The Battle of the Somme Essay -- Papers

The Battle of the Somme The Battle of the Somme involved the main allied attack on the Western Front in the 1st World War. It is mainly famous due to the loss of 58,000 British troops on the first day of battle (1st July 1916). The attack ran from 1st July until 18th November and was located upon a 30-kilometre front, from North of the Somme River between Arras and Albert. The offensive was planned earlier in 1915 and was intended to be a joint Franco-Anglo attack. The French Commander in Chief, Joffre, said that the aim was to drain the German forces of reserves, however territorial gain also had some input. Sir Douglas Haig was the Commander in Chief of the BEF who would be conducting the major offensive in 1916. Originally, although the British forces made up the bulk of the offensive forces, the attack was to be predominantly French. However the German siege on Verdun at the beginning of 1916 resulted in the diversion of almost all-French manpower and efforts as Falkenhayn had promised to bleed France white. This changed the intent of the Somme attack and the French ordered the planned date (1st August 1916) to be bought forward to 1st July, the aim now to divert the Germans from Verdun to the defence of the Somme. Haig now had no choice but to take charge of the attack in Joffre's absence. He used both the ideas of himself and those of General Rawlinson. On Saturday 24th June the attack proceeded by an eight-day preliminary bombardment on the German lines. The expectation being that all forward German defences would be destroyed leaving the at... ...Battle of the Ancre where the field fortress of Beaumont Hamel was captured. The British were finally progressing, but even this was bought to a halt when extremely bad weather caused the Somme offensive to end. The result had been an estimated 420,000 British casualties, a further 200,000 for the French and around 500,000 for the Germans and all for only 12 kilometres of land in Britain and Frances favour. Over 1 million lives were lost in this battle alone and all the Somme offensive was designed for was to divert German attention from the French at Verdun. Some believe this battle acted as a learning curve in the employment of artillery, which contributed to the victory in 1918. In my opinion it shows the severity and pointlessness of war. Hardly anything was achieved apart from the loss of thousands of lives.