WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.759 Welcome to today's deep dive. Today we're looking 00:00:02.759 --> 00:00:06.000 at a battle that, well, it often gets completely 00:00:06.000 --> 00:00:08.699 lost in the overwhelming tragedy of 1915 on the 00:00:08.699 --> 00:00:10.759 Western Front. It really does. There's just so 00:00:10.759 --> 00:00:13.080 much ground to cover in that year alone. Right. 00:00:13.259 --> 00:00:14.980 We're talking about the Battle of Festubert. 00:00:15.500 --> 00:00:17.879 And I know it's incredibly easy to just gloss 00:00:17.879 --> 00:00:20.679 over these early engagements, but Festubert represents 00:00:20.679 --> 00:00:25.160 a massive, fundamental tactical pivot. A completely, 00:00:25.239 --> 00:00:27.699 completely transformative moment for how the 00:00:27.699 --> 00:00:30.280 war was fought. Exactly. So our mission for you 00:00:30.280 --> 00:00:33.200 today is to cut right through the dry dates and 00:00:33.200 --> 00:00:35.539 the endless casualty lists. If you look closely 00:00:35.539 --> 00:00:38.399 at the mud of Festivere, you find the exact moment 00:00:38.399 --> 00:00:41.140 when military minds were forced to change how 00:00:41.140 --> 00:00:43.579 modern wars are fought. And alongside that, you 00:00:43.579 --> 00:00:46.520 find deeply personal, culturally devastating 00:00:46.520 --> 00:00:48.420 stories of the people who are actually there. 00:00:48.659 --> 00:00:50.579 So to really grasp the gravity of this, we need 00:00:50.579 --> 00:00:52.219 to look at the landscape. Give us the overview. 00:00:52.429 --> 00:00:55.750 Well, it's the spring of 1915, and we are looking 00:00:55.750 --> 00:00:59.130 at a geopolitical landscape defined by a massive, 00:00:59.450 --> 00:01:02.049 deadly deadlock. We're in the Artois region of 00:01:02.049 --> 00:01:03.649 France. Just south of Neuve -Chapelle, right? 00:01:03.990 --> 00:01:07.069 Yeah. Right. Exactly. And the British First Army, 00:01:07.189 --> 00:01:10.349 which is under General Sir Douglas Haig, along 00:01:10.349 --> 00:01:13.230 with the French 10th Army, are desperately trying 00:01:13.230 --> 00:01:16.250 to find a way to break through these deeply entrenched 00:01:16.250 --> 00:01:18.769 German lines. And the pressure is just immense. 00:01:18.950 --> 00:01:22.180 Oh, it's unbelievable. The learning curve for 00:01:22.180 --> 00:01:25.719 fighting a modern industrialized war was incredibly 00:01:25.719 --> 00:01:29.120 steep, and the cost of every single lesson they 00:01:29.120 --> 00:01:31.700 were learning was being paid in human lives. 00:01:32.099 --> 00:01:33.739 And the broader context for you to keep in mind 00:01:33.739 --> 00:01:37.280 here is the Second Battle of Artois. This was 00:01:37.280 --> 00:01:39.659 a massive offense of stretching from early May 00:01:39.659 --> 00:01:42.760 all the way to mid -June. It involved coordinated 00:01:42.760 --> 00:01:45.040 efforts between the French and the British against 00:01:45.040 --> 00:01:47.379 the German Empire. But the British military leaders 00:01:47.379 --> 00:01:49.760 weren't just flawlessly executing some grand 00:01:49.760 --> 00:01:51.920 master plan. They were scrambling. They were 00:01:51.920 --> 00:01:53.840 absolutely scrambling to adapt. Just throwing 00:01:53.840 --> 00:01:55.459 everything at the wall to see what would break 00:01:55.459 --> 00:01:57.579 the stalemate. They really were. And to understand 00:01:57.579 --> 00:02:02.900 the specific decisions made at Festiveri... Right. 00:02:03.159 --> 00:02:06.400 May 9th. Yes. On May 9th, the British Army suffered 00:02:06.400 --> 00:02:09.060 a catastrophic failure at a place called Auburs 00:02:09.060 --> 00:02:12.139 Ridge. The tactics they had relied on up to that 00:02:12.139 --> 00:02:14.560 point completely fell apart. Okay, let's unpack 00:02:14.560 --> 00:02:17.819 this because that direct background is crucial 00:02:17.819 --> 00:02:21.520 for what happens next. At Auburs Ridge, the British 00:02:21.520 --> 00:02:24.599 command used what they called hurricane bombardments. 00:02:24.939 --> 00:02:27.039 Right, hurricane bombardments. Which meant an 00:02:27.039 --> 00:02:29.599 intense, relatively short burst of artillery 00:02:29.599 --> 00:02:33.379 fire. The goal was rapid shock and awe. and then 00:02:33.379 --> 00:02:35.500 the infantry would advance with what they called 00:02:35.500 --> 00:02:38.819 unlimited objectives. Unlimited objectives is 00:02:38.819 --> 00:02:41.340 such a telling phrase, isn't it? It really highlights 00:02:41.340 --> 00:02:43.840 the mindset. I mean, it meant they were aiming 00:02:43.840 --> 00:02:46.539 for a massive sweeping breakthrough. They were 00:02:46.539 --> 00:02:48.840 hoping to push the line forward by an astonishing 00:02:48.840 --> 00:02:52.060 3 ,000 yards. It's about 1 .7 miles. Right, 1 00:02:52.060 --> 00:02:55.180 .7 miles deep into enemy territory in basically 00:02:55.180 --> 00:02:58.699 a single sprint. But it failed miserably. The 00:02:58.699 --> 00:03:00.680 hurricane bombardment just didn't do the job. 00:03:00.780 --> 00:03:02.539 It didn't sufficiently cut the barbed wire. didn't 00:03:02.539 --> 00:03:05.199 destroy the machine gun nests. The German defenses 00:03:05.199 --> 00:03:07.800 held completely and the British infantry were 00:03:07.800 --> 00:03:10.979 just cut to pieces. So within a matter of days, 00:03:11.460 --> 00:03:13.759 the British command had to completely rethink 00:03:13.759 --> 00:03:16.280 their entire approach. Which brings us to the 00:03:16.280 --> 00:03:18.719 major tactical pivot we mentioned. The British 00:03:18.719 --> 00:03:21.840 look at their own failure at Auburs Ridge and 00:03:21.840 --> 00:03:24.159 then they look over at their allies. The French. 00:03:24.360 --> 00:03:26.639 Yeah, the French, who were seeing slightly more 00:03:26.639 --> 00:03:29.460 success with a completely different method. So 00:03:29.460 --> 00:03:32.180 the British command decides to scrap the hurricane 00:03:32.180 --> 00:03:35.330 bombardment idea entirely. Instead, they adopt 00:03:35.330 --> 00:03:38.550 the French tactic, which is slow, deliberate 00:03:38.550 --> 00:03:41.409 artillery fire. It is a fundamental shift in 00:03:41.409 --> 00:03:43.669 military psychology. They went from trying to 00:03:43.669 --> 00:03:45.870 sprint through a brick wall to trying to slowly 00:03:45.870 --> 00:03:48.270 dismantle it brick by brick. Nepotically preparing 00:03:48.270 --> 00:03:51.490 the way for the infantry. Exactly. Slowly, continuously 00:03:51.490 --> 00:03:54.349 cutting through the barbed wire and systematically 00:03:54.349 --> 00:03:56.849 demolishing German strong points over a period 00:03:56.849 --> 00:04:00.069 of days, not minutes. And they dramatically lowered 00:04:00.069 --> 00:04:02.610 their expectations for the infantry, right? They 00:04:02.610 --> 00:04:05.770 abandoned that deeply ambitious 3000 yard breakthrough. 00:04:06.090 --> 00:04:09.270 Yes. For Festubert, the goal was narrowed down 00:04:09.270 --> 00:04:11.870 to capturing a trench line just 1 ,000 yards 00:04:11.870 --> 00:04:13.990 forward. A third of the distance. A third of 00:04:13.990 --> 00:04:16.790 the distance. It was designed as a continuous 00:04:16.790 --> 00:04:19.670 attack plan. It involved one division pushing 00:04:19.670 --> 00:04:22.569 from a spot known as Rue du Bois to Chocolat 00:04:22.569 --> 00:04:25.029 Manier Corner and another division attacking 00:04:25.029 --> 00:04:27.790 about 600 yards further north. If we connect 00:04:27.790 --> 00:04:29.790 this to the bigger picture. And this is vital. 00:04:30.089 --> 00:04:32.129 The Battle of Festubert officially goes down 00:04:32.129 --> 00:04:35.069 as the very first British attempt at a strategy 00:04:35.069 --> 00:04:37.819 of attrition in the first. World War. Attrition. 00:04:38.500 --> 00:04:41.980 It's a grim, deeply cynical concept. It meant 00:04:41.980 --> 00:04:43.959 the generals were officially acknowledging that 00:04:43.959 --> 00:04:46.360 a glorious, rapid breakthrough to win the war 00:04:46.360 --> 00:04:49.480 quickly was no longer the reality. Warfare had 00:04:49.480 --> 00:04:52.199 permanently changed. It was now about the slow, 00:04:52.560 --> 00:04:55.220 agonizing, grinding down of the opponent's resources 00:04:55.220 --> 00:04:57.899 and manpower. You accept that you will take heavy 00:04:57.899 --> 00:05:00.519 losses, strictly in order to inflict heavy losses 00:05:00.519 --> 00:05:03.600 on the enemy. It's the horrific realization that 00:05:03.600 --> 00:05:05.620 you aren't going to win by outmaneuvering the 00:05:05.620 --> 00:05:07.939 enemy. You're going to win by out surviving them. 00:05:08.379 --> 00:05:11.180 But what makes this specific shift to attrition 00:05:11.180 --> 00:05:14.199 at Festy Bear even more complex is the overarching 00:05:14.199 --> 00:05:16.939 strategic goal behind it. Because you might think 00:05:16.939 --> 00:05:19.500 an attack of this scale was about capturing a 00:05:19.500 --> 00:05:22.759 vital town or a major supply railway. But it 00:05:22.759 --> 00:05:25.399 wasn't. This entire offensive was actually designed 00:05:25.399 --> 00:05:28.930 as a massive distraction. The primary motivation 00:05:28.930 --> 00:05:31.089 for the British 1st Army resuming the offensive 00:05:31.089 --> 00:05:33.589 here was to act as a decoy. While the French 00:05:33.589 --> 00:05:36.129 10th Army was simultaneously launching a massive 00:05:36.129 --> 00:05:38.649 attack against Vimy Ridge, which is further south 00:05:38.649 --> 00:05:41.430 near Arras, the British attack at Festubert was 00:05:41.430 --> 00:05:44.170 explicitly intended to attract German divisions 00:05:44.170 --> 00:05:46.610 away from the French front. The British command 00:05:46.610 --> 00:05:48.610 wanted the Germans to send their reinforcements 00:05:48.610 --> 00:05:51.769 north to face them rather than reinforcing the 00:05:51.769 --> 00:05:53.949 defenders holding off the French at Vimy. So 00:05:53.949 --> 00:05:56.029 the soldiers on the ground are being sent into 00:05:56.029 --> 00:05:58.870 a meat grinder, testing out this grueling new 00:05:58.870 --> 00:06:01.949 attrition warfare entirely to serve as a magnet 00:06:01.949 --> 00:06:05.029 for enemy artillery and reinforcements. It sets 00:06:05.029 --> 00:06:07.910 a terrifying tone for the execution of the battle. 00:06:08.410 --> 00:06:11.589 Now, the assault targeted a salient, a piece 00:06:11.589 --> 00:06:14.569 of land jutting out into enemy territory in the 00:06:14.569 --> 00:06:17.089 German lines between New Chappelle and the village 00:06:17.089 --> 00:06:20.500 of Festubert. It was a three mile front. and 00:06:20.500 --> 00:06:22.980 they prepared to hit it with an unprecedented 00:06:22.980 --> 00:06:26.319 level of firepower. To execute this deliberate, 00:06:26.720 --> 00:06:29.399 methodical French style of bombardment, they 00:06:29.399 --> 00:06:32.899 massed 433 artillery pieces. And instead of a 00:06:32.899 --> 00:06:35.639 short hurricane barrage, they bombarded the German 00:06:35.639 --> 00:06:39.779 lines continuously for 60 hours. 60 hours. That's 00:06:39.779 --> 00:06:42.949 two and a half days of nonstop deafening explosions. 00:06:43.189 --> 00:06:45.470 They fired roughly a hundred thousand shells 00:06:45.470 --> 00:06:47.949 into that three -mile stretch. The sheer noise 00:06:47.949 --> 00:06:50.110 and the constant vibration of the earth must 00:06:50.110 --> 00:06:52.329 have been mind -bending. Oh, absolutely paralyzing. 00:06:52.670 --> 00:06:54.970 The intention was to completely obliterate the 00:06:54.970 --> 00:06:56.990 wire and level the strong points of the German 00:06:56.990 --> 00:06:59.629 6th Army. And after all that buildup, the way 00:06:59.629 --> 00:07:01.509 they actually launched the infantry assault was 00:07:01.509 --> 00:07:03.730 a historic first. Here's where it gets really 00:07:03.730 --> 00:07:06.370 interesting. The attack officially began at 1130 00:07:06.370 --> 00:07:09.800 p .m. on the night of May 15th, 1915. This was 00:07:09.800 --> 00:07:12.319 the very first British night attack of the entire 00:07:12.319 --> 00:07:15.759 war. Visualizing a night attack in 1915 is chilling. 00:07:16.660 --> 00:07:18.959 The darkness would have added an unimaginable 00:07:18.959 --> 00:07:22.100 layer of chaos. You have thousands of men trying 00:07:22.100 --> 00:07:24.259 to navigate through a landscape that has just 00:07:24.259 --> 00:07:27.680 been completely pulverized by artillery. It's 00:07:27.680 --> 00:07:30.480 littered with craters and debris in pitch black. 00:07:30.600 --> 00:07:33.100 Trying to maintain formation and coordination 00:07:33.100 --> 00:07:36.209 without any modern communications equipment. 00:07:36.490 --> 00:07:38.829 Knowing the enemy is out there in the dark. So 00:07:38.829 --> 00:07:40.810 if you're an infantryman going over the top at 00:07:40.810 --> 00:07:43.550 1130 p .m., you're probably expecting to walk 00:07:43.550 --> 00:07:45.829 into a shattered landscape where the enemy has 00:07:45.829 --> 00:07:48.689 been annihilated by those 100 ,000 shells. You 00:07:48.689 --> 00:07:50.870 would hope so, yeah. But what actually happened 00:07:50.870 --> 00:07:53.709 when they crossed no man's land? What's fascinating 00:07:53.709 --> 00:07:56.670 here is, despite that unimaginable volume of 00:07:56.670 --> 00:08:00.610 explosive power, the 60 -hour bombardment fundamentally 00:08:00.610 --> 00:08:03.769 failed. It failed completely. It did not significantly 00:08:03.769 --> 00:08:06.149 damaged the frontline defenses of the German 00:08:06.149 --> 00:08:09.110 6th Army. How does that even happen? You drop 00:08:09.110 --> 00:08:11.250 a hundred thousand shells on a three -mile front 00:08:11.250 --> 00:08:13.759 and the enemy's front door is still locked. It 00:08:13.759 --> 00:08:16.160 comes down to a few critical factors of early 00:08:16.160 --> 00:08:19.060 trench warfare. First, the Germans were already 00:08:19.060 --> 00:08:21.600 learning to dig deep. They were creating reinforced 00:08:21.600 --> 00:08:24.540 dugouts that could withstand a lot of the standard 00:08:24.540 --> 00:08:28.019 field artillery of the time. Right. Second, a 00:08:28.019 --> 00:08:30.839 massive portion of the British shells were shrapnel 00:08:30.839 --> 00:08:33.120 shells. Which are designed to burst in the air. 00:08:33.279 --> 00:08:35.580 Exactly. They boost in the air and rain down 00:08:35.580 --> 00:08:38.500 metal to kill troops in the open. They are practically 00:08:38.500 --> 00:08:41.379 useless for destroying earthworks or cutting 00:08:41.379 --> 00:08:44.279 thick belts of barbed wire. You need high explosive 00:08:44.279 --> 00:08:46.940 shells for that. And the British simply didn't 00:08:46.940 --> 00:08:49.320 have enough of them. And finally, the terrain 00:08:49.320 --> 00:08:53.000 itself in Artois was incredibly mushy. A lot 00:08:53.000 --> 00:08:55.700 of those shells simply plunged deep into the 00:08:55.700 --> 00:08:58.539 soft mud and exploded underground. Muffling the 00:08:58.539 --> 00:09:00.980 blast. Muffling the blast and leaving the defenses 00:09:00.980 --> 00:09:03.519 above ground relatively intact. So the infantry 00:09:03.519 --> 00:09:05.659 steps out into the pitch black, expecting ruined 00:09:05.659 --> 00:09:08.899 trenches, and instead they hit a solid wall of 00:09:08.899 --> 00:09:11.879 German machine gun fire. From there, the timeline 00:09:11.879 --> 00:09:15.679 of the battle becomes a horrific grinding slog. 00:09:15.879 --> 00:09:18.340 During that initial night attack, only the 6th 00:09:18.340 --> 00:09:20.480 Brigade made any real progress. And that was 00:09:20.480 --> 00:09:22.440 mainly because the weather conditions were relatively 00:09:22.440 --> 00:09:25.379 good that first night. But that minor success 00:09:25.379 --> 00:09:28.019 was incredibly fleeting. The initial night attack 00:09:28.019 --> 00:09:30.860 on the 15th achieves almost nothing strategically, 00:09:31.320 --> 00:09:33.440 so the command decides to try again the very 00:09:33.440 --> 00:09:36.659 next afternoon. Right. At 3 .15 p .m. on May 00:09:36.659 --> 00:09:39.200 16th, they push forward again in broad daylight. 00:09:39.700 --> 00:09:41.700 The original brigades attack, and they are joined 00:09:41.700 --> 00:09:44.080 by the 7th Division, which opens up a completely 00:09:44.080 --> 00:09:46.440 new front further to the south. But they are 00:09:46.440 --> 00:09:49.059 running into the exact same unbroken defenses. 00:09:49.440 --> 00:09:51.980 The casualties mount at an astronomical rate. 00:09:52.080 --> 00:09:55.460 By the next day, May 17th, the situation is so 00:09:55.460 --> 00:09:58.340 dire that the 4th Guards Brigade of the 2nd Division 00:09:58.340 --> 00:10:01.340 has to be sent in just to relieve elements of 00:10:01.340 --> 00:10:03.580 the battered 7th Division. And even with fresh 00:10:03.580 --> 00:10:06.419 elite troops, they only manage to secure minor, 00:10:06.799 --> 00:10:09.639 agonizingly slow advances. It just keeps grinding 00:10:09.639 --> 00:10:12.500 on. This is the reality of the new attrition 00:10:12.500 --> 00:10:16.019 strategy. By May 19th, just four days after the 00:10:16.019 --> 00:10:18.460 initial night attack, the fighting capacity of 00:10:18.460 --> 00:10:21.100 the units involved is simply gone. The casualties 00:10:21.100 --> 00:10:23.279 are so devastating that both the 2nd Division 00:10:23.279 --> 00:10:25.399 and the 7th Division have to be withdrawn from 00:10:25.399 --> 00:10:27.860 the battle entirely. And the main objectives 00:10:27.860 --> 00:10:30.779 they set out to capture on May 15th. Still firmly 00:10:30.779 --> 00:10:33.440 in German hands. And as those original divisions 00:10:33.440 --> 00:10:36.100 were shattered and pulled off the line, the British 00:10:36.100 --> 00:10:38.559 command had to feed new forces into the meat 00:10:38.559 --> 00:10:41.269 grinder to keep the distraction going. The troops 00:10:41.269 --> 00:10:43.269 fighting this battle weren't just from the United 00:10:43.269 --> 00:10:45.970 Kingdom. This offensive relied on the incredible 00:10:45.970 --> 00:10:49.070 diversity of a global empire. Right there in 00:10:49.070 --> 00:10:51.509 the initial assaults, you had Indian troops from 00:10:51.509 --> 00:10:54.750 the Garwall Brigade and the 7th Meerut Division. 00:10:55.269 --> 00:10:58.330 And then on May 18th, the 1st Canadian Division 00:10:58.330 --> 00:11:01.149 is ordered into the fray. Assisted by the 51st 00:11:01.149 --> 00:11:03.350 Highland Division. But by the time the Canadians 00:11:03.350 --> 00:11:05.860 and the Highlanders enter the battle, The environmental 00:11:05.860 --> 00:11:08.200 conditions have completely deteriorated. The 00:11:08.200 --> 00:11:10.159 relatively clear weather of the initial assault 00:11:10.159 --> 00:11:12.559 is gone. They are ordered to attack in heavy 00:11:12.559 --> 00:11:15.580 rain. The battlefield, which was already marshy 00:11:15.580 --> 00:11:18.019 and cratered by artillery, turns into an absolute 00:11:18.019 --> 00:11:21.299 quagmire of deep thick mud. Charging a fortified 00:11:21.299 --> 00:11:24.080 machine gun position is terrifying enough. Now 00:11:24.080 --> 00:11:26.399 imagine doing it in a torrential downpour, slipping 00:11:26.399 --> 00:11:29.159 and sinking into the mud with artillery shells 00:11:29.159 --> 00:11:31.779 geysering water and earth all around you. The 00:11:31.779 --> 00:11:33.700 Canadians and the Highlanders threw themselves 00:11:33.700 --> 00:11:36.779 at the German lines but made very little progress 00:11:36.779 --> 00:11:39.539 in the face of intense artillery fire. The British 00:11:39.539 --> 00:11:42.019 forces eventually had to just stop the forward 00:11:42.019 --> 00:11:45.120 momentum and violently dig in to hold their new 00:11:45.120 --> 00:11:47.519 slightly advanced front line right there in the 00:11:47.519 --> 00:11:49.620 heavy rain. And while the British Empire forces 00:11:49.620 --> 00:11:52.220 were bogging down in the mud, the Germans were 00:11:52.220 --> 00:11:55.309 using the time efficiently. They brought up reinforcements 00:11:55.309 --> 00:11:58.090 and strengthened their secondary defensive positions 00:11:58.090 --> 00:12:00.909 even further. The British attempted to resume 00:12:00.909 --> 00:12:03.690 the attack from May 20th all the way to May 25th, 00:12:03.929 --> 00:12:06.460 but it was completely futile. They made virtually 00:12:06.460 --> 00:12:08.960 no further progress. The Battle of Festubert 00:12:08.960 --> 00:12:11.799 finally sputtered to an exhausted halt. So what 00:12:11.799 --> 00:12:14.399 does this all mean when the guns finally stopped 00:12:14.399 --> 00:12:17.779 on May 25th? What did this grand shift to attrition 00:12:17.779 --> 00:12:19.960 actually achieve? We have to look at the numbers. 00:12:20.059 --> 00:12:22.059 Let's break down the sobering math of this 10 00:12:22.059 --> 00:12:25.159 -day battle. For all that planning, the 60 -hour 00:12:25.159 --> 00:12:28.100 bombardment, the night attacks, the endless waves 00:12:28.100 --> 00:12:31.240 of global troops, the offensive resulted in a 00:12:31.240 --> 00:12:34.299 total advance of just 1 .9 miles. That is about 00:12:34.299 --> 00:12:36.820 three kilometers. You could comfortably walk 00:12:36.820 --> 00:12:38.620 that distance in your neighborhood in less than 00:12:38.620 --> 00:12:41.720 40 minutes. The cost of that 1 .9 miles of muddy 00:12:41.720 --> 00:12:44.570 French territory is staggering. The British Empire 00:12:44.570 --> 00:12:48.769 suffered 16 ,648 casualties. To break that down, 00:12:49.090 --> 00:12:52.629 the 2nd Division alone suffered over 5 ,400 casualties. 00:12:53.250 --> 00:12:57.470 The 7th Division lost over 4 ,100. The 47th Division 00:12:57.470 --> 00:13:00.750 lost over 2 ,300. The 1st Canadian Division suffered 00:13:00.750 --> 00:13:04.230 over 2 ,200 casualties. And the 7th Miroot Division 00:13:04.230 --> 00:13:07.909 suffered over 2 ,500. Over 16 ,000 men killed, 00:13:08.009 --> 00:13:10.399 wounded, or missing for a 40 -minute walk. And 00:13:10.399 --> 00:13:12.240 what about the German side, the defenders who 00:13:12.240 --> 00:13:14.860 were supposed to be ground down by this new strategy 00:13:14.860 --> 00:13:17.039 of attrition? How many losses did they take? 00:13:17.360 --> 00:13:20.000 The German 6th Army suffered around 5 ,000 casualties, 00:13:20.080 --> 00:13:22.279 which includes about 800 men who were taken prisoner. 00:13:22.639 --> 00:13:24.820 So the strategy of attrition in this very first 00:13:24.820 --> 00:13:27.200 British iteration resulted in the attackers taking 00:13:27.200 --> 00:13:29.700 more than three times the casualties of the defenders 00:13:29.700 --> 00:13:31.539 they were trying to grind down. Taking three 00:13:31.539 --> 00:13:33.679 times the losses of your enemy is a horrifying 00:13:33.679 --> 00:13:36.659 way to wage a war. And to really understand the 00:13:36.659 --> 00:13:39.299 scale of the violence happening across the Western 00:13:39.299 --> 00:13:42.779 Front in the spring of 1915, we have to look 00:13:42.779 --> 00:13:45.279 at those numbers in the context of the broader 00:13:45.279 --> 00:13:47.759 Second Battle of Artois. Right, because Festubert 00:13:47.759 --> 00:13:49.740 didn't happen in a vacuum. While the British 00:13:49.740 --> 00:13:52.220 were fighting and dying at Festubert, the French 00:13:52.220 --> 00:13:54.360 were fighting their own grueling battles to the 00:13:54.360 --> 00:13:57.480 south. French casualties during the wider Artois 00:13:57.480 --> 00:14:01.690 offensive reached over 102 ,000 men. Wow. Total 00:14:01.690 --> 00:14:04.029 German casualties across the entire sector were 00:14:04.029 --> 00:14:07.850 over 73 ,000. 16 ,000 casualties at Pfisterberg. 00:14:08.039 --> 00:14:10.919 A hundred thousand French casualties. Those numbers 00:14:10.919 --> 00:14:13.159 are so vast, they can easily become abstract. 00:14:13.240 --> 00:14:15.840 They lose their human scale. Exactly. But what 00:14:15.840 --> 00:14:18.360 if we look at exactly who made up those numbers? 00:14:19.039 --> 00:14:20.879 Because of how the British Army recruited at 00:14:20.879 --> 00:14:23.220 the time, those casualties weren't spread evenly 00:14:23.220 --> 00:14:25.700 across the country. They were hyper concentrated. 00:14:25.860 --> 00:14:28.320 The military used what they called the Pals Battalion 00:14:28.320 --> 00:14:31.320 system or localized territorial forces. Men from 00:14:31.320 --> 00:14:33.340 the same villages, the same factories or the 00:14:33.340 --> 00:14:36.080 same sports teams were actively encouraged to 00:14:36.080 --> 00:14:37.950 enlist together and serve shoulder. to shoulder. 00:14:38.269 --> 00:14:40.889 Which meant that a single bad afternoon on the 00:14:40.889 --> 00:14:44.009 front line could literally wipe out a generation 00:14:44.009 --> 00:14:46.990 of men from one specific town. Which brings us 00:14:46.990 --> 00:14:49.889 to a deeply specific cultural impact that shows 00:14:49.889 --> 00:14:53.070 how a battle in France rippled out and devastated 00:14:53.070 --> 00:14:56.149 communities far away. We have to look at the 00:14:56.149 --> 00:14:58.590 Scottish Highlands and a traditional stick and 00:14:58.590 --> 00:15:01.309 ball game called Shinty. Shinty has incredibly 00:15:01.309 --> 00:15:03.769 deep cultural roots in the Scottish Highlands. 00:15:04.470 --> 00:15:06.950 These Shinty teams weren't just random guys playing 00:15:06.950 --> 00:15:09.690 a weekend game. They were the absolute anchors 00:15:09.690 --> 00:15:12.070 of their communities. And because of those localized 00:15:12.070 --> 00:15:14.690 recruitment strategies, these tight knit Shinty 00:15:14.690 --> 00:15:17.090 playing communities were disproportionately devastated 00:15:17.090 --> 00:15:19.610 by the losses at the Battle of Festuber. Whole 00:15:19.610 --> 00:15:22.070 teams enlisted together, fought together and 00:15:22.070 --> 00:15:24.490 fell together in the mud of Artois. The impact 00:15:24.490 --> 00:15:26.649 on these small Highland towns was so profound 00:15:26.649 --> 00:15:29.370 and lasting that a full century later, the one 00:15:29.259 --> 00:15:32.379 100th anniversary of the battle in 2015 wasn't 00:15:32.379 --> 00:15:34.720 just marked by politicians laying wreaths in 00:15:34.720 --> 00:15:36.820 London. It was marked intimately by the sports 00:15:36.820 --> 00:15:39.279 teams themselves. Show tee clubs representing 00:15:39.279 --> 00:15:41.539 areas that lost a massive portion of their young 00:15:41.539 --> 00:15:44.500 men organized their own centennial commemorations. 00:15:45.000 --> 00:15:47.279 Records of the 2015 commemorations show specific 00:15:47.279 --> 00:15:50.529 teams coming together to mourn. Skye Kamenock 00:15:50.529 --> 00:15:53.370 and Kingussie Kamenock, two areas that lost a 00:15:53.370 --> 00:15:55.889 great many men at Festubert, joined up with the 00:15:55.889 --> 00:15:58.909 British force's own Shinty team, known as Scotts 00:15:58.909 --> 00:16:02.009 Kamenock. They held an entire weekend of commemorations, 00:16:02.409 --> 00:16:05.090 lectures, memorial services, and Shinty matches 00:16:05.090 --> 00:16:07.669 on the Isle of Skye, strictly to remember the 00:16:07.669 --> 00:16:09.990 players who never came back from that 1 .9 mile 00:16:09.990 --> 00:16:12.750 advance. A week after that event on the Isle 00:16:12.750 --> 00:16:15.370 of Skye, another club, the Beule Shinty Club, 00:16:15.909 --> 00:16:18.659 held their own memorial. They specifically chose 00:16:18.659 --> 00:16:20.919 to rename their local sports pavilion to honor 00:16:20.919 --> 00:16:24.320 two brothers who died in the battle. Donald and 00:16:24.320 --> 00:16:26.519 Alastair Patterson. You hear those names and 00:16:26.519 --> 00:16:29.200 suddenly it's not 16 ,000 anonymous casualties 00:16:29.200 --> 00:16:31.720 on a ledger anymore. It's Donald and Alastair. 00:16:31.919 --> 00:16:34.600 Just two years before the battle in 1913, the 00:16:34.600 --> 00:16:36.659 Patterson brothers were part of the Beule team 00:16:36.659 --> 00:16:38.980 that won the Kaminok Cup, which is essentially 00:16:38.980 --> 00:16:41.039 the holy grail of the sport. They were local 00:16:41.039 --> 00:16:43.340 champions, athletic, young, the pride of their 00:16:43.340 --> 00:16:46.200 entire town. And by May of 1915, they were both 00:16:46.200 --> 00:16:48.309 killed at Festuber. The loss of men like the 00:16:48.309 --> 00:16:50.409 Patterson brothers ripped a hole in the social 00:16:50.409 --> 00:16:53.029 fabric of these highland towns that took generations 00:16:53.029 --> 00:16:57.009 to heal. But there is one final haunting detail 00:16:57.009 --> 00:16:59.529 regarding Donald Patterson that really bridges 00:16:59.529 --> 00:17:02.330 the gap between the pulverized battlefield in 00:17:02.330 --> 00:17:05.069 France and the community left behind in Scotland. 00:17:05.500 --> 00:17:09.119 Donald played the bagpipes. Yes. And decades 00:17:09.119 --> 00:17:10.900 after he was killed in the battle in the early 00:17:10.900 --> 00:17:14.339 1980s, his personal bagpipes were somehow recovered 00:17:14.339 --> 00:17:16.519 along with his other effects. It's incredible 00:17:16.519 --> 00:17:19.440 to think of a wooden instrument surviving the 00:17:19.440 --> 00:17:21.400 destruction of that battlefield and making its 00:17:21.400 --> 00:17:23.970 way back home decades later. And what's truly 00:17:23.970 --> 00:17:26.609 chilling is that during those deeply emotional 00:17:26.609 --> 00:17:30.009 100th anniversary commemorations in 2015, those 00:17:30.009 --> 00:17:32.910 exact same bagpipes, Donald Patterson's bagpipes 00:17:32.910 --> 00:17:35.150 were played. A century after the artillery of 00:17:35.150 --> 00:17:37.670 Festubert silenced him, his music was heard again 00:17:37.670 --> 00:17:40.009 by the communities still mourning him. That really 00:17:40.009 --> 00:17:42.509 just encapsulates how a 1 .9 mile stretch of 00:17:42.509 --> 00:17:44.950 muddy French territory represented this massive 00:17:44.950 --> 00:17:47.140 shift in world history. the dawn of attrition 00:17:47.140 --> 00:17:49.740 warfare, the first British night attack, and 00:17:49.740 --> 00:17:51.980 the tragic intersection of a global war with 00:17:51.980 --> 00:17:54.839 local communities. This raises an important question. 00:17:55.019 --> 00:17:56.940 One that really lingers when you look at the 00:17:56.940 --> 00:17:59.119 totality of what happened over those 10 days. 00:17:59.539 --> 00:18:01.779 We have to remember the strategic reality we 00:18:01.779 --> 00:18:03.859 discussed at the very beginning. Right. This 00:18:03.859 --> 00:18:08.200 entire battle, the 60 hour bombardment, the terrifying 00:18:08.200 --> 00:18:11.079 night attacks, the desperate charges in the rain 00:18:11.079 --> 00:18:14.000 by troops from across the globe was fundamentally 00:18:14.000 --> 00:18:17.289 designed as a decoy. It was a strategic move 00:18:17.289 --> 00:18:20.210 by high command to draw German attention away 00:18:20.210 --> 00:18:22.589 from the French fighting at Vimy Ridge. It forces 00:18:22.589 --> 00:18:25.269 you to ponder the deeply chilling mathematics 00:18:25.269 --> 00:18:28.369 of modern warfare. You have to consider the minds 00:18:28.369 --> 00:18:30.829 of the military planners who sat in relatively 00:18:30.829 --> 00:18:34.150 safe rooms looking at broad maps and weighed 00:18:34.150 --> 00:18:36.990 the deliberate sacrifice of 16 ,000 of their 00:18:36.990 --> 00:18:39.710 own men. They accepted the devastation of entire 00:18:39.710 --> 00:18:42.250 cultural communities, erasing local champions 00:18:42.250 --> 00:18:45.390 like the Scottish shinty players, all to act 00:18:45.390 --> 00:18:48.269 as a distraction for an ally miles away. It requires 00:18:48.269 --> 00:18:51.329 a level of calculated ruthlessness that is incredibly 00:18:51.329 --> 00:18:53.670 difficult to fully comprehend today. It's a heavy 00:18:53.670 --> 00:18:56.069 thought, and it's exactly the kind of perspective 00:18:56.069 --> 00:18:58.509 we hope you take away from these deep dives. 00:18:58.950 --> 00:19:00.809 We want to thank you so much for joining us. 00:19:01.210 --> 00:19:04.289 The history we think we know is always infinitely 00:19:04.289 --> 00:19:06.509 more complex and often far more heartbreaking 00:19:06.509 --> 00:19:09.089 when we actually take the time to unpack the 00:19:09.089 --> 00:19:12.309 tactical realities and the human cost. Keep asking 00:19:12.309 --> 00:19:14.569 questions, keep looking past the casualty list, 00:19:14.809 --> 00:19:16.569 and keep questioning the history you thought 00:19:16.569 --> 00:19:18.049 you knew. We'll see you next time.