The Learning Curve: The 46th North Midland Division on the Western Front
Andrew Syk investigates whether one British army division truly comprised ‘lions led by donkeys’, or whether its officers learned the lessons of their early mistakes.
On a misty Sunday morning in September 1918, the 46th (North Midland) Division achieved its finest feat of the war, an achievement described by the military historian John Terraine as one of the greatest in the whole history of the British Army. It successfully crossed the St Quentin Canal and breached the Hindenburg Line, the last major German defensive work on the Western Front. It was not a fluke. This tactical superiority over the German army was the consequence of hard-learned lessons during the preceding four years.
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