Frankforce and the Defence of Arras 1940

List of Maps

Arras and the Surrounding Area

A map taken from Blaxland’s Destination Dunkirk illustrating the threat to Arras

A map taken from Harder than Hammers depicting the route taken by 70 Brigade on 20 May

A map taken from The Shadow of Vimy Ridge showing the British and German dispositions on 21 May

A map taken from The Shadow of Vimy Ridge depicting the British and German deployments east and west of Arras along the Scarpe valley

Walk 1 – A simplified map of central Arras showing the circular route beginning at Place du Maréchal Foch

Walk 2 – St-Nicolas and Ste-Catherine

Introduction by Series Editor

Devoted to the short-lived Frankforce, this book is geographically in an area associated with the 1914-1919 BEF and in particular Third Army. Place names and features will be readily recognised with those whose interest lies primarily in the Great War; it will add considerable further interest to battlefield tours, albeit concerning fighting that lasted, at best, only a few days.

In my early days of systematic battlefield touring, now (alas) over thirty years ago, I was introduced to the events of the latter days of May 1940 in the Arras area by the finest battlefield guide I have known, Tony Spagnoly. Although the visit was primarily to the Great War battlefields around Arras, he touched upon one or two events during the fighting there less than twenty five years later.

One story he recounted was of a couple of men of the Durham Light Infantry who were having a quick drink in a café in Wancourt; they were shot as they emerged by a machine gun mounted on a motor bike side car. The proprietress of the bar, whose family owned the bar then, remembered the events of 20 May vividly. The soldiers now lie, with several unknown from the campaign, in the communal cemetery. Further afield, in the typically unassuming Artois hamlet of La Herlière, about twenty kilometres south west of Arras and off the Doullens road, lies Private Lungley of the 5th Buffs, killed on 20 May and buried in the communal cemetery. In death he is accompanied by two soldiers from the Great War.

John Lungley came from Worthing, which added to the interest for my father, who then lived there. His battalion was a unit in the rather unfortunate 12th (Eastern) Division, whose men were ill trained, ill equipped and had been rushed to France. It was part of 36 Brigade, which was severely mauled during the fighting. Gregory Blaxland, in his Destination Dunkirk, devoted some lines to John Lungley. He comments that, despite the miserable outcome of the fighting, the locals who remained to view the fighting received a badly needed boost to their morale to sustain them for the coming years:

Certainly at La Herlière a lone deed of defiance by a young British soldier lightened the sullen gloom of the subsequent occupation. His name was Private Lungley … his Bren could be heard to chatter out his answer to shouted demands for his surrender. A tank had to be brought up to kill him and he was buried in the hole from which he had fought. The villagers emulated his defiance of German orders by nightly laying flowers on his grave, and they turned out with such fervour for his reburial in the village cemetery that the Germans, in great anger, stopped the ceremony. Instead, it took place secretly at night. The pride of the people had been rekindled, and this was an achievement of far greater value than anything measurable in terms of casualties inflicted or delays imposed.

I had done quite a bit of work on the dead of my old school in the Great War; however, this did not preclude reading some of the moving obituaries of those who lost their life in the Second War. Amongst these was John Radford of 2/Wilts, he was of particular interest to me because his father, also an old boy, was awarded the MC in the previous conflict whilst serving in the Royal Field Artillery; and who then became the commander of the school’s OTC when it was re-established after the outbreak of hostilities. Supplied with his details by the CWGC, on one of my annual battlefield visits I made the diversion to Pelves (a place of some note in the 1917 Battle of Arras). He lies in the little communal cemetery, close to the River Scarpe, along with two others from his battalion.

A more recent contact with those caught up in the German onslaught of 1940 came in the late 1990s when I was examining an extension of the Grange Subway at Vimy, a section of it closed to the public. As part of a Durand Group investigation, I was seeing if a way could be dug through a blockage to what on the map was shown to be a series of rooms that served as a company – and on 9 April 1917 as a battalion – headquarters. The endeavour came to nought; but I was able to admire the graffiti that had been carved into the chalk by British troops whiling away the hours in that late spring of 1940. More poignant was that of refugees – a fair number of whom seem to have been Belgian – who also left their mark on the wall of a gallery that had been dug to fight another war. Alas, access to this area is now firmly blocked.

The cases of those men of the DLI, of John Lungley and John Radford underline a point made by Jerry in this fine book about the men of Frankforce: the little communal cemeteries in the area often hold one or two graves from the fighting of May 1940 and doubtless they are very rarely visited. Since so many come to this part of France on tours of the battlefields of the Great War, it would seem fitting to take the time to stop occasionally and visit these isolated burials of the sons of soldiers, many of whom who would have fought over these same fields and who could scarcely have imagined that the whole, ghastly process was to be repeated well within the lifetime of most of them.

Nigel Cave

Ratcliffe College

Author’s Introduction

There is no other city in France that has the same associations in time of conflict that the British have with Arras. Since the campaigns of John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough, in the early 18th century, British soldiers have fought in and around Arras, occasionally as an enemy but, more often, as defenders of French and Allied democracy. Battlefield visitors to the area will immediately recognize the names of towns and villages that were as significant to the men of Marlborough’s army as they were to those who fought in the First and Second World Wars.

Arras lies in a hollow on a large chalk plain in northern France, with Vimy Ridge to the north and the River Scarpe valley to the west and east. Established by the Gaul tribes during the Iron Age, the first mention of the name Arras appeared in the 12th century, possibly originating from the Celtic word Ar, meaning running water. Today it is the third largest conurbation in the Pas-de-Calais after Calais and Boulogne-sur-Mer, with a population of nearly 44,000. Well known for its architecture, culture and history, the city is twinned with Ipswich in Suffolk and Oudenaarde in Belgium.

Early history

Originally named by the Romans Nemetacum, (and later Atrebatum), Arras rose to prominence as an important garrison town renowned for its arts and crafts. In the late 4th century the inhabitants were converted to Christianity and an episcopal see and monastic community were established by Saint Vaast. In 667 the building of Abbey Saint Vaast became the catalyst for the modern city of Arras to develop and, despite the later attacks by the Vikings in the 9th century, the city became an important cultural and commercial centre and was granted a commercial charter by the French crown in 1180.

The city hosted the Congress of Arras in 1435 in an unsuccessful attempt to end the Hundred Years’ War. After the death of Duke Charles the Bold of Burgundy in 1477, King Louis XI of France besieged Arras. In an effort to erase the city’s identity completely, Louis renamed it temporarily Franchise but ten years later the city was bequeathed to the Spanish Habsburgs as part of the Spanish Netherlands. Arras remained under Habsburg rule from 1493 until 1640, when it was captured again by the French. The Spanish ceded it by the peace treaty in 1659 and it has since remained French.

In 1780 Maximilien de Robespierre, a French lawyer and politician born in Arras and, one of the best-known and most influential figures of the revolutionary period, was elected fifth deputy of the Third Estate of Artois to the Estates-General in 1789. From September 1793 to July 1794, during the Reign of Terror, the city was under the supervision of Joseph Lebon, who implemented food restrictions, ordered 400 executions and destroyed several religious monuments, including Arras Cathedral and the Abbey of Saint Vaast.

Marlborough and the Ne Plus Ultra Lines

The war of 1701 between Britain and France stemmed largely from Louis XIV’s political ambitions, but by 1708 the Duke of Marlborough, and Prince Eugene of Savoy had defeated the French at Blenhein, Ramillies and Oudenaarde and pushed France towards collapse. However, a renewed defiance by Louis XIV led to a second British campaign in Flanders led by the Duke in 1711. The most tangible demonstration of this defiance was the Ne Plus Ultra Lines, a system of fortifications, entrenchments and inundations, which blocked the way to Paris and stretched from Cambrai to the coast. Constructed under the direction of Claude de Villars, the line drew its name from the need to prevent the further advance of Marlborough’s army and at Arras ran along the River Scarpe. Here Marlborough demonstrated his strategic and tactical brilliance by unbalancing Villars with a march from the eastern end of the lines to Vimy, and then dashing eastwards again to penetrate the lines at Arleux. Misleading Villers over the importance he attached to Arleux, Marlborough allowed the small town and its causeway to fall into French hands, while he embarked on yet another deceptive manoeuvre. Splitting his army into three, he stealthily led his main force back to regain the causeways at Arleux and Aubencheul-au-Bac. Guarding his rear with a strong force and refusing to do battle with Villars, Marlborough then laid siege to Bouchain, (which surrendered on 12 September), thus consolidated his opening through the NePlus Ultra Lines.

John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough.

The First World War

Apart from the German cavalry incursion into Arras on 6 September 1914, the city remained west of the front line for the rest of the war and, although badly damaged by German shellfire, retained its integrity as an allied bastion. From October 1914 German forces held the high ground in Artois, which included Vimy Ridge and the plateau of Notre Dame de Lorette, from where they dominated French forces from Lens to Arras. In an effort to take the Lorette plateau the French launched the First Battle of Artois in 1914 which, although it failed to alter the status quo, did not prevent the French from embarking on the Second Battle of Artois, which began on 9 May 1915. On this occasion the French managed to reach the crest of Vimy Ridge before they were finally forced to retreat; but they did take the Lorette plateau from the Germans after days of brutal close quarter fighting. On 25 September 1915, the Third Battle of Artois commenced in conjunction with a large–scale British attack at Loos further north. A huge bombardment of five days preceded the infantry advance towards the village of Souchez but ultimately failed to secure Vimy Ridge.

In 1916, British and Commonwealth troops took over this part of the line from the French. The Battle of Arras (9 April to 16 May 1917) was a largely British offensive on a broad front running from Vimy Ridge in the north to Bullecourt in the south. There were big gains on the first day, particularly on Vimy Ridge, which was successfully taken by the Canadian Corps and the British 24th Division. The Third Army in the centre advanced astride the Scarpe River, making the deepest penetration into German held territory since 1914, while in the south the Fifth Army attacked the Hindenburg Line, where they made only minimal gains. The British then engaged in a series of small-scale operations to consolidate the new positions and although these battles were generally successful, they failed to achieve the hoped for breakthrough.

British troops in the Grand Place in 1917.

On 28 March 1918, twenty-nine German divisions attacked the British Third Army on a ten mile front between Authuille and Oppy, with Arras and Vimy Ridge as the principal objectives. Operation Mars was one of a number of German offensives fought in the Spring of 1918, with the intention of ending the war before the arrival of the Americans. Fortunately, the British at Arras were far more prepared than the unfortunate Fifth Army further south, and the attack stalled within days against a well dug in defensive force. Arras remained firmly in Allied hands until the Armistice in November 1918.

The Second World War

After war was declared on 3 September 1939, the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) were back at Arras, where they established General Head Quarters (GHQ) in Palais-St-Vaast. During the short British occupation and defence, the city was badly damaged by German bombing and the last British troops evacuated the city on 23/24 May. After the D-Day landings in June 1944, the British Guards Armoured Division formally re-entered Arras on 1 September.

Material concerning the deployment of the units at Arras in 1940 has come from a variety of sources, including regimental histories and unit war diaries. While the war diaries give an overall picture of daily events, the reader should be aware that frequently these diaries were completed after the event and are not always entirely accurate. It is also regrettable that all too often regimental historians relied on the information contained in these diaries. Personal diary accounts are usually a little more accurate in content but are sometimes difficult to match with events that took place on a wider strategic front. However, Major Alan Coleman’s diary is not only accurate but provides a humorous element into what must have been a harrowing time for the Arras garrison. Similarly, the accounts by Second Lieutenants Tony Younger and Rhidian Llewellyn provide us with two accurate accounts of events that took place south of the main railway line in Arras. The deployments of battalions along the Scarpe has again drawn on unit war diaries and regimental histories, but has also benefitted from personal accounts found amongst the 1970 Royal Tank Corps Battlefield Tour papers at the Imperial War Museum. These personal reminiscences have also brought the attack of 21 May to life by providing details from officers of both sides of the conflict that hitherto have been left out of published accounts of the fighting around Arras.

The threat to Arras showing the advance of German units from the west and south.

In Appendix 1 the reader will find notes on the various tanks referred to in the text and, in particular, the thickness of armour plating, which was a vital factor in armoured conflict. Appendix 2 provides a list of cemeteries in the wider Arras area that are outside the scope of this book, but where casualties from the May 1940 conflict can be visited. Appendix 3 is an abbreviated version of the Order of Battle for Arras in May 1940, although further details of each unit involved can be found in the relevant chapter. The ranks given to each individual are those