The Old Contemptibles 1914

Discussions on all aspects of the First World War not covered in the other sections. Hosted by Terry Duncan.
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Pips
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The Old Contemptibles 1914

#1

Post by Pips » 17 Oct 2018, 03:07

The Regular British Army (the original BEF) sailed for France in 1914 with 6 Divisions. It fought at Mons (23 August), fell back to Le Cateau, through the retreat to the 1st Battle of the Marne, the advance the 1st Battle of the Aisne, the Race to the Sea and First Ypres (November '14).

At this point most historians write off the 6 Regular Army Divisions as having been decimated and wiped out by continual warfare, and move onto replacements and then Kitchener's Mob.

Is this an accurate reflection on the BEF? Were those 6 Divisions 'wiped out'? Would anyone know how many personal survived - both the battles of 1914 and the War for that matter?

Cheers.

antwony
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Re: The Old Contemptibles 1914

#2

Post by antwony » 17 Oct 2018, 11:16

This isn't, quite, an answer to your question, although I don't think the question can really be answered as the term (as your use of italics reflect) 'wiped out' is length of a piece of string territory.

The 29DIV, which first served in Gallipoli, was also composed of prewar Regular Army battalions. It took an estimated 94,000 casualties.

Aren't sure of the exact size of UK divisions in WW1. But if I'd make an estimate at say 18,000 max strength, the 29th would have been literally wiped out 5+ times over. However, given that many (the majority???) of those 94,000 casualties would been suffered by the Infantry battalions, who made up a minority of the 18,000, it would have been practically 'wiped out' far more than 5 times.

So I'm not really answering your question about the first 6 divisions. But, I think the basis of your question is, perhaps, demonstrating a bit of ignorance i.e. a rifleman in a infantry battalion on the Western Front in 1914 had little chance of making it to 1915 without getting hit. The chances of surviving the war, uninjured and serving at the front the whole time are astronomically small.

P.S. You're aware of the British Army's regimental system, right? Any prewar Regulars alive in 1915 would have been very suitable senior NCO material for the regiment's newer battalions.


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Re: The Old Contemptibles 1914

#3

Post by Terry Duncan » 17 Oct 2018, 12:10

Quite a few survived, one notable casualty on armistice day was George Ellison a man who had served right through the war until about 90 minutes from its end, and he was still a private at the wars end despite pre-war service, but I could not say if there were any significant reasons for this. Often the casualties were from the 'replacements' sent out to keep the units up to strength, whilst those with a lot of experience tended to survive as they made fewer mistakes. Others from the original BEF survived the war by having been transferred to India in Oct-Nov 1914, spending most of the war on the Northwest Frontier - one of my great grandfathers saw the war through like this but always insisted he would have rather been in France as the Germans were friendlier than many of the locals where he was.

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Re: The Old Contemptibles 1914

#4

Post by Leros87 » 20 Oct 2018, 01:32

I refer to David Ascoli’s book The Mons Star - the BEF 1914. In August the BEF consisted of 5 infantry and 1 cavalry division and an independent infantry Brigade in two Corps. III Corps was formed in France in 31 August with 4th Div (which reached Le Cateau on 24 Aug) and 6th Div (which reached the Aisne on 16 Sept). IV Corps was formed on 9 Oct with 7th Div (landed Zeebrugge 6 Oct) and 3rd Cav Div (landed Zeebrugge 7 Oct). The 2nd Cav Div formed in Sept and the Cav Corps on 9 Oct. All these were Regular Army units.

8th Div was formed in Sept from overseas garrisons but only reached France on 6 Nov. There were three other divisions formed also from overseas garrisons: 27th and 28th in Nov and Dec and 29th in Feb 15. The first two fought hard at Second Ypres and then sent to Salonika.

The Indian Corps arrived in France from 30 Sept and were in action by 22 Nov.

The ration strength of the BEF rose from 163,897 on 16 Sept to 224,647 on 22 Nov. The 1914 Star, the first British campaign medal, bearing the dates 5 Aug to 22 Nov was awarded to fewer than 230,000 recipients.

BEF casualties:
2600 at Mons (23 Aug-5 Sept), 7800 at Le Cateau (26 Aug), at least 3200 during the rest of the withdrawal, 13,000 during the battle of the Marne (7-10 Sept), 13,500 in the battle of the Aisne (12-15 Sept) and 58,200 in first battle of Ypres (10 Oct - 22 Nov, including La Bassée, Messines and Armentières). Total at least 98,300 casualties.

There is a chart showing that at the end of First Ypres of the 84 infantry battalions in the BEF 18 had less than 100 men, 31 had less than 200, 26 had less than 300 and only 9 had more. 1st, 3rd and 7th Divs suffered the most. The Official History stated that in the battalions that had fought from Mons there remained an average of only one officer and 30 men.

During the War the following divisions suffered further heavy casualties: 1st Cav (6500), 2nd Cav (4700), 3rd Cav (5500), 1st (40,000), 2nd (45,000), 3rd (43,000), 4th (45,000), 5th (50,000), 6th (25,000), 7th (68,000), 8th (64,000).

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Re: The Old Contemptibles 1914

#5

Post by Pips » 22 Oct 2018, 01:08

Thank you very much Leros, That's exactly the sort of info I was interested in. Casualties' amongst the 'originals' was indeed horrendous.

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