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Archiver > GREATWAR > 2005-03 > 1110983597


From: patrick holland <>
Subject: RE: [WW1] Somme Casualties - Lest we forget
Date: Wed, 16 Mar 2005 22:33:53 +0800
References: <016201c52a04$7469be50$8e6d86d9@PETERB><OPEPLCMBIFDGHJGEAMNIEEPOEJAA.Lees.Ken@BTinternet.com>
In-Reply-To: <OPEPLCMBIFDGHJGEAMNIEEPOEJAA.Lees.Ken@BTinternet.com>


Peter, Ken and all.

According to this Canadian web site:

http://www.cdli.ca/beaumont/somme.htm

" On July 1, in broad daylight ,one hundred thousand men, the
Newfoundlanders among them, climbed out of their trenches and advanced
shoulder to shoulder in line, one behind the other, across crater-torn
waste of No Man's Land. "

" ..... holding as best they could the parade-ground formations then
prescribed for assaulting infantry by the General Staff, ..... "

" The casualties sustained by the British army in the opening day of the
Battle of Somme totalled 57,470, of which 19,240 were fatal. No unit
suffered heavier losses than the Newfoundland Regiment ...... "

Such was the scale of the massacre that when Paul Spooner kindly sent me a
photo he took for me of the last resting place of my father 's cousin ,

Pte George S. Holland DCM. The Queen 's. who died from his wounds on
the 20th. July age 20

and was buried at Heilly Station I was shocked to find that there were 2
other young men from the Leicestershire Regt buried in the same grave. I
was also stunned at the shear number of headstones crammed into a
relatively small space.

And then I read further on in the article :

" The Somme campaign finally ended in November 1919. Bogged down in mud,
the Allied Forces could claim only to have taken ten kilometres of ground
from the German defenders. The terrible cost was 600,000 casualties. "

I wondered why those who were politically and militarily responsible for
this senseless massacre and earlier ones such as the disaster at Gallipoli
, have not been held truly accountable for what they did.

To-day we charge people, who are held responsible in places such as
Kosovo and Bosnia for allowing their forces to kill civilians and unarmed
soldiers just because they were ethnically different, with crimes against
humanity. Several of them have been captured and are on trial in The
International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague while others are still on
the run.

By contrast in WW1 millions of men were sent to their certain death by
incompetent political and military leaders who were afterwards rewarded
with Titles and other honours. This must never be allowed to happen again.

Hopefully, the creation of the (ICJ), the emergence of greater
accountability and transparency plus more examples of people power and the
removal of immunity to prosecution will keep these callous megalomaniacs
in check. Pinochet in Chile is at last being held accountable for the
large number of murders which occurred during the period when he was
President. That 's a good sign.

Lest We Forget

Patrick.

Perth, Western Australia.

At 05:19 PM 3/16/05, you wrote:
>Peter,
>
>The figures vary according to the source, but the 400,000 figure you refer
>to is 'casualties' and that includes the wounded and missing and possibly
>prisoners of war, whilst the lower quoted figures refer to the dead only.
>
>Regards,
>
>Ken
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Peter F BATCHELOR [mailto:]
>Sent: 16 March 2005 08:45
>To:
>Subject: [WW1] Somme Casualties
>
>
>I am undertaking some research into the Battle of the Somme in 1916 and am
>struggling to come to terms with the number of men lost by the British and
>Commonwealth forces. It would appear to be generally accepted that the
>total figure is in excess of 400,000 [When the Barrage Lifts] but when I
>explore totals from obtained from SDITGW and CWGC I find their figures for 1
>July to 30 November 1916 considerably less than this figure.
>
>SDITGW - approx 120,000 [+ 63rd RND, Royal Marines, RFC, Canada & Australia]
>CWGC - approx 150,000 Buried/Commemorated in France and the UK for the same
>period.
>
>I would emphasise that I am looking at men who died and not just
>'casualties'.
>Obviously I am missing something but what?
>
>Any ideas?
>
>Peter Batchelor
>
>
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