The final book of the trilogy on army supply

The final  book of the trilogy on army supply
The third of my books on army supply

Tuesday, 27 March 2018

Talking about Ordnance - lessons learnt and lessons forgotten

I gave a talk on Ordnance to the Lincoln branch of the Western Front Association. This was done with some trepidation since I am not a military historian. I see myself as a writer of people's stories.

I explained that I came to Ordnance via a couple of large boxes of scrap albums which my mother had kept of my father's war. She had been his PA and he had led the RAOC. I found that the albums contained the story of how the army was mechanised in WW2; with some further research they became War on Wheels.

In writing War on Wheels it was clear to me that much had come from the earlier experience of the Great War of many of the those concerned. I needed to find out, and Ordnance is the result. It tells a story of the equipping of the British Army for the Great War.

I was pleased by the numbers attending my talk and by the questions they asked. It was not a subject well known by many. A few people knew much more detail than I do, and that was helpful to me.

Reflecting on the evening and the discussions that took place, I think more and more that it is true to say that Ordnance services learnt a great deal during the years of WW1. Many mistakes were made and much initiative used, but, by September 1918, the Ordnance supply machine was working.

It reminded me of what Max Hastings wrote of D Day, which I quote in War on Wheels:

To almost every man of the Allied Armies, the predominant memory of the campaign, beyond the horror of battle, was the astounding efficiency of the supply services…for young British soldiers, who had grown up with the legend of the War Office’s chronic bungling, and of the Crimea and the Boer War, Second Army’s administration in Normandy seemed a miracle.

It also seemed that in the years between 1918 and 1939 much had also been forgotten and so a great deal had to be re-learnt between 1939 and 1944. That is in the story of War on Wheels.


Thursday, 22 March 2018

The Ordnance role against the German offensive - one hundred years on

In researching my book, Ordnance, I found how the allies had been preparing for a German offensive on the western front since the time when the Russian Revolution resulted in their armies withdrawing from the eastern front.

Divisions were brought back from Palestine and Italy amongst others. American had come under pressure to commit before she was really ready.

The challenge for Ordnance was threefold. To salvage what equipment and ammunition they could in the face of the German advance. To set up mobile repair workshops to maintain guns in the retreat and to ensure that the retreating troops were as fully equipped as possible for defence and counterattack.

I was fortunate in finding wonderful first hand accounts of quite incredible work done under fire and under pressure.

Four years of trench warfare had resulted in mobile workshops taking root; also, supplies had accumulated close to the front. All this made the retreat more difficult and much had to be left behind. The British, though, were retreating toward their base depots which eased re-supply and over ground which had not been turned into a mud bath by years of war. The Germans advanced into and were seriously held up by that same mud bath.

Some witnessed the first appearance of the light Whippet Tank and, not having been previously informed, assumed it was German.
The French Renault equivalent to the British Whippet with the contrasting horse drawn wagon