HOLD THE LINE
It was now the turn of Bert and the Aucklanders to play their part in closing the gap in British defences on the Somme to halt the German advance. And it was to be a crucial part.
They and the rest of the slimmed down 1st Brigade were given the task of securing the left flank that had been causing the New Zealand division such problems – they would need to charge directly into those areas that the Germans held in the largest numbers and push them back, clearing the sugar refinery crossroads and seizing at least a chunk of the D174, the vital road up to Hebuterne which the Kiwis wanted to make their ultimate defensive line: a line that the German attack could smash against, but once staked out by the Kiwis, would not yield again.
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1st Auckland Battalion, 2nd Rifle Battalion (reduced by one company which was still somewhere back near Amiens) and just one company of machine-gun specialists to give extra firepower, were to operate as 1st Brigade. They split their attacking front between them, with the D919, the main road heading out of Mailly-Maillet and going direct to the sugar refinery crossroads, at the centre. On the left of the road 2nd Rifles would go forward. On the right, where they would meet the Germans attacking Apple Tree Knoll head on, was 1st Auckland. LMG gunners were distributed between them.
If things went badly and more troops were needed anywhere in this attacking front, it was hoped 2nd Auckland Battalion, still trudging its way from Hangest-sur-Somme, would arrive in the knick of time. Realistically though, the Aucklanders and Dinks were on their own.
It was 5.30pm when they set out from Mailly-Maillet.
The Dinks parted company with the Aucklanders around the rail station at the northern tip of Mailly-Maillet. From there they made their way through the fields between Mailly and the tiny village of Colincamps, heading initially for the tree lined Rue de Bois, a road from Colincamps which joined the D919 just short of the Sugar Refinery junction.
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Immediately they found themselves facing problems. All day the presence of advance scouting parties of Germans who had made incursions into Colincamps had been causing the New Zealand division headaches. Uncertainty about whether NZ troops would be needed to clear the village had delayed the entrance of 1st Brigade into the fight to establish the defensive line. Now, as they began that attack, Colincamps was once more being flagged as a potential threat. Artillery and the Whippet tanks had driven the Germans out earlier in the day, but “just how far we did not know, nor how far the enemy had crept back when the tanks retired before 3pm”. This quote is from an actual Rifle Brigade field war diary, compiled on the day of the attack by an unknown Dink sergeant from 2nd Rifles B Coy. The diary is now housed at the British National Archives in Kew, London.
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The Dinks therefore had no choice but to assign an entire company, B Coy, to deploy in an extended left flank to cover any possible renewed attack by Germans from the direction of Colincamps.
That left just two companies of 2nd Rifles to seize their targets.
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The Dinks found themselves having to struggle in and out of old trenches as they moved forward.
D Company was on the left and going cautiously because of the uncertainty about the German forces ahead of them. The fields here were cut up by old trenches and each time they approached one, it carried the risk of hiding German forces who would gun them down. Each had to be painstakingly checked. As it turned out, all of them were clear, nor did any German forces appear from Colincamps, and the few Germans the Dinks saw mainly pulled back ahead of their advance, retreating to the high ground they occupied around La Signy Farm. But Lieutenant-Colonel Austin says the result of this slow progress was that the advance by D Company was not as successful as intended, platoons drifted more northwards than they should have instead of straightening and heading east towards the D174. Nethertheless, by 7pm D Company had made good ground, passing first over the Rue de Bois, then up to the D4129, a secondary road also running from Colincamps. Using that as their front-line marker, they extended their right flank back down the road to reach the intended goal of the D174, at a three-way crossroads known by the British as Euston Junction, several hundred metres north of the sugar refinery crossroads. Here they linked up with C Company.
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The men of C Company had run into a greater challenge. They had been given the task of taking the Rue de Bois where it met the main road next to the sugar refinery. From there they were to take the D174.
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They had passed through the advance posts of their comrades from 1st Rifles opposite Apple Tree Knoll, then pushed up through the fields, their right flank hugging close to the D919 as it bent away northwards from Mailly-Mallet. There was an old munitions dump at the bend of the Rue de Bois, just before it reached the D919 next to the sugar refinery and this had been set alight by German artillery which was concentrating its firepower on the dump, clearly hoping to create a major explosion to hinder the Dinks. Colonel Stewart recounts explosions were indeed booming from the “blazing ammunition dump” while Lieutenant-Colonel Austin says dense smoke was billowing from it, blowing across the fields. The explosions did not stop the Dinks, in fact the smoke had the effect of concealing the advancing platoons of C Company. Even so, Austin says “a considerable number of casualties had been caused by machine-gun fire coming from the high ground” around La Signy Farm.
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When C Company finally emerged from the smoke, they were close to the bend in the Rue de Bois and immediately found themselves also hit by fire from three machine guns stationed at the main sugar refinery crossroads. The Germans had dug themselves in with trenches cutting across the junction and into the fields either side. A single platoon of Dinks lead the way, rushing across the Rue de Bois, over the intervening field and onto the D174, hopping across this road also, gaining some cover on the other side and began to pour flanking fire into the Germans. A second platoon of Dinks surged in their wake, seizing old trench saps alongside the roads and together they concentrated fire on the Germans on the D919 east of the refinery junction, forcing the Germans to pull back south of the road, into the fields between the D919 and Kilometre lane – the very fields that the Aucklanders were supposed to be clearing. But of Auckland, there was no sign.
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The Dinks, caught out by the absence of the Aucklanders, found they had to quickly set up a new and perilous defensive flank, facing south into the fields around Kilometre Lane, even as they also faced Germans on the D174 northwards and in the high ground of La Signy farm. It was a desperate position to be in, fighting on both sides. With no choice, they gamely started a sniping duel with the Germans to keep them contained south of the D919. Other Platoons from this fiercely determined Dinks company forced their way further north along the D174 to Euston Junction, forging the link with D Company. The Germans they met also pulled back before them, to a line marked by the British on their maps as Waterloo Bridge and Jeremiah Hedge. But the Dinks’ field notebook records that “owing to the dark it is hard to state exactly how many enemy.”
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Kiwi soldiers dug in behind a hedgerow in the Mailly-Maillet area – you can see their spades standing on the left of the photo. This impromptu trench is facing La Signy Farm and is typical of how the Kiwis dug in their defensive works and took advantage of hedgelines during the day of 26 March.
It was around 6.45pm, the Dinks had done the best they could and now, in the dusk, they started digging in to secure their positions.
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The key question remained – where the hell were the Aucklanders?
Auckland attack
The Auckland Battalion had last been seen by the Dinks just outside Mailly-Maillet, marching forward in a column beside the D919.
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The Aucklanders had reached an apple orchard and found two English eighteen-pounder guns and their crews which Ormond Burton says “for the last four days had been retiring and fighting all the way.” Around 5pm this plucky gun crew swung back into action to provide some limited artillery support to 1st Brigade as it pushed forward. Three hundred yards further on near a windmill the Aucklanders came under machine-gun fire from two German positions to the right. Though the sources don’t specify the location of those guns they were likely on the ridgelines south of One Tree Hill – the D919 was well within the range of the German Maschinengewehr, or MG 08, which could fire up to 3.5km distance. The Aucklanders immediately swung into the fields on the east of the D919 in fighting formation.
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A typical German WWI machine gun team.
They spread out with two companies leading the attack. The 16th Company (Waikato) took the left, keeping touch with the D919 while 15th Company (North Auckland) moved further to the right. Between them they were strung out on a 1.5km long attacking front stretching east from the D919 into the fields beyond Auchonvillers. 3rd Company were positioned close behind in support, 6th stayed anchored on the D919, to guard the flank of the attacking companies, much as the Dinks had used their B Company.
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The Aucklanders advanced over their wide front, going generally north-westwards, until they reached the Apple Tree Knoll area where the Cantabrians from 2nd Brigade had been helping hold the flank till now. The Aucklanders moved through the Cantabrian defensive positions, temporarily using the hedgerows zigzagged from the knoll as cover.
But at the moment they passed through the hedge line into the open countryside a German aeroplane, spotting for the German attackers, flew low over their heads and reported their position. Artillery fire started falling. More serious however were the enemy machine guns, which at once opened up.
Burton says: “Here the enemy fire became intense and at this point casualties commenced to occur.”
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From the hedge, Burton says, the ground fell away for some little distance and then after a small level space, rose again to the ridge lines running off One Tree Hill, ridgelines the Germans had occupied in force.
The Aucklanders, 16th to the north, 15th further south, charged down the slope, headlong into the enemy fire coming at them – German machine guns blazing, rifles sniping and bigger calibre artillery smashing down. The 15th hit the D174. The stretch of road before them was flat, they were beyond that area which was called the sunken road. There was no cover until the foot of the ridge where some old British trenches lay. They pounded over the road and onwards, their only hope to reach that trench.
Private Jesse Stayte, who had been with Bert as one of the Rainy 19th reinforcements back in November 1916, was serving now in 15th Coy. He wrote an account of this charge in his diary: “The screech of bullets was awful, and our men began to fall rapidly. We had 800 yards to go down a slope before we could get cover. Fritz was on the ridge in front. However, we went on and got to the bottom where there was a trench which was our objective and we took it, but we left a trail of dead and wounded all down that slope.”
Once into the old British reserve trenches, spurred on by the mauling they had just taken, the men of the 15th surged up the old trench lines, throwing grenades and remorselessly attacking the German positions further up the slope, routing the Germans. Burton describes it: “Getting into a tangle of old saps [trench works] ... they bombed forward, past the chalk pits, through the Bowery and into the enemy positions beyond. Three machines guns were taken and a number of the enemy, who were fleeing in all directions, were killed.” You can see The Bowery on the map on the next page, orienting you as to where this action took place. The Bowery used to be a wood before WWI, which disappeared into the dirt during the battering this tired old battlefield endured during the long years of war. It was never replanted after the war and there is no sign of it today. It is a landmark fossilised on the maps of the era.
This map shows the various attacking drives of the 1st Brigade, with the dotted line estimating the new defensive front they had established by the end of the day.
The men of 16th Company were having an even harder time. Before them lay the Sunken Road, that part of the D174 which had been causing problems for the Kiwis all day, and beyond that they would be directly beneath the high ground of One Tree Hill, the strongest German concentration in this area. As they charged from the hedgerows of Apple Tree Knoll the German fire coming at them was so heavy, the casualty rate so high, the advance began to stall.
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They reached the shelter of the sunken road, their flank pressed up against the sugar factory cross roads. The intensity of the German machine gun barrage coming down from One Tree Hill and the ridgeline before them meant they could not continue. Burton says simply: “At the foot of the ridge and just to the right of the sugar refinery the 16th were checked. Many men had fallen.” Those left alive or simply still able to stand took cover behind the hedgerow and embankment of the sunken road and the officers remaining held a quick discussion on how to proceed. It was 6.45pm and the 16th had to officially report what nobody wanted to hear.
They were held up.
Not able to go forward.
New Zealand troops lie in wait in a machine-gun post on the Somme during the Spring Offensive in 1918.
1st Auckland found itself in a precarious position – 15th Company had pushed far ahead and was now isolated in enemy territory while 16th Company was pinned down and unable to join up with them. And to their left, across the other side of the D919 the 2nd Rifles were likewise left up in the air, having to defend on two sides because the 16th had not cleared the fields around Kilometre Lane. There were two choices, 15th Company could withdraw, and the Rifles be forced to pull back also to join up a defensible flank with 1st Auckland, surrendering all their hard-won gains. Or 16th could renew their attack, drive through the remaining German opposition, regardless of how withering the incoming fire would be, and push the line forward again.
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It was now that Coates and 3rd Company, which had been in reserve, played their pivotal role. It was their turn to brave that unforgiving German fire. Coates, with Bert close at his side as his Company signaller, lead his Company thundering down the slope and across the fields from Apple Tree Knoll, seeing comrades fall just as Private Jesse Stayte had described happening to his company. They hurled themselves into the meagre cover beside what was left of 16th ready to strengthen resolve. Coates conferred with the Captain of the 16th, Henry Te Reiwhati Vercoe. The decision was made. They were here to stop the German advance and forge that damn defensive line and the Aucklanders were not about to back down. No matter what the cost, they were going forward.
Lying in the sheltered lee of the sunken road Coates and Vercoe organised their plans. Shortly before dusk, around 7pm, all was ready. The order was given, fix bayonets. This was to be a hard, brutal fight at close quarters in near dark. The specialist Lewis gunners assigned to 16th and 3rd then went into action. Burton: “The Lewis gunners coming practically out into the open, engaged the enemy guns and drew nearly all the fire upon themselves. They suffered heavily. Few of them were left, but their purpose was achieved.” It had given the infantry soldiers the chance they needed.
From the sunken road to the German lines was 120 yards of open, gently rising slope. Jumping up from the cover of the Sunken Road, with Vercoe recorded as crying out “come on boys, rush them, rush them” the remaining men of the 16th Waikatos and 3rd Company, with Bert among them, charged up the slope “in the teeth of” renewed fierce German fire. But this time there was no stopping the Auckland attack. They smashed into the German lines, grim and determined, bayonets bared. Burton says: “The Aucklanders closed in with cold steel and in a few moments the Huns were a crowd of panic-stricken fugitives. It was in vain that their officers endeavoured to rally them – a few were taken prisoner, many were killed and the remainder ran.” Harper says the Battalion’s war diary records 40 prisoners and eight machine guns captured – consider that number for a moment, eight machine guns each capable of spitting 500 bullets a minute, which had been pouring all that firepower onto the Kiwis as they had charged. It is a wonder any of them made it to the German lines.
This Google satellite view shows the actual field that 3rd and 16th Auckland bayonet charged across as it is in 2018. Note that the sugar refinery is no longer in existence, it is just a bare field now.
In his 2012 book on the French battlefields Dr Peter Pedersen, head of the Research Centre at the Australian War Memorial and one of Australia's leading military historians, gives his view of this skirmish: “When darkness fell, 1st Auckland’s left bayonet charged across the D174. Maddened by their earlier losses, they were merciless and took few prisoners in drawing level with 2nd Rifles and the rest of the Aucklanders.”
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It is easy to see that charge up the slope as just another of the tough engagements in a day of disjointed actions, a day in which many men in the Kiwi companies had shown extraordinary courage. But even on the day, that particular charge was seen as critical, an instance when the momentum of the Kiwis could have been lost, the Germans ceded key high ground and most probably the 15th North Aucklanders lost and the 2nd Rifles put under such pressure they too may have been forced back during the night.
But thanks to this charge, the Companies of 1st Auckland managed to reunite, combining their fighting strength and securing that important stretch of ridgeline which the Germans had been holding in such strength throughout the day, directing fire onto the Dinks and then the Cantabrians. The Aucklanders pulled up short of the top of the rise designated One Tree Hill, but they had done enough. From here the Aucklanders could reach out to the Cantabrians on the right who were dug-in just short of Beaumont-Hamel, taking the threat of being outflanked off them.
Harper says of that rush up the slope: “This attack demonstrated the fighting spirit and great courage of the New Zealand officers and soldiers. Taking the ridge was a significant achievement as it enabled 1st Auckland to link up with 2nd Canterbury battalion on its right flank.”
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With the Dinks, Auckland and Canterbury in place, a significant part of the much-needed defensive line was now achieved. Just the northern stretch needed to be secured. Since Puiseaux, the village originally intended to be the lynch pin to the north, was now in German hands and the British were once more backpedaling, the Australians had now also been ordered into action. They were given the task to take over Hebuterne, providing the Kiwis a new anchor to join their line to. By now, late in the evening, more of the Kiwi units coming from Hangest-sur-Somme had arrived and been cobbled into another adhoc brigade. At 1am on March 27 3rd Rifles, 2nd Otago and 2nd Wellington, working together, marched through Mailly-Maillet to Colincamps. They pushed out more German patrols who had once more infiltrated the village and gained touch with the Australians just south of Hebuterne.
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After little more than 24 hours, the gap was closed.
New Zealand machine gunners near Colincamps 1918.
Now the question was whether it could be held against renewed German efforts. The line may have been formed but the Germans were still in a relatively strong position. They held the high ground to the north, around La Signy farm, overlooking the New Zealand positions where they could cause problems with the range of their machine guns. Many of the Kiwis wanted to push on, but General Russell was prudently more cautious. He knew he could not afford to over stretch his forces. As Colonel Stewart records “the time was not yet ripe for further action and General Russell issued orders forbidding an attack till the general situation cleared itself.”
Consolidation was called for.
As night fell the Aucklanders secured their new position. It was bitterly cold and none of the men had greatcoats to keep warm. The Germans made repeated counter-attacks and the Aucklanders steadfastly held their new line, repelling them.
Burton: “Numbers of the enemy were on the front and several times they came up against the Auckland posts.”
The sugar refinery, now behind the line of 2nd Rifles, was set on fire by German artillery. It burnt luridly through the night, adding to the blazing munitions dump, as a backdrop to the German attacks.
Burton sums it up simply: “It was a wild night.”
And it was as this night was drawing to a close, during a German attack around 7am on Wednesday 27 March, that Bert was killed. Bert, as a signaller, could have stayed on the phone, keeping headquarters back at Hedauville briefed. But he knew there were no reserve troops to call up, the New Zealanders were stretched too thin. 1st Ak were the only men between the German advance and Amiens at that point of the line. As the Germans once more fiercely assaulted the trenches held by 3rd Auckland, he was standing with his comrades of 2 Platoon, rifle firing. The cool headed, solid presence of platoon sergeant Erick Jordan was nearby. A couple of yards further along the trench was Private Arthur Burnside, a fellow signaller, also shooting away. Coates said “the Bosche were attacking our position. We were all fighting for all we were worth.” Bert was close to Coates, when Coates saw him hit by a German bullet and knocked back. He was lifted away, Coates thought it was to await medical aid, but could not check until the assault was repelled. Bert however had been killed instantly. Burnside saw him go down and thought it must have been a sniper from the German lines who got him.
That it was a sniper was quite probable and typified the style of fighting here, as described earlier, with small, mobile units of Germans who quickly set up machine gun nests, with those not actively firing the Maschinengewehr turning to sniping with their rifles until they were needed to replenish the belts of ammunition the machine gun chewed through.
Coates was also injured at some stage during the furious defence that morning. He is officially recorded as receiving an injury on 26 March. But he was not hit by enemy fire this time. Historian Michael Basset says he injured his leg, possibly slipping as he tried to help a wounded man, and had to be carried back to safety himself by one of his men. He stayed with his unit initially, carrying on as best he could during the urgency of the defensive effort and later was sent to convalesce in England, out of action for a few months.
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Coates won a bar to his Military Cross for his actions on March 26 leading Bert and the 3rd in their charge against the Germans and then keeping them solid in defence of the hard-won ground they held. This is his citation: "For conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty. He brought his company after five days' strenuous marching with little rest in perfect order into action, and by pushing forward exploiting platoons during the night enabled a more advanced line to be consolidated, securing 20 prisoners. Next day, when several of his men were killed or wounded under heavy fire, he showed complete indifference to danger, attending to the wounded and carrying men to safety. His willingness to sacrifice himself for others was an inspiration to all his men."
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Later, in August, Coates wrote a letter home to Bert’s parents describing Bert’s last moments. The family also placed an advertisement in a paper called The Chronicle that circulated to the troops. At least two of Bert’s comrades from his platoon saw the ad and wrote back - Sergeant Jordan and Burnside, giving details of Bert’s last moments. Regrettably only fragments of those letters remain, and the crucial pages are missing.
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While Bert had fallen, the action continued for the survivors in the 3rd. During the day of 27 March, the Aucklanders remained dug in and came under heavy bombardment. Burnside told the family: “We had a very strenuous day then and things were not looking [good].” Jock Vennell, author of a biography of General Russell, writing in the Otago Daily Times in 2008, described the following events – the Germans counterattacked all that day in an attempt to break through, abandoning their infiltration tactics for full-frontal assaults on the New Zealand positions. Russell sent a rallying message to his commanders, calling on them to keep holding the line they had paid so dearly to forge:
"Here we are and here we stay. We've wire in front, on our flanks and to our rear. No matter what happens, there's to be no retreating. The division stands firm.”
New Zealand troops in the front line at La Signy Farm in April 1918.
Russell was well aware of what he was asking. His outnumbered troops were fighting off repeated attacks for 36 hours without the support of their artillery, and they were short of food and warm clothes. On the night of 28 March it began to rain continuously, and the New Zealand trenches were soon knee-deep in mud and water.
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But hold they did, fighting tenaciously. Meanwhile the Brigades of the NZ Field Artillery had been racing south from Ypres and by the morning of 29 March they arrived and were in position, firing, giving the infantry some much needed support. At last the line was deemed secure.
And after soaking up the pressure, Russell finally gave the order to unleash a counter attack. On 30 March the Kiwis surged forward and captured the high ground of La Signy Farm. As Vennall puts it: “Though a small operation in tactical terms, it was the first successful offensive action taken by the British army on the Western Front since the start of the Michael offensive nine days earlier.”
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In the words of Australian war correspondent Charles Bean, "the news of it came in those dark days like a tonic to the whole of the British Army and to the Empire".
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The NZ Herald carried a 2 April report by English correspondent Philip Gibbs, which has a slightly nauseating ‘boys-own-adventure’ style to it, the type of reporting that served the political purposes of glorifying the war and disguising the realities (Gibbs is the man who admitted after the war that he had hidden the truth about the Ypres battlefield to allegedly protect those at home). It is however useful to quote it, showing how the Anzac success was being portrayed: “Australian and New Zealanders have come into the line, fresh and keen, uplifted by a fierce enthusiasm and stirred by emotions which make these fellows very dangerous. I saw them coming to relieve hard-pressed troops. The sight made the pulse beat and gave a sense of new security.” Gibbs says of the Kiwis they were “spick, span and debonair. Lads who have already seen many adventures. It was a glorious sight on the road. After reaching the battle-line there were things doing. They sent out patrols, clearing No Man’s Land, caught Germans in ambushes, raking stragglers with bullets, slaughtered the enemy in several small attacks and drove him out of woods and villages, scaring him horribly day and night.”
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The success of the Kiwis had reverberations even at GHQ. As soon as news came that the Anzacs had plugged the gap, Haig relieved Gough of his command of Fifth Army – on 27 March, only hours after Bert’s death. On 2 April the entire Fifth Army was disbanded and renamed the Fourth, in an effort to wipe out memory of those few days in March when they were fleeing backwards. There was talk of a court-martial of Gough. It was another example of infighting between Haig and the politicians and prompted as much by the desire of all of them to shield themselves from blame and find instead a convenient scapegoat.
A Kiwi section post near Mailly-Maillet, 31 March, 1918.
At the same time as the New Zealanders were holding their sector, the German High Command continued to order new battering operations against the British line as part of its overall offensive. The Ministry of Culture and Heritage website outlines the impact: Operation Mars launched on 28 March aimed a blow at Arras, 20 km to the north of the Kiwis’ position, described by one historian as the single most important day of the campaign. This time the British armies held firm. On 4 April another attempt was made to reach Amiens, this time above Heburterne, which the Australians repelled. Next day, the Germans returned to attacking the Kiwi sector. They temporarily drove the New Zealanders out of La Signy Farm, but the line held, and the German assault was brought to a halt. During this time Erick Jordan led the remnants of his section from 2 Platoon on a charge against yet another German machine gun nest, taking it and saving countless lives. For this he received a Distinguished Conduct Medal. Further North in Ypres, later in April, Operation Georgette pushed the British out of much of their gains in the Ypres Salient, but again ultimately fell short of their target of the Hazebrouck railhead.
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In all, the New Zealand Division faced 10 days of extreme pressure in the Mailly-Maillet sector. Forging the new line and then defending it had cost some 500 dead, Bert among them, and another 1900 wounded.
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The Kiwis were relieved in June but by July were back in the front, this time slightly north of Mailly-Maillet, above Heburterne. Here they again decided to seize the initiative in a way the British were unable to do and push on in a series of small, lightening attacks which did not allow the Germans to settle in and revert back to the bunkered, trench warfare. The New Zealand forces were renown for being at their best when ranging over open ground - and they used that strength to the best advantage now.
By the end of July, the Germans had exhausted themselves. None of their large attacks were bringing them decisive gains, but each dwindled away precious resources. As the Culture and Heritage site says: “German factories, starved of materials by the Allied naval blockade, struggled to replace the weapons and equipment that had been lost.” They were losing men at an unsustainable rate. The British and its allies too were close to exhausting their available troops. But they had the Americans who were pumping increasing numbers of soldiers and equipment into the war.
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On 8 August, the British now launched their own set piece attack, using Australian and Canadian troops. It was a stunning victory, capturing 50,000 Germans and 500 field guns and marked the end for the Germans. From here on the British, with the New Zealanders playing their part, forced the Germans back. Following the capture of La Signy Farm came Sailly-au-Bois and Louport Wood, Baupame and Le Quesnoy, successful, decisive engagements which helped turn the tide. These battles are commemorated on the outside walls of the Auckland War Memorial Museum, if you walk a circumference of the museum you can see those names carved there.
The Kiwis were no longer just plugging the gap, they were taking the fight to the Germans and bodily pushing them back.
The Allies eventually broke through the main German lines of defence and the war became a British drive in to Germany. There were many costly battles to come, but Germany finally surrendered on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918.