Christmas in the Trenches by Alan Wakefield

Author:Alan Wakefield
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780750953214
Publisher: The History Press
Published: 2013-07-10T16:00:00+00:00

Christmas 1917

I send to all ranks of the Navy and Army my hearty good wishes for Christmas and New Year. I realize your hardships patiently and cheerfully borne and rejoice in the success you have won so nobly. The Nation stands faithfully to its pledges, resolute to fulfil them. May God bless your efforts and give us victory. Our Christmas thoughts are with the sick and wounded sailors and soldiers. We know by personal experience with what patience and cheerfulness their suffering is borne. We wish all a speedy restoration to health, a restful Christmastide and brighter days to come.

The King’s Christmas Message to his Troops, 1917

As 1917 drew to an end the Allies were in a position of strength despite the collapse into revolution of Russia during November. The Germans’ launching of unrestricted submarine warfare and withdrawing to the Hindenburg Line position (March–April 1917) were admissions that the fighting on the Somme and at Verdun in 1916 could not be sustained for another year. The U-boat campaign drew the USA into the war against Germany and with it gave a huge advantage in terms of raw materials, manufacturing power and manpower to the Allies. To make matters worse for Germany, by late 1917 the U-boat campaign had failed, defeated by the Royal Navy’s anti-submarine measures, including the introduction of a convoy system for merchant shipping. On the Western Front pressure had been maintained on the Germans. On 9 April the British opened the Battle of Arras, in support of the French ‘Nivelle Offensive’. The Canadian Corps took Vimy Ridge and during the initial fighting the British 3rd Army also made inroads into the Hindenburg Line. However, stalemate returned as fighting dragged on until mid-May, and Gen Nivelle’s much-vaunted offensive on the Chemin des Dames, which opened on 16 April, was a total failure. This defeat broke the morale of the French Army and led to widespread mutinies that lasted until the autumn. From this time Haig’s BEF became the main offensive force on the Western Front.

In the summer of 1917, Haig launched an offensive in Flanders. Heralded by the explosion of nineteen large mines under German positions on Messines Ridge, the offensive known as the Third Battle of Ypres, or more popularly Passchendaele, got under way on 31 July. However, with over 4 million shells having been fired in the preparatory artillery bombardments, the ground over which the infantry was expected to advance was badly torn up. After four weeks many of the initial objectives were not taken and torrential rains set in, turning the battlefield into a quagmire. A change in tactics, bringing in ‘Bite and Hold’ operations to win limited objectives met with some success. But with increasingly poor weather conditions, the battle degenerated into a slogging match with both sides losing something in the region of 250,000 men by the time Haig halted operations following the capture of Passchendaele Ridge in November.

If the Germans believed this to be the end of major operations for 1917, they

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