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Elegy: The First Day on the Somme
The New York Times-bestselling author of Napeoleon: A Life and The Storm of War tells the shattering story of the blackest day in the history of British army: the first day of the Somme Offensive, July 1, 1916
On July 1, 1916, after a five-day bombardment, 11 British and five French divisions launched their long-awaited "Big Push" on German positions on high ground above the Rivers Ancre and Somme on the Western Front. Some ground was gained, but at a terrible cost. In killing-grounds whose names are indelibly imprinted on 20th-century memory, German machine-guns—manned by troops who had sat out the storm of shellfire in deep dugouts—inflicted terrible losses on the British infantry. The British Fourth Army lost 57,470 casualties, the French Sixth Army suffered 1,590 casualties, and the German 2nd Army 10,000. And this was but the prelude to 141 days of slaughter that would witness the deaths of between 750,000 and 1 million troops. Andrew Roberts evokes the pity and the horror of the blackest day in the history of the British army—a summer’s day turned hell on earth by modern military technology—in the words of casualties, survivors, and the bereaved.
On July 1, 1916, after a five-day bombardment, 11 British and five French divisions launched their long-awaited "Big Push" on German positions on high ground above the Rivers Ancre and Somme on the Western Front. Some ground was gained, but at a terrible cost. In killing-grounds whose names are indelibly imprinted on 20th-century memory, German machine-guns—manned by troops who had sat out the storm of shellfire in deep dugouts—inflicted terrible losses on the British infantry. The British Fourth Army lost 57,470 casualties, the French Sixth Army suffered 1,590 casualties, and the German 2nd Army 10,000. And this was but the prelude to 141 days of slaughter that would witness the deaths of between 750,000 and 1 million troops. Andrew Roberts evokes the pity and the horror of the blackest day in the history of the British army—a summer’s day turned hell on earth by modern military technology—in the words of casualties, survivors, and the bereaved.
320 pages, Hardcover
First published October 15, 2015
About the author
Andrew Roberts
85 books1,534 followersDr Andrew Roberts, who was born in 1963, took a first class honours degree in Modern History at Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge, from where he is an honorary senior scholar and a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD). He has written or edited twelve books, and appears regularly on radio and television around the world. Based in New York, he is an accomplished public speaker, and is represented by HarperCollins Speakers’ Bureau (See Speaking Engagements and Speaking Testimonials). He has recently lectured at Yale, Princeton and Stanford Universities and at the US Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
February 21, 2016
Elegy – Haunting History
Andrew Roberts is one of the best military historians of the moment, award winning, and not afraid to tackle tough subjects with honesty and clarity. Elegy is a look at one of the most written about battles in the First World War, the Battle of the Somme, a battle that was supposed to relieve the pressure on the French at Verdun. Instead tens of thousands were killed on the first day with many more following over the following months during the Battle.
Roberts starts his history of the battle with an interesting description of how the Newfoundlanders faired on day one with no support but had to go forward following orders. Roberts uses letters and diaries of the men to describe the three month period from when the Battle began until its end in November 1916.
Elegy evokes the horrors of the first day of the needless slaughter as men after man were mown down by machine gun fire. So little was gained on that day and the targets each battalion had were not achieved, in fact some not until the end of the battle.
This book has clearly been written at speed and there are some errors, and the sources that Roberts’s uses are British, but then again he is telling the story that is deep in the British psyche of military disasters. What this short book does give is the bleakest of pictures about the battle there is no romantic view of mechanised war.
There are many reasons why things went dreadfully wrong at the Battle of the Somme, such as the Allies not managing to keep secret the date and time of the ‘surprise’ attack for which the Germans were able to prepare themselves in advance and dig themselves in well. That many of the British Artillery shells were duds and therefore had no impact whatsoever on the German front line, the British soldier also had to carry a 66lb of equipment most of which was unnecessary. Also the intelligence on German numbers was woeful and underestimated the actual number. All of whom were dug in safely as the bombardment took place.
The Somme will always remain deep in the British psyche especially at the wastefulness of and tragedy of World War 1. This is a short book, readable for those who want to know more, but there are many excellent books on this Battle that are better.
Andrew Roberts is one of the best military historians of the moment, award winning, and not afraid to tackle tough subjects with honesty and clarity. Elegy is a look at one of the most written about battles in the First World War, the Battle of the Somme, a battle that was supposed to relieve the pressure on the French at Verdun. Instead tens of thousands were killed on the first day with many more following over the following months during the Battle.
Roberts starts his history of the battle with an interesting description of how the Newfoundlanders faired on day one with no support but had to go forward following orders. Roberts uses letters and diaries of the men to describe the three month period from when the Battle began until its end in November 1916.
Elegy evokes the horrors of the first day of the needless slaughter as men after man were mown down by machine gun fire. So little was gained on that day and the targets each battalion had were not achieved, in fact some not until the end of the battle.
This book has clearly been written at speed and there are some errors, and the sources that Roberts’s uses are British, but then again he is telling the story that is deep in the British psyche of military disasters. What this short book does give is the bleakest of pictures about the battle there is no romantic view of mechanised war.
There are many reasons why things went dreadfully wrong at the Battle of the Somme, such as the Allies not managing to keep secret the date and time of the ‘surprise’ attack for which the Germans were able to prepare themselves in advance and dig themselves in well. That many of the British Artillery shells were duds and therefore had no impact whatsoever on the German front line, the British soldier also had to carry a 66lb of equipment most of which was unnecessary. Also the intelligence on German numbers was woeful and underestimated the actual number. All of whom were dug in safely as the bombardment took place.
The Somme will always remain deep in the British psyche especially at the wastefulness of and tragedy of World War 1. This is a short book, readable for those who want to know more, but there are many excellent books on this Battle that are better.
January 8, 2026
לסקירה מפורטת בעברית ואנגלית, קישור לבלוג שלי -
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November 8, 2015
very well written, as usual. Well-researched. I saw photos and documents I had never seen before and learned information about the Somme which I am very glad my grandfather missed (he was in Salonika having left the Western Front after 2nd Ypres). Still don't think much of Haig though Andrew Roberts tries his best to defend him.
November 3, 2024
The story of the Somme. On 1st July 1916 British and French forces lauched an attack on German positions. In his book Andrew Roberts depicts the scene in dramatic detail both leading up to the assualt and its consequences of the battle - nearly a million troops being killed.
A highly readable book where Roberts evokes the pity and horror of the day - a truthful and lucid overview
A highly readable book where Roberts evokes the pity and horror of the day - a truthful and lucid overview
December 27, 2023
nearby lies pte. g.h. saltinstall, aged nineteen, of the north staffordshire regiment, son of a widowed mother from burton-on-trent, who chose the words [for his headstone]: "death divides but memory clings."
the title elegy was well-chosen for this incredibly moving work of military history.... if that sentence sounds paradoxical then it is because andrew roberts has actually done the impossible and imbued the too-often cool & anemic field of military history with true feeling, and most importantly, true generosity toward the missing and the dead. to say i was surprised is an understatement...! the book is punctuated with excerpts like the one above, where roberts, roaming the field of battle, pauses before the dozens of cemeteries littering the somme and takes a moment to describe those who are buried there. these sections are truly elegiac; they are acts of remembering fragrant with generosity, and so unexpected. it is clear that roberts actually cares about the men he is describing. too often these kinds of biographical sketches are thrown in merely for padding, or to give the reader a break from the grind of tactics and strategy; roberts would have had a perfectly readable book without them, being a writer of great talent. still he chose to return the forgotten dead to the pages of history. i know i keep using the word "generous," but it really takes a writer of generous spirit to do such a thing. i hope this book sets the precedent for future works on the somme, and on the war in general....
the title elegy was well-chosen for this incredibly moving work of military history.... if that sentence sounds paradoxical then it is because andrew roberts has actually done the impossible and imbued the too-often cool & anemic field of military history with true feeling, and most importantly, true generosity toward the missing and the dead. to say i was surprised is an understatement...! the book is punctuated with excerpts like the one above, where roberts, roaming the field of battle, pauses before the dozens of cemeteries littering the somme and takes a moment to describe those who are buried there. these sections are truly elegiac; they are acts of remembering fragrant with generosity, and so unexpected. it is clear that roberts actually cares about the men he is describing. too often these kinds of biographical sketches are thrown in merely for padding, or to give the reader a break from the grind of tactics and strategy; roberts would have had a perfectly readable book without them, being a writer of great talent. still he chose to return the forgotten dead to the pages of history. i know i keep using the word "generous," but it really takes a writer of generous spirit to do such a thing. i hope this book sets the precedent for future works on the somme, and on the war in general....
March 2, 2023
July 1st, 1916 is one of those landmarks in military history that still takes your breath away. After an intense one-week bombardment that saw British and French artillery hurl over 1.6 million shells towards the German positions embedded in the flat Picardy region of northern France, British forces rose from their trenches at 7:30 AM on that fateful summer day and marched toward the German lines. They expected a walk-over; what they got was a bloodbath. The serried British ranks were mowed down by German machine gun fire up and down the 18 mile front; subsequent waves of attack were similarly stopped by an onslaught of German bullets. The largest artillery bombardment in military history made hardly a dent on the German defenses, fortified by deep dugouts that were sometimes 60 feet underground. By day's end, over 19,000 British soldiers were killed, 57,000 wounded. It was (and still is) the deadliest day in the history of the British army: almost equal to the British death tolls in the multi-year Crimean and Boer Wars. If there was ever a day that marked the futility of war, and this war in particular, it would be the first day of the Somme battle. Our most popular stereotypes of the Great War largely result from this encounter: brave soldiers marching to their certain deaths because of the stupid plans of stupid generals.
Andrew Roberts is here to destroy these myths. This brief account of Day One on the Somme provides a thorough and readable overview of the battle's first day while offering a counterbalance to the conventional narrative that still dominates discussions about the Somme. He's particularly keen to situate the offensive in the broader strategic and military context as well as describe the attack's meticulous preparation, which takes up roughly half the book.
Roberts stresses that the Somme battle was merely one part of a general Allied plan, hatched in December 1915, for simultaneous offensives along the entire front of the Central Powers to wear them down and prevent a transfer of forces from one front to another. The British were to conduct a great offensive in the Picardy region just north of the Somme river alongside the French, in conjunction with an Italian attack on the Austrians and a Russian offensive against the Germans and Austrians, all generally timed for the summer of 1916. The German attack on Verdun in February 1916, with its consequent drain on French forces, only made the British attack more imperative.
The initial plan of attack called for a 5-day artillery bombardment (later lengthened to a week because of heavy rain), followed by an infantry assault along an 18-mile front that merely intended to capture the front-line trenches while holding on for the counterattack. It was essentially an attrition strategy. The British commander-in-chief, Douglas Haig, thought this plan was too cautious and rewrote it to enable a major breakthrough of the front. Most crucially, the new plan called for the shelling of the German second and third-line trenches, yet despite the awesome amount of artillery power at the British disposal, this had the effect of dispersing the artillery fire over too wide an area. Confidence in the artillery bombardment's effectiveness and lack thereof in the troops' fighting quality led to tactical clumsiness during the attack: troops were instructed to march in lines rather than in small groups while being forced to carry 66 pounds of equipment, most of it for rebuilding the destroyed trenches they expected to easily capture.
The attack was to be made on arguably Germany's strongest defenses on the Western front. Since the Picardy region had been under German control since fall 1914 and had not seen serious fighting since those days, they were able to build immense and impressive fortifications: dugouts dozens of feet below ground, deep layers of barbed wire, and machine-gun posts on the high ground in the area (the Germans occupied most of it). Roberts points out that the French, who were the senior partners on the Western Front, insisted on the Somme as the point of attack because the British and French lines met in this region and because its relatively flat terrain offered the best chance of a breakthrough. The British simply had to attack and attack here, whether they liked it or not.
With this introductory run-up out the way, Roberts concisely and movingly narrates the first day's fighting. Up and down the line at zero-hour, the British advanced on the German positions at a brisk walking pace, expecting to face little-to-no resistance. The Germans could scarcely believe what they were witnessing and opened up with murderous machine-gun fire. The British found themselves trapped in no-man's-land: not only did the artillery kill few Germans, it even failed to destroy the barbed wired in front of them. Indeed, a good number of the shells simply failed to explode. Roberts manages to weave in a slew of harrowing accounts of that terrifying experience. He notes the remarkable case of the Scottish bagpiper who went over the top and played his tunes in the hailstorm of bullets without getting hit; whether the Germans refused to shoot at him because they were so impressed by the bravery is unknowable. He also highlights the tragic fate of one regiment, the Newfoundlanders, who suffered a nearly 90% casualty rate on that first day.
Yet he concludes that the opening attack, however bitter, was a learning experience that paved the way to victory. The Somme battle led to a revamping of tactics - no more line-to-line assaults, better coordination of artillery and infantry, attacks at dawn rather than in broad daylight - that bore fruit in future offensives. The battle also chewed up 600,000 Germans while convincing the German high command to abandon attrition warfare and go-for-broke by unleashing the submarines against Britain, a fateful move that dragged the US into the war in 1917 and ultimately sealed Germany's fate. I'm always reluctant to play armchair strategist since I've never worn a military uniform and don't remotely claim expertise in military matters, but I think there's enough in here to dispel at least some of the myths about this battle.
Andrew Roberts is here to destroy these myths. This brief account of Day One on the Somme provides a thorough and readable overview of the battle's first day while offering a counterbalance to the conventional narrative that still dominates discussions about the Somme. He's particularly keen to situate the offensive in the broader strategic and military context as well as describe the attack's meticulous preparation, which takes up roughly half the book.
Roberts stresses that the Somme battle was merely one part of a general Allied plan, hatched in December 1915, for simultaneous offensives along the entire front of the Central Powers to wear them down and prevent a transfer of forces from one front to another. The British were to conduct a great offensive in the Picardy region just north of the Somme river alongside the French, in conjunction with an Italian attack on the Austrians and a Russian offensive against the Germans and Austrians, all generally timed for the summer of 1916. The German attack on Verdun in February 1916, with its consequent drain on French forces, only made the British attack more imperative.
The initial plan of attack called for a 5-day artillery bombardment (later lengthened to a week because of heavy rain), followed by an infantry assault along an 18-mile front that merely intended to capture the front-line trenches while holding on for the counterattack. It was essentially an attrition strategy. The British commander-in-chief, Douglas Haig, thought this plan was too cautious and rewrote it to enable a major breakthrough of the front. Most crucially, the new plan called for the shelling of the German second and third-line trenches, yet despite the awesome amount of artillery power at the British disposal, this had the effect of dispersing the artillery fire over too wide an area. Confidence in the artillery bombardment's effectiveness and lack thereof in the troops' fighting quality led to tactical clumsiness during the attack: troops were instructed to march in lines rather than in small groups while being forced to carry 66 pounds of equipment, most of it for rebuilding the destroyed trenches they expected to easily capture.
The attack was to be made on arguably Germany's strongest defenses on the Western front. Since the Picardy region had been under German control since fall 1914 and had not seen serious fighting since those days, they were able to build immense and impressive fortifications: dugouts dozens of feet below ground, deep layers of barbed wire, and machine-gun posts on the high ground in the area (the Germans occupied most of it). Roberts points out that the French, who were the senior partners on the Western Front, insisted on the Somme as the point of attack because the British and French lines met in this region and because its relatively flat terrain offered the best chance of a breakthrough. The British simply had to attack and attack here, whether they liked it or not.
With this introductory run-up out the way, Roberts concisely and movingly narrates the first day's fighting. Up and down the line at zero-hour, the British advanced on the German positions at a brisk walking pace, expecting to face little-to-no resistance. The Germans could scarcely believe what they were witnessing and opened up with murderous machine-gun fire. The British found themselves trapped in no-man's-land: not only did the artillery kill few Germans, it even failed to destroy the barbed wired in front of them. Indeed, a good number of the shells simply failed to explode. Roberts manages to weave in a slew of harrowing accounts of that terrifying experience. He notes the remarkable case of the Scottish bagpiper who went over the top and played his tunes in the hailstorm of bullets without getting hit; whether the Germans refused to shoot at him because they were so impressed by the bravery is unknowable. He also highlights the tragic fate of one regiment, the Newfoundlanders, who suffered a nearly 90% casualty rate on that first day.
Yet he concludes that the opening attack, however bitter, was a learning experience that paved the way to victory. The Somme battle led to a revamping of tactics - no more line-to-line assaults, better coordination of artillery and infantry, attacks at dawn rather than in broad daylight - that bore fruit in future offensives. The battle also chewed up 600,000 Germans while convincing the German high command to abandon attrition warfare and go-for-broke by unleashing the submarines against Britain, a fateful move that dragged the US into the war in 1917 and ultimately sealed Germany's fate. I'm always reluctant to play armchair strategist since I've never worn a military uniform and don't remotely claim expertise in military matters, but I think there's enough in here to dispel at least some of the myths about this battle.
February 11, 2018
A dry read, lacking in much sense of prose. Perhaps it needs to be. The goal was a true, honest and fair accounting of the slaughter. Roberts could still have made it more readable. I'm reading Harris' 'Covenant with Death' next, which has been described as the best description of the Somme.
I'm left to ponder: Do Germans understand their history? Are kids taught the reality of what their leaders did to the world? Do the Chinese, Cambodians, Japanese, Sudanese, Russians, etc., etc. understand what their leaders did to the world? Do these nations know enough history to prevent it from ever happening again? Or is this degree of slaughter of the innocent too much to comprehend, requiring a widespread cognitive dissonance and the invention of a fake national history ?
I'm left to ponder: Do Germans understand their history? Are kids taught the reality of what their leaders did to the world? Do the Chinese, Cambodians, Japanese, Sudanese, Russians, etc., etc. understand what their leaders did to the world? Do these nations know enough history to prevent it from ever happening again? Or is this degree of slaughter of the innocent too much to comprehend, requiring a widespread cognitive dissonance and the invention of a fake national history ?
December 21, 2015
An excellent light history of the British Army on the first day of the Somme, when the British suffered in the ballpark of 60,000 dead and wounded. You learn some of the minutiae like why the attack was a disaster, possible dud munitions.....but also it does an excellent job of telling the story of the troops. Highly recommended
June 18, 2016
Roberts' has done a fantastic job of charting the history of one of history's bloodiest and costly battles. A fantastic book that is all too brief, yet brilliantly tells the story of those brave and courageous men who gave their lives for us. A moving and emotional read but one that everyone should be reading as we approach the 100th year anniversary of the Battle of the Somme.
May 18, 2016
Not the best book by Andrew Roberts but nevertheless an interesting read about Britjains biggest single loss of casualties bin one day of war.
May 18, 2016
A good, thought-provoking read, but it did not provide any new insights. It depended a lot on secondary sources. Nevertheless it was quite readable.
August 19, 2021
Even for people of my generation The Battle of the Somme resounds with great significance. In my case it is because one of my grandfathers fought in it and won the Military Medal: I am so grateful that he survived, holed up in a shell crater with a Lewis gun holding off a German counter attack for a day and night with all his comrades around him dead. For those who lived through the times it was devastating.
There has been, and still is, much debate around both General Douglas Haig’s decision to initiate the battle and the tactics he laid down to be used during it and this book discusses this as well as including many quotes, both Allied and German, from those who fought there. My Grand-dad just said that it was hell on earth.
Haig was stifled in what he could do by the fact that he was under the overall command of the French; General Joffre was Commander-in-Chief and he wanted Haig to act because of the desperate need of the French Army for a diversion from the disastrous fighting at Verdun. In addition, Haig, at the behest of the French, had to launch his “half trained volunteer rank-and-file, led by ill experienced officers in a premature offensive against immensely strong defences, manned by the best army in Europe”. All this with the French insisting that the attack be launched in full daylight, rather than at dawn. The result of the above was massed slaughter. Much blame can also be laid at the feet of the Intelligence Officers who, before the battle, had grossly underestimated the German strength and, during the battle, gave excessively optimistic reports on how the battle was going. Intelligence also seemed unaware of just how deep and well constructed the German defences were: the week long artillery barrage had done little damage to either the trenches, dug-outs or the fields of barbed wire.
Of the 120,00 plus troops who went over the top on the first day 57, 471 were casualties. 993 Officers and 18, 247 other ranks were killed outright.
The book is about just the first day of The Battle of the Somme, which was on 01 July 1916, but the fighting went on till 18 November 1916, when the Germans retired to a new, and better, defensive line. From start to finish the British casualty list, at the Battle of the Somme, was 419,655.
Although a text book, this is an easy, though disturbing, read. The author mentions, and even quotes, from a novel “Covenant with Death” by John Harris (which I have on the recommendation of Grand-dad Bunce). Why? Well Harris had a father and father-in-law who fought in the battle and survived without injury, a brother-in-law and uncle who were gassed (as was my grand-dad), two uncles who lost legs, with a fourth killed. I recommend you buy and read both books.
The Somme did have some positives: it forced the Germans to pull troops away from Verdun; it convinced the Germans that the Western Front could only be a defensive war; it compelled the British to change their battle tactics to ones that were less costly in lives. But at what cost?
There has been, and still is, much debate around both General Douglas Haig’s decision to initiate the battle and the tactics he laid down to be used during it and this book discusses this as well as including many quotes, both Allied and German, from those who fought there. My Grand-dad just said that it was hell on earth.
Haig was stifled in what he could do by the fact that he was under the overall command of the French; General Joffre was Commander-in-Chief and he wanted Haig to act because of the desperate need of the French Army for a diversion from the disastrous fighting at Verdun. In addition, Haig, at the behest of the French, had to launch his “half trained volunteer rank-and-file, led by ill experienced officers in a premature offensive against immensely strong defences, manned by the best army in Europe”. All this with the French insisting that the attack be launched in full daylight, rather than at dawn. The result of the above was massed slaughter. Much blame can also be laid at the feet of the Intelligence Officers who, before the battle, had grossly underestimated the German strength and, during the battle, gave excessively optimistic reports on how the battle was going. Intelligence also seemed unaware of just how deep and well constructed the German defences were: the week long artillery barrage had done little damage to either the trenches, dug-outs or the fields of barbed wire.
Of the 120,00 plus troops who went over the top on the first day 57, 471 were casualties. 993 Officers and 18, 247 other ranks were killed outright.
The book is about just the first day of The Battle of the Somme, which was on 01 July 1916, but the fighting went on till 18 November 1916, when the Germans retired to a new, and better, defensive line. From start to finish the British casualty list, at the Battle of the Somme, was 419,655.
Although a text book, this is an easy, though disturbing, read. The author mentions, and even quotes, from a novel “Covenant with Death” by John Harris (which I have on the recommendation of Grand-dad Bunce). Why? Well Harris had a father and father-in-law who fought in the battle and survived without injury, a brother-in-law and uncle who were gassed (as was my grand-dad), two uncles who lost legs, with a fourth killed. I recommend you buy and read both books.
The Somme did have some positives: it forced the Germans to pull troops away from Verdun; it convinced the Germans that the Western Front could only be a defensive war; it compelled the British to change their battle tactics to ones that were less costly in lives. But at what cost?
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July 22, 2019Read for my History of Europe in the 20th Century class.
April 16, 2022
Excellent read
It really dives down into the horrors of this war
If you like wwi then you’ll appreciate this work
It really dives down into the horrors of this war
If you like wwi then you’ll appreciate this work
July 23, 2016
An examination of the first day of the Somme
The Battle of the Somme was fought over the summer and fall of 1916. The British, who moved up their plans to preclude a collapse of the French Army at Verdun, suffered nearly 60,000 casualties on the first day, July 1, 1916. This book looks at the events of that day and its consequences. While the author rightly focuses on the human costs associated with the battle, especially since they were worsened due to poorly evolved tactics at this time. However, Roberts also points out that the lessons learned from this battle stood the British Army in good stead for the rest of the war and eventually ensured victory.
The Battle of the Somme was fought over the summer and fall of 1916. The British, who moved up their plans to preclude a collapse of the French Army at Verdun, suffered nearly 60,000 casualties on the first day, July 1, 1916. This book looks at the events of that day and its consequences. While the author rightly focuses on the human costs associated with the battle, especially since they were worsened due to poorly evolved tactics at this time. However, Roberts also points out that the lessons learned from this battle stood the British Army in good stead for the rest of the war and eventually ensured victory.
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews