Colonel Sir Stephen Shepherd Allen KBE CMG DSO - 2/ Auckland, 1918

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Text originally published in 1920 under the same title.

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2/Auckland, 1918

Being a Partial Record of the War Service in France of the 2\ Auckland Regiment during The Great War

BY LIEUT.-COLONEL S. S. ALLEN C.M.G., D.S.O.

Contents

THE following table gives the numbers of all ranks who were on the roll of the 2nd Battalion Auckland Regiment during its whole existence, as well as the numbers who were killed:

On the Battalion roll

Officers188

Other Ranks4073

Total4261

Killed, died of wounds and missing

Officers46

Other Ranks694

Total740

The proportion of killed was thus approximately one in every six who served with the Battalion. The proportion of officers killed was approximately one in four.

THE 2nd Battalion, Auckland Regiment, has done more fighting in France than any other battalion in the New Zealand Division. This may seem a bold statement but it is amply corroborated by the facts, as the following brief record of the actions in which it has been engaged will show beyond possibility of dispute.

Battle of the Somme, 1916. 2/Auckland and 2/Otago were the first New Zealand battalions to go over the top in France. This was in the battle of the 15th September the first occasion on which tanks were usedwhich resulted in the most signal British victory up to that time in the war. In the fighting which followed that battle, 2/Auckland was engaged again in operations round the Flers and Gird trenches.

Fleurbaix, 1917. The whole battalion was employed on a raid, the only one on so large a scale ever tried by the N.Z. Division. The raid was quite successful, and its result was the capture of a number of prisoners and acquirement of much valuable information.

Messines, 1917. The battalion held the whole Divisional front during the five days preliminary bombardment, and after this trying experience was one of the two battalions to go furthest and establish the most advanced posts in the attack on the 7th June.

Ypres, 1917. On the 4th October, in the [attack on Gravenstafel Ridge, 2/Auckland and 2/Wellington were the battalions detailed to capture the final objective on the 1st Brigade front.

The exploits of the battalion in 1918 form the subject of this book, but it is convenient to summarise them now.

27th March.The battalion was in support to 1/Auckland and 2/N.Z.R.B. in the advance from Hedauville to a position in front of Mailly Maillet, and relieved the 2/N.Z.R.B. early the following morning.

30th March.2/Auckland, with assistance on the right and left from 1/Wellington and 4/N.Z.R.B., fought the memorable little battle of La Signy Farm.

24th August.In the fighting round Bapaume 2/Auckland was the first battalion of the 1st Brigade to be engaged, and took the village of Grevillers.

30th August and subsequent days.The battalion took Bancourt and the ridge to the east of that village in one of the hardest battles of the 1918 offensive.

29th September.Battle of Welsh Ridge, 1/Auckland and 2/Auckland were on the left of the Brigade, and penetrated furthest beyond the German positions.

30th September.2/Auckland seized and held the bridge over the Escaut River at Crvecur.

10th October.2/Auckland on the left and 2/Wellington on the right advanced to the Selle River, the latter crossing it in front of Briastre.

4th November.Battle of Le Quesnoy. In the final battle of the war, 2/Auckland was in Brigade Reserve, for the only occasion in which the Brigade has been engaged, and consequently took no prominent part in the battle. With such a record of fighting it is no wonder that the battalion has a high opinion of itself, and it is right that its history should be recorded in some detail. To describe the period of 1916 and 1917 with its monotonous trench warfare, broken only by two or three battles, would not be of such general interest, but the changing scenes of 1918 are of a more absorbing nature. Before commencing the narrative, however, a preliminary chapter on the composition and earlier history of the battalion is necessary.

THE original New Zealand Expeditionary Force, the N.Z.E.F., as it will be more convenient to call it, was dispatched from New Zealand in October, 1914. As far as the infantry were concerned, it consisted of the Auckland, Canterbury, Otago and Wellington Regiments, each of one battalion only, drawn from the four military districts into which the Dominion of New Zealand is divided. For some years past there has been a system of compulsory service in the territorial forces in New Zealand, and in the Auckland District there are four infantry territorial Regiments, the 3rd (Auckland) Regiment, 6th (Hauraki) Regiment, 15th (North Auckland) Regiment, and 16th (Waikato) Regiment. Each of these Regiments, or rather the areas from which they are drawn, provided a company of the original Auckland Battalion; and the four companies of that battalion were named after these four regimentsthe 3rd (Auckland) Company, 6th (Hauraki) Company, 15th (North Auckland) Company, and 16th (Waikato) Company respectively. Each of these companies also wore the badge of the territorial Regiment after which it was named, so that the badges in the battalion were company badges and not regimental. The same system was adhered to in the other battalions of the N.Z.E.F., and was preserved when second battalions of the regiments in the original force were formed, and the nomenclature has always proved somewhat puzzling to outsiders.

After the evacuation of the Gallipoli Peninsula in December, 1915, the N.Z.E.F. returned to Egypt. It was decided to expand it considerably, the mounted brigade was left in Egypt, and the remainder of the force became a Division under the command of Major-General Russellnow Sir A. H. Russell, K.C.B., K.C.M.G. Each battalion in the original brigade was broken into two, and the four new battalions thus formed, 2/Auckland, 2/Canterbury, 2/Otago and 2/Wellington became the 2nd Brigade, commanded by Brigadier-General Braithwaite. The third Brigade necessary to complete the Division, the 3rd New Zealand Rifle Brigade, was formed brand new from New Zealand.

The 2nd Brigade was formed on the 1st March, 1916, and 2/Auckland was commanded from that date till June, 1916, by Lieut.-Col. W. W. Alderman, who belongs to the Australian Staff Corps, and sailed from New Zealand with the original N.Z.E.F. The battalion came to France with the New Zealand Division in April, 1916, and in June, 1916, Lieut.-Col. Alderman was succeeded in the command of the battalion by Lieut.-Col. J. W. H. Brown, afterwards Brigadier-General, who was unfortunately killed while commanding the 1st Brigade at Messines in June, 1917. General Brown was perhaps the finest soldier who left New Zealand, and his untimely death was nowhere regretted more than in his old battalion. In January, 1917, on the promotion of Lieut.-Col. Brown, I was promoted Lieut.-Col., and commanded the battalion from that time. I had previously been 2nd in command, first under Lieut.-Col. Alderman and later under Lieut.-Col. Brown, so that I have belonged to 2/Auckland throughout its whole existence.