By Lieutenant-General Sir John Monash , G.C.M.G. , K.C.B. , V.D. , D.C.L. , LL.D. WITH 9 FOLDING MAPS IN COLOUR AND 31 ILLUSTRATIONS LONDON: HUTCHINSON & CO. PATERNOSTER ROW...

The following pages, of which I began the compilation when still engaged in the arduous work of Repatriation of the Australian troops in all theatres of war, were intended to be something in the nature of a consecutive and comprehensive story of the Australian Imperial Force in France during the closing phases of the Great War. I soon found that the time at my disposal was far too limited to allow me to make full use of the very voluminous documentary material which I had collected during the ca

The renown of the Australians as individual fighters, in all theatres of the Great War, has loomed large in the minds and imagination of the people of the Empire. Many stories of the work they did have been published in the daily Press and in book form. But it is seldom that any appreciation can be discovered of the fact that the Australians in France gradually became, as the war progressed, moulded into a single, complete and fully organized Army Corps. Seldom has any stress been laid upon the

The course of events during June and July pointed to the conclusions, firstly, that the enemy contemplated no further offensive operations in the Somme Valley, and, secondly, that the condition of the whole German Second Army, astride of the Somme, offered every temptation to us to seize the initiative against it. So far as the Australian Corps was concerned, however, my total frontage, which had been increased (as the result of our exploitation) to over eleven miles, precluded the possibility,

My plan for the impending battle involved the employment of four Divisions in the actual assault, with one Division in reserve. The Reserve Division was to be available for use in one of two ways; either as a reserve of fresh troops to exploit any successes gained upon the first day, or else to take over and hold defensively the ground won, if the assaulting Divisions should have become too exhausted to be relied upon for successful resistance to a counter-attack in force. The frontage allotted

The Fourth British Army had opened the great Allied counter-offensive with a brilliant stroke. It remained to see in what fashion the Allied High Command would proceed to exploit the victory. Would the Fourth Army be called upon, with added resources, at once to thrust due east, with the object of drawing upon itself the German reserves, and dealing with them as they arrived; or would blows now be delivered on other fronts with a view to keeping those reserves dispersed? The immediate decision,

The design which I had formed after the battle of August 8th of driving the enemy completely out of the bend of the Somme—but which I was obliged to abandon for the time being because of the decision of the Fourth Army to thrust in a south-easterly direction—was now about to be realized. The effect of the battle of Chuignes, following so closely upon the advance of the Third Army two days before, made it probable that the enemy would decide upon a definite withdrawal to the line of the Somme. It

During the closing days of August events had commenced to move rapidly; for the offensive activities initiated by the Fourth Army, three weeks earlier, began to spread in both directions along the Allied front. The Third British Army had entered the fray on August 21st; the First British Army was ready with its offensive on August 26th, on which date the Canadian Corps, restored to its old familiar battleground, delivered a great attack opposite Arras. The French, who, on my right flank, had alo

The successive withdrawals of the First, Fourth, Third and Fifth Australian Divisions from the battle zone during the period from September 22nd to October 2nd had been arranged with the Fourth Army Commander about the middle of September. The Corps had been continuously employed on front-line duty since April, and had already accomplished a considerable advance, for every inch of which it had been obliged to fight. This consideration alone had earned for the Corps a period of rest. But other im

The time has arrived when it is proper to take stock of gains and losses, and to endeavour to appraise, at its true value, the work done by the Australian Army Corps during its long-sustained effort of the last six months of its fighting career. It has become customary to regard the actual captures of prisoners and guns as a true index of the degree of success which has attended any series of battle operations. Every soldier knows, however, that such a standard of judgment, applied alone, would

The 3rd, 6th and 12th Artillery Brigades were Corps Troops not forming part of any Division. The 9th Artillery Brigade was disbanded at the end of 1916....

In order to illustrate the nature of the individual fighting carried out by the Australian Corps, during the period covered by this book, the following very small selection has been made from the official records of deeds of gallantry by individual soldiers. In every one of these twenty-nine cases, the Victoria Cross has been awarded by His Majesty the King: No. 4061, Sergeant Stanley Robert MacDougall , 47th Battalion, A.I.F. "At Dernancourt , on morning of 28th March, 1918, the enemy attacked

The following were the complete orders issued by the Australian Army Corps for the Battle of August 8th, 1918. They form only a small part of the whole of the orders which were required for the operation. There were, in addition, detailed orders by the Corps Artillery Headquarters, the Heavy Artillery, the Chief Engineer, and each of the five Divisions and fifteen Brigades, and also by the Administrative Services of the Corps. On the question of the form of the orders, the most expedient course