Current Information:

Age-31

West Norwood

Born & Enlisted-London

Devonshire Cemetery, Mametz, France

The opening day of the Battle of the Somme 1st July 1916

This was a disastrous day for the British Army in France. Eleven divisions of Fourth Army attacked along a 15 mile front from Maricourt to Serre. Two further divisions of Third Army launched a diversionary attack just to the north of Serre at Gommecourt. For a week beforehand the British artillery pounded the German trenches but the Germans had been there for a long time and they had constructed deep, concrete reinforced shelters beneath their trenches and many survived the bombardment. The troops went over the top at 7.30am but even before they had left their overcrowded trenches, many had been killed or maimed by German artillery. The Germans knew that they were coming. Once in No-Man’s-Land the artillery continued to take its toll and then the machine guns opened up on the advancing British infantry. They fell in their thousands and the attack came to a standstill almost everywhere. Survivors sought cover wherever they could find it and at night they crawled back to their own lines, often dragging a wounded soldier with them. Only in the south were any advances made with the attack on Fricourt and Mametz. Over 19,000 British soldiers were killed on this day, including 2,500 from London.

On 1st July, 7th Division attacked along part of the southern sector of the fifteen mile front. 20 Brigade advanced on Mametz with the 2nd Gordon Highlanders, 9th Devonshire and 2nd Border battalions while 8th Devonshire were in reserve. When the attack was held up two companies of 8th Devonshire were ordered up but they too lost heavily in no man’s land, meeting stubborn German resistance especially from a cutting beyond the Mametz-Halt road.  For the rest of the morning they assisted in clearing the dug-outs in this cutting. At 1pm the last company of 8th Devonshire was sent up to fill the gap between 2nd Gordon Highlanders and 9th Devon. The leading platoons suffered heavily from machine gun fire at the Shrine but guided to the left, the rest made it up.  At 3.30pm and after a half hour bombardment this company of 8th Devonshire joined in the advance to secure Mametz.  200 Germans surrendered from Mametz and Shrine dug-outs, and others were seen retiring towards Fricourt Wood.  8th Devonshire then moved on to Hidden Wood and by 4.05pm all of Mametz was in British hands. At some stage during the day, William Dunn was killed.