Capture of Montauban
The Capture of Montauban, took place on 1 July 1916, the first day of the Battle of the Somme. The battle was fought by the British Fourth Army and the French Sixth Army against the German 2nd Army, on the Western Front, during the First World War. Montauban is a commune in the Somme department in Picardy in northern France and lies on the D 64, between Guillemont to the east and Mametz to the west. To the north are Bazentin-le-Petit and Bazentin-le-Grand. Bernafay and Trônes woods are to the north-east and Maricourt lies to the south.
Military operations resumed in the area of Montauban in late September 1914 during the Race to the Sea, when the II Bavarian Corps and later the XIV Reserve Corps of the German 6th Army, attacked westwards down the Somme valley to reach Albert, Amiens and the sea. The attack was stopped just east of Albert by the French Second Army, which then attempted a reciprocal outflanking move further north and forced the 6th Army to fight a defensive battle as more troops were moved further north to attempt another advance around Arras, Lille and Lens.
On 1 July 1916, the German first defensive position ran south of the village, along the lower slopes of Montauban Spur. The junction of the British Fourth Army and XX Corps of the Sixth Army ran through Maricourt and to the east of Montauban. The 30th Division held the right of the corps area, next to the French 39th Division. Signs of an offensive by the British and French had been seen in May 1916 but German military intelligence anticipated an offensive against the Fricourt and Gommecourt spurs, with a possible supporting attack in between, rather than an attack further south around Montauban and the Somme river.
The 30th Division attacked behind a creeping barrage and captured its objectives of Montauban and the Montauban Ridge, inflicting many casualties on Bavarian Infantry Regiment 6 and Infantry Regiment 62. A German counter-attack in the early hours of 2 July was a costly failure and the 30th Division began operations against Bernafay and Trônes woods on 3 July. Montauban was recaptured by German troops on 25 March 1918 during Operation Michael, as the right flank units of the 17th Division and the 1st Dismounted Brigade of the 1st Cavalry Division retreated. The village was recaptured for the last time six months later on 26 August by the 18th Division, during the Second Battle of Bapaume.
Background
1914
On 25 September, during the Race to the Sea, a French attack north of the Somme against the II Bavarian Corps, forced a hurried withdrawal. As more Bavarian units arrived in the north, the 3rd Bavarian Division advanced along the north bank of the Somme, through Bouchavesnes, Leforest and Hardecourt until held up at Maricourt. The 4th Bavarian Division further to the north, defeated French Territorial divisions and then attacked westwards near Gueudecourt, towards Albert, through Sailly, Combles, Guillemont and Montauban. The village was captured on 28 September, against dug in French infantry and artillery of the northern corps of the French Second Army. Bavarian Reserve Infantry regiments forced back the French 3rd Battalion, 69th Infantry Regiment and then attacked Maricourt. The Bavarian attack managed to advance half-way to Carnoy but was held up nearly short of Maricourt and the troops dug in after dark.The XIV Reserve Corps attacked on 28 September, with the 26th Reserve Division and the 28th Reserve Division along the Roman road from Bapaume to Albert and Amiens, intending to reach the Ancre and then continue westwards along the Somme valley. The 28th Reserve Division advanced through Mametz close to Fricourt against scattered resistance from French infantry and cavalry. On 29 September, French counter-attacks at Fricourt almost succeeded; the German infantry were ordered to hold the village regardless of casualties and the French defence of Maricourt was equally effective. A lull followed and in October, both sides began to improve the ditches and shallow scrapes dug when the German advance had ended.
In November 1914, the 28th Reserve Division was instructed to improve the fortifications in the divisional area, which included Montauban. Chalk spoil from digging was to be disguised by soil or turf, communication trenches should be deepened to, trenches were to be lined by bricks and the overhead cover of dugouts and machine-gun nests was to be made thicker; sanitary conditions in the trenches were to be improved and trench junctions signposted. Units were to clarify their boundaries and survey the areas into which they could fire without endangering neighbouring units. Listening posts were to be equipped with bell pulls for warnings and linked by deeper communication trenches. Obstacles of barbed wire up to high, fencing and knife rests were to be kept ready to keep French patrols out of the trenches. Attacks from 17 to 21 December by the 53rd Division were defeated, despite a chronic shortage of artillery ammunition, which led many appeals for fire support to go unanswered. On 21 December, artillery-fire was available to repulse an attack on the village, in which troops were captured and many more killed; a local truce was observed for the French to recover their wounded and dead but on Christmas Day there was no truce in the area.
1915
In January 1915, General Erich von Falkenhayn the German Chief of the General Staff, ordered a reconstruction of the defences which had been improvised when mobile warfare ended on the Western Front, late in 1914. Barbed wire obstacles were enlarged from one belt wide to two belts wide, about apart. Double and triple thickness wire was used and laid high. The front line had been increased from one trench line to a front position with three trenches apart, the first trench occupied by sentry groups, the second was kept for the bulk of the front-trench garrison and the third trench for local reserves. The trenches were traversed and had sentry posts in concrete recesses built into the parapet.Dugouts had been deepened from to, apart and large enough for An intermediate line of strong points about behind the front line was also built. Communication trenches ran back to the reserve position, renamed the second position, which was as well-built and wired as the front position. The second position was sited beyond the range of Allied field artillery, to force an attacker to stop and move guns forward before assaulting it. The Second Army had fought the Battle of Hébuterne on a front at Toutvent Farm, to the west of Serre, against a salient held by the 52nd Division and gained on a front, at a cost of killed against a German loss of
1916
In February, following the Herbstschlacht in 1915, a third defensive position back from the Stützpunktlinie was begun in February and was almost complete on the Somme front when the battle began. German artillery was organised in a series of sperrfeuerstreifen ; each officer was expected to know the batteries covering his section of the front line and the batteries ready to engage fleeting targets. A telephone system was built, with lines buried deep for behind the front line, to connect the front line to the artillery. The Somme defences had two inherent weaknesses that the rebuilding had not remedied. The front trenches were on a forward slope, lined by white chalk from the subsoil and easily seen by ground observers. The defences were crowded towards the front trench, with a regiment having two battalions near the front-trench system and the reserve battalion divided between the Stützpunktlinie and the second line, all within and most troops within of the front line, accommodated in the new deep dugouts.The concentration of troops at the front line on a forward slope guaranteed that it would face the bulk of an artillery bombardment, directed by ground observers, on clearly marked lines. Much of the new defence-building on the Somme began in the area north of Fricourt and work further south through Montauban to the river had not been completed by 1 July. For nearly a year after the Battle of Hébuterne, the area became a backwater and the German divisions became known as the Sleeping Army. In May 1916, increased activity behind the British front line indicated that an offensive was being prepared. On 10 and 19 July, the 28th Reserve Division repulsed attacks near Fricourt. When Reserve Infantry Regiment 109 moved into the area of Mametz and Montauban in mid-June, the defences were seen to be poor and there had been far less fighting in the sector. Telephone connexions were inadequate and there had been little stocking of supplies and ammunition around the front line. By July, Reserve Infantry Regiment 23 had been brought up to Montauban, east of Reserve Infantry Regiment 109.
Prelude
German preparations
In late May 1916, the 2nd Army on the Somme front was reinforced to eight divisions in line from Roye on the south bank north to Arras, with three divisions held in reserve. The Guard Corps with three divisions took over from Gommecourt to Serre, which reduced the frontage of the XIV Reserve Corps from, the 28th Reserve Division holding the line from Ovillers south to Maricourt. Recruit battalions of troops undergoing advanced training were moved closer to the front to occupy the second and third positions if needed; the 2nd Army had about and howitzers, which were outnumbered the British artillery. In early June, the German defenders were confronted by British patrols but the front was mostly quiet until 20 June, when British heavy guns began to bombard the area behind the German front line, as far back as Bapaume, until 23 June.The German front line opposite XIII Corps had been developed into a front position with several lines of trenches linked by communication trenches and a new reserve line about further back, from Dublin Trench to Train Alley and Pommiers Trench; a communication trench known as Montauban Alley had been dug below the skyline, along the north facing of Caterpillar Valley. A second position existed about further back from Maurepas to Guillemont, Longueval and the Bazentin villages. The third position was incomplete and the second position was not as elaborate as the defences to the north, the ground being mainly clay and soil, unlike the chalk characteristic of the terrain further north. All available labour was absorbed in keeping the first position in repair during the preparatory bombardment. In the 12th Division area, the second position was a shallow trench and work had only begun on the third position. The front position had been made more formidable, with the strong points of The Castle, along with Glatz and Pommiers redoubts, made by blocking trenches and encircling them with barbed wire. Montauban had been fortified and a trench dug around the south side.
On the night of Bavarian Reserve Infantry Regiment 6 of the 10th Bavarian Division was sent forward to relieve the troops on either side of Montauban, which had been reduced by the British and French preliminary bombardment to about thirty men. Many of the fortifications were found to have been demolished and only three shelters were relatively safe. The relief had been chaotic with vague orders and an unclear chain of command. BIR 6 took over from the north bank of the Somme to the road between Montauban and Carnoy, with the rest of the division in reserve near Bapaume or in the line near Thiepval. The 12th Division was in support, Infantry Regiment 63 opposite the French XX Corps and Infantry Regiment 62 behind Montauban. Reserve Infantry Regiment 109 of the 28th Reserve Division held the line from the Carnoy road, westwards to Mametz. On the following night an attempt was made to relieve Reserve Infantry Regiment 109 with Infantry Regiment 23 of the 12th Division but the extent of British artillery-fire prevented more than companies reaching the front line, the rest waiting at Montauban. Most of the artillery and ammunition of the 12th and 28th Reserve divisions in the valley north of Montauban and Mametz was destroyed. Opposite the 30th Division, much of the garrison and most of the machine-guns had been destroyed by the bombardment.