the Battle of Loos

With this effort the IV. and I. Corps had shot their bolt and fresh troops were required to carry on the attack and break through the second line. Unfortunately Sir John French had kept back near Bethune his general reserve, the XI. Corps (Raking), consisting of the Guards Division, recently formed, and the 21st and 24th Divisions, two New Army divisions, just out from Eng land. No orders for the 21st and 24th Divisions to move from their rendezvous 5 to 8 miles from the battlefield were sent until 9:3o A.M. on the 25th, and it was not until :20 P.M. that these divisions were put under Sir D. Haig.

The Attack on Sept. 26.

Already fatigued by a series of night marches to reach Bethune unseen by enemy aeroplanes, and by delays due to the congestion of traffic on the roads behind the battlefield, it was the morning of Sept. 26 before the 21st and 24th Divisions were on the field and ready to move to the attack of the German second line between Bois Hugo and Hulluch. And meantime it had become necessary to use the two leading brigades to patch up the British line. Hill 7o and Hulluch, on the flanks of the attack, were still in enemy hands, renewed attacks having failed to capture them, and soon after 9 A.M. the Germans had recaptured Bois Hugo. In the hours which had elapsed since the original attack, they had recovered from their surprise, brought up reinforcements and strengthened their second line. During the night of the 25th-26th and early morning of the 26th they made counter-attacks on both flanks of the line gained by the British in the first advance and recovered part of the lost ground.

The attack of the four remaining brigades of the two divisions at II A.M. against the intact second line was a failure, though some units actually reached the wire entanglement in front of it.

sible, began to stream back. The Guards Division was brought up to fill the gap in the line that their retirement caused, and the 3rd Cavalry Division to stiffen the defence near Loos village.

The French X. Army, having no gas, had less success than the British; but its persistent attacks, against the crest of Vimy Ridge by Gen. Foch's orders, caused the Germans to divert the Guard Corps from the British to the French front.

After Sept. 26 the fighting became desultory and degenerated into trench warfare, and on the 3oth the French offensives, both in Champagne (where also no success had been achieved) and Artois, were formally stopped in order to prepare for another combined effort. Delays brought about by bad weather, enemy interference with the preparations and enemy counter-attacks, led to postponement after postponement.

The Last Phase.

Finally a renewed French attack in Cham pagne was made on Nov. 6, a French attack in Artois on Nov. II, and a British (fresh divisions, the 12th, 28th and 46th having arrived) on the i3th, with no result but heavy casualties. Trench fighting, particularly round the Hohenzollern Redoubt, went on for several days longer, and then both sides settled down to winter conditions. The fighting of the year had but proved that, with the guns and munitions then available, the defence was still stronger than the attack. The British losses in the battle of Loos included three divisional commanders killed (Maj.-Gen. Sir T.

Capper, G. H. Thesiger and F. D. V. Wing) and 2,407 officers and 57,985 other ranks killed, wounded and missing, and were probably three times as heavy as those of the enemy.

See History of the Great War Based on Official Documents, "Military Operations France and Belgium, 1915," vol. ii. (5928, where there is a bibl.) ; Les Armees Francaises dans la Grande Guerre, tome iii. (1922) ; M. Schwarte, Ed., Der grosse Krieg, 1914-1918, vol. ii.

(1921-25). (J. E. E.)