Haig managed to hit the Germans hard and as expected lost the lives of many men, but he did say, “The nation must be taught to bear losses.” Source C is the complete opposites of B; it is the experience of a private that actually fought in the battle. He says that hundreds of dead soldiers were “…strung out on the barbed wire…” This gives us the view of someone who was actually part of the terror – he was not up to 50 miles away as Haig was most of the time. This person stoop up and told the world what the Somme was really like, he says that many wondered how Haig could even imagine that Tommie’s would get through the barbed wire. So far we have a balanced argument, we have the view of a private and the General (Haig) to consider, but we still can’t make a decision on whether Haig was an uncaring General.
Source D is a still from Blackadder, a program made in 1988, but the people who directed it still held some resentment towards Haig. Many people would have wanted to get revenge on Haig for what he had done for so little land. So the extract shows the officer being surprised at Haig wanting to make another attack, and then he realizes that it might all be down to wanting to “…move his drinks cabinet six inches closer to Berlin.”
Source E is written only a year after the battle, it is showing the views of soldiers before they were sent to the front line. When studying world war one, most people are shocked to find that the Generals were often 50 miles away from the front line and this is exactly what the cartoon is trying to show, it shows us that because Haig is to far away it could mean that he doesn’t care about his solders and army, all he wants to do is gain as much land as possible and make it look as if the attack was going well so that he can keep his job.
Moving on to source F, we look at an extract from a book called, “British Butchers and Bunglers of World Wars”, this means that whoever wrote the book was probably against Haig and though he was a butcher or he might even had liked Haig, but thought he was a good source to put into a book like that because Haig had so many people against him and so many things that people good criticize him for.
The next source (source G) is a good source to have because it comes straight from the Germans themselves. This is good because they knew what went on with their troops after the battle so that we don’t have to guess. As I have mentioned before, one of the top objectives for Haig was to break German morale, and according to this source he did just that. “The confidence of the German troops in victory was no longer as great as before.”
Source H is again a very reliable source, it is an extract written by a British soldier who fought in both the World Wars and could therefore decipher which had the better tactics. He believes that Haig had the great courage to “…shoulder the main burden of the struggle in the Somme battles of 1916,” and that if he hadn’t then the French resistance would have crumbles and put them out of the war. If the French were put out of the war then the Allies too would have eventually lost the war, as Germany would occupy most of France – leaving them in a far superior position. This source, therefore gains more favour for Haig not being the butcher of the Somme. Source I is Lloyd George (secretary for War) writing to Haig on September 1916. I believe that Lloyd George was influenced to write good things because had his letter been bad and was intercepted by the press, British morale could have been destroyed.
I believe source J is evidence towards my beliefs because in Lloyd Georges War Memoirs, (wrote in 1930 after the war) he talks about his disbelief in Haig. I think that at the time he did not have the courage to stand up and admit he was wrong in appointing Haig. He also comments that he only feels that the Somme saved the Allies because the Germans had the stupidity to quarrel with the Americans and bring them into the war.
In conclusion to my essay I feel there are both points for and against Haig being the “butcher of the Somme” Haig’s aims were to reduce German morale and raise British morale, to break out of the trenches, relieve pressure on the French at Verdun and most of all try and bring the war to an end. Well what he did was kill many of Germany’s most experienced soldiers meaning that the German morale was disturbed, because of this the British felt they had a better chance of winning now thus meaning a morale boost. As for relieving pressure on the French, this was probably Haig’s biggest achievement because had he not done this then the Germans would have taken over Verdun and then most of France – leading to a 90% chance of the Allies in with a running chance of winning and he also weakened the Germans. My personal view is that Haig led to the winning of the war and that he was not butcher of but there will always be people who will disagree, but the question we are left with that no one can answer is :-
Did, what Haig achieve warrant the death of so many Allied troops?
