BERNARD FREYBERG
In the closing days of the Battle of the Somme, this Lieutenant Colonel gallantly led his men to take the heavily defended village of Beaucourt, despite being wounded multiple times
This famous officer earned the highest honour during the Battle of the Somme
“THE PERSONALITY, VALOUR AND UTTER CONTEMPT OF DANGER ON THE PART OF THIS SINGLE OFFICER ENABLED THE LODGEMENT IN THE MOST ADVANCED OBJECTIVE OF THE CORPS TO BE PERMANENTLY HELD”
Freyberg’s citation in the LONDON GAZETTE on 15 December 1916
At 7.20am on 1 July 1916 the Battle of the Somme commenced when the British detonated a large mine under a German strongpoint defending the village of Beaumont-hamel. The British offensive was designed to relieve pressure on the beleaguered French Army at Verdun. In addition, according to General Sir William Robertson, Chief of the Imperial General Staff, its second objective was to inflict heavy losses on the German forces. A further 16 mines were detonated before the Allies went over the top. General Beauvoir de Lisle’s 29th ‘Incomparable’ Division led the attack at Beaumont-hamel and they were mown down before the Redan Ridge. The British Army suffered 57,470 casualties that day.
Beaumont-hamel was not taken until 13 November, by the 51st (Highland) Division during the Battle of Ancre. On that very day Lieutenant Colonel Bernard Freyberg, of the Queen’s Royal West Surrey Regiment, commanding Hood Battalion, won the Victoria Cross during the attack on neighbouring Beaucourt. Freyberg’s unit formed part of the 63rd (Royal Naval) Division which had been created in 1914 at the instigation of Winston Churchill, who at the time was First Lord of the Admiralty. Although it included a brigade of Royal Marines its other two brigades comprised of army battalions. Freyberg’s command was part of the 188th Brigade, along with the suitably nautically named Drake, Hawke and Nelson battalions, deployed on the immediate right of the
51st Division. Their task was to pierce the deep German defences to the southeast of Beaumont-hamel. The 51st and 63rd Divisions formed part of Lieutenant General EA Fanshawe’s 5th Corps.
Freyberg first came to prominence at Gallipoli during the ill-fated landings in the Dardanelles, where he served with the Hood Battalion. He had bravely swam ashore, 3km out from a boat, to light signal flares on the beach to distract fire from the Royal Naval Division on the night of 24 April 1915. This gained him his first Distinguished Service Order. Historian BH Liddell Hart wrote: “His feat, and its effect, was an outstanding proof that in war it is the
man, and not men, who count – that one man can be more useful than a thousand.” Freyberg was described as “huge, handsome with keen grey eyes”. After his division was evacuated, although he transferred to the Queen’s Royal West Surrey Regiment, he deployed to France to take charge of his old battalion. The Queen’s battalions ended up deployed with the 7th, 12th, 18th, 24th, 33rd and 41st Divisions on the Somme.
The 63rd Division achieved some tactical surprise at Beaucourt as the Germans were complacent, believing that their well-prepared positions were impregnable. The morning mist also helped the attackers as German artillery struggled to effectively support their forward positions. The greatest challenge facing Freyberg and his men was the sea of mud and vast water-filled craters. General Sir Douglas Haig, Commander-in-chief of the British Expeditionary Force, noted: “The country roads, broken by countless shell craters, that crossed the deep stretch of ground we had lately won, rapidly became almost impassable, making the supply of food, stores and ammunition a serious problem.”
When the advance was signalled Freyberg and his men struggled through the morass of no-man’s land. The clatter of machine guns soon announced that the Germans were not going to give ground easily. Although barbed wire cutting
“PROBABLY THE MOST DISTINGUISHED PERSONAL ACT OF THE WAR” General de Lisle Commander of the 29th Division
parties preceded Freyberg and the shelling had also severed the wire, it remained intact in many places. Freyberg’s battalion became disorganised crossing the German frontline trenches, weakening and slowing his advance.
He rallied his men and led an assault on the Germans’ second line, during which he was hit by enemy fire twice. During the next day and night his battalion hung on to their gains but were in desperate need of reinforcements. When these finally arrived Freyberg led the next assault, taking Beaucourt along with 500 German prisoners. Beaucourt’s large mill had been reduced to a shattered and derelict ruin and the miller’s adjacent house, its roof smashed in, had all but collapsed. To add to the melancholy air, the surrounding trees, although still standing, had been shorn of most of their branches by heavy shelling.
The capture of Beaucourt and Beaumonthamel by 5th Corps were the most notable gains of the Battle of Ancre, which made Freyberg’s decisive leadership even more important. In the bitter fighting for the village he was wounded a further two times. However, Freyberg refused to be evacuated until he had issued his final orders to his remaining men and secured Beaucourt. When he arrived at the causality station his injuries were such that he was assessed to be terminal and placed in a tent with other men who were expected to die. He was not treated except for pain killers, but when he didn’t succumb to his wounds he was operated on and survived.
A second VC was won on 13 November by Private John Cunningham, 12th Battalion,
East Yorkshire Regiment, which formed part of the 31st Division. His unit was involved in the attacks on a German trench to the north of Beaumont-hamel near Hebuterne. When his bombing party were all killed or wounded he proceeded to clear the enemy communication trench on his own. He even returned to British lines to collect fresh bombs. Cunningham successfully moved forward to the next enemy position and in the process single handedly killed ten Germans.
The wounded Freyberg had one small consolation: he was spared being at the front
over the winter of 1916-17. British commanders had hoped to exploit the success at Beaumonthamel and Beaucourt but the terrible conditions made that impossible. Snow squalls and icy winds began to sweep the devastated landscape, and the onset of winter rapidly brought the bloodletting to a halt. A German soldier serving with the 111th Infantry Reserve Regiment lamented: “Our losses are dreadful. And now we have bad weather again, so that anyone who is not wounded falls ill.”
When the Battle of the Somme finally came to a close on 18 November 1916 the British had suffered 419,654 casualties and the French 204,253. The Germans lost something in the region of 500,000. In four-and-a-half months of fighting the Allies had advanced on average 8km on a 23km front. “Britain, up to the Battle of the Somme, had not lost men on the same scale as the rest of the belligerents,” wrote Prime Minister David Lloyd George. “But by the end of 1916 her losses were greater than those she had sustained in the aggregate in all her wars put together since the Wars of the Roses, and had cost more than all the wars she had ever waged.”
After recovering, Freyberg saw further action in 1917 and 1918. As well as his VC he also won three Distinguished Service Orders during the First World War. After the conflict he continued his distinguished military career: in the Second World War he commanded the 2nd New Zealand Division in North Africa, then Allied forces on Crete in 1941, and finally the New Zealand Corps in Italy in 1944. Afterwards he served as the Governor General of New Zealand from 1946-52 and then Deputy Constable and Lieutenant Governor of Windsor Castle, 1953-63.