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GENERAL JOFFRE 
 AND HIS BATTLES 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 AND HIS BATTLES 
 
 BY 
 
 RAYMOND RECOULY 
 
 (CAPTAIN X) 
 
 WITH PORTRAIT AND MAPS 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 
 1916 
 
:K3 
 
 COPTRIGHT, 1916, BT 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 
 PubUshed October, 1916 
 
 OCT 25 1916 
 
 ©CU446079 
 
 1/1 ^ / 
 
PREFATORY NOTE 
 
 The writer of the following pages is one 
 of the many talented and devoted young 
 Frenchmen who, loving life, now hold it 
 lightly compared to their love of France. It 
 has been Captain Recouly's good fortune to 
 have a share in much of the fighting, while 
 his position on the General Staff has brought 
 him into close relation with the men by 
 whom the fighting is planned. Readers of 
 Scribnefs Magazine during the past year 
 know him as **Captain X,'' and may be glad 
 to have his articles collected in a permanent 
 form. He also kept a journal while in the 
 field during 1915, which was published as 
 "La Bataille dans la For^t," under the pen- 
 name of "Jean Lery." Part of this was used 
 
PREFATORY NOTE 
 
 in his articles; the rest is here translated for 
 the first time. As his work was necessarily 
 done under difficult conditions, and not con- 
 secutively, occasional overlappings and repe- 
 titions may be found, but it has been thought 
 that too much editing would take away from 
 its freshness and simplicity. 
 
 VI 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. General Joffre : The Victor of the Marne 3 
 
 II. The French Offensive in Champagne . . 67 
 
 III. Two Collaborators of General Joffre — 
 
 General de Castelnau and General 
 
 FocH 112 
 
 IV. Journal of the Author 152 
 
 V. The Battle of Verdun 235 
 
MAPS 
 
 FACING 
 PAGE, 
 
 The battle of the Marne — position of the armies, 
 
 September 5th and September loth, 1914 ... 22 
 
 Position of German trenches and the progress of the 
 
 French offensive 76 
 
 The formidable series of German fortifications and 
 
 trenches known as "The Hand of Massiges" . . 102 
 
 Verdun and the surrounding region 254 
 
 Relief map of Le Mort-Homme and the hills north of 
 
 Verdun 272 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE AND HIS BATTLES 
 
General Joffre and His Battles 
 
 I 
 
 GENERAL JOFFRE: THE VICTOR OF 
 THE MARNE 
 
 TT was in the early days of September, 
 -I 1914, those stirring and crowded days 
 that preceded the great battle of the Mame. 
 My division, retreating from Belgian Luxem- 
 burg by way of Mezieres and Rethel, had 
 just reached Vitry-les-Reims, some five miles 
 north of Rheims. 
 
 "This," I said to myself, "marks the end 
 of our retreat. The Rheims forts, old as 
 they are, will give us a fairly good base; and 
 protected by them we shall give battle and 
 win/' 
 
 Notwithstanding our steady retirement, 
 nothing could have been better than the 
 morale of our army. Twice already our divi- 
 sion had been pitted in serious and bloody 
 
 3 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 battle against the Saxon army of Von Hansen. 
 On each occasion, though confronted by 
 forces superior to our own, we had inflicted 
 heavy losses on the enemy and remained the 
 uncontested masters of the field. Neverthe- 
 less, after each battle the order to retreat 
 (dictated, as we well knew, by considerations 
 based on the situation along the entire front) 
 had been given two or three hours later; and 
 off we had started in the night, down the 
 dark country roads, through the sleeping vil- 
 lages, abandoning to the invader yet another 
 portion of the sacred soil of France. 
 
 "This time at least," said I to myself, "we 
 shall stand firm and keep a solid grip above 
 Rheims.*' 
 
 And now, at about eleven o'clock at night, 
 the head of the staff suddenly sent for me. 
 "We are to evacuate Rheims,*' he said, "and 
 continue our retreat. You must start at once 
 for Tauxi^res and get our staff quarters ready. 
 The division will begin to march at mid- 
 night." 
 
 4 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 I listened with a heavy heart. But there 
 is this much good in the soldier's trade, that 
 it leaves no time for discouragement. I had 
 only ten minutes in which to wake my orderly 
 and my chauffeur, to pack my belongings, 
 and be off. 
 
 It was a moonless night, but beautifully, 
 divinely clear. The air trembled with soft, 
 warm breezes. I took my place beside the 
 chauffeur to help him find the road, which 
 neither of us knew. Not a soul was stirring 
 in the streets of Rheims. In the deep silence 
 of the night not even a footfall awakened the 
 deserted squares, and there were no lights in 
 any of the houses. It was like an abandoned 
 town. In my perplexity as to the right road 
 I aimed for the cathedral, whose huge yet 
 slender mass stained the night sky with a 
 darker shadow. The lofty towers seemed al- 
 most to touch the stars, and a mysterious 
 serenity, emanating from them, enveloped 
 the ancient city. 
 
 I stopped at the door of one of the hotels 
 
 5 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 in front of the cathedral and rang the bell. 
 After a long delay the sleepy porter appeared. 
 I asked him to show me the road, and he 
 pointed it out, and then asked: "Captain, 
 are our troops falling back? Are the Ger- 
 mans coming?'' I had not the heart to lie 
 to the poor fellow after waking him up at 
 that hour. "The Germans will be here to- 
 morrow evening," I said. "But we shall 
 come back and drive them out again." 
 
 As we climbed the slope among the famous 
 vineyards, through Verzenay and Verzy, and 
 began to cross the great forest of Rheims, my 
 mind was full of dark thoughts, and of feel- 
 ings of doubt and anguish. Should we suc- 
 ceed in holding our own against this terrible 
 foe, who had prepared his campaign down to 
 the smallest details, who was spending men 
 and ammunition recklessly, hurling against us 
 ten, even a dozen, times in succession the 
 close formations of his battalions, spreading 
 panic in the country by ruthlessly burning 
 every village in his path and shooting down 
 
 6 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 the harmless inhabitants? In proportion as 
 we retreated and as he advanced, his military 
 strength and his certainty of victory were 
 both bound to increase, like an avalanche 
 gathering bulk as it sweeps down the moun- 
 tainside. And as to our own soldiers, would 
 not this continuous retreat finally affect their 
 spirits and destroy the self-confidence, the 
 obstinate, invincible faith in the destinies of 
 France, which was the one condition of vic- 
 tory whenever the great battle began? 
 
 These disquieting thoughts continued to 
 haunt me as we drove on through the night. 
 But little by little, with the first approach of 
 dawn, my sombre presentiments vanished. 
 What mattered a few leagues of countryside, 
 a few villages, and even towns, temporarily 
 abandoned to the enemy? France, I saw, 
 was not a mere expanse of territory, not only 
 groups of houses or monuments of stone. 
 The France of to-day is her army, and the 
 army's spirit remains unsubdued. Never had 
 indifference to fatigue, to suffering, and even 
 
 7 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 to death, complete self-effacement, complete 
 surrender of one's self, attained a higher de- 
 gree in officers and in men. Never had the 
 flower of heroism so magnificently bloomed. 
 And the spirit of the average citizen at home 
 was the same as the soldier's. From Paris, 
 where one hears the very heart-beat of 
 France, one of our comrades had sent me the 
 day before the report of a little incident that 
 had struck me as worthy of the great tradi- 
 tions of Greece and Rome. As my friend 
 came out of the church of the Madeleine and 
 paused on the upper steps of the portico, a 
 poorly but neatly dressed little boy, not 
 more than ten years old, came up to him 
 and pushed into his hand a bit of paper on 
 which was written: "We must not despair; 
 France cannot be beaten.'' My friend ran 
 after the child and asked who had told him 
 to distribute the paper. He learned that for 
 two days and nights the boy's whole family 
 —his mother, his two sisters, and an aged 
 relative — had been steadily at work in their 
 
 8 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 poor lodgings, writing several thousands of 
 the papers which the lad was handing to 
 passers-by. 
 
 From the humblest soldier to the highest 
 chiefs the entire French army has complete, 
 imflinching faith in its commander-in-chief. 
 From the very first engagements his firm and 
 resolute hold upon the reins had inspired his 
 troops with courage and confidence. The re- 
 sult of our first encounters with the enemy 
 had not been what we had hoped. The in- 
 completeness of our organization, our lack of 
 heavy artillery, our inadequate information 
 as to the German army, all these deficiencies 
 were cruelly evident in the early battles. Nor 
 did all our generals display in the same de- 
 gree the qualities of intelligence and energy 
 required of a great military leader — for the 
 simple reason that in times of peace it is all 
 but impossible to prognosticate a general's 
 worth in war. Only the test of battle gives 
 the true measure of a general's merits. This 
 or that brilliant reputation, won during the 
 
 9 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 big manoeuvres, falls to pieces with the first 
 crack of the rifle and the bursting of the first 
 shells; while an officer on whom only slight 
 hopes have been founded may display at the 
 first test the qualities of a bom leader. 
 
 From the o^itset, whenever General Joffre 
 detected in his generals the slightest weakness 
 of character or talent, he promptly and piti- 
 lessly removed them. It mattered not if the: 
 delinquents were among his oldest comrades,, 
 his closest friends: they were at once replaced 
 by those among their subordinates who, dur- 
 ing the first battles, had established their 
 military aptitude and their general superior- 
 ity; and the entire army, by its silent verdict, 
 its mute approbation, never failed to ratify^ 
 these appointments. 
 
 One of my chiefs had seen General Joffre 
 at the general headquarters two days before 
 our retreat from Rheims. He had brought 
 back from the visit an impression of absolute 
 confidence. "I mean to deliver the big bat- 
 tle," the general had said to him, "in the 
 most favorable conditions, at my own time,, 
 
 lO 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 and on the ground I have chosen. If neces- 
 sary, I shall continue to retreat. I shall bide 
 my time. No consideration whatever will 
 make me alter my plans.'' 
 
 I recalled all this as the motor rushed along 
 through the night, and as I repeated to my- 
 self the words of the commander-in-chief, 
 glorious with their hint of hope, our retreat 
 seemed less unbearably painful. Since wait 
 we must, we would wait. 
 
 We had not to wait long. Three days 
 later, on the morning of September 5th, just 
 as we reached a point a little to the north 
 of Fere-Champenoise, a sensational order was 
 brought to us. The retreat of the French 
 armies was at an end. That very evening 
 preparations for a general attack were to be 
 made, and on the morrow the whole army, 
 from Paris to the Vosges, was to assume the 
 offensive. 
 
 The morning of the 6th of September, 
 1914, marks a capital date in the history of 
 the world. It was the beginning of the great 
 tattle of the Mame. That morning General 
 
 II 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 Joffre issued to our soldiers the great Order 
 of the Day, which was read along the entire 
 front. It reveals the unshakable confidence 
 of the chief in his soldiers, and of the soldiers 
 in their general: 
 
 "At the moment of engaging a battle on 
 which the fate of the country hangs it is 
 necessary to remind every one that the time 
 has passed for looking backward. Every 
 effort must be made to attack and to drive 
 back the enemy. The hour has come to 
 advance at any cost, and to die where you 
 stand rather than give way. In the present 
 circumstances no weakness can be tolerated." 
 
 For four days and four nights the battle 
 raged. On the evening of the fourth day 
 every one of the German armies was in full 
 retreat. At certain points the retreat had 
 turned into a rout. General Joffre and his 
 army had won the biggest victory of all time. 
 
 It is not too much to assert that a victory 
 so complete, a recovery so startling, is with- 
 
 12 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 out a parallel in military history. The only 
 analogy it suggests is that of a wrestler, al- 
 ready down, with shoulders all but touching, 
 who, leaping suddenly to his feet, takes his 
 antagonist by the throat, throws him and 
 makes him bite the dust. It is not surprising 
 that some people believed in a miracle. But 
 there are no miracles in battle. Miracles in 
 war are due, nine times out of ten, or even 
 ninety-nine times out of a hundred, to the 
 heroism of the men and the genius of their 
 chiefs. 
 
 General Jofifre plays an open game. He is 
 never afraid to show his hand. When he had 
 won the victory of the Mame he himself 
 undertook to show how he had won it. He 
 has just published the series of his "General 
 Orders'' during the days before the great 
 battle, from the 25th of August to the 6th 
 of September, 1914. These despatches are 
 official documents of indisputable authentic- 
 ity and authority. They contain the irre- 
 futable and naked truth, and they confirm 
 
 13 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 the contention that the great battle of the 
 Mame was clearly foreseen, and planned in 
 all its details, by the commander-in-chief. 
 
 The first of General Joffre's orders is dated 
 August 25th; but before dwelling on its im- 
 portance and significance it is necessary to 
 outline briefly the respective situations, at 
 that date, of the French and German armies. 
 
 The French War Office was well aware of 
 the plan of the German General Staff, which 
 consisted in making a violent attack through 
 Belgium, with the purpose of turning our left 
 flank. All our officers knew that the German 
 army would violate the neutrality of Belgium; 
 but the enveloping movement of the German 
 armies was made on a scale, and with an 
 offensive dash, that entirely exceeded our ex- 
 pectations. We had not supposed it possible 
 that the Germans, on the first day, could 
 bring their entire reserves into action. But 
 that was what they did; and the striking force 
 of their army corps was thereby more than 
 doubled. Their reserve corps were ready to 
 
 14 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 support the active army; and these reserves 
 were exactly as well trained, as well equipped, 
 and as abundantly provided with heavy ar- 
 tillery as their active force. 
 
 For years past the German Government 
 had been spending at least twenty millions 
 of marks a year to maintain, among their 
 continental neighbors, and especially in 
 France, a horde of spies who had penetrated 
 everywhere and ferreted out all the secrets 
 of our War Office. A country as peaceful 
 and republican as France has neither the 
 money nor the resources, even if it had the 
 inclination, to indulge in such extravagances 
 of espionage. The German aim was to finish 
 with France within a few weeks, in order to 
 have a free hand to deal with Russia, while 
 the latter country was still struggling with 
 the difficulties of mobilization. At the out- 
 set, therefore, the Germans left a relatively 
 small force on the Russian frontier: four 
 corps of the active army (out of twenty-five 
 and a half) and a few formations of the re- 
 
 15 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 serve. All the rest — that is to say, about 
 fifty army corps, or two million five hundred 
 thousand men — ^were thrown at once against 
 France. 
 
 France, owing to her inferior population, 
 was unable to provide so big an army to face 
 this formidable onset. The fact of this in- 
 feriority is one which cannot be too insis- 
 tently dwelt upon. The French forces, at the 
 opening of the war, must have been numer- 
 ically inferior by at least a million men; while 
 the British army, at the same date, num- 
 bered three divisions, or from seventy to 
 eighty thousand men at the most. 
 
 What, in presence of the German plan, 
 was to be the French retort? A plan based 
 on the principle of the immediate offensive 
 was held to be best suited to our national 
 temperament and the well-known dash of 
 our soldiers. Four simultaneous attacks were 
 contemplated. The first was through upper 
 Alsace toward Mulhouse; and Mulhouse was 
 captured by us, then lost, and then a third 
 
 i6 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 time retaken. But this was only a secondary 
 episode of the war. 
 
 Our second attack was through Lorraine 
 and the passes of the Vosges, in the direction 
 of Saarbourg and Saveme. After some suc- 
 cesses on this frontier our troops, in the re- 
 gion of Morhange, came upon largely superior 
 forces and very strong positions which the 
 Germans had had ample time to fortify. 
 Heavy artillery, with which the enemy was 
 abundantly provided, played an important 
 part in these early engagements. We had 
 to retire. Luneville was taken and Nancy 
 threatened by German guns. 
 
 Our third plan of attack was through Bel- 
 gian Luxemburg, and here, too, we had to 
 beat a retreat. 
 
 Finally, our army on the left wing, sup- 
 ported by the British, was to assume the 
 offensive in Belgium, and make a flanking 
 attack on the German army, while the latter 
 sought, by an enveloping movement, to cross 
 the Meuse between Liege and Namur. A 
 
 17 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 little delay in carrying out this plan threw 
 away our chance of success. The battle of 
 Charleroi, where the Anglo-French armies 
 were engaged against very large forces, was a 
 virtual defeat. Germany had pitted against 
 us the main bulk of her forces, and the 
 English and French armies were compelled 
 to begin a rapid retreat. This released Von 
 Kluck's army, which was left free to plunge 
 headlong, fifty kilometres at a stride, on its 
 march to Paris. 
 
 Such was the general situation about the 
 22d of August, 1 914; such the imminent peril 
 which General Joffre had to face. No heav- 
 ier burden, no more formidable responsibility, 
 ever weighed on human shoulders. A mo- 
 ment's discouragement, an instant's hesita- 
 tion, and France would have been lost, and 
 Europe and the rest of the world left to dis- 
 cover the meaning of such a disaster as the 
 triumph of Germany. 
 
 General Joifre did not have that moment's 
 hesitation. He showed himself the immediate 
 
 18 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 master of a situation of unparalleled danger. 
 He might have chosen to dispute with the 
 invader every inch of French territory; but 
 such a plan would have entailed the gravest 
 risks. It would have necessitated giving 
 battle at once and in the most unfavorable 
 conditions. Our army on the left, operating 
 with the British army, would not have had 
 time to pull itself together; and, given the im- 
 mense number of men that the Germans were 
 able to put into the field, our forces would 
 have been exposed to an overwhelming defeat. 
 The commander-in-chief's plan was of a 
 much higher kind. He decided squarely to 
 refuse battle both with his left wing and his 
 centre and, while withdrawing these two 
 armies, to carry out a fresh concentration of 
 his forces which should quietly shift them 
 from the east to the west. While Von Kluck 
 was rapidly pushing southward, Joffre, with 
 the object of turning his right fiank, as rapidly 
 formed a fresh army under the command of 
 General Manoury. Here is the order of the 
 
 19 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 day (dated August 25th) which embodies this 
 project: 
 
 In the region of Amiens a fresh group of 
 forces will be created by the units trans- 
 ported by rail (Seventh Corps), the Fourth 
 Division of Reserves, and perhaps another 
 active army corps, formed between the 22d 
 of August and 2d of September. 
 
 Such was the origin of the army of Ma- 
 noury, which, by menacing Von Kluck's 
 forces, played so important a part during the 
 battle of the Mame. The creation of this 
 army was entirely due to the foresight of 
 General Jofifre. 
 
 Two days later, on August 27th, the com- 
 mander-in-chief formed, at the very centre 
 of the line, another army, which he placed 
 under the command of one of our most emi- 
 nent chiefs. General Foch. The creation of 
 the Manoury army on the left, and of the 
 Foch army in the centre — these are the two 
 acts which contain in germ the victory on 
 the Mame. 
 
 20 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 It will be seen by the indisputable evidence 
 of the dates above given that ten days be- 
 fore the great battle General Joffre had made 
 all his preparations for it. The fresh shift- 
 ing of our forces, the mobilization by rail of 
 the various army corps, was effected without 
 a hitch, and it only remained to await devel- 
 opments. Once Von Kluck had advanced 
 sufficiently to uncover his right wing, thus 
 exposing it to the attack of Manoury's army, 
 the battle could begin. 
 
 The right moment arrived on the 4th 
 of September. On that day cavalry recon- 
 noissances and the reports of the aviators 
 showed that Von Kluck had turned south- 
 east, toward Meaux and Coulommiers, well 
 off the straight road to Paris. Instantly, 
 on the afternoon of September 4th, General 
 Joffre gave the order to attack. The main 
 lines of this order are as follows: 
 
 I. Advantage must be taken of the pre- 
 carious situation of the first German army 
 (Von Kluck) to bring to bear against it the 
 
 21 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 forces of the Allied armies on the extreme 
 left. All arrangements will be made on Sep- 
 tember 5th, in view of an attack on the 6th. 
 
 II. The disposition of forces to be ef- 
 fected on the evening of the 5th of September 
 will be: 
 
 {a) All the forces at the disposal of the 
 sixth army (Manoury), northwest of Meaux, 
 must be ready to cross the Ourcq between 
 Lizy-sur-Ourcq and May-en-Multien, in the 
 general direction of Chateau-Thierry. For 
 this operation the elements of the first cav- 
 alry corps in the neighborhood will be placed 
 under General Manoury's orders. 
 
 (6) The British army on the Changis- 
 Coulommiers front facing eastward will be 
 ready to attack in the general direction of 
 Montmirail. 
 
 (c) The fifth army (General Franchet d'Es- 
 perey), in slightly closer formation on the 
 left, will take its position along the general 
 line Courtacon-Estemay-Sezanne ready to at- 
 tack in the general direction of south-north. 
 The second cavalry corps will secure the con- 
 nection between the British and the fifth 
 army. 
 
 22 
 
5 10 20 30 VO 50 K? 
 
 o ' s ' ' 10' ' i5 ' 20 ' if. ' aa ' 'Miles 
 
 THE BATTLE OF THE MARNE. 
 Position of the armies, September s, 1914. 
 
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 I I— 
 
 5 
 
 MARNE. 
 
 iber lo, 1914. 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 (rf) The ninth army (General Foch) will 
 cover the right of the fifth army and hold 
 the southern approaches of the marshes of 
 St.-Gond. A portion of its forces will take 
 up their position on the plateau north of 
 Sezanne. 
 
 III. The offensive will be taken by these 
 various armies on the morning of the 6th of 
 September. (gigned) J. Joffre. 
 
 On the morrow the fourth army, under 
 General Langle de Gary, and the third army, 
 under General Sarrail, received instructions 
 in harmony with these general orders. 
 
 All preparations had been made and all 
 the orders given. Everything which it was 
 humanly possible for a great commander to 
 do in anticipation of a great battle had been 
 done. The result depended on the capacity 
 of the chiefs and the valor of the troops. 
 
 Picture for a moment what must have 
 been the state of mind of General Joffre on 
 the 5th of September, the tragic hour on the 
 eve of the great battle ! Here was a man of 
 
^Albert 
 Chaulnes . 
 
 T 
 
 fepoQifte 
 
 S^Quentin 
 
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 5 10 20 3 itO 50 K' 
 
 5' 10' ' 15' 20' zs' 30 Miles 
 
 THE BATTLE OF THE MARNE. 
 Position of the armies, September lo, 1914. 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 great moral elevation, of pure and ardent 
 patriotism, intensely alive to the terrible re- 
 sponsibility weighing upon him; a character 
 of the old heroic mould, modest and reticent, 
 disdainful of vulgar ambition and self-adver- 
 tisement; and this man was aware that in 
 the battle which was to be fought on the 
 morrow the very existence of France was at 
 stake. If the battle was lost, Paris would 
 be taken and France conquered for all time. 
 
 General Jofifre knew the tragic and des- 
 perate nature of the crisis confronting him. 
 With the fullest consciousness of that crisis, 
 and moved by intense emotion, he despatched 
 to the government at Bordeaux a telegram 
 which, when it is made public, will show 
 France that her chief is made of the stuff of 
 Plutarch's men. 
 
 The gist of the message was as follows: 
 General Joffre informed the President of the 
 Republic that he had done all he could to 
 save the state, that the die was cast, and that 
 it only remained to await results. His tone 
 
 24 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 was calm and confident. He aflfirmed his 
 conviction that the impending battle would 
 be fought under conditions favorable to 
 France. He described the enemy as being 
 held in a vise between Paris and Verdun; he 
 declared that the spirit of the troops had 
 never been better, and he summed up by 
 saying that the preponderance of chances was 
 on our side. 
 
 The wonderful forecast embodied in this 
 despatch was soon to be realized. At the 
 appointed moment all our armies opened a 
 simultaneous attack. Manoury's army on 
 the Ourcq so completely shattered one of 
 Von Kluck's divisions that the German com- 
 mander, threatened with immediate envelop- 
 ment, was suddenly compelled to shift his 
 forces to meet the British army. The Brit- 
 ish army and that of General Franchet 
 d'Esperey, taking advantage of this retreat, 
 plunged straight ahead, drove the German 
 corps back by a vigorous thrust, and in this 
 way gained a good deal of ground toward the 
 
 25 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 north. At the same time all our armies were 
 advancing along the entire line from west to 
 east, each army fastening itself to the one 
 preceding it with the successive forward jerks 
 of a parrot climbing along a stick. 
 
 Those were soul-thrilling days. We who 
 lived through them, in actual contact with 
 them, knew that they marked a dividing line 
 in our experience, and that henceforward ail 
 we did and were would gravitate about that 
 central moment of om* lives. 
 
 The Gemians instantly saw the danger 
 menacing them. They made a frantic effort 
 to break through the centre of our line, be- 
 tween Sezanne and Fere-Champenoise, in the 
 region of the marshes of St.-Gond. The Im- 
 perial Guard and all the picked troops were 
 massed at that point. Their object was to 
 overthrow Foch's army. By a series of re- 
 peated onslaughts, led wdth the most reckless 
 violence, they attempted to pierce our lines 
 and cut our armies in two. Once this result 
 obtained, they would only have had to fall 
 
 26 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 back against our left and right to compass 
 our defeat. 
 
 At one time, on the third day and on the 
 morning of the fourth (September 8th and 
 9th), it looked very much as if they might 
 succeed. They had pushed back the whole 
 right wing of the army of Foch. The Guard 
 had occupied Fere-Champenoise. But the 
 left of Foch's army still clung desperately to 
 the outskirts of the plateau overlooking the 
 marshes of St.-Gond. In vain the Germans 
 multiplied their attacks and wore themselves 
 out in prodigious onslaughts. The Moroccan 
 division, under General Humbert, held fast 
 to every inch of ground, replying to each 
 German thrust by a still more furious assault. 
 Not for a single instant did General Foch 
 admit the possibility of retreat. At a critical 
 moment one of his officers came to him. 
 "General, my troops are worn out !'* 
 
 "So are the Germans. Attack!'' was the 
 curt reply. 
 
 At the most crucial period of the struggle 
 
 27 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 General Foch conceived and executed a 
 manoeuvre which, together with Manoury's 
 movement, was one of the determining causes 
 of victory. The right of Foch's army had 
 given way, while the left was still holding 
 out. Instantly he transferred an excellent 
 division from left to right, taking the Ger- 
 mans by an unexpected flanking movement 
 and checking their advance. 
 
 The Germans, far from being able to pierce 
 our centre, were by this time in the gravest 
 peril. On their right wing the situation of 
 Von Kluck's army was becoming more and 
 more critical: it was in imminent danger 
 of envelopment. Everywhere the Germans* 
 losses had been terrible — some of their regi- 
 ments lost a third of their strength. More 
 than once I have heard General Joffre say 
 that this prodigious slaughter was one of 
 the main causes of the German retreat. 
 
 On the evejiing of September 9th the Kaiser 
 was compelled to sign the general order for 
 the retreat of the whole of his armies. Good- 
 
 28 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 by to Paris, and the hope of a triumphal 
 entry! The very troops which, a few days 
 before, had swept so arrogantly through our 
 villages now traversed them again with low- 
 ered heads. In many instances the retreat 
 turned into a veritable rout. The German 
 troops seemed astounded by the sudden dis- 
 aster — the repulse was a staggering one. 
 Two days after the battle the proprietor of 
 the principal hotel at Chalons-sur-Mame told 
 me a characteristic anecdote. A German Gen- 
 eral Staff had taken up its quarters in the 
 hotel, which happens to be well known for its 
 cellar. The general was a Royal Highness who 
 was treated by the staff with the profound- 
 est deference. On the evening of September 
 9th the officers had all gone to bed after 
 an excellent dinner and much riotous drink- 
 ing. Toward midnight there were hurried 
 steps in the passages and the prince and his 
 staff, hastily roused, rushed out of their rooms 
 in their night-clothes. "We must be off at 
 once!*' shouted his Highness. "Order the 
 
 29 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 motors! The French are here!'' In fifteen 
 minutes the hotel was empty — the whole 
 General Staff had vanished, forgetting, in 
 then* panic, several cases of champagne of a 
 vintage they had found greatly to tlieir taste. 
 The moral of the story is that tlie French 
 troops only arrived two days later. 
 
 The victory of the Mame is immense, gigan- 
 tic in character. It took place along a front 
 of four hundred kilometres, which should 
 be viewed as a whole — that is to say, from 
 Paris to the Vosges — and not be studied 
 at any isolated point of the line. The ten- 
 dency to view it in that way has misled many 
 people ignorant of all the facts of the cam- 
 paign. They think only of the army of Ma- 
 noury and its manoeuvre. They forget all 
 the other elements at work, and imagine it 
 was that single manoeu\Te which determined 
 the victory. To do this is like looking 
 through the small end of a telescope. It is 
 as if some one at a concert, who happened 
 
 30 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 to be seated close to the violin or the violon- 
 cello, should conclude that the merits of the 
 symphony were due to those two instruments 
 alone. As a matter of fact, the applause is 
 due to the leader of the whole orchestra, that 
 is to say, to General Joffre. This is the in- 
 evitable inference to be drawn from any 
 rational examination of the facts. 
 
 It is also said that but for Von Kluck's in- 
 explicable manoeuvre in turning to the south- 
 east on September 4th, instead of immediately 
 attacking Paris, the victory of the Mame 
 could not have been won, the capital would 
 have fallen, and the war soon afterward have 
 come to a disastrous end. All these asser- 
 tions are equally mistaken. If Von Kluck 
 was really in a position, on September 4th, to 
 end the war at a single blow, and did not do 
 it, he is undoubtedly the most inefficient 
 general who has ever commanded a German 
 army. And, if this is the case, it is hard to 
 see why the Kaiser keeps him in command 
 and showers honors and decorations on him, 
 
 31 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 when he ought obviously to have been court- 
 martialed and shot. 
 
 It implies an unparalleled ignorance of 
 military matters to suppose that the general 
 at the head of one of the six or seven German 
 armies then invading France was free to make 
 so important a move without first getting 
 into touch with the German General Staff. 
 The truth is, Von Kluck could not dream of 
 besieging Paris before getting well rid of 
 those of our forces, in front and on his flank, 
 which would have certainly fallen on him 
 while he was engaged in the attack on the 
 capital. He could not, and he had no right 
 to, act otherwise than he did. It is an abso- 
 lute rule of German strategy that the enemy's 
 army must first be destroyed before the in- 
 vestment of a fortified place is attempted. 
 In the present instance this rule was impera- 
 tive. For (as will some day be known) there 
 was already too big a gap, there was in fact 
 a veritable hole, between the army of Von 
 Kluck and the other German army on his 
 
 32 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 left. General JoiBfre, as has been seen, has 
 not hesitated to publish the series of his mili- 
 tary orders previous to the battle of the 
 Mame. Whenever his example is followed 
 in Germany, and the orders of the German 
 General Staff are published, it will be seen 
 which of the two series of documents is dis- 
 tinguished by clearness and precision, and 
 which is confused and vague. 
 
 The German orders given before the battle 
 of the Mame happen to be in the possession 
 of our staff, and I have had the privilege of 
 reading them. At that time the German 
 General Staff used ciphered radiograms, and 
 as we had discovered the cipher all the com- 
 mimications of the German headquarters 
 were immediately known to us. In the early 
 days of the war the German War Office had 
 but one purpose — to act rapidly and to strike 
 hard. Strategic scruples did not hamper the 
 German generals any more than diplomatic 
 scruples hampered the German statesmen. 
 The different German armies were engaged 
 
 33 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 in a sort of steeplechase toward the centre 
 of France. The fastest was to win the prize. 
 The Germans were so confident in the force 
 of their momentum that they fancied they 
 could overwhelm and shatter everything they 
 encountered. This confidence naturally grew 
 in proportion as the French armies retreated. 
 The Germans believed they were driving the 
 French before them in headlong rout. They 
 have never been brilliant psychologists, and 
 the fine shades of the French temperament 
 escaped their perspicacity, and doubtless 
 always will. The fact is illustrated by the 
 attitude and the utterances of Von Kluck 
 on Sunday, September 6th, at Coulommiers. 
 The picture is curious enough to claim a 
 moment's attention, and we possess definite 
 proof of its accuracy. Never have German 
 pride and self-sufficiency broken out with 
 finer effect. It is really worth while to record 
 the attitude of Von Kluck on the day of the 
 battle of the Mame. 
 The French soldiers had evacuated Cou- 
 
 34 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 lommiers the night before. During the night 
 the German troops arrived, battalion after 
 battaUon, and were immediately sent on 
 toward the south. It was Sunday afternoon. 
 The few inhabitants left in the little town 
 had shut themselves into their houses. Sud- 
 denly a hundred or more German soldiers 
 carrying revolvers rushed into the main 
 street, knocking at all the doors and shout- 
 ing: "Shut the windows, the staff is coming !'' 
 A quarter of an hour later, in a magnificent 
 60 h.-p. car, his Excellency General von 
 Kluck arrived. He took up his quarters in 
 the finest house in the town. One of his 
 officers, who had preceded him, had already 
 ordered dinner: two dishes of meat, peas and 
 pork (his Excellency's favorite dish), washed 
 down with champagne, and a good deal of it. 
 The general enjoyed his dinner and, when it 
 was over, settled himself down in a big arm- 
 chair in the doorway. He summoned the 
 fine military band which always accompanies 
 him. "Some French airs,'' he commanded: 
 
 35 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 "Only French airs — Carmen, La Mascoite'' 
 The band played La Mascotte and Car- 
 meriy and Von Kluck's satisfaction increased. 
 **Why don't the people turn up to listen to 
 my band? They've never heard a better 
 one!'* He sent an imperious summons to 
 his aged hostess, who presented herself in 
 fear and trembling. "Don't be afraid, ma- 
 dam," he said affably. "Where are your 
 husband and children?'' The poor woman 
 said that her husband was dead and that her 
 three sons were in the army. "Oh, well, 
 they'll be Germans," returned Von Kluck 
 consolingly; "and so will you. The half of 
 France is going to be German, and it's the 
 best thing that could happen to it. You'll 
 see what we'll make of you when you've had 
 a course of German discipline and culture. 
 You French have a lot of showy qualities: 
 what you want is discipline. We're going to 
 defeat your army — the job is half done now 
 — and by the end of the week we shall be in 
 Paris." With this he allowed the poor lady 
 to retire. 
 
 36 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 The entire German army, from the soldiers 
 to the generals, share the views of this typical 
 chief. This is why it has made such a reck- 
 less expenditure of energy, striking right and 
 left to the point of exhaustion in its uncon- 
 trollable frenzy of destruction. At the out- 
 set of the war the whole German army shared 
 Von Kluck's conviction that everything would 
 be over in a few weeks. One day our regi- 
 ment had been fighting from dawn until sun- 
 set, withstanding seven or eight German at- 
 tacks. Our men were utterly done up — 
 they hardly had the strength to prepare their 
 evening meal. We were all sure that that 
 night the Germans, who were bound to be 
 as tired as we were, and who had suffered 
 enormous losses, would leave us time to get 
 a few hours' sleep. But at about ten o'clock 
 a terrible fusillade burst out suddenly all 
 along the line of outposts — the quick-firing 
 guns had begun the music which is so like 
 the staccato notes of a mowing-machine bent 
 on business. And thereupon there followed 
 an astotmding, terrifying impression — a great 
 
 37 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 shower of star shells burst out from beyond 
 the German lines, shedding over the entire 
 battle-field the fantastic, shifting gleams of 
 Bengal fires. Then search-lights, suddenly 
 unmasked, sent a flood of blinding light along 
 our front; and at the same moment we saw 
 a German column, at least three battalions 
 strong, charging toward our lines. The men 
 advanced in close formation, four by four, as 
 if on parade. We saw distinctly the subal- 
 terns and the officers, driving forward with 
 the flat of their swords some soldiers who 
 had fallen out of line. The regimental band 
 was playing, fifes screaming, drums rolling. 
 The whole astounding spectacle — the music, 
 the illuminations, the brilliant search-lights, 
 and the massed battalions — called forth from 
 the colonel who was standing at my side: 
 "It's the finest show I ever saw in my life !'' 
 Our outposts had hastily retired. Almost 
 instantly our machine guns opened an infer- 
 nal fire against this magnificent target. The 
 rifles came to the aid of the machine guns 
 and were joined by our "75,'' which was still 
 
 38 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 trained for action. Every shot made its 
 mark in those serried columns. We saw- 
 whole lines go down: it was like a gigantic 
 game of ninepins. This attack, for all its 
 insane temerity, was absolutely without re- 
 sult, and almost the whole regiment must 
 have been wiped out. During the four days 
 and four nights of the battle of the Mame 
 the Germans again and again rushed on death 
 in the same way — the losses they suffered 
 were appalling. Military critics, in Germany 
 as well as in France, hold it to be an axiom 
 that a troop which has lost by fire a quarter 
 of its men is incapable of continuing the 
 struggle, and the case of the Prussian Guard 
 at St.-Privat is often cited as an instance. 
 The cautious and reasonable Joffre is no 
 spendthrift of his soldiers. At the battle of 
 the Marne he indulged in no such luxury of 
 hecatombs, and his self-restraint did not 
 deprive him of victory. 
 
 Photographs and portraits have made the 
 face of the commander-in-chief familiar to 
 
 39 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 the whole world. The impression he pro- 
 duces is one of massive force and vigor. He 
 is tall and robustly built, and there is great 
 straightforwardness and kindness in his calm 
 face crowned with white hair. I have often 
 seen him at the general headquarters. They 
 are situated in a delightful little town not 
 far from Paris, a town kno^vn to all Ameri- 
 cans who come to France; and the General 
 Staff is lodged in a famous building familiar 
 to visitors from overseas. The first impres- 
 sion received on entering the headquarters is 
 one of quiet and repose. Once I was sum- 
 moned there at the very moment when a 
 great battle was being fought in Flanders. 
 From the particular spot in which I stood all 
 orders were being sent out, and there all the 
 information from the whole front converged. 
 The General Staff headquaiters is both the 
 heart and the brain of that gigantic organism, 
 an army of three million men. One would 
 have expected a scene of intense activity, a 
 general sense of hurry and confusion; but 
 
 40 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 nothing could less resemble what I saw. In 
 the hall a few officers were passing to and fro 
 with bundles of papers under their arms. In 
 one comer a group of soldiers, bent over a 
 table, were sealing some big envelopes. A 
 lift took me to an upper story. I went down 
 a narrow passage where two orderlies were 
 on duty, and was ushered into the office of 
 General Pelle, who is the right arm of the 
 commander-in-chief. He wore the khaki of 
 our Moroccan troops, whom he commanded 
 before the war, and his handsome face looked 
 somewhat thin and drawn from prolonged 
 vigils and overwork. 
 
 General Pelle was for some time our mili- 
 tary attache in Berlin. He is thoroughly 
 acquainted, not only with the German army, 
 but with the German people. Our "Yellow 
 Book'* contains a report by him, written in 
 1912, which is a marvel of perspicacity, and 
 even of prophetic insight. After a few mo- 
 ments' talk, he told me that General Joffre 
 would receive me at once, and without fur- 
 
 41 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 ther ceremony he opened a door on the op- 
 posite side of the room and led me into the 
 great general's presence. The room was 
 very small and furnished like an ordinary 
 sitting-room in a small hotel. "The four 
 feet square of my cabinet/' said Richelieu; 
 Joffre, too, might speak of his "four feet 
 square.'' 
 
 The commander-in-chief was sitting at a 
 small table on which there were two or three 
 sheets of paper and a map. There is a look 
 in his steel-blue eyes that all his photographs 
 and portraits fail to show. It is a look that 
 admits of no reply: there is finality in his 
 glance. The minute and searching precision 
 with which he questioned me about the ob- 
 ject of my visit showed me that he knew in 
 its smallest details every sector of the inter- 
 minable front extending from the North Sea 
 to the Vosges, from Nieuport almost up to 
 Mulhouse. He listened attentively to my 
 explanations, and put into a few words, the 
 fewest possible, his observations and orders; 
 
 42 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 then, with a vigorous handshake, he turned 
 to other duties. 
 
 General Joffre gets up every morning at 
 five o'clock and is always in bed by nine in 
 the evening. Strict orders are given not to 
 wake him except in cases of emergency. 
 Self-command and insight are the dominant 
 qualities of a great military chief, and neither 
 of these qualities is possible without a good 
 sleep. As often as possible the general gets 
 away from his headquarters to visit the front 
 and inspect his troops. I recall a day, two 
 weeks after the victory of the Mame, when 
 we were near Rheims, at the fort of Mont- 
 bre. From the outworks, which formed a 
 splendid observatory, we had a view of the 
 entire battle-field. As we were watching the 
 results of our gun-fire on the German trenches 
 just across the valley, suddenly, without 
 warning. General Joffre arrived with General 
 Foch. He had come to congratulate our 
 chief, General Humbert, on his magnificent 
 conduct during the battle of the Marne, and 
 
 43 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 a few cordial, moving words conveyed his joy 
 in his officer's achievement. 
 
 Two powerful limousines for his officers 
 and a third motor for detectives form the 
 entire escort of the commander-in-chief. On 
 his arrival at any particular point he reviews 
 with the utmost care and precision the bat- 
 talions under arms. He inspects everything, 
 questions the soldiers, bestows decorations, 
 showing an unflagging diligence in the fulfil- 
 ment of this part of his duties, which brings 
 him in constant personal contact with his 
 men. After these inspections and reviews 
 General Joffre and a dozen or more officers 
 meet at a short military luncheon in some 
 small town. The talk on these occasions is 
 perfectly free from constraint, all the officers 
 present frankly exchanging their impressions. 
 The general himself does not say much — he 
 has often been called "Joffre the Silent." 
 But he does not dislike to hear others talk 
 and has no objection to laughter and gay- 
 ety; in fact, he is not without his own quiet 
 
 44 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 sense of humor. I once heard it remarked 
 in his presence that the mustaches and hair 
 of many of our generals had grown suddenly 
 white since the war. "It's the worry, the 
 fatigue, the responsibility," somebody sug- 
 gested. "No doubt," the chief agreed; "and 
 perhaps also the lack of certain indispensable 
 toilet articles." 
 
 The conclusion to be drawn from all the 
 conversations and all the isolated sayings of 
 General Joffre is that he possesses an un- 
 shakable belief in the successful issue of the 
 present war. This robust faith emanates 
 from him like a powerful current. It is a 
 pity that all those who criticise and lament — 
 their number in France is luckily not great 
 — all the fault-finders and unbelievers — can- 
 not be given a bath of confidence at our 
 general headquarters. They would come back 
 cured. 
 
 General Joffre does not admit for an in- 
 stant that there can be the slightest doubt 
 as to our victory, our complete and compre- 
 
 45 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 hensive victory. And his faith in the out- 
 come is based on the fact that, over and 
 above the daily incidents and accidents of 
 the struggle, he perceives its deep realities 
 and profound determining causes. These 
 causes are all in our favor. Even taking 
 matters at the worst, as far as we are con- 
 cerned, even supposing that we never suc- 
 ceed in breaking through the German lines 
 and in driving the enemy back a kilometre; 
 even in that case (and it is unthinkable) there 
 remains for Germany the certainty of ulti- 
 mate defeat and disaster. To consider only 
 the question of reserves of soldiers, leaving 
 aside the whole matter of money and other 
 economic considerations, the resources of 
 Germany and Austria are strictly limited. 
 The day is at hand when these resources will 
 be exhausted. Those of the Allies, on the 
 contrary, are almost infinite; and victory is 
 mathematically assured to them. 
 
 Germany, seventeen years ago (the calcu- 
 lation should be made from that date, since 
 
 46 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 it is impossible to enlist soldiers under seven- 
 teen years of age) had fifty-five millions of 
 inhabitants: in other words, a third more 
 than France. Since the beginning of the 
 war she has formed twice as many army 
 corps as we have, and this virtually means 
 that, relatively to the figure of her popula- 
 tion, she has accomplished a far greater mili- 
 tary effort than we. For instance, while 
 France out of a thousand inhabitants en- 
 listed one himdred soldiers, Germany out of 
 the same number enlisted from a hundred 
 and twenty-five to a hundred and thirty. 
 These figures are indisputable. Germany has 
 drawn much more largely on her reserves 
 than France, and they are bound to be much 
 sooner exhausted. 
 
 During the first months of the war the 
 force left by Germany on the Russian front 
 was relatively small — it represented scarcely 
 an eighth part of her total strength. But as 
 the Austrian army began to weaken and the 
 menace of the Russian invasion of Hungary 
 
 47 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 became more pressing, Germany had to come 
 to the rescue of her ally. It was impossible 
 for her to withdraw any considerable number 
 of troops from the western front, as she has 
 been inaccurately said to have done. She 
 transferred only some cavalry divisions which 
 were not particularly useful to her, and a 
 certain amount of heavy artillery; but she 
 placed on the Russian front a considerable 
 portion of the fresh formations then being 
 created in Germany. It is only necessary to 
 consider the furious onslaughts in Poland 
 and in Galicia, where battles last for more 
 than a month, to know that relatively few 
 of those fresh troops will ever be in a condi- 
 tion to be brought back to the French or the 
 Italian frontiers. In fact, by August or Sep- 
 tember every time we kill or wound a Ger- 
 man soldier on our front Germany will have 
 increasing difficulty in finding a substitute; 
 and the time will eventually come when it 
 will be impossible for her to find any. That 
 moment will strike the hour of her defeat. 
 
 48 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 The whole aggressive plan of campaign of 
 Germany was based on a short, sharp assault 
 lasting a few weeks or a few months. That 
 was why she did not scruple to expend her 
 maximum force at the outset. At the very 
 first shock she utilized everything she could 
 dispose of; and hereafter her strength, in- 
 stead of increasing, must steadily diminish. 
 Our own, on the contrary, is in almost all 
 respects as steadily increasing. We have 
 abundant reserves of men, since, in contra- 
 distinction to the German method, we have 
 made only a small number of new formations. 
 The English army is constantly growing, 
 Italy is flinging into the melee her fresh 
 troops, numbering, at the minimum, one mil- 
 lion five hundred thousand men; and there 
 still remains the inexhaustible reservoir of 
 Russia. We are manufacturing more and 
 more shells, and every day proves more em- 
 phatically the preponderating part which 
 ammunition plays in the present war. Fi- 
 nally, our heavy artillery, which was deficient 
 
 49 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 at the outset, is daily becoming more consid- 
 erable. 
 
 These are only some of the reasons, all as 
 solid as granite, on which the robust opti- 
 mism of General Joffre is based. When 
 people speak to him in discouraging tones 
 he merely shrugs his broad shoulders and 
 smiles. The one thing to beware of, in his 
 opinion, is impatience. Germany is virtually 
 a besieged citadel. She is holding firm to 
 the very last moment, she seems to be mak- 
 ing light of her enemies, she never ceases to 
 proclaim her invincibility. But some day 
 the citadel will fall, and all will be over. 
 
 Immediately after our victory on the 
 Mame the Germans took to the trenches. 
 That fact was of itself more than a half- 
 confession of failure. For it should be noted 
 that they might have retreated a little far- 
 ther (as we ourselves had done two weeks 
 before), and then manoeuvred in such a way 
 as to deliver a new battle which, if they had 
 won it, would have given them decisive re- 
 
 50 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 suits. Instead of that they condemned them- 
 selves to the wearing-out process of trench 
 warfare, which precluded all possibility of a 
 quick and resounding success. The hope of 
 such a success is over for all time. It is no 
 longer within their power to inflict on us the 
 violent shattering blow they were so confi- 
 dent of dealing. All the attacks they have 
 attempted since the battle of the Mame have 
 been checked: the effort to invest Verdun 
 at the end of September, 1914, the advance 
 on Calais, the battle of the Yser in September 
 and October, 1914, the offensive movement 
 against Soissons in January, 1915. Since this 
 last attack, that is to say, for more than six 
 months, they have not made a single serious 
 assault against the French front. Since Janu- 
 ary they have left to us the initiative and held 
 themselves strictly and entirely on the defen- 
 sive. They explain this inactivity by saying 
 that they want to finish with the Russians 
 once for all in order to be free to return with 
 all their forces against the French. This ex- 
 
 51 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 planation may satisfy the credulity of strate- 
 gists beyond the Rhine, but two minutes' re- 
 flection will show what it is worth. There is 
 no such thing as finishing "once for air* with 
 the Russians. However badly they may now 
 and then be beaten (and Germany has in- 
 flicted more than one serious defeat on them), 
 the Russian forces invariably pull themselves 
 together again and are ready almost at once 
 to begin the struggle all over again. As 
 Prince von Biilow has put it: "Fighting the 
 Russians is like pounding a pillow.*' 
 
 The Austro-Germans have just driven the 
 Russians back about two hundred kilometres 
 in Galicia. There can be no doubt as to the 
 reality of the victory, but it is a victory that 
 can have no lasting consequences. The Rus- 
 sians, instead of giving battle on the Duna- 
 jetz, are fighting on the Dniester; that is all ! 
 
 Now, suppose that instead of this advance 
 of two hundred kilometres on the eastern 
 front Germany had been able to progress, 
 say, some fifteen kilometres on the French 
 
 52 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 front; that she had been able, for instance, 
 to take Compiegne or Amiens. Would not 
 the moral and material consequences of such 
 an advance have been of a very different im- 
 portance? Obviously, if Germany has not 
 tried to do this, it is because she feels she is 
 in no position to undertake it. 
 
 Such considerations as these determine the 
 confidence of General Joffre. Whenever he 
 speaks (and he talks as little as possible) it 
 is with such arguments as these that he de- 
 velops his views, which may be summed up 
 thus: "We have only to keep to the path 
 that we are now following to be sure of vic- 
 tory." For more than a month now, in the 
 region about Arras, our armies have had an 
 unbroken series of successes. It is true that 
 they have been merely local successes; but 
 some day one of these local successes will sud- 
 denly assume the character of a general suc- 
 cess ; and once Germany begins to be beaten 
 her defeat will be rapid. The battle of the 
 Mame marked the first short act of the war; 
 
 53 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 the second act, played in the trenches, is a 
 painful business, and is continuing longer 
 than one would have supposed; but it is pos- 
 sible that the third and last act will be as 
 sliort as the first. 
 
 In the solitude of St. Helena, Napoleon, 
 who was not entirely without experience in 
 such matters, often put to himself the ques- 
 tion: **What are the qualities that make a 
 great general?'' It is rare — so he concluded 
 — to find in one and the same man all the 
 necessary attributes. The first essential for 
 a general is that his intelligence or talent 
 should be in stable equilibrium with his 
 character or courage. The general (to use 
 Napoleon's phrase) should be "carre," that 
 is, "four-square"; by which he meant that 
 he should be well-balanced. It was another 
 of Napoleon's sayings that a general who has 
 more intelligence than character resembles a 
 ship which carries too much sail: at the 
 slightest whiff of wind it risks capsizing. He 
 
 54 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 often cited as an instance his adopted son, 
 Eugene Beauhamais, whom he sought, by 
 advice and by daily correspondence, to form 
 for a military career. According to Napo- 
 leon, Prince Eugene was not marked by any 
 exceptional gifts; but his faculties were so 
 evenly balanced that he was nevertheless an 
 excellent general. 
 
 Nothing could be truer than these observa- 
 tions; and they are marvellously applicable 
 to General Joffre. The striking thing in his 
 character is just this admirable balance, typi- 
 cally French. His moral and intellectual 
 qualities, his brains and his character, are 
 in perfect equilibrium; and he is above all, 
 and to the full extent of the word, what our 
 seventeenth century called a "grand honnete 
 homme.'' He is quite without ambition, 
 utterly disinterested, and without any desire 
 for popularity or self-advertisement. His one 
 dream, when he has beaten Germany and 
 given back to France her former frontiers, 
 with the place due to her among nations, is 
 
 55 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 to retire to his little home in the Pyrenees 
 and end his days in peace. Among the Ger- 
 man generals who have been pitted against 
 him none can for a moment be compared with 
 him. Joffre won the victory of the Mame. 
 Apart from their partial successes at the out- 
 set, the German generals who have fought in 
 France have secured not one single victory. 
 Only one German general has to his credit 
 cer1:ain really big successes: Marshal von 
 Hindenburg has more than once terribly 
 beaten the Russians. But if Hindenburg is 
 compared to Joffre an impartial judgment 
 must give the French general the palm. The 
 Russian army, when it is opposed to the Ger- 
 man army, is in many important respects in 
 a condition of unquestionable inferiority. It 
 has at its disposal only a very rudimentary 
 system of railways, and the railway is of 
 capital importance in modem warfare. Its 
 supply of ammunition has also, up to the 
 present time, been utterly inadequate; and, 
 owing to this double superiority, Hindenburg 
 
 S6 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 has been able securely and rapidly to concen- 
 trate his army corps against the Russians, 
 and then to break through their lines by 
 crushing them under a rain of shells. These 
 considerations should never be left out of 
 account in estimating his military merit. 
 Hindenburg, if I may use a French phrase, 
 has always "played on velvet," whereas 
 Joffre has had to deal at every point with an 
 army much better organized and infinitely 
 better prepared than the French army. This 
 fact proportionately enhances the praise to 
 which he is entitled. 
 
 Journal of the Author 
 
 September 11th, 1915. — Flameng, the painter, 
 is in Argonne, making a series of very interest- 
 ing sketches of our battle-fields. These stud- 
 ies, which are done with the utmost care and 
 exactness, will be a most valuable contribu- 
 tion toward the history of the war. As he 
 had expressed a wish to see the Chateau of 
 Mondement, I was detailed to accompany 
 
 57 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 him, of which I was very glad, and we set off 
 on a radiant morning. 
 
 The road from Vitry-le-Frangois to Fere- 
 Champenoise follows pretty closely the line 
 of part of the battle of the Mame. It was a 
 year, almost to the day, since we won that 
 great victory, which seems greater and more 
 important as one gets further away from it; 
 the lapse of time cannot fail to throw it into 
 yet higher relief. 
 
 The harmonious unity of that tremendous 
 contest is as striking as the immensity of its 
 front. It is as measured and regulated as 
 one of Racine's tragedies, or a formal French 
 garden. Each of the elements of which it is 
 made up depends upon the element next to 
 it; the play of many forces, distinct yet con- 
 verging, give to this great military event its 
 crowning significance. 
 
 At Fere-Champenoise we took the road to 
 Bannes. Here we came upon the line of 
 Morin and the famous marshes of St.- 
 Gond, marshes which are almost always, by 
 
 58 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 the way, without water. The Germans had 
 planted their heavy artillery on the heights 
 above them to the north, and from there 
 they could shell us with deadly accuracy. 
 
 In the villages through which we went 
 the damage done by the war was being 
 repaired; new roofs everywhere replaced 
 those which the shells had shattered. The 
 industry of our peasants, the elasticity of 
 our race, which, however it may bend to 
 the storm, springs back with all its vigor, is 
 seen here in its full beauty. Women instead 
 of men were working in the fields, but not 
 one field was uncultivated. It was only just 
 a year since war had been raging in these 
 very places, and already it seemed remote, 
 far back in the wide spaces of time. 
 
 I was eager to see Mondement again, for it 
 was there that my division (the first division 
 of Moroccan infantry) had made such a mag- 
 nificent stand at the battle of the Marne. 
 The most impressive view of the chateau is 
 from the road beside the marshes of St.-Gond, 
 
 59 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 as it stands on the edge of a high ridge, 
 lifting its feudal outline proudly against the 
 sky, and dominating with its heavy walls 
 and towers the wide plain which lies below. 
 It was on the plain that the battle was most 
 furious, and from there the Germans hurled 
 themselves on the ridge, after two days and 
 two nights of terrific bombardment. 
 
 The chateau looks very much as when we 
 left it after that fierce struggle on the 9th of 
 September. The Germans had finally suc- 
 ceeded in taking it the night before; General 
 Humbert, who commanded the Moroccan 
 division, made up his mind to take it back 
 again, no matter at what cost. And we did 
 retake it, but only at the third assault, as 
 night was closing in, much helped in this 
 last attack by two guns which our men very 
 pluckily dragged up the steep slope and 
 planted only a few hundred yards from the 
 chateau, so that we could pour grape-shot 
 on the Germans while they still held it, and 
 also as they tried to get away. 
 
 60 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 The day after that bloody struggle the 
 chateau of Mondement was an extraordinary 
 sight. The iron gates and railings of its 
 forecourt were twisted and broken, the thick 
 house walls were pierced everywhere by shells 
 and in some places crumbling altogether, while 
 parts of the roofs were ready to fall in. Some 
 of the outbuildings which had been burned 
 down were still smouldering. This was the 
 setting for a swarming and seething mass of 
 infantry, Zouaves, woimded and dying men, 
 with German prisoners by the hundred. 
 
 And although twelve months have passed, 
 everything still bears mute witness to the 
 violence and intensity of the conflict. The 
 owner has been satisfied with repairing the 
 main part of the roof in a summary manner, 
 which takes away from the picturesqueness 
 of the ruins; the hideous patch of new slates 
 contrasts ill with the fire-scorched stones and 
 charred beams. Where the stables and out- 
 buildings stood a little heap of ashes and rusty 
 iron is all that is left of his luxurious limousine. 
 
 6i 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 Nature, however, is already coming into 
 her own again, and under this flood of sun- 
 light, in this soft air, the chateau does not 
 convey any impression of sadness or gloom. 
 Mondement bears its scars gallantly, like a 
 strong fighting man who holds his head high 
 and looks the future in the face. 
 
 At the back of the main building a great 
 breach was made in the surrounding walls, 
 and through it we went into what was 
 the garden, now overgrown with flourishing 
 weeds, among which some flowering plants 
 struggle patiently. While our infantrymen 
 attacked the principal entrance, it was here 
 that the Zouaves made their assault. The 
 Germans, threatened on all sides, within a 
 hand's breadth of being surrounded, suddenly 
 took to flight, jumping out of the second- 
 story windows and tumbling over the walls. 
 
 What a setting for a war picture — the 
 stem old tower in the comer with the swarm 
 of Teutons, hunted hard by our men, pour- 
 ing out headlong and running for dear life! 
 
 62 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 No wonder that my companion was carried 
 away by it, and set to work on his sketch at 
 once. 
 
 Many of the huge old trees in the park 
 were split and battered by shells, which 
 made me remember one tragic incident of 
 the battle. The Germans had brought very 
 heavy artillery fire to bear on the chateau, 
 from which General Humbert was directing 
 the fighting. One of my comrades was stand- 
 ing waiting for orders when M. Baur, the 
 surgeon-in-chief, said to him: "Why do you 
 expose yourself so unnecessarily? Do as I 
 am doing — stand behind a tree.'' Two min- 
 utes afterward an enormous shell struck full 
 on that very tree, cutting it in two as if it 
 had been a match, and killing the surgeon 
 instantly. My friend, who had remained 
 quietly standing twenty yards away, was not 
 even scratched. Such are the chances of 
 war and destiny! 
 
 A few days before that, German shells had 
 been falling fast into a field occupied by 
 
 63 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 some Zouaves, and making great holes in 
 the ground. The officer in command, seeing 
 that one of the men looked rather uneasy, 
 said to him, half in joke and half in earnest: 
 "Do you want me to show you a sure way 
 not to be hit? Put yourself into the next 
 hole made by a shell; two never strili:e in 
 the same place/' A big, funnel-shaped hole 
 opened close beside him as he spoke, and to 
 practise what he preached he crept into it. 
 A few seconds afterward another shell did 
 strike exactly in the same place, smashing him 
 into a jelly. 
 
 Near the road which leads to Broye, a 
 churchyard, always decorated with flags and 
 flowers, is full of the graves of French sol- 
 diers, killed close around the chateau. The 
 little church to which it belongs had a very 
 hard time during the bombai'dment. On the 
 morning of September 10th, before we left 
 Mondement, the general and some of his offi- 
 cers went there to the funeral of the surgeon- 
 in-chief. It was an impressive ceremony. The 
 
 64 
 
THE VICTOR OF THE MARNE 
 
 walls were full of gaping holes, the roof- 
 less choir open to the sky; a soldier-priest 
 recited rapidly the prayers for the dead, and 
 then we left our comrade in one of the many 
 hastily made graves. 
 
 The wounds of the little church are not yet 
 healed, but the worst holes have been cov- 
 ered with big pieces of canvas. On one of 
 the walls is a list of the names of officers of the 
 77th who fell in the attack on the chateau, 
 that intrepid regiment which, helped by the 
 Zouaves of the Moroccan division, finally 
 wrested Mondement from the enemy. I can 
 see it still, climbing the steep ascent at Broye, 
 in the blazing midday sun; the men haggard, 
 dusty, breathing hard, straining on as they 
 near the battle, heroic in their impetuous en- 
 ergy. Fast, faster yet ! Their help is sorely 
 needed, for never has the situation been so 
 desperate. It is the most critical moment in 
 the great battle which will decide the fate of 
 France. They know it, they feel it, her brave 
 soldier-sons, and for her sake they press on, 
 
 6s 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 choking with dust and thirst, up the exhaust- 
 ing hill, with quicker and yet quicker step. 
 
 On every side the storm of battle rages; 
 the bombardment grows more and more in- 
 tense ; long lines of wounded go trailing down 
 toward the village; the heavy ammunition 
 caissons creak and clatter, as their horses, 
 flogged into a fast trot, drag them, swaying 
 and lumbering, up the steep track. 
 
 The passing of that regiment, marching 
 steadily to victory in the midst of the tumult 
 and anguish, will always remain to me one 
 of the most noble and inspiring memories of 
 the war. 
 
 66 
 
II 
 
 THE FRENCH OFFENSIVE IN 
 CHAMPAGNE 
 
 (SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER, 1915) 
 
 AT the crossways near the batteries one 
 ^ ^ has to leave the highroad which, at 
 this point, is raked by German guns, and fol- 
 low a rutty track that makes a long circuit 
 through the fields. Near the crossways, at 
 
 the A farm, the soldiers of the colonial 
 
 corps, who have already spent one winter 
 there and are cheerfully preparing to spend 
 another, have built themselves the queerest 
 and most exotic of villages — a real Sudanese 
 settlement of conical-roofed huts, shaped like 
 a Mandarin's hat. In the middle of the vil- 
 lage is a tiny wooden church, with a belfry 
 that does its best to taper up into a spire. 
 A soldier-priest says mass there every Sun- 
 
 67 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 day. He and the altar take up nearly the 
 whole of the space inside the church, while 
 the faithful gather outside, piously following 
 the service. On the fagade is a Latin in- 
 scription: 
 
 Regin^ Victoria 
 
 PiLOSI MiLITES ^DIFICARUNT HaNC 
 ECCLESIAM 
 
 **To the Queen of Victory the Poilus {Pilosi Mili- 
 tes) have erected this chiirch." (The ** Poilus'* 
 have not all forgotten their humanities !) 
 
 Just beyond there rises a steep slope bris- 
 tling with batteries; on its crest are the artil- 
 lery observation-posts. They are admirably 
 fitted up and protected by thick courses of 
 logs and beaten earth. A general is there, 
 attentively examining with his field-glass the 
 opposite slope, the greater part of which is 
 in German hands. The general is one of 
 the youngest chiefs of the French army. 
 When hostilities broke out he was a colonel 
 commanding a brigade; now, after just 
 twelve months of war, he stands on one of 
 
 68 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 the highest rungs of the ladder. He is tall, 
 slim, young-looking, with an air of extreme 
 distinction, quick, incisive speech, and reso- 
 lute blue eyes. Whenever those eyes of his 
 light on a new face he feels the immediate 
 need to label and classify it and store away 
 the image in some pigeonhole of his marvel- 
 lously lucid memory, where thereafter it will 
 always have its distinctive place. Looking 
 at him and listening to him, one has the im- 
 pression that the art of warfare is above all 
 things a matter of precision, foresight, and 
 tenacity. The masters of military science, 
 the men predestined to shine in war, are those 
 in whom the balance between brain and char- 
 acter, between understanding and willing, is 
 most perfectly adjusted. 
 
 General Petain, having finished his minute 
 inspection of the enemy's lines, emerges from 
 the obscurity of the observation-post and de- 
 scends by zigzagging communication trenches 
 to the motor awaiting him at the foot of the 
 hill. When he drives off he leaves on all of 
 
 69 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 us the impression that his visit portends 
 some big event. 
 We were in the first days of August, 1915 
 
 — it was just a year since the war had be- 
 gun. The great German scheme of taking 
 Paris and subjugating France in a few months 
 
 — or a few weeks — had utterly failed. The 
 battle of the Mame had broken down the 
 first German offensive; six weeks later the 
 furious dash on Calais was no less effectually 
 checked. As for the numerous local attacks 
 in the Argonne, in the course of which thou- 
 sands of men, the best perhaps of the Ger- 
 man army, were recklessly sacrificed in the 
 effort to enhance the military prestige of 
 the Kronprinz — all these attacks were far 
 too local and limited to produce any lasting 
 result. 
 
 Despairing of a decisive success on the 
 Western front, the Germans last spring turned 
 the weight of their forces on the Eastern 
 lines. To help out the demoralized army 
 of Austria-Hungary they began, first in Gali- 
 
 70 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 cia and then in Poland, a vigorous offensive 
 which made them masters of a considerable 
 extent of territory. Their formidable heavy 
 artillery and their almost inexhaustible re- 
 serves of munitions gave them a rapid ascen- 
 dency over the Russian army, which, at that 
 time, lacked not only munitions but rifles. 
 Russia made a magnificent defense; but in 
 August, 1915, her armies were in a difficult 
 position. The German hopes, which had 
 ebbed during the previous winter, were once 
 more at the flood. It was clearly our busi- 
 ness, on the Western front, to draw off some 
 of the army corps which were threatening to 
 break through the lines of our Allies. 
 
 The French offensive in Artois, made four 
 months earlier, on a narrow front, had re- 
 sulted brilliantly. It had confirmed the faith 
 of France in the valor of her troops and in 
 the vigor and intrepidity of their powers of 
 attack; it had proved that, even after a 
 winter of stagnation in the trenches, the 
 French army had lost nothing of its dash. 
 
 71 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 At the same time, the movement had shown 
 that the German defenses, in spite of their 
 perfection, can be successfully attacked and 
 taken if only the attack is carefully enough 
 studied and minutely enough prepared on 
 the lines which previous experience has indi- 
 cated. So much we knew last August; and 
 the time seemed to have come to renew the 
 assault of the previous spring on a larger 
 scale and with more important forces. 
 
 Those forces were now available. The ar- 
 rival of large English reinforcements had al- 
 lowed the English front to be lengthened and 
 had thereby released a corresponding body 
 of French troops. That it is always a deli- 
 cate operation to substitute, along any part 
 of the front, one body of troops for another, 
 is a fact that must be obvious to the most 
 superficial student of the art of war. The 
 present war is one of scientific precision and 
 complexity. The solidity of any portion of 
 the front is insured only by a combination 
 of precautions and previsions as intricate 
 
 72 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 and smoothly running as the wheels of a 
 complicated machine. If one of the wheels 
 stops the whole machine is likely to break 
 down. The artillery fire, for example, must 
 be so accurately regulated that the shells 
 fall with mathematical precision at the pre- 
 determined point, without even a few yards' 
 deviation. The attainment of such a result 
 necessitates extraordinary exactitude of aim, 
 observation-posts skilfully selected, and such 
 perfect telephonic communication that, at a 
 word of command, batteries several kilometres 
 away can instantly and unerringly pour a 
 hail of shell on any given point. 
 
 The substitution of one army corps for 
 another necessitates a change of artillery- 
 men, telephonists, sappers and miners, and 
 so on; and the exchange must be carried out 
 without the least delay or the slightest break 
 of continuity along the front. In the present 
 instance the feat was accomplished with com- 
 plete success. Everything had been so in- 
 telligently prepared that when the English 
 
 73 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 front was extended the change did not pro- 
 duce the slightest fluctuation anywhere along 
 the line. The fact augurs well for the fu- 
 ture. 
 
 Some of our army corps, which had taken 
 part in the May offensive in Artois, had 
 meanwhile had time to rest and reform. The 
 attacking power of a body of troops is ex- 
 actly analogous to the nerve-power of a 
 man. When a man is young, active, and 
 full of life, no matter how great his temporary 
 exhaustion, a few days of rest and a few 
 nights of sleep will put him on his feet again. 
 The French army is in this happy prime of 
 its recuperative powers. Such and such a 
 regiment or division may return from a hard 
 battle considerably depleted; but after a 
 few weeks of rest in good quarters, where the 
 men can eat, sleep, and wash, the troops will 
 have recovered their original temper and be 
 ready to meet a fresh onset. 
 
 This surprising elasticity, this promptness 
 in throwing off fatigue and suffering, is not 
 
 74 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 only the dominant characteristic of the French 
 soldier, but the fundamental quality of the 
 whole race — the quality which again and 
 again has shone out in its long history. 
 
 Every preceding experience of the war had 
 shown that an attack, to have any chance 
 of success, must be backed by formidable 
 artillery with an almost inexhaustible supply 
 of ammunition. The time had come when 
 this force of artillery was at our command, 
 and this supply of ammunition in our re- 
 serves. We were beginning to see the result 
 of the prodigious industrial effort by which 
 France, within the space of a few months, 
 had mobilized the greater part of her fac- 
 tories to the sole end of the intensive produc- 
 tion of war material. At any moment we 
 chose it was in our power to sweep the 
 German lines with a deluge of shot and 
 shell. 
 
 The ground chosen for the attack, which 
 extended from Auberive to a point east of 
 Ville-sur-Tourbe, covers a length of about 
 
 75 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 twenty-five kilometres, and is far from being" 
 an undiversified surface. Looking from west 
 to east, it presents the following features: 
 
 (1) A glacis about eight kilometres wide, 
 of which the gentle slopes are covered with 
 scattered clumps of trees. The road from 
 St.-Hilaire to St.-Souplet, passing by the 
 Baraque de TEpine de Vedegrange, is nearly 
 on the axis of this glacis. 
 
 (2) The hollow at the bottom of which 
 lies the village of Souain. The first line of 
 German trenches followed the inner lip of 
 this hollow. The road from Souain to Somme- 
 Py makes, as it were, the diameter of the 
 half-circle. The Navarin farm, three and a 
 half kilometres north of Souain, is on the 
 crest of the hills commanding the hollow. 
 
 (3) North of Perthes comes a level stretch 
 running between the wooded hills of the 
 Trou-Bricot and the Butte-du-Mesnil, like a 
 long corridor three kilometres wide, barred 
 at intervals by lines of trenches and abutting 
 on a series of heights, the so-called "buttes 
 
 76 
 
7^^ 
 
 m^. 
 
 
 Mfe 
 
 
 
 
 '-ei\-Donmois 
 
 6ay<in f = 
 
 
 
 
 -?^>i7^ 
 
 ■s^-.:: 
 
 
 
 .-- £!derWacques«l 
 
 Ifiie^ 
 
 MAP SHOwmr, POSITION OF GERMAN TRENCHES AND THE PROGRESS OF THE FRENCH OFFENSR'E 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 de Souain," the "cotes"* 193 and 201, and 
 the "butte de Tahure," crowned by the Ger- 
 man second lines. 
 
 (4) North of Mesnil is a very strong posi- 
 tion, bastioned on the west by the twin 
 heights of the Mamelle Nord and the Tra- 
 peze, and on the east by the "butte'' of 
 Mesnil. Between these two points the Ger- 
 man trenches formed a powerful curtain, 
 behind which a broken region of dense wood- 
 land extends to Tahure. 
 
 (5) North of Beausejour is a bare stretch 
 of easy country sloping up gradually in the 
 direction of Ripont to the farm of the Maisons 
 de Champagne. 
 
 (6) North of Massiges the powerfully forti- 
 fied "cotes" 191 and 199, which look on the 
 map like the pattern of a hand, form the 
 eastern flank of the German defenses. From 
 here the ground slopes away gently toward 
 Ville-sur-Tourbe . 
 
 ♦The numbers of these "c6tes," or hills, indicate their al- 
 titude in metres. 
 
 77 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 The two chief positions of the German 
 works lay from three to four kilometres apart. 
 The deeper of the two was formed by three 
 or four lines of trenches, separated from each 
 other by barbed-wire entanglements and run- 
 ning back to a depth of from four hundred to 
 five hundred yards. The second position con- 
 sisted of a single trench, reinforced here and 
 there by a support trench. This portion of 
 the line, and the barbed-wire entanglements 
 preceding it, were built almost entirely on the 
 reverse slope of the hill, so that it was ex- 
 tremely difficult for our artillery to get the 
 range. 
 
 In addition to these main points of the 
 line, admirably organized centres of resis- 
 tance had been formed wherever the groimd 
 permitted — so many little fortresses, nests 
 of concealed mitrailleuses, to which the troops 
 of defense had orders to cling to the last 
 round of shell if the intervening trenches 
 were overwhelmed. 
 
 It is obvious that the attack of lines or- 
 
 78 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 ganized on this scale could have nothing in 
 common with the war of manoeuvre that 
 preceded the battle of the Marne. This was 
 a wholly different kind of conflict, a siege 
 war with methods and regulations of its 
 own. To form an idea of it one must turn 
 to the record of the great sieges of history, 
 and notably to that of Sebastopol. 
 
 The first necessity for the attacking army 
 was to know with the utmost accuracy the 
 exact place of every German trench, the 
 depth of the barbed-wire defenses, and the 
 position of the machine guns and the batter- 
 ies. Thanks to our many means of infor- 
 mation, we were fully instructed on all these 
 points. Every feature of the German posi- 
 tions was marked on a map and known by 
 its special designation. The attacking troops 
 knew exactly what was ahead of them and 
 where they were going. 
 
 The arrival of the troops had begun well 
 in advance of the attack. Along the rail- 
 
 79 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 ways and on the highroads there had been 
 for days an uninteniipted stream of trains 
 and motor-tmcks. The region about Chalons 
 was swai'ming witli soldiers. 
 
 The landscape of mid-Champagne, the 
 "Champagne pouilleuse/' where so often 
 in past times the destinies of France have 
 been fought out, is monotonous, but not 
 \nthout beauty. It is a region of untilled 
 fields, of scattered pine forests, heatlis, and 
 ponds, traversed by beautiful straight roads 
 which seem puiposely to avoid the few and 
 \\idely separated \illages. In these latter 
 the half-timbered houses are all of tlie same 
 t}i)e, and mostly several centuries old. They 
 were so much fuel for the Kaiser's bonfires, 
 and it did not take many of his incendiaiy 
 tablets to set them ablaze. 
 
 Pi'eparations were going rapidly forward; 
 tlie sense of momentous things was in the 
 ail'. Day by day, as the decisive hour drew 
 nearer, the gi*eat army massed for tlie at- 
 tack felt its ardor and impatience grow. 
 
 80 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 The generals and the commanding officers 
 exhorted their men; but words were un- 
 necessary. Never had the tone of the French 
 troops been finer; never had France pos- 
 sessed a more magnificent army than that 
 gathered last autumn on the plains of Cham- 
 pagne. It was my good fortune to assist at 
 several of the rounds of inspection, during 
 which our most brilliant general, gathering 
 about him his officers and men, set forth in 
 a few words the effort and the self-sacrifice 
 that their country required of them; and 
 on every sternly set face the same look of 
 heroic abnegation, the same resolve to strike 
 hard and conquer, made mute response to 
 his appeal. 
 
 The artillery preparations had begun three 
 days earlier, on the 22d of September. The 
 fire was kept up night and day, with a pre- 
 determined rhythm and according to a care- 
 fully regulated plan. The objects to be at- 
 tained were the following: the destruction 
 of the wire entanglements, the burying of 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 the defending line in their underground shel- 
 ters, the wrecking of the trenches and the 
 parapets, and the cutting off of the com- 
 munication trenches. 
 
 The fire raked not only the first-line trenches 
 but the support trenches and even the sec- 
 ond-line positions. At the same time the 
 long-range guns were bombarding the various 
 headquarters, the encampments, and the 
 railway-stations, cutting off the railway com- 
 munication and interrupting the bringing up 
 of supplies. 
 
 From a height above Massiges I looked on 
 for hours at this bombardment. Never have 
 I seen one approaching it in violence. The 
 shells burst so close to each other that the 
 puffs of white smoke along the heights were 
 merged in a single cloud. It was like look- 
 ing at a multitude of geysers in full ebulli- 
 tion. The air was shaken by an uninter- 
 rupted roar, against which, now and then, 
 a huge detonation would detach itself with 
 a crash that seemed to shake the earth: it 
 
 82 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 was the explosion of a heavy projectile from 
 one of the big guns. 
 
 It was not the first bombardment I have 
 followed. During the Russo-Japanese War, 
 on the second day of the battle of Liaoyang, 
 I saw the whole Japanese artillery concen- 
 trate its fire on the peak of Shoshan a few 
 hours before the infantry assault. On the 
 last day of the battle of the Mame, from 
 the heights opposite Mondement, all the 
 batteries of our division sent an infernal 
 blast of shell against the summit crowned 
 by the chateau, which was held by the Prus- 
 sians. But these bombardments were as 
 nothing compared to the present attack. 
 The dazed and distracted German troops 
 completely lost their heads. Every few mo- 
 ments they sent up star shells as a signal 
 to their artillery to open a curtain fire 
 against the French. The unfinished let- 
 ters found on many of the prisoners taken 
 after the attack show the prodigious effect 
 of this deluge of steel. A German soldier 
 
 83 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 Avrites, on September 25tli: "I have received 
 no news from home, and sliall probably re- 
 ceive none for several days. The postal 
 service has stopped; the whole line has been 
 so violently bombarded that no human being 
 could hold out. The railway is so contin- 
 uously shelled that all trains have ceased 
 lomning. We have been in tlie jfighting line 
 for three da>'s. During these tliree days 
 tlie French have shelled us so incessantly 
 that our trenches ai*e completely wiped out.'* 
 Another wrote on tlie 24th: "For the last 
 two days the French have been bombarding 
 us lilce madmen. To-day one of our shelters 
 was demolished. There were sixteen men 
 in it, and eveiy one of them was killed. 
 IMany others were killed besides, and masses 
 of men were wounded. The artillery fii*e is 
 almost as rapid as that of tlie infantry. The 
 whole front is covered by a cloud of smoke 
 W'hicli hides eveiything. The men ai'e drop- 
 ping like flies. The trenches are a heap of 
 wreckage.'' 
 
 84 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 Still another, writing on the same day, 
 says: '*A rain of shell is falling on us. Our 
 kitchen and provisions are cannonaded all 
 night. The field-kitchens no longer arrive. 
 Oh, if only the end were in sight ! Peace ! 
 peace! is the cry on every man's lips." 
 
 An artilleryman of the 100th Regiment of 
 field-artillery writes on September 25th: 
 
 "We have been through awful hours. It 
 seemed as if the whole world were crum- 
 bling away. We have had heavy losses. Last 
 night one company of two hundred and fifty 
 men had sixty killed. A neighboring battery 
 lost sixteen. 
 
 **The following instance will show you the 
 frightful power of the French projectiles. 
 A shelter five metres below ground, roofed 
 with two layers of logs and two and a half 
 metres of earth, was smashed like a match.'' 
 
 The captain commanding the third com- 
 pany of the 135th Regiment of German re- 
 serves writes in his report: "Send us a supply 
 of rations at once. We have received no 
 
 8s 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 provisions to-day. We are in urgent need 
 of flares and hand-gi'enades. Is the sani- 
 tary column never coming to look after our 
 wounded?" And a few hours later: ** I in- 
 sist on immediate reinforcements. My men 
 are dying of fatigue and want of sleep. I 
 have no news of the battalion." 
 
 The artillery preparation was at the highest 
 pitch of efficiency. We had done all that it 
 was in our power to do. There remained 
 one important factor of success; but that, 
 alas ! w^as an incalculable one. No one could 
 foresee the weather, and much depended on 
 our having a fine day for the attack. Clear 
 weather would give us an immense advan- 
 tage by facilitating that co-ordination of ac- 
 tion between the infantry and the supporting 
 artillery on which success in the offensive so 
 largely hangs. Once the attacking columns 
 were thrown into the furnace, it was vitally 
 necessary for the staff and the artillery to 
 keep in constant touch witli them, to Imow 
 
 86 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 exactly how far they had advanced, and to 
 be able at each step to support and direct 
 them. 
 
 The assault on the second-line positions 
 also depended for its success on a clear at- 
 mosphere; for this second position, usually 
 placed on the reverse slopes of hilly ground, 
 is so extremely difficult to discover that its 
 wire defenses can be only partially destroyed 
 by the artillery. 
 
 During the days preceding the general 
 attack the sky, which had hitherto been ra- 
 diant, began to grow cloudy. Toward night- 
 fall on the 24th the clouds melted away be- 
 fore a moon that seemed to promise a return 
 of fine weather, a promise which the next 
 morning unhappily belied. By daybreak a 
 fog had closed down on the lines and a thick 
 drizzle was beginning to fall. 
 
 But no atmospheric conditions could damp 
 the feverish impetuosity of our troops. The 
 moment for the general attack was set for a 
 quarter past nine. During the night all the 
 
 87 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 attacking troops had taken up their positions. 
 The soldiers lined all the parallel trenches, 
 and the trenches of communication by which 
 the supporting column was to be brought 
 up. Every officer had set his watch by the 
 time of the general headquarters. 
 
 One must have lived through such mo- 
 ments to realize their tragic and passionate 
 beauty. Hundreds and thousands of men in 
 the vigor of their youth are massed there to- 
 gether awaiting the shock. Many of them 
 — and they all know it — are inexorably 
 marked for death. All of them feel the great 
 shadow groping for them, invisible yet ever 
 present in their ranks; but its nearness, far 
 from weakening their courage, touches their 
 resolve with a stem and manly gravity. 
 
 By seven in the morning I was at a com- 
 mander's station from which part of the battle- 
 field was visible. Our artillery fire still went 
 on, ever intenser and more furious, as though 
 seeking, during the minutes that remained, 
 to crush and submerge such portions of the 
 
 8S 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 German lines as had escaped our heavy guns. 
 It was obvious that, after three days of such 
 uninterrupted bombardment, the Germans 
 must know that the decisive hour was at 
 hand. Every few seconds flares rushed up 
 from their lines, imploring the curtain fire 
 that was to stop our infantry. 
 
 Suddenly, at the preordained moment, the 
 French, headed by their officers, revolver in 
 hand, flung themselves out of the trenches 
 along the whole of the immense line. In 
 order to maintain the necessary discipline 
 and self-control of the troops under the 
 deadly fire that awaited them, each section 
 was marshalled into line as soon as it reached 
 open ground. Then, at double-quick so that 
 they should not lose their wind by too im- 
 petuous a dash forward, they broke in a 
 first immense wave against the German 
 trenches. Hardly had one wave of infantry 
 swept forward when another surged up be- 
 hind it and flowed impetuously in the same 
 direction. The advance was like that of a 
 
 89 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 mighty sea whose irresistible breakers must 
 undermine the rockiest coast. 
 
 The speed of the French advance was so 
 great that the Germans were almost every- 
 where taken by surprise. All their first-line 
 trenches were submerged. The troops who 
 occupied them were all killed or gave them- 
 selves up; and the infantry swept on to the 
 second line. On the way it captured a large 
 number of German cannon, machine guns, 
 and heavy pieces; the artillerymen fell where 
 they stood. Wherever a German defensive 
 work was too solidly organized to be taken 
 with a rush, it was invested by our troops; 
 and the enemy, thus encircled, surrendered 
 in thousands. At certain points of the front 
 our infantry poured ahead with such im- 
 petuosity that the artillery, to support it, 
 had to limber their guns and move them 
 forward, exactly as in open battle. There 
 could be no more amazing proof of the vigor 
 and vehemence of the French attack. 
 
 Unhappily, it was not to be hoped that 
 
 90 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 the forward movement should everywhere 
 strike the same pace. Irregularity of ad- 
 vance is one of the inevitable conditions of 
 siege war. The lines of least resistance are 
 bound to be carried with relative speed; 
 while at points where the difficulty of the 
 ground or the greater courage of the de- 
 fenders makes the advance harder, progress 
 necessarily slackens. Therefore, a few hours 
 after the first assault, the line attacked, in- 
 stead of being straight, has been bent into 
 a series of perilous zigzags. 
 
 Nevertheless, after two or three days of 
 fierce fighting, the French troops had achieved 
 important results. To form an idea of what 
 had been gained, it is necessary to consider 
 separately each of the sectors of the front; 
 for in each one the struggle assumed a dif- 
 ferent form and had a different outcome. 
 
 In the region to the right of the Epine 
 de Vedegrange the advance of our troops 
 was very rapid. At this point there was an 
 extremely strong German centre of resistance, 
 
 91 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 composed of a triple and a quadruple line 
 of trenches, machine-gun blockhouses, and 
 a bit of woodland covered with one of the 
 most intricate systems of defense along the 
 German front and giving shelter to numerous 
 concealed batteries. But the whole of this 
 sector was taken by a sudden and irresistible 
 dash. In spite of heavy losses, in spite of the 
 fatigue of incessant fighting, the French 
 swept on and on, leaving behind them only 
 enough men to scour the conquered region 
 and break down its centres of resistance. 
 On the 27th of September, toward evening, 
 our troops were in touch with the German 
 second line; at two points we had even got 
 a footing in them, making a breach of about 
 five hundred yards. Unluckily, it was im- 
 possible to widen this breach sufficiently to 
 reap the reward of our success. German 
 heavy batteries concentrated their strength 
 on the opening, and hidden machine guns 
 swept its sides with a fierce enfilading fire. 
 Nevertheless, the results achieved in this 
 
 92 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 sector figure up as follows: the taking of 
 fifteen square kilometres of ground riddled 
 with trenches and fortified works, of forty-four 
 pieces, seven of 105 mm. and six of 150 mm., 
 and of more than three thousand prisoners. 
 
 In the Souain sector the enemy line swept 
 a great curve about the village. At certain 
 points the German trenches were over a 
 kilometre from ours. It therefore became 
 necessary, when the offensive was planned, 
 to push our works far enough forward to 
 facilitate the attack on the German front. 
 This subterranean engineering was carried 
 out with incomparable pluck and energy. 
 Leaving the trenches at night, our soldiers 
 literally bounded across the intervening space. 
 When they reached the designated point they 
 dug themselves in, afterward linking their 
 new line to the trenches they had left by 
 communication trenches. This exceedingly 
 difficult exploit was actually accomplished 
 under the eyes and under the fire of the 
 enemy, and the parallel trenches followed the 
 
 93 
 
GENER.\L JOFFRE 
 
 cunT of the Gimiiaii lino at a distance of 
 loss than two hundrod yards. 
 
 Tho attack lx\can simultaneously at three 
 points. To tlie west we advanced toward 
 the wcxxied i^round: in the centre we fol- 
 lowed the line of the road from S<.niain to 
 Somme-P>% in the dkection of the Navarin 
 fami; to the east we bent toward the wcxxis 
 which are intersected by the road from Souain 
 to Tahure. and toward tlie **buttes" of Sou- 
 ain. Oiu* advance was extremely rapid. To 
 the left we covered two kilometres in less 
 than an hour; in the centre, three kilometres 
 in forty-five minutes. By ten o'clock we 
 were abreast of the Navarin fanii, and a 
 glance at the map \^'ill show the amazing 
 rate of our progress. 
 
 Toward the east it was harder to make 
 headway. The Sabot wood was full of Ger- 
 man machine-gims. which greatly facilitated 
 the enemy's resistance. But this centre of 
 defense was suiTOunded and taken, enabling 
 our troops to close up wiUi tliose which were 
 
 94 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 attacking to the north of Perthes. The Ger- 
 mans were completely encircled, and, leav- 
 ing only a sufficient force to reduce the posi- 
 tion, the main part of our troops pushed on. 
 
 Those left behind sent parlementaire's to 
 demand the surrender of the Germans. They 
 were met by rifle fire, upon which they at- 
 tacked the defenders with the bayonet. The 
 survivors surrendered and were sent to the 
 rear, and a number of batteries and a large 
 amount of material remained in our hands. 
 By the 28th we were in contact with the 
 second German line. Our troops had been 
 magnificent, and they had been led by gen- 
 erals and officers whose courage and disre- 
 gard of self may be measured by the fact that 
 one general of division and four colonels had 
 already been wounded, and two colonels 
 killed. 
 
 Between Souain and Perthes lies a wooded 
 region where violent fighting had already 
 taken place in the previous February. We 
 had then carried a part of the German 
 
 95 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 trenches, and the enemy, aware that the 
 point was a vital one, had provided it with 
 powerful defenses. First came an almost 
 triangular salient, which was very strongly 
 held — we called it the Pocket. Beyond, 
 the fonnidably organized defenses of the 
 Trou-Bricot wood presented an almost in- 
 surmountable obstacle. This bit of country, 
 pocketed by craters and seamed and cross- 
 seamed with trenches and communication 
 trenches was nearly impregnable; yet it 
 failed to check the impetus of our troops. 
 
 The way in which the Pocket and the 
 Trou-Bricot were carried may be regarded 
 as a model of tliat particular type of war- 
 fare. The plan of attack, marvellously con- 
 ceived, was yet more marvellously executed. 
 The first thing to be done was to take the 
 Pocket. At the appointed hour our batteries 
 progressively lengthened their range, while 
 the infantry dashed forward. The attack 
 was carried out in perfect order, and half 
 an hoiu* later, at a quarter before ten, the two 
 
 96 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 columns which had stormed the extremities of 
 the salient were in contact. The work was 
 surrounded and the surviving defenders sur- 
 rendered. At the same time a battalion got 
 a footing on the southern edge of the wood of 
 the Trou-Bricot. The succeeding battalions, 
 skirting its eastern edge, executed a perfect 
 left turning movement and formed in echelon 
 along the communication trenches. Mean- 
 while, to the north of Perthes our troops had 
 pierced the three lines of German trenches 
 and, covered by our artillery, were sweeping 
 on to the ** York ' ' trench. They took it almost 
 without striking a blow. Farther to the east, 
 along the road from Perthes to Tahure, 
 greater difficulties were encountered. A Ger- 
 man mitrailleuse in a shelter kept up a trouble- 
 some fire; but finally one of our infantry 
 officers, with a sergeant, succeeded in bring- 
 ing up a gun to within a little over three hun- 
 dred yards of the mitrailleuse and promptly 
 smashed it. 
 Toward the end of the afternoon one of 
 
 97 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 our regiments had reached the road leading 
 from Souain to Tahure. The Trou-Bricot 
 wood was thus almost completely encircled, 
 and our soldiers dashed into the German 
 encampment from all sides and swept it 
 clear of its defenders. The surprise was 
 complete. Some of the German oflficers 
 were taken in bed; this fact, which is ab- 
 solutely established, testifies to the amazing 
 rapidity of the attack. It shows also the 
 confidence of the Germans in the secu- 
 rity of their position. They were certainly 
 justified in thinking the Trou-Bricot secure 
 from attack. They had spent the whole 
 winter and spring in perfecting its defenses, 
 and had fitted up luxurious quarters for 
 themselves in their impregnable fortress. The 
 houses of the adjacent villages and all the 
 chateaux in the neighborhood had been me- 
 thodically pillaged. The German officers had 
 transported to the subterranean apartments 
 of the Trou-Bricot chairs, sofas, beds, ward- 
 robes, and even pianos. On one of these 
 
 98 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 officers was found an extremely curious order 
 from a German quartermaster-general, for- 
 bidding the occupants of the houses and 
 chateaux of the neighborhood to take the 
 furniture with them when they left. "Such 
 things can no longer be permitted/' the order 
 gravely ran, "because, if the first occupants 
 carry away everything they take a fancy to, 
 nothing will be left for those who come after 
 them." 
 
 The surrounding of the Trou-Bricot was 
 one of the most successful manoeuvres of our 
 offensive. Throughout all this region the 
 majority of the German batteries were sur- 
 prised and taken in the height of the action, 
 and the gimners and loaders killed before 
 they knew what was happening. One of 
 our regiments advanced four kilometres in 
 two hours, taking on the way ten guns, three 
 of 105 mm. and seven of 77 mm. 
 
 Unhappily, after midday our rate of prog- 
 ress began to slacken. The thick weather 
 made it impossible for our artillery to follow 
 
 99 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 the advance and it became increasingly dif- 
 ficult to establish liaisons. From the " buttes ' ' 
 of Souain and Tahure the enemy poured a 
 converging fire on our troops, who were ad- 
 vancing over open ground. Nevertheless, 
 they pushed forward to the foot of the hill 
 of Tahure, where they dug themselves in. 
 But the wire entanglements protecting the 
 second German position were still intact, and 
 a fresh bombardment would have been re- 
 quired to carry it. 
 
 It was to the north of Mesnil that the 
 German resistance was most dogged. Our 
 attack made us masters of a hollow called 
 the ravine of Cuisines; but it was impossi- 
 ble for us to get beyond this point. 
 
 To the north of Beausejour, however, we 
 scored a swift and brilliant success. The 
 successive waves of the attacking force, fling- 
 ing themselves on the first lines, completely 
 submerged them. The onrush carried some 
 of the troops straight to the crest of Maisons 
 de Champagne; on the way they passed 
 
 lOO 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 through several batteries, killing the gunners 
 at their posts. It was in this sector that the 
 cavalry lent an unexpected support to the 
 infantry. Two squadrons of hussars, in 
 spite of a violent curtain fire, had swept past 
 our trenches and were galloping toward the 
 German batteries to the north of Maisons 
 de Champagne. On the way they reached a 
 trench in which the Germans had managed 
 to maintain themselves. The German ma- 
 chine-guns were instantly turned on the 
 hussars and a few horses fell. The hussars 
 immediately sprang to the ground and rushed 
 at the trenches with drawn swords, giving 
 the infantry time to rally under cover of 
 this diversion. The resistance of the enemy 
 was broken and six hundred prisoners were 
 taken at this particular point. 
 
 The heights of Massiges had also been 
 converted into what the Germans regarded 
 as an impregnable fortress, from the summit 
 of which they commanded all our principal 
 positions. But in a quarter of an hour our 
 
 lOI 
 
GENERiVL JOFFRE 
 
 infantiy had scaled the height and wore iii 
 pc>ssession of the C^ninan works. There fol- 
 lowed a teiTilie hand-grenade light in tlio com- 
 nuniieation trenches. As onr bomb-throwers 
 advanced the Cornians snrrendered in masses. 
 An nninlermpted chain of boiub-throwei*s, 
 like the chain of buckets at a fire, occupied the 
 irenches and the ridges of tlie hill. For more 
 than eight days the tight went on witliout 
 respite, and with unexampled fury. The 
 Germiuis brought up continual reinforce- 
 ments. All tlieir available troops were called 
 up to defend the hill of Massiges, which they 
 were resolved to hold at all costs. The Ger- 
 man gunnel's dropped beside their guns, the 
 grenadiei-s on.tlieir gxenade-boxes. And still 
 our tixxps continued slowly but steadily 
 to advance, till tinally w\^ obtained posses- 
 sion of the w'hole crest of IMassiges, main- 
 taining oui-selves there in spite of the furious 
 counter-attacks of the enemy. The Gennan 
 General Staff appears to have been especially 
 affected by the loss of tliis position. Ac- 
 
 I02 
 
^-^^M 
 
 uasi 
 
 rtali. 
 
 ^rf, 
 
 ■--'>»/;j 
 
 S 
 
 .>'/- 
 
 \^- 
 
 virtj 
 
 ,/< 
 
 ^0 
 
 B'j> 
 
 fjr.(^, 
 
 '(li 
 
 'A 
 
 ^"^^Oi 
 
 : FOR'FFfrrA'l |fj,\s ANI. 
 
MAP SHOWING THE FORMIDABLE SERIES OF GERMAN FORTIFICATIONS AND TRENCHES KNOWN AS "THE HAND OF MASStGES.' 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 cording to the German communiques, it was 
 voluntarily evacuated because our artillery 
 fire had made it untenable. But whenever 
 the Germans lose a position they profess to 
 have abandoned it of their own accord; after 
 the battle of the Marne they went so far as 
 to describe their retreat of sixty kilometres 
 as a strategic manoeuvre. As a matter of 
 fact, the heights of Massiges were won from 
 the enemy bit by bit, yard by yard, by the 
 dauntless courage of our bomb-throwers. 
 
 Our huge attack along a front of twenty- 
 five kilometres was supported by two others 
 designed to cover our flanks. The task of 
 the troops to whom this duty was allotted, 
 and especially of those operating on the 
 western borders of the Argonne, between 
 Servon and the wood of La Grurie, was 
 peculiarly difficult. It was their duty to 
 hold in check and to immobilize as large a 
 force of the enemy as possible, and they ful- 
 filled their mission brilliantly and with un- 
 faltering bravery. 
 
 103 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 Our offensive in Champagne is universally 
 acknowledged to have been a great tactical 
 success. Along the whole front the first 
 line of German works, three or four lines of 
 trenches, the strongest centres of defense, 
 the points of support, and the field-works 
 were all carried. At certain points our troops 
 even succeeded in making a breach in the 
 second line. If these breaches were not 
 wide enough to permit our supporting troops 
 to pour through them, it was chiefly because 
 the persistent bad weather made it impos- 
 sible to follow up our advantage. 
 
 In spite of this, the results obtained, ma- 
 terially as well as morally, were extremely 
 satisfactory. 
 
 In the first place, our tactical success had 
 an immediate strategical result of the first 
 importance. The Germans, roused to the 
 great risk they had run, recalled in hot haste 
 ten or twelve of their divisions operating on 
 the Russian front: that is to say, a body 
 of troops large enough to have permitted 
 
 104 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 them to press their advance into Russian 
 territory and perhaps obtain a decisive ad- 
 vantage over our allies. The fact is indis- 
 putable, and it would be hard to exaggerate 
 its importance. The check of the German 
 offensive in Russia coincided exactly with 
 our victory in Champagne, and the link be- 
 tween the two events is very close. 
 
 For several days the Germans were in a 
 state of great alarm. They understood that 
 their front had very nearly been broken 
 through. The hurried orders of their Gen- 
 eral Staff, the agitation of their troops, re- 
 vealed their anxiety and apprehension. 
 
 Our advance made us master of about 
 forty square kilometres of ground, and left 
 in our hands an enormous number of pris- 
 oners — twenty-five thousand men, three 
 hundred and fifty officers, one hundred and 
 fifty guns, besides machine guns, bomb- 
 throwers, and a large amount of other booty. 
 Such figures are the trophies of an important 
 victory. To measure their significance it is 
 
 105 
 
GENKRAL JOFFRE 
 
 only necessary to compare them with those of 
 some of the memorable battles which French 
 soldiei*s have fought and won in the past. 
 
 At Jena, for instance, we tcx^k fifteen thou- 
 sand prisonei-s at\d two hundred c^uns. The 
 Pi'ussian lapses on that cx'casion amounted to 
 eighteen thousand men. 
 
 At Austerlitz we took twelve thousand 
 prisonei'S and one hundred and eighty-six 
 gims, while tlie imp<.n'ial army lost twenty-five 
 thousand men. 
 
 For the first time since the bc^ginning of 
 the present war the German troops in Cham- 
 pagne suiTendered (7/ /}iiissc. Whole regi- 
 ments tlius dis:ippeared completely from tlie 
 German amiy; and for da>'s and days, along 
 the great highwa>' that nms through Chalons, 
 an uninternipted stream of Gennan prisoner 
 poured in from the front. 
 
 The lettei-s and journals found on these 
 prisoners and taken from the dead lx\u* wit- 
 ness to the extreme discouragement of the 
 enemy. On Uie 30th of September a lieu- 
 
 lOO 
 
TUK CriAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 tenant of reserves of the Tenth Army Corps 
 jotted down the following lines: 
 
 Yesterday sixteen of my men were killed 
 by torpedrxis. It is frightful. If only the 
 rain would begin again, or the fog come 
 back! But with this weather the aviators 
 are sure to be on us again, and we shall be 
 deluged with torpedrx^s and with shells from 
 the trenches. Clear skies, how I hate you! 
 Fog, fog, come back to help us ! 
 
 The German losses were extremely heavy 
 — it is not impossible to compute them ap- 
 proximately. At the beginning of September 
 the Germans had seventy battalions on the 
 Champagne front. Before the 25th of the 
 month, in anticipation of our attack, they 
 brought twenty-nine more battalions to this 
 front, forming a total of ninety-nine; and the 
 one hundred and fifteen thousand men com- 
 posing this force were immediately thrown 
 into action. 
 
 During the first days of the battle the 
 
 107 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 wastage on the German side was so great 
 that the General Staff was obliged to renew 
 its forces by despatching to the front ninety- 
 three new battalions. In the greater number 
 of regiments the losses were certainly not 
 lower than fifty per cent. Therefore it may 
 be safely assumed that the total of German 
 losses in Champagne amounted to one hun- 
 dred and forty thousand men. 
 
 The importance which General Joftre at- 
 tached to this victor}^ is shown by the fol- 
 lowing Order of the Day, which he addressed 
 to the army: 
 
 General Headqu.\rters, October 3d. 
 
 The commander-in-chief desii'es to trans- 
 mit to the troops under his command the 
 expression of his profound satisfaction re- 
 garding the results obtained by the attacks 
 up to the present time. 
 
 Twenty-five thousand prisoners, three hun- 
 dred and fifty officers, one hundred and fifty 
 gims, and materiel which it has not yet been 
 possible to count: such are the results of a 
 
 loS 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 victory of which the fame has rung through 
 Europe. 
 
 None of the sacrifices entailed have been 
 vain. All who were engaged have done their 
 part. Our present success is the surest pledge 
 of future victory. 
 
 The commander-in-chief is proud to have 
 under his command the finest troops that 
 France has ever known. 
 
 J. JOFFRE. 
 
 The most important result of our success 
 in Champagne is that for the first time since 
 the beginning of the war the Germans com- 
 pletely lost their initiative, and even any 
 serious ability to react against our attack. 
 One of their generals, Von Ditfurth, acknowl- 
 edges the fact explicitly in one of his orders. 
 
 "I have the impression,'' he writes, "that 
 our infantry is simply remaining on the de- 
 fensive. ... I cannot protest too ener- 
 getically against such a system, which neces- 
 sarily results in deadening in our troops all 
 spirit of aggression, leaving to the enemy com- 
 
 109 
 
c;KM RAl. JOl I RK 
 
 ploto freedom of action, and siibordinatmc: 
 our own alliuuie lo his iniiiative." 
 
 \'on PiiUirth wavS rii^ht. Tp to the date 
 of the Chanipai^ne otYensive the dernians. 
 whenever they Ux^t any pcxsition. however 
 ins i>;nit leant, considered it a point oi iionor 
 to retake what they had last at any east. 
 Now for the tirst time, after this important 
 victory, they seemed incapable of any serious 
 counter-attack. 
 
 They mereh attempted to ccather together 
 as lari^e a force as they could muster - the 
 rank and hie of the rei;iments all in inextri- 
 cable confusion and to mass it on their 
 s<.\'ond lines, whicii they felt to Ix^ giiively 
 menaced. That was ilie limit oi tlieir elTort. 
 No serious attempt was made to recover any 
 of the advantai^es i^ained by the I'Vench. It 
 is im|.x^ssible to lay tcx> much stress on this 
 fact. 
 
 In the coui*so of this tenable "match" we 
 Stv one of two advers;iries recei\e a territic 
 blow without tryini: to return it. There 
 
 no 
 
THE CHAMPAGNE OFFENSIVE 
 
 could te no better presage for the future. 
 It is true that the blow received has not laid 
 the adversary low; but no one in France 
 ever imagined that Germany, which has de- 
 voted half a century to the preparation of 
 this war, lavishing upon the task all her 
 wealth, her intelligence, her power of or- 
 ganization, and also her ruthless savagery, 
 could be disabled by one blow. The struggle 
 now going on is a question of patience, of 
 energy, and of endurance. Great results, 
 as we know, are most often obtained little 
 by little, and as the consequence of unin- 
 terrupted effort. 
 
 What has been accomplished in Cham- 
 pagne by the heroism of our men and the 
 intelligence of their chiefs is no small achieve- 
 ment. History will in due time record the 
 fact. 
 
 Ill 
 
Ill 
 
 TWO COLLABORATORS OF GENERAL 
 
 JOFFRE 
 
 General de Castelnau and General 
 
 FOCH 
 L GENER.VI. de CASTELNAU 
 
 IN tlie early da>'s of September, 1914, and 
 simultaneously with the battle of the 
 Marne, the Gemians made a formidable at- 
 tempt to get the better of our amiy in Lor- 
 raine. They were detennined, at no matter 
 what price, to seize Nancy. The Kaiser 
 came in person to Dieuze. Near by, on the 
 frontier, a glittering regiment of white cuiras- 
 siers stood in readiness; he intended to place 
 himself at their head and make Nancy the 
 scene of one of those preannounced spectac- 
 ular entries which, throughout this war, the 
 god of battles has consistently denied him. 
 
 112 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 With Nancy as a centre, and taking a 
 radius of twenty to twenty-five kilometres, 
 an arc traced from the banks of the Moselle, 
 near Pont-a-Mousson, to those of the Meurthe, 
 near Dombasle, would correspond approxi- 
 mately with the heights of the Grand-Cou- 
 ronne. This is the name given to an almost 
 unbroken line of considerable hills which 
 form a huge half-circle round Nancy from 
 the Meurthe to the Moselle. These heights 
 command striking glimpses of distant land- 
 scape. On a clear day the cathedral of 
 Metz is clearly visible : so also is the Cote de 
 Delme, which the Germans have strongly 
 fortified and made into one of the important 
 points of their lines of defense. At the foot 
 of the hills meanders the Seille, a little tribu- 
 tary of the Moselle. This stream forms the 
 frontier. 
 
 The Germans, impatient for a decision, 
 threw themselves recklessly against the Grand- 
 Couronne. Their attacks upon the hill of 
 Ste.-Genevieve on the north and upon the 
 
 113 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 Grand-Mont d'Amance at the centre were 
 particularly violent. Entire battalions of 
 men were sacrificed without a thought. In- 
 deed, at that moment of the war this was 
 the customary German method. Secure in 
 the belief that the war would be a matter of 
 weeks or, at most, of months, they felt no 
 need to economize the lives of their soldiers. 
 But, in spite of these unsparing efforts, the 
 Grand-Couronne stood firm. The great Mont 
 d'Amance alone received more than twenty 
 thousand shells without material injury. The 
 French troops holding the foot of the slopes 
 had to defend the valley through which the 
 main road to Nancy runs. The fate of the 
 capital of Lorraine was in their hands. These 
 troops were proof against every attack. They 
 fought to the extreme limit of human en- 
 durance. The Germans, exhausted and dis- 
 heartened, were forced to let go their hold 
 and beat a retreat. Nancy was saved. On 
 the night before their departure the enemy 
 attempted a cruel, cowardly, and typically 
 
 114 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 Teutonic revenge upon the city they had 
 failed to seize. Some forty shells were dropped 
 on Nancy from one of their long-distance 
 batteries; but only the suburbs of the town 
 were reached. 
 
 The splendid resistance offered by the 
 army of Lorraine contributed directly to 
 the victory of the Mame, and enabled us 
 to reap the full fruit of our success. Had 
 the army of Lorraine been shaken, had 
 Nancy fallen, the very pivot of all our forces 
 might have been imperilled. 
 
 In fact, the more one considers the battle 
 of the Mame, the more clearly it shows itself 
 as a gigantic unity, a perfectly contrived 
 whole, where all the elements were dove- 
 tailed into each other, without the smallest 
 gap between, where each of the great actors 
 called upon the stage fulfilled to the exact 
 letter the part he had to play. 
 
 The commander of the army of Lorraine 
 and the soul of this magnificent resistance, 
 was General de Castelnau, one of the close 
 
 "S 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 collaborators of General Joffre. Hardly was 
 the contest over and calm restored to this 
 portion of the line when General de Castel- 
 nau was suddenly sent to a new and hotly 
 contested section of the battle-front. After 
 the retreat of the Mame the first effort of 
 the Gennans was a turning movement against 
 our left wing. Molent engagemeiits took 
 place in the neighborhood of Peronne and 
 Amiens: each of the opposing armies tended 
 to shift their forces from east to west. Here, 
 as elsewhere, the German attacks came to 
 the same result. They w^ere entirely re- 
 pulsed. 
 
 General de Castelnau, who had led a single 
 army to the most brilliant success, and under 
 conditions of the utmost difficulty, was pro- 
 moted by General Joffre to the command 
 of a group of armies. In this capacity he 
 exercised the high control of our great of- 
 fensive in Champagne in September, 1915. 
 Here, once more, he added a new achieve- 
 ment to his former successes. Not long after- 
 
 ii6 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 ward, when General Joffre was appointed 
 commander-in-chief of all the armies of France, 
 on the Balkan front as well as the French, 
 General de Castelnau was made the chief of 
 his General Staff. He thus finds himself the 
 gemralissime' s right-hand man, sharing in 
 every moment of his work. 
 
 General de Castelnau was bom at St.- 
 Affrique, in the Aveyron. Somewhat short 
 in stature, but well-proportioned, thick-set, 
 and solidly built, with a bronzed complexion, 
 quick gestures, and a frank, alert expression, 
 he is a vigorous offshoot of a race which unites 
 southern vivacity with the sturdiness of a 
 mountain stock: a race of hot blood and 
 cold brain. The rough soil of the table-lands 
 of Languedoc and Gascony has, in fact, 
 produced a notable line of warriors. Typical 
 of them is Montluc, a man with whom Gen- 
 eral de Castelnau presents more than one 
 point of likeness. Montluc, too, was hard: 
 hard on others, but harder still on himself, 
 ardent in the cause of his service, possessed 
 
 117 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 of an unfailing imagination, a fluent and 
 vivid gift of language, distinguished for his 
 prowess in the field, and no less for his power 
 to recount the story of that prowess to the 
 delight of his contemporaries and of pos- 
 terity. The "Commentaries'' of Montluc 
 are certainly among the books to which, in 
 the course of this war, many Frenchmen, 
 and many who are not French, must most 
 willingly have returned. It is good to repeat 
 the proud and splendid words with which 
 those "Commentaries" open: "As there 
 are certain lands wherein some fruits do co- 
 piously abound, that elsewhere rarely flourish, 
 so also, in infinite number, does our Gas- 
 cony customarily bear great and valiant cap- 
 tains as a fruit proper and natural to itself." 
 Languedoc's fruitfulness in military leaders 
 was far from exhausting itself in Montluc. 
 In the wars of the Empire alone, Murat, 
 Bessieres, Marbot — all men of Gascon birth 
 — stand in the very foreground of the pic- 
 ture. 
 
 ii8 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 General de Castelnau's family had long 
 been settled in the Rouergue, at the foot of 
 the Gausses. His father, a lawyer of great 
 ability, well-known and greatly esteemed in 
 those parts, was for many years the mayor 
 of St.-Affrique. He had three sons: the eld- 
 est entered the Polytechnic School and is now 
 a brilliant engineer; the second followed his 
 father's profession and became deputy for 
 the Aveyron; the third, who chose the pro- 
 fession of arms, is Edouard de Castelnau, our 
 general. He was bom in 1851 and is now 
 sixty-five years of age. 
 
 We have here a perfect type of an old 
 French bourgeois family. In it, to the full, 
 are seen the finest and strongest qualities of 
 our race: its sense of duty, its love of indus- 
 try, its spirit of sacrifice. General de Castel- 
 nau is the father of ten children. Since the 
 beginning of the war three have been killed — 
 two in the earliest months of the fighting, 
 the third at the time of the French offensive 
 of September, 1915. In spite of these heavy 
 
 119 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 losses, he has pursued his great task without 
 allowing himself a single moment's distrac- 
 tion from the great cause intmsted to him. 
 Families like these — and they are more 
 numerous than foreigners usually suppose — • 
 form the backbone of our nation: it is they 
 who have done most to save France. 
 
 The foreigner, however intelligent and dis- 
 cerning, has seldom any opportunity of be- 
 coming acquainted with people of this type. 
 It is not only the idle and unobserv^ant tourist 
 who comes to spend a few weeks in Paris, 
 treating it as the best watering-place in the 
 world, and seeking, rigorously and exclu- 
 sively, for just those distractions and those 
 impressions which a watering-place can give, 
 to whom families of this kind are unknown. 
 Even those who come frequently to France, 
 or establish themselves there, have the ut- 
 most difficulty in obtaining a deeper insight 
 into French life than Paris society gives. 
 Paris society is in no sense t>Tpical of France; 
 and in a great crisis, such as war, it is an- 
 
 120 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 other France that is suddenly disclosed — 
 the true France, unknown and unsuspected. 
 It is no wonder that many who have never 
 known this France are amazed at the sudden 
 revelation. 
 
 Edouard de Castelnau began his educa- 
 tion in the Jesuit college of his native town. 
 At the age of eighteen he passed into the 
 military school of St.-Cyr, where French 
 cavalry and infantry officers receive their 
 training. This was in 1869. A year later 
 the Franco-German War broke out. The 
 young men of St.-Cyr, whether of senior or 
 junior standing, were immediately given com- 
 missions as second lieutenants and distrib- 
 uted among the regiments. Second Lieu- 
 tenant de Castelnau served through the 
 whole of this disastrous campaign. It was a 
 terrible first experience of life, which could 
 not but leave its impress on the minds of the 
 young men who underwent it. 
 
 In spite of all the deficiencies in our mili- 
 tary preparations, our troops came, no less 
 
 121 
 
CKNKRAL JOlFRi: 
 
 llian ihwc or tour tiinos. within an inch 
 nay. within a liair'v^ breadth of routini; tho 
 CuMinan anniOvS. Tlien, as ahvays, the moral 
 and mihtary c|uaUtios ot" the raeo were won- 
 derful. It was the hii^her eoniniand whieh 
 was inadequate. Ihider dilTerent leatlers 
 this or that disastrous defeat would, without 
 a doubt, have been ehani;ed into a brilliant 
 vietory, and l^iissia would ultimately have 
 been beaten. Unhappily, our leaders were 
 what they were, and Germany eame out of 
 the war a victorious and immensely ai;- 
 i^randi.ed [xnver. 
 
 Youni; de Castelnau, in the course of this 
 campaii^n. was promoted, tirst to the rank 
 oi lieutenant, and then io tliat oi captain. 
 For him. as for all who ser\ed with him, 
 there was only one task: to set about reor- 
 i^ani.ane;: the military power which had been 
 shattered in this disaster and to t;ive France 
 an army. 
 
 On this patriotic labor, this natuMial recon- 
 stniction, all Castelnau's efforts were hence- 
 
 laa 
 
c;i:m:kals dk casiklnau and ioch 
 
 forth concenlraled. His military life had 
 bcKun with an unsuccessful war with Ger- 
 many; it is crowned by another C^erman war 
 from which we have every assurance of com- 
 ing out victorious. The interval between 
 these two wars — a period of forty-four years 
 of hard study and hard thinking — was de- 
 voted by him, and by our other chiefs, to 
 one single problem — that of fitting our 
 army for a conflict which each one of them, 
 in spite of all the illusions of pacifists and 
 politicians, knew in his heart to be inevitable. 
 Forty-four years concentrated upon a sin- 
 gle purpose gives a wonderfully harmonious 
 unity — tenor vit^je, the I^omans called it — 
 to a human life. And a great and deeply 
 satisfying reward for their efforts and their 
 labors has come to the men who, like Joffre 
 and Castelnau, have had but one thought 
 all their lives — to prepare the army of 
 France for victory. 
 
 Castelnau mounted the successive grades 
 of a military career and at each stage re- 
 
 123 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 ceived the recognition due to him. He 
 passed into the Ecole de Guerre, was pro- 
 moted to a divisional staff, to the staff of an 
 army corps, and thence to the Great General 
 Staff, from time to time, at each of these 
 stages, putting in his periods of command 
 with the troops. 
 
 It was in 1906 that he became general, and 
 from that moment his rise was very rapid. 
 When, in 1913, General Joffre was designated 
 as conmiander-in-chief of the armies in the 
 field in case of war, he lost no time in calling 
 General de Castelnau to his side as chief 
 of staff. The confidence which General Joffre 
 reposes in him is unbounded. The two great 
 chiefs have for long been accustomd to work 
 together and with one accord, and in con- 
 tinuous collaboration they studied one by 
 one all the difficult problems of a future 
 war. This collaboration, begun and con- 
 tinued in times of peace, was to become closer 
 still upon the field of battle, where it has 
 
 124 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 come to fruition. After eighteen months of 
 war we find General de Castelnau acting as 
 second to the generalissimey Hving and work- 
 ing beside him, and placing his whole intel- 
 ligence and his whole activity at the service 
 of his great chief. 
 
 II. GENERAL FOCH 
 
 At the end of August, 1914, our great re- 
 treat was in progress. It was the eve of the 
 battle of the Mame. The Tenth Division 
 was retreating from the northeast of Charle- 
 ville, on the Belgian frontier, in the direction 
 of Rethel and Rheims, covering the left 
 wing of the fourth army. This retreat, 
 however, did not prevent it from dealing 
 some heavy thrusts at the enemy. On Au- 
 gust 28th, near Signy-FAbbaye, it overthrew 
 an entire corps of Saxons forming part of 
 Von Hausen's army, and, in spite of a decided 
 inferiority in numbers, won an incontestable 
 victory in the field. Nevertheless, in obe- 
 dience to general orders, it became necessary 
 
 125 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 in the middle of the night to turn and con- 
 tinue the retreat. But our soldiers retained 
 a very clear consciousness of having just 
 beaten the Germans; and, in spite of this 
 backward movement, their tone and confi- 
 dence were unimpaired. 
 
 Some days later at Bertoncourt, near 
 Rethel, they once more got the better of 
 the German invader. Two battalions of 
 colonial infantry stormed this village at the 
 point of the bayonet. The Saxons who oc- 
 cupied it had descended to the unspeakable 
 foul play of hiding behind a screen of civilians, 
 to shield themselves from the rifle-fire of our 
 troops. This fact is attested in official docu- 
 ments by a hundred depositions each more 
 crushing than the last. 
 
 On August 30th — it was a morning of 
 dog-day heat — a general was walking to 
 and fro in front of the Hotel de Ville in the 
 market-place of Attigny on the Aisne, a small 
 town a little above Rethel. His manner was 
 abrupt and jerky; his air was anxious, his 
 
 126 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 expression grave. From time to time a staff- 
 officer would arrive bringing him information 
 and presenting him with reports. He would 
 snatch each paper that was brought to him, 
 cast a rapid eye over it, and resume his walk. 
 A number of German prisoners were marched 
 past, marshalled by our soldiers with fixed 
 bayonets. They were a wretched band, 
 bare-headed, dishevelled, panting, covered 
 with dust and sweat. The general hardly 
 turned his eyes in their direction. The road 
 and the market-place were packed with an 
 agitated throng. Batteries, munition sec- 
 tions, endless convoys, succeeded one an- 
 other without a pause. The neighboring 
 guns grew louder and louder, as if the battle 
 were drawing nearer. A regiment passed. One 
 of the men noticed the general and nudged 
 his companion: "Look at the boss," he said. 
 "I shouldn't care to tackle him to-day." 
 
 "The boss" {le patron) was General Foch. 
 He had just assumed command of a new 
 army, expressly created for his control. 
 
 127 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 The placing of Foch's army in the centre 
 of our line, and of Manoury's army near 
 Paris, were two master-strokes of General 
 Joffre, admirably carried out by his sub- 
 ordinates — two strokes in which our whole 
 victory on the Marne was already implied. 
 The German menace in Belgium was be- 
 coming every moment graver and more pro- 
 nounced; our left army and the British force 
 were giving way. A new and rapid distri- 
 bution of our forces was imperative. Some 
 of our army corps were therefore passed from 
 east to west. In the Paris sector an army 
 under the command of General Manoury 
 was created behind the intrenched camp, 
 ready at a given moment to hurl itself on 
 Von Kluck and threaten to envelop his 
 troops. Similarly, in the centre, between 
 our fourth and fifth armies, a new army was 
 formed and intrusted to General Foch, who, 
 in Lorraine, had brilliantly distinguished him- 
 self in command of one of our finest corps — 
 the Twentieth, of Nancy. 
 
 128 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 Events were not slow in proving the wis- 
 dom and insight of the measures taken by 
 General Joffre in the full agitation of re- 
 treat. A few days later the retreat was at 
 an end and the battle of the Mame had be- 
 gun. 
 
 The Germans recognized the deadly threat 
 upon their left, where Von Kluck, sharply 
 attacked by Manoury, was compelled to 
 expose himself to two fronts at a time. They 
 attempted to get out of the danger by a 
 vigorous offensive directed on our centre. 
 The Prussian Guard, another of their crack 
 corps, made a violent attack in the neighbor- 
 hood of Fere-Champenoise and the marshes 
 of St.-Gond. It was at this point that Gen- 
 eral Foch was situated. So spirited was the 
 onslaught of the Germans that they suc- 
 ceeded in shaking part of Foch's troops. 
 His entire right was driven back to the south 
 of Fere-Champenoise. His army no longer 
 lined up horizontally with our general front; 
 it had become a vertical line, an elbow. 
 
 129 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 Happily, the divisions on his left held firm. 
 At Mondement, at the southern extremity of 
 the marshes of St.-Gond, they clung to their 
 positions and offered a dogged and heroic 
 resistance. 
 
 But, though the right of this army gave 
 way, the general in command of it, Foch, did 
 not bend for an instant. Energy, tenacity, 
 resistance ai'e his conspicuous qualities. Vic- 
 tory is above all things a question of will; 
 and it was by sheer force of will that victory 
 was destined to be wrested from the enemy's 
 hands. The general communicated his con- 
 fidence to all around him. The word of com- 
 mand was to hold on; to hold on whatever 
 happened and at whatever price. And this 
 was not enough. He achieved far more: he 
 attacked. He accomplished a tour de force, 
 almost a miracle: with an army three- 
 fourths defeated he passed to the offensive. 
 
 A general who had been placed under 
 Foch's command came to report that his 
 men were tired out: his troops were at the 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 end of their tether. The rebuff was sharp: 
 "Tired out!*' replied the general. "So are 
 the Germans. You are to attack.'' 
 
 Yet there was a moment, during the last 
 two days of the great battle, when General 
 Foch's position was highly critical. One of 
 his army corps and a reserve division were 
 beaten back beyond Fere-Champenoise. On 
 his left, which up to now had held firm, the 
 Germans after a terrible attack succeeded in 
 occupying the Chateau de Mondement. At 
 nightfall, on the evening of the 8th, the great 
 plain, seen from the height of the cliff of 
 Broye, presented a prodigious spectacle — 
 a veritable vision of the Apocalypse. Cloud 
 upon cloud of gleaming red and bronze rolled 
 over it; the last rays of the sun lit up the 
 storms of dust raised by the guns and by the 
 great host of horse and foot; the bursting 
 shells flashed incessantly; and over the whole 
 scene rose the flames of mighty conflagra- 
 tions. The Germans had only to reach a 
 little beyond Mondement to become imme- 
 
 131 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 diate masters of the entire cliff, from the 
 summit of which their heavy artillery could 
 blast our forces in the plain unhindered and 
 turn our retreat into a rout. General Foch 
 demanded a final effort of heroism from his 
 sorely tried army, and the army answered 
 to his call. The Chateau of Mondement, 
 which the Germans had just seized, was re- 
 taken by our troops after three successive 
 attacks. The last of these, more violent 
 than the rest, was made at nightfall with 
 the help of two guns daringly moved up to 
 within four hundred yards in order to shell 
 the defenders of the place. At the most 
 critical moment of the conflict General Foch 
 improvised and executed an amazingly skil- 
 ful manoeuvre to which our final victory was 
 due. The Germans had driven themselves 
 into our army like a wedge; their front took 
 the form of an elbow. General Foch was 
 inspired to turn to our own advantage a 
 position which appeared wholly favorable 
 to the enemy. He slipped one of his divi- 
 
 132 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 sions abruptly from left to right, in such a 
 way as to throw it suddenly upon the Ger- 
 man flank. The movement took the enemy 
 by surprise. On a smaller scale it was the 
 same skilful manoeuvre as that by which 
 General Joffre threw Manoury's army on 
 the flank of Von Kluck. In each case the 
 result was admirable. The two manoeuvres 
 were the deciding cause of the German re- 
 treat and won us the victory of the Mame. 
 
 Every frontal attack which the Germans 
 had attempted had completely failed. They 
 were gravely menaced on their flank, their 
 troops were totally exhausted, their muni- 
 tions at an end. This was the situation 
 which faced the German Ge\ieral Staff. They 
 recognized that to go on was to run the risk 
 of a complete disaster. The Kaiser in person 
 signed with his own hand the memorable 
 order to retreat. France and its capital 
 were saved. 
 
 To this brilliant end General Foch had 
 largely contributed. General Joffre recog- 
 
 ^33 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 nized the fact a few days later, in the con- 
 gratulations which his ordre du jour offered 
 to his brilliant collaborator. 
 
 Three weeks passed. The Germans, hav- 
 ing failed to take Paris or destroy the French 
 army, now tried to outflank us on their right. 
 They pushed their forces farther and farther 
 toward Amiens and Arras. But their stroke 
 was parried; and they found us ready with 
 an answer. Our army corps were moved 
 from right to left and from east to west. 
 These two strategic movements, or **oquades,** 
 on the French and German sides developed 
 parallel to one another. The Germans were 
 as incapable here as they had been elsewhere 
 of making the least advance or gain. The 
 two armies extended their fronts more and 
 more to the north. They climbed toward 
 Lille and the Yser. This is the phase which 
 has been called "the race for the sea.** And 
 when at length the North Sea was reached 
 at Nieuport the two adversaries must needs 
 come to a halt. 
 
 134 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 Just before this the Germans, through 
 their crushing superiority in heavy artil- 
 lery, were enabled to seize Antwerp. The 
 little Belgian army made a fortunate escape 
 toward Ghent and Fumes. They were en- 
 abled to do this by the heroic resistance of 
 the French naval brigade under the com- 
 mand of Admiral Ronarc'h, which, step by 
 step, contested the enemy's advance. The 
 English army began to move northward 
 toward Ypres from the positions on the banks 
 of the Aisne which it had occupied since the 
 battle of the Mame. The Germans there- 
 upon decided to make a terrific effort to 
 overturn the English army, the Belgian army, 
 and the French troops which lay between 
 them. This was the signal for the battle 
 of the Yser. 
 
 The violence of that battle and the fury 
 of the German assaults can never be de- 
 scribed. The Kaiser, after failing to take 
 Paris, must have his revenge, and the re- 
 venge must be dazzling. He decided that 
 
 135 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 at any cost Calais must be his. Now was 
 the moment when all Germany abandoned it- 
 self to a hatred of England that amounted 
 to frenzy. Lissauer had just composed that 
 amazing and monstrous song, destined surely 
 to remain in human history as a typical ex- 
 ample of the degree of aberration and criminal 
 folly to which a self-infatuated people can 
 attain. 
 
 Those who ruled the counsels of Germany 
 were convinced that if Calais could be reached 
 their strength in submarines would enable 
 them to establish a close blockade against 
 England, isolate her, and hold her at their 
 mercy. The Kaiser, wishing to inflame the 
 fury of his troops and to obtain from them 
 a superhuman effort of courage and energy 
 came in person to take part in the attack 
 which he believed would prove decisive. 
 He established himself at Roulers; he passed 
 his troops in review and exalted their enthu- 
 siasm. The Germans, who desired to break 
 through at whatever cost, attacked in great 
 
 136 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 masses, as though with the stroke of a club. 
 On one day they threw no less than seven 
 divisions, one upon the other, against the 
 French and English lines. The English, 
 left to themselves, must have bent before 
 this terrific onslaught. It was absolutely 
 necessary to support them. Some of our 
 best army corps were abruptly taken from 
 certain parts of our front, sent in rapid suc- 
 cession by rail, and thrown upon the Yser. 
 It was a human dike raised to stay the Ger- 
 man inundation. 
 
 These strategic movements, far superior 
 in scale to anything imagined before the 
 present war, were carried out with great 
 rapidity and perfect order. Yet one need 
 only cast an eye on the map to realize that 
 this concentration of forces upon the Yser 
 involved far greater difficulties on our side 
 than on the enemy's. The front from the 
 North Sea to the Vosges makes almost a 
 right angle, running north and south to 
 Compiegne, and afterward east and west. 
 
 137 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 The Germans are within the angle; we out- 
 side it. It follows that they are more readily 
 able than ourselves to send rapid reinforce- 
 ments to one or other of their wings. 
 
 In the first days of October General Foch, 
 who directed his army in the centre of the 
 general line, had been transferred to our 
 left wing and given a far more important 
 command. All our armies of the north were 
 placed at his orders. He had, moreover, 
 the delicate task of achieving a complete 
 unity and co-ordination of effort with the 
 English and Belgian armies. He was, in 
 short, the commander-in-chief of all the 
 troops which resisted the German onslaught 
 on the Yser: a heavy task which was once 
 again to yield him a brilliant success. 
 
 The battle opened. The Germans called 
 up continual reserves and forced the pace 
 of their attack. But General Foch's con- 
 fidence remained unbroken : it communicated 
 itself to all who came near him. As each 
 battalion arrived it was thrown into the 
 
 138 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 furnace. Not a day, not an hour, could be 
 lost. Every gap had to be filled, and rein- 
 forcements flung incessantly to strengthen 
 our tottering line. 
 
 The whole flat region between the Yser 
 and the sea is typical of the Low Countries: 
 water, water encroaching and submerging, is 
 everywhere. Scratch the soil and water ap- 
 pears. It is a fat and fertile country, sat- 
 urated and oozing with humidity, blankly 
 monotonous to look upon. Before the war 
 a dense population crowded this rich land of 
 Flanders. How much more crowded was it 
 then, when through every village and hamlet 
 the stream of Belgian refugees had over- 
 flowed in thousands! And where should 
 room be found for all these army corps of 
 French soldiers arriving one after the other, 
 ceaselessly? It was lucky that these men 
 and their officers were the easiest and most 
 good-natured in the world. And, after all, 
 the human race is capable of infinite com- 
 pression. 
 
 139 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 Our troops did not limit themselves to 
 the defensive. From time to time they 
 passed to the counter-attack with great 
 spirit. They attempted to seize the Cha- 
 teau of Dixmude in order to gain the bridge- 
 head which we hold at that point. It was a 
 dark and gloomy winter's day, such as is 
 frequent in that region, with a thick mist 
 and a depressing, sooty sky. Quite near us 
 this foggy atmosphere was cleft by the forked 
 fire of bursting shells, for here at the bridge 
 of Dixmude the Germans were scarcely a 
 thousand yards away. 
 
 From Nieuport to Thann, from the North 
 Sea to the Vosges, many cities have been 
 destroyed in the course of this war. But 
 Dixmude endured the heaviest bombard- 
 ment that a town can suffer. There is not 
 a house unstruck, not a road that has not 
 been pitted by shells. And what pits they 
 are! One of them measured eight yards in 
 diameter, and three and a half yards in depth. 
 A carriage and horses, a whole section of 
 
 140 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 infantry, could be hidden in it. Indescrib- 
 ably melancholy, in the dismal winter twi- 
 light, are the roads and squares of the little 
 town where the tempest of war has raged. 
 It is an empty city, overtaken by death. 
 
 When one thinks of the battle of the Yser, 
 the violence of the attacks which the Ger- 
 mans renewed week after week, their un- 
 ceasing efforts, their reckless sacrifice of 
 human life, one wonders how any resistance 
 was possible. Our battalions were hardly 
 out of the train before they were thrown into 
 the thick of the fighting; the country was 
 unknown to them; their trenches, hastily 
 contrived, were far from perfect; night and 
 day they struggled in the mud. Yet, in spite 
 of all, they held firm. At every point the 
 German thrust was checked. 
 
 The same qualities of endurance and te- 
 nacity, the same heroism which won for us 
 the battle of the Marne, secured for General 
 Foch and the excellent troops he commanded 
 this successful issue on the Yser. General 
 
 141 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 Foch*s attitude during these hard days must 
 have recalled to many some words which 
 he spoke at the Ecole de Guerre with all the 
 emphasis of a vigorous faith. He quoted a 
 phrase of Joseph de Maistre: "A lost battle 
 is a battle one believes oneself to have lost; 
 in a material sense no battle can be lost/* 
 And he added: "A battle, then, can only 
 be lost morally. But, if so, it is also morally 
 that a battle is won." One might add to 
 this aphorism another: A battle won is a 
 battle in which you refuse to acknowledge 
 defeat. 
 
 The conduct of General Foch on the Yser 
 and in the region of Fere-Champenoise corre- 
 sponded exactly with his professions in the 
 Ecole de Guerre. For Foch, before putting 
 the art of war into practice on the field of 
 battle, had already taught it in his lectures 
 and published works. His is the deeply inter- 
 esting case of a famous professor of strategy 
 called by the turn of events to give his theories 
 and his teaching a living application. It is 
 
 142 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 worth while to examine how this came about. 
 How, and in what circumstances, were the 
 theories fitted to the facts ? 
 
 General Foch was bom in 1851, the son 
 of a civil servant at Tarbes. He is thus an 
 exact contemporary of General de Castelnau 
 and General Joffre. As soon as he entered 
 college his teacher in mathematics declared: 
 "His genius is for geometry; he has the 
 makings of a polytechnician." And, in fact, 
 General Foch, making good this prediction, 
 entered the Ecole Polytechnique, from which, 
 in due course, he graduated as an artillery- 
 man. While holding the rank of lieutenant- 
 colonel, he was appointed professor in strategy 
 and general tactics at the Ecole de Guerre. 
 Ten years later, after holding commands in 
 various arms, he was made director of this 
 same school. 
 
 He has condensed the drift of his teaching 
 into two books now celebrated, "The Prin- 
 ciples of War'' and "The Conduct of War.'' 
 Here may be found his whole theory of war 
 
 143 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 illustrated with a prodigal abundance of 
 facts and instances. He starts with the 
 principle that it is an absolute mistake, in 
 war, to take nothing but the material factors 
 into account. Over and above the "earthly'* 
 element of military art remains what Napo- 
 leon called the ''divine'' element. Hence 
 war is not an exact science, but a terrific 
 and passionate drama, where man with his 
 moral and physical faculties is cast for the 
 principal part. 
 
 Instruction in war is, however, necessary, 
 because for most men the realities of the 
 battle-field are not favorable to inspiration. 
 Most often they have a paralyzing effect. 
 Under fire it is all one can do to carry out 
 what one has learned, to act up to the knowl- 
 edge which a long and difiicult training has 
 built up. The smallest success in military ac- 
 tion presupposes long preparation in thought 
 and study. Genius is not universal, and in 
 its absence a general can rise to the height 
 of his task only by method and by science. 
 
 144 
 
GKNKRALS DE CASIELNAU AND lOCH 
 
 The function of the lonr/ military education 
 is to give officers the ri^^ht reflex actions on 
 the field of battle. But these are only to be 
 acquired by sustained and constant effort. 
 
 "Modem war," says Ckneral Foch, ''is 
 a national war." The end it sets itself is 
 not the conquest or maintenance of a prov- 
 ince but the defense or propagation of prin- 
 ciples: spiritual ends and philosophical ideas. 
 It brings into play the feelings and passions 
 of every soldier. When Bonaparte in his 
 famous proclamation to the army of Italy 
 based his appeal on those passions he inau- 
 gurated a new era in war. 
 
 On the subject of the intellectual discipline 
 of commanders General Foch has written 
 several pages which rank among the best 
 that the ideal of military duty has ever in- 
 spired. "In war, except for the commander- 
 in-chief, every officer is a subordinate. Every 
 one of them, in seeking to command must 
 seek to obey. But obedience is a difficult 
 art. Many circumstances — to say nothing. 
 
 145 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 of the enemy — interfere with tlie execution 
 of tlie order received. To conquer these cir- 
 cumstances demands a mental discipUne that 
 is intelligent and alert. A conmiander, tlien, 
 should first and foremost be a man of char- 
 acter, but he should also be capable of the 
 comprehension and resource necessaiy for 
 obedience. . . . Discipline involves a mental 
 activity — an activity of reflection: it is 
 not a matter of immobility, like the silence of 
 the ranks. Discipline, in a commander, does 
 not mean merely tlie execution of orders 
 witliin convenient, just, rational, or even 
 possible limits. It means a frank entry into 
 tlie thoughts and intentions of whoever is 
 in supreme command, and tlie adoption of 
 every possible means to satisfy tliem. Dis- 
 cipline does not mean a silent acquiescence 
 that limits itself to whatever can be under- 
 taken without compromising oneself; it is 
 not the art of avoiding responsibilities. It 
 is the art of acting in the spirit of a given 
 order, and calls us, to tliat end, to find in 
 
 146 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 our intelligence a means, of executing the 
 order, and in our character the energy to 
 take the necessary risks/' 
 
 General Foch illustrates these definitions 
 by the case of General de Failly, who on the 
 4th and 6th of August, 1870, was either un- 
 able or unwilling to carry out his orders to 
 go first to Bitche and then to Reichshoffen, 
 with the result that he failed to take part in 
 the battle where the army of Alsace was over- 
 whelmed, and where his presence would as- 
 suredly have changed the issue. And Gen- 
 eral Foch continues: ''At a time like ours, 
 which believes itself able to neglect ideal 
 elements, which pretends to live realistically, 
 rationally, positively, and to avoid abstrac- 
 tions, when everything is reduced to terms of 
 science and to a more or less ingeniously 
 contrived empiricism, we are left with but 
 one resource against error and disaster. That 
 resource — and it is both sure and fertile 
 in results — lies in abandoning ourselves to 
 the service of two abstractions of a moral 
 
 147 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 order, duty and discipline. And this ser- 
 vice, if it is to lead to success, must be backed 
 up by science and good sense." Such are 
 the governing ideas of General Foch. 
 
 In daily life the general is a man of few 
 words. He speaks with mathematical con- 
 ciseness, and his conversation is always full 
 of vigor. Cold, calm, and self-possessed, he 
 is conspicuous for just the qualities which 
 the English most prize. Add to these his 
 close knowledge of the English army, along 
 with his keen sense of the national tempera- 
 ment and character, and we shall easily 
 comprehend the influence he exerts over 
 every Englishman who comes in contact 
 with him. To this influence is due in large 
 measure the perfect understanding and co- 
 hesion which has existed between the French 
 and English armies from the very beginning 
 of the war. It was, indeed, far from being 
 the simplest of tasks to insure this cohesion. 
 Great delicacy and tact were obviously called 
 for. General Foch, by the force of character 
 
 148 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 which every Englishman recognizes in him, 
 achieved it without the smallest difficulty. 
 
 Superficially, at any rate, the trench war- 
 fare in which the two armies have now been 
 so long rooted is very different from the kind 
 of war that General Foch has written of and 
 taught. It was open to the Germans, after 
 the battle of the Mame, to continue the 
 free-moving warfare from which alone rapid 
 and decisive results can be obtained. They 
 preferred to dig themselves in. This course, 
 it is true, has enabled them thus far to hold 
 firm. But by this course, it is no less true, 
 they are renouncing the possibility of beat- 
 ing us, of putting us once for all out of ac- 
 tion. Trench warfare for them was not, and 
 can never be, more than a pis-aller. The 
 enemy well know that this state of siege, by 
 its very nature, and in proportion to its 
 length, must necessarily work out to their 
 disadvantage, since Germany, cut off as it 
 is from all use of the sea, plays the part of 
 the besieged, while France and England are 
 
 149 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 the besiegers. Consequently, the mere fact 
 that the Germans have chosen or accepted 
 this kind of war upon the western front is 
 in itself an admission of impotence and de- 
 feat. 
 
 Moreover, whether we fight in trenches 
 or in the open, it is still by the moral qualities 
 of the belligerents that victory will finally 
 be decided. From this point of view we have 
 no cause for uneasiness, for the moral supe- 
 riority is ours. And here the confidence of 
 General Foch in the ultimate issue is un- 
 equalled. To him, as to General de Castel- 
 nau, the war has brought heavy private 
 sorrows. His son and his son-in-law were 
 killed in the earliest months. He has said 
 nothing of his own grief, but has given an 
 example to all by redoubling his efforts and 
 his perseverance. 
 
 In this war battles, which used to be a 
 matter of hours or of days, are now pro- 
 longed to months and years. Many on- 
 lookers are so struck by the paradox of this 
 
 150 
 
GENERALS DE CASTELNAU AND FOCH 
 
 slow development that they are tempted 
 to disbelieve in any final decision or rup- 
 ture of the equilibrium. But we, who live 
 among the actors in the drama, have, on the 
 contrary, a mathematical certainty that the 
 rupture will come and that it will come in 
 our favor, and that on an enfeebled Ger- 
 many the Allies by a common effort will 
 one day deliver, their united stroke. 
 
 151 
 
IV 
 
 JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 lltb-15tb January, 1915. 
 T?OR the last ten days our army corps, 
 -■- tired out by the hard fighting which 
 we have had in Flanders, on the borders of 
 the Yser and in the region around Ypres, 
 is resting between Montdidier and Amiens. 
 
 Accustomed as we are to the gray mud 
 of Flanders, this dry, clean, smiling country 
 on the confines of Picardy and the Ile-de- 
 France seems to us paradise. 
 
 There are then really villages which are 
 not shelled every day, houses which have 
 not been knocked to pieces by big guns, 
 good beds in which one may sleep for hours 
 almost out of sound of the cannon! And 
 above all, there are our own French roads, 
 wide and well made, where two or three 
 carriages may go abreast without risk of 
 
 152 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 collision or overturning. I think perhaps we 
 French are prouder of our good roads than 
 of anything else. 
 
 We are rather afraid, however, that our 
 time for rest will not be long. 
 
 But to what point on the front will they 
 "apply" us? Near Rheims, where we have 
 been already, or in the region around Chalons, 
 or in Alsace ? One guess is as good as another, 
 and of what use is it to rack one's brain 
 when it is so simple just to wait? Some of 
 these days or nights a telegram will come 
 to settle the question. . . . 
 
 The telegram is here, and we are to be 
 sent to the — th Army in the Argonne. The 
 entrainment of the troops is to begin at once. 
 Some of us are to make the journey by motor, 
 and I am to go among the first, to get our 
 encampment ready. 
 
 Our route is by Compiegne, Villers-Cot- 
 terets, Chalons, Ste.-Menehould, and I am 
 told that our temporary camp is to be a 
 Httle to the north of Revigny. This is the 
 
 153 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 region which the Kronprinz has been "work- 
 ing/* and his army deserves especial men- 
 tion for the accompUshed way in which it 
 sets fire to villages and loots private property. 
 In one house which I saw, the most con- 
 siderable in the village, absolutely nothing 
 had been left except the heaviest pieces of 
 furniture. In this place our men were on 
 the heels of the Germans, who, therefore, 
 did not have time to burn down the houses 
 as they did at Sommeilles, Sermaize, Cler- 
 mont and almost all the villages of the coun- 
 tryside, although they had the same amiable 
 intentions here also. During their retreat 
 the mayor was arrested and kept a pris- 
 oner in the mairie by a guard with fixed bay- 
 onets, being told that '* To-morrow morning 
 when our men have all got out, you will be 
 shot and your village burned to the ground." 
 Luckily our soldiers arrived during the night, 
 so the commune and its chief magistrate were 
 saved. 
 The position of our corps will extend from 
 
 154 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 the Aisne to a point somewhat above Servon, 
 and our job is to defend a hne which divides 
 the wood of La Grurie and stretches beyond 
 Four-de-Paris. We shall be in the midst of 
 the forest of Argonne. 
 
 I am going ahead to see about our halt- 
 ing-places. It snowed last night, the coun- 
 try is all white, and the roads in very bad 
 condition. 
 
 Ste,-Menehould. — This town fairly swarms 
 with troops. I made a short halt at the 
 Hotel de Metz, an old inn on the main road 
 between Metz and Paris, formerly in great 
 repute; the ample kitchen, with its innumer- 
 able copper vessels, evoked a vision of the 
 postmasters and postilions of a time when 
 travelling, if laborious, was also leisurely. 
 
 We went down the valley of the Aisne as 
 far as La Neuville-au-Pont. It is a common- 
 place village enough, but the main door of the 
 church is charming, and it has a delicate 
 Renaissance fagade, one of those exquisite 
 
 155 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 jewels which one is surprised and enchanted 
 to find even in tlie remotest corners of pro- 
 vincial France. 
 
 The front which we hold starts from the 
 Aisne, at the ford of Melzicourt, a little 
 farther up than Servon, and at first it goes 
 straight toward the east, crossing the road 
 from Servon to Vienne-le-Chateau, and then 
 strikes into the wood of La Grurie, going in 
 a wavy line with ins and outs, as far as the 
 Fontaine-aux-Chamies, which is in the heart 
 of the wood. From there it bends south- 
 ward, crossing the brook which ams from 
 the Fontaine-aux-Charmes about a kilometre 
 from La Harazee, where it makes another 
 elbow. Then it turns again toward the south 
 until it is only three hundred metres from 
 Four-de-Paris, and from there it goes west into 
 the Bolante wood. With its countless salients 
 and indentations this line is uncomfortably 
 lilve the teeth of a saw, which is precisely what 
 is going to make it so hard to hold. 
 
 The officers of the corps which we have 
 
 156 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 come to relieve have given us any amount 
 of information about our new sector, which 
 may be summed up as: "You will have a 
 stiff job; the troops you are facing are splen- 
 didly equipped for this sort of fighting, they 
 are in fine spirits because they have had 
 some success, and they mean to push on, 
 no matter how many men they lose/* 
 
 The corps in front of us is the Sixteenth 
 from Metz, one of the finest and best drilled 
 in the whole German army. We had to do 
 with the Prussian Guard at the marshes of 
 St.-Gond, during the battle of the Mame, and 
 a little later before Rheims, and we also met 
 the Fifteenth Corps from Strasburg in the 
 Ypres region: this last corps and that of 
 Metz are in many respects even better than 
 the Guard. Our friends also told us that 
 the general in command of the Sixteenth 
 Corps is Von Mudra, an engineer, very strong 
 on making mines, who has with him a num- 
 ber of sappers and mine-layers. Every ten 
 days or so an attack is made on one or other 
 
 157 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 of our sectors, which is materially helped by 
 skilfully prepared mines. 
 
 This is the news which we get from the 
 men who have lived here for the past four 
 months. It does seem likely that our job 
 will not be altogether an easy one. 
 
 As soon as I could get a couple of hours 
 to myself, I went to see General Gouraud, 
 who was wounded a short time ago and is 
 not far from here. 
 
 The road from Ste.-Menehould to Cler- 
 mont by Les Islettes is enchanting. It runs 
 through the breadth of the great forest, and 
 from the top of a hill, before one begins to 
 go down toward the hollow of the Biesme, 
 there is a wide and noble view over the 
 rounded flanks of the Argonne, with woods, 
 and still more woods as far as one can see. 
 
 I found General Gouraud all alone, in very 
 attractive quarters, half chateau, half farm- 
 house. Almost every village in the Argonne 
 has one of these houses of the better sort, 
 which in most cases still belong to the de- 
 
 158 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 scenclants of the master glass-workers who 
 built them. 
 
 The general was hit by a bullet during a 
 very hard fight in which his division was 
 engaged last month, but by great good luck 
 the ball passed between his arm and his 
 body, grazing two arteries without touching 
 either. It was one of those extraordinary 
 chances which fortune reserves for the favor- 
 ites on whom she has set her seal, and who 
 are destined for great ends. 
 
 Although he still has some fever, and the 
 surgeons are obliged from time to time to 
 **hack aV him, as he calls it, the general 
 has not been willing to give up his com- 
 mand. He also is facing an adversary who 
 gives him little chance to rest. The Ger- 
 mans make one attack after another, but 
 are being held in check until such time as 
 they can be repulsed. 
 
 What clear, masterful eyes the general 
 has, and what a fine soldierly head ! As I 
 left him I thought of what was said of one 
 
 159 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 of Napoleon's great generals: "Merely to 
 look at hini made men brave/* 
 
 A little snow fell yesterday, and there 
 was frost last night. This morning it is 
 clear with bright sunshine. We started on 
 horseback from La Neuville in the direction 
 of La Harazee. After passing Moiremont, 
 the road goes down, skirting the forest, to 
 Vienne-la-Ville, in the valley of the Aisne. 
 Fifteen hundred metres farther, we left this 
 valley for that of the Biesme, which cuts 
 across the forest of Argonne, first from 
 north to south, then from east to west. 
 Vienne-le-Chateau comes next, a picturesque 
 mountain village among thick trees. The lit- 
 tle river runs boiling through it, and perched 
 on a rock high above is the old castle which 
 dominates the valley. This is one of the 
 famous ''passes of the Argonne.'* Another 
 kilometre brought us to La Harazee, and 
 from there we came back, cutting straight 
 across the forest. There are many paths and 
 
 1 60 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 trails, but outside of them the undergrowth 
 is so thick that it would be almost impossible 
 to force a way through it. The dampness of 
 this region is proverbial. Springs gush down 
 all the slopes, and the heavy clay soil allows 
 no water to run off, so the roads soon be- 
 come almost impassable. The men splash 
 and slip about, often going in up to their 
 ankles, and if they are to be moved from 
 one place to another it is absolutely neces- 
 sary to make a solid path by laying down 
 round billets of wood, one against another. 
 A trench is scarcely dug before it is three- 
 quarters full of water, and the men have 
 to bale it out with pails and shovels, or even 
 with their tin plates and mess-bowls, as if 
 it were a leaky boat. 
 
 That is the sort of place in which they 
 have been fighting desperately, day and 
 night, month in and month out. 
 
 In some parts of the forest the firing has 
 been so severe and prolonged that the trees 
 are cut to pieces; the branches have been 
 
 i6i 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 hacked off one after another, until what is 
 left of them suggests the stumps of human 
 limbs. 
 
 The narrow valley of the Biesme makes a 
 deep cleft in the Argonne, almost like an 
 excavation, and it is by no means the only 
 one. On all sides and in every direction 
 these deep ravines with steep sides, which 
 the people of the country call "barribans,'' 
 are insurmountable obstacles to any one 
 wishing to cross the forest except by certain 
 paths. 
 
 January 19th, — We have been here six 
 days, and to-day the Germans made three 
 attacks on our positions. In the western 
 sector a big minemverfer exploded in our 
 trenches, knocking them about badly, where- 
 upon one of the enemy's columns rushed 
 forward against our first line, and managed 
 to get a foothold in the sector of one of our 
 companies. As soon as that happened our 
 
 162 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 reserve company came to the rescue, and 
 took back all the lost ground except in two 
 places. After dinner we went at it again, 
 and this time got back all the trench, into 
 which the Germans had already brought a 
 number of bags of cement, in order to lose 
 no time in consolidating the position which 
 they thought they had taken from us. 
 
 In the sector to the right, the Germans 
 exploded two mines in front of the parapet 
 of one of our trenches, at a point known as 
 the salient of Marie-Therese, but our men 
 instantly filled up the great funnel-like hol- 
 lows, and our sappers made short work of 
 putting the position back as it had been 
 before. At six o'clock in the afternoon there 
 was yet another attack on our front at Fon- 
 taine-aux-Charmes. Our infantry fire and 
 the curtain fire of the artillery made the 
 Germans stop short in their first advance, 
 but they came on again throwing hand- 
 grenades and bombs and got as far as our 
 trenches. Then the fighting became hand 
 
 163 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 to hand and they were pushed back, def- 
 initely this time. 
 
 This afternoon, near Moiremont, our gen- 
 eral reviewed a battalion which was on its 
 way back from the fighting line. The com- 
 panies were all full, and the appearance of 
 the men entirely satisfactory. A number 
 of them were questioned, and they all an- 
 swered most cheerfully. They said the food 
 was still very good and they had wine every 
 day. One of the captains said to me: '*The 
 men have stopped asking each other how 
 long the war is likely to last, as they did a 
 couple of months ago. They feel sure now 
 that it will be long, and they have made up 
 their minds to it.'' 
 
 January 20th, — Two German aviators 
 have had to come down within our lines 
 because their gasoline gave out. One of the 
 pilots was a very intelligent captain, just 
 out of the War Academy; there was an- 
 other officer and two non-commissioned of- 
 ficers. Curiously enough — although it is per- 
 
 164 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 fectly natural if one thinks about it — the 
 mental attitude of these men was in an in- 
 verse ratio to their standing and intelligence. 
 The non-commissioned officers believed im- 
 plicitly all the stories with which their govern- 
 ment and the Teutonic press feed the pop- 
 ular credulity; the Russians, for instance, 
 were soon to be entirely crushed, and then 
 Hindenburg would come back with his armies, 
 and France would be crushed in her turn. 
 The other officer was somewhat less con- 
 fident, but the captain was the least con- 
 fident of them all. He did not say much 
 while he was being officially questioned, but 
 he was less reserved when we were talking 
 familiarly upon various subjects. Some one 
 said to him that no doubt the German Gen- 
 eral Staff would soon start some great of- 
 fensive against us, to which he answered at 
 once: "Bah! what good would that do?*' 
 Again somebody said that the Sixteenth 
 Corps, which was opposing us, was presuma- 
 bly very tired and should be replaced, and his 
 answer to that was: ''Replace it! but with 
 
 165 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 what?" We spoke afterward of the battle 
 of the Marne, and his opinion about it was 
 most interesting. 
 
 Because of our rapid retreat the Germans 
 thought we were beaten, routed, and prac- 
 tically annihilated; our sudden halt, and 
 our rapid offensive when the great battle 
 began, fairly stunned them. It seemed to 
 the captain perfectly natural and logical 
 that Von Kluck should have made his move- 
 ment toward the southeast, in order to at- 
 tack our forces, instead of going on straight 
 to Paris. It was important to put an end 
 to our army by dealing it a paralyzing blow. 
 After that Paris would fall to him whenever 
 he chose to take it. But what really hap- 
 pened was that the aimy which was be- 
 lieved to be in disorderly retreat turned at 
 the time appointed by its leaders and beat 
 the Germans. When any of them are sin- 
 cere they own that they cannot get over 
 the stupefaction into which they were plunged 
 — the reason being that they never have 
 understood and never will understand the 
 
 i66 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 temperament and psychology of any nation 
 except their own, and that of the French 
 nation least of all. 
 
 One of our lieutenants of engineers was 
 killed to-day. During their last attack the 
 Germans, as soon as they had broken into 
 our trench, immediately began to make a 
 communication trench leading to their own. 
 The lieutenant had started off early to put 
 his sappers at work; at the end of this com- 
 munication trench he suddenly came face 
 to face with a German trooper, who shot 
 him dead. The trenches here, as on many 
 other points of our line, form such a com- 
 plicated labyrinth that even the men who 
 know them best often lose their way. Ger- 
 mans and French are only a few metres 
 apart, and it happens frequently that they 
 come up against each other without the 
 least warning. 
 
 January 22rf. — Another very heavy at- 
 tack, as if to prove to us that the Argonne 
 
 167 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 deserves its evil reputation. It was like all 
 the other German attacks here, very care- 
 fully prepared and carried out with specially 
 adapted arms, perfect technic, and intelli- 
 gent organization. To the north of the 
 fountain of La Mitte, our line juts out into 
 a sharp angle, which goes by the name of 
 the Marie-Therese salient. Although I have 
 made various investigations, I have never 
 been able to find out why it is so called — 
 the most usual explanation is that it is near 
 the house of a gamekeeper who had a daugh- 
 ter of that name. I give the explanation for 
 what it is worth. The first troops that came 
 into this region, after the battle of the Mame, 
 gave to the works they made any names 
 which happened to strike their fancy, and 
 most of these titles stuck. However it may 
 have been christened, it is certain that the 
 Marie-Therese salient is hungrily coveted 
 by the Germans and it is uncommonly hard 
 to hold, because, owing to its shape, it can 
 be attacked on three sides at once. 
 
 i68 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 To-day, about ten o'clock in the morning, 
 our neighbors the enemy, having pushed 
 their mines almost up to our trenches, sud- 
 denly burst out, each man armed only with 
 two big bombs which he threw as quickly 
 as possible. That naturally produced some 
 confusion for a minute or two, during which 
 a German battalion fiercely assailed Marie- 
 Therese on all three sides. One of our com- 
 panies was commanded by a lieutenant who 
 suddenly went mad from the excitement of 
 the hand-to-hand fighting. (That has hap- 
 pened several times in the course of the war.) 
 All our mitrailleurs were killed, and our men 
 forced back into the next trench, which be- 
 longed to another regiment. That naturally 
 made more confusion; the men fell back 
 still farther and the Germans, pressing them 
 hard, got hold of some points on our second 
 line. A counter-attack was immediately or- 
 dered as some of our relieving-troops hap- 
 pened to be near. 
 tThe news of this engagement reached us 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 in the middle of the day, and tlie genera 
 commanding our corps gave the order a 
 once to regain our positions at any cost 
 even if all our reserves had to be called up 
 At two o'clock a battalion of chasseurs mad( 
 a push on the left of the salient, got as fa 
 as our captured first-line ti'enches and triec 
 to hold them, but was thmst back by a fierc< 
 attack made by fresh German troops. / 
 thii'd counter-attack in the evening was lee 
 by Captain M., and there was yet another 
 tlie next morning, but after a very hare 
 struggle we were only able to get back par 
 of our positions. Our imits, altliough ver} 
 much mixed up, fairly clung to the ground 
 and a new line was quickly organized. Aftei 
 that the Germans could not gain anothei 
 inch. 
 
 All day and all night we fought furiously 
 and with all sorts of weapons; bombs anc 
 grenades were freely thro\^^l, but much o; 
 the fighting was hand to hand witli bayonets 
 knives, and even spades and picks. 
 
 I70 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 A German radiogram announced that they 
 had taken four mitrailleuses and two hun- 
 dred and fifty prisoners; they really got three 
 mitrailleuses, no longer of use, and about one 
 hundred prisoners, all wounded except a few 
 sappers who were surprised in their mines. 
 These attacks, as I have said, are carefully 
 thought out and minutely prepared for; even 
 the columns which are to repel our counter- 
 attacks are all ready. Each man engaged 
 knows exactly what he has to do; behind 
 those who throw bombs and grenades into the 
 trenches come the sappers loaded with bags 
 of cement and bundles of faggots to build up 
 again at once what their comrades have blown 
 to pieces. Ten minutes after an assault such 
 a trench is ready for defense again. 
 
 January 25th. — In this trench warfare, 
 which becomes more and more like a siege, 
 there are three things which above all others 
 serve to protect a front and make a success- 
 ful attack on it almost impossible. These 
 
 171 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 are: 1, The curtain fire of the artillery; 2, 
 barbed-wire entanglements and various other 
 obstacles; and 3, the flanking fire of mitrail- 
 leuses, machine guns, and rifles. Here, from 
 the nature of the ground where we must 
 work, and also from the unusual proximity 
 of the enemy's lines, these defenses are much 
 more difficult to organize than elsewhere. 
 In many places the German and French 
 lines are not more than ten or twenty metres 
 apart, and at certain points they almost 
 touch, with the result that rifle-firing and 
 bomb-throwing are incessant. 
 
 It would be impossible to set up barbed- 
 wire entanglements under such circumstances, 
 especially as the Germans are so lavish in their 
 use of star shells and flares at night that the 
 workers would be as much exposed as in 
 daylight. As we cannot do any better we 
 try to protect the trenches by throwing out 
 in front of them the wire entanglements 
 known as "reseaux Brun,'* but these are by 
 no means an efficient protection. 
 
 172 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 For the reasons which I have given it is 
 hard to manage flanking fire, while the cur- 
 tain fire of our batteries is seriously ham- 
 pered by the forest trees, the thick under- 
 growth, the uneven ground, and also by the 
 close neighborhood of the enemy. But our 
 artillery officers are geniuses in their line and 
 actually manage to get the better of all these 
 difficulties, and to establish curtain firing. 
 The different means by which they succeed 
 are often most ingenious. Sometimes guns 
 are placed several kilometres apart, all aimed 
 with mathematical precision at sectors of 
 the enemy's line only a few metres from each 
 other. The artillery observers are stationed 
 permanently in the first-line trenches; at 
 the least sign of any activity in the enemy's 
 line a telephone call from these observers 
 is followed almost instantly by a shower of 
 shells, and the Germans, who have begun to 
 show their pointed helmets make haste to 
 scuttle back into their burrows. Any num- 
 ber of projected attacks have been stopped 
 
 173 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 in this way before they had fairly begun — 
 our "75*s'' are watch-dogs who bark and 
 bite at the first suspicious sound. 
 
 That admirable artilleryman Colonel B., 
 whose rich imagination is always fertile in 
 tricks of his trade and stratagems of all 
 sorts, has invented a whole series of artillery 
 devices. There is what he calls "tentative 
 firing/' to be directed against roads used by 
 the enemy, or paths which he may take, 
 and also "punitive firing,'' "preliminary fir- 
 ing," to make the enemy answer and disclose 
 his positions, and so on. Just now the Ger- 
 mans are very economical with their artillery. 
 Is it because they have not enough, or are 
 they saving their guns and shells for more 
 serious work? Perhaps they, like ourselves, 
 are passing through a crisis in regard to muni- 
 tions. But we must not indulge hopes which 
 may prove deceiving — we should not forget 
 that they are the greatest industrial nation 
 on earth! 
 
 January 26th. — Certainly this fighting in 
 
 174 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 the Argonne is like none other that has ever 
 been known, and has its own especial methods 
 and instruments. Rifles are not much used, 
 but on the other hand there is a great con- 
 sumption of grenades and bombs of all sorts; 
 some go off by friction, others have fuses at- 
 tached, and still others explode where they 
 fall, like the engines dear to anarchists. 
 
 There is an equal variety in contrivances 
 for throwing bombs, and with these the 
 Germans are well supplied; each of their 
 companies in the Argonne has one large 
 and four small ones. We also have them of 
 all calibers; the "Celerier," which are made 
 from the sockets of shells, and others much 
 larger. One of these hurls a terrible pro- 
 jectile which our men have affectionately 
 christened "the baby.'' It is a pleasure to 
 see it on its way through the air toward the 
 German trenches, in which it explodes with 
 a tremendous crash. Then big blocks of 
 stone and clods of earth fly ten metres high, 
 mingled with odd legs, arms, and trunks of 
 
 175 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 any Boches who may happen to be too close, 
 and the survivors utter fearful yells, for, 
 unlike our men, they do not suffer silently. 
 
 On account of the number and variety of 
 weapons soldiers in the trenches never have 
 a moment's rest. Besides, the only way of 
 preventing your enemy from attacking you 
 is to keep him busy all the time, and the 
 general in command of our corps is con- 
 stantly giving orders to this end. Our ad- 
 versary must be teased and tormented in- 
 cessantly, his work destroyed, his plans 
 upset. Has he begun to lay a promising 
 mine? Some fine night a lot of our plucky 
 young fellows, often volunteers, jump into the 
 head of his sap and blow the mine with its 
 makers into bits with melinite. 
 
 This imderground warfare, as may be sup- 
 posed, goes on all the time. Their sappers 
 and ours never stop burrowing and tunnel- 
 ling to get nearer each other. It is pure 
 delight when you are so fortunate as to get 
 up close to the enemy's position without 
 
 176 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 his knowledge; the mine is then made ready, 
 and at the appointed time his trench and all 
 who are in it go flying into the air. 
 
 But the sappers on his side are also always 
 on the alert, and it often happens that the 
 whereabouts of your mine is discovered, 
 and then it is their turn to come in at one 
 end and blow it up, the game being to de- 
 stroy you and your work without hurting 
 themselves. 
 
 In the hand-to-hand fighting, which we 
 have so often in the main trenches and those 
 which connect them, the rifle and bayonet 
 are not of much use. A shorter weapon, 
 like a hatchet, a boarding-cutlass, or the 
 short infantry sabre of our grandfathers 
 would be more effective at close quarters. 
 Nearly all the German infantrymen are 
 armed with cutlasses. Our men prefer revolv- 
 ers, and are given them whenever it is pos- 
 sible; they also carry hand-grenades and 
 bombs hooked into their belts. 
 
 It seems that we are getting back to the 
 
 177 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 sort of warfare which was waged hundreds 
 of years ago. I was reading, last spring, an 
 absorbingly interesting account by M. Gus- 
 tave Schlumberger of the siege of Con- 
 stantinople, and really the fighting between 
 the Germans and ourselves here in the Ar- 
 gonne is not very unlike the struggle between 
 Turk and Greek under the Long Walls. 
 
 January 29th. — A week to the day after 
 the division on our right was violently at- 
 tacked we have had another assault, still 
 more violent, on our left division. 
 
 About five o'clock I was waked by the 
 heaviest firing which I have heard since we 
 came here. It was bitter cold; the ther- 
 mometer had gone down in the night below 
 9 degrees,* but later the sun shone bril- 
 liantly in a cloudless sky as we started on 
 horseback toward Vienne-le-Chateau, tak- 
 ing a road to the left in order to avoid Moire- 
 mont. Between Vienne-la-Ville and Vienne- 
 
 * 15° Fahrenheit. 
 178 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 le-Chateau some "77** shells fell in the fields 
 close beside us, and when we reached the 
 village the colonel commanding the artillery 
 of our division said to us: "We have been 
 obliged to evacuate our first-line trenches, 
 and I have just given the order to fire on 
 them/' That was certainly serious. What 
 could have happened? It was this: as one 
 brigade was relieving another, about half 
 past six, the enemy made a lively attack on 
 our first line by means of bomb-throwers 
 with violent artillery curtain firing on the 
 rear zone. One of our salients was also 
 blown up by a mine. This was all accord- 
 ing to their usual way of beginning an as- 
 sault. Immediately afterward our whole 
 front, of three battalions, was heavily at- 
 tacked, the enemy's troops advancing by 
 fours in close formation, with drums and 
 fifes playing. Our right battalion was pushed 
 back and the officer in command wounded. 
 The centre battalion appeared to be sub- 
 merged, and almost completely wiped out; 
 
 179 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 as a result of this sudden falling back, the 
 left wing of the brigade next to ours lost 
 some of its first-line trenches. The general 
 commanding the division at once began to 
 organize three counter-attacks, the corps 
 commander having given him all the reserve 
 strength which could be spared. The two 
 first attacks did not get beyond what was 
 called "the ravine of the mitrailleuses.'' 
 The third carried a trench which was being 
 made by the Germans, but was then stopped 
 by the barbed-wire entanglements which they 
 had already put up. 
 
 Toward the end of the day yet another 
 counter-attack was launched; that also was 
 unsuccessful, because the men could not 
 force their way through an impenetrable 
 thicket. The corps commander then or- 
 dered that we should take advantage of the 
 darkness to strengthen our second line of 
 defense. This had several advantages over 
 our first, as it was more solidly constructed 
 and also had flanking protection; the forest 
 
 i8o 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 was also not so dense, which would allow 
 our artillery to employ curtain firing. 
 
 The next morning we had trustworthy in- 
 formation from two different sources, which 
 gave us an idea of how desperate the fight- 
 ing had been on the day before. We learned 
 that before they went into it the German 
 soldiers had been made drunk; a number of| 
 our men said to me: "They fairly stank o:^ 
 alcohol." There was absolutely no doubtj 
 about it, and the same thing has been noticed 
 here a number of times; it even happens 
 sometimes that ether takes the place of 
 alcohol. 
 
 The men of our centre battalion, sur- 
 rounded from the beginning of the attack, 
 fought at bay in their trenches all day long 
 and half the night. Very few unwounded 
 prisoners fell into the enemy's hands; when 
 a man had fired his last cartridge he dropped 
 where he stood. We heard that the battalion 
 commander, who was wounded very early 
 in the assault, said to his liaison agent: *'Go 
 
 i8i 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 and report to the colonel at once. As for 
 us, we shall die here." 
 
 Repeated fights like this make these months 
 in the Argonne seem like one long battle. 
 The Germans show great vigor and keen- 
 ness; they spend themselves in one attack 
 after another, each methodically planned 
 and violently carried out. 
 
 But what, after all, have they made by 
 these efforts? Up to the present time their 
 most fortunate strokes have only won them 
 a few hundred metres. 
 
 Their General Staff has evidently taken 
 a lively interest in all these operations in 
 the forest. A long article published re- 
 cently in the Gazette de Francjort, and after- 
 ward reprinted as a pamphlet, was called 
 "The War in the Forest of Argonne,'' and in 
 it the German gains were set forth. I need 
 not say that they were magnified and ex- 
 aggerated to the fullest extent. Old Field- 
 Marshal Count Haeseler lives in a little 
 village not far from here and from there he 
 
 182 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 follows all movements with the utmost at- 
 tention, and no doubt is consulted as to them. 
 The Kronprinz, who commands the army 
 which is directly opposite us, has his head- 
 quarters at Stenay. Is it not necessary for 
 dynastic reasons that he should sometimes 
 succeed, whatever the price of his victory ? 
 
 It seems to me that there are both local 
 and general reasons to account for such 
 persistent efforts. In the end of September, 
 after their thrust in the region of the Woevre 
 had made them masters of St.-Mihiel, the 
 Germans were able for a time to indulge in 
 the flattering hope of surrounding Verdun. 
 To accomplish that end they tried, on the 
 west, the same movement which they had 
 found successful to the eastward. A series 
 of attacks in the forest of Argonne, or on 
 its borders, would allow them, they thought, 
 to gain possession of the railway between 
 Ste.-Menehould and Verdun, and after that 
 it would be comparatively easy to invest 
 the fortress. They were all the more en- 
 
 183 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 coil raged because in the first fighting in the 
 Argonne they were able to get the upper 
 hand, on account of their superior organiza- 
 tion and equipment. They had any num- 
 ber of sappers and miners, for instance, and 
 from IVIetz, which is quite near, they could 
 get all sorts of supplies. But in spite of their 
 efforts, their advance during the last four 
 months has been insignificant ; it seems likely 
 that Ste.-Menehould will be a goal as impos- 
 sible for them to attain as Calais or Paris. 
 
 February 1st. — This afternoon the Ger- 
 mans have been exploding large mines under 
 the salient of Bagatelle, where one of our 
 sectors ends. While both wings of our works 
 crimibled into the craters made by the ex- 
 plosion, a troop of the enemy rushed at the 
 centre, where there w^ere no accessory de- 
 fenses; tliat particular place was so con- 
 stantly swept by fire that it was impossible 
 to put up barbed wire. A counter-attack 
 should have been made immediately, but it 
 
 184 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 was somewhat delayed, because the battal- 
 ion of reserves did not assemble quite quickly- 
 enough . The further we go the more we are 
 convinced that it is imperatively necessary 
 to have our reserves close at hcmd, and al- 
 ways ready to be called upon. 
 
 February 2d, — As I was on my way back 
 from the Croix-Gentin, about five o'clock this 
 afternoon, I met Lieutenant M., who gave me 
 a piece of bad news. One of our best friends 
 and comrades. Captain Boiteux, was killed 
 by a bullet in the head as he was inspecting 
 one of our first-line trenches. He was pass- 
 ing quickly across one of our loopholes when 
 he was hit; the Germans have special marks- 
 men detailed to fire at these gaps in the para- 
 pets whenever they perceive the least move- 
 ment. What an admirable officer we lose 
 in him ! Slender and lithe, with a handsome, 
 intelligent, dark head; devoted to his work, 
 active, and full of energy, always occupied 
 and always ready for any duty, no matter 
 
 18:: 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 how difficult it might be. He came to us 
 from the Ecole de Guerre, and, although he 
 was only thirty-four years of age, he was 
 married and the father of three little girls. 
 We used to have many long talks in the 
 evenings when he came in, all covered with 
 mud from making his rounds; then sud- 
 denly he would say: **Now I must be off 
 — I want to write to my wife before I 
 turn in.'' 
 
 They have just brought back his body, 
 and laid it on a bed in a bare and wretched 
 room, hurriedly made a little less dreary by 
 some wreaths of leaves and a few flags. He 
 is dressed as he fell; his head is wrapped in 
 bandages, leaving only his face uncovered; 
 on his breast is his kepi, pierced with the 
 bullet-hole. A few candles give a faint and 
 timid light; two soldiers, with fixed bayonets, 
 stand immovably on guard; a priest, who is 
 also a stretcher-bearer, kneels at the foot of 
 the bed, reading prayers from his missal, and 
 one after another our officers watch beside 
 
 i86 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 their comrade who, in the dim light, seems to 
 be quietly asleep. 
 
 February 3d. — As to the morale of the 
 Germans, we could not do anything more 
 dangerous than to deceive ourselves in re- 
 gard to it. It is better, for every reason, to 
 face the truth and acknowledge it. The 
 German spirit is still undaunted. Their 
 soldiers fight admirably, and when they are 
 surrounded they often prefer to die rather 
 than surrender. Notwithstanding this, how- 
 ever, the letters which they receive from their 
 people at home show much less confidence 
 than in the first months of the war. There 
 are frequent signs of fatigue and discourage- 
 ment; the women, more particularly, com- 
 plain bitterly of the length of the war, the 
 high price of provisions, etc. 
 
 February 10th. — ^We went this morning to 
 Vienne-le-Chateau and then on to La Hara- 
 zee. While we were there, about half past 
 nine, a very violent attack was made on the 
 
 187 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 Marie-Therese salient. After his usual fash- 
 ion, the enemy blew up part of our trenches 
 by means of a mine, and then at once poured 
 a considerable force into the breach thus 
 made. The first ranks were armed with 
 bombs and grenades; then followed a great 
 mass of men who managed to occupy part 
 of our line. Our reser\^e battalion, which 
 came up at once, delivered a counter-attack, 
 which stopped their advance; other counter- 
 attacks were carried out during the day, and 
 we won back part of the lost ground. The 
 hand-to-hand fighting was more than usually 
 ferocious, as the Germans, who for the most 
 I part had been made dmnk beforehand, mas- 
 ( sacred their prisonei'S. There is abundant 
 testimony as to this fact, and of a kind which 
 does not admit of contradiction. An ad- 
 jutant and two private soldiers deposed under 
 oath that they had witnessed the follow^ing 
 incident: two of our men were surrounded 
 by a group of Germans, who first disarmed 
 them, and immediately afterward shot them 
 down with revolvers. 
 
 i88 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 February 11th, — The chasseurs of the — th 
 battalion captured a German mitrailleuse 
 the other day, and the general commanding 
 the division offered them the usual prize 
 of two hundred francs which the General 
 Staff gives on such occasions, whereupon one 
 of the men who had taken the gun said to 
 him : " No, thank you. General ! We are quite 
 willing to have our heads mashed for France, 
 but not for money/' This was from a poor 
 peasant of Lorraine, to whom two hundied 
 francs meant a fortune. 
 
 February 12th. — This forest of Argonne is 
 full of enchanting bits of scenery; valleys, 
 always fresh and cool, with cheerful little 
 streams running through them; undergrowth 
 where lights and shadows play; gentle slopes 
 with flowing lines; pools where the great 
 trees look at their own likenesses in the clear 
 water. 
 
 And all these charming woods and streams 
 and springs have the most delightful names 
 imaginable, such as the Bois de la Viergette, 
 
 189 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 le Ruisseau des Emerlots, la Fontaine la 
 Houyette, la Fontaine-aux-Charmes, la Fon- 
 taine-Madame. 
 
 The ridge which forms a sort of backbone 
 to the forest is called La Haute Chevauchee 
 — a name which makes one think of the 
 chase here long ago, when the stag was run 
 down by huntsmen and hounds after furious 
 galloping through the leafy alleys. 
 
 About noon a great number of Germans, 
 in columns of fours, fell upon our battalion 
 to the north of the old salient of Marie- 
 Therese, but as their advance was stopped 
 by infantry fire, while our artillery swept 
 their rear, they were thrown back, leaving 
 many dead behind them. 
 
 At one o'clock in the afternoon our ar- 
 tillery began, in order to prepare for an at- 
 tack which was to be launched an hour later. 
 Two companies of the — th battalion of 
 chasseurs dashed toward the enemy's posi- 
 tions, but could not get far, as they were 
 
 190 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 met by a lively fusillade, combined with the 
 fire of some mitrailleuses which were hidden 
 behind trees, and had therefore escaped our 
 artillery. One detachment, however, man- 
 aged to gain about fifty yards and get into 
 a communicating trench very near the enemy's 
 line, where they held on obstinately. 
 
 February 13th, — ^We have blown up a Ger- 
 man mine in front of our left division, to the 
 east of Bagatelle. The Germans attacked 
 the road to Bagatelle on both sides, forcing 
 back our sentries. They then pushed along 
 through our left-hand trenches and pro- 
 ceeded to wall themselves in behind sacks 
 filled with earth. Three companies promptly 
 reinforced our line of defense on that side, 
 and by nine o'clock in the evening our troops 
 had destroyed the enemy's barriers, reoc- 
 cupied the entire line, and put our observa- 
 tion posts back where they had been. Along 
 the front of our right division the Germans 
 succeeded in blowing up one of our stores of 
 
 191 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 explosives, which was in the Blanleuil trenches, 
 on the crest between the Ravin Sec and the 
 Ravin de la Fontaine-Madame, but a cur- 
 tain of artillery fire put an end at once to any 
 possibility of attack on their part. 
 
 All night there was great activity on their 
 side and ours, especially in the direction of 
 the Four-de-Paris, and in the central sector 
 we advanced about five hundred and fifty 
 metres. 
 
 February 14ih, — Everywhere, but especially 
 toward Marie-Therese, the enemy is un- 
 commonly lively. We interfere mth him as 
 much as possible, by means of bombs and 
 grenades, having always in mind the in- 
 structions of the general in command of our 
 corps, which are that we must keep our 
 morale superior to that of our adversary, and 
 at the first reasonable moment take the in- 
 itiative in attack. 
 
 February 16ih. — Our artillery is now sup- 
 porting the left division of the corps next to 
 
 192 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 us, which is at grips with a strong German 
 force in the region of Bolante. During the 
 night we have made several lucky strokes 
 against the Boche mines in different places; 
 it seems to us that our foe is becoming some- 
 what less aggressive. The roles are gradu- 
 ally changing; in the beginning, thanks to 
 his superior equipment, and also to his great 
 strength in sappers and miners, he had rather 
 the upper hand, but now he seems, little by 
 little, to be losing it. 
 
 In the meantime, our lines of defense are 
 everywhere more strongly organized and the 
 curtain of our artillery established wherever 
 it is necessary, while the vigilance of our 
 officers and men never flags for a moment. 
 The result is that the enemy's attacks — 
 and Heaven knows he makes them often 
 enough! — are for the most part failures. 
 From time to time, after a shower of bombs 
 and grenades, the Roches come out of their 
 trenches and advance in close formation. 
 In a few seconds they are pelted with a hail 
 
 193 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 of shells and bullets, and back they go quickly 
 into their holes, except those who lie dead 
 outside their parapets. At other times they 
 tunnel their way along, in order to keep 
 their men as much as possible out of the open, 
 but these tunnels often turn out to be graves 
 for the human moles who dig them; our men 
 are always on the watch, ready to throw 
 bombs which frequently leave no one alive. 
 
 All along our front, by untiring vigilance 
 and incessant activity, we manage to frus- 
 trate the plans of our adversary before they 
 can be matured, but it is easy to understand 
 what fatigue and mental strain this involves 
 for our troops and their leaders. In the first- 
 line trenches our men are on the alert dur- 
 ing the whole twenty-four hours, standing in 
 mud and water, subject to constant fire from 
 every sort of projectile. Imagine what life 
 under such conditions must be ! 
 
 The whistling of shells and bullets in the 
 forest makes strange, fantastic music; in 
 these narrow ravines the least sound repeats 
 itself with astonishing amplitude and so- 
 
 194 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 nority, and as the troops which are held in 
 reserve must be as near the first line as 
 possible, it is almost as hard for them to rest 
 as if they were actually under fire, while in 
 the encampments where they go when they 
 are relieved they are almost always subject 
 to violent bombardment. 
 
 But why dwell on all this fatigue and 
 danger? The spirit of our men remains 
 beyond praise; it is something sublime, al- 
 most miraculous, compelling one to bow be- 
 fore it in all humility. It must be remem- 
 bered that, even on days when there is no 
 serious fighting, the losses in killed and 
 wounded often mount up into the hundreds. 
 
 I was present the other day at the review 
 of a regiment which was on its way back 
 from the trenches. A cold rain was falling, 
 and the men were covered with mud from 
 head to foot. They were almost all young, 
 surprisingly young, with beardless faces, but 
 all had the same expression of seasoned 
 courage and resolution. 
 
 I remember being particularly struck by 
 
 195 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 the proud bearing of one of these "Marie- 
 Louises," * a slender little corporal. The 
 general stopped before him to ask some ques- 
 tions, and his battalion commander said: 
 "He's the best bomb-thrower in the batta- 
 lion; no one can touch him at hurling hand- 
 grenades. He has only been with us for three 
 months, but at the very first opportunity 
 we'll make him a sergeant." Truly it may 
 be said of such as he what Napoleon said of 
 his conscripts: ''Honor and courage radiate 
 from them." 
 
 Many of the oflficers are scarcely older 
 than the men whom they command. We 
 had a number of second lieutenants sent 
 to us lately, young fellows who had just passed 
 their examinations to enter St.-Cyr. They 
 all arrived full of dash and vigor, ready to 
 throw themselves heart and soul into what- 
 ever was expected of them. 
 
 It is not uncommon to see the cross of the 
 
 * A name given to the students at the Military School of 
 St.-Cyr. 
 
 196 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 Legion of Honor shining here and there on 
 one of these young breasts. Some of them 
 have already been wounded two or three 
 times, and are veterans, rich in experience 
 and full of resource. It is not wonderful 
 that their men regard them with mingled 
 admiration and respect. What a send-off 
 these boys have, what a magnificent entry 
 into life ! To the heart of youth the brightest 
 beams of the rising sun are pale compared 
 with the first rays of glory — so said Vauve- 
 nargues, who himself was a soldier. 
 
 February 17th, — This is the day set for 
 the offensive on our left in the Hurlus region, 
 in which the business of our corps is to keep 
 up such incessant activity that the Ger- 
 mans who face us will not be able to with- 
 draw any of their troops to use elsewhere. 
 All day we have heard very heavy firing 
 toward the west. Our right-hand division 
 has been executing a series of operations, 
 one of them being to blow up a German 
 
 197 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 blockhouse on the right bank of the stream 
 which flows out of the Fontaine-aux-Charmes. 
 Everything which was not destroyed by the 
 explosion is being hammered by one of our 
 **65" guns, at a range of four hundred metres. 
 About ten o'clock we exploded a mine under 
 a trench in the Four-de-Paris region, and 
 part of a battalion of chasseurs jumped into 
 the gap thus made and pushed on to the next 
 line. Immediately a strong German coun- 
 ter-attack was launched, advancing as usual 
 in columns of fours, pushing our force back 
 and getting as far as the trench which had 
 been torn up by our mine. There they were 
 met by a mixed fire of infantry and artillery, 
 under which they fell back quickly, leaving 
 many dead behind them. 
 
 The objective of our principal attack was 
 the ridge of Blanleuil, and every detail had 
 been most carefully thought out. 
 
 While the battalions chosen for the attack 
 were resting, during the last four days, three 
 large mines which we had laid under the 
 
 198 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 enemy's positions were all ready to be touched 
 off. All the assaulting party were trained 
 bomb-throwers, and the troops were arranged 
 in three echelons. The duty of the first was 
 to jump into the enemy's works directly after 
 the explosion, and to push on as much far- 
 ther as possible. The second echelon was to 
 support the first and hold the ground which 
 had been taken, and the third was to back 
 them both up and make sure of success. 
 Each assaulting column was preceded by 
 bomb-throwers; then came the chasseurs 
 with fixed bayonets, then the sappers from 
 the engineer corps carrying tools and sacks 
 of earth, and last of all a mitrailleuse. At 
 eight o'clock the mines blew up under the 
 German trenches, one of them exploding at 
 the same time a mine which the Germans 
 themselves had made. At the same moment 
 our artillery began a curtain fire on the rear 
 of the adversary's positions, keeping it up 
 on all points from which he might attempt to 
 make a flanking movement. In another mo- 
 
 199 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 ment our three assaulting columns emerged 
 from the communication trenches in which 
 they had formed and advanced, headed by 
 their section commanders. The battalion 
 commander whose duty it was to direct the 
 attack, a man of the most splendid courage, 
 stood upright on the parapet of the trench, 
 calmly pointing out their way to his men 
 with his walking-stick. Our columns flung 
 themselves at the enemy's trench, breaking 
 into it in three places; about a hundred Ger- 
 mans who were in it were killed, and their 
 bodies left lying there; we took four prison- 
 ers and also brought back a mitrailleuse. By 
 half past eight we held three hundred and 
 fifty metres of the enemy's first line; all four 
 section commanders had been killed or 
 woimded, but the men were now fairly 
 started; part of them rushed on, leaped into 
 the enemy's communication trenches, and 
 thus reached the trenches of his second line, 
 which were crowded with Germans abun- 
 dantly supplied with bombs and all other am- 
 
 200 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 munition. After the first moment of sur- 
 prise, violent counter-attacks were poured 
 against our men from all the communication 
 trenches at the German rear, and they were 
 obliged to fall back to the first-line trench 
 which they had just taken. This was very 
 deep and narrow at the top, widening out at 
 the bottom; the parapet facing our line was 
 low, but much higher at the back; this was 
 to prevent our firing on the German lines, 
 and also to afford shelter to their men in the 
 event of a counter-attack. 
 
 By this time our engineers had begun to 
 fill up the holes made by our shells, and 
 to block the ends of the trench which we 
 had taken with sacks of earth, in order to 
 prevent an attack through the communica- 
 tion trenches. The second echelon now came 
 to reinforce the first, and two of our mitrail- 
 leuses took up their positions. A German 
 company showed itself in the open only to be 
 mown down by one of them instantly, for 
 which the revenge was a violent counter-fire, 
 
 20I 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 and several of our gunners were killed or 
 wounded beside their pieces. The Germans 
 now recommenced their counter-attacks; 
 these were particularly directed at our right, 
 where the incessant rain of their bombs made 
 our positions hard to hold. The officer in 
 command had already reinforced the front 
 by two companies of the third echelon; a 
 third company was at once brought up and 
 held close by as a reserve. The trenches and 
 communication trenches were as full as it 
 was practicable to have them; it was impos- 
 sible to move many men on the ground be- 
 tween our line and the trench which we had 
 taken, because it was covered with an inex- 
 tricable tangle of felled trees and other ob- 
 structions. 
 
 Our last company kept those who were 
 fighting supplied with grenades, bombs, and 
 also with sacks of earth, which are almost as 
 useful. 
 
 The Germans renewed their attacks over 
 and over again, and by slipping along the 
 
 202 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 communication trenches they managed to 
 get to the middle of our first line, but each 
 time as they came on they were repulsed. 
 Soon after midday they pelted the trench 
 which we had taken from them and also our 
 first and second lines with their "77's*' and 
 "105's," and minenwerfer. The ground was 
 ploughed up, and our trenches badly knocked 
 about; the battalion which formed the rear- 
 guard of our first line of defense had twenty 
 men killed and fifty-three wounded as they 
 stood in the trench. 
 
 Between half past one and two o'clock 
 the Germans tried a bayonet charge in close 
 formation. That was broken up by our 
 rifle-fire, but they soon came back, con- 
 verging from all the communication trenches, 
 and hurling a great number of explosives. 
 The fiery rain of bombs became more and 
 more severe, especially on the right; one 
 chasseur after another was killed or wounded. 
 Toward half past four we lost that part of 
 the trench, only because all the men who 
 
 203 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 held it were dead. Their battaUon comman- 
 der, who had risked his Ufe a hundred times 
 since the morning, stood on the parapet 
 calling out, "Steady, chasseurs! Stand 
 firm!" until he fell over with a bullet in his 
 brain. 
 
 The general commanding the division gave 
 the order to bring up another reserve bat- 
 talion, and to launch a counter-attack with 
 what was left of the battalion actually en- 
 gaged, but that effort was a failure for two 
 reasons — the ground was not clear enough, 
 and we were short of bombs. 
 
 The enemy then made a flanking attack 
 on the other part of our trench; one by 
 one our men were assailed by an uninter- 
 rupted shower of bombs. They fell back, 
 inch by inch, taking two hours to cover 
 two hundred metres, and leaving forty per 
 cent of their number on the way. Little by 
 little we retired from the trench we had taken, 
 and fell back on our positions. Our general 
 ordered us to draw together on our front, and 
 
 204 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 to hold on there. Our artillery had supported 
 the infantry throughout, but at certain times 
 it could not be altogether effective because 
 our lines and those of the enemy were too 
 close to each other. 
 
 Our engineers kept each attacking column 
 supplied with all that was necessary to make 
 the captured trench fit for defense again; 
 all day long they toiled hard under a pound- 
 ing fire which knocked their work to pieces 
 as soon as it was in place. The struggle 
 was magnificent; it is not too much to say 
 that there was no foot of ground lost unless 
 the man who held it was killed. There were 
 no more bombs, there was very little am- 
 munition; the men in the wings, which were 
 overcrowded and flanked, could not be sup- 
 plied from the centre, because the communi- 
 cating trench was obstructed. A company 
 of chasseurs fought for two hours with the 
 rifles and ammunition of the Germans, throw- 
 ing back at them their own unexploded 
 bombs. 
 
 205 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 It was another example of the absolute 
 necessity of supplying our troops with so 
 many good and effective bombs that they 
 may be used without stint. 
 
 All the units engaged, whether for the at- 
 tack and retention of the enemy's position, 
 or for the retention of our own positions at 
 Blanleuil and other points on our front, were 
 altogether admirable in their courage, dash, 
 and tenacity. The officers did their duty 
 nobly. The Germans certainly suffered 
 severely; their losses are said to be con- 
 siderably heavier than ours. 
 
 February 18th. — This morning, about three 
 o'clock, the first German shells fell upon the 
 village where we are now. The familiar 
 whistling sound walked me, but nobody got 
 up. It was dark and also cold — two ex- 
 cellent reasons for staying where we were, 
 and after all no harm was done, except to 
 some chairs and plates in one of the officers' 
 mess-rooms. 
 
 206 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 February 20th, — While I was at Chalons 
 for a couple of hours to-day, I saw a pro- 
 cession of four or five hundred Germans 
 who had been taken prisoners yesterday 
 near Perthes. They went through the prin- 
 cipal street, surrounded on all sides by ter- 
 ritorial troops with fixed bayonets; the pop- 
 ulace of the town was much excited. Most 
 of the men seemed to me to be of a type 
 distinctly inferior to those which I have 
 hitherto seen. Some were knock-kneed, some 
 round-shouldered, some sickly-looking — there 
 were all varieties of physical deficiency. 
 
 What a contrast to those superb prisoners 
 of the Prussian Guard whom we took around 
 Rheims! They were strapping fellows, vig- 
 orous and well set up, giving a vivid impres- 
 sion of youth in its prime. 
 
 February 27th. — The fighting on our left, 
 at Hurlus, still goes on. This morning while 
 we were galloping on the heights of Mont- 
 Yvron, the sound of the cannon seemed to 
 
 207 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 be quite near. Going by Maffrecourt, one 
 reaches other hills which spread out in the 
 arc of a circle. The soil is dry — more like 
 the chalky earth of Champagne than the 
 mud and slime to which we are used in 
 Argonne. To the north we looked over the 
 village and chateau of Hans, the place where 
 Attila and Brunswick halted, as one may 
 learn from an inscription there. To the left 
 lies the village and hill of Valmy, with its 
 column to commemorate the battle — a 
 fine shaft, visible from a long distance on 
 every side. The heart of Kellermann is at 
 its base, and the stone which covers it bears 
 Goethe's celebrated phrase: '*This place and 
 day mark a new era in the history of the world, 
 and you may say *I was there.' '' We are on 
 the very ground where the battle was fought, 
 — a conflict more important in its relation 
 to history than from the military point of 
 view. The Duke of Brunswick's army, hav- 
 ing forced its way through the passes of the 
 Argonne, which Dumouriez has rather in- 
 
 208 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 accurately called the Thermopylae of France, 
 faced Germany and had its back turned 
 toward Paris. It was just the opposite with 
 the army of Kellermann. The fighting re- 
 solved itself into a violent cannonade, for 
 the duke, disconcerted by the military aspect 
 and firm stand of the revolutionary troops 
 (whom he had expected to turn tail at his 
 first volley), did not dare come to closer 
 quarters. Goethe has described the pro- 
 found discouragement of Brunswick's of- 
 ficers the night after the battle. They 
 passed it in the old inn at the sign of the 
 Moon, which still stands on the highroad 
 between Ste.-Menehould and Chalons. It 
 had rained so hard for the last week that 
 their baggage was stuck somewhere in the 
 mud; the inn was execrable and they could 
 get nothing to eat; altogether the plan of 
 coercing revolutionary France seemed to them 
 more and more hazardous. 
 
 The present descendants of the duke have 
 shown themselves more persevering, which 
 
 209 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 will mean all the more credit to us when we 
 succeed in turning them out ! 
 
 March 2d. — We are gradually getting the 
 upper hand of the enemy; the initiative of 
 attack is usually on our side, and when the 
 Germans try their hands at it their efforts 
 almost always come to nothing. We owe 
 our success here, as everywhere else, to three 
 qualities — energy, tenacity, and patience. 
 We have just had another proof of this in 
 a fight which took place to-day at Blan- 
 leuil. The enemy had been active before 
 our position there for several days; possession 
 of that rise would allow him to enfilade our 
 salient at Bagatelle, and by steady work 
 he had been able to push his advance works 
 to within about twenty yards of our trenches. 
 His game was to keep hammering at our 
 first line with his "77" and "105" guns, at 
 short range, throwing a hail of shells which 
 smashed our trenches first at one place and 
 then at another, so that we were kept con- 
 stantly busy repairing them. 
 
 2IO 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 At daybreak on the 1st of March the firing 
 became still more violent, and the "105's" 
 also turned their attention to the rear of our 
 position; everything pointed to an attack 
 before long. 
 
 Just then we had one battalion in our 
 first line, and another as a reserve in the 
 sector to the rear. At the request of the in- 
 fantry, our artillery opened a curtain fire to 
 cover the front of our trenches. The gen- 
 eral in command of the division ordered two 
 more battalions to advance in the direction 
 of La Harazee, and, as the neighborhood of 
 Four~de-Paris was also under severe fire, a 
 brigade was quickly moved to our line at 
 Biesme. 
 
 About a quarter past seven in the morn- 
 ing three mines were blown up under our 
 trenches, making a deep crater in their 
 centre, and two smaller ones to the right 
 and left, overturning the parapets and bury- 
 ing many of our men beneath them. The 
 smoke and dust had not cleared away before 
 the enemy was in the craters throwing bombs, 
 
 211 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 and, thus being in our trench, they attempted 
 to get into those which adjoined it. 
 
 The four officers and many non-commis- 
 sioned officers of the two companies which 
 were in our first line were killed or wounded 
 by this onset. The men of our second line 
 had not time to come up through the com- 
 munication trenches, and could only manage 
 to retard the assailants with their rifle-fire; 
 these filtered through at one spot after an- 
 other, while a hand-to-hand struggle was go- 
 ing on in that part of the trench which had 
 not yet been taken. 
 
 The Germans brought up heavy reinforce- 
 ments, but these, as they arrived, were met 
 by the fire of our artillery and mitrailleuses; 
 their advance was thus frequently checked, 
 but part of our first battalion had already 
 been engulfed by the German flood. Their 
 men were no sooner in our trenches than they 
 used them against us with astonishing rapid- 
 ity; their attacking column had always at 
 its heels a swarm of workers bearing sacks 
 of earth, bundles of faggots and metal shields, 
 
 212 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 with which they quickly improvised a parapet. 
 We managed to stop them, however, by a 
 tremendous effort, and our right-hand com- 
 pany held its position, although with heavy 
 loss. 
 
 A counter-attack, launched by another 
 battalion, first succeeded in checking the 
 advance of the Germans, and then began to 
 push them back. Yet another battalion, 
 ready and close at hand, could not come in 
 because the field was swept by the fire of 
 the enemy's "77's'' and "lOffs,'' as well as 
 by that of his mitrailleuses and infantry, 
 and he was also able to enfilade us, which 
 made communication exceedingly difficult. 
 
 The general in command renewed his order 
 that our positions should be maintained, at 
 whatever cost, and ordered also that prep- 
 arations should be made for a counter-attack, 
 with the co-operation of a company of en- 
 gineers, as soon as it was dark. 
 
 The Germans could not supply their left 
 with the reinforcements on which they were 
 counting, because they were continually 
 
 213 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 shelled by our artillery, but they contrived 
 to bring some troops up on their right, not- 
 withstanding the fire of our mitrailleuses, 
 by way of the ravine of the Fontaine-Ma- 
 dame. 
 
 The artillery of our division proceeded 
 forthwith to make careful preparations for 
 the nocturnal counter-attack, which was to 
 have the valuable help of several batteries 
 attached to the adjoining division. The as- 
 saulting battalion reconnoitred the groimd 
 as far as possible, and by nightfall the dif- 
 ferent companies, well furnished with bombs 
 and grenades, faced the forces which they 
 were to attack. 
 
 At ten minutes before seven our artillery 
 began a lively fire upon the enemy's positions 
 in general, followed up by a more particular 
 attack intended to batter down his flanking 
 protections. 
 
 Just at this time a tremendous storm 
 broke, accompanied by heavy snow-squalls. 
 But it could not hinder our attacks; as soon 
 as a whistle gave the signal our men leaped 
 
 214 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 forward and rushed with fixed bayonets 
 against the enemy, in spite of heavy artillery 
 fire, crying out: "Hurrah! Forward!*' 
 
 By this first dash one company succeeded 
 in breaking through as far as the German 
 second line at several points; little by 
 little our men edged their way into the 
 trenches, clearing them out with the bayonet 
 as they went. For more than four hours 
 the fight went on in this first-line trench and 
 in the communicating trenches leading to 
 it, in which the Germans had barricaded 
 themselves. The ground was won foot by 
 foot; while our men fought their way they 
 had to demolish obstructions, clear out heaps 
 of corpses, and put the trench in serviceable 
 condition. At last we succeeded in taking 
 back almost all our ground; only an in- 
 significant part was still in the enemy's 
 hands. We found much valuable material 
 in the German trenches; tools, sacks of 
 earth and shields which we turned to ac- 
 count at once, to say nothing of many rifles 
 and cartridges. Our men bore themselves 
 
 215 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 nobly; the young soldiers went to the at- 
 tack with the courage and steadiness of 
 veterans, for which they were commended 
 by the corps commander in a general order. 
 The struggle was so desperate that almost 
 no prisoners were taken; we had only four 
 in all, two of whom were severely and two 
 slightly wounded, and from what they told 
 us we gathered that only two Frenchmen, 
 both of them badly hurt, had been taken. 
 
 The German loss was certainly heavy; 
 for we took up more than a hundred bodies, 
 and the troops at their rear were held in 
 close formation for some time under the 
 fire of our heavy guns and mitrailleuses. 
 Judging from what our prisoners told us, 
 our shelling of their trenches was remarkably 
 accurate and effective. 
 
 I met an officer this morning who had 
 just been for six days in the first- line trenches, 
 at a place where the fighting was especially 
 fierce. He looked dazed, like a man who 
 has had a knock on the head from which 
 
 216 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 he has not yet recovered. His voice sounded 
 muffled and some of his words were indis- 
 tinct: "I beg your pardon/' he said to me; 
 "it's very odd, but I don't seem able to say 
 what I want to." During the fight on March 
 1st, when our trench fell into the hands of 
 the Germans, five of our men retreated to 
 the dark end of a communication trench. 
 When our troops retook the trench these men 
 came out, but in the half-light they were 
 mistaken for Boches and fired on. Their 
 sergeant was killed, and the four others went 
 back into their hole again. After a time 
 they threw over the parapet pebbles wrapped 
 in paper, on which was written, "We are 
 Frenchmen; don't fire on us," and they 
 signed their names and gave their section 
 and company. They were then naturally re- 
 ceived with open arms and fed back to 
 strength, for they were half dead with 
 hunger. 
 
 The long list of our battles in the Argonne 
 shows the triumph of persistent effort. 
 
 217 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 Throughout the war our victories have been 
 due to energy and tenacity, a fact which is 
 even more evident here than elsewhere. 
 
 End of July, 1915, — After four months 
 spent on another part of the front, the chances 
 of military service have brought me into Ar- 
 gonne again, and I find myself back in the 
 
 interesting little city of X , the military 
 
 centre of the district. It is still crowded and 
 noisy; its principal street, with a square at 
 either end, is jammed day and night with 
 long lines of wagons, automobiles, and motor- 
 trucks; here and there on the pavement a 
 civilian's dark coat makes him conspicuous 
 among the throng of men in uniform. 
 
 The little town has become one enormous 
 shop, a shop with a hundred doors and a 
 thousand counters — a very Land of Promise 
 for dealers in tinned food of every sort. 
 
 During these first days my duty has 
 obliged me to go over a wide stretch of 
 country, and I have revisited the dreary 
 
 218 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 little village, always swimming with water, 
 where we spent last winter. So far it has not 
 suffered much from the misdeeds of the 
 enemy's "noisy gun,'' so-called because its 
 shells land with a tremendous crash. Near 
 
 the X farm the odd little village with its 
 
 conical roofs, which the colonial troops 
 amused themselves by building, in what may 
 be called the Soudanese style of architecture, 
 is considerably larger than when I last saw 
 it. The territorials from the Morvan began 
 this spring to make themselves comfortable 
 
 quarters on the bank of the X brook, on a 
 
 charming site where they are much better off 
 than they were before. Everywhere there are 
 temporary dwellings of all sorts, from the 
 simple hut of branches piled together to the 
 little forester's cabin, which sometimes even 
 possesses the incredible luxury of glazed 
 windows with sashes that open and shut! 
 
 I went to a very touching and beautiful 
 
 ceremony this morning. The bishop of C 
 
 219 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 came to the church at the upper end of the 
 town, near the chateau, to celebrate high 
 mass in honor of the men who have died here 
 in defense of their country. 
 
 The dead of the Argonne ! In no corner of 
 our soil has the blood of our soldiers been 
 shed with more profusion or more heroism. 
 How much courage, how much fortitude have 
 been lavished in the forest on which one 
 looks down from the chateau, in the narrow 
 valleys, on the slopes of the ravines, during 
 the bitter struggle which has swayed to and 
 fro here during the past year ! 
 
 No part of France, not even Lorraine in 
 the region of Gerbeviller, has been more 
 systematically looted, ravaged, and destroyed 
 than the district which lies between Ste.- 
 Menehould and Revigny. Almost every vil- 
 lage is in ruins. 
 
 Under the summer sunlight some of these 
 wrecks, as at Sermaize and Sommeilles, are 
 clothed with a charm and dignity which re- 
 calls the antique; it would be easy to be- 
 
 220 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 lieve that twenty centuries are behind their 
 crumbling walls. 
 
 But the unfortunate people who used to 
 live in them are not particularly alive to 
 this sesthetic beauty; having no longer a 
 roof to cover them, they must manage to 
 exist in their cellars, or else camp in the open 
 air. An association of English Quakers, 
 co-operating with our government, has come 
 generously to their aid, and is busily putting 
 up here and there little wooden houses among 
 the ruins. 
 
 These can be built with surprising rapid- 
 ity, and are most useful, but they certainly 
 have an alien look in these old stone villages 
 of the Meuse valley. 
 
 By some extraordinary piece of good luck, 
 the hordes of the Kronprinz spared the 
 
 pretty chateau of N . It sheltered the 
 
 staff of a general who had to get out as 
 fast as he could after the battle of the Mame, 
 and consequently had not time to bum the 
 house and destroy its contents. It may also 
 
 221 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 be that the presence of the owner of the 
 chateau, who remained during the inva- 
 sion, had something to do with saving her 
 dwelling. 
 
 It must never be said that the Germans 
 are entirely devoid of chivalry, for they al- 
 lowed the old lady to remain in a wretched 
 kennel next to the servants' kitchen. There 
 can be no mistake as to this, for they scrawled 
 on the door of the den in chalk words, which 
 may still be read there: "Apartment re- 
 served for the mistress of the chateau. Ad- 
 mittance strictly forbidden." Not far away 
 a large and handsome building, partly cha- 
 teau and partly farmhouse, was another 
 Teutonic general's headquarters. Before they 
 decamped, the gentlemen of his staff took 
 pains to slash the tapestry of the furniture in 
 the drawing-room with their swords, as well 
 as the leather of the dining-room chairs. 
 There happened to be a few pigs in the 
 stable which had not been eaten; these 
 same officers took the trouble to send for 
 
 222 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 them and to shut them up in the living- 
 rooms of the chateau, where the owner found 
 them when he came back two days later. 
 
 There is abundant testimony to show that 
 this really happened, and perhaps it shows, 
 even more than the atrocities committed by 
 the Germans, the trend of their minds and 
 the quality of what one may call their taste. 
 
 This Argonne country, full of woods and 
 springs, is never more delightful than dur- 
 ing the height of summer. While men are 
 fighting steadily, killing each other with 
 might and main, God's humbler creatures 
 are enjoying life in perfect security. 
 
 The young partridges pick up their food on 
 the roads as freely as if they were only hum- 
 ble sparrows; hares dart out from under one's 
 feet everywhere; the wild boars, no longer 
 himted, show themselves in groups on the 
 edges of the forest and in the clearings. 
 
 August 2d. — ^The Germans made an at- 
 tack on "cote'' 213 last night, which is in 
 
 223 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 the sector of the Fontaine-aux-Charmes. We 
 had noticed their growing activity for several 
 days, and finally they bombarded our trenches 
 with their heavy artillery and minemverfer, 
 having advanced by tunnelling, in order to 
 get as close to our lines as they could. 
 
 There was another attack this afternoon 
 at St.-Hubert, more to the left, upon a 
 sector where there were three battalions, 
 and here the Germans made copious use of 
 liquid fire. 
 
 A man belonging to a landwehr regiment 
 was killed the other day, and we found two 
 very interesting letters on his body. The 
 first was from his mother. 
 
 AsCHERSLEBEN, July 14th, 1915, 
 Papa has been to see your family. Things 
 are not going very well; your wife only 
 gets, altogether and for everything, twenty- 
 one marks a month for herself and her two 
 children, barely enough to give them dry 
 bread and a little soup. She is obliged to 
 leave the children to be looked after by some 
 
 224 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 one else while she goes about looking for 
 work. This is very hard to be had, and even 
 if she can make sixty pfennigs a day she has 
 to spend it all for the children, so she has 
 nothing left. 
 
 My dear son, I beg that you will 'go to 
 see your colonel and ask him to give you a 
 little more money, so that you may send 
 some to your family. The distress is great. 
 Show him this letter. If he will not, ask 
 him to send you back home, that you may 
 find work and so keep your family from dying 
 of hunger. It takes away all my strength 
 to hear those who belong to you crying in 
 their misery. Do be so good as to show him 
 this letter. There are so many men fighting 
 that one more or less will not be noticed. 
 For my own part I have given five children 
 to the war. So, either manage to send more 
 money to your family, that they may not 
 starve to death, or else get sent home your- 
 self. 
 
 To the same man from his wife, July 6th: 
 
 Impossible to get cabbages or vegetables; 
 potatoes will soon be very dear; there is 
 
 225 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 very little fmit. Gherkins for pickling cost 
 seven or eight pfennigs — tliere are no more 
 cucumbers nor horseradish. Do you ever 
 think of what we are able to buy? Money 
 has no value any more. Five marks are ex- 
 actly as if one had notliing. Wool is ex- 
 ceedingly dear. 
 
 I have read tliat one of our newspapers 
 means to start an inquiiy in order to find 
 out whether the French are gifted witli a 
 talent for organization in as high a degree 
 as tlie Gennans. 
 
 It is a tliousand pities that this slieet 
 could not have sent one of its editors to study 
 tlie disti'ibuting railway-station which sup- 
 plies our army, for this station or depot is 
 really a marvel of organization. Simplicity, 
 quickness, absence of red tape and useless 
 officials, judicious adaptation of means to 
 their ends — everything, m short, which is 
 needed m order to make a difficult ser\dce 
 work smootlily may be found here. 
 
 Each anny, as every one knows, has its 
 
 226 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 own distributing station, which plays the 
 same part in regard to it that the heart does 
 in our human organism. The distributing 
 station is also like the heart, because it draws 
 in and sends out. 
 
 Such a station is the indispensable link be- 
 tween the supplying country in the rear 
 and the fighting front. From the rear it 
 receives men, arms, munitions, provisions, 
 clothes, and all sorts of equipments for the 
 men, as well as their letters and parcels. 
 All of these are distributed over our front, 
 and from the front to the rear come men 
 on leave, the sick and wounded, arms cind 
 equipments no longer fit to be used — in 
 short, everything which the fighting units 
 want to get out of their way. 
 
 It is not hard to see that such a service 
 is necessarily very complicated. Then also 
 it is of capital importance; if there is any 
 hitch or delay at the station its effect will 
 be immediately felt at the front, and the 
 combatants may be deprived of such indis- 
 
 227 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 pensable supplies as food, clothing, or am- 
 munition. 
 
 Captain R did the honors of his station, 
 
 which he manages as if it were some great 
 industry, or a large factory of which he was 
 at the head. In the first place he gave us a 
 few brief and concise explanations as to the 
 way in which the whole machine was run, 
 and showed us a plan hanging on the wall 
 which made everything clear at a glance. 
 Here at different points on the line were the 
 principal depots; a large enclosure for the 
 live stock, a park for the artillery, another for 
 the sappers, a centre for sanitary supplies, 
 etc. The course of the incoming and out- 
 going currents was marked by arrows — it 
 was all perfectly simple and easy to under- 
 stand. The next thing was to see how this 
 well-planned system actually worked. We 
 arrived just as the daily provision trains 
 were being made up. Each of these trains 
 supplies its own particular unit, and is fitted 
 out on a separate track; so many cars for 
 hay and oats, so many for other forage, so 
 
 228 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 many for meat, bread, vegetables, and so on. 
 These trains will start at night, and arrive 
 at their destinations before morning, each 
 to be met at its own station by gangs of men 
 with wagons who will distribute their con- 
 tents to the troops nearest that point. Huge 
 barracks built conveniently near the plat- 
 forms of the distributing station hold many 
 different sorts of merchandise. To go through 
 them was like visiting a series of huge shops. 
 Everything was clean, everything in perfect 
 order; every one knew just what he had to 
 do, and did it. The parcel-post service 
 alone, the working of which we examined 
 in detail, keeps more than thirty soldiers 
 busy sorting and classifying. 
 
 Then we went to see the trains which were 
 about to start for the front. A hospital 
 train was just coming in, bringing sick and 
 wounded, for whom surgeons and orderlies 
 were waiting, ready to distribute them in 
 the proper groups. There were the slightly 
 wounded and disabled, who were to remain 
 in hospital where they were, others who 
 
 229 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 needed immediate care, others who were to 
 be sent further to base hospitals, etc. All 
 this sorting out was done very quickly and 
 in the most orderly manner. 
 
 Order, rapidity, simplification — those were 
 the words which occurred to the mind most 
 frequently in the course of our rapid inspec- 
 tion. 
 
 This improvised organization answers its 
 purposes admirably. At its head is a chief 
 who is active, hard-working, responsible, hav- 
 ing his whole heart in his work and anxious 
 to do as much as possible for every one. 
 Under him, working in two or three large 
 rooms, are a set of officers who second him 
 zealously and to the best of their ability. 
 Telephone calls succeed each other almost 
 without interruption, replacing reams of 
 written reports, to the great advantage of 
 the service. 
 
 The department charged with furnishing 
 supplies to the army has worked well since 
 
 230 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 the beginning of the war. Even in the heat 
 and stress of battle, when conditions are 
 most difficult, or when there has been a 
 great concentration of troops, the distribu- 
 tion of food has been made in good time, 
 and the men have received their rations 
 promptly. The food of our soldiers is excel- 
 lent, and as varied as it is possible to make 
 it; this has certainly had a share in main- 
 taining the high morale of the army. 
 
 I know the chief commissary of an army 
 corps, a man particularly intelligent and re- 
 sourceful, who, from one day to the next, 
 found the nvimber of men dependent upon 
 him for their food exactly doubled. It was 
 when the battle of the Yser was at its 
 height, and other units were temporarily 
 added to his corps, so that it was a question 
 of finding eighty thousand rations instead of 
 forty thousand. He managed somehow to 
 get around the difficulty, and all the men 
 were fed without delay. 
 
 But after all the good administration of 
 
 231 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 a commissary depends altogether upon that 
 of his distributing railway-station ! 
 
 August 11th. — I was waked very early 
 this morning by the combined noises of a 
 furious cannonade and a violent thunder- 
 storm. 
 
 There has been a severe German attack 
 in the ravine of the Fontaine-la-Houyette, 
 preceded, as usual by a heavy bombardment 
 with large shells and torpedoes. 
 
 End of October, — Nothing happens any 
 more in our Argonne, where it used to be 
 so lively. The Germans do not make any 
 attacks, and one quiet day follows another. 
 The sum of our daily losses has fallen to 
 zero, probably because we have consolidated 
 our defenses, and built excellent bomb-proof 
 shelters in case we should be shelled again. 
 The forest and the whole country are magnif- 
 icent in these autumn days, and the trees 
 are clothed in the most marvellous colors. 
 
 232 
 
JOURNAL OF THE AUTHOR 
 
 November 10th. — Still calm, still nothing 
 happening on our front. It certainly is a 
 tremendous change. The Germans used for- 
 merly to attack us regularly every week or 
 ten days, but now they remain strictly on the 
 defensive. They scarcely even answer our 
 artillery fire. 
 
 What has become of the fine plan to take 
 our railway between Ste.-Menehould and 
 Verdun? How long it seems since we have 
 had a rhodomontade from Major Moraht! 
 After so many efforts and sacrifices on their 
 part, this sudden inaction is hard to account 
 for. The most probable reason for it is that 
 the Germans have found out the futility of 
 their attempts. Perhaps the German Gen- 
 eral Staff, on adding up its losses in Ar- 
 gonne, has come to the conclusion that 
 thousands of its best soldiers have been 
 slaughtered in the vain pursuit of an elusive 
 and fantastic goal. 
 
 The cost of throwing military limelight on the 
 Kronprinz may seem to them rather excessive. 
 
 233 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 Whatever their reasons may be, the at- 
 titude of the Germans in Argonne has changed 
 completely. Henceforth they seem likely to 
 remain on the defensive here, as on all other 
 parts of the western front. The change is 
 great, and of significant importance, because 
 it calls attention to another check. The 
 Germans have not succeeded any better in 
 Argonne than they did on the Yser — there 
 and here they tried to pass — and we have 
 stopped them. 
 
 234 
 
V 
 THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 OF all cities in the world, none gave the 
 impression of a stronghold more strik- 
 ingly than Verdim. The great encircling 
 walls, in which the heavy outer gates were 
 much as Vauban left them, compressed the 
 town like a mighty cuirass, and in its narrow 
 streets, even in time of peace, there were 
 always many more soldiers than civilians. 
 The Meuse, a stream now forever tragic, 
 flows through the middle of the city, but no 
 fresh air seemed to follow its current; a 
 river is always the chief ornament of any 
 other abode of men, but in this place given 
 over to war it was only an additional de- 
 fense — another wide moat. 
 
 In August and September, 1915, just a 
 year after the war began, my military service 
 took me frequently to Verdun. At that 
 
 235 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 time it had been for months one of the quietest 
 of our sectors; to the right and left, around 
 Eparges and in Argonne, the fighting had 
 been fierce, and was renewed from time to 
 time, but in the Verdun salient, which lay 
 between, there was little going on. 
 
 A large part of the population had, in 
 consequence, remained in the city. A few 
 big German shells fired at very long range 
 had, to be sure, fallen within the walls; 
 they made a great noise but did little damage, 
 and the gallant men and women of Lor- 
 raine, whose country has been a battle- 
 field for hundreds of years, are not easily 
 frightened. Almost all of the shops were 
 open. Verdun is known far and wide for its 
 sugared almonds, those "dragees'' without 
 which no wedding-feast nor christening in 
 France is complete, and the confectioners 
 went on calmly making them. Some in- 
 genious spirits among them had even in- 
 vented a large "dragee-bombe,'' 'shaped like 
 the shell of our "75'' gun, which opened 
 
 236 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 suddenly with a loud report, scattering a 
 harmless shrapnel of almonds. 
 
 The merest glance at the map is enough 
 to show that the old citadel bars one of the 
 principal highways from Germany into France. 
 In the first days of the war, when the Ger- 
 mans were making their great offensive in 
 Belgium, they took it for granted that Ver- 
 dun would fall without a struggle, and at 
 the time of their rush on Paris, early in 
 September, 1914, the French army defend- 
 ing the fortress, commanded by General Sar- 
 rail, found itself peculiarly placed. The Kron- 
 prinz^s army, spreading down by all the 
 roads from the Argonne, had succeeded in 
 getting to the south of Revigny; General 
 Sarrairs right wing rested on Verdun, so 
 that his main force faced west instead of 
 north, and in that position played its part 
 in the battle of the Mame. After that de- 
 feat the Germans retreated as fast as they 
 could go; General SarraiFs army pursued 
 them to the north, reoccupied Ste.-Mene- 
 
 237 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 hould, and pushed as far as possible into 
 the forest of Argonne. 
 
 As the Germans had not succeeded in 
 taking Verdun during their great envelop- 
 ing advance on Paris, they next tried to at- 
 tack it on the other side, from the plain of 
 Woevre. An effort on what are called the 
 Hants de Meuse gave them possession of 
 St.-Mihiel, and if after that they had been 
 able to cross the Meuse and push on further, 
 Verdun would have been almost entirely 
 flanked. But their advance was energetically 
 halted. St.-Mihiel marked its farthest limit. 
 
 Thus both attacks on Verdun, one from 
 the west by the Argonne, the other from 
 the east by the Hants de Meuse, failed com- 
 pletely, and the incessant efforts of the 
 Kronprinz, kept up during a whole year 
 in the forest of Argonne, met with insignif- 
 icant results compared with the number of 
 lives they cost. At last, unable to get aroimd 
 Verdun, no matter from what side they 
 made the attempt, the Germans decided 
 to attack it in front. 
 
 238 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 One of the great principles of German 
 strategy is that the main body of an enemy 
 must be sought, attacked, and beaten first 
 of all, no matter what else has to be disre- 
 garded. This is not a discovery of the Ger- 
 mans; they borrowed it from Napoleon, 
 who made it the dominant rule of his strat- 
 egy, and like all strategical rules, it is based 
 on common sense; what is essential must 
 be considered before what is merely acces- 
 sory. In accordance with this doctrine, in 
 the beginning of the war the Germans di- 
 rected most of their efforts against France, 
 who was, and is still, as the Kaiser declared 
 not long ago, "the chief enemy." 
 
 Their first great offensive having met 
 with disaster at the battle of the Mame, 
 they tried a second a fortnight later at the 
 battle of the Aisne, and a third, not long 
 afterward, at the battle of the Yser. 
 
 Each of these efforts failed, and toward 
 the end of 1914 the Germans found them- 
 selves held in check at every point of our 
 front. What then shall they do? It stands 
 
 230 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 to reason that they will reconstitute their 
 forces, organize new divisions, new army 
 corps, and again try to force a decisive issue 
 where alone it can be found — that is to 
 say, on the French front. France once 
 beaten, Germany might consider the war 
 at an end, but on the contrary, while France 
 holds out, no matter what victories may be 
 won elsewhere, the war will go on indefi- 
 nitely. 
 
 Let us see what actually happened. In 
 the course of 1915 the Germans made some 
 very severe attacks, as at Vailly, Soissons, 
 the trench fighting at Calonne, and when 
 they used gas at Ypres, but these did not 
 lead to anything. In the operations on the 
 western front it was the Allies who took 
 the initiative. 
 
 Nor could the fighting in the Argonne, 
 no matter how fierce, be considered as a 
 great offensive. At intervals of eight or ten 
 days, during the last months of 1914 and 
 the first half of 1915, the army of the Kron- 
 
 240 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 prinz, which was composed of some of the 
 best German troops, made exceedingly vio- 
 lent attacks in the forest of Argonne, in which 
 a whole division or even two were engaged. 
 Their object was clearly defined; it was to 
 gain our trenches one after another, and 
 little by little, through incessant effort, to 
 push the French line toward the south in 
 order to cut, or at least to interfere with, 
 the only railway on which Verdun depended 
 for her supplies. 
 
 During all that time the German strength 
 was chiefly directed against Russia rather 
 than France. Why did they give up their 
 original plan? Why did they break one of 
 the rules of their strategy? It was because 
 political and diplomatic reasons intervened 
 to counterbalance the judgment of the mili- 
 tary authorities, and to force their hand. 
 In the spring of 1915 the Russian army had 
 reached the southern slopes of the Car- 
 pathians, directly menacing Hungary. Italy 
 also was on the point of declaring war with 
 
 241 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 Austria; the Dual Monarchy was likely to 
 crumble away unless immediately assisted. 
 Through her marvellous system of espionage 
 Germany was fully informed of the scarcity 
 of all sorts of munitions in the Russian army, 
 and this was a good reason for attacking 
 Russia while she could offer less resistance 
 than France. It was therefore decided that 
 the offensive should be on the eastern front. 
 The movement was conducted with great 
 vigor; its importance was undeniable, but 
 it could not in any sense be regarded as 
 conclusive. 
 
 This attack on the Russians was followed 
 by another on the Serbians, and, with the 
 effective assistance of the Bulgarians, Serbia 
 and Montenegro were overrun. 
 
 But France determined to defend Salo- 
 nica at whatever cost, and her ally, Great 
 Britain, was of the same mind. A powerful 
 and constantly increasing Anglo-French army 
 assembled there, and although Germany blus- 
 tered she did not dare to strike. The former 
 
 242 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 situation repeated itself — Germany had made 
 an advance without gaining any decisive re- 
 sult. 
 
 The end of 1915 brought her back, whether 
 she would or no, to what was after all the 
 essential point of the war — her struggle 
 with France. The German people had been 
 fed with false hopes and dazzled by glittering 
 visions. They were told that when once the 
 road to Constantinople was open the con- 
 quest of Egypt was certain, and Turkey and 
 Bulgaria would furnish unlimited reserves to 
 crush Germany's enemies. Those visions 
 gradually faded, and reality had to be faced 
 
 — the reality that imtil she had won a great 
 victory over France Germany could not 
 hope to end the war successfully. 
 
 Therefore, toward the end of 1915, the 
 Germans determined to do what they had 
 not attempted during the whole of the year 
 
 — to make a supreme effort against the 
 French front. 
 
 It is important to keep always in mind 
 
 243 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 that they did this because they could not 
 do otherwise; they had not, like England, 
 Russia, and ourselves, resources which al- 
 lowed them to wait; they knew that time 
 was fighting not for but against them. The 
 docile German press continued to assert 
 that, as their armies occupied Belgium, Po- 
 land, and part of France, they were sub- 
 stantially victorious; in order to win it 
 was not necessary that they should attack; 
 they had but to keep the ground they al- 
 ready held. 
 
 The simple fact that the German General 
 Staff felt obliged to undertake a great of- 
 fensive against us proves the falsity of these 
 asseverations. The staff was fully aware 
 that it would be most difficult, in fact al- 
 most impossible, to force the French posi- 
 tions; its officers knew that lives by the 
 hundreds of thousands must be sacrificed 
 in order to gain a doubtful result. As, in 
 face of such knowledge, an offensive was 
 decided upon, it is self-evident that no other 
 
 244 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 course was open, especially as an attack on 
 Salonica was found to be impracticable. 
 
 Once it was settled that a thrust forward 
 should be made, the point of attack had to 
 be chosen. Why was that choice Verdun? 
 There are many reasons to account for it. 
 It was absolutely necessary that the French 
 front should be penetrated at some espe- 
 cially important point. Also, since the Ger- 
 mans occupied St.-Mihiel, the sector of 
 Verdun formed a salient which laid it open 
 to a possible attack from three sides at the 
 same time. Our front once broken through, 
 both wings of the German army could en- 
 velop us and our defeat would become a 
 disaster. Moreover, the sector of Verdun 
 is cut in two from north to south by the 
 Meuse, which gives the attacking party a 
 distinct advantage. If troops on the right 
 side of the river, which is the more exposed, 
 were forced to retreat hurriedly,' they could 
 only do so by means of a limited number of 
 bridges. In winter the Meuse often over- 
 
 245 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 flows its banks and floods the surrounding 
 country, which would make the building of 
 additional bridges a slow and difficult busi- 
 ness; if the enemy should press on vigor- 
 ously, bringing his heavy artillery to bear 
 on the spots where he knows these bridges 
 must be placed, retreat would become an 
 exceedingly risky matter. Military history 
 has often proved the truth of this, the battle 
 of Leipsic being one of the most striking 
 examples. 
 
 If we look at the railways we shall see yet 
 another reason for the German decision. 
 In ordinary times Verdun is supplied by two 
 main railway lines, one running from south 
 to north, by St.-Mihiel, the other going from 
 west to east, by Ste.-Menehould. The first 
 line was partly in the hands of the Germans 
 since their occupation of St.-Mihiel. The 
 second was exposed to the fire of the Ger- 
 man batteries between St.-Mihiel and Verdun, 
 especially in the region of Aubreville and 
 Dombasle, where it makes a sharp elbow 
 
 246 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 northward, and it would run great risk of 
 being cut there. There is also a third line 
 making a diagonal from Revigny to Verdun, 
 but that is scarcely worth counting. As it 
 was only meant to serve local interests, its 
 capacity is very limited; it zigzags cheerfully 
 across the fields like a drunken man, so much 
 so that the country people call it "le tor- 
 tillard'' — the twister. 
 
 The Germans supposed that the defenders 
 of Verdun would be seriously embarrassed 
 by this inadequate railway system. Many 
 trains are constantly needed in order to feed 
 a large army, and above all to keep it sup- 
 plied with munitions, and our enemy hoped 
 that these trains could not be provided. 
 But they did not take into account our ad- 
 mirable French roads, nor the ingenuity of 
 our General Staff, which makes marvellous 
 use of our network of highways, and had 
 for some time been considering the pos- 
 sibility of supplying the needs of Verdim 
 by motor-trucks alone. This motor-truck 
 
 247 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 service is one of the best-regulated and most 
 successful developments of the present war. 
 Its creation and growth were only a matter 
 of a few months, and it works to perfection; 
 the officers responsible for it have certainly 
 shown that a faculty for rapid and intelli- 
 gent organization is a privilege not exclu- 
 sively reserved for Germans. Any lingering 
 doubt would be dispelled by a visit to one of 
 our "army zones." An apparently endless 
 procession of these trucks stretches out for 
 miles along the road, each keeping its proper 
 distance from the one ahead of it, and all 
 moving with absolute precision and disci- 
 pline. When the fighting began at Verdun 
 thousands of them were in readiness, and by 
 their means our great army was kept fully 
 supplied with food and ammunition. 
 
 The German High Command had an- 
 other reason for attacking Verdun, besides 
 those of home politics and military strategy. 
 Although they have since denied it, they 
 intended to take the city in a few days, and 
 
 248 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 thus prove to all the world the irresistible 
 power of Germany. The neutral nations 
 which were still hesitating would then make 
 haste to range themselves beside her. The 
 Teutonic General Staff is past master in the 
 art of exaggeration, and when one remembers 
 the capital which was made out of the ad- 
 vance on Fort Douaumont it is easy to im- 
 agine to what lyric flights the German press 
 would have been inspired by the fall of 
 Verdun. 
 
 With the sole exception of Paris, "Fer- 
 toun," as the Germans call it, has been more 
 spoken of in their newspapers than any 
 other French city. Half a dozen times since 
 the war began its fall had been announced; 
 each time the news was false, but now the 
 German General Staff resolved to make it 
 true. 
 
 The plan of the attack was to be a repe- 
 tition, with more crushing force, of the vic- 
 torious offensive made in the spring of 1915 
 on the Russian army in Galicia. A mass of 
 
 249 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 infantry, supported by heavy artillery, was 
 to be hurled against the centre of our posi- 
 tions; our front once broken, both wings 
 of the German army would close in on the 
 salient of Verdun like a vise, making our 
 retreat disastrous, if not impossible. 
 
 In order to make sure of this result, all 
 available forces were concentrated. Toward 
 the end of 1915 some of the heavy guns 
 which had been used in the Russian cam- 
 paign were brought back, and as many as 
 could be spared were withdrawn from the 
 western front. It is estimated that there 
 were two thousand guns, all of large caliber, 
 in the appalling mass of artillery thus con- 
 centrated. The ordinary field-piece was little 
 used; the work was done chiefly by those 
 much heavier: "105," "210," "305," "380," 
 up to "420." It was expected that this 
 deluge of fire would annihilate our trenches 
 and the men in them, rendering it impos- 
 sible for us to hold our positions. 
 
 For this enormous amount of artillery 
 
 250 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 enormous quantities of munitions were pro- 
 vided; great piles of shells and bombs were 
 accumulated in every possible place through- 
 out the region which the Germans held. 
 The supplies thus in readiness, they pro- 
 ceeded to organize the assaulting army. 
 
 As the Germans have not an inexhaust- 
 ible supply of men, they could no longer 
 make new divisions and army corps, as 
 they had done at the battle of the Yser. 
 For three or four months they had been 
 withdrawing their finest corps from other 
 fronts in order to make them into a phalanx 
 such as Mackensen had thrown against the 
 Russians. These corps were the Fifteenth, 
 brought back from the region of Ypres; the 
 Eighteenth, from the Somme; the Seventh 
 Reserve Corps, from the Aisne; and the 
 Third, part of which had been on the Ser- 
 bian front, but had done no fighting. All 
 these corps were allowed to rest at a distance 
 from the front, in comfortable quarters, and 
 the men were abundantly fed; some of the 
 
 251 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 German prisoners said they had been given 
 double rations of meat and triple of coffee. 
 One of these corps, the Fifteenth, which is 
 in garrison at Strasburg in time of peace, 
 ranks with the corps usually garrisoning 
 Metz as among the best in the army. 
 
 In November and December, 1914, during 
 the battle of the Yser, I was in the sector of 
 Ypres, directly facing this corps, and it was 
 the opinion of competent judges that no 
 troops in the German army fought with 
 more dash and vigor, while their commander. 
 General von Daimling, was of exceptional 
 ability. An order of the day was found on 
 one of our prisoners at Verdun, in which 
 this general announced to his men that the 
 decisive moment had come at last, and that 
 their irresistible attack on Verdun would at 
 once put an end to the war. 
 
 These four corps, intended especially for 
 the assault, were largely made up of the 
 most vigorous soldiers from the class of 
 1916, who had been drilled and trained with 
 the utmost care. The formations of officers 
 
 252 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 and non-commissioned officers had been en- 
 tirely made over. During the last months 
 of 1915 the German General Staff was ob- 
 viously careful of officers, knowing that they 
 could not easily be replaced, but in the at- 
 tack on Verdun, which was meant to be 
 conclusive, the officers received orders to 
 sacrifice themselves without reserve. They 
 were required to lead their men in order to 
 make the assault more impetuous and over- 
 whelming. 
 
 These four army corps were thus brought 
 into the sector of Verdun and inserted, like 
 a wedge, into the army of the Kronprinz, 
 which crowded to right and left in order 
 to make room for them. Three of his corps 
 were also to attack, making seven army 
 corps ready for the great offensive. 
 
 The positions occupied by the French 
 just before the great battle are well known, 
 having been accurately given in an official 
 publication from our General Headquarters, 
 made in the Bulletin des Armees. 
 
 Our left, starting from the Meuse, rested 
 
 253 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 on Brabant, Consenvoye, and Les Caures; 
 on our centre we held the wood of Ville, 
 L'Herbebois, and Omes; our right included 
 Maucourt, Mogeville, the pool of Braux, 
 and the wood of Hautes Charrieres. Behind 
 this first line was a second, taking in the 
 village of Samogneux, hill (or "cote") 344, 
 the Mormont farm, Beaumont, La Wavrille, 
 Les Fosses, Le Chaume, Les Carrieres, Bezon- 
 vaux, Grand Chenas, and Dieppe. Still 
 farther to the rear, with the village of Bras 
 as a landmark, came the line of the forts of 
 Verdun; Douaimiont, Hardaumont, Vaux, La 
 Laufee, and Eix. Between them and our 
 second line a series of counter-sloping trenches 
 ran from Douaumont to Louvemont, on the 
 "cotes'' of Poivre and Talou. 
 
 If our first line is followed on the map it 
 will be seen to form an arc of a vast circle, 
 beginning at the Meuse, stretching to its 
 centre at Verdim, and ending as far up as 
 Etain, in the plain of Woevre. In this arc 
 the sector most fiercely attacked was that 
 
 254 
 
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 ""TJ 
 
 <C^^ 
 
 Brabanr.. <-J^^/ ^'^ 
 
 oG rem illy 
 3rabanr . Kt^J^ \ '^ ' 
 
 ^v^r>Do^aumon/- 
 
 0/ 
 
 Ue^!' )\og^3. 
 
 
 4-/ 
 
 ^ 
 
 >/^^ ^^ 
 
 4. Eix 
 
 i^TERDUN 
 
 Blerct /Forest" 4, 
 
 Haudaumo 
 
 Du|ny 
 Ancemonr oVoXDieues.Meuse 
 
 XTAIN 
 
 )SouiIIy 
 
 lesEparge^ 
 
 iBeauzee- 
 
 ^^^Lacroix 
 
 Courouvre 
 o 
 
 Pierrefit^e 
 o, 
 
 Rupr 
 
 rBAR-L^UC 
 
 IST.MIHIEL 
 
 Boncourr 
 ,0 
 
 COMMERC 
 
 THE SURROUNDING REGION. 
 
VERDUN AND THK SURROUNDING RKCION. 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 between Brabant and Omes, which forms a 
 decided salient. Artillery fire could sweep 
 it on three sides: from the heights of Mont- 
 faucon and the wood of Forges on the west, 
 where it made a noticeable curve inward; 
 from the north; and also from the east. 
 
 It must be borne in mind that, from its 
 nature, this first line of ours could only be 
 held against a violent attack with the greatest 
 difficulty, and this is true of our second line 
 as well. The part of prudence would there- 
 fore be to fall back gradually from one line 
 to another, not risking a decisive engage- 
 ment until a favorable position could be 
 reached. This was what our General Staff 
 decided to do. 
 
 The first four weeks of the war (August and 
 September, 1914) and the first four days of 
 the battle of Verdun (February 21st-25th) 
 resemble each other strongly in general out- 
 line, and in what may be termed the rhythm 
 of their operations. I wish to call attention 
 to this, because to my mind it is the domi- 
 
 255 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 nant and essential feature of these great 
 military events. In August, 1914, as in 
 February, 1916, the Germans made extraor- 
 dinary preparations; they studied the plan 
 of their offensive in all its details; they ac- 
 cumulated a formidable number of men and 
 an inexhaustible amount of ammunition; 
 their officers and soldiers alike were ready 
 to throw themselves into the attack with 
 the greatest impetuosity. The method and 
 the force of this offensive were so irresistible 
 that the French High Command found it 
 necessary to fall back, and some ground was 
 given up in order that a successful stand 
 might be made later. It was yielding a side 
 issue; the important, the vital point, was to 
 win the battle finally; whether a few leagues 
 or kilometres more or less to the north or 
 south was of no consequence. Our troops 
 retired until the favorable moment came, 
 and then, when the Germans were sure we 
 were beaten, we struck with our full force, 
 and at the crucial moment defeat was turned 
 into victory. From that time the Germans 
 
 256 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 were stopped, and in several places driven 
 back; all their efforts and sacrifices were 
 useless, and only served to mark the im- 
 portance of their check. 
 
 That was the rhythm of the first four 
 weeks of the war, up to the battle of the 
 Mame, and it was also the rhythm of the 
 first four days of the battle of Verdun, up 
 to the recapture of the Fort of Douaumont 
 by our Twentieth Corps. 
 
 First act: The French fall back as the 
 Germans advance. 
 
 Second act: A decisive battle ends in 
 victory for the French. 
 
 Third act: The Germans are held in 
 check; they may move to and fro, but they 
 can make no serious advance, and will wear 
 themselves out to no purpose. 
 
 I. The German Attack and the 
 French Retreat 
 
 On the 21st of February, at a quarter 
 past seven in the morning, the bombard- 
 ment of Verdun began, and continued with 
 
 257 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 an intensity which made the German fire 
 during the war, even at the battles of Cham- 
 pagne and Artois, seem like child's play in 
 comparison. The number of pieces of heavy 
 artillery which fired incessantly was stupen- 
 dous; French aviators flying over the Ger- 
 man lines agreed in reporting that in the 
 region to the north of our positions, espe- 
 cially in Spincourt and the woods adjoin- 
 ing, it was "like a display of fireworks." 
 Such an incessant cannonade came from the 
 little wood of Gremilly, north of La Jumelle, 
 that our observers had to give up marking 
 on their cards the different batteries in ac- 
 tion; they were everywhere; the guns stood 
 almost wheel to wheel. That went on for 
 hours, and at four o'clock in the afternoon 
 the firing became still more intense; it was 
 as if thousands of rockets were being sent 
 up for the "bouquet" of the show. In order 
 to make our positions untenable, asphyxiat- 
 ing and lachrymatory bombs were mingled 
 with the heavy projectiles, while six captive 
 
 258 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 balloons floated over the German lines and 
 directed their aim. Our first lines were 
 almost levelled by this avalanche of steel — 
 trenches, parapets, shelters, no matter how 
 well made, were utterly destroyed. Then, 
 toward five o'clock, the first infantry attack 
 was launched. 
 
 The Germans were convinced that their 
 infernal fire had made it impossible for our 
 infantry to hold their ground, and counted 
 on occupying our positions almost without 
 resistance on our part. Most of the work 
 would have been done by their artillery; 
 they need only advance and occupy ground 
 which had been evacuated. The German 
 tactics during their attacks on Verdun were 
 all based on this conviction. The artillery 
 must strike systematically and with crush- 
 ing force on every point of our line, making 
 a zone of death around all our centres of 
 resistance. When the destruction seemed 
 complete, part of the infantry was sent 
 forward to examine the effect of the firing. 
 
 259 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 Each recohnoitring group was made up of 
 about fifteen men; behind them came the 
 bomb-throwers, and after them again the 
 first great wave of infantry. In this instance 
 they did not sufficiently take into account 
 the magnificent courage of our soldiers. In 
 spite of the blasting fire they stuck to their 
 positions, making the most of every little in- 
 equality of the ground, and crouching low in 
 the yawning holes made by the great shells. 
 As the Germans advanced their ranks were 
 mown down like grass by our mitrailleuses. 
 Then the bombardment began again. No 
 sooner was one attack repulsed than another 
 came on, and at the end of the first day the 
 enemy had a foothold in some of the trenches 
 of our first line, and in a few places had even 
 got as far as our supporting trenches. They 
 had also taken the woods of Haumont and 
 Caures, but the southern part of Caures 
 was won back by the splendid bravery of 
 Lieutenant-Colonel Driant and his chasseurs. 
 In the region of Soumazzanes, the wood of 
 
 260 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 Ville and L'Herbebois, our supporting line 
 still held firm. 
 
 The morning of the 22d was cold and 
 snowy, and about half past seven the Ger- 
 mans began to warm us, in the western part 
 of the sector, by throwing jets of liquid fire 
 into the wood of Consenvoye. Thanks to 
 these "flammenwerfer'' they managed to 
 get to the bottom of a ravine; in Herbebois 
 and the wood of Ville the hand-to-hand 
 fighting was bloody and determined. The 
 German artillery fire became still more vio- 
 lent; great gusts of flame swept over Angle- 
 mont, the Mormont farm, and La Wavrille. 
 The village of Haumont was in the hottest 
 of it; but the gallant men who held it stood 
 close around their colonel and fought until 
 the last; it was six o'clock in the afternoon 
 before the enemy could get into its ruins. 
 By the end of the day we had lost the wood 
 of Ville, but we still held most of Herbebois 
 and La Wavrille. 
 
 The troops had no protection; main and 
 
 261 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 communication trenches, shelters, centres of 
 defense — all were battered to pieces; it 
 was fighting in the open. Night fell; in the 
 cold and the snow, under the unceasing 
 bombardment, our men hastily dug them- 
 selves in again. It was absolutely necessary 
 to stop the German advance, in order to 
 give our reserves time to come up; the men 
 knew it, and although they were tired out 
 they worked, as they had fought, like de- 
 mons. 
 
 During the night of the 22d-23d we evac- 
 uated Brabant. The village of Samogneux 
 was under such heavy fire that a counter- 
 attack on our part was impossible, and we 
 were objiged to remain on the defensive. 
 To the eastward the Germans had got 
 within eight hundred metres of the farms of 
 Anglemont and Mormont, and were shelling 
 them with their 305-mm. and 380-mm. guns. 
 It was an infernal rain of fire, but with ad- 
 mirable energy and discipline our men held 
 their positions. 
 
 262 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 At six in the morning of the 23d the enemy 
 attacked La Wavrille and was repulsed. In 
 L'Herbebois the fighting was desperate all 
 day. The northern border of this wood is 
 a thick coppice about five hundred metres 
 wide; the Germans, who wanted to carry 
 this position at any cost, attacked here in 
 great force and in close formation. The 
 French waited until they were within fifty 
 metres and then opened on them with volley- 
 firing by platoons; our mitrailleuses and 
 "75's" also fired at close range into the solid 
 mass. Whole ranks were wiped out at a 
 time; it was downright slaughter. This 
 first attack having failed, four others were 
 launched, with the same result. The fighting 
 became furious beyond description. In one 
 of our communicating trenches, four grena- 
 diers threw bombs steadily for more than 
 twenty hours; it was death for whoever tried 
 to pass them. The Germans, in spite of all 
 their efforts and their reckless squandering 
 of life, could not gain a foot of ground. But 
 
 263 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 unfortunately, as night fell, after incessant 
 attacks, they succeeded in taking La Wa- 
 vrille, and the holders of Herbebois were 
 obliged to fall back or risk being flanked. 
 The men, fighting-mad, refused to retreat, 
 choosing rather to die where they stood. 
 
 Again, on the 24th, the Germans ad- 
 vanced and again we fell back, having evac- 
 uated the village of Samogneux during the 
 night, as it was in a very dangerous position. 
 A French regiment was stationed astride of 
 the road from Samogneux to Vacherauville, 
 with orders to hold "cote" 344, whatever 
 happened. The Germans knew how im- 
 portant this road was and did their best to 
 get it. Five or six times they tried to make 
 their way out of Samogneux, each time to 
 be met by the combined fire of our infantry, 
 our mitrailleuses, and our artillery. Their 
 losses were frightful, and it was evening be- 
 fore they succeeded in fastening themselves 
 on the "cote." By that time the village 
 of Beaumont, the wood of Fosses, and Le 
 
 264 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 Chaume had been already occupied for some 
 hours. 
 
 At twenty minutes past two in the after- 
 noon a large German force poured out be- 
 tween Louvemont and "cote" 347; the vil- 
 lage of Omes, attacked on three sides at 
 once (a danger to which it had always been 
 exposed), was almost surrounded and had 
 to be evacuated. That threw us back on 
 the line of the forts. 
 
 The Germans were sure they had won 
 this greatest war game. One last effort 
 would make them masters of the heights 
 above Verdun, and our army would be 
 forced to retire in disorder. 
 
 II. The Counter-Attack and the 
 French Recovery 
 
 And yet all the elements which were to 
 come to our rescue were already at hand. 
 Our High Command had had time to bring 
 up important reserves, which, coming into 
 action at the right time and place, would 
 
 265 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 at once change the situation. These re- 
 serves could not have been used effectively 
 until the real object of the enemy was clear; 
 it might be that he was only making a feint 
 before Verdun and would strike his chief 
 blow at another point of our lines. It was 
 necessary that he should come on, and thus 
 show his hand. The heroic resistance of our 
 men for three days to numbers much greater 
 than their own, their fierce disputing of every 
 foot of ground, their wearing down of the 
 German resistance had given our reinforce- 
 ments this necessary time. 
 
 On that day of desperate fighting, the 
 24th, Major-General de Castelnau left head- 
 quarters in order to decide upon the spot 
 what measures he should take. He came; 
 he made up his mind without hesitation. 
 His orders were that the reserves should 
 come into action at once, and at whatever 
 cost stop the German advance on our prin- 
 cipal lines. 
 
 That same day General Petain arrived, 
 
 266 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 with all his staff, to take active command 
 of the troops defending Verdun. 
 
 In one of my former chapters, "The 
 French Offensive in Champagne," I de- 
 scribed this general, one of the glories of 
 our army and of France. "He is tall, slim, 
 young-looking, with an air of extreme dis- 
 tinction, quick, incisive speech, and resolute 
 blue eyes. Whenever those eyes of his light 
 on a new face he feels the immediate need to 
 label and classify it, and store away the 
 image in some pigeonhole of his marvel- 
 lously lucid memory, where thereafter it 
 will always have its distinctive place. Look- 
 ing at him and listening to him, one has the 
 impression that the art of warfare is above 
 all things a matter of precision, forethought, 
 and tenacity. The masters of military 
 science, the men predestined to shine in 
 war, are those in whom the balance between 
 brain and character, between understanding 
 and willing, is most petfectly adjusted." 
 
 One of our finest army corps was im- 
 
 267 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 patiently waiting to be sent into action. 
 Since the war began it had been in battle 
 wherever fighting was to be found; in Flan- 
 ders, in Artois, and in Champagne, winning 
 laurels everywhere. 
 
 This corps was now thrown into the fur- 
 nace without hesitation. The German ad- 
 vance was checked; their offensive broken; 
 they could go no farther. 
 
 It was bitter cold, and drifting snow hin- 
 dered the march of our columns. The Ger- 
 man artillery tried to stop the coming of 
 our reinforcements by a formidable curtain 
 fire and by shelling our rear lines inces- 
 santly. But our men, knowing the value 
 of those fateful hours, marched with eager 
 hearts, regardless of all obstacles. As an 
 official communique said: "It was like the 
 battle of the Mame — the cry of 'Forward !' 
 gave them superhuman courage." 
 
 The principal field of the great fight was 
 the table-land of Douaumont, which is to 
 the battle of Verdun what the marshes of 
 
 268 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 St.-Gond, the Chateau of Mondement, and 
 the plain of Fere-Champenoise were to the 
 battle of the Mame. 
 
 On the morning of the 25th the Germans 
 made a fierce attack on the "cote" of Poivre, 
 carrying the villages of Louvemont and 
 Bezonvaux. Before Douaumont the fight- 
 ing was fiendish; by five o'clock in the after- 
 noon the village seemed to be surrounded. 
 While this violent struggle was going on, a 
 party of Brandenburgers, belonging to the 
 Third Corps, managed to creep up to the 
 fort of Douaumont, and held on there. 
 
 The Teutonic General Staff forthwith 
 trumpeted to the world that "the armored 
 fort of Douaumont, the comer-stone of the 
 French defense of Verdun, has been carried 
 by a Brandenburg regiment*'; and wireless 
 messages everywhere proclaimed this vic- 
 tory as positive. But it was only temporary. 
 By the time the news was spread abroad 
 our troops had thrust back the enemy by a 
 vigorous counter-attack, and were closing 
 
 269 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 around the Brandenburgers. A bloody strug- 
 gle followed; the Germans, knowing how 
 much depended on it, did their utmost to 
 widen the breach they had made toward 
 the fort of Douaumont; the village of Douau- 
 mont was taken and retaken, but all the 
 German effort and bloodshed were in vain 
 — henceforth their advance was definitely 
 controlled. 
 
 III. The Fighting on Our Wings 
 AND THE German Check 
 
 When the Germans found that their frontal 
 attack was not the conclusive success for 
 which they had striven, they decided, after 
 a pause, to attack both our wings, on the 
 left bank of the Meuse. This movement 
 was to be carried out by the army of the 
 Kronprinz, with the help of the picked 
 corps which had joined it. In an order of 
 the day dated March 4th the Kronprinz 
 exhorted his troops to prepare themselves 
 for the supreme effort necessary to take 
 
 270 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 Verdun, "the heart of France." Our posi- 
 tions on the left bank of the Meuse now 
 formed more or less of a salient, compared 
 to those on its right bank, where our troops 
 had been obliged to draw back, and against 
 this salient the German attack was accord- 
 ingly directed. 
 
 The same movement which had taken 
 place on the right side now repeated itself. 
 We held our first line only long enough to 
 retard the German advance, but when they 
 reached our principal positions at Mort- 
 Homme and "cote'* 304 they could go no 
 farther. Then began a series of very bloody 
 struggles. The wood of Corbeaux, for in- 
 stance, was taken and retaken and lost over 
 and over again, the enemy only succeeding 
 in holding it after a third attack. 
 
 On the 14th of March, new German di- 
 visions having come up, another fierce at- 
 tempt was made. Mort-Homme was shelled 
 even more heavily than at the beginning of 
 the battle; every infernal modem projectile, 
 
 271 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 time and percussion bombs, asphyxiating 
 and lachrymatory shells were hurled on our 
 positions; one hundred and twenty were 
 counted in a single minute. 
 
 When at last, about three in the afternoon, 
 the German infantry swept forward, most 
 of the men in our trenches were half suf- 
 focated and almost buried alive. "Cote" 
 265 was taken, but the little peak 295 re- 
 mained in our hands. 
 
 While the fighting on the left bank of the 
 Meuse was going on, an attack was also 
 made on the fort and village of Vaux, on the 
 right side of the river, east of Douaumont, 
 and on the 8th of March a vigorous offensive 
 gave the German infantry possession of the 
 firat houses of the village, from which they 
 were almost entirely driven out by a bril- 
 liant counter-attack on our part. At no time 
 did they get near the fort, which lies to the 
 rear; a fact which did not prevent their 
 authorities from issuing the following sensa- 
 tional communique: "The 6th and 19th 
 
 272 
 
RELIEF MAT OF LE MORT-IlOMilH AND THE HILLS NiOKTII OF VEKDIIN. 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 Regiments of Posen Reserves, led by General 
 von Guretski-Comitz, have stormed the ar- 
 mored fort of Vaux, and have also taken 
 many other fortifications in that neighbor- 
 hood." 
 
 It so happened that, at the very time 
 when this "news'' was being rushed every- 
 where, one of the officers of our General 
 Staff went into the fort of Vaux and was 
 able to assure himself that it had not been 
 attacked, and that the troops holding it 
 were quite undisturbed. Our General Staff 
 thereupon immediately contradicted the lying 
 report in the most positive manner. 
 
 Again, as in the case of the Sussex, the 
 intentional bad faith of our enemy was ex- 
 posed, but that did not disconcert him; it 
 was then announced that the fort had been 
 taken, and retaken later by a French counter- 
 attack. It was not necessary for us to re- 
 take Vaux, for the simple reason that we had 
 never lost it. 
 
 Day followed day, and the attacks on our 
 
 273 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 right and left wings led to no more decisive 
 result than those made at first on our centre. 
 The German assaulting corps, which had 
 borne the brunt of the fighting, were dec- 
 imated and worn out; some of the regiments 
 had lost as high as sixty per cent of their 
 officers and men. It was absolutely neces- 
 sary that they should be sent to the rear to 
 rest and be reorganized. 
 
 But the officers of the German General 
 Staff were well aware that the whole world 
 had its eyes upon Verdun. They knew they 
 were playing for a high stake, and that the 
 outcome of the war depended to a great 
 extent on the mighty struggle on both sides 
 of the Meuse. Therefore, rather than ac- 
 knowledge failure, they decided to redouble 
 their efforts. New divisions were hurried 
 forward to replace those which were ex- 
 hausted, and on the 9th of April another 
 very violent attack was hurled against our 
 positions on the left bank of the river, at 
 
 cote" 304. But there were no longer suf- 
 
 274 
 
 << ^A^ 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 ficient reserves to give this thrust the power 
 and scope of those in the beginning. All 
 that could be done was to bring up one di- 
 vision after another, to relieve those which 
 were most exhausted. Heavy artillery could 
 be used like a battering-ram against one or 
 other of our positions, but there was no 
 longer any question of a general advance. 
 I wish to dwell upon this point, for a new 
 phase of the battle has begun. 
 
 In order to be convinced of the magni- 
 tude of the German failure, one has but to 
 follow the successive changes in the tone of 
 the Teutonic press as the struggle dragged on. 
 
 It was taken for granted that the advance 
 on Verdun would strike us like a thunder- 
 bolt. The Kronprinz said so in a procla- 
 mation, and the Kaiser, as usual, made an 
 inspiring visit to the army about to fall on 
 us. In a Bavarian newspaper, the Munchener 
 Neueste Nachrichten, Colonel Medicus proudly 
 wrote later: "Our ring of steel is visibly 
 tightening around the fortress; we shall 
 
 275 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 therefore be able to record a great and deci- 
 sive victory, of which the consequences will 
 be felt at once; of this the governor of Ver- 
 dun must be sadly certain." This was at the 
 time when the German wireless stations were 
 busily spreading the news broadcast that 
 "the armored fort of Douaumont, the comer- 
 stone of the defense of Verdun," had been 
 carried by storm under the eyes of the Kaiser. 
 The press, usually so carefully muzzled, was 
 allowed to say what it chose: the Rhei- 
 nische Westfdlische Zeitung declared that "the 
 taking of the fort of Douaumont, which 
 breaks the circle of forts at its most vulner- 
 able point, makes it possible to predict the 
 speedy fall of the fortress itself." The 
 Frankfurter Zeitung improved on this fore- 
 cast by saying: "It is clear that men who 
 have not recoiled before the defenses of 
 Douaumont, one of the strongest fortresses 
 in France, will not be stopped by any slighter 
 resistance." 
 As time went on, and Verdun did not 
 
 276 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 fall, it became necessary to put a damper 
 on this enthusiasm. The German press 
 was therefore ordered to exhort the public 
 to possess its soul in patience. All the mili- 
 tary critics explained carefully to their readers 
 that the delay was foreseen and intentional. 
 The Berliner Tageblatt of March 15th said: 
 "Spoiled by the extraordinary rapidity of 
 the campaign which made us masters of the 
 Russian fortresses last summer, we some- 
 times make the mistake of comparing it 
 with the present fighting on the western 
 front, which has for its objective the fall of 
 Verdun." 
 
 Days lengthened into weeks, and the for- 
 tress still stood; so the press faced about, 
 gravely affirming that the General Staff 
 had never really meant to take Verdun at 
 all, and that any such statement was a 
 malevolent and perfidious invention of the 
 French. The staff had only attacked at that 
 point in order to prevent the general offen- 
 sive for which the French were making ready 
 
 277 
 
GENERAL JOFFRE 
 
 These contradictions are very significant 
 and enlightening, because they bear witness 
 to the hopes, the fears, and the disappoint- 
 ment of the German people from day to day. 
 
 To sum up one may say: First, Germany 
 knew that a war of erosion must of necessity 
 be to her disadvantage, because time was 
 working against her, and the resources of 
 England, Russia, and France were increas- 
 ing, while her own steadily diminished. She 
 therefore meant to end the struggle by a 
 smashing blow, and chose the sector of 
 Verdun in order to deal this blow to her 
 "chief enemy," France. After masterly prep- 
 aration she had accumulated in this sector 
 all the resources in men and munitions of 
 which she could dispose. The result of the 
 first four days of the battle was in her favor, 
 but as soon as our reserves came up her ad- 
 vance was checked. Willing to sacrifice 
 any number of lives in order to win, she 
 has drawn ruthlessly on her reserves, and 
 at the end of three months of carnage she 
 
 278 
 
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN 
 
 finds herself in the position of a desperate 
 gambler who has risked his fortune on a 
 single stake, only to find that luck has turned 
 against him. 
 
 279 
 
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