Charles E W Bean, Diaries, AWM38 3DRL 606/116A/1 - September 1918 - Part 4

Royal Hotel
Teignmouth
Devon.

Departments
1. Manager of A.I.F. Publicity
Special jobs:
(a) Distribution
(b) Photo production.
Depts. A. Photo production.
B. Photo & cinema publicity to
press & cinema firms
C. ^ souvenir Books, etc. for A.I.F.
sales etc under D.
Editing by Manager: Printing etc by managers
D. Publicity to A.I.F.
of Cinema, photo, souvenir books,
Anz. B.
E. Anzac Bulletin. 

C. Blocks in A/B to be chosen by
Manager or art editor specially marked from
France. To be uniform size & capable
of printing in Book form 1ce monthly
pr. as well as all pictures to be given
catalogue N^o 
D. Every A/B Block to be gn Catalogue N^o.
orders for photos go to A W R S but to be 

All the advance positions for the guns close to the tape
line are all supplied as mentioned already
and resected on the ground. They don't have
to move into present Nomansland until the red line
has been reached.

After capture of xx blue line all the
brigades will have to move into Nomansland,
but only 4 will move before the time table is over.  

Wanted for something better. Tommy
tanks are being used purely as a

Our brigade last night lost over 40 planes in the
thunderstorm.

We have to use normal bombing planes to hide
tanks 9.30 to midnight and for 1 hour before zero.

Forming up of infantry as normal.

We have a long way to go before we meet
organised trenches except at Le Verguier.
The officer personally said last night that we that they were depending on
their mgs but the other infantry no more.  We
hope their infantry is disorganised.
This is first time that the 1 Aust division has been
in a big show said boys from this G.O.C. 

6.

When the barrage timetable has been completed (at 9.53)
at that time 2 artillery brigades in each division will have
come out of the barrage, limbered up and come
up to positions from which they can cover the
advance of that expedition infantry.

While this is happening the heavy artillery also
has its program. We have no big
barrage in the ordinary sense. But we have
a defensive bombardment (which is on Aug 8.

(3 bullets hand fired at one and same time.
This feature is new.)

From 238. 290 all well centred
on the Hind. line. Most of the heavies (8 brigades are at C/B).
3 brigades heavies are on this.

An extremely inadequate allotment of tanks 5 to 1 Division 4 to
4 Division. But army has only 21 tanks because they are 

1st Divisions 2nd objective includes the very very important
key position of Cologne Farm.
xxx Just note from 4 Division to Gricourt is
Le Verguier village  a mass of trenches
and very strongly fortified.
1 Division have to capture Harg,
Villeret & Cologne Farm.
If we can capture Cologne Farm
we have done a very useful thing.

Blue line. Divisions are to make the next
and auspicious attempt to capture it by allocating
for its capture certain bodies of troops. But
if these bodies fail they are not to throw in
other bodies of troops.

If the enemy is disorganised we can take advantage
of this. But if we fail after the next attempt
we are not to waste troops.  The wire has not been
successfully cut. We may find behind this wire
freshly rested troops. 4 battalions are on for today.

Their guns to maintain barrage to the end.
During the barrage we have to bring forward some
of the guns.
We have fresh guns which will combine
forces to arrange a halt in the barrage.
This is on the brown line 200 to 300 yards
down hill from top of the ridge. The object
of this is to get the troops as far as we
can through an organised trench system which is
sure to be barraged by the enemy.
On the brown line we will need a minimum
of 50 minutes (i.e. on the last place where we
reach it it will be 50 minutes.)
We will have the brown line at 3 hours 10 minutes
after zero.  (8.30 am.)
4 Division halt 2 hours.
1 Division 1¼ hrs to 50 minutes. During this time
the artillery is re-arranged from the first division.

and tell the divisions that they must be in front of it.
This is 3 days ago we were able to place the guns.
It looked a bit touchy yesterday but they are very
confident
1   }  1
3   }
4   }
12  }  4
Starts with a normal artillery barrage. I have 15 artillery
brigades. 1st Division 8 4 Division 7 which
gives quite a dense barrage. 4 Division objective lines are
so chosen that the guns can complete the whole timetable
right up to the red line without shifting any guns
at all. Green line main ridge,
red line are old outpost line. Blue line Harg
1. green   2 final objective   3 blue fortnight till expedition objective.

1st Division have to shift guns as depth is too great

On March 21 we had Harg.
and an outpost line. Germans have both.
The object of our operation is to capture both lines
so as to restore the situation as on March 21.
We have found that we cannot capture it by
powerful penetration.

Disadvantages - though we have weak infantry
in front we have very powerful artillery prepared
who have positions we cannot shell to.

3      }
Aus }   Common problem as to situation
9      }
We took on frontage of 7000 yards narrowing to 6000

4 Division on right  1 Division on left.
On this occasion we fixed our start line
before we had the country on which it lay
several 100 yards in front of our leading posts.

62^o/127 b cent
Diagram - see original document

Write to Burnham Bell Marlow
[shorthand] abt p7 line.
1918 . German Offensive 2nd Par
Last Par on P 9.
3 & 4 Divisions & 4 & 5 Divisions
4 Corps was to open more on village after
that was done.

3 corps of 4 army simultaneously and 5^th corps
of 3rd army. 1st French corps had promised to
cooperate but owing to other attempts made by Foch
they find they cannot do it.

Object - capture of certain land.

We want to seize the Hargict-Le Verguier
ridge. These towns really are old main line.

The 3 Hindg system line is not an outpost
line but to keep us away from the main line
which is behind the canal.

14^th Bde
German Portable
Search light set -
searchlight w one carriage
Engrs ofcr is on
a [[?]] (Horse train)
L/ [[?]] send a [[?]]
G Co [[?]]
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[[Long?]]
[[Sw?]]