Current Information:

Born-Poplar

Caterpillar Valley Cemetery, Longueval, Somme

The Battle of the Somme (July-November, 1916)

By the beginning of September, 1916,  the Battle of the Somme had been raging for two months. Thousands of men had already been killed or wounded or were simply missing, never to be seen again and and just a few square miles of the French countryside, all in the southern part of the battlefield, had been captured from the enemy. Mistakes had been made by the various commanders and would be continued to be made but there was no turning back as the British, Australians, South Africans, New Zealanders and Canadians carried on battering away at the German defences in the hope of a breakthrough, So it continued all the way through to November with nearly every battalion and division then in France being drawn into it at some stage. In the end the German trenches had been pushed back a few more miles along most of the line but the cost in lives had been staggering. By the end of the fighting in November, 1916, British Army casualties numbered over 400,000, killed, wounded and missing.

3rd September, 1916, saw the start of a general offensive along a wide section of the front line that resulted, among other gains, in the capture of the village of Guillemont. On the left of this front 1st Division attacked High Wood and Wood Lane, a German trench running between High Wood and Delville Wood. At noon on that day, 1st Cameron Highlanders and 1st Black Watch of 1 Brigade went over the top. On the left, 1st Black Watch were held up by machine-gun fire which prevented them from entering High Wood but 1st Cameron Highlanders on the right had more success and managed to capture a section of Wood Lane and even establish themselves in posts 100 yards beyond it. At this stage they called up two companies of 8th Royal Berkshire also of 1 Brigade, to help them consolidate. "A" Company on the left were held up by machine guns from High Wood and did not reach their objective, but "C" Company got across and joined up with the 1st Cameron Highlanders afterwards sending back men for ammunition and a Stokes Trench Mortar. The men started to consolidate the position. Meanwhile the two remaining Companies of Berkshires who had been on the road were quickly hurried up to the garrison the front line. But in the end all these efforts proved both futile and costly. At about 1.30pm the enemy made a heavy counter attack and with his artillery succeeded in forcing a  withdrawal from the captured position and a return to the original front line. During this operation the casualties were heavy. One of these was Edgar Ellis.