August 1914: Surrender at St Quentin - John Hutton

[Anthony Pigott]

I came across this in a bookshop yesterday. Has anyone read / reviewed it? I couldn't find any reference to it on the Forum when I searched.

Regards

Anthony

[Chris_Baker]

I have. My review can be seen on this page http://www.1914-1918.net/reviews_battles.htm but I have also pasted it below:

This is a history of a notorious episode during the retreat of the British Expeditionary Force from Mons all the way down to the Marne and beyond in late August 1914. It concerns elements of the 1st Royal Warwickshire Regiment and the 2nd Royal Dublin Fusiliers of 10th Infantry Brigade (4th Division), who dragged themselves, bewildered and exhausted, into the town of St Quentin after managing to get away from the battle at Le Cateau on 26 August. Their commanding officers Lieutenant Colonels John Elkington and Arthur Mainwaring, in the belief that the town was now surrounded by Germans, that their men were in no fit state to move any further and wishing to avoid casualties to the civilian population, arranged with the mayor to surrender their force. They were unaware that a British cavalry screen stood between them and the enemy, and the energy and determination for the troops not be given up came from the cavalry in the shape of Major Tom Bridges of 4th Dragoon Guards. The dreadfully weary Warwicks and Dubs were persuaded to resume their retreat: Elkington and Mainwaring were subsequently court-martialed; cleared of cowardice but cashiered out of the service.

The story has often been told, not least in two very good and relatively modern books: Peter Scott's "The Colonel's surrender at St Quentin" and John Ashby's "Seek glory, now keep glory". Both of them and John Hutton's volume suffer from the limited existence of the original sources concerning the incident. The court martial record and the surrender document, both vital pieces of evidence, are absent, forcing all of the authors to rely on the three protagonists own versions and upon secondary sources. John Hutton has made use of the sound recording archive at the Imperial War museum, but none of the clips quoted actually cover the vital moments in St Quentin. As such, the three versions pretty much rely on the same evidence and it is only the author's own interpretation of events that distinguishes them. John Hutton takes an even-handed and sympathetic view, recognising the enormous strains placed upon the officers and the fog of war that both confounded intelligence and prevented communication.

Overall, we are given a good personal background of the main players and an engaging, entertaining telling of the retreat, from the tense and desperate moments as 10th Brigade falls apart during the latter stage at Le Cateau down to the eventual withdrawal from St Quentin. Of great interest too is the description of the contrast in the lives of the two disgraced officers: Elkington went on to join the French Foreign Legion and gave valuable and courageous service; Mainwaring disappeared from public view and died without having much of a chance to address the controversies that continue to surround his role in the affair.

Given that the incident had received a good deal of prior coverage and without new evidence, it is perhaps inevitable that "August 1914" does not mark a vital development in the historiography of the early period of the war. But it is a good read, well observed, and certainly worth a look.

[Warwicks]

I've read the Colonels surrender and (as you would expect with my username 'seek glory, now keep glory', so was interested to see there is another book discussing this topic.

I'm a little disappointed that Chris has highlighted that there is no real new information, however my interest is sufficiently raised that I've ordered the book and I'll have a read through.

[Alan Tucker]

For the Colonels' surrender Scott is very good, Ashby adds very little and Hutton is what Chris says in his review although he is perhaps a little kind.

[SiegeGunner]

The author is presumably the John Hutton (now Lord Hutton of Furness) who was for a time Minister of Defence in the last Labour government, and who published a book about the WW1 history of units local to his constituency while he was Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise & Regulatory Reform (ex-DTI). If so, good to see that he is continuing his interest in the Great War since leaving the Commons at the last election. In fact, having just googled to find what he's up to these days, I see that he is now the Chairman of the Royal United Services Institute.

[Anthony Pigott]

I have. My review can be seen on this page http://www.1914-1918...ews_battles.htm but I have also pasted it below:

...

The court martial record and the surrender document, both vital pieces of evidence, are absent, forcing all of the authors to rely on the three protagonists own versions and upon secondary sources.

...

Thanks Chris. I should have thought to look there. I'm intrigued by what you say about the documents. Is anything known about why they're 'absent'? (Perhaps this shouldn't be on this thread.)

Regards

Anthony

[Moonraker]

This afternoon I was walking past Purley Hall, Elkington's home, and the thought came to mind: how do the battalion histories and war diaries of the 1st Royal Warwickshire Regiment and the 2nd Royal Dublin Fusiliers describe the events of August 26?

Moonraker

[Stoppage Drill]

Having joined this forum only recently, I find I have a lot of recollections that I would have immediate difficulty in verifying. I was a visitor to the battlefields back in the '60's and met some interesting folks, Rose Coombes, Tony Farrar-Hockley amongst others, and many veterans. However, I'm way out of date. But at least I could still go round when there were still MG08 sleds in the remains of the trenches, and I still have an SMLE which I picked up near Beaumont Hamel.

Given these caveats, here's a few recollections about the St Quentin do. I certainly stand to be corrected.

CO 1 R Wark (John Ford Elkington, I have always remembered) s was persuaded to surrender by the mayor of St Quentin. The story that gained currency (probably a fiction, but famous) was that Tom Bridges and his orderly broke into a toy shop, and took a penny whistle and drum, and inspired the men to continue marching by playing rousing tunes. (I know, I know . . . . )

Colonel Elkington was a member of the family which owned the well known eponymous Birmingham firm of silversmiths. After cashiering he joined the French Foreign Legion, lost a leg at Ferme de navarine in 1917 and was subsequently pardoned by KGV.

Major Bernard Montgomery ('oo ?) was a company commander in 1 R Warks, but missed this particular incident. Can't remember why, wounded, staff appointment ???

Go on, pull me apart !

[CROONAERT]

Colonel Elkington ....After cashiering he joined the French Foreign Legion, lost a leg at Ferme de navarine in 1917 and was subsequently pardoned by KGV.

He enlisted into the 3e regiment de marche de la 1er Regiment Etranger as a Soldat 2eme Classe in February 1915 (later transferred to the 2/1st) and suffered a serious leg wound near Souain/Navarin Fme on 28th September 1915. Thanks in no small part to a fellow Legionaire named David Wheeler (a doctor from Buffalo, New York) who was also wounded at the same time, the leg was saved (Wheeler was later to serve both in the Canadian and US Armies as a MO. He died in action whilst serving as the MO of the 16th Infantry Regiment after being mortally wounded by MG fire on 18th July 1918). He was, however, medically discharged from the French Army in early 1916 and returned home, being granted a pardon with restoration of rank and the award of the DSO in October 1916.

Dave

[Alan Tucker]

My timeline of the 'Elk'

APPENDIX THREE. COLONEL JOHN FORD ELKINGTON. 1st Bn

Born February 3rd 1866 at Newcastle, Jamaica

The first of five sons of Major-General J.H.F Elkington (1830-1889) and Margaret nee Jamieson. Also one daughter

Father in 1866 Senior Major 2nd Bn of what was soon to be named the Royal Warwickshire Regiment, then stationed on the island. He commanded the battalion in Britain in 1867

Educated at Elizabeth College, Guernsey, where his father was stationed at the time. In 1885 his father was appointed Governor of Guernsey

Attended Sandhurst 1885-6

1886 Commissioned into the 1st Bn Royal Warwicks as a Lieutenant

1893 January. Captain

1895-7 Posted to Malta and Egypt

1897-9 Based at the Regimental Depot at Warwick

1899-1900 Served in Northern Nigeria attached to the West African Frontier Force

1900-1901 Served with the 2nd Bn in South Africa. Queen’s medal with four clasps

1901 April Promoted Major

1901-2 With the 2nd Bn in Bermuda

1902-6 Served at home

1906-7 South Africa with the 3rd Bn

1908 July 9 Married Mary Rew at Whitchurch, Oxfordshire.

1909 July 25 First son born – John David Rew Elkington – at Purley Hall, near Reading. Father then serving with the 1st Bn at Peshawar. John served with the Rifle Brigade in the Second World War and also became a Lieutenant Colonel.

1910 Promoted Lieutenant-Colonel

1914 February Appointed Lieutenant Colonel, 1st Bn Royal Warwicks

1914 September 9 Daughter born – Jean Margaret Rew

1914 October 31 London Gazette announced that from September 14 he had been ‘cashiered by sentence of a General Court-martial’.’The writer of an article which appeared in the Daily Sketch of September 1916 had spoken to a unnamed friend of Elkington who claimed that as soon as the court martial decision was known he remarked “There is still the Foreign Legion”. (Ashby p 94) His friends lost him, hearing of him only vaguely by report’. ‘He set out to make good a name that he felt needed cleansing’. He immediately joined the Foreign Legion of the French Army as a legionnaire 2nd class.

He took part in…

1915 May 9 Attack on Hill 140 (Vimy Ridge)

1915 June 16 Attack on Hill 119 near Souchez

1915 September 28 Attack on Navarin Farm in Champagne, east of Berry-au-Bac.. Here he was badly wounded in the leg by machine gun fire. He was operated on eight times at Grenoble’s Hospital Civil and his leg was saved. Whilst in hospital for many months he was awarded the Medaille Militaire and the Croix de Guerre avec Palme. He returned to England to convalesce.

1916 July Lieutenant-General Sir Aylmer Hunter-Weston,then commanding VIII Corps but at Haucourt in 1914 had commanded 11th Brigade and then presided over the court martial, wrote to congratulate Elkington for the way in which he had regained his honour by gallant conduct in the Legion. He also pressed the Adjutant-General for a pardon.

1916 September 7. The London Gazette reported his reinstatement as a Lieutenant Colonel in the Royal Warwickshire Regiment from August 22 1916‘in consequence of his gallant conduct while serving in the ranks of the Foreign Legion of the French Army’.

1916 September 8. He told the Daily Sketch – “I did nothing of note. I was with the others in the trenches. I did what everybody else did. We all fought as hard as we could”.

1916 October 20 He was received by the King – still very lame

1916 October 28 Awarded the DSO. His wound prevented further service. He now returned to the family home at Purley House, Pangbourne, Reading and then Adbury Holt, Berkshire.

1918 February Went on half pay

1918 May 22 Birth of a younger son – Richard Ford Rew. One of the sponsors at his baptism was Lieutenant David Wheeler, American Expeditionary Force, who had become a close friend of Elkington in the Foreign Legion. Richard died of wounds in Tunisia in 1943 as a captain in the 10/Rifle Brigade. Family was living at Adbury Holt, Newbury, Berkshire

1919 July retired

1939 His daughter, Jean Margaret Rew Elkington, married a soldier killed at Arnhem in September 1944 – he was then Lieutenant Colonel Sir William Richard de Bacquencourt Des Voeux, CO of the 156th Parachute Regiment (AA). Her father still lived at Adbury Holt in 1939. Jean died on May 20 1974.

(Scott page 6-7 and Times September 7 1916 and other dates)

1944 June 27 Death of Lieutenant Colonel Elkington. His obituary in the Newbury Weekly Times on June 29 spoke highly of his active work in local affairs, particularly Burghclere – a JP at Kingsclere, started a Men’s Club, Chairman of Newbury District Hospital in 1918. It concluded – “he was a gallant soldier and a great gentleman”.

1946 May Stained glass window dedicated to John Ford and Richard Elkington unveiled in the Church of the Ascension, Burghclere, Berkshire. It was unveiled by Field Marshal Montgomery of Alamein. ‘Monty’ said ‘he made good more than he lost’ (Newbury Weekly News May 23 1946)

1956 July 14 The estate of Mrs Mary Elkington, the widow of the Lieutenant Colonel, of Burghclere, near Newbury, was valued at £124175 after duty.

(Hugh McLeave ‘The Damned Die Hard’. New York. 1973. Times. Birmingham Weekly Post)

[Alan Tucker]

My account of these events from my current work on the Regiment...

Lieutenant Colonel A.E Mainwaring of the 2nd Dublin Royal Fusiliers with 40 men had reached Malincourt where Lieutenant C.P Cowper and 60 Warwicks were attached to him. At 5 a.m. on August 27th he decided to march on St Quentin. Soon afterwards he met Elkington and 100 Royal Warwicks; Mainwaring now deferred to Elkington’s seniority.They arrived in the middle of the day.

In the War Diary Major Poole outlined the fate of the ‘Elkington Party’…

August 27

‘….augmented by other details reached St Quentin where Colonel Elkington surrendered at the Mayor’s request on German threat to bombard the town; their surrender he later withdrew and left the town alone. The men under Lieutenant Cowper found their way to Ham and 1st Line transport. Lieutenant Cowper’s party that night were entrained to Compiegne’.

The events at St Quentin are known as the ‘Colonels’ Surrender’ and warrant further explanation (27). The two Colonels made for the railway station hoping to rescue their men by train but found that all the staff had fled. Mainwaring then went to see the newly installed Mayor, Arthur Gibert, who received information that the town was surrounded and told the officer that the presence of British troops would mean that the town would be shelled and women and children would be killed. Mainwaring’s later statement (28) stated that “Colonel Elkington agreed that we must not endanger the safety of the inhabitants by fighting in the town”. Both offered their men the chance to escape To Noyon but “their limit of endurance was reached” and they refused to move. Mainwaring again – “He therefore directed me to sign a surrender, and while I was doing so he disarmed the men, putting their rifles and ammunition in one railway shed, and them in another”. Mainwaring in his statement believed that he had no alternative and was personally under enormous physical and mental strain. St Quentin’s main square was still thronged with exhausted stragglers when Major G.T.M Bridges arrived with elements of 2nd Cavalry Brigade. After some difficulty he persuaded and cajoled the men to form up after promising carts for those who could not walk. By 4 p.m. Elkington had left the town alone although exactly when or why is not known or where he went. In his statement he claimed that he believed the danger was past and that his men could get out and he was anxious ‘to collect more stragglers’. Mainwaring now tried to retrieve the surrender document from the Mairie but it fell into the hands of cavalry officers. Between 10 p.m. and midnight the ‘ragged army’ of about 440 men left with a cavalry escort just before German Uhlans entered St Quentin. Within twenty-four hours they reached Noyon and entrained to Compiegne.

…… On September 12 the two Colonels were court-martialled at Chouy for ‘unbecoming behaviour’ and ‘without due cause agreed

together to surrender themselves and the troops under their respective command’. A cowardice charge was dropped. Elkington claimed that he took full blame for any mistakes made.The guilty

verdict led to a ‘cashiering’ announcement in the London Gazette on October 30 1914. (for Elkington’s later career see Appendix 4). Elkington’s fate was not widely known in the battalion. Lieutenant Hamilton wrote on October 31 – “Hear the Elk did something very cowardly and had been cashiered – dreadful” (30). His immediate joining of the French Foreign Legion as an ‘English gentleman who had made a mistake’ was probably all about military honour given that his father and four brothers all had significant army careers.

[Northern Soul]

The author is presumably the John Hutton (now Lord Hutton of Furness) who was for a time Minister of Defence in the last Labour government, and who published a book about the WW1 history of units local to his constituency while he was Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise & Regulatory Reform (ex-DTI). If so, good to see that he is continuing his interest in the Great War since leaving the Commons at the last election. In fact, having just googled to find what he's up to these days, I see that he is now the Chairman of the Royal United Services Institute.

As an historian, I have to say that John Hutton seems to be carving a literary niche for himself by simply rehashing work that has gone before. In the case of "Kitchener's Men" nothing of value was added to the canon of knowledge about the King's Own; it was just a reworking of the various regimental and unit histories and, as far as I could see, did little in the case of the 4th Battalion to clear up some of the issues concerning the geographical location of its men during the key battles. The confusion was carried over from Wadham & Crossley's history into his version and an opportunity was missed. There was also quite a bit of generalisation, too, and when discussing the subject of recruitment I don't think he'd really grasped why the King's Own was the dominant regiment in the south-west Cumbria area, rather than the (more logical) border Regiment. I also seem to recall that here and there there were some absolute howlers in the text as well.

As a politician, his departure from office has not been lamented in Furness.

p.s. What is it about the forum software that it will never allow me to write border Regiment with a capital "B" - it always reverts to lower case? Most strange.