Formation of the Battalion (1st September 1916)
More than 600,000 British infantrymen were
killed or wounded during the ten weeks of the battles
of the Somme Valley which began on 1st July 1916.
The battlefields of Flanders and France had become
a maze of trench systems so complex as to require
air observation to comprehend.
Trench warfare bore hardest on the infantry
and in August 1916 it was decided by The King, the
Chief of the Imperial General Staff and the Colonel
of The 1st Life Guards, that the flood of recruits for
the Household Cavalry would be diverted into badly
needed infantry - a battalion, in fact, raised and
trained within The Household Cavalry. On Friday,
1st September 1916, The Household Battalion
formed at Hyde Park Barracks, under the wing of
the Reserve Regiment of The 1st Life Guards. The
battalion strength was 28 Officers and 900 men. Of
the 84 Officers who eventually served in the new
unit, 15 were 1st Life Guards, 11 were 2nd Life
Guards, 8 were from The Blues, 22 were commissioned
directly into The Household Battalion, 17 were
Foot Guards and 11 came from cavalry and infantry
of the Line.
Captain Wyndham Portal of The 1st Life
Guards was appointed to the Lieutenant Colonelcy
of the Battalion. He had served in The 1st Life
Guards from 1908 to 1911 and rejoined from the
Reserve in 1914. He was to command The Household
Battalion throughout its existence.
The new infantry battalion trained in Hyde
Park and later in September, moved to camp in
Richmond Park. Shortly after The Household
Battalion entrained for France, on 8th and 9th
November 1916, the Reserve of the Battalion moved
from London to Combermere Barracks. Windsor,
with the Reserve Regiment of The 2nd Life Guards.
From here, drafts of over 2,000 men were sent out to
the Western Front to replace casualties suffered by
the Household Battalion during its 14 months of
combatant service. The men were paid the cavalry
rate of pay, a few pence more than the infantry, and
they wore cavalry service dress on furlough with a
distinctive cap badge, the design of which is perpetuated
in the present day Household Cavalry
Forage Cap Badge.
The Somme Valley (8th December 1916 to mid
February 1917)
Most of the men had merely 99 days service
when The Household Battalion manned trenches for
the first time on 8th December 1916 at Sailly
Sailliesel, east of Combles and Morval in the Somme
Valley. The Somme battles had petered out five days
earlier but German artillery still rumbled and the
sticky, red, Somme red mud was just as deep. Over forty
men had to be dug out and there were cases of total
exhaustion during the period December - January,
after which The Household Battalion moved to other
trenches at Bouchavesne and went into the 'rest area'
of Arras in mid February.
The Scarpe, Arras, Fampoux and Roeux (8th April to
14th May 1917)
The misfortunes of Britain's allies in 1917
dictated circumstances in which three major battles,
Arras, 3rd Ypres and Cambrai, were planned and
fought. The Household Battalion was involved to the
hilt in all three. The French commander Nivelle was
replaced by Marshals Foch and Petain in Spring 1917
after part of the French army mutinied. Field Marshall
Sir Douglas Haig launched the Arras offensive on
Easter Monday 1917 to draw German attention
away from the disaster which had overtaken the
French army, further South. As a cavalry officer, he
saw the mission of cavalry as the exploitation of the
eventual break through in the trench war stalemate
and put the 3rd Cavalry Division into the attack on
the Hindenhurg Line at Monchy le Preux on Easter
Monday, 9th April 1917. There was a general advance
of the infantry north and south of the 45 foot wide,
6 foot deep Scarpe River flowing east to west
through Arras. North of the Scarpe, the Household
Battalion, as part of the 10th Brigade in the 4th
Infantry Division were allotted the task of advancing
along the swampy banks of the muddy little river on
the hamlet of Fampoux, (formerly pop. 1,015
but now flattened and enemy held).
While their brothers of The 1st and 2nd Life
Guards and Blues rode against barbed wire and
machine guns with the 3rd Cavalry Division to
Monchy, The Household Battalion stalked towards
Fampoux with rifles and bayonets in the sleet. With
them were the Warwicks, Seaforth and Royal Irish
Fusiliers. It took the Brigade 11 days to take
Fampoux and The Household Battalion lost 9
Officers and 166 non Commissioned Officers and
Men killed in action. Ahead was the smaller but even
more formidable German defence at Roeux at a bend
in the river, one mile from Fampoux and 6,000 yards
from the Hindenhurg Line itself.
Roeux Cemetry (3rd May and 12/13th May 1917)
Roeux cemetery, 50 yards north west of the
village, must have been among the least attractive
pieces of land in northern France in 1917. Packed
with Germans, well entrenched, it was even less
desirable when The Household Battalion attacked
on 3rd May. With the Irish Fusiliers, who had
attacked the village. The Battalion was forced back
with above 230 casualties.
The attack was renewed on the 12th May,
the same battalions taking the same objectives.
Smoke shells gave a screen which prevented a clear
picture of the attack from Battalion Headquarters,
but overnight, and in the early hours of the 13th
May, The Household Battalion won one Military
Cross and nine Military Medals and forced the
Germans out of Roeux at bayonet point. The squalid
little villages of Fampoux and Roeux cost The
Household Battalion nine Officers killed and a
total of nearly 500 casualties, that is to say, more
than half the original strength of The Battalion.
The remnant moved to the cellars under the
old city of Arras, ruined and bleak. They rested here
for some days while their losses in manpower were
made good by new faces - recruits from Windsor.
Ypres 1917; Poelcappelle and Passchendaele (4th to
13th October 1917).
Russia, our eastern ally, had virtually ceased
to be militarily effective against the Germans from
July 1917 and the Bolshevik Revolution of October
1917 took Russia out of the war altogether. Italy
suffered the crushing defeat - at the hands of the
Austrians - of Caporetto. The United States had
come into the war in April 1917 but no United
States troops arrived in France in any number until
1918. The British authorities were apprehensive of
the arrival of new German Divisions on the Western
Front from the Russian Front. The 3rd battle of
Ypres began on 31st July 1917 and lasted to the
10th November. Its aim was to kill as many of the
enemy as possible - not to gain ground. The fact,
reckoned in killed and wounded per mile of territory gained,
the 3rd Battle of Ypres was more
expensive than the Somme 1916. 8,200 British
casualties were inflicted per mile of territory gained
at Ypres against 5,000 on the Somme.
On 10th October 1917, Colonel Portal's
unit came under command of 12th Brigade and was
instructed to be ready to advance on 12th October on
extreme right of the 12th Brigade which was on the
extreme right of the 4th Div with 18th Inf. Div on
its right. The Household Battalion's objective was a
few pillboxes and MG posts marked on the map as
Requette Farm, left and east of Poelcappelle where
fighting had been going on since the 9th October.
Early in the morning of the 12th October,
Colonel Portal's men lost touch with the Royal
West Kents, who were on their right and acting as
extreme left flank battalion of the 18th Infantry
Division. The Household Battalion also came under
heavy fire from Poelcappelle which contained enemy.
Part of a company of The Household Battalion were
able to get into Requette Farm, capture its machine
gunners and guns and hold it. Their hold was tenuous
since no runner, (the only means of communication
with Battalion Headquarters), could get by
Poelcappelle on account of snipers. Nonetheless, this
dwindling remnant of a company of cavalry-cum infantry held out until the late afternoon. At 1500
hours, 12th October, only three Officers remained in
the forward companies of the Battalion. They were
Captain V.A. Cazalet, MC, (1LG); 2nd Lieut. C.H.
Davies, (2LG); and Lieutenant A.L. Martin (Gren.
Gds.). All three had begun the action in the Support
Company. The men under their command were
utterly exhausted and not a single non-Commissioned
Officer above the rank of Corporal remained. In the
dark of the small hours of the 13th October, the 3
rifle companies still left at the rear had to be taken up
in relief by the Commanding Officer, his Adjutant,
Captain R.W.G. Dill, and Battalion Corporal Major
Wright.
To the right of the 4th and 18th Divisions, the
attack on Passchendaele failed and wounded men,
and some able, drowned in the mud beneath floating
duck-boards. There was a withdrawal along the whole
sector of the Poelcappelle - Passchendaele Front.
The reckoning for The Household Battalion was a
loss of over 400 men for a temporary gain of 600
yards.
In rest at Arras, The Household Battalion
received its last draft of 500 new faces from Windsor
in late October.
THE BATTLE OF CAMBRAI 1917
On the 20/21st November 1917, 324 British tanks
attempted to take the Hindenburg line by storm west of Bourlon Wood.
The tank attack failed. Infantry went in and took Bourlon Wood 23rd-28th November, but the Germans launched attack with infantry, artillery and poison gas, 30th November
to 3rd December 1917 and restored the former position.
THE DEFENCE OF BOURLON WOOD (30th November to 3rd December 1917).
This reference is to the activities of Colonel
Portal's men during the battles near Cambrai between 20th November and 3rd December 1917. Here
in an effort to end the stalemate of trench warfare by
the use of the mobility of tanks, the British army had
been engaged in violent action, the vortex of which
was a few acres of tree stumps and rain filled shell
holes known as "Bourlon Wood .
The Battalion Padre, the Rev. R.E.M. Haines
wrote of Bourlon Wood "I doubt very much whether
his, (a clerical acquaintaince) religious beliefs would
have stood us in much stead in holding Bourlon Wood
at Cambrai, living as we had to, under the most
beastly shell and gas fire, simply in shell holes, and
come away as we did with just 90 fit men.' So much
for routine trench duty'
In another letter, the same Padre Haines
writes, "I see the Cambrai despatch is out. We feel
a bit disappointed as we thought one of our Troopers
might have got the VC for which he was recommeded
. The Bosch began shelling us with his beastly gas
shells and everybody dashed for his respirator. In the
confusion, the Colonel could not find his and called
for his orderly to bring it. It couldn't be found but
in a few seconds the orderly came back with one
in his hand and said 'Here it is Sir, Colonel Portal
put it on. When we came to take them off, twenty
minutes later, the orderly was seen dead without a
gas mask. He had deliberately given his own respirator,
which he was perfectly justified in keeping for himself, to the Colonel, knowing that it meant death for
him in a few minutes. One can never take a mean
view of life and men but we did think he might have
been given the Victoria Cross."
The End (27th January to 16th February 1918.)
The Household Battalion was disbanded on
16th Febuary 1918. It had proved too much to fill
the gaps in its ranks from The Household Cavalry in
addition to the maintenance of drafts for The 1st
and 2nd Life Guards and The Blues, who were due
to lose their horses for the rest of the war and
become The 1st, 2nd and 3rd Guards Machine Gun
Regiments. Thus on 27th January 1918, the remains
of The Household Battalion manned the trenches for
the last time. It was as muddy, cold and unpleasant as
ever, but this time the mere handful of men were not
called on for either offensive or defensive action on
any large scale. By early February all that remained
was Battalion Headquarters, which dispersed 16th
February. George V wrote a valedictory, "You can
rest assured that as an infantry battalion formed from
The 1st and 2nd Life Guards and The Royal Horse
Guards, you have added yet another chapter to the
grand traditions of my Household Cavalry."
All That Remains
The Household Battalion never had a Standard
or Colour during its existence but in 1919 a King's
colour was made for The Battalion. It remains in the
place where it was lodged by Colonel W R Portal,
in Holy Trinity Church, Windsor on Sunday, 25th
July, 1920 on the left of the chancel screen. On
Sunday 16th October 1921, new alter rails in the church were dedicated to the memory of the 450 men of the
Household Battalion who had given
their lives during the Wars darkest years.
The Colour is the normal Union Flag of the
infantry colour but unique in respect of its gold
stitched title, in the first quarter, "The Household
Battalion'' and, totally without any other device or
heraldic embellishiment. It bears at the centre of the
crosses of St George, St Andrew and St Patrick,
the Crest of The Household Cavalry and the cap
badge of The Household Battalion. The finial is the
spear point of old days, before 1858 and not The
Crown and Lion emblem.
The final gesture of this gallant Battalion
came when it was given the choice of selecting its
honours to be stitched on the Colour. Colonel Portal
decided that the honours to which The Household
Battalion was entitled should be embroidered on the
Standards of the parent Regiments of Household
Cavalry.
The Household Battalion Colour therefore
bears no battle honours.
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