ON JULY 1, 1916, the British Army mounted one of the most ambitious offensives ever undertaken. It was an assault that quickly turned into one of the greatest disasters in military history.
At exactly 7:30 a.m., some 100,000 men went “over the top” in a coordinated advance across a 15-mile front against German lines near the Somme River in France.
Designed to relieve pressure on French forces then fighting at Verdun, the British attack had been carefully planned and was intended to drive a wedge through the enemy line, thus sending the German army tumbling back toward Berlin. H-hour was preceded by a colossal artillery bombardment that rained shells over German lines non-stop for more than a week. Undertaken to soften up enemy defenses, the cannonade saw more than a million shells fired from almost 25,000 heavy guns. Remarkably, the shelling had almost no effect. The Germans were dug in far deeper than the British anticipated and the artillery failed to destroy the miles of barbed wire that protected the entrenched defenders. The explosion of 17 massive underground mines and a “creeping barrage” laid down in front of the advancing British troops were both supposed to ensure success that fateful morning. Neither tactic proved effective.
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