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Age-24

Enlisted-Deptford

The Battle of the Somme (July-November, 1916)

By the beginning of September, 1916,  the Battle of the Somme had been raging for two months. Thousands of men had already been killed or wounded or were simply missing, never to be seen again and just a few square miles of the French countryside, all in the southern part of the battlefield, had been captured from the enemy. Mistakes had been made by the various commanders and would be continued to be made but there was no turning back as the British, Australians, South Africans, New Zealanders and Canadians carried on battering away at the German defences in the hope of a breakthrough, So it continued all the way through to November with nearly every battalion and division then in France being drawn into it at some stage. In the end the German trenches had been pushed back a few more miles along most of the line but the cost in lives had been staggering. By the end of the fighting in November, 1916, British Army casualties numbered over 400,000, killed, wounded and missing.

The village of Thiepval had been a first day objective when the Battle of the Somme began on 1st July, 1916, and two an a half months later it was still in German hands, That all changed on 26th September when an attack by the Reserve Army succeeded in wresting it  from the enemy. 18th Division used 53 and 54 Brigades for this operation with 55 Brigade, which included the 7th Royal West Kent battalion, in reserve. On 27th September, 7th Royal West Kent moved up closer to Thiepval during which they were heavily shelled, with one of the German shells causing forty casualties. The next day 18th Division continued their attack with their objective being the the formidable German stronghold, the Schwaben Redoubt, one thousand yards north of Thiepval. 53 and 54 Brigades met stubborn resistance here and only managed to capture its western and south-western faces and that night 7th Royal West Kent moved forward to relieve them. It was a very difficult relief. There was a great deal of uncertainty as to where the actual front line was, shell fire continued unabated, the enemy still controlled much of the Redoubt and had established trench blocks in many places, and immediately launched a number of counter attacks on the newly arrived troops. It was all they could do just to hold their positions and despite all their efforts there was little chance of pushing the Germans further back The fighting here was extremely fierce and 7th Royal West Kent remained in the thick of it until 5th October, when, greatly reduced in numbers and utterly exhausted they were finally relieved. Their casualties during this period amounted to nearly three hundred and included Cyril Levett who was killed in action on 30th September.