Battle of Mons (1914): The British Army's First Fight of the War

The Battle of Mons, fought on 23 August 1914 along a canal in southern Belgium, was the first major battle of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) in the First World War. Some 70,000 to 80,000 British soldiers held off larger German forces for most of the day before being forced into a long retreat. The battle became famous for its disciplined rifle fire, the first Victoria Crosses of the war and the legend of the Angels of Mons.

Background

After the German invasion of Belgium, the BEF of four infantry divisions and a cavalry division crossed to France and advanced into Belgium on the left of the French Fifth Army. Its commander, Field Marshal Sir John French, expected to join a general Allied advance. Instead he ran straight into the German First Army under General Alexander von Kluck, part of the right wing of the Schlieffen Plan sweeping west of the Meuse.

Unlike the huge conscript armies of France and Germany, the BEF was a small professional force of long-service regulars, filled out by reservists recalled to the colours. Its infantry were well trained in musketry, and many of its officers and men had served in the Boer War of 1899–1902.

The first British clash came on 22 August, when a patrol of the 4th (Royal Irish) Dragoon Guards met German cavalry at Casteau, north-east of Mons. Corporal Edward Thomas is traditionally credited with firing the first British shot of the war on the continent.

The battle

On 23 August the British II Corps under General Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien held a line along the Mons–Condé Canal, with a vulnerable loop of the canal at Nimy and Obourg, north of Mons. Haig’s I Corps, to the right, saw little action. German infantry attacked from the morning onwards, often in dense formations.

British regular infantry were trained to fire around 15 aimed rifle shots a minute, the so-called “mad minute”, and they inflicted heavy losses. At the Nimy railway bridge, Lieutenant Maurice Dease kept his machine guns firing despite repeated wounds and died; Private Sidney Godley covered the retreat of his comrades alone until he was captured. Both received the Victoria Cross, the first of the war, and Royal Engineers who tried to demolish the canal bridges under fire earned two more.

By afternoon the Germans had crossed the canal at several points and outflanked the salient. The British fell back to a second line south of Mons. That evening, learning that the French Fifth Army on their right was retreating after the Battle of Charleroi, Sir John French ordered a general withdrawal. The Fifth Army under General Charles Lanrezac had been fighting at Charleroi since 21 August and pulled back without close coordination with the British, leaving their right flank exposed.

British casualties for the day were about 1,600 killed, wounded and missing. German losses are less certain, with estimates ranging from a few thousand to around 5,000, but German accounts confirm that several regiments suffered heavily at the canal crossings.

The Great Retreat

The retreat from Mons lasted about two weeks and covered roughly 250 to 320 km, ending south of the Marne in early September. Exhausted men marched in summer heat, often with little sleep. On 26 August Smith-Dorrien’s II Corps stood and fought at Le Cateau, suffering about 7,800 casualties but checking the German pursuit. The retreat ended when the Allies turned to fight the First Battle of the Marne.

Myths and facts

The Angels of Mons. On 29 September 1914 the Welsh writer Arthur Machen published a short story, “The Bowmen”, in the London Evening News, in which ghostly archers from Agincourt save British soldiers. Over the following months it was retold as fact, with angels replacing the bowmen. Machen repeatedly stated that it was invented, and no contemporary account from the battle supports it.

The “contemptible little army”. Veterans of 1914 proudly called themselves the Old Contemptibles, after an order supposedly issued by the Kaiser describing the BEF as contemptible. Historians have found no evidence that such an order was given; it appears to have been invented or distorted by British propaganda.

The rifle fire. Germans are often said to have mistaken British rifle fire for machine guns. Some German accounts do describe very heavy fire, but this claim has been exaggerated in popular memory.

Timeline

• 1914, 21 August: Private John Parr is killed near Mons, one of the first British soldiers to die in the war.
• 1914, 22 August: British and German cavalry clash at Casteau.
• 1914, 23 August: the Battle of Mons; the British withdraw that night.
• 1914, 26 August: the Battle of Le Cateau.
• 1914, 5 September: the Great Retreat ends south of the Marne.
• 1918, 11 November: Canadian troops enter Mons on the day of the armistice.

Legacy

The war ended for Britain where it had begun. Canadian troops liberated Mons on the morning of the Armistice of 11 November 1918. The St Symphorien Military Cemetery near Mons holds the graves of John Parr and of George Ellison, believed to be the last British soldier killed in action, on 11 November 1918, as well as German soldiers who fell in 1914.

Why it matters

Mons was a small battle by First World War standards, but it was the British Army’s first major battle in western Europe since Waterloo in 1815, fought only about 50 km away. It slowed the German advance, began the retreat that led to the Marne, and gave rise to some of the most enduring legends of the war.