TOGOLAND

 

On the outbreak of war it was decided to invade the German West African colony of The Togoland, the present

independent nation of Togo. The primary aim was to stop the Germans using a recently installed powerful radio

transmitter there to send news of shipping movements to their commerce raiders. It was to be mounted from the neighbouring British colony of The Gold Coast (now Ghana) using local forces.

 

On 7 August 1914 British forces landed from the sea unopposed at Lome on the coast of Togoland, the Germans apparently believing that the Royal Navy was about to bombard it. A week later, having established a firm base, the force commenced its advance on Kamina, the site of the transmitter. It fought two brief encounters on the way but, after a brisk battle, accepted the surrender of the enemy there on 26 August. The transmitter had been totally destroyed and whilst the British would have liked to be able to use it, the main thing was that the Germans could not.

 

Meanwhile the French had invaded the country from Dahomey and subsequently advanced inland against resistance.

Thus the first British offensive of the war had met with complete success within two weeks. The total Allied force involved numbered about a thousand: the British element consisted of a battalion of The Gold Coast Regiment (a locally recruited regiment but the officers and some NCOs were British) and some African police and

customs men. The total British casualties (killed and wounded) amounted to just over a hundred. Although the country was a very unhealthy one for Europeans, disease does not appear to have been a significant factor.

The local forces were intended for border defence and internal security only. They therefore had no administrative services of their own: these had to be provided by the civilian departments and by the employment of a large number of African carriers. Although locally mounted, the campaign was controlled by the Colonial Office in London and, moreover, the Governor of the colony appeared to be involved in what would ordinarily be regarded as military matters. The commander of the invading force was only a captain although he was given the local rank of lieutenant colonel.

The OH claims that the African Regimental Sergeant Major of The Gold Coast Regiment ( the holder of the DCM and the MM) fired the first British shot of the war.

 

 

THE MAN WHO DARED DEFEND HAIG by J. P. Lethbridge

 

Roderick McLeod was born in 1891. He studied at Rugby and Woolwich and was commissioned in the Royal Artillery in 1911. He served in the First World War on the Western Front, including at Passchendaele and in Italy. Between the wars he served on battery duty and in staff jobs. In the Second World War he was an aide to General Ironsides the Chief of the Imperial General Staff from 1939 to 1940. The peak of McLeod's career was commanding an imaginary 'Fourth Army' set up before D Day to fool the enemy into thinking that our forces would land near Calais rather than in Normandy. He retired in 1945 a full colonel.

 

At some date in 1967 in a publication I cannot trace McLeod defended Haig's conduct of Passchendaele. This prompted a reply from Major General Hubert Essame.

 

Born in 1896 he had been commissioned in the Northamptonshire Regiment, an infantry unit, in 1916 and served with it at Passchendaele and other battles. He was twice wounded and won the Military Cross. In the Second World War Brigadier Essame commanded the 214th Brigade in the 43rd (Wessex) Division during the NW Europe 1944--1945 campaign. He retired in 1949, a major general, and became a military historian, lecturer and broadcaster.

 

To quote Major General Essame's letter printed in the Daily Telegraph on 10 August 1967:

 

Surviving infantry officers like myself who took part in the July 31 offensive and in the subsequent operations in the mud of Passchendaele/e in the following August, September and October will have read Colonel Roderick MacLeod's [sic] lame defence of Haig with astonishment.

Among Haig's mistakes he fails to mention is the fact that the gigantic build up of artillery and ammunition in the Ypres Salient had been blatantly obvious to the Germans ever since the end of June. The RFC were incapable of preventing enemy air reconnaissance over the area. Once the battle started the infantry lacked the communications for keeping in touch with the artillery when operations became fluid. conditions at Passchendaele in sheer horror.

The tanks were mechanically incapable of competing with the bog and in flagrant defiance of common sense were used in penny packets. No area less suited to their characteristics could have been found.

 

'Even to the stupidest infantry soldier on the spot it was obvious by the first week of August that the offensive had shot its bo/t. Never at any time in history has a commander displayed greater ignorance of conditions in his own front line than Haig at this time.

 

'In retrospect it is amazing to me as a survivor that the infantry stuck the protracted horror of Passchendaele as bravely as they did. Every cardinal error in their handling was committed. Within units the turnover due to casualties was so rapid that platoon commanders never had time to /earn their men's names.

When in reserve their spirits were shaken nightly by working parties in the slime of the forward posts. They were short of sleep, over-

loaded and once battle started had no hot food or drink.

 

'Thousands of the wounded died of exposure. They were soaked to the skin for days on end and when they failed to take an objective were made to attack again in the same way. I saw nothing in World War II even at Caen or in the Reichswa/d to equal the conditions at Passchendaele in sheer horror"

'Colonel MacLeod concludes that the "Passchendaele battles paved the way to victory in 1918'. A more accurate statement would be that they broke the hearts of the bulk of the infantry and paved the way for our defeat when Ludendorff attacked in March 1918.

 

'Haig's statue is indeed appropriately sited in Whitehall facing the Cenotaph. Yours faithfully 'H. ESSAME'

 

Major General Essame died in 1976 aged seventy-nine. Colonel McLeod died in 1984 aged ninety

The Bulletin of the Birmingham Branch of the WFA

Compiled by Bob Butcher

January 2007