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| Messines Today from the 7 June 1917 Front Line |
Professor Glyn Harper, Massey University
For the New Zealand Division 1917 was a crucial year. Brought up to full strength after its severe blooding on the Somme in September 1916 and after spending many months training its large number of reinforcements, the New Zealand Division was involved in three set piece battles and two minor actions during the year. Prior to the first military engagement of 1917 the New Zealand Division was at the peak of its condition. At the end of the year after suffering the nation's worst-ever military disaster in October, the division was a spent force incapable of further military action. In its opening effort of the year, the division performed brilliantly, however, in capturing the objective which gave the opening operation of the Allies 1917 Flanders campaign its name—Messines.
As a preliminary to the launch of the British Expeditionary Force's (BEF's) main offensive for 1917, the Messines Ridge, south of the Ypres Salient was to be captured. This ridge line ran for nearly ten kilometers from St Yves, near Ploegsteert Wood, in the south to just beyond Wytschaete. This would secure the southern flank of the Ypres offensive planned for later in the year as well as ejecting the Germans from a vital piece of high ground, thus denying them observation over the potential battlefield.
Responsibility for mounting the attack at Messines was assigned to General Herbert Plumer's Second Army, which had spent many months planning and preparing it. Plumer, despite his un-military appearance, was one of the most able generals in the BEF, and this operation involved several innovative features. For a start, the objectives were strictly limited in what Plumer's colleague General Henry Rawlinson called a "bite and hold" operation. Capture of the ridge line was the ultimate prize; there was to be no attempt at breaking through the German lines.
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| The Three Major Battles of the Flanders Campaign |
Artillery support, upon which success of the operation depended, was to be overwhelming—more than 2,000 guns, of which a third were heavy and medium. The American military theorist Stephen Biddle has calculated that the ten-day artillery bombardment that preceded the infantry attack on 7 June was "of literally atomic magnitude" with more explosive power than a U.S. W48 tactical nuclear warhead dumped on every mile of the German frontline trenches.
The infantry from the nine divisions involved in this attack and the three more in reserve were well trained and moved into location early so that most commenced the attack well rested. Railways had been constructed right up to the start line to ensure adequate logistical support throughout the operation. All preparations had been made under cover of darkness so as to preserve the element of surprise.
Then there was the knockout blow. Twenty-one mine shafts (26 in some sources) had been sunk deep under the German lines and filled with more than a million pounds of high explosive. Their detonation would signal the start of the attack. As the Australian official historian Charles Bean commented on Messines: "Never had a big British operation been prepared in such detail."
The New Zealand Division had a key role in this attack. As a result of being involved in only minor actions since leaving the Somme in October 1916 and being able to train those formations not holding the frontline trenches, the division was in fine form for this attack. In April 1917 the various artillery and infantry brigades underwent, in turn, 12 days of intensive training for their roles in the forthcoming offensive. The history of the New Zealand Division records of this training:
. . .nothing was left undone to achieve realism. The ground at the training area happened to conform with the actual position to be assaulted, and replicas of the whole German trenches and our assembly ones were cut out a foot deep to scale. In these, battalions and brigades rehearsed the delicate operations of the assembly and attack, and attained the invaluable certainty of purpose. The final full-dress rehearsals were witnessed and criticized by the Second Army Commander and his Staff.
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| New Zealand Troops in the Sector Before the Attack |
The training for Messines included testing tactics for open warfare and for obtaining the maximum firepower from the recent reorganization of platoons into specialized sections of riflemen, Lewis gunners, bombers, and rifle bombers. As a result, the historian Christopher Pugsley believes that the New Zealand Division was "at its peak" for Messines. He writes that "the combination of enthusiasm, esprit de corps and training reached its high point for this battle."
Tomorrow: Part II, Capturing Messines
Source: Over the Top, July 1917
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