The Great War (All 8 Volumes). Various Authors
to have taken, and what was foreseen during the whole course of the war.
It was on September 4, 1914, in the morning, that the observations made by the French cavalry, as well as by British aviators and those of the army of Manoury and the military government of Paris, made it clear that the German right (Von Kluck's army) was bending its march toward the southeast in the direction of Meaux and Coulommiers, leaving behind it the road to Paris.
At this moment the Fifth French Army of the left was ready to meet the German forces in a frontal attack, and it was flanked toward the northwest by the British army and by General Manoury's army to the northeast of the capital.
The disposition of forces aimed at in General Joffre's order of August 25 was thus accomplished; the French escaped the turning movement, and they were in a position to counter with an enveloping movement themselves. The wings of the French forces found support in their maneuvering in their contact with the strongholds of Paris and Verdun. Immediately the commander in chief decided to attack, and issued on the evening of September 4 the series of general orders, which announced the big offensive and eventually turned the tide of battle.
CHAPTER XV
GERMAN RETREAT
That morning of the 8th, then, saw General von Kluck in full retreat. His frontal attack on General d'Espérey had failed and the Fifth French Army had advanced. The British were at his flank, and besides, they had been able to spare some of their heavy artillery to send to the Sixth Army under General Maunoury, to enable him to cross the Ourcq. It is by no means certain that even with this assistance could the Sixth Army have silenced the terrible fire of those howitzers, but General von Kluck dared no longer leave his artillery there, it must be taken with him on his retreat, or become valuable booty. Leaving a few batteries to guard the crossings of the river, the Ourcq division of the German right retreated in good order, to rejoin their comrades who had been so unexpectedly mauled by the British. The honor of this day was, curiously, not to the victorious, but to the defeated army. Had General von Kluck done nothing other than conduct his army in retreat as he did, he would have shown himself an able commander. Sir John French and General d'Espérey followed up their advantage. The artillery fire of the British was good and in a running fight, such as this retreat, the light field artillery of the French did terrible execution. The brunt of the British fighting was at La Trétoire. General d'Espérey fought steadily forward all day, driving the retreating army as closely as he could, but proceeding warily because of General von Kluck's powerful counterattacks. The fighting was continuous from the first break of daylight until after dusk had fallen, and it was in the twilight that the French Army at last carried Montmirail on the Petit Morin, a feat of strategic value, since it exposed the right flank of Von Bülow's army, exposed by the retreat of General von Kluck.
From this review of the forced retirement of General von Kluck, it will be seen that the German right was compelled to sustain an attack at three points, from the Sixth French Army on the banks of the Ourcq, from the British army in the region of Coulommiers and from the Fifth French Army near Courtaçon. Each of these attacks was of a widely different character. The result of this attack has been shown in the summary of the three days (four days on the Ourcq) which resulted in the British capture of Coulommiers and in the French capture of Montmirail. This was General Joffre's counteroffensive, and it developed in detail almost exactly along the lines that he had laid down.
The scene of the fighting across the west bank of the Ourcq was that of a wide-open country, gently undulating, dotted with comfortable farmhouses, and made up of a mosaic of green meadow lands and the stubble of grain fields. The German heavy guns came into action as soon as the French offensive developed. Tremendous detonations that shook the earth, and which were followed by sluggish clouds of an oily smoke showed where the high-explosive shells had struck. Already, by the evening of the first day's fighting, there were blazing haystacks and farmhouses to be seen, and the happy and smiling plain showed scarred and rent with the mangling hand of war. On the 6th, a sugar refinery, which had been held as an outpost by a force of 1,800 Germans, was set on fire by a French battery. The infantry had been successful in getting to within close range and as the invaders sought to escape from the burning building, they were picked off one by one by the French marksmen. The French infantry, well intrenched, suffered scarcely any loss. It was in brilliant sunshine that the fire broke out, and the conflagration was so fierce that the empty building sent up little smoke. The flames scarcely showed in the bright light, and to the onlooker, it seemed as if some rapid leprous disease was eating up the building. The situation was horrible for the Germans, either to be trapped and to perish in the flames, or to face the withering French infantry fire without any opportunity to fight back. Less than 300 of the occupants of the refinery won clear.
Wherever the forces met, the slaughter was great and terrible. In the excitement and the eagerness of the first offensive, the French seemed to have forgotten the lessons of prudence that the long retreat should have ingrained into their memory, and they sought to take every village that was occupied by the Germans with a rush. The loss of life was greatest at a point four miles east of Meaux. There, on a sharp, tree-covered ridge, the Germans had intrenched, and gun platforms had been placed under the screen of the trees. An almost incessant hail of shrapnel fell on these lines, and the French infantry charges were repulsed again and again, with but little loss on the German line. But, meantime, village after village had been attacked by the French and carried with the bayonet, and on Sunday, September 6th, 1914, that part of the battles of the Marne which dealt with the driving back of the Germans to the line of the Ourcq, was in some of its feature like a hand-to-hand conflict of ages long gone by. Yet, overhead aeroplanes circled, on every side shells were bursting, the heavy smell of blood on a hot day mingled with the explosive fumes, but the Zouaves and the Turcos fought without ceasing and with a force and spirit that went far to win for the French the cheering news that village after village had been freed of the invaders.
When the night of that Sunday fell, however, on the line of the Ourcq, the balm of darkness seemed to be almost as much a forgotten thing as the blessedness of silence. There was no darkness that night. As the Germans evacuated each village they set fire to it. The invaders actually held their machine guns at work in the burning village until the position was no longer tenable. The wind blew gustily that night, and all the hours long, the Germans collected their dead, built great pyres of wood and straw and cremated their comrades who had fallen on the field of battle.
The next day, at this point, developed fighting of the same general character. One of the most heroic defenses of General von Kluck's army was that of the Magdeburg Regiment, which held its advanced post ten minutes too long and consequently was practically annihilated. Although the French had everywhere shown themselves superior with the bayonet and at close infighting, even as the Germans had displayed an incredible courage in advance under gunfire, and rightly held their heavy artillery to be the finest in the world, in the mêlée around the colors of the Magdeburg Regiment, there was nothing to choose for either side. The lieutenant color bearer was killed, in the midst of a ring of dead, and not until almost the whole regiment had been killed under the impact of far superior numbers, were the tattered colors taken into the French lines. It was on this day, Tuesday, September 8, 1914, that the British army realizing that it had turned the flank of General von Kluck's southern divisions sent its heavy batteries to the pressure on the banks of the Ourcq.
A graphic picture of the artillery side of the fighting on the Ourcq was given by one of the artillery officers detached from the British force.
"Meaux was still a town of blank shutters and empty streets when we got there this morning," he wrote, "but the French sappers had thrown a plank gangway across the gap in the ruined old bridge, built in AD 800, that had survived all the wars of France, only to perish at last in this one.
"Smack, smack, smack, smack go the French guns; and then, a few seconds later, four white mushrooms of smoke spring up over the far woods and slowly the pop, pop, pop, pop, of the distant explosions comes back to you. But now it is the German gunners' turn. Bang! go his guns, two miles away; there is a moment of eerie and uncomfortable silence—uncomfortable because there