Current Information:

Age-29

Born-Hammersmith

Bethune Town Cemetery, France

The Race to the Sea - September-October 1914

By the middle of September 1914, the Aisne battlefield had stagnated into trench warfare and in order to break this impasse, both sides tried to outflank each other in a general movement northwards. Moving up through Picardy, Artois and Flanders, the race was over by 19th October when the North Sea was reached. The Western Front, a line of trenches stretching from Belgium to Switzerland, was now a reality. Initially it was the French army that conducted this movement whilst the British Expeditionary Force remained on the Aisne but by 6 October British reinforcements were needed to help beat off German attacks around Lille. They moved north and along with reinforcements from Britain, they took up new positions in Flanders, on the left of the Allied line and much closer to the Channel ports.

The battle of La Bassée,

This was fought by II Corps (3rd and 5th Divisions) between 10th October and 2nd November 1914 and as the name suggests it focused on an area around the town of  La Bassée in northern France. It was part of the Race to the Sea and it determined the line of the Western Front in that sector. There were some initial British successes but La Bassée remained firmly in German hands. German reinforcements arrived and  the village of Neuve Chapelle was captured by them. Towards the end of October, the fighting on this front died down as the attention of both armies switched to Ypres.

On 1st October, 1914 the 1st Cornwall Light Infantry battalion and the rest of 14 Brigade, 5th Division, left the Aisne and began their move northwards. On 12th October they crossed La Bassée canal at Avelette Bridge where the advance guard were engaged by the Germans and progress was slow. On the following day, 13th October, the battalion made a small advance from Rue du Bois to La Quinque Rue where they dug themselves in and stayed for two days. During this time they had to deal with shell fire, snipers and during the night of 14/15th October, an attack on their positions which began at 6pm, when B Company were relieving A Company, and lasted through until 2am. Ernest Chudley was one of the battalion’s casualties.