End of the Battle of Langemarck

On 24 October 1914, according to British nomenclature, the Battle of Langemarck came to an end, the first stage of the First Battle of Ypres. Three days earlier General Douglas Haig’s British I Corps had set off towards Bruges, but ran into new German reserve corps and went over to the defensive. From 22 to 24 October the Germans attacked almost without pause along the whole arc around Ypres, from the Ypres–Yser canal to Zandvoorde. The British held the front, although on the last day the Germans broke through it in Polygon Wood. North of the town the British were relieved by the French.

The Kortekeer inn

On the evening of 22 October Germans of XXIII Reserve Corps broke into gaps in the forward position of the 1st Battalion, Cameron Highlanders, at the Kortekeer inn (Kortekeer Cabaret), on the road from Langemarck to Bikschote (PL). The Scots had to fall back. The next morning a force of five battalions under General Edward Bulfin counter-attacked. Around midday the British retook the inn and freed 54 captured Scots. According to the British official history, about 550 Germans of the 45th Reserve Division were taken prisoner on this sector that day. Bulfin, however, judged the forward position at the inn too difficult to hold, and in the evening withdrew his battalions to a line a little further back, behind the road.

At the same time the Germans attacked the village of Langemarck itself from the north. The Gloucestershire and Welch battalions repulsed the attack with rifle fire, and at about 1 p.m. the German retreat under artillery fire turned into a disorderly rout. The 1st Division lost 1,344 men on 23 October, but the attackers’ losses were much higher.

The French arrive

On 23 October the French 17th Division of General Pierre Dubois’s IX Corps arrived at Ypres, the first of the regular corps that the commander-in-chief of the French army had promised the British two days earlier. On the crowded roads the French column lost many hours and only reached Sint-Juliaan around midday. It was supposed to attack towards Passendale, but could not get beyond the line of the British 2nd Division. That evening the German XXVI Reserve Corps struck the 2nd Division once more, and in the morning the French counted 740 German dead in front of the position of a single Oxfordshire battalion. During the night of 23–24 October the French took over the whole of the 2nd Division’s sector. It was occupied by twelve French battalions, although eight British ones had previously been enough to hold it.

On 24 October the 17th Division attacked towards Zonnebeke, but advanced only a few hundred metres. In the evening the French 87th Territorial Division began to relieve the British 1st Division at Langemarck. The Germans were shelling the trenches, so the changeover dragged on until dawn, and the 1st Division only assembled in reserve between Ypres, Hooge and Zillebeke on the morning of 25 October. From then on the French held the northern half of the semicircle around Ypres and the British the southern half, with the junction in front of Zonnebeke. This division of the front lasted until the end of the battle.

Polygon Wood

The most dangerous situation arose on 24 October on the sector of the British 7th Division, east of Ypres. At dawn Germans of XXVII Reserve Corps began a heavy bombardment of its shallow trenches, dug in sandy soil. Sand thrown up by the explosions got into the rifles and jammed them. At about 8 a.m. the Germans surrounded the 2nd Battalion, Wiltshire Regiment, on the ridge by the village of Reutel, in front of the eastern edge of Polygon Wood. The British lost about 450 killed, wounded and captured, and the next morning only 172 other ranks answered the roll call, half of whom had not been in the line that day. Through the gap the Germans entered the wood.

They were first stopped by the Northumberland Hussars, a mounted volunteer regiment sent from the divisional reserve, together with the 2nd Battalion, Royal Warwickshire Regiment. It was the first serious action of any unit of the volunteer Territorial Force in this war. The Warwickshires lost nearly 300 men, including their commanding officer. At about 11 a.m. help arrived in the form of the 5th Brigade of the 2nd Division, released by the French the previous night. Its 2nd Battalion, Worcestershire Regiment, and 2nd Battalion, Highland Light Infantry, charged through the wood with the bayonet. The clash with the Germans was fought hand to hand, at very close range, and ended with them fleeing the wood. The Worcestershires lost 6 officers and about 200 men. The Germans held on only to the ridge at Reutel.

In the afternoon the Germans twice attacked the crossroads on the road from Menin to Ypres, east of the village of Geluveld (PL) (Gheluvelt), but were repulsed. In the evening the 6th Brigade of the 2nd Division, together with the French, advanced more than a kilometre towards the road from Beselare to Broodseinde. From 22 to 24 October the 7th Division lost 120 officers and 2,700 men. Its battalions were now only a fraction of their original strength, and the Wiltshire battalion had practically ceased to exist.

Outcome

The Battle of Langemarck was an encounter battle in which both sides wanted to break the enemy’s front and neither succeeded. The British, although outnumbered, held their positions, and at Zonnebeke even advanced a little. The new German reserve corps suffered enormous losses, especially among officers, and were for the time being incapable of further attacks. On the evening of 24 October the commander of the 4th Army, Duke Albrecht of Württemberg, ordered XXIII, XXVI and XXVII Reserve Corps to hold and fortify their positions at Ypres, and sent into the attack only the troops in the north, where the battle against the Belgians and the French was raging on the Yser.

On the same day Field Marshal John French warned London that unless the supply of artillery ammunition improved, his troops would soon have to fight without the support of their guns. About 150 shells per gun remained in the depots in France, and only seven shells per gun per day could be delivered from home. In the following days the weight of the fighting at Ypres shifted east and south-east of the town, along the Menin road, where the exhausted 7th Division stood.