And on the on the way I saw a tank and uh when he went across it stopped about halfway across which was about 3 kilometers away from the from Flor.

The tank was numbered D7 with Archie Richards at the guns.

It had broken down just a short distance from its start point, and it wasn’t the only one.

The opening day of battle highlighted serious flaws with the army’s new weapon.

Of the 49 tanks available for action that morning, only 32 had reached the starting point for battle.

Of these, 14 either suffered mechanical failure, got stuck in shell holes, or were knocked out by enemy fire.

But for those that kept going, the effects were dramatic.

When Archie and his crew were given another vehicle, they made devastating progress.

Nothing got in their way.

We had to go over previous dead and dead that you you’d killed.

If they fell in your way, you had to go over.

We we never deviated the tanks for anything only only uh for action you know all feelings of humanity leaves you when you’re when when you’re fighting.

You say to yourself, “Well, it’s either him or me.

” See? So I got to get in first.

So you you’ve got no feelings of humanity, right? Then afterwards, yes, perhaps.

And inside the tanks, conditions were almost unbearable.

Well, the atmosphere was very, very sickening really, especially when you were in action and all the traps closed down and splinters from the machine guns flying inside.

when we are in action flying all about sparks.

A terrible terrible noise with the with our guns firing, the German guns firing and machine guns going and the noise of our engine and everything.

Oh yeah, shocking.

But despite the conditions for the crews, when the tanks managed to get to the German trenches, the effect was nothing short of spectacular.

Hundreds surrendered as panic swept through the lines.

They’d never seen anything like it before.

But when they when they saw we was armed with small guns and machine guns, they gave up right away.

It’s surprising we we hadn’t time to get on top of the trench before they was out with their arms up.

A week after the start of the battle, the village of Flair was in British hands.

Although the tanks had revealed their [music] weaknesses, they had undoubtedly played a significant part in the advance, and their crews were heralded as heroes.

But the big push had fallen short of its objective.

British troops had failed to break through German lines and many formidable German defense positions remained intact.

Conditions on the SO were fast becoming unbearable.

Shellfire had churned up the battlefields [music] and in places British frontline positions were little more than a series of connected shell holes.

Simply getting food rations and water to the men at the front was becoming a logistical nightmare.

On the 13th of November, the Allies launched an attack on Bowmont Hamill, a village which had been part of a failed assault on the 1st of July.

On that day, the first New Foundland regiment had been virtually wiped out in the attack, and their bodies still littered the battlefield.

As Zohour approached, 19-year-old officer Norman Collins gave encouragement to the men in his command.

You’re looking at your watch and to see zero hour.

Then you look and see that your men, the men you’re going to go over the top with are left and right, are equipped and ready to go.

And then you you encourage them right and left to go with you.

All go together.

So you sort of shepherded them over [snorts] as well as you could.

And that’s that’s the only description I could give you.

You were a shepherd.

Yes.

And all the time I have no doubt whatever that I was as frightened as anything and hoping probably even have a faint hope that I would survive.

After an heroic effort, Bowmont Hamill was captured later that same day, but there was to be no rest for Norman Collins, who was given a grim task.

I was told to collect the newly killed dead which I did.

I I took it.

It was stretcher bears.

Uh unfortunately the stretcherbears a number of them that were related to the ones who were dead and it was a bit upsetting.

Some of them were their brothers and brothers and cousins especially the Scottish regiment.

You we had such a lot of the same name clan name you see Mlan and they of course were very upset very very upset.

But it wasn’t only his own men that he was ordered to bury.

Then I was told to go back into the no man’s land [clears throat] or or rather what was Roman man’s land and bury the old dead.

That is the dead of the new foundant regiment who had been killed there on July the 1st.

The first one I saw, the first one I came across with his hair growing, hair growing out of his still growing from his face.

When I touched it, the rats ran out.

There was nothing left under the potty except a bone.

I just realized then for me what death was.

A horrible form of death, too.

Not long after leading the attack on Bowman Hamill, Norman Collins’s position came under heavy shellfire.

I knew that this shell, which was the scream was getting louder and louder.

Uh was had my name on it.

And I wasn’t knocked down, but I knew I was hit.

And I put my hand down and I I felt that my hand I saw my hand was covered in blood.

But I turned around and all my men were on the floor either dead or wounded and they were crying out.

They were very badly wounded, some of them.

Putting the lives of his men before his own, Norman helped the wounded into an ambulance, only getting in himself once the last man was safe, he was on his way home to Blighty.

So, I got into the ambulance uh having completed my mission, I suppose, and off we went.

And as the ambulance drove away, you could hear the gunfire getting getting farther and farther away as you went along.

And finally, there were no guns at all.

The Battle of the Son finally ended on the 19th of November, 1916.

In the four months of fighting, the Allies had captured little more than six miles of ground at a cost of over 600,000 men, killed or wounded.

The debate over whether Hey’s tactics to wage a war of attrition were right continues to this day, but many of the men who followed his orders in the summer of 1916 felt happy to have done so.

One of those was 20-year-old Robbie Burns, whose war came to an end when he was hit by shrapnel.

Despite nearly losing his leg, he remained optimistic about his contribution to the war effort.

I was happy.

I knew I did something for my country.

I felt happy and I still feel happy.

But yes, I still feel very happy that I was in that war and I came out because as we say, if it hadn’t been for us, a lot of people wouldn’t be here today.

And I still maintain that some of those fellas gave their lives so that other people could live.

And I still contain that they saved us all.

They saved the country.

Another whose physical injuries would stay with him for the rest of his life was 19-year-old George La.

Having spent nearly 2 years at the front, the deafening noise of artillery fire had seriously damaged his hearing and he became a danger to himself and his colleagues.

They’re going back.

One night I went back with the sergeant and uh he said, “Stop.

Stop.

” He said, “We stopped by a hedge.

” And uh he said, “We wait here a minute.

” I said, “What’d you stop for?” He said, “Can’t you hear that going across?” I said, “Well, all them sh you can hear it.

” I said, “No, I can’t hear it.

” Oh, he said, “You’re no good to me.

” And uh I started crying because it went off deaf.

I couldn’t I only hear what they were talking about.

So I decided that I told myself I’m going to go sick in the morning, find out what it is.

George’s deafness was confirmed by the doctors and he was sent home to England where he spent the rest of the war working on the land.

But for some of those who fought on the Som, the injuries were mental rather than physical as living with the constant threat of death shattered minds as well as bodies.

During the course of the Great War, a new medical condition was discovered by doctors treating soldiers exposed to frontline action, shell shock.

By the end of the war, some 80,000 British soldiers were diagnosed with this debilitating condition which caused shakes, tremors, and periods of extreme anxiety.

Having spent two terrifying months in a tank during the Battle of the Song, 19-year-old Archie Richards from Cornwall began to feel the mental effects of frontline duty.

I was shell shocked at that time.

Oh yes, I there was no doubt about that.

I was shell shocked.

I wasn’t in my right senses or anything else, you know.

makes you feel cringy and it makes you feel I don’t know.

It makes you feel bad in yourself.

Real bad.

You you you begin to do like this.

And I never did that before.

But every time a big shell crashed, a tremendous corrupt noise they make.

Oh, like a crashing like well I don’t know what a terrible crash cuz they were dropping near.

See and every time every time one dropped I I quench up like this.

Well, I never did that before.

So that shows I was I was shocked and I couldn’t couldn’t believe myself at the time.

I couldn’t believe it that I I thought my nerves would would carry me, but no, it broke my nerve.

These symptoms could manifest themselves years later, even in the most able of soldiers.

21-year-old officer Richard Hawkins was sent home to England after being wounded on the SO.

After the war, he had a successful career in sales and advertising, but often struggled with a nervous condition caused by his experiences in the front line.

After the war, I was troubled for a good many years by a difficulty in speaking.

It was hardly a stammer.

It was a stuttering.

But it was awfully difficult in business occasion to go to a meeting and have to say something.

It was tremendous strain on one’s um nervous system which had pretty well been shattered after 19 months and the front line pretty well which one couldn’t sleep at night and [clears throat] that sort of thing.

Despite all this, Richard always looked back on his wartime experiences with great pride and a deep affection for the men in his command.

All nice, decent boats.

We all had great fun.

Really, tremendous fun.

Enjoyed ourselves.

We really I personally enjoyed the running war.

I think I don’t know why, but it was great fun.

For all the horrors experienced by those who fought in the battle of the song, the lasting memory for many is of lost colleagues.

After the war, Norman Collins experienced a vivid apparition, a haunting tribute to the friends who had given their lives for king and country.

I had a vision and I was standing in in a trench and eye at eye level.

There were there were legs going feet marching marching feet going along.

No heads just feet legs legs marching along.

And there were all the men, all the men I visualized who were killed in the war.

And there they were going on marching away, marching into into a distance and where I would never follow.

You see all the people I knew have gone except me.

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