page_title: Capture of Martinpuich
section_title: Analysis
hierarchical_section_title: Capture of Martinpuich / Aftermath / Analysis
caption_attribution_description: English: Map of Somme front, July-October 1916
context_page_description: The Capture of Martinpuich took place on the 15 September 1916. Martinpuich is situated 18 miles south of Arras, near the junction of the D 929 and D 6 roads, opposite Courcelette, in the Pas-de-Calais, France. The village lies south of Le Sars, west of Flers and north-west of High Wood. In September 1914, during the Race to the Sea, the divisions of the German XIV Corps advanced on the north bank of the Somme westwards towards Albert and Amiens, passing through Martinpuich. The village became a backwater until 1916, when the British and French began the Battle of the Somme and was the site of several air operations by the Royal Flying Corps, which attacked German supply dumps in the vicinity.
  The 15th Division of the Fourth Army captured the village on 15 September, during the Battle of Flers–Courcelette. Several hundred prisoners of the 3rd Bavarian Division and the 45th Reserve Division were taken and after the village was captured, the pre-war light railway was repaired. The village was lost on 25 March 1918, during the German spring offensive and was recaptured for the last time on 25 August, by the British 21st Division.
context_section_description: In 1926, J. Stewart and John Buchan, the 15th Division historians, called the attack on Martinpuich a well planned and executed operation, in which infantry, artillery and engineers had worked together and inflicted a serious blow on the defenders, for relatively few casualties. An officer of BIR 17 wrote that the defensive barrage had been "a complete failure" and that close co-operation of the opposing infantry and artillery, was a result of the "remarkable achievements of their aviators", who watched the progress of the attack. Artillery observers had advanced with the infantry and established posts with telephones in a few hours. A huge amount of engineer stores were found in the village and 13 machine-guns, three heavy howitzers, thee field guns and a trench mortar were captured.
  One of the two tanks which operated on the 15th Division front reached Bottom Trench, engaged German troops there and at Tangle Trench, then engaged machine-gunners in the village, before returning to refuel, after which it hauled small-arms ammunition forward; the second tank was knocked out before it reached the departure point. A tank allotted to the 50th Division on the right, knocked out three machine-guns on the east side of Martinpuich. From 16–17 September, the division consolidated, digging communication trenches from the old front line, building bomb and ammunition stores and worked on dug outs; on 18 September, the 23rd Division began to relieve the 15th Division. As Bavarian prisoners saw the accumulation of material behind the British front, they doubted that Germany could prevail against the plenty of the Allies but also felt sure that with similar resources, they would have been able to persist with the offensive and win the war.
caption: Somme Front, July–October 1916
exif: {"Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image Software": "Microsoft Windows Photo Gallery 6.0.6001.18000", "Image DateTime": "2013:11:11 01:19:51", "Image ExifOffset": "2202", "Image Padding": "[]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "96", "Thumbnail YResolution": "96", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "4420", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "2239", "EXIF ImageUniqueID": "BFF834218DA14D0B9E3DDB12A4310718", "EXIF Padding": "[]"}