Guided Walk Sunday 20th November visiting some of the fallen from the Battle of the Somme

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The Battle of the Ancre Heights

There will be a free guided walk visiting the graves and headstones in the Brockley & Ladywell cemeteries of some of those who fought and fell during the 141 days of horror  of the Battle of the Somme (July to November 1916).  The walk will be led by FOBLC members Peter Mealing, Mick Martin and Mike Guilfoyle.

All are welcome to join, we meet at 2:00pm on Sunday 20th November at the Ladywell Cemetery entrance.  The walk will last approximately 2 hours.  The event is free though donations are welcome.

‘Gentlemen , when the barrage lifts’ –Rifleman Kenneth Middleton Davies QVR, killed first day of the Battle of the Somme.

Situated aside the inner pathway close to Brockley Grove lies a forlorn cross which contains the evocative lettering 'the barrage lifts' and tells the onlooker that Rifleman Kenneth Middleton Davies,  of the Queens Victoria Rifles or ‘Old Vics’ was killed in action aged 24 years in France on the first day of the Battle of the Somme 1st July 1916.  The famous quote above was attributed to a Company Commander in the 9th Battalion of the King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry who offered a toast before the Battle of the Somme, 'Gentlemen, when the barrage lifts'. In the week long pre-battle bombardment no less than 1,700,000 shells were fired at German positions!

British Troops going over the top on the 1st July 1916 –juxtaposed with bottom photograph of family grave in Brockley cemetery .

Kenneth Middleton Davies was born in Lambeth in mid-1891, being the eldest son of William Middleton Davies, a man of various occupations, and his wife who was born Hannah Eliza Shotter.

At the time of the 1911 census, Kenneth was living with his parents at 70 Revelon Road, Brockley, South East London, and was working as a solicitor's clerk. His army service record has not survived but it is known that he enlisted in London and his medal card states that he first saw active service in France on 9th May 1915, and was killed in action on 1st July 1916, the first day of the Battle of the Somme on which some 20,000 British soldiers lost their lives and another 40,000 were wounded. Kenneth's body was either not recovered or not identified and he is commemorated on the Thiepval the 9th Battalion of the London Regiment. Serving as a 'rifleman',  his medal card states that he was awarded the 1914-15 Star but omits any reference to the British War Medal and Victory Medal to which he also would have been entitled. Empty shell casings and ammunition boxes representing a small sample of the ammunition used by the British Army in the bombardment of Fricourt, France, on the first day of the Battle of the Somme, 1 July 1916. [Photo courtesy of the Australian War Memorial, AWM H08331]-

The 1st July 1916  was a near disastrous day for the British Army in France. Eleven divisions of Fourth Army attacked along a 15 mile front from Maricourt  to Serre. Two further divisions of Third Army launched a diversionary attack just to the north of Serre at Gommecourt. For a week beforehand the British artillery pounded the German trenches but the Germans had been there for a long time and they had constructed deep, concrete reinforced shelters beneath their trenches and many survived the bombardment. The troops went over the top at 7.30 am but even before they had left their overcrowded trenches, many had been killed or maimed by German artillery. The Germans knew that they were coming. Once in No-Man’s-Land the artillery continued to take its toll and then the machine guns opened up on the advancing British infantry. They fell in their thousands and the attack came to a standstill almost everywhere. Survivors sought cover wherever they could find it and at night they crawled back to their own lines, often dragging a wounded soldier with them. Only in the south were any advances made with the attack on Fricourt and Mametz. Over 19,000 British soldiers were killed on this day, including 2,500 from London.

The 56^th (London) Division and the 46^th (North Midland) Division carried out the diversionary attack on Gommecourt. It was intended to draw German reserves away from the main battle further south and to pinch out the Gommecourt salient. It failed on both counts. The German defences at Gommecourt were among the strongest any British attack faced on 1^st July. Nevertheless 56^th Division’s attack on the southern edge of the salient began promisingly. The first two German lines were taken but they could get no further. 46^th Division’s attack came to grief on the uncut wire and by the end of a very bloody day, all but the dead and injured were back in their own trenches. On 1^st July, 169 Brigade, 56^th Division attacked with 5^th London and 9^th London (Queen Victoria’s Rifles) with 16^th London detailed to pass through them once they had taken their objectives and captured a German stronghold called the Quadrilateral. But events did not work out as planned. The wire had not been cut properly and there were only a few gaps in it through which the attacking troops of 9^th  London could pass and whilst they waited they were hit by concentrated machine gun fire. Despite this some did make it through and into the German trenches. At this stage the German artillery opened up with full force, plastering no-man’s land and preventing supplies and reinforcements getting across. By now the German defenders had emerged from their deep dug outs and were pouring fire on the Londoners from their strongly held reserve trenches. Even so, some of the attacking force managed to push on to Nameless Farm road, a sunken road, but this is as far as they got. To show one’s head above the 4 ½ foot bank of the sunken road meant instant death. By midday the Londoners were running short of grenades and they were under strong bombing attacks from Gommecourt Park which  forced them back.  There was little help from British artillery and the wounded began crawling back across no-man’s land.  By 2pm they were still holding parts of the German 1^st & 2^nd line and the southern part of Gommecourt Park.  But their position was doomed.  There was no further attack from 46^th Division and to the south news came of the failure of 31^st Division.  Nevertheless they continued to resist but by 4pm the Germans had retaken their 2^nd trench and had footings in the 1^st. Before dark the Londoner’s numbers had been reduced to 70 holding a small part of Ferret Trench 200 yards from Gommecourt Park and at 9.30pm the last party made it back suffering badly en route. The planned renewed attack did not take place. 

Kenneth’s name is one of 72,196  British and South African servicemen on The Thiepval Memorial to the Missing of the Somme, who died in the Battles of the Somme of the First World War between 1915 and 1918, with no known grave.

The Somme Revisited

On Monday 25th April I accompanied three of my FOBLC colleagues Geoffrey Thurley (the Chair), Mick Martin and Peter Mealing (the driver) across the channel, following the route that General De Gaulle once called the 'fatal avenue', the sweep of low lying country in Northern France heading towards the much visited Somme battlefield (the Somme is the name of a French department and river). The weather was unremittingly poor, with a freezing wind and driving rain,  similar to the conditions that delayed the start of the battle whose centenary will be marked on 1st July 2016, which became the bloodiest day in British military history.   We nevertheless managed to cover several of the most iconic battlefield sites that are forever associated with what at the time was seen as the 'Big Push' aimed at bringing the First World War to an end.

Commonwealth War Grave Commission cemeteries lie dotted along roadsides, there are 242 in the Somme department, and provided a poignant reminder of the horrible losses sustained in the battle. We passed first through the village of Gommecourt at the northern extremity of the 22 mile battlefield,  where the 56th (London) Division fought with particular heroism, before stopping outside the village of Serre, at which many of the 'Pals' battalions in the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) recruited from the industrial towns of Northern England suffered terrible losses attacking German positions uphill from a series of copses, and whose sacrifice was captured in the memorable quote 'Two years in the making, Ten minutes in the destroying', Walking in what was once 'no mans land' with the sound of a skylark overhead and viewing the memorial plaques was a hauntingly memorable moment. The verdant landscape that surrounds the bronze Caribou statue at Beaumont Hamel (opened by Earl Haig in 1925), the scene of the Newfoundland battlefield park was perhaps the busiest of the sites we visited with parties of French and Canadians visitors much in evidence.

The monumental Thiepval Memorial to the missing, containing the names of 73,357 soldiers whose bodies were never recovered, is visible from afar and although we were unable to get too close as preparations for the centenary meant that it was part covered in scaffolding, we did ambulate it before moving onto Mametz Wood.

Arriving on a single track road at Mametz Wood was a particularly poignant moment, having earlier successfully campaigned for a maroon plaque to be erected at the birthplace of Poet and Artist David Jones in Arabin Road, Brockley, who as a private in the 38th (Welsh) Division was wounded there following a bloody action to capture the wood, an action launched on the 7th July 1916 and who later recounted his experiences in his masterpiece 'In Parenthesis'. We placed a wooden cross at the foot of the stunning Welsh dragon memorial (erected in 1987) and the photograph at the top of this post was taken shortly thereafter. Alighting for lunch at the much patronised 'Le Tommy ' restaurant in Pozieres- the scene of determined German resistance from the onslaught of Australian troops, due to its strategic importance, we then stopped at the Tank Memorial, three British tanks went into battle for the first time in the history of warfare on the 15th September 1916 before starting on the homeward journey to Calais.

Having arrived safely back in London , due to the commendable forward planning and able direction of our driver Peter Mealing, we were each left with so many powerful memories and recalled in muted conversation some of those remembered in Brockley and Ladywell cemeteries who fell on the Somme, which battle formally ended on the 18th November 1916, the Allies having advanced seven miles for truly enormous losses, before the war then entered another destructive attritional phase.

The friends group have two forthcoming events that will mark the Somme centenary in slightly different ways:   

In the Ladywell cemetery chapel on : Tuesday 31st May at 7.30pm (as part of the Brockley Max festival) Dr Anne Price -Owen ( Director : David Jones Society) will present an Illustrated talk ' David Jones: Artist, Warrior, Author of In Parenthesis’ All welcome.

The Ladywell Chapel, Brockley and Ladywell Cemetery, SE4 (where David Jones is buried) - The evening of July 9th 2016

A performance of our David Jones In Parenthesis programme. This is another very exciting site-specific performance for the Company. Both these performances fall within the exact centenary dates of the Battle of Mametz Wood, which much of In Parenthesis is based on. (This event is subject to final confirmation)

Mike Guilfoyle

Vice-Chair, FOBLC

Francis Paget Hewkley: awarded Military Medal for bravery at the Somme

Many thanks to Stuart Hallifax who has written a great piece on Francis Paget Hewkley in his Great War London blog.  Hewkley was brought up in London, emigrated to Australia in 1912 and then enlisted a signalman in the Australian infantry.  He served at Gallipoli before transferring to the Western Front where he won a Military Medal for his bravery in the Battle of the Somme.

One of Hewkley’s drawings for the ANZAC Book

However in June 1917 Hewkley was killed in action at Zonnebeke Ridge.  He was buried in a nearby Belgian military cemetery but is commemorated on his parent's headstone in the Brockley & Ladywell Cemetery. 

For the full article please click here




Frances Paget Hewkley Family Grave: source Billion Graves