which showed that the battle had been the most
serious military disaster which had yet befallen the enemy. A fuller
enumeration taken some days later gave 13,000 men, 3 howitzers, 28
heavy guns, 130 field-guns, 84 trench-mortars, and 250 machine-guns
as the total capture. It may be mentioned that over 1000 prisoners
were taken from each of the six different German divisions already
enumerated, which disposes of their mendacious assertion that only
two divisions occupied their front. It was certainly the greatest
blow delivered by the British Army up to that date, and the only
other day's fighting at all comparable in its results was the French
attack upon the Champagne {44} front on September 25, 1915, where the
number of prisoners was greater but the capture of guns was less.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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