The War From Here — PPCLI catches Germans by surprise

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 28/02/2015 (3900 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

100 YEARS AGO, St. Eloi, Belgium — In the early hours of Feb. 28, 1915, No. 4 Company of the Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry (PPCLI) launched a surprise raid on German trenches at Shelley’s Farm near St. Eloi.

The Canadians’ mission was clear — destroy a German sap, a recently excavated, forward-facing firing trench situated within a dozen metres of the Allies’ unconnected trench lines. The orders for the raid, issued by the regiment’s commanding officer, Lt.-Col. Francis Farquhar, are historically significant. They document the first trench raid executed by a Canadian regiment in the Great War.

Commander-in-chief of the British forces in the field, Gen. Sir John French, heaped praise upon the PPCLI for their initiative, while proclaiming the number of causalities incurred in the raid as “trifling.” In the raid’s wake, the casualties consisted of three officers and 14 other ranks.

The names of those who participated in the late February raid trickled onto Canadian casualty lists in the days and weeks that followed. It was then that the “trifling losses” at St. Eloi took on greater significance to Manitobans as they realized the killed and missing were their own.

The “cruel scythe of war,” announced the Manitoba Free Press, had swept over Winnipeg, bringing with it the dreadful certainty that more losses would come.

The trench raid was an aspect of warfare that became common in the First World War, and Canadians were credited with refining it.

In preparation for the first raid by the PPCLI, Maj. A. Hamilton Gault, the PPCLI’s illustrious backer and second-in-command, and Lt. W. Gourlay (Shorty) Colquhoun, a 6-foot-7 scouting officer, conducted reconnaissance. Only Gault returned.

Colquhoun had the misfortune of encountering the Germans, and becoming the first Canadian officer captured in the war. He remained a prisoner for its duration. Colquhoun’s actions that night would earn him another first. He would be the first recipient of the Canadian Military Cross in the Great War, cited for “conspicuous gallantry and resources on numerous occasions at St. Eloi,” including his reconnaissance efforts on that fateful night of the raid.

Despite the loss of Colquhoun, the PPCLI raid went ahead. Platoons in No. 4 Company were assigned specific tasks as documented in the battalion’s war diary.

Lt. Colville Crabbe’s platoon led the rush, company Sgt. Maj Samuel Patterson’s platoon provided support, and Sgt. Maj. Conway Lloyd’s platoon destroyed the trench walls, the parapets. Supporting the platoons were a team of three snipers led by Lance-Cpl. Donald Ross and a team of three bombers led by Lt. Talbot Papineau.

Papineau’s men raced along outside the German parapet, lobbing bombs into the trench. Ross was killed upon entering the sap, but Crabbe continued the charge, clearing the trench until his men encountered a blockade erected by the Germans.

Meanwhile, Lloyd’s men destroyed approximately 30 metres of parapet before evacuating, while Patterson’s platoon guarded the group against a counterattack and covered their hasty withdrawal.

The actual raid is estimated to have lasted a little more than 20 minutes. In that time the mission’s goals were accomplished. But at its end, three soldiers were reported missing, including Colquhoun, five had been killed, and nine were wounded. The wounded included Crabbe, who led the rush, and Gault, who had not wanted to be excluded from his regiment’s first raid. He was shot through the wrist while pulling in stretchers.

Attributing names to the often unnamed of the “other ranks” can be difficult.

Of the 24 Canadians the Canadian Virtual War Memorial lists as having died between Feb. 27 and 28, 15 belong to men of the PPCLI. Those of No. 4 Company were identified from their 1914 Nominal Roll. The soldiers included Lance-Cpl. George Arthur Batchelor, 30, a rancher; Pte. Roland Fruen, 34, a miner; and Pte. John McLaughlin, 30, a CPR investigator. All the men listed Winnipeg as home.

Lloyd, who led the destruction of the parapet, had been killed in the raid as had Ross, who was in charge of the snipers. Lloyd, 31, was a packer from Calgary, while Ross, 32, was a labourer affiliated with the PPCLI’s

No. 1 Company.<t-0.5>

In addition to Colquhoun, both Pte. John Tabor and Pte. Thomas Bruce Haddock were reported missing on the Canadian casualty lists. Weeks later, they would be declared dead dating from the day of the raid. Tabor, 32, was a labourer from Saskatoon. Haddock, 37, was a mechanical engineer from Readie, Sask., but was considered a Winnipeg native.

Haddock was the last of the raiders to be declared dead. He was a member of the Legion of the Frontiersmen, having enlisted with the group in Moose Jaw, Sask. All the Moose Jaw Frontiersmen were attached to the PPCLI, and they made an impression on Winnipeggers when their special troop train briefly stopped in the city on Aug. 15, 1914.

The Frontiersmen’s uniform of khaki riding breeches and shirts, putties, boots with spurs, khaki silk neckerchiefs, and Stetson hats distinguished them from the other contingents from Calgary, Edmonton, Saskatoon and Winnipeg. All were travelling together to Ottawa to join the remainder of the Princess Patricia’s.

These brothers in arms were considered PPCLI “originals,” an honorific bestowed on the 1,098 men who enlisted in August 1914. The dead from the Feb. 27-28 raid were all “originals” from the Canadian West. All but one were born in the United Kingdom. All were unmarried.

In death, all shared a new resting place, the regimental cemetery started by the PPCLI in February 1915: Voormezeele Enclosure No. 3. By war’s end, they would be joined by 1,604 other Commonwealth soldiers, of whom 609 remain unidentified. Names may have been forgotten, but contributions have not.

SOURCES

• Archival sources:

• Library and Archives Canada

Newspapers:

• Brandon Daily Sun

• London Gazette

• Manitoba Free Press

• The Patrician

Websites:

• Birth of a Regiment

• Canadian Great War Project

• Canadian Virtual War Memorial

• Commonwealth War Graves Commission

Books:

• David Bercuson, “The Patricias: The Proud History of a Fighting Regiment,” 2001.

• Jeffery Williams, “First in the Field: Gault of the Patricias,” 1995.

• Ralph Hodder-Williams, “Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry, 1914-1919,” 1923.

• Robert F. Zubkowski, “As Long as Faith and Freedom Last,” 2003

» Suyoko Tsukamoto is a Brandonite who has spent three seasons in the archeology field at the Camp Hughes National Historic site.