World War, 1914-1918 -- Campaigns -- Western Front; World War, 1914-1918 -- Great Britain
The scene of these last events has been rather different from that
which witnessed the English advance of the 12th and 13th of November.
This, one may say in passing, proves the elasticity of the British
offensive.
If the eye travels, on the map, to the right, beyond the positions in
which the last battle was fought, it follows a line almost parallel
to the valley of the Ancre. To-night, then, the English, not pursuing
this theoretically correct line, inclined their front slightly to the
South, to the centre of a line drawn between Thiepval and Le Sars. This
re-entering angle formed an obvious obstacle to the domination of the
Ancre valley upon the whole of this part of the British front. For this
reason General Sir Douglas Haig decided to abolish it.
Hence the movement of this morning.
The attack was elaborately prepared, and with the utmost secrecy, and
was launched at dawn.
At the moment of writing this telegram the reports that are coming in
from the scene of action show that the operation is being carried out,
within the limits assigned, very successfully. To employ an expression
coined by one of their own number, the Boche prisoners are "pouring" to
the rear.
This morning the weather, so fine during the last three days, was
extremely unfavourable to any movement of troops. There had been heavy
snow during the night, and for the first time this winter our Allies
fought in the snow. About 8 o'clock, the temperature having risen, a
thaw set in. After that it was in foul mud that they did their fighting.
In order to understand properly the British manoeuvres on the two banks
of the Ancre, we must remark that yesterday, the 17th of November, the
English had executed a movement which obviously aimed at assisting
to-day's operations.
Shortly, by outflanking the village of Beaucourt to the East, they
had carried their foremost positions, by yesterday evening, as far as
the little wood of Hollande. Now it is clear that any advance in this
direction seriously menaces Grandcourt and those positions on the north
bank of the Ancre, which the British troops attacked this morning.
A superior staff-officer remarked lately in my hearing that the German
line, throughout the recent fighting, has exhibited points of varying
strength. He attributed this circumstance to the work of the English
artillery. The resistance which the enemy had been able to offer had
varied directly with the effectiveness of the English gunfire.
It is also noticeable that the German losses in killed, prisoners and
missing are considerably greater than the corresponding losses among
the English. This result is apparently due to the fact either that the
Germans surrender more readily than the English, or that the British
artillery causes the enemy to sustain the heavier damage in dead and
wounded, or else finally that, unlike the English, the Germans do not
include their lightly wounded in the total of their losses.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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