Tuesday 20 March 1918: the fictional officers of RC Sherriff’s Journey’s End prepare themselves for a daylight raid on the opposition trenches, the main objective of which is to obtain a German prisoner. ‘Go in like blazes,’ the Colonel counsels Raleigh, ‘grab hold of the first Boche you see and bundle him across here. One’ll do, but bring more if you see any handy.’

From Journey’s End (2018), courtesy of Lionsgate Films

In real life, an enemy prisoner taken by the 8/Royal West Kents (in the same stretch of 72nd Brigade as the East Surreys) had reported that the enemy attack – which had been expected for some time – was likely to come on the night of the 20th/21st March. The West Kents reported that patrolling was carried on as usual, and ‘no abnormal enemy activity was reported’. Much the same was recorded in the War Diary of 72nd Brigade, but the warning was sufficient to ensure that the East Surrey men ‘slept with their box respirators in the alert position’, since gas shells were expected.

From: McPhail, H. & Guest, P., Battleground Europe: St Quentin Hindenburg Line, Pen & Sword, 2000

The terrain defended by the Brigade is shown on the map, and described by Michael Lucas:

‘[It] held around 3,000 yards of front in rolling countryside. 8/Royal West Kent…recalled that there was a very wide no-man’s land and the outpost zone was about 800 yards deep. Behind these were trenches. There was a redoubt at Vadencourt. Most of the positions were moderately well wired and had good fields of fire. The River Omignon, part of which formed a swamp, ran between the two front-line battalions. The positions south of the river, held by 1/North Staffs, 72 Brigade’s right-hand battalion,  and only recently taken over from the French, were not so satisfactory. They were heavily dependent on interlocking machine-gun fire, for which good visibility was necessary.’

In response to the information from the prisoner, 1/North Staffs reinforced the Essling Redoubt with a couple of additional platoons, while one company from the East Surreys was brought up from reserve in Vermand, as well as an additional company of Machine Gunners.

The Official History of the 8/Royal West Kents reports that:

‘The night was clear and fine, but just before dawn a thick mist began to develop which shortly became so dense that it was impossible to see more than fifteen yards. It was in this famous mist that the Germans commenced their grand offensive against the British 3rd and 5th Armies, which was designed to cut between the British and French forces and win the war in a few weeks.’