The Battle of the Ancre Heights (1 October – 11 November 1916), is the name given to the continuation of British attacks after the Battle of Thiepval Ridge from during the Battle of the Somme. The battle was conducted by the Reserve Army (renamed Fifth Army on 29 October) from Courcelette near the Albert–Bapaume road, west to Thiepval on Bazentin Ridge. British possession of the heights would deprive the German 1st Army of observation towards Albert to the south-west and give the British observation north over the Ancre valley to the German positions around Beaumont-Hamel, Serre and Beaucourt. The Reserve Army conducted large attacks on and from
Many smaller attacks were made in the intervening periods, amid interruptions caused by frequent heavy rain, which turned the ground and roads into rivers of mud and grounded aircraft. German forces in footholds on the ridge, at the east end of (Regina Trench) and in the remaining parts of (Schwaben Redoubt) to the north and Stuff Redoubt () north-east of Thiepval, fought a costly defensive battle with numerous counter-attacks and attacks, which delayed the British capture of the heights for more than a month.
Stuff Redoubt fell on 9 October and the last German position in Redoubt fell on 14 October, exposing the positions of the 28th Reserve Division in the Ancre valley to British ground observation. A German retreat from the salient that had formed around St. Pierre Divion and Beaumont Hamel either side of the Ancre, was considered by Erich Ludendorff and the new army group commander Field Marshal Rupprecht, Crown Prince of Bavaria and rejected, due to the lack of better defensive positions further back, in favour of counter-attacks desired by General Fritz von Below the 1st Army commander. General Max von Gallwitz the 2nd Army commander, noted in early October that so many of his units had been moved to the 1st Army north of the Somme, that he had only one fresh regiment in reserve.
The German counter-attacks were costly failures and by 21 October, the British had managed to advance and take all but the last German foothold in the eastern part of (Regina Trench). A French offensive during the Battle of Verdun on 24 October, forced the Germans to suspend the movement of troops to the Somme front. From British attacks were postponed due to more poor weather, before the capture of of the eastern end of Regina Trench by the 4th Canadian Division on 11 November. Fifth Army operations resumed in the Battle of the Ancre (13–18 November).
Background
Strategic developments At the end of September, the Anglo-French armies had crossed the Péronne–Bapaume road around Bouchavesnes, taken Morval, Lesbœufs and Gueudecourt in the centre and captured most of Thiepval Ridge on the northern flank. On 29 September, Sir Douglas Haig instructed the Fourth Army to plan operations to advance towards Bapaume, reaching Le Transloy on the right and Loupart Wood north of the Albert–Bapaume road on the left. The Reserve Army was to extend the attacks of the Fourth Army by making converging attacks on the Ancre valley, attacking northwards from Thiepval Ridge towards Loupart Wood–Irles–Miraumont and eastwards on the north bank of the Ancre, by attacking towards Puisieux on a front from Beaumont Hamel to Hébuterne, with the right flank meeting the attacks from the south at Miraumont, to envelop German troops in the upper Ancre valley. The Third Army was to provide a flank guard north of the Reserve Army, by occupying a spur south of Gommecourt. The Reserve Army operations were to begin by 12 October, after the Fourth Army had attacked towards Le Transloy and Beaulencourt and the French Sixth Army had attacked Sailly-Saillisel around 7 October. The French Tenth Army south of the Somme was to attack on 10 October north of Chaulnes. Normal autumn weather in the Somme region would be an obstacle but an exceptional amount of rain and mist grounded aircraft and created vast mud fields, which caused many attacks to be postponed. Haig issued a much less ambitious directive on 7 October but the poor weather, German tactical changes and reinforcements on the Somme front, led to the costly failure of many attacks by both sides.
After meeting with Rawlinson and Gough, Haig cancelled the Third Army operation on 17 October. The Reserve Army plan for a converging attack towards the Ancre, was limited to an attack up the valley on 23 October. The failure of the Fourth Army attack of 18 October caused another revision of the plan, with II Corps of the Reserve Army to capture the rest of Thiepval Ridge on 19 October, the Fourth and French Sixth armies to attack on 23 October and the less ambitious Reserve Army attack to begin on 25 October. Gough issued a new operation order on 15 October and began another reorganization on the north side of the Ancre. There was more heavy rain on 19 October, which led a delay of the II Corps operation until 21 October. The attack succeeded but the rains returned on 24 October and the main attack next day was postponed. Gough was given discretion by Haig to make further postponements, on 27 October Gough set 1 November as the provisional date, postponed it again on 29 October to 5 November and on 3 November Haig gave Gough the choice of cancelling the attack; Haig also suggested a subsidiary attack while waiting for the weather to improve, if the state of the ground justified the effort. Gough proposed an attack on 9 November but preferred to wait for better weather. Haig agreed that no attack should begin until the ground was dry enough for infantry to move freely, when there was a forecast of two days of fair weather and another postponement followed.
In August the German armies on the Somme had been subjected to great strain. IX Reserve Corps had been "shattered" in the defence of Pozières, the 18th Reserve Division having lost . Ten fresh divisions had been brought into the Somme front and an extra division had been put into the line opposite the British. Movement behind the German front was made difficult by constant Anglo-French artillery-fire, which added to equipment shortages by delaying rail deliveries and interrupting road maintenance. Damage, wear, defective ammunition, capture and destruction had left guns and guns in the two German armies out of action by the end of August. The artillery situation was only slowly improved by the plan devised by Gallwitz to centralize counter-battery fire and use the reinforcements of aircraft to observe artillery fire. The extra aircraft had little effect on Allied air superiority but were able eventually to increase the accuracy and efficiency of bombardments.
The 2nd Army had been starved of reinforcements in mid-August to replace exhausted divisions in the 1st Army and plans for a counter-stroke had been abandoned for lack of troops. The emergency in Russia caused by the Brusilov Offensive, the entry of Rumania into the war and French counter-attacks at Verdun put further strain on the German army. Falkenhayn was sacked from the supreme command () on 28 August and replaced by Hindenburg and Ludendorff. The new supreme command (Third OHL) ordered an end to attacks at Verdun and the despatch of troops from the area to Rumania and the Somme front. On 5 September, proposals for a new shorter line to be built in France were ordered from the commanders of the western armies, who met Hindenburg and Ludendorff at Cambrai on 8 September, where they announced that no reserves were available for offensive operations except those planned for Rumania. Ludendorff condemned the policy of holding ground regardless of its tactical value and advocated holding front-line positions with the minimum of troops and the recapture of lost positions by counter-attacks.
On 15 September, Rupprecht was ordered to prepare a rear defensive line and on 23 September work on the new (Hindenburg Position) was ordered to begin. On 21 September, after the battle of Flers–Courcelette (15–22 September), Hindenburg ordered that the Somme front was to have priority in the west for troops and supplies and by the end of the Battle of Morval Rupprecht had no reserves left on the Somme front. During September, the Germans had sent another thirteen fresh divisions to the British sector and scraped up troops wherever they could be found. The German artillery had fired of field artillery shells and of heavy artillery ammunition, yet the début of the tank, the defeat at Thiepval and the suffered by the armies on the Somme in September, had been severe blows to German morale. On 7 October, Rupprecht forecast a British attack north of the Ancre River in mid-October. Anxieties about the situation at Verdun also increased and on 19 October, the despatch of reinforcements from Verdun to the Somme was suspended. Defeats inflicted by the French Tenth Army led to the sacking of the 2nd Army Chief of Staff, Bronsart von Schellendorf.
Prelude
British preparations
The front-line of the Reserve Army had not moved far since the beginning of the battle, except in the south, near the Albert–Bapaume road; the ground behind the front-line was far less damaged than that behind the Fourth Army. When supply routes to the Fourth Army were washed out by rain in October, movement remained relatively easy in much of the Reserve Army area. Gough began to concentrate more troops north of the Ancre, for the attack intended for 12 October. In early October the north bank had been held by the 39th Division of V Corps, up to the boundary with the Third Army at Hébuterne. On 1 October the 2nd Division was moved in on the left of the 39th Division, to hold the ground from Redan Ridge to the army boundary. On 4 October the XIII Corps headquarters was brought out of reserve, to control of the front line, up to the junction with the Third Army and the left flank of the 2nd Division was relieved by the 51st Division. The 39th Division was transferred to II Corps on 2 October and then took over the area immediately south of the Ancre on 5 October, by extending its right flank to relieve the 18th Division at Thiepval.
By 7 October, XIII Corps had the 51st and 19th Divisions in line and on 8 October, V Corps relieved the 2nd Division with the 3rd and 63rd divisions. Gough issued instructions for the attack on the north bank from and arranged for the 1st Cavalry Division and the 3rd Cavalry Division to move closer to the front line. The artillery of V Corps and XIII Corps steadily bombarded the German defences on the south bank, where II Corps operations against (Regina Trench to the Canadians and Stuff Trench to the British) continued and simulated an offensive on the north bank with artillery bombardments, wire-cutting and smoke screens. Patrols and raids were carried out on the north bank, although mud and thick fog made it hard to keep direction. On 31 October, a patrol got into the German front-line near Hébuterne and found no Germans within . On the night of 2 November, two V Corps patrols reached the German second line near Serre and a raid by the 31st Division of XIII Corps on 7 November, took four prisoners.