Pozieres

This is an excerpt from our book, The Hunter Region in The Great War. After the slaughter of Fromelles, where the Australian 5th Division had been critically weakened in a failed “feint”, the main British attack on the Somme awaited an Australian contribution. The British attack had gotten off to a bad start. The artillery bombardment before the infantry attack didn’t do the damage the British generals had hoped for, so casualties on the British side were extremely heavy. About 20,000 died on the first day, with many more wounded. But the British, committed to trying…