1.
Hundred Days Offensive
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The offensive essentially pushed the Germans out of France, forcing them to retreat beyond the Hindenburg Line, and was followed by an armistice. The term Hundred Days Offensive does not refer to a battle or unified strategy. The Spring Offensive of the German Army on the Western Front had begun on 21 March 1918 with Operation Michael and had petered out by July, the Germans had advanced to the river Marne but failed to achieve a decisive breakthrough. When Operation Marne-Rheims ended in July, the Allied supreme commander Ferdinand Foch ordered a counter-offensive which became known as the Second Battle of the Marne, the Germans, recognising their untenable position, withdrew from the Marne towards the north. For this victory, Foch was granted the title Marshal of France, Foch considered the time had arrived for the Allies to return to the offensive. The American Expeditionary Force, was present in France in large numbers, pershing was keen to use his army in an independent role. The Somme was chosen as a site for the offensive for several reasons. As in 1916, it marked the boundary between the BEF and the French armies, in this case defined by the Amiens–Roye road, also the Picardy countryside provided a good surface for tanks, which was not the case in Flanders. Finally, the German defences, manned by the German 2nd Army, were relatively weak, the Battle of Amiens opened on 8 August 1918, with an attack by more than 10 Allied divisions—Australian, Canadian, British and French forces—with more than 500 tanks. Through careful preparation, the Allies achieved surprise, the attack, led by the British Fourth Army, broke through the German lines and tanks attacked German rear positions, sowing panic and confusion. By the end of the day, a gap 15 mi wide had been created in the German line south of the Somme, the Allies had taken 17,000 prisoners and 330 guns. Total German losses were estimated to be 30,000 men, while the Allies had suffered about 6,500 killed, wounded, the collapse in German morale led Erich Ludendorff to dub it the Black Day of the German Army. The advance continued for three days but without the spectacular results of 8 August, since the rapid advance outran the supporting artillery. During those three days, the Allies had managed to gain 12 mi but most of that had occurred on the first day, as a result of the Germans adding reinforcements. On 10 August, the Germans began to pull out of the salient that they had managed to occupy during Operation Michael in March, haig refused and prepared to launch a fresh offensive by the Third Army at Albert, which opened on 21 August. The offensive was a success, pushing the German 2nd Army back over a 34 mi front, Albert was captured on 22 August. The attack was widened on the south, by the French Tenth Army starting the Second Battle of Noyon on 17 August, capturing the town of Noyon on 29 August. On 26 August, to the north of the initial attack, with the front line broken, a number of battles took place as the Allies forced the Germans back to the Hindenburg Line
2.
World War I
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World War I, also known as the First World War, the Great War, or the War to End All Wars, was a global war originating in Europe that lasted from 28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918. More than 70 million military personnel, including 60 million Europeans, were mobilised in one of the largest wars in history and it was one of the deadliest conflicts in history, and paved the way for major political changes, including revolutions in many of the nations involved. The war drew in all the worlds great powers, assembled in two opposing alliances, the Allies versus the Central Powers of Germany and Austria-Hungary. These alliances were reorganised and expanded as more nations entered the war, Italy, Japan, the trigger for the war was the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary, by Yugoslav nationalist Gavrilo Princip in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914. This set off a crisis when Austria-Hungary delivered an ultimatum to the Kingdom of Serbia. Within weeks, the powers were at war and the conflict soon spread around the world. On 25 July Russia began mobilisation and on 28 July, the Austro-Hungarians declared war on Serbia, Germany presented an ultimatum to Russia to demobilise, and when this was refused, declared war on Russia on 1 August. Germany then invaded neutral Belgium and Luxembourg before moving towards France, after the German march on Paris was halted, what became known as the Western Front settled into a battle of attrition, with a trench line that changed little until 1917. On the Eastern Front, the Russian army was successful against the Austro-Hungarians, in November 1914, the Ottoman Empire joined the Central Powers, opening fronts in the Caucasus, Mesopotamia and the Sinai. In 1915, Italy joined the Allies and Bulgaria joined the Central Powers, Romania joined the Allies in 1916, after a stunning German offensive along the Western Front in the spring of 1918, the Allies rallied and drove back the Germans in a series of successful offensives. By the end of the war or soon after, the German Empire, Russian Empire, Austro-Hungarian Empire, national borders were redrawn, with several independent nations restored or created, and Germanys colonies were parceled out among the victors. During the Paris Peace Conference of 1919, the Big Four imposed their terms in a series of treaties, the League of Nations was formed with the aim of preventing any repetition of such a conflict. This effort failed, and economic depression, renewed nationalism, weakened successor states, and feelings of humiliation eventually contributed to World War II. From the time of its start until the approach of World War II, at the time, it was also sometimes called the war to end war or the war to end all wars due to its then-unparalleled scale and devastation. In Canada, Macleans magazine in October 1914 wrote, Some wars name themselves, during the interwar period, the war was most often called the World War and the Great War in English-speaking countries. Will become the first world war in the sense of the word. These began in 1815, with the Holy Alliance between Prussia, Russia, and Austria, when Germany was united in 1871, Prussia became part of the new German nation. Soon after, in October 1873, German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck negotiated the League of the Three Emperors between the monarchs of Austria-Hungary, Russia and Germany
3.
Canal du Nord
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The Canal du Nord is a 95-kilometre long canal in northern France. The canal connects the Canal latéral à lOise at Pont-lÉvêque to the Sensée Canal at Arleux, the French government, in partnership with coal-mining companies in the Nord and Pas-de-Calais departments, developed the canal to help French coal mining companies withstand foreign competition. Construction of the began in 1908 but halted in 1914. The war caused widespread destruction of the canal and the French government made no attempt to resume construction until 1959, construction recommenced in 1960 and the waterway opened to the public in 1965. Until the construction of the Canal du Nord, the Canal de Saint-Quentin was the only linking the Seine basin to the north of France. In 1860, the coal companies in the Pas-de-Calais region grouped themselves into a Comité des Houillères du Pas-de-Calais. The group expanded into the Comité des Houillères du Nord et du Pas-de-Calais in 1878, a special commission of the French Ministry of Public Works conducted their first study in 1878 to find a “suitable means of putting the coal mines in a position to withstand foreign competition. The concept of the canal was included in the Freycinet Plan, plans for the canal were presented to the Chamber of Deputies in 1882. On 23 December 1903, the French government authorized construction of the Canal du Nord, in 1908 construction began on the canal. Under the plan, coal-mining companies contributed one-third of the construction cost, three quarters of the excavations, eleven locks and all of the bridges were complete, with work well advanced on the tunnels, when World War I forced a halt in construction. The war resulted in destruction of the canal and the French government did not attempt to resume building prior to the Second World War. The Battle of the Canal du Nord was part of a general Allied offensive against German positions on the Western Front during the Hundred Days Offensive of World War I. The battle took place along a portion of the Canal du Nord. It began one day after the Meuse-Argonne Offensive, one day before an offensive in the Flanders region of Belgium, Bordeaux, Société de géographie commerciale de Bordeaux
4.
Geographic coordinate system
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A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
5.
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
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The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland was established as a sovereign state on 1 January 1801 by the Acts of Union 1800, which merged the kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland. The growing desire for an Irish Republic led to the Irish War of Independence, Northern Ireland remained part of the United Kingdom, and the state was consequently renamed the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Britain financed the European coalition that defeated France in 1815 in the Napoleonic Wars, the British Empire thereby became the foremost world power for the next century. The Crimean War with Russia and the Boer wars were relatively small operations in a largely peaceful century, rapid industrialisation that began in the decades prior to the states formation continued up until the mid-19th century. A devastating famine, exacerbated by government inaction in the century, led to demographic collapse in much of Ireland. It was an era of economic modernization and growth of industry, trade and finance. Outward migration was heavy to the colonies and to the United States. Britain also built up a large British Empire in Africa and Asia, India, by far the most important possession, saw a short-lived revolt in 1857. In foreign policy Britain favoured free trade, which enabled its financiers and merchants to operate successfully in many otherwise independent countries, as in South America. Britain formed no permanent military alliances until the early 20th century, when it began to cooperate with Japan, France and Russia, and moved closer to the United States. A brief period of limited independence for Ireland came to an end following the Irish Rebellion of 1798, the British governments fear of an independent Ireland siding against them with the French resulted in the decision to unite the two countries. This was brought about by legislation in the parliaments of both kingdoms and came into effect on 1 January 1801, however, King George III was bitterly opposed to any such Emancipation and succeeded in defeating his governments attempts to introduce it. When the Treaty of Amiens ended the war, Britain agreed to return most of the territories it had seized, in May 1803, war was declared again. In 1806, Napoleon issued the series of Berlin Decrees, which brought into effect the Continental System and this policy aimed to eliminate the threat from the British by closing French-controlled territory to foreign trade. Frances population and agricultural capacity far outstripped that of the British Isles, Napoleon expected that cutting Britain off from the European mainland would end its economic hegemony. The Spanish uprising in 1808 at last permitted Britain to gain a foothold on the Continent, after Napoleons surrender and exile to the island of Elba, peace appeared to have returned. The Allies united and the armies of Wellington and Blucher defeated Napoleon once, simultaneous with the Napoleonic Wars, trade disputes, arming hostile Indians and British impressment of American sailors led to the War of 1812 with the United States. The war was little noticed in Britain, which could devote few resources to the conflict until the fall of Napoleon in 1814, American frigates inflicted a series of defeats on the Royal Navy, which was short on manpower due to the conflict in Europe
6.
Canada
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Canada is a country in the northern half of North America. Canadas border with the United States is the worlds longest binational land border, the majority of the country has a cold or severely cold winter climate, but southerly areas are warm in summer. Canada is sparsely populated, the majority of its territory being dominated by forest and tundra. It is highly urbanized with 82 per cent of the 35.15 million people concentrated in large and medium-sized cities, One third of the population lives in the three largest cities, Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver. Its capital is Ottawa, and other urban areas include Calgary, Edmonton, Quebec City, Winnipeg. Various aboriginal peoples had inhabited what is now Canada for thousands of years prior to European colonization. Pursuant to the British North America Act, on July 1,1867, the colonies of Canada, New Brunswick and this began an accretion of provinces and territories to the mostly self-governing Dominion to the present ten provinces and three territories forming modern Canada. With the Constitution Act 1982, Canada took over authority, removing the last remaining ties of legal dependence on the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Canada is a parliamentary democracy and a constitutional monarchy, with Queen Elizabeth II being the head of state. The country is officially bilingual at the federal level and it is one of the worlds most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations, the product of large-scale immigration from many other countries. Its advanced economy is the eleventh largest in the world, relying chiefly upon its abundant natural resources, Canadas long and complex relationship with the United States has had a significant impact on its economy and culture. Canada is a country and has the tenth highest nominal per capita income globally as well as the ninth highest ranking in the Human Development Index. It ranks among the highest in international measurements of government transparency, civil liberties, quality of life, economic freedom, Canada is an influential nation in the world, primarily due to its inclusive values, years of prosperity and stability, stable economy, and efficient military. While a variety of theories have been postulated for the origins of Canada. In 1535, indigenous inhabitants of the present-day Quebec City region used the word to direct French explorer Jacques Cartier to the village of Stadacona, from the 16th to the early 18th century Canada referred to the part of New France that lay along the St. Lawrence River. In 1791, the area became two British colonies called Upper Canada and Lower Canada collectively named The Canadas, until their union as the British Province of Canada in 1841. Upon Confederation in 1867, Canada was adopted as the name for the new country at the London Conference. The transition away from the use of Dominion was formally reflected in 1982 with the passage of the Canada Act, later that year, the name of national holiday was changed from Dominion Day to Canada Day
7.
New Zealand
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New Zealand /njuːˈziːlənd/ is an island nation in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. The country geographically comprises two main landmasses—the North Island, or Te Ika-a-Māui, and the South Island, or Te Waipounamu—and around 600 smaller islands. New Zealand is situated some 1,500 kilometres east of Australia across the Tasman Sea and roughly 1,000 kilometres south of the Pacific island areas of New Caledonia, Fiji, because of its remoteness, it was one of the last lands to be settled by humans. During its long period of isolation, New Zealand developed a distinct biodiversity of animal, fungal, the countrys varied topography and its sharp mountain peaks, such as the Southern Alps, owe much to the tectonic uplift of land and volcanic eruptions. New Zealands capital city is Wellington, while its most populous city is Auckland, sometime between 1250 and 1300 CE, Polynesians settled in the islands that later were named New Zealand and developed a distinctive Māori culture. In 1642, Dutch explorer Abel Tasman became the first European to sight New Zealand, in 1840, representatives of Britain and Māori chiefs signed the Treaty of Waitangi, which declared British sovereignty over the islands. In 1841, New Zealand became a colony within the British Empire, today, the majority of New Zealands population of 4.7 million is of European descent, the indigenous Māori are the largest minority, followed by Asians and Pacific Islanders. Reflecting this, New Zealands culture is derived from Māori and early British settlers. The official languages are English, Māori and New Zealand Sign Language, New Zealand is a developed country and ranks highly in international comparisons of national performance, such as health, education, economic freedom and quality of life. Since the 1980s, New Zealand has transformed from an agrarian, Queen Elizabeth II is the countrys head of state and is represented by a governor-general. In addition, New Zealand is organised into 11 regional councils and 67 territorial authorities for local government purposes, the Realm of New Zealand also includes Tokelau, the Cook Islands and Niue, and the Ross Dependency, which is New Zealands territorial claim in Antarctica. New Zealand is a member of the United Nations, Commonwealth of Nations, ANZUS, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, Pacific Islands Forum, and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation. Dutch explorer Abel Tasman sighted New Zealand in 1642 and called it Staten Landt, in 1645, Dutch cartographers renamed the land Nova Zeelandia after the Dutch province of Zeeland. British explorer James Cook subsequently anglicised the name to New Zealand, Aotearoa is the current Māori name for New Zealand. It is unknown whether Māori had a name for the country before the arrival of Europeans. Māori had several names for the two main islands, including Te Ika-a-Māui for the North Island and Te Waipounamu or Te Waka o Aoraki for the South Island. Early European maps labelled the islands North, Middle and South, in 1830, maps began to use North and South to distinguish the two largest islands and by 1907, this was the accepted norm. The New Zealand Geographic Board discovered in 2009 that the names of the North Island and South Island had never been formalised and this set the names as North Island or Te Ika-a-Māui, and South Island or Te Waipounamu
8.
German Empire
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The German Empire was the historical German nation state that existed from the unification of Germany in 1871 to the abdication of Kaiser Wilhelm II in 1918, when Germany became a federal republic. The German Empire consisted of 26 constituent territories, with most being ruled by royal families and this included four kingdoms, six grand duchies, five duchies, seven principalities, three free Hanseatic cities, and one imperial territory. Although Prussia became one of kingdoms in the new realm, it contained most of its population and territory. Its influence also helped define modern German culture, after 1850, the states of Germany had rapidly become industrialized, with particular strengths in coal, iron, chemicals, and railways. In 1871, it had a population of 41 million people, and by 1913, a heavily rural collection of states in 1815, now united Germany became predominantly urban. During its 47 years of existence, the German Empire operated as an industrial, technological, Germany became a great power, boasting a rapidly growing rail network, the worlds strongest army, and a fast-growing industrial base. In less than a decade, its navy became second only to Britains Royal Navy, after the removal of Chancellor Otto von Bismarck by Wilhelm II, the Empire embarked on a bellicose new course that ultimately led to World War I. When the great crisis of 1914 arrived, the German Empire had two allies, Italy and the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Italy, however, left the once the First World War started in August 1914. In the First World War, German plans to capture Paris quickly in autumn 1914 failed, the Allied naval blockade caused severe shortages of food. Germany was repeatedly forced to send troops to bolster Austria and Turkey on other fronts, however, Germany had great success on the Eastern Front, it occupied large Eastern territories following the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. German declaration of unrestricted submarine warfare in early 1917 was designed to strangle the British, it failed, but the declaration—along with the Zimmermann Telegram—did bring the United States into the war. Meanwhile, German civilians and soldiers had become war-weary and radicalised by the Russian Revolution and this failed, and by October the armies were in retreat, Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire had collapsed, Bulgaria had surrendered and the German people had lost faith in their political system. The Empire collapsed in the November 1918 Revolution as the Emperor and all the ruling monarchs abdicated, and a republic took over. The German Confederation had been created by an act of the Congress of Vienna on 8 June 1815 as a result of the Napoleonic Wars, German nationalism rapidly shifted from its liberal and democratic character in 1848, called Pan-Germanism, to Prussian prime minister Otto von Bismarcks pragmatic Realpolitik. He envisioned a conservative, Prussian-dominated Germany, the war resulted in the Confederation being partially replaced by a North German Confederation in 1867, comprising the 22 states north of the Main. The new constitution and the title Emperor came into effect on 1 January 1871, during the Siege of Paris on 18 January 1871, William accepted to be proclaimed Emperor in the Hall of Mirrors at the Palace of Versailles. The second German Constitution was adopted by the Reichstag on 14 April 1871 and proclaimed by the Emperor on 16 April, the political system remained the same. The empire had a parliament called the Reichstag, which was elected by universal male suffrage, however, the original constituencies drawn in 1871 were never redrawn to reflect the growth of urban areas
9.
United Kingdom
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The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom or Britain, is a sovereign country in western Europe. Lying off the north-western coast of the European mainland, the United Kingdom includes the island of Great Britain, Northern Ireland is the only part of the United Kingdom that shares a land border with another sovereign state—the Republic of Ireland. The Irish Sea lies between Great Britain and Ireland, with an area of 242,500 square kilometres, the United Kingdom is the 78th-largest sovereign state in the world and the 11th-largest in Europe. It is also the 21st-most populous country, with an estimated 65.1 million inhabitants, together, this makes it the fourth-most densely populated country in the European Union. The United Kingdom is a monarchy with a parliamentary system of governance. The monarch is Queen Elizabeth II, who has reigned since 6 February 1952, other major urban areas in the United Kingdom include the regions of Birmingham, Leeds, Glasgow, Liverpool and Manchester. The United Kingdom consists of four countries—England, Scotland, Wales, the last three have devolved administrations, each with varying powers, based in their capitals, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast, respectively. The relationships among the countries of the UK have changed over time, Wales was annexed by the Kingdom of England under the Laws in Wales Acts 1535 and 1542. A treaty between England and Scotland resulted in 1707 in a unified Kingdom of Great Britain, which merged in 1801 with the Kingdom of Ireland to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Five-sixths of Ireland seceded from the UK in 1922, leaving the present formulation of the United Kingdom of Great Britain, there are fourteen British Overseas Territories. These are the remnants of the British Empire which, at its height in the 1920s, British influence can be observed in the language, culture and legal systems of many of its former colonies. The United Kingdom is a country and has the worlds fifth-largest economy by nominal GDP. The UK is considered to have an economy and is categorised as very high in the Human Development Index. It was the worlds first industrialised country and the worlds foremost power during the 19th, the UK remains a great power with considerable economic, cultural, military, scientific and political influence internationally. It is a nuclear weapons state and its military expenditure ranks fourth or fifth in the world. The UK has been a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council since its first session in 1946 and it has been a leading member state of the EU and its predecessor, the European Economic Community, since 1973. However, on 23 June 2016, a referendum on the UKs membership of the EU resulted in a decision to leave. The Acts of Union 1800 united the Kingdom of Great Britain, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have devolved self-government
10.
Henry Horne, 1st Baron Horne
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General Henry Sinclair Horne, 1st Baron Horne GCB, KCMG was a military officer in the British Army, most notable for his generalship during the First World War. He was the only British artillery officer to command an army in the war, Horne was born on 19 Feb 1861 in the parish of Wick in Caithness, Scotland, the third son of Major James Horne and Constance Mary Shewell. He was first educated at Harrow, receiving a commission from the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich in May 1880. Promotion to Captain followed on 17 August 1883, and to Major on 23 February 1898, from 1899 to 1902 Horne fought with the cavalry in the Second Boer War in South Africa under Sir John French. He received the promotion to Lieutenant colonel on 29 November 1900. In 1905 he received the promotion to lieutenant-colonel and served with the Royal Horse Artillery under Sir Douglas Haig. His military career was unremarkable until 1912 when he was promoted to brigadier, War broke out two years later and Horne was appointed to command a force of artillery under General Haig, who commanded I Corps. Horne fought with distinction in the British Expeditionary Forces actions throughout 1914, in October of that year, he was promoted to major general, a few months later, he was given command of the 2nd Division. The media launched vicious attacks on the Secretary of State for War, Lord Kitchener, significantly, the artillery were reorganised after this fiasco at General Hornes suggestion. In November 1915, Horne accompanied Lord Kitchener to the Dardanelles, for several months, Horne was placed in charge of the Suez Canal defences. March 1916 saw him back on the Western Front and he joined the Fourth Army which was preparing for an attack on the Somme. On 1 July 1916, General Hornes XV Corps participated in the costliest battle of the First World War, in the pre-battle plans, Horne advocated and became an architect of the creeping barrage which was used for the rest of the war. The Battle of the Somme, which raged on for four months,13 British divisions participated in the attack, General Hornes XV Corps consisted of the 21st and 7th Divisions. His divisions focused their attack on two villages, Fricourt and Mametz, they captured both on the first day for about 8,000 casualties, on 1 January 1917, he was promoted to the substantive rank of Lieutenant-General for distinguished service in the field. His first trial occurred in April 1917, when his troops were sent on an attack on the fearsome Vimy Ridge. French Army commander Robert Nivelle was critical of Hornes plan, Nivelle was the one found incompetent and, after one month of relative failure, the attack on Vimy Ridge was spearheaded by the First Armys shock troops. The capture of Vimy Ridge would prove essential to the British Army, nivelles failure and sacking lengthened the actions around Arras. With success imminent, General Haig began siphoning troops northward, where many would participate in the Battles of Messines, the First Army served mainly as a diversion and a placeholder until April 1918
11.
Julian Byng, 1st Viscount Byng of Vimy
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Field Marshal Julian Hedworth George Byng, 1st Viscount Byng of Vimy GCB GCMG MVO was a British Army officer who served as Governor General of Canada, the 12th since Canadian Confederation. Known to friends as Bungo, he was born to a family at Wrotham Park in Hertfordshire, England. Upon graduation, Byng received a commission as a officer and thereafter saw service in Egypt. There, he befriended individuals who would be his contemporaries when he attained senior rank in France, after the end of his viceregal tenure, Byng returned to be appointed Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis and was promoted within the peerage to become Viscount Byng of Vimy. Three years after attaining the rank of marshal, Byng died at his home on 6 June. Until the age of 17, Byng was enrolled at Eton College, Byng later claimed that he had been the schools worst Scug, the colloquial term for an undistinguished boy. With three sons already in the army and another already put up for the 7th Queens Own Hussars, thus, at the age of 17, Byng was instead sent into the militia and on 12 December 1879 commissioned as a second lieutenant into the 2nd Royal Middlesex Rifles. He was promoted to lieutenant on 23 April 1881, during this period, Byng also developed a liking for theatre and music halls, and by the age of twenty had taken an interest in the banjo. At a meeting of the Jockey Club in 1882, Byngs father was asked about his sons by his friend, Albert Edward. Upon hearing that Byng had not yet found a permanent career, the Prince offered a place for him in his own regiment, the 10th Royal Hussars. Byng himself was delighted at the opportunity, as both his uncle, Lord Chesham, and his cousin, Charles Cavendish, had served in the regiment. Most of the rebels were dispersed shortly after, and on 29 March the regiment re-embarked for Britain, arriving on 22 April. During the summer of 1884, Byng spent much of his time playing polo and training recruits and horses, Byng struck up a friendship with both Albert Victor and George, but did not socialise with them much outside of army circles. Byng was appointed as the adjutant on 20 October 1886, only nine days before the death of his father. It was also at this time that Byng became acquainted with the Lord Rowton, in 1888, the Hussars again moved, this time to York, where Byng kept his men busy by raising successful cricket and football teams. Byng was promoted to captain on 4 January 1890, around the time he began to consider entering the Staff College at Camberley, by December 1894, Byng graduated from the Staff College and was immediately appointed to command the A Squadron of the hussars. He was appointed to the Royal Victorian Order as a member 4th class in May. By the midpoint of the year, Byng was sent back to India to command the 10th Royal Hussars at Mhow and was appointed to the rank of a lieutenant colonel on 11 October 1902
12.
Otto von Below
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Otto Ernst Vincent Leo von Below was a Prussian general officer in the Imperial German Army during the First World War. He was most notable for his command, along with the Austro-Hungarian commander Svetozar Boroević, before the War broke out, Otto von Below was promoted Generalmajor in 1909 and Generalleutnant in 1912. He was commanding 2nd Infantry Division immediately prior to the outbreak of war, on 1 August 1914, at the outbreak of the First World War, Below was given command of I Reserve Corps as part of 8th Army on the Eastern Front. He led his Corps in the Battles of Gumbinnen, Tannenberg, as a result of his successes, he was promoted to General der Infanterie at the end of August 1914 and to command of 8th Army at the beginning of November. Below commanded the 8th Army in the Second Battle of the Masurian Lakes and his forces advanced into Courland and Lithuania as far as the southern reaches of the Western Dvina River. In October 1916, Below was appointed to the command of Heeresgruppe Below on the Macedonian Front, consisting of the German 11th Army, in April 1917, he was briefly sent to the Western Front to command 6th Army around Lille. Below next served on the Italian Front from September 1917, commanding the Austro-German 14th Army in the Battle of Caporetto, his units were able to break into the Italian front line and rout the Italian army, which had practically no mobile reserves. The battle was a demonstration of the effectiveness of the use of stormtroopers, the use of poison gas by the Germans played a key role in the collapse of the Italian Second Army. A breakdown in German logistics brought the battle to a close on the line of the Piave River, if February 1918, Below was brought back to the Western Front to command the newly formed 17th Army for the Kaiserschlacht Offensive. Below was expected to overrun Arras during March 1918 in a repeat of Caporetto, attacking the stronger, better prepared British 3rd Army, he had less success than forces further south facing the British 5th Army. Below briefly commanded the 1st Army, shortly before the wars end, Below was involved in preparations for a possible final battle on German territory. Below was awarded the Pour le Mérite on 16 February 1915 for outstanding leadership and distinguished military planning and successful operations, and the Oakleaves on 27 April 1917. In addition to the Pour le Mérite, Below was also awarded the Order of the Black Eagle on 1 November 1917, a post-war attempt by the Allies to try him as war criminal failed. Otto von Below died on 9 March 1944 in Friedland, Lower Saxony, below was the cousin of Fritz von Below, another German commander during the war. The two Generals are often confused, Imperial German Army 1914-18, Organisation, Structure, Orders-of-Battle
13.
Georg von der Marwitz
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Johannes Georg von der Marwitz was a Prussian cavalry general, who commanded several German armies during the First World War on both the Eastern and Western fronts. Marwitz was born in Stolp in the Province of Pomerania and entered the Prussian Army in 1875, in 1881 he married Helene von Kameke, daughter of Prussian War Minister Georg von Kameke, with whom he had five children. From 1883 to 1886 he attended the Prussian Military Academy, until 1900 he commanded a cavalry regiment, at which point he became chief of staff of XVIII Corps. Before the outbreak of the First World War he was the Inspector-General of Cavalry, Marwitz was assigned to the Western Front in 1914 as commander of II Cavalry Corps, and participated in the Battle of Haelen. He was then transferred south and fought with Austria-Hungary against the Russians, on 6 October 1916 he became adjutant to Kaiser Wilhelm II, a post which he left in December 1916 to take command of the Second Army on the Western Front. The German Army formed along the Siegfried-Stellung line to Havrincourt Wood to la Vacquerie, in front lay a strongly fortified line of trenches. Behind the Support Line was yet another called the Beaurevoir-Masnieres-Marcoing Line. Esch system was built with concrete bunkers with massed machine-gun cover. The planned Wotan Line to Cambrai, where situated Marwitzs Second Army was never completed and his superior officer was Feld-Marschal Crown Prince Rupprecht, in command of the Army Group. General Marwitzs command was 3 or 4 infantry divisions, as per instructions he sent out patrols into British trenches searching for prisoners. Marwitz thought troop dispositions unchanged when reporting on 18 November 1917 and his officers apparently attached no particular significance to the presence of camouflaged tanks in the sector, seen for the first time on November 20. Marwitz, ignoring air reconnaissance of a build-up in the rear, the Caudry Group however took prisoner testimonies more seriously, being more responsive also to air intelligence. When he first heard of the British tank attack, he was still in bed at the le Cateau HQ, the surprise was disabling of his infantry, exacerbated by cut communication lines. Commanding Northern Group the Crown Prince informed Berlin, who blamed Second Army inattentiveness, but Marwitz defending was inclined to were forced to contemplate total withdrawal. AM of 21 November, Fontaine had already fallen, but the Second Army knew the allied strength and they ordered up Reserves - 214th, 119th and 3rd Guards Divisions all from the north Aisne and Flanders. Rupprecht required even more to support Marwitz position, action would fall on Bourlon Ridge, identified by the British as a vital strategic target. But the Germans had already raided Byngs III Corps seizing many prisoners, the massive German build-up around Cambrai should have informed them that the Germans finally took the threat of tank warfare seriously. In this Battle of Cambrai, which saw the most extensive use of tanks to date, more than twice the previous number, as a consequence, AM of 26 November 1917, Rupprecht and Marwitz planned at le Cateau the first offensive against the British since April 1915
14.
Western Front (World War I)
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The Western Front or Western Theater was the main theatre of war during World War I. Following the outbreak of war in August 1914, the German Army opened the Western Front by invading Luxembourg and Belgium, the tide of the advance was dramatically turned with the Battle of the Marne. Following the Race to the Sea, both sides dug in along a line of fortified trenches, stretching from the North Sea to the Swiss frontier with France. This line remained unchanged for most of the war. Between 1915 and 1917 there were several major offensives along this front, the attacks employed massive artillery bombardments and massed infantry advances. However, a combination of entrenchments, machine gun emplacements, barbed wire, as a result, no significant advances were made. In an effort to break the deadlock, this front saw the introduction of new technology, including poison gas, aircraft. But it was only after the adoption of improved tactics that some degree of mobility was restored, the German Armys Spring Offensive of 1918 was made possible by the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk that marked the end of the conflict on the Eastern Front. In spite of the stagnant nature of this front, this theatre would prove decisive. The terms of peace were agreed upon with the signing of the Treaty of Versailles in 1919, belgiums neutrality was guaranteed by Britain under the 1839 Treaty of London, this caused Britain to join the war at the expiration of its ultimatum at 11 pm GMT on 4 August. Armies under German generals Alexander von Kluck and Karl von Bülow attacked Belgium on 4 August 1914, Luxembourg had been occupied without opposition on 2 August. The first battle in Belgium was the Siege of Liège, which lasted from 5–16 August, Liège was well fortified and surprised the German Army under von Bülow with its level of resistance. German heavy artillery was able to demolish the main forts within a few days. Following the fall of Liège, most of the Belgian field army retreated to Antwerp, leaving the garrison of Namur isolated, with the Belgian capital, Brussels, although the German army bypassed Antwerp, it remained a threat to their flank. Another siege followed at Namur, lasting from about 20–23 August, for their part, the French had five armies deployed on their borders. The pre-war French offensive plan, Plan XVII, was intended to capture Alsace-Lorraine following the outbreak of hostilities, on 7 August the VII Corps attacked Alsace with its objectives being to capture Mulhouse and Colmar. The main offensive was launched on 14 August with 1st and 2nd Armies attacking toward Sarrebourg-Morhange in Lorraine, in keeping with the Schlieffen Plan, the Germans withdrew slowly while inflicting severe losses upon the French. The French advanced the 3rd and 4th Armies toward the Saar River and attempted to capture Saarburg, attacking Briey and Neufchateau, before being driven back
15.
German invasion of Belgium
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The German invasion of Belgium was a military campaign which began on 4 August 1914. Earlier, on 24 July, the Belgian government had announced that if war came it would uphold its historic neutrality, the Belgian government mobilised its armed forces on 31 July and a state of heightened alert was proclaimed in Germany. On 2 August, the German government sent an ultimatum to Belgium, demanding passage through the country, two days later, the Belgian Government refused the demands and the British Government guaranteed military support to Belgium. The German government declared war on Belgium on 4 August, troops crossed the border, the government abandoned the capital, Brussels, on 17 August and after fighting on the Gete river, the Belgian field army withdrew westwards, to the National Redoubt at Antwerp on 19 August. Brussels was occupied the day and Namur was besieged on 21 August. After the battles of Mons and Charleroi, the bulk of the German armies marched south into France, leaving small forces to garrison Brussels, the III Reserve Corps advanced to the fortified zone around Antwerp and a division of the IV Reserve Corps took over in Brussels. German troop withdrawals to reinforce the armies in France were postponed, to repulse a Belgian sortie from 9–13 September. While the French armies and the BEF began the Great Retreat into France, on 27 August, a squadron of the Royal Naval Air Service flew to Ostend, to fly air reconnaissance sorties between Bruges, Ghent and Ypres. British marines landed in France on 19/20 September and began scouting unoccupied Belgium in motor cars, on 2 October, the Marine Brigade of the Royal Naval Division was moved to Antwerp, followed by the rest of the division on 6 October. Despite minor British reinforcement, the siege of Antwerp ended when its defensive ring of forts was destroyed by German super-heavy artillery, the city was abandoned on 9 October and Allied forces withdrew to West Flanders. Military operations in Belgium also moved westwards as the Belgian army withdrew from Antwerp to the close to the border with France. By November 1914, most of Belgium was under German occupation, a German military administration was established on 26 August 1914, to rule Belgium through the pre-war Belgian administrative system, overseen by a small group of German officers and officials. The German occupation was maintained until late 1918, the 1839 Treaty of London recognized Belgium as an independent and neutral state. The Agadir Crisis of 1911 left the Belgian government in little doubt as to the risk of a European war, in September 1911, a government meeting concluded that Belgium must be prepared to resist a German invasion, to avoid accusations of collusion by the British and French governments. Britain, France and the Netherlands were also to continue to be treated as potential enemies, in 1913 and 1914, the Germans made inquires to the Belgian military attaché in Berlin, about the passage of German military forces through Belgium. If invaded, Belgium would need help but would not treat foreign powers as allies or form objectives beyond the maintenance of Belgian independence. Neutrality forced the Belgian government into a strategy of independence, based on a rearmament programme begun in 1909. The Belgian plan was to have three army corps, to reduce the advantage of the German armies over the French
16.
Battle of Halen
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In 1914, Halen was a small market town and a convenient river crossing of the Gete River, the town was also on the principal axis of advance of the Imperial German army. The battle was a victory for the Belgians but did little to delay the German invasion of Belgium. On 3 August the Belgian government refused a German ultimatum and the British government guaranteed military support to Belgium should Germany invade, Germany declared war on France, the British government ordered general mobilisation and Italy declared neutrality. On 4 August, the British government sent an ultimatum to Germany and declared war on Germany at midnight on 4/5 August, Belgium severed diplomatic relations with Germany and Germany declared war on Belgium. German troops crossed the Belgian frontier and attacked Liège, a week after the German invasion, German cavalry had been operating towards Hasselt and Diest, which threatened the left flank of the army on the Gete. Belgian General Headquarters chose Halen as a place to delay the advance, the Belgian Cavalry Division was sent from Sint-Truiden to Budingen and Halen, to extend the Belgian left flank. Belgian and French troops were rumoured to be between Tienen and Huy and Marwitz advanced to the north towards parties of Belgian cavalry, which had retired towards Diest. On 11 August, large bodies of German cavalry, artillery and infantry had been seen by Belgian cavalry scouts in the area from Sint-Truiden to Hasselt, Belgian headquarters therefore anticipated a German advance towards Hasselt and Diest. To block the German advance the Belgian Cavalry Division, commanded by Lieutenant-General Léon de Witte, was sent to guard the bridge over the River Gete at Halen. During an evening meeting, the Belgian general staff convinced de Witte to fight a dismounted action, General de Witte had garrisoned the Gete crossings at Diest, Halen, Geetbets and Budingen. The main road from Hasselt to Diest passed through this village, if captured, Loksbergen and Waanrode would be outflanked and the left wing of the Belgian army threatened. The German cavalry did not begin to move until 12 August due to the fatigue of the caused by the intense summer heat. The 2nd Cavalry Division of Major-General von Krane advanced through Hasselt to Spalbeek, Marwitz ordered the 4th Cavalry Division to cross the Gete and at 8,45 a. m. the 7th and 9th Jäger battalions advanced. Belgian engineers had blown the bridge over the Gete but the structure only partly collapsed, the main Belgian defence line was west of Halen, in terrain which gave only an obstructed view to the attacker. The 17th and 3rd Cavalry brigades assisted the Jäger in and south of Halen, attacks into the cornfields beyond were repulsed with many casualties, some cavalry becoming trapped by wire fences. Rode in against infantry, artillery and machine-guns, hung up on the wire, fell into a sunken road, the Jäger were also repulsed despite support from the 2nd Guards Machine-gun Detachment and dismounted cavalry sharpshooters. Towards the end of the day, Marwitz broke off the engagement, the 2nd Cavalry Division retired towards Hasselt and the 4th Cavalry Division withdrew to Alken. De Witte repulsed the German cavalry attacks by ordering the cavalry, significant casualties were inflicted upon the Germans
17.
Battle of Dinant
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The Battle of Dinant was an engagement fought by French and German forces in and around the Belgian town of Dinant during the First World War during the German invasion of Belgium. The French Fifth Army and the British Expeditionary Force advanced into Belgium and fought the Battle of Charleroi and Battle of Mons, from the Meuse crossings in the east, to Mons in the west. On 15 August 1914, German troops captured the Citadel of Dinant overlooking the town until it was recaptured by a French counter-attack during the afternoon, French troops spent the next few days fortifying the Meuse crossings and exchanging fire with German troops on the east bank. A German raiding-party drove into Dinant on the night of 21/22 August but the attack degenerated into a fiasco, in which Germans may have fired at each other. Rather than assume that the fire had come from the French on the west bank. The raiders ran away, with 19 dead and 117 wounded, the massacre was a systematic attack on assumed civilian resisters and was the largest German atrocity perpetrated during the invasion, which became known as The Rape of Belgium. In 1914, the town had a population of 7,000 people and was an important strategic crossing on the Meuse, where the river flows through a south–north gorge. Three roads and a path converged on the town from the east, over an escarpment and down into the town, the wooded ridge on the east bank was topped by the Napoleonic era stone Citadel of Dinant overlooking the town and the Meuse bridge, 100-metre below. In 1914 there was a ribbon of streets about 4 kilometres long on the east bank, before the battle, the Mayor of Dinant urged the population to not take part in the fighting and forbade manifestations in support of the Allies. The initial operations in the German invasion of France began with the Occupation of Luxembourg, five German infantry brigades, three cavalry divisions with horse artillery and machine-gun detachments and ten Jäger battalions crossed the Belgian border. The town of Dinant was close to the French border, between Liège and Mons on the east bank of the Meuse, on 6 August, Belgian engineers dispersed a patrol of German hussars at Anseremme and on 12 August, French infantry at Dinant destroyed a cavalry patrol. By 14 August, the French Fifth Army had occupied Dinant, on 15 August, troops of the German 3rd and 4th Cavalry divisions, five battalions of Jäger and three field artillery groups, attempted to take Dinant by coup de main. At 6,00 a. m. German cavalry guarded the flanks as the 12th Freyberg Jäger Battalion and the 13th Garde-Jäger Battalion supported by horse artillery and machine-guns, attacked the town and citadel. The Germans got a machine-gun into the citadel around 11,45 a. m. Jäger descended the stairway and advanced into the town by 1,30 p. m. The French had no artillery and were forced out of the citadel, parties of Jäger crossed the bridge in pursuit, as Germans on the high ground on the east bank and in the citadel, engaged the French at the end of the bridge with machine-gun fire. The Jäger were forced back across the Meuse and by 5,00 p. m. the French had climbed the 408 stairs to the citadel, the Germans withdrew from the town and the heights with their prisoners, towards the main body of the 3rd Army. During the battle, the French Cavalry Corps, attempted to attack the German flank on the east bank but was held up by German infantry, the French retired to the west bank having lost 1,100 casualties and occupied the bridge and houses nearby. Two battalions of the 148th Infantry Regiment in Leffe and St. Nicolas also retired to the west bank, in Dinant a civilian had been killed, one had been wounded and the hospital and houses on the east bank had been hit by shells
18.
Siege of Namur (1914)
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The Siege of Namur was a battle between Belgian and German forces around the fortified city of Namur during World War I. Namur was defended by a ring of fortresses, known as the Fortified Position of Namur. The French army was defeated at the Battle of Charleroi and managed to only one regiment into Namur as a reinforcement. The forts were destroyed by the bombardment, some being demolished by heavy artillery rather than the siege guns. The Anglo-French Entente had led the Belgians to perceive that the British attitude to Belgium had changed, on mobilization, the King became Commander-in-Chief and chose where the army was to concentrate. A school of thought wanted a return to a deployment in line with French theories of the offensive. Belgian plans became a compromise in which the army concentrated behind the Gete river with two divisions forward at Liège and Namur. German strategy had given priority to operations against France and a defensive posture against Russia since 1891. German planning was determined by numerical inferiority, the speed of mobilisation and concentration, frontal attacks were expected to be costly and protracted, leading to limited success, particularly after the French and Russians modernised their fortifications on the frontiers with Germany. By 1898–1899, such a manoeuvre was intended to pass swiftly through Belgium, helmuth von Moltke the Younger succeeded Schlieffen in 1906 and was less certain that the French would conform to German assumptions. 1,700,000 men which were expected to be mobilised in the Westheer. The French would either be annihilated by the manoeuvre from the north or it would create conditions for victory in the centre or in Lorraine on the common border, on the right bank were Fort de Maizeret, Fort dAndoy and Fort de Dave, all modernized. The obsolete Citadel of Namur in the town became redundant, the forts were built of non-reinforced concrete but this could only be poured in daylight, which caused weak joints between each pour. A citadel was built and covered by 3–4 metres of concrete, caserne walls which were vulnerable, had concrete of 1.5 metres thickness. The forts had a side to the rear, to allow them to be recaptured by Belgian forces counter-attacking from the rear. Barracks and support facilities were built on the side, using the rear ditch for light. Each fort had a detachment of infantry, to sortie from the fort to engage an attacker, the Battle of Liège was the first engagement in the German invasion of Belgium and the first battle of World War I. The attack on the city began on 5 August 1914 and lasted until 16 August, the Belgian field army withdrew from the Gete towards Antwerp from 18–20 August and Brussels was captured unopposed on 20 August. The siege of Liège lasted for days, rather than the two days anticipated by the Germans. 107,000 men which advanced on Namur on 16 August
19.
Battle of the Frontiers
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The Battle of the Frontiers was a series of battles fought along the eastern frontier of France and in southern Belgium shortly after the outbreak of World War I. The Franco-British were driven back by the Germans, who were able to invade northern France, French and British rearguard actions delayed the German advance, allowing the French time to transfer their forces to the west to defend Paris, resulting in the First Battle of the Marne. Moranville began planning for the concentration of the army and met Belgian railway officials on 29 July, on mobilization, the King became Commander-in-Chief and chose where the army was to concentrate. A school of thought wanted a return to a frontier deployment, Belgian plans became a compromise, in which the field army concentrated behind the Gete river, with two divisions further forward at Liège and Namur. The Schlieffen plan amounts to a critique of German strategy in 1914 since it clearly predicted the failure of Moltke’s underpowered invasion of France. It was his hope that the French would either be annihilated or the manoeuvre from the north would create conditions for victory in the centre or in Lorraine, on the common border. The armies were to concentrate opposite the German frontier around Épinal, Nancy and Verdun–Mezières, the French deployment was intended to be ready for a German offensive in Lorraine or through Belgium. On 1 August, the British government ordered the mobilisation of the navy, military operations began on the French frontier, Libau was bombarded by a German light cruiser SMS Augsburg and the British government guaranteed naval protection for French coasts. On 3 August, the Belgian Government refused German demands and the British Government guaranteed military support to Belgium, Germany declared war on France, the British government ordered general mobilisation and Italy declared neutrality. On 4 August, the British government sent an ultimatum to Germany and declared war at midnight on 4/5 August, Belgium severed diplomatic relations with Germany and Germany declared war on Belgium. German troops crossed the Belgian frontier and attacked Liège, on 2 August, as small parties of German soldiers crossed the French border, Messimy told Joffre that he had the freedom to order French troops across the German but not the Belgian frontier. As soon as news arrived that German troops had entered Luxembourg, operations into Belgium were forbidden, to deny the Germans a pretext until 4 August, when it was certain that German troops had already violated the Belgian border. To comply with the Franco-Russian Alliance, Joffre ordered an invasion of Alsace-Lorraine on for 14 August, on 8 August General Instruction No. On 14 August Joffre and Lanrezac met but Joffre considered that only a few German cavalry and infantry parties had crossed the Meuse, with the BEF moving to Maubeuge and Hirson a redeployment of the Fifth Army would disrupt the deployment of the other armies. On 14 August a new intelligence report showed eight German corps between Luxembourg and Liège and by the next day Joffre allowed the move of the Fifth Army north, to operate beyond the Meuse. The XI Corps was transferred to the Fourth Army and the XVIII Corps was moved from the Third Army to the Fifth Army, the VII Corps in the south was reinforced by two divisions, a cavalry division and the First Group of Reserve Divisions. The corps was renamed the Army of Alsace, to relieve the First Army of concern about Alsace during the operations in Lorraine, two corps were removed from the Second Army and became a strategic reserve. Joffre met Sir John French on 16 August and learned that the British could be ready by 24 August, Joffre also arranged for Territorial divisions to cover the area from Maubeuge to Dunkirk
20.
Battle of Charleroi
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The Battle of Charleroi, or the Battle of the Sambre, was fought on 21 August 1914, by the French Fifth Army and the German 2nd and 3rd armies, during the Battle of the Frontiers. The French were saved by a counter-attack at Dinant and the re-direction of the 3rd Army to the north-west in support of the 2nd Army, rather than south-west. By 20 August, the Fifth Army had begun to concentrate on a 40-kilometre front along the Sambre, centred on Charleroi, on the left flank, the Cavalry Corps linked the Fifth Army with the British Expeditionary Force at Mons. The French had 15 divisions, after transfers of troops to Lorraine, facing 18 German divisions from the 2nd Army, the Germans attacked again on 22 August, with three corps against the entire Fifth Army front. Fighting continued on 23 August when the French centre around Charleroi began to fall back, the 3rd Army crossed the Meuse and attacked the French right flank, held by I Corps. The attack threatened to cut the line of retreat of the Fifth Army but I Corps stopped the German advance with a counter-attack. With the evacuation of Namur and news of the Fourth Army retreat from the Ardennes, Lanrezac ordered the Fifth Army to withdraw, lest he be encircled and cut off from the rest of the French army. The Fifth Army retreat after the Battle of Charleroi, arguably saved the French army from decisive defeat, after fighting another defensive action in the Battle of St. Quentin, the French were pushed to within miles of Paris. Lanrezac was sacked by Joffre on 3 September and replaced by Lieutenant-General Louis Franchet dEspèrey, the 1934 work by the French Fascist and writer Pierre Drieu La Rochelle, The Comedy of Charleroi, explores the authors role in the battle. In 2001 Brose recorded 10,000 Fifth Army losses and in 2009, on the western flank of the French, the BEF lost 1,600 men
21.
Battle of Mons
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The Battle of Mons was the first major action of the British Expeditionary Force in the First World War. It was an action of the Battle of the Frontiers. At Mons, the British Army attempted to hold the line of the Mons–Condé Canal against the advancing German 1st Army, britain declared war on Germany on 4 August 1914 and on 9 August the BEF began embarking for France. Unlike Continental European armies, the BEF in 1914 was exceedingly small, the BEF was probably the best trained and most experienced of the European armies of 1914. British training emphasised rapid-fire marksmanship and the average British soldier was able to hit a target fifteen times a minute. This ability to generate a volume of accurate rifle-fire played an important role in the BEFs battles of 1914. The Battle of Mons took place as part of the Battle of the Frontiers, the BEF was stationed on the left of the Allied line, which stretched from Alsace-Lorraine in the east to Mons and Charleroi in southern Belgium. The British reached Mons on 22 August, on that day, the French Fifth Army, located on the right of the BEF, was heavily engaged with the German 2nd and 3rd armies at the Battle of Charleroi. The British thus spent the day digging in along the canal, at the Battle of Mons the BEF had some 80,000 men, comprising the Cavalry Division, an independent cavalry brigade and two corps, each with two infantry divisions. I Corps was commanded by Sir Douglas Haig and was composed of the 1st, II Corps was commanded by Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien and consisted of the 3rd and 5th Divisions. Each division had 18,073 men and 5,592 horses, I Corps was deployed in this manner to protect the right flank of the BEF, in case the French were forced to retreat from their position at Charleroi. I Corps did not line the canal, which meant that it was involved the battle. The dominant geographical feature of the battlefield, was a loop in the canal and this loop formed a small salient which was difficult to defend and formed the focus of the battle. The first substantial action occurred on the morning of 22 August, at 6,30 a. m. the 4th Dragoon Guards laid an ambush for a patrol of German lancers outside the village of Casteau, to the north-east of Mons. When the Germans spotted the trap and fell back, a troop of the dragoons, led by Captain Hornby gave chase, followed by the rest of his squadron, all with drawn sabres. After a further pursuit of a few miles, the Germans turned and fired upon the British cavalry, drummer Edward Thomas is reputed to have fired the first shot of the war for the British Army, hitting a German trooper. Advancing towards the British was the German 1st Army, commanded by Alexander von Kluck, the 1st Army was composed of four active corps and three reserve corps, although only the active corps took part in the fighting at Mons. German corps had two each, with attendant cavalry and artillery
22.
Great Retreat
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From 5–12 September, the First Battle of the Marne ended the Allied retreat and forced the German armies to retire towards the Aisne river and fight the First Battle of the Aisne. Reciprocal attempts to outflank the opposing armies to the north followed, the Battle of the Frontiers is a general name for all of the operations of the French armies until the Battle of the Marne. A series of encounter battles began between the German, French and Belgian armies, on the German-French frontier and in southern Belgium on 4 August 1914, the Battle of Mulhouse was the first French offensive of World War I against Germany. The French captured Mulhouse until forced out by a German counter-attack on 11 August, the main French offensive, the Battle of Lorraine, began with the Battles of Morhange and Sarrebourg advances by the First Army on Sarrebourg and the Second Army towards Morhange. Château Salins near Morhange was captured on 17 August and Sarrebourg the next day, the German 6th and 7th armies counter-attacked on 20 August, the Second Army was forced back from Morhange and the First Army was repulsed at Sarrebourg. The German armies crossed the border and advanced on Nancy but were stopped to the east of the city, to the south the French retook Mulhouse on 19 August and then withdrew. On 24 August at the Battle of the Mortagne, a limited German offensive in the Vosges, by 20 August a German counter-offensive in Lorraine had begun and the German 4th and 5th Armies advanced through the Ardennes on 19 August towards Neufchâteau. An offensive by French Third and Fourth armies through the Ardennes began on 20 August, the opposing armies met in thick fog and the French mistook the German troops for screening forces. On 22 August the Battle of the Ardennes began with French attacks, the Third Army recoiled towards Verdun, pursued by the 5th Army and the Fourth Army retreated to Sedan and Stenay. Mulhouse was recaptured again by German forces and the Battle of the Meuse 26–28 August), Liège was occupied by the Germans on 7 August, the first units of the BEF landed in France and French troops crossed the German frontier. On 12 August The Battle of Haelen was fought by German and Belgian cavalry and infantry and was a Belgian defensive success. The BEF completed its move of four divisions and a division to France on 16 August. The Belgian government withdrew from Brussels on 18 August and the German army attacked the Belgian field army at the Battle of the Gete. Next day the Belgian army began to retire towards Antwerp, which left the route to Namur open, Longwy, further west, the Fifth Army had concentrated on the Sambre by 20 August, facing north either side of Charleroi and east towards the Belgian fortress of Namur. On the left, the Cavalry Corps linked with the BEF at Mons, by 20 August, the Fifth Army had begun to concentrate on a 40-kilometre front along the Sambre, centred on Charleroi and extending east to the Belgian fortress of Namur. On the left flank, the Sordet Cavalry Corps linked the Fifth Army to the British Expeditionary Force at Mons, Bülow attacked again on 22 August with three corps against the entire Fifth Army front. Fighting continued on 23 August, when the French centre around Charleroi began to fall back, the German 3rd Army had crossed the Meuse and launched an attack against the French right flank, held by I Corps. The French stopped the German advance and delivered a counter-attack, the Fifth Army was confronted by the German 3rd and 2nd armies from the east and the north
23.
First Battle of the Marne
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The Battle of the Marne was a World War I battle fought from 7–12 September 1914. It resulted in an Allied victory against the German Army, the battle was the culmination of the German advance into France and pursuit of the Allied armies which followed the Battle of the Frontiers in August and had reached the eastern outskirts of Paris. The Battle of the Marne was a victory for the Allies, the Battle of the Frontiers is a general name for all the operations of the French armies from 7 August to 13 September. A series of encounter battles began between the German, French and Belgian armies on the German-French frontier and in southern Belgium on 4 August 1914, Liège was occupied by the Germans on 7 August. The first units of the British Expeditionary Force landed in France, the Battle of Mulhouse was the first French offensive of World War I. The French captured Mulhouse, until forced out by a German counter-attack on 11 August, on 12 August, the Battle of Haelen was fought by German and Belgian cavalry and infantry, resulting in a Belgian defensive success. The BEF completed its move of four divisions and a division to France on 16 August. The Belgian government withdrew from Brussels on 18 August, the main French offensive, the Battle of Lorraine, began with the Battles of Morhange and Sarrebourg advances by the First Army on Sarrebourg and the Second Army towards Morhange. Château-Salins near Morhange was captured on 17 August and Sarrebourg the next day, the German 6th and 7th Armies counter-attacked on 20 August, and the Second Army was forced back from Morhange and the First Army was repulsed at Sarrebourg. The German armies crossed the border and advanced on Nancy, but were stopped to the east of the city. The Belgian 4th Division, the part of the Belgian army not to retreat to the defensive lines around Antwerp, dug in to defend Namur. Further west, the French Fifth Army had concentrated on the Sambre by 20 August, facing north on either side of Charleroi and east towards Namur, additional support was given to the Belgians at Namur by the French 45th Infantry Brigade. On the left, the Cavalry Corps of General Sordet linked up with the BEF at Mons, to the south, the French retook Mulhouse on 19 August and then withdrew. By 20 August, a German counter-offensive in Lorraine had begun, an offensive by the French Third and Fourth Armies through the Ardennes began on 20 August in support of the French invasion of Lorraine. The opposing armies met in thick fog, the French mistook the German troops for screening forces, on 22 August, the Battle of the Ardennes began with French attacks, which were costly to both sides and forced the French into a disorderly retreat late on 23 August. The Third Army recoiled towards Verdun, pursued by the 5th Army, Mulhouse was recaptured again by German forces and the Battle of the Meuse, caused a temporary halt of the German advance. At the Battle of Mons, the BEF attempted to hold the line of the Mons–Condé Canal against the advancing German 1st Army. The British were eventually forced to withdraw due to being outnumbered by the Germans and the retreat of the French Fifth Army
24.
First Battle of the Aisne
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The Advance to the Aisne consisted of the Battle of the Marne and the Battle of the Aisne. When the Germans turned to face the pursuing Allies on 13 September, between Compiègne and Berry-au-Bac, the Aisne River winds westward and is about 100 feet wide, ranging from 12–15 feet deep. Low-lying ground extends a 1-mile on each side, rising abruptly to a line of steep cliffs 300–400 feet high, the Germans settled on the higher northern side 2 miles beyond the crest, behind a dense thicket that covered the front and slope. Low crops in the unfenced countryside offered no natural concealment to the Allies, deep, narrow paths cut into the escarpment at right angles, exposing any infiltrators to extreme hazard. The forces on the plateau commanded a wide field of fire. At Chivres-Val east of Venizel, there was an escarpment the Germans had selected as their strongest position. The French Fifth Army crossed the Aisne at Berry-au-Bac and captured the eastern tip of Chemin des Dames, contact was established along the entire front. East of Chemin des Dames, the French Fourth, Fifth and Ninth armies made only negligible progress beyond the positions they had reached on 13 September, under the thick cover of the foggy night, the BEF advanced up the narrow paths to the plateau. When the mist evaporated under a bright morning sun, they were raked by fire from the flank. Those caught in the valley without the fogs protective shroud fared no better, on 14 September, Sir John French ordered the entire BEF to entrench, but few entrenching tools were available. Soldiers scouted nearby farms and villages for pickaxes, spades and other implements, without training for stationary warfare, the troops merely dug shallow pits in the soil. These were at first intended only to cover against enemy observation. Soon the trenches were deepened to about seven feet, other protective measures included camouflage and holes cut into trench walls then braced with timber. Trench warfare was also new for the Germans, whose training and equipment were designed for a war to be won in six weeks. Siege howitzers now lobbed massive shells into the Allied trenches, skilful use of trench mortars and hand and rifle grenades, enabled the Germans to inflict great losses upon Allied troops, who had neither been trained nor equipped with these weapons. Searchlights, flares and periscopes were also part of the German equipment intended for other purposes, a shortage of heavy weapons handicapped the British. Only their 60-pounders were powerful enough to shell enemy gun emplacements from the Aisnes south shore, four artillery battery of 6-inch guns, were rushed from England. Although a poor match against the German 8-inch howitzers, they helped somewhat, defensive firepower was limited to rifles and two machine guns allotted to each battalion
25.
Siege of Antwerp (1914)
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The Siege of Antwerp was an engagement between the German and the Belgian, British and French armies around the fortified city of Antwerp during World War I. German troops besieged a garrison of Belgian fortress troops, the Belgian field army, the city, which was ringed by forts known as the National redoubt, was besieged to the south and east by German forces. A German bombardment of the Belgian fortifications with heavy and super-heavy artillery began on 28 September, the Belgian garrison had no hope of victory without relief and despite the arrival of the Royal Naval Division beginning on 3 October, the Germans penetrated the outer ring of forts. The Belgian army held the area late in 1918, when it participated in the Allied liberation of Belgium. The city of Antwerp was defended by numerous forts and other defensive positions, the principal line of resistance comprised a ring of 21 forts, 10–15 kilometres outside the city, which had been built after 1882. A group of two forts and three coastal batteries defended the Scheldt and there were a number of prepared inundations. The German army invaded Belgium on the morning of 4 August, German cavalry appeared at Visé early on 4 August and found the bridge down and Belgian troops on the west bank. The Germans found a ford, crossed the river and forced the Belgians to retire towards Liège, by the evening it was clear to the Belgian High Command that the 3rd Division and the Liège garrison were in the path of a very large invasion force. Ludendorff attacked again around noon on 6 August and found no opposition in the city, the Germans began a siege of the fortress, which fell on 16 August. On 10 August German cavalry reached the Gete and Jäger began to move northwards to Diest, on 12 August German cavalry and Jäger attacked at the Battle of Halen and were driven off after a ten-hour battle. By 17 August, a number of German troops had crossed into Belgium between the Meuse, Demer and Gete, despite the demolitions carried out by the Belgian army. The Belgian position on the flank of the Gete, was threatened by a flanking manoeuvre through Huy. On 18 August the Germans attacked again, captured Halen, entered Tienen and attacked the 1st Division frontally and on the northern flank, Brussels, the Belgian capital, was captured on 20 August, as the Belgian field army arrived at Antwerp. Namur fell on 24 August, at the time that the field army made a sortie from Antwerp towards Brussels. A brigade of the IV Reserve Corps was sent to occupy Brussels, the IX Reserve Corps was ordered to move to Antwerp on 22 August. The plan anticipated operations by divisions from seven reserve corps on the east of the National Redoubt. In 1914 the siege was conducted by only six divisions, one of which was needed to guard the Liège–Brussels railway between Tienen and Brussels and the ground between Brussels and Antwerp. The 6th and 5th Reserve, Marine and 4th Ersatz divisions forced Belgian outposts back 4–5 miles on 28 September, the clearances proved unwise, since they made the forts visible, trenches could only be dug 1-foot deep, because of the high water-table and had no overhead cover
26.
Race to the Sea
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The outflanking attempts had resulted in a number of encounter battles but neither side was able to gain a decisive victory. After the opposing forces had reached the North Sea, both tried to conduct offensives, leading to the costly and indecisive Battle of the Yser. After mid-November, local operations were carried out by both sides and preparations were made to take the offensive in the spring of 1915. Erich von Falkenhayn, Chief of the German General Staff since 14 September, concluded that a decisive victory could not be achieved on the Western Front and that it was equally unlikely in the east. Over the winter lull, the French army established the basis of offensive trench warfare. Infiltration tactics were developed, in which dispersed formations of infantry were followed by nettoyeurs de tranchée, artillery observation from aircraft and creeping barrages, were first used systematically in the Second Battle of Artois. New defences were to be built behind the front line to contain a breakthrough until the position was restored by counter-attacks, the Westheer began the huge task of building field fortifications, which were not complete until the autumn of 1915. Under Plan XVII the French peacetime army was to form five field armies, with groups of Reserve divisions attached, the armies were to concentrate opposite the German frontier around Épinal, Nancy and Verdun–Charleville-Mezières, with an army in reserve around Sainte-Menehould and Commercy. The French deployment was intended to be ready for a German offensive in Lorraine or through Belgium, German strategy had given priority to offensive operations against France and a defensive posture against Russia since 1891. German planning was determined by numerical inferiority, the speed of mobilisation and concentration, frontal attacks were expected to be costly and protracted, leading to limited success, particularly after the French and Russians modernised their fortifications on the frontiers with Germany. By 1906 such a manoeuvre was intended to pass through neutral Belgium, helmuth von Moltke the Younger succeeded Schlieffen in 1906 and was less certain that the French would conform to German assumptions. 1,700,000 men expected to be mobilised in the Westheer. Either the French would be annihilated or the manoeuvre from the north would create conditions for victory in the centre or in Lorraine on the common border. The Battle of the Frontiers is a name for all of the operations of the French armies until the Battle of the Marne. A series of encounter battles began between the German, French and Belgian armies, on the German-French frontier and in southern Belgium on 4 August 1914, the Battle of Mulhouse was the first French offensive against Germany. The French captured Mulhouse until forced out by a German counter-attack on 11 August, the main French offensive, the Battle of Lorraine, began with the Battles of Morhange and Sarrebourg advances by the First Army on Sarrebourg and the Second Army towards Morhange. Château-Salins near Morhange was captured on 17 August and Sarrebourg the next day, the German 6th Army and 7th Army counter-attacked on 20 August and the Second Army was forced back from Morhange and the First Army was repulsed at Sarrebourg. The German armies crossed the border and advanced on Nancy but were stopped to the east of the city, to the south the French retook Mulhouse on 19 August and then withdrew. On 24 August at the Battle of the Mortagne, a limited German offensive in the Vosges, by 20 August a German counter-offensive in Lorraine had begun and the German 4th Army and 5th Army advanced through the Ardennes on 19 August towards Neufchâteau
27.
Battle of the Yser
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The front line was held by a large Belgian force which halted the German advance in a costly defensive battle. The Allied victory at the Yser stopped the German advance into the last corner of unoccupied Belgium, the German army invaded Belgium on the morning of 4 August. German cavalry appeared at Visé early on 4 August, to find the bridge down and Belgian troops on the west bank, the Germans crossed at a ford and forced the Belgians to retire towards Liège. By evening, it was clear to the Belgian High Command that the Third Division, at an engagement between the First Division and the German IX Corps near Tienen, the Belgians had 1,630 casualties. The Belgian government of Charles de Broqueville left Brussels for Antwerp, the German Siege of Namur ended with a Belgian capitulation on 24 August, as the field army made a sortie from Antwerp towards Brussels. The Germans detached the III Reserve Corps from the 1st Army to mask the city, on 1 October, General Hans Hartwig von Beseler ordered an attack on the Antwerp forts Sint-Katelijne-Waver, Walem and the Bosbeek and Dorpveld redoubts by the 5th Reserve and Marine divisions. A counter-attack failed and the Fourth Division was reduced to 4,800 infantry, proclamations warning the inhabitants that King Albert I and the government would leave Antwerp were put up during the day. Early on 9 October, German troops found some forts of the inner ring empty, Beseler ended the bombardment and summoned the governor, General Victor Deguise. About 30,000 men of the Antwerp garrison surrendered and the city was occupied by German troops, about 33,000 soldiers of the garrison fled north to the Netherlands, where they were interned for the duration. The race ended on the North Sea coast of Belgium, when the last open area from Dixmude to the North Sea was occupied by Belgian troops from Antwerp, British and French forces in Belgium covered the retirement of the Belgians and British from Antwerp. The First, Third and Fourth divisions reached Ostend, the Fifth and Sixth divisions arrived at Torhout and Diksmuide, the Germans 4th Ersatz Division and Landwehr troops at Lokeren and Moerbeke turned east towards Ghent before the withdrawal was discovered. On 11 October, German troops were detected advancing on Ghent, a withdrawal from Ghent from 3, 00–10,00 p. m. began, after which German troops entered the city. Several bridges were demolished during the retirement, although crowds of civilians on the main road, part of northern France and the north Belgium from the Pas-de-Calais to the Scheldt estuary had been known as Flanders since the eleventh century. By 1914, the plain was bounded by canals linking Douai, Béthune, Saint-Omer, to the south-east, canals run between Lens, Lille, Roubaix and Courtrai, the Lys river from Courtrai to Ghent and to the north-west lies the sea. The plain is almost flat, apart from a line of low hills from Cassel, east to Mont des Cats, Mont Noir, Mont Rouge, Scherpenberg, a coastal strip about 10 miles wide, is near sea level and fringed by sand dunes. Inland the ground is mainly meadow, cut by canals, dykes, drainage ditches, the ground surface quickly turns to a consistency of cream cheese and on the coast troop movements were confined to roads, except during frosts. The rest of the Flanders Plain is woods and small fields, divided by hedgerows planted with trees and cultivated from small villages, south of La Bassée Canal around Lens and Béthune was a coal-mining district full of slag heaps, pit-heads and miners houses. Intervening areas are agricultural, with roads on shallow foundations, unpaved mud tracks in France and narrow pavé roads along the frontier
28.
First Battle of Ypres
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The First Battle of Ypres was a battle of the First World War, fought on the Western Front around Ypres, in West Flanders, Belgium, during October and November 1914. The battles at Ypres began at the end of the Race to the Sea, reciprocal attempts by the German, North of Ypres, the fighting continued in the Battle of the Yser, fought between the German 4th Army and the Belgian army and French marines. General Erich von Falkenhayn, head of the Oberste Heeresleitung, then tried a limited offensive to capture Ypres and Mount Kemmel, the autumn battles in Flanders had quickly become static, attrition operations, unlike the battles of manoeuvre in the summer. French, British and Belgian troops in improvised field defences, repulsed German attacks for four weeks, from 21–23 October, German reservists had made mass attacks at Langemarck, with losses of up to 70 percent, to little effect. The defensive use of artillery and machine guns had dominated the battlefield, thirty-four German divisions fought in the Flanders battles, against twelve French, nine British and six Belgian, along with marines and dismounted cavalry. Falkenhayn reconsidered German strategy over the winter, because Vernichtungsstrategie and a dictated peace against France, Falkenhayn intended to detach Russia or France from the Allied coalition, by diplomatic as well as military action. A strategy of attrition, would make the cost of the war too great, the remaining belligerents would have to negotiate or face the Germans concentrated on the remaining front, which would be sufficient to obtain a decisive victory. On 9 October, the First German offensive against Warsaw began with the battles of Warsaw, four days later, Przemyśl was relieved by the advancing Austro-Hungarians and the Battle of Chyrow 13 October–2 November) began in Galicia. Czernowitz in the Bukovina, was re-occupied by the Austro-Hungarian army on 22 August, on 29 October, the Ottoman Empire commenced hostilities against Russia, when Turkish warships bombarded Odessa, Sevastopol and Theodosia. Next day Stanislau in Galicia was taken by Russian forces and the Serbian army began a retreat from the line of the Drina, on 4 November, the Russian army crossed the frontier of Turkey-in-Asia and seized Azap. Britain and France declared war on Turkey on 5 November and next day, Keupri-Keni in Armenia was captured, on 10 October, Przemysl was surrounded again by the Russian army, beginning the Second Siege, Memel in East Prussia was occupied by the Russians a day later. Keupri-Keni was recaptured by the Ottoman army on 14 November, the Sultan proclaimed Jihad, next day the Battle of Cracow began, the Second German Offensive against Warsaw opened with the Battle of Łódź. The Great Retreat was a withdrawal by the Franco-British armies to the Marne, from 24 August –28 September 1914. After the defeat of the French Fifth Army at the Battle of Charleroi, a counter-offensive by the French and the BEF at the First Battle of Guise, failed to end the German advance and the Franco-British retreat continued beyond the Marne. After the retreat of the French Fifth Army and the BEF, General Fournier was ordered on 25 August to defend the fortress at Maubeuge, which was surrounded two days later by the German VII Reserve Corps. Maubeuge was defended by fourteen forts, with a garrison of 30,000 French territorials and c. 10,000 French, British, on 7 September, the garrison surrendered, after super-heavy artillery from the Siege of Namur demolished the forts. The Germans took 32,692 prisoners and captured 450 guns, small detachments of the Belgian, French and British armies conducted operations in Belgium and northern France, against German cavalry and Jäger. On 27 August, a squadron of the Royal Naval Air Service flew to Ostend, British marines landed at Dunkirk on the night of 19/20 September and on 28 September, a battalion occupied Lille
29.
First Battle of Artois
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The First Battle of Artois was a battle fought during World War I by the French and German armies on the Western Front. The battle was the first offensive move on the Western Front by either side after the First Battle of Ypres ended in November 1914, the French assault failed to break the stalemate. In May 1915, the Tenth Army conducted an offensive known as the Second Battle of Artois, the Third Battle of Artois, sometimes called the Artois–Loos Offensive, took place from 25 September –15 October 1915
30.
First Battle of Champagne
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The battle was fought by the French Fourth Army and the German 3rd Army. The offensive was part of a strategy by the French army to attack the Noyon Salient, a bulge in the new Western Front. The First Battle of Artois began on the flank of the salient on 17 December. By early November, the German offensive in Flanders had ended, attacks by the French would assist the Russian army and force the Germans to keep more forces in the west. After studying the possibilities for an offensive, the Operations Bureau of Grand Quartier Général reported on 15 November, the Bureau recommended to General Joseph Joffre a dual offensive, with attacks in Artois and Champagne, to crush the Noyon salient. The report noted that the German offensive in the west was over, principal attacks were to be made in Artois by the Tenth Army towards Cambrai and by the Fourth Army in Champagne, from Suippes towards Rethel and Mézières, with supporting attacks elsewhere. The objectives were to deny the Germans an opportunity to move troops and to break through in several places, after minor skirmishes, the battle began on 20 December 1914 when the XVII and I Colonial Corps attacked and made small gains. On 21 December, the XII Corps failed to advance, because most gaps in the German barbed wire were found to be covered by machine-guns, the attack by XII Corps was stopped and the infantry began mining operations, as the artillery bombarded German defences. On 27 December, Joffre, sent the IV Corps to the Fourth Army area, on 30 December, the French began a new attack as the Germans counter-attacked II Corps on the right flank, took three lines of defence and inflicted many casualties. Next day, II Corps retook most of the lost ground but the Germans made four big counter-attacks against the Fourth Army, over the next few days, the French used artillery-fire to keep pressure on the Germans. A counter-attack on the night of 7/8 January drove the French out of a salient west of Perthes, until another French attack recovered most of the lost ground. Supporting attacks in Artois and Champagne by the Second Army, Eighth Army, the Fourth Army attacks were assisted by the Army Detachment of the Vosges, which had also had little success. The armies on supporting fronts had far fewer guns and an attack by the XI Corps of the Second Army on 27 December, had no artillery support, in the Vosges, French artillery did not begin to fire until the two attacking divisions began to advance. All of the attacks were costly failures. In late January, a German attack was made against the Third Army, having been pushed back, the French counter-attacked six times and lost 2,400 casualties. The German attack failed to divert French troops from the flanks of the Noyon Salient, when such operations succeeded it had become necessary to make similar preparations for a new attack, by digging approach trenches and destroying German field defences with artillery-fire. Obtaining a breakthrough by continuous battle was impossible and de Langle claimed that methodical successive attacks, to points of tactical importance. Joffre replied that the failure of the offensive was due to inadequate artillery-support, attacks had been made on narrow fronts of a few hundred metres, despite the offensive taking place on a 12-mile front and left infantry far too vulnerable to massed artillery-fire
31.
Battle of Hartmannswillerkopf
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The Battle of Hartmannswillerkopf or Hartmannsweilerkopf was a series of engagements during the First World War fought for the control of the Hartmannswillerkopf peak in Alsace in 1914 and 1915. Hartmannswillerkopf is a rocky spur in the Vosges mountains, about 5 km north of Thann. The peak stands at 956 m and overlooks the Alsace Plain, Rhine valley, from the vantage point, Mulhouse and the Mulhouse–Colmar railway could be seen and the French railway from Thann to Cernay and Belfort shielded from German observation. The two French invasions and captures of Mulhouse by the French VII Corps and then the Army of Alsace, were repulsed by the German 7th Army, both sides then stripped the forces in Alsace to reinforce the armies fighting on the Marne, Aisne and further north. For the rest of 1914 and 1915, both sides made intermittent attempts to capture and re-capture Hartmanswillerkopf, a few border skirmishes took place after the declaration of war by France and after 5 August, more German patrols were sent out as French attacks increased. French troops advanced from Gérardmer to the Col de la Schlucht, on 8 August, Bonneau cautiously continued the advance and occupied Mulhouse, shortly after its German defenders had left. General Paul Pau was put in command of a new Army of Alsace to re-invade Alsace on 14 August, as part of an offensive by the First. On the left flank, two divisions advanced with Chasseur battalions, which had moved into the Fecht valley on 12 August, on the evening of 14 August, Thann was captured and the most advanced troops reached the western outskirts of the city, by 16 August. On 18 August, the VII Corps attacked Mulhouse and captured Altkirch on the south-eastern flank, by the evening of 19 August, the French occupied the city, having captured 24 guns,3,000 prisoners and considerable amounts of equipment. The Army of Alsace was dissolved on 26 August and many of its units distributed among the remaining French armies, in September 1914, the German 7th Army was transferred to the Aisne and left three Landwehr brigades in Oberelsaß. The force was named Armee-Gruppe Gaede on 19 September 1914, after its commander General der Infanterie Hans Gaede, on 25 December, the French 66th Division and a battalion of Chasseurs Alpins attacked through deep snow and woods, to improve the French position on the peak of Hartmannswillerkopf. The French attack was a success but the German defenders were pushed back only a short distance, the French counter-attacked but were repulsed and the main German attack on 30 January near Wattwiller made early progress then bogged down against the French defences. French attacks against Division Fuchs from 19–27 February were repulsed but on 26 February, on 5 March, the French captured a blockhouse and a German counter-attack by two regiments was defeated. In December 1915, Dubail as commander of Groupe darmées de lEst planned an operation to consolidate the French position in the region by capturing Mulhouse. An attack on Hartmannswillerkopf by the 66e Division, which had been fighting in the all year was to be the prelude to the larger attack. The division was given 250 more guns for the attack, two of which were super-heavy 370 mm Filloux mortars, an average of one gun per 13 m of German front. After several postponements, the French bombardment including the super-heavy mortars began on 21 December from Hartmannswillerkopf to Wattwiller. In the afternoon the 66e Division attacked, taking the peak, next day the reinforced Landwehr Brigade 82 of the 12th Landwehr Division counter-attacked and re-took the peak, except for trenches on the north slope, which fell on 23 December
32.
Battle of Neuve Chapelle
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The Battle of Neuve Chapelle took place in the First World War. It was a British offensive in the Artois region of France and broke through at Neuve-Chapelle, more troops had arrived from Britain and relieved some French troops in Flanders, which enabled a continuous British line to be formed, from Givenchy-lès-la-Bassée north to Langemarck. The battle was intended to cause a rupture in the German lines, a French assault at Vimy Ridge on the Artois plateau was also planned, to threaten the road, rail and canal junctions at La Bassée from the south, as the British attacked from the north. The battle was the first deliberately planned British offensive and showed the form which position warfare took for the rest of the war on the Western Front, tactical surprise and a break-through were achieved, after the First Army prepared the attack with great attention to detail. A big German counter-attack by twenty infantry battalions early on 12 March, was a costly failure, Sir Douglas Haig, the First Army commander, cancelled further attacks and ordered the captured ground to be consolidated, preparatory to a new attack further north. An acute shortage of ammunition made another attack impossible, apart from a local effort by the 7th Division. Despite poor weather conditions, the stages of the battle went extremely well for the British. The RFC quickly secured aerial dominance and set about bombarding railways, the remaining fifteen 18-pdr batteries, six 6-inch howitzer siege batteries and six QF4. 5-inch howitzer batteries with sixty howitzers fired on the German front-line trenches. The trenches were 3 feet deep, with breastworks 4 feet high but were unable to withstand a howitzer bombardment, the bombardment was followed by an infantry assault at 8,05 a. m. The Garhwal Brigade of the Meerut Division, Indian Corps attacked with all four battalions on a 600 yards front, on the right the attack quickly collapsed, both companies losing direction and veering to the right. The attack confronted a part of the German defence not bombarded by the artillery, the Indian troops forced their way through the German wire and took 200 yards of the German front trench, despite many casualties. A fresh British attack was arranged from the north, in which the Garhwali troops were to join in with a frontal assault. German troops infiltrated northwards, before being forced back by bombers and bayonet charges, Haig ordered more attacks that day, with similarly disappointing results. The German defences in the centre were quickly overrun on a 1,600 yards front, at Haigs request, the British Commander-in-Chief Field Marshal Sir John French, the British commander in France, released the 5th Cavalry Brigade to exploit the expected breakthrough. On the left of the attack, two companies of the German Jäger Battalion 11 delayed the advance for more than six hours until forced to retreat, although aerial photography had been useful, it was unable to efficiently identify the enemys strong defensive points. Primitive communications also meant that the British commanders had been unable to keep in touch with other and the battle thus became uncoordinated. The battle at Neuve Chapelle marked a watershed in trench warfare, the British telephone system proved vulnerable to German artillery-fire and the movement of troops along communication trenches was delayed by far more than the most pessimistic expectations. Small numbers of German troops in strong-points and isolated trenches, had been able to maintain a volume of small-arms fire sufficient to stop the advance of far greater numbers of attackers
33.
Second Battle of Ypres
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It was the first mass use by Germany of poison gas on the Western Front. For the first time, a colonial force defeated a European power on European soil. The eastern part of the salient was defended by one Canadian, the II Corps and V Corps of the Second Army comprised the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Cavalry Divisions and the 4th, 27th, 28th, Northumbrian, Lahore and 1st Canadian Divisions. Although poison gas had been used before, at the Battle of Bolimów three months earlier, the gas had liquified in the cold and become inert, German troops carried 5,730 gas cylinders, weighing 90 pounds each, to the front by hand. The cylinders, opened by hand, relied on the wind to carry the gas towards enemy lines. Because of this method of dispersal, a number of German soldiers were injured or killed while carrying out the attack. The French troops in the path of the gas cloud sustained about 6,000 casualties, many died within ten minutes, and many more were blinded. Chlorine gas forms hypochlorous acid when combined with water, destroying moist tissue such as the lungs, the chlorine gas, denser than air, quickly filled the trenches and forced the troops out into heavy enemy fire. Although many French troops ran for their lives, others stood their ground, the German High Command had not foreseen the effectiveness of the new weapon and all available troops had been transferred to Russia, leaving few reserves in the west. General von Falkenhayn, Chief of the German General Staff, had ordered the attack as an effort by the German 4th Army. German troops advanced at 5,00 p. m. but dusk, apprehension about the effect of the gas, Canadian troops defended the flank of the break-in by urinating into cloth and holding them to their faces to counter the effects of the gas. At Kitcheners Wood, the 10th Battalion of the 2nd Canadian Brigade was ordered to counter-attack in the gap created by the gas attack. They formed up after 11,00 p. m. on 22 April, both battalions attacked with over 800 men, in waves of two companies each, at 11,46 p. m. Without reconnaissance, the battalions ran into obstacles halfway to their objective, engaged in fire from the wood. The attack cleared the former oak plantation of Germans at a 75-percent casualty rate, the village of St. Julien was in the rear of the 1st Canadian Division until the poison-gas attack of 22 April, when it became the front line. Julien into the rear of the Canadian front line and he was killed the following day. On the morning of 24 April, the Germans released another gas cloud towards the re-formed Canadian line just west of St. Julien, word was passed to the troops to urinate on their handkerchiefs and place them over their nose and mouth. The countermeasures were insufficient, and German troops took the village, the next day the York and Durham Brigade units of the Northumberland Division counter-attacked, failing to secure their objectives but establishing a new line closer to the village
34.
Second Battle of Artois
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The Second Battle of Artois from 9 May –18 June 1915 was a battle on the Western Front during the First World War. A German-held salient from Reims to Amiens had been formed in 1914, a reciprocal French advance eastwards in Artois could cut the rail lines supplying the German armies between Arras and Reims. Field Marshal Sir John French, commander of the British Expeditionary Force, co-operated with the French strategy to capture Vimy Ridge, the French attacked Vimy Ridge and the British attacked further north in the Battle of Aubers Ridge and the Battle of Festubert. The battle was fought during the German offensive of the Second Battle of Ypres, the British attack at Aubers Ridge was a costly failure and two German divisions in reserve were diverted south against the Tenth Army. On 18 June, the offensive was stopped and local attacks were ended on 25 June. The French offensive had advanced the front line about 3 kilometres towards Vimy Ridge, on an 8-kilometre front. The failure to break through, despite the expenditure of 2,155,862 shells and the loss of 102,500 casualties, led to recriminations against Joffre, the German 6th Army lost 73,072 casualties. A lull followed until the Second Battle of Champagne, the Third Battle of Artois, the French government accepted that the task facing Joffre and the army was far more difficult than expected, after the winter fighting in Artois and Champagne. Despite costly mistakes, many lessons had been learned, methods had been changed and more weapons, the offensives had failed in their objectives but had become more powerful and better organised, except for the bungled effort at St. Mihiel. The greater amount of heavy artillery gave grounds for confidence, that attacks could break the German front. Eight new divisions were formed in February 1915 and another fourteen in April, nine divisions were transferred to Russia in May, which reduced the Westheer to 97 divisions against 110–112 larger French, British and Belgian divisions. The western armies had c. 4,000 modern and 350 obsolete field guns,825 modern and 510 obsolete heavy guns, a reserve of 276 heavy guns and mortars was also being prepared. The OHL had 7 1⁄2 divisions in reserve, with the 58th and 115th divisions behind the 6th Army, indications of an attack in Artois had been detected but not signs of a general offensive on the Western Front. Should part of the front line be lost, it was to be retaken by counter-attack, behind the line, new defences were to be built and connected by communication trenches, to delay a further attack, until reserves could be assembled for a counter-attack. Enemy reinforcements were to be obstructed by a shell-barrage, on 4 May, Falkenhayn reiterated the need to improve reserve positions and also to build a rear position about 2–3 kilometres behind the front line. The Franco-British offensives in 1915 found the German defences in a state of development, as the building programme was completed slowly. Joffre accepted the proposals on 23 March, with the objective being the seizure of Vimy Ridge, the French army had not completed an adaptation to siege warfare and much of the equipment necessary, particularly heavy artillery, did not exist. It had been impossible to synchronise operations in Artois with the First Battle of Champagne, the document contained instructions on infiltration tactics, rolling barrages and poison gas, which were to be used systematically for the first time
35.
Second Battle of Champagne
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The Second Battle of Champagne in World War I was a French offensive against the invading German army. On 25 September 1915, twenty divisions of the Second Army and Fourth Army of Groupe darmées du Centre, attacked at 9,15 a. m. with each division on a 1, 500–2,000 yards front. A second line of seven divisions followed, with one infantry division, six German divisions held the line opposite, in a front position and a reserve position the R-Stellung further back. French artillery observers benefitted from good weather but on the night of 24/25 September, heavy rain began, the German front position was broken in four places and two of the penetrations reached as far as the R-Stellung, where uncut barbed wire prevented the French from advancing further. The main defensive effort was made at the R-Stellung, behind which the bulk of the German field artillery had been withdrawn, a supporting attack by the French 3rd Army on the Aisne took no ground. Joffre allotted two reserve divisions to the GAC and ordered the Groupe darmées de lEst to send all 75 mm field gun ammunition, except for 500 rounds per gun, to the Second and Fourth armies. On 26 September, the French attacked again, closed up to the R-Stellung on a 7. 5-mile front, another 2,000 German troops were captured but attacks against the R-Stellung from 27–29 September, broke through on 28 September. Smaller French attacks against German salients continued from 30 September –5 October, on 3 October, Joffre abandoned the attempt at a breakthrough in Champagne, ordered the local commanders to fight a battle of attrition and then terminated the offensive on 6 November. The offensive in Champagne had advanced the French line for about 4 kilometres, at a cost of c. 100,000 more French, the French had attacked in Champagne with 35 divisions against the equivalent of 16 German divisions. The document contained instructions on infiltration tactics, rolling barrages and poison gas, continuous battle was to be replaced by step-by-step advances, through successive German defence lines. Methodical attacks were to be made each time and would inexorably consume German infantry reserves, the German defences would eventually collapse and make a breakthrough attack feasible. The slower, more deliberate methods, would conserve French infantry, in the autumn battles, the Allies had outnumbered the Westheer by 600 infantry battalions but had not achieved a breakthrough and after the first day, German reinforcements made one impossible. Several divisions had returned from the Eastern Front but were tired, French reviews of the offensive found that reserves had moved close to the front, ready to exploit a breakthrough and had advanced on time. The troops had then become bunched up with the divisions, blocked the lines of communication and suffered many casualties. Communications failed and commanders had been in ignorance of the situation, artillery co-ordination with the infantry had been poor, the momentum of the initial breakthrough had not been maintained, because the French troops crowding forward had become disorganised, which made co-ordinated attacks impossible to arrange. It was recommended that such reserves should be available by reducing the number of German troops in the front line. Co-operation between all arms, assistance from neighbouring sectors and the exploitation of flanking moves had defeated the French offensive, more intermediate strong points, built for all-round defence were recommended, between the first and second positions. Observation posts should be secure from attack, reconnaissance reports acted on promptly
36.
Battle of Loos
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The Battle of Loos was a World War I battle that took place from 25 September –13 October 1915 in France on the Western Front, during the First World War. It was the biggest British attack of 1915, the first time that the British used poison gas, the French and British tried to break through the German defences in Artois and Champagne and restore a war of movement. Despite improved methods, more ammunition and better equipment, the Franco-British attacks were contained by the German armies, British casualties at Loos were about twice as high as German losses. The battle was the British part of the Third Battle of Artois, at the Frévent Conference on 27 July, Field Marshal French failed to persuade Ferdinand Foch that an attack further north offered greater prospects for success. The debate continued into August with Joffre siding with Foch and the commanders being over-ruled by Herbert Kitchener, on 3 May, the British decided upon use of poison gas in military operations in France. French was doubtful that a breakthrough would be achieved, Haig was hampered by the shortage of artillery ammunition, which meant the preliminary bombardment, essential for success in trench warfare, was insufficient. Prior to the British attack, about 140 long tons of gas was released with mixed success. Wanting to be closer to the battle, French had moved to a command post at Lilliers. In many places British artillery had failed to cut the German wire in advance of the attack, advancing over open fields, within range of German machine guns and artillery, British losses were devastating. The British were able to break through the weaker German defences and capture the town of Loos-en-Gohelle, supply and communications problems, combined with the late arrival of reserves, meant that the breakthrough could not be exploited. Haig did not hear until 10,00 a. m. that the divisions were moving up to the front, when the battle resumed the following day, the Germans had recovered and improved their defensive positions. British attempts to continue the advance with the reserves were repulsed, twelve attacking battalions suffered 8,000 casualties out of 10,000 men in four hours. A lull fell on 28 September, with the British having retreated to their positions, having lost over 20,000 casualties. The Royal Flying Corps came under the command of Brigadier-General Hugh Trenchard, the 1st, 2nd and 3rd wings under Colonels E. B. Ashmore, John Salmond and Sefton Brancker participated, as the British were short of artillery ammunition, the RFC flew target identification sorties prior to the battle, to ensure that shells were not wasted. During the first few days of the attack, target-marking squadrons equipped with wireless transmitters. Later in the battle, pilots carried out a bombing operation for the first time in history. Aircraft of the 2nd and 3rd wings dropped many 100-pound bombs on German troops, trains, rail lines, as the land offensive stalled, British pilots and observers flew low over German positions, providing target information to the artillery
37.
Third Battle of Artois
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The Third Battle of Artois, was fought by the French Tenth Army against the German 6th Army on the Western Front of World War I. The battle is known as the Loos–Artois Offensive and included the big British offensive by the British First Army. The offensive, meant to complement the Second Battle of Champagne, was the last attempt of 1915 by the French commander-in-chief Joseph Joffre to exploit an Allied numerical advantage over Germany. Joffres plan was for simultaneous attacks in Champagne-Ardenne and Artois, to capture the railways at Attigny and Douai, joffres plan was a series of attacks along the Western Front, supported by Italian attacks across the Isonzo River and a British Expeditionary Force attack near Loos-en-Gohelle. At first, Field Marshal John French and General Sir Douglas Haig opposed the attack, because of the lie of the land, the generals were overruled by the British minister of war, Lord Horatio Kitchener, who ordered French and Haig to conduct the offensive. The Tenth Army accumulated seventeen infantry and two divisions for the offensive, backed by 630 field guns and 420 heavy artillery pieces. The German 6th Army had about thirteen divisions and from 19–13 September the French fired 1.4 million field gun shells and 250,000 heavy rounds, obsolete 90 mm guns were been used to fire another 63,500 shells. Following a four-day artillery bombardment starting on 21 September, infantry of the French Tenth Army attacked at 12 to be sure that the morning mist had dispersed. XXI Corps attacked the rest of Souchez village and La Folie farm, XXXIII Corps made some progress, on the XXI Corps front, the 13th Division, attacking near Souchez with 14,790 men had casualties of 41 percent in the first few days. By 26 September, the XXXIII and XXI corps had taken the village of Souchez, the French failed to breach the German second line of defence and a breakthrough could not be achieved. Joffre sent the French IX Corps to assist the British attacks at Loos, in very wet weather, the Tenth Army captured Vimy Ridge except for the highest point, where German counter-attacks retook the ground from XXXIII Corps. Foch took over ground on the British right flank but it became impossible to co-ordinate attacks for the same day, the Battle continued until 13 October but ended amidst the autumn rains, mutual exhaustion and recrimination. The two French 1915 offensives in Artois had advanced the front line by 5–6 km on a 9 km front, fayolle reported that the Third Battle of Artois had been a failure, because of uncut wire and the firepower of German machine-guns and artillery. The German Official Historians of the Reichsarchiv recorded German casualties to the end of October as 51,100 men. In 2008, Sheldon used figures taken from the French Official History to record 48,230 casualties, J. E. Edmonds, the British hfficial historian recorded 61,713 British and c. 26,000 German casualties at the Battle of Loos
38.
Battle of Verdun
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The Battle of Verdun, fought from 21 February to 18 December 1916, was the largest and longest battle of the First World War on the Western Front between the German and French armies. The battle took place on the north of Verdun-sur-Meuse in north-eastern France. The German 5th Army attacked the defences of the Fortified Region of Verdun, poor weather delayed the beginning of the German attack until 21 February, but the Germans enjoyed initial success, capturing Fort Douaumont in the first three days of the offensive. Afterwards the German advance slowed, despite many French casualties, by 6 March, 20 1⁄2 French divisions were in the RFV and a more extensive defence in depth had been constructed. Pétain ordered that On ne passe pas were to be made, by 29 March, French artillery on the west bank had begun a constant bombardment of German positions on the east bank, which caused many German infantry casualties. In March, the German offensive was extended to the bank of the Meuse. The Germans were able to advance at first but French reinforcements contained the short of their objectives. In early May, the Germans changed tactics and made local attacks and counter-attacks, part of the fort was occupied, until a German counter-attack recaptured the fort and took numerous prisoners. The Germans changed tactics again, alternating their attacks on banks of the Meuse and in June captured Fort Vaux. The Germans continued the offensive beyond Vaux, towards the last geographical objectives of the plan, at Fleury-devant-Douaumont. The Germans drove a salient into the French defences, captured Fleury, a German attempt to capture Fort Souville in early July was repulsed by artillery and small-arms fire. In August and December, French counter-offensives recaptured much of the ground lost on the east bank and recovered Fort Douaumont, the Battle of Verdun lasted for 303 days and became the longest and one of the most costly battles in human history. After the German invasion of France had been halted at the First Battle of the Marne in September 1914, the war of movement ended at the Battle of the Yser and the First Battle of Ypres. The Germans built field fortifications to hold the ground captured in 1914, in late 1914 and in 1915, offensives on the Western Front had failed to gain much ground and been extremely costly in casualties. Falkenhayn offered five corps from the reserve for an offensive at Verdun at the beginning of February 1916. After the war, the Kaiser and Colonel Tappen, the Operations Officer at Oberste Heeresleitung, in the Gorlice–Tarnów Offensive, the German and Austro-Hungarian Armies attacked Russian defences frontally, after pulverising them with large amounts of heavy artillery. In the north, a British relief offensive would wear down British reserves, to no decisive effect, hints about Falkenhayns thinking were picked up by Dutch military intelligence and passed on to the British in December. The Fortified Region of Verdun lay in a salient formed during the German invasion of 1914, in a directive of the General Staff of 5 August 1915, the RFV was to be stripped of 54 artillery batteries and 128,000 rounds of ammunition
39.
Battle of the Somme
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The Battle of the Somme, also known as the Somme Offensive, was a battle of the First World War fought by the armies of the British and French empires against the German Empire. It took place between 1 July and 18 November 1916 on both sides of the reaches of the River Somme in France. The battle was intended to hasten a victory for the Allies and was the largest battle of the First World War on the Western Front, more than one million men were wounded or killed, making it one of the bloodiest battles in human history. The French and British had committed themselves to an offensive on the Somme during Allied discussions at Chantilly, Oise, in December 1915. Initial plans called for the French army to undertake the main part of the Somme offensive, the first day on the Somme was, in terms of casualties, also the worst day in the history of the British army, which suffered 57,470 casualties. These occurred mainly on the front between the Albert–Bapaume road and Gommecourt, where the attack was defeated and few British troops reached the German front line, the battle is notable for the importance of air power and the first use of the tank. At the end of the battle, British and French forces had penetrated 10 km into German-occupied territory, the Anglo-French armies failed to capture Péronne and halted 5 km from Bapaume, where the German armies maintained their positions over the winter. Debate continues over the necessity, significance and effect of the battle, David Frum opined that a century later, the Somme remains the most harrowing place-name in the history of the British Empire. Allied war strategy for 1916 was decided at the Chantilly Conference from 6–8 December 1915, in December 1915, General Sir Douglas Haig replaced Field Marshal Sir John French as Commander-in-Chief of the BEF. Haig favoured a British offensive in Flanders close to BEF supply routes, to drive the Germans from the Belgian coast, Haig was not formally subordinate to Marshal Joseph Joffre but the British played a lesser role on the Western Front and complied with French strategy. A week later the Germans began an offensive against the French at Verdun, by 31 May, the ambitious Franco-British plan for a decisive victory, had been reduced to a limited offensive to relieve pressure on the French at Verdun with a battle of attrition on the Somme. The Chief of the German General Staff, Erich von Falkenhayn, intended to end the war by splitting the Anglo-French Entente in 1916, Falkenhayn chose to attack towards Verdun to take the Meuse heights and make Verdun untenable. The British would then have to begin a hasty relief offensive, Falkenhayn expected the relief offensive to fall south of Arras against the Sixth Army and be destroyed. If such Franco-British defeats were not enough, Germany would attack the remnants of armies and end the western alliance for good. Eloi, south of Ypres and reduced the German counter-offensive strategy north of the Somme, to one of passive, the Battle of Verdun began a week after Joffre and Haig agreed to mount an offensive on the Somme. The battle changed the nature of the offensive on the Somme, as French divisions were diverted to Verdun, German overestimation of the cost of Verdun to the French contributed to the concentration of German infantry and guns on the north bank of the Somme. The German offensive at Verdun was suspended in July, and troops, guns, the Brusilov Offensive, absorbed the extra forces that had been requested on 2 June by Fritz von Below, commanding the German Second Army, for a spoiling attack on the Somme. During the offensive the Russians inflicted c. 1,500,000 losses including c. 407,000 prisoners, three divisions were ordered from France to the Eastern Front on 9 June and the spoiling attack on the Somme was abandoned
40.
Operation Alberich
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Operation Alberich was the codename of a German Army military operation in France during World War I. The British referred to it as the German Retreat to the Hindenburg Line, ludendorff was unsure as to whether retreating to the Siegfriedstellung was the best thing to do, since withdrawing might diminish the morale of German soldiers and civilians. An offensive was considered if enough reserves could be assembled in the new year, a study suggested that seventeen divisions might be made available but that this was far too few for a decisive effect in the west. Ludendorff accepted the plan after representations by Rupprecht, Crown Prince of Bavaria, commander of Army Group Rupprecht over the objections of the 1st, a move back to the Hindenburg Line would shorten the front by 40–45 kilometres and require 13 fewer divisions. The order for the withdrawal to begin was issued on 16 March, the operation began on 9 February 1917 throughout the area to be abandoned. Railways and roads were dug up, trees were felled, water wells were polluted, towns and villages were destroyed and a large number of mines and other booby-traps were planted. About 125,000 able-bodied French civilians in the region, were transported to work elsewhere in occupied France, while children, mothers and the elderly were left behind with minimal rations. On 4 March, General Louis Franchet dEspèrey, commander of Groupe darmées du Nord, advocated an attack, the operation is considered to have been a propaganda disaster for Germany, due to the scorched earth policy but also one of the shrewdest defensive actions of the war. Two other lines closer to the front were observed as they were dug from Ablainzevelle to west of Bapaume and Roquigny, with a branch from Achiet-le-Grand to Beugny and Ytres. The first intimation that the British received that a withdrawal had begun, was when British patrols probing German outposts found them unoccupied, the German Retreat to the Hindenburg Line
41.
Nivelle Offensive
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The Nivelle Offensive in 1917, was a Franco-British offensive on the Western Front in the First World War. The main offensive was to be delivered by the French on the Chemin des Dames ridge, fighting known as the Battle of the Observatories continued for local advantage all summer on the Chemin des Dames and along the Moronvilliers heights east of Reims. In late October the French conducted an attack on the west end of the Chemin-des-Dames in the Battle of La Malmaison. Nivelle claimed that a barrage on German lines would bring France victory in 48 hours. The Russian Revolution, the German withdrawal to the Hindenburg Line, at a meeting on 6 April, despite the doubts of other politicians, the army group commanders and the British, Alexandre Ribot, the new French Prime Minister supported the plan. Nivelle offered his resignation but it was refused, despite Nivelles authority having been undermined, preparing the Nivelle Offensive was a huge and costly undertaking, involving c. 1.2 million troops and 7,000 artillery pieces on a front between Reims and Roye. The principal effort was an attack on the German positions along the Chemin des Dames ridge, in the Second Battle of the Aisne, the plan had been in development since December 1916 but the preparations were plagued by delays and information leaks. Mazel, the Sixth Army of General C, mangin and the Tenth Army commanded by General D. Duchêne. Forty-nine infantry and five divisions were massed on the Aisne front with 5,300 guns. The ground at Brimont began to rise to the west towards Craonne, the French held a bridgehead 20-kilometre wide on the north bank of the Aisne, south of the Chemin des Dames from Berry-au-Bac to Fort Condé on the road to Soissons. German air reconnaissance was possible close to the front although longer-range sorties were impossible to protect because of the number of Allied aircraft. On 6 April a division was encamped near Arras, troop and transport columns crowded the streets, more narrow-gauge railways. British aerial activity opposite the 6th Army greatly increased and by 6 April Ludendorff was certain that an attack was imminent, by early April German air reinforcements had arrived the Arras front, telephone networks had been completed and a common communications system for the air and ground forces built. On the Aisne front German intelligence had warned that an attack on 15 April against German airfields, the Luftstreitkräfte arranged to meet the attack but it was cancelled. Dawn reconnaissances had been ordered to scrutinise French preparations and gave the first warning of attack on 16 April, quentin on 1–4,10 and 13 April, which took some of the German defences in front of the Siegfriedstellung in preliminary operations. The main attack on 13 April made very little progress, against a German defence relying mainly on machine-gun fire, to the south of the road the initial objective was Devils Wood to Tilloy-lès-Mofflaines and Bois des Boeufs, with a final objective of the Monchyriegel between Wancourt and Feuchy. The Third Army attack on the German defences either side of the Scarpe river penetrated 6,000 yards, most of the objectives had been reached by the evening of 10 April, except for the line between Wancourt and Feuchy around Neuville-Vitasse. The village fell that day, although the German garrisons in some parts of Monchyriegel held out for more days
42.
Battle of Arras (1917)
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The Battle of Arras was a British offensive on the Western Front during World War I. From 9 April to 16 May 1917, British troops attacked German defences near the French city of Arras on the Western Front, the British achieved the longest advance since trench warfare had begun, surpassing the record set by the French Sixth Army on 1 July 1916. The British advance slowed in the few days and the German defence recovered. The battle became a stalemate for both sides and by the end of the battle the British Third and First armies had suffered about 160,000 casualties. For much of the war, the armies on the Western Front were at a stalemate. The Allied objective from early 1915 was to break through the German defences into the ground beyond. The British attack at Arras was part of the French Nivelle Offensive, the aim of the French offensive was to breathrough the German defences in forty-eight hours. At Arras the British were to re-capture Vimy Ridge, dominating the plain of Douai to the east, advance towards Cambrai, the British effort was a relatively broad front assault between Vimy in the north-west and Bullecourt to the south-east. After a long preparatory bombardment, the Canadian Corps]] of the First Army in the north fought Battle of Vimy Ridge and took the ridge. The Third Army in the centre advanced astride the Scarpe River and in the south, the British armies then engaged in a series of small-scale operations to consolidate the new positions. Although these battles were successful in achieving limited aims, they were costly successes. When the battle ended on 16 May, British Empire troops had made significant advances but had been unable to achieve a breakthrough. At the beginning of 1917, the British and French were still searching for a way to achieve a breakthrough on the Western Front. Both battles consumed enormous quantities of resources while achieving virtually no strategic gains on the battlefield, the mid-war years were momentous times. Governing politicians in Paris and London were under pressure from the press. The casualties from the battles of Gallipoli, the Somme and Verdun had been high, British Prime Minister, H. H. Asquith, resigned in early December 1916 and was succeeded by David Lloyd George. The United States Congress finally declared war on Imperial Germany on 6 April 1917, in March, the German army in the west, withdrew to the Hindenburg line in Operation Alberich, which negated the tactical assumptions underlying the plans for the French offensive. Until French troops advanced to compensate during the Battles of Arras, they encountered no German troops in the assault sector, the French government desperately needed a victory to avoid civil unrest but the British were wary of proceeding, in view of the rapidly changing tactical situation
43.
Second Battle of the Aisne
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The Second Battle of the Aisne was the main part of the Nivelle Offensive, a Franco-British attempt to inflict a decisive defeat on the German armies in France. The strategy was to conduct sequenced offensives from north to south, by the British Expeditionary Force, General Robert Nivelle planned the offensive in December 1916, after he replaced Joseph Joffre as Commander-in-Chief of the French Army. When the French armies met the British advancing from the Arras front, the Germans would be pursued towards Belgium, the offensive began on 9 April, when the British attacked at the Battle of Arras. On 16 April, the Groupe darmées de Reserve attacked the Chemin des Dames and the next day, the Fourth Army of Groupe darmées de Centre, near Reims to the south-east, began the Battle of the Hills. The Chemin des Dames ridge had been quarried for stone for centuries, leaving a warren of caves, the offensive met massed German machine-gun and artillery fire, which inflicted many casualties and repulsed the French infantry at many points. The failure had an effect on the morale of the French army. The new French strategy was not one of passive defence, in June and July the Fourth, Sixth and Tenth Armies managed to conduct several limited attacks and the First Army was sent to Flanders to participate in the Third Battle of Ypres. The British prolonged the Arras offensive into mid-May, despite uncertainty about French intentions, high losses, the British captured Messines Ridge on 7 June and spent the rest of the year on the offensive in the Third Battle of Ypres and the Battle of Cambrai. Nivelle believed the Germans had been exhausted by the Battle of Verdun and the Battle of the Somme in 1916 and could not resist a breakthrough offensive, the main attack on the Aisne would be preceded by a large diversionary attack by the British Third and First armies at Arras. The French War Minister, Hubert Lyautey and Chief of Staff General Henri-Philippe Pétain opposed the plan, Nivelle threatened to resign if the offensive did not go ahead and having not lost a battle, had the enthusiastic support of the British Prime Minister David Lloyd George. The Second Battle of the Aisne involved c. 1.2 million troops and 7,000 guns on a front from Reims to Roye, the original plan of December 1916 was plagued by delays and information leaks. By the time the offensive began in April 1917, the Germans had received intelligence of the Allied plan and strengthened their defences on the Aisne front. The German retreat to the Hindenburg Line left a belt of devastated ground up to 25 miles deep in front of the French positions facing east from Soissons, northwards to St. Quentin. Operation Alberich freed 13–14 German divisions, which were moved to the Aisne, the German withdrawal forestalled the attacks of the British and Groupe darmées du Nord but also freed French divisions. By late March, GAN had been reduced by eleven infantry, conduct of the Defensive Battle was published on 1 December 1916. The new manual laid down the organisation for the defence of an area. Positions necessary for the new method were defined in Principles of Field Position Construction, experience of the German First Army in the Somme Battles, was published on 30 January 1917. During the Battle of the Somme in 1916 Colonel von Lossberg had been able to establish a line of relief divisions, ludendorff was sufficiently impressed by the Lossberg memorandum to add it to the new Manual of Infantry Training for War
44.
Battle of the Hills
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The Battle of the Hills also known as the Battle of the Hills of Champagne and the Third Battle of Champagne, was a battle of the First World War that was fought from April–May 1917. The offensive was intended to be an auxiliary to that of the Groupe darmées du Nord along the Chemin des Dames, general Anthoine, commander of the Fourth Army had originally planned a supporting attack but this was rejected by Nivelle, who required a more ambitious effort. The battle took place east of Reims, between Prunay and Aubérive, in the province of Champagne, along the Moronvilliers Hills. On the left of XII Corps east of the Suippes, the 24th Division established a guard, by attacking through Bois des Abattis towards Germains. On the left flank of the division, the part of Aubérive east of the river was rapidly captured, on the west bank of the Suippes, battalions of the 75th Territorial Regiment attached to the Moroccan Division, made appreciable progress round the main part of Aubérive. The Moroccan Division was repulsed on its extreme right but the Régiment de marche de la Légion étrangère gained a foothold in the fortifications at Le Golfe. To the north-east of Mont Haut, the reached a depth of 1.5 miles. Further west, the 34th Division took Mont Cornillet and Mont Blond, the French spent 18 April consolidating but the 45th Division pushed up to the southern edge of Mont Haut. Next day, the 33rd Division captured Le Téton and the capture of Aubérive was completed by the 24th Division and the Territorial battalions. On 20 April, French troops got onto the summit of Le Casque and on 22 April, the Fourth Army attacks took 3,550 prisoners and 27 guns. The French attacked again from 17–22 April and despite German counter-attacks on 19 and 23 April, after a lull, the French attacked again on 30 April and ended the offensive on 20 May. The number of German prisoners taken by the end of the battle had increased to 6,120. The Moronvilliers massif was a group of hills, densely wooded before 1914, the village of Moronvilliers lay in a dip below the north crest of the main ridge. There is a peak known as Mont Sans Nom,700 feet high, with a hollow then a ridge to the north-west. A road ran east from Beine to Nauroy, Moronvilliers and St. Martin lHeureux on the Suippes, the highest point of the hills at Mont Haut is nearly as high as Vigie de Berru,870 feet, the highest hill overlooking Reims from the east. The loss of Fort Brimont would make the German positions on the low ground south of the Aisne, from Berméricourt north-west to the mouth of the Suippes, vulnerable to a further attack. The capture of the German defences on the edge of the Châlons Plain above Aubérive, was necessary for an advance around Beine and an attack from the east of the Nogent lAbbesse massif. Success would allow the Fourth Army to advance towards the Suippes, the railway from Bazancourt to Warmeriville, Somme-Py and Apremont, the main German supply line south of the Aisne, would be cut
45.
Battle of Messines (1917)
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The Nivelle Offensive in April and May had failed to achieve its more ambitious aims, led to the demoralisation of French troops and the dislocation of the Anglo-French strategy for 1917. The offensive at Messines forced the Germans to move reserves to Flanders from the Arras and Aisne fronts, the 4th Army divisions of Gruppe Wijtschate held the ridge, which were later reinforced by a division from Gruppe Ypern. The battle began with the detonation of a series of mines beneath German lines and this was followed by a creeping barrage 700 yards deep, covering the British troops as they secured the ridge, with support from tanks, cavalry patrols and aircraft. The effectiveness of the British mines, barrages and bombardments was improved by advances in artillery survey, flash-spotting, British attacks from 8–14 June advanced the front line beyond the former German Sehnen line. The Battle of Messines was a prelude to the much larger Third Battle of Ypres campaign, in January 1916, General Sir Herbert Plumer recommended to Field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig the capture of Messines Ridge before an operation to capture the Gheluvelt plateau further north. The Flanders campaign was postponed because of the Battle of Verdun in 1916, Haig intended to force the Germans to move troops away from the French armies on the Aisne front, where demoralisation amid the failure of the Nivelle Offensive had led to mutinies. The British would gain observation of the slope of Menin Ridge at the west end of the Gheluvelt plateau. The front line around Ypres had changed little since the end of the Second Battle of Ypres. The British held the city, while the Germans held the ground of the Messines–Wytschaete Ridge to the south, the lower ridges to the east. The Ypres front was a salient bulging into the German lines but was overlooked by German artillery observers on the higher ground, the British had little ground observation of the German rear areas and valleys east of the ridges. Gradients varied from negligible, to 1,60 at Hooge and 1,33 at Zonnebeke, underneath the soil was London clay, sand and silt. The area was considered by the British to be drier than Loos, Givenchy, the Second Army devised a centralised artillery plan of great sophistication, following the practice established at the Battle of Arras in April 1917. The use of survey, gun calibration, weather data. Target-finding became systematic, with the use of new sound-ranging equipment, better organisation of flash-spotting, Second Army counter-battery artillery bombardments increased from twelve in the week ending 19 April, to 438 in the last ten days before the attack. A survey of captured ground after the found that 90 percent of the German artillery positions had been plotted. The 2nd Field Survey Company also assisted the mining companies by establishing the positions of objectives within the German lines, using intersection and a special series of aerial photographs. The company surveyed advanced artillery positions, so that moving forward to them once the battle had begun could begin firing as soon as they arrived at the positions. The British had begun an offensive against the German-held Wijtschate salient in 1916
46.
Battle of Passchendaele
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The Battle of Passchendaele was a major campaign of the First World War, fought by the Allies against the German Empire. Passchendaele lay on the last ridge east of Ypres,5 miles from a junction at Roulers. The next stage of the Allied plan was an advance to Thourout–Couckelaere, to close the German-controlled railway running through Roulers, further operations and a British supporting attack along the Belgian coast from Nieuwpoort, combined with Operation Hush, were to have reached Bruges and then the Dutch frontier. The campaign ended in November, when the Canadian Corps captured Passchendaele, apart from attacks in December. In 1918, the Battle of the Lys and the Fifth Battle of Ypres were fought before the Allies occupied the Belgian coast, a campaign in Flanders was controversial in 1917 and has remained so. The British Prime Minister, David Lloyd George, opposed the offensive, field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig, commanding the British Expeditionary Force, did not receive approval for the Flanders operation from the War Cabinet until 25 July. Belgian independence had been recognised in the Treaty of London which created a sovereign, the German invasion of Belgium on 4 August 1914, in violation of Article VII of the treaty, was the reason given by the British government for declaring war on Germany. British military operations in Belgium began with the arrival of the British Expeditionary Force at Mons on 22 August. On 10 October, Lieutenant-General Erich von Falkenhayn, the Chief of the German General Staff, ordered an attack towards Dunkirk and Calais, followed by a turn south to gain a decisive victory. On 16 October, the Belgians and some French reinforcements began the defence of western Belgium, when the offensive failed, Falkenhayn ordered the capture of Ypres to gain a local advantage. By 18 November, the First Battle of Ypres ended in failure, large British offensive operations in Flanders were not possible in 1915, due to the consequent lack of resources. The Germans conducted their own Flanders offensive at the Second Battle of Ypres, Sir Douglas Haig succeeded Sir John French as Commander-in-Chief of the BEF on 19 December 1915. A week after his appointment, Haig met Vice-Admiral Sir Reginald Bacon, Haig preferred an advance from Ypres, to bypass the flooded area around the Yser and the coast, before a coastal attack was attempted, to clear the coast to the Dutch border. Other operations were begun by the British to regain territory or to evict the Germans from ground overlooking their positions, engagements took place on 12 February at Boesinghe and on 14 February at Hooge and Sanctuary Wood. There were actions from 14–15 February and 1–4 March at The Bluff,27 March –16 April at the St. Eloi Craters, in January 1917, the Second Army held the line in Flanders from Laventie to Boesinghe with eleven divisions and up to two in reserve. There was much trench mortaring, mining and raiding by both sides and from January to May, the Second Army had 20,000 casualties. In May, reinforcements began moving to Flanders from the south, in January 1916, General Herbert Plumer, the Second Army commander, began to plan offensives against Messines Ridge, Lille and Houthulst Forest. General Henry Rawlinson was also ordered to plan an attack from the Ypres Salient on 4 February, planning continued but the Battle of Verdun, at meetings in November 1916, Haig, the French commander-in-chief Joseph Joffre and the other Allies met at Chantilly
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Battle of La Malmaison
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The Battle of La Malmaison from 23–27 October was the final French action of the 1917 campaign of the First World War, which had begun with the Nivelle Offensive. The French captured the village and fort of La Malmaison and took control of the Chemin des Dames ridge, the German 7th Army had discovered French preparations for the attack and also identified the date and time. General Max von Boehn chose to defend the front positions, rather than them as an advanced zone. Zero hour had been set for 5,45 a. m. but a German message, ordering the front garrisons to be ready at 5,30 a. m. was intercepted and the French start time was moved forward to 5,15 a. m. The French infantry advanced behind a creeping barrage but the earlier zero hour meant that the attack began in the dark. Rain began to fall at 6,00 a. m. the 38th Division captured Fort de Malmaison and XXI Corps took Allemant and Vaudesson. From 24–25 October, XXI and XIV corps advanced rapidly and the I Cavalry Corps was brought forward into the XIV Corps area, the 7th Army conducted the Bunzelwitz Bewegung, a retirement from the Chemin-des-Dames to the north bank of the Ailette, on the night of 1/2 November. General Robert Nivelle replaced Joseph Joffre as French Commander-in-Chief in December 1916, after the fighting at Verdun. Nivelle claimed that a barrage on German lines could bring French victory in 48 hours and avoid the costly battles of attrition. The French offensive began on 16 April 1917, after support from the France Prime Minister, despite the doubts of other politicians, Pétain, Micheler, other army commanders. The Nivelle offensive involved c. 1.2 million French, Quentin and Laon to the Aisne east of Soissons, ending at Cerny en Laonnois on the Chemin-des-Dames ridge, although the withdrawal to the last part of the line did not take place. The new fortifications were intended to be precautionary, built to be used as rallying-positions Eventual-Stellungen to shorten the Western Front, economise on troops, the Siegfriedstellung had the potential to release the greatest number of troops and was begun first on 27 September 1916. The French Third Army began the offensive against German observation points at St. Quentin from 1–13 April, the British attack either side of the Scarpe river penetrated 6,000 yards, the furthest advance achieved since the beginning of trench warfare. Most of the objectives were reached by the evening of 10 April, the First Army attacked from Ecurie north of the Scarpe to Vimy Ridge, which fell at about 1,00 p. m. in a 4,000 yards advance. By 16 May, the British had captured 254 German guns but had not broken through, the Germans were forced to retire from the area between Braye-en-Laonnois, Condé-sur-Aisne and Laffaux to the Hindenburg Line from Laffaux Mill, along the Chemin-des-Dames to Courtecon. The German armies in France were still short of reserves, despite the retirements to the Hindenburg Line in March, because of the shortage of troops, the front-holding divisions had to change places with the Eingreif divisions, rather than be withdrawn to recuperate. In a lull from 9 May –20 August, more German divisions were depleted than at Verdun the previous year. Of the German divisions engaged on the ridge, none spent more than twelve days in the line and only the 46th Reserve Division returned for another period in the line, from May, there were many local actions on the Chemin-des-Dames ridge
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Battle of Cambrai (1917)
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The Battle of Cambrai was a British offensive and German counter-offensive battle in the First World War. Major General Henry Tudor, Commander, Royal Artillery of the 9th Division, fuller, a staff officer with the Tank Corps, was in the process of looking for a place to use tanks as raiding parties. General Julian Byng, commander of the British Third Army, decided to both plans into the attack. Despite British success on the first day, mechanical unreliability, German artillery and infantry defences exposed the frailties of the Mark IV tank, on the second day, only about half of the original number of tanks were available. Numerous developments since 1915 matured at Cambrai, such as predicted artillery fire, sound ranging, infantry tactics, infantry-tank co-ordination. The techniques of warfare continued to develop and played a vital part during the Hundred Days Offensive in 1918. The German defences were formidable, Cambrai having been a stretch of front thus far enabled the Germans to fortify their lines in depth. Tudors plan sought to test new methods in combined arms, with emphasis on combined artillery and infantry techniques, Tudor advocated using the new sound ranging and silent registration of guns to achieve instant suppression fire and surprise. Despite efforts to preserve secrecy, the Germans had received sufficient intelligence to be on moderate alert, the attacking force was six infantry divisions of the III Corps on the right and IV Corps on the left, supported by nine battalions of the Tank Corps with about 437 tanks. In reserve was one division in IV Corps and the three divisions of the Cavalry Corps. Initially, there was success in most areas and it seemed as if a great victory was within reach. On the right, the 12th Division advanced as far as Lateau Wood before being ordered to dig in, the 20th Division forced a way through La Vacquerie and then advanced to capture a bridge across the St Quentin canal at Masnières. The bridge collapsed under the weight of a tank halting the hopes for an advance across the canal, in the centre the 6th Division captured Ribécourt and Marcoing but when the cavalry passed through late, they were repulsed from Noyelles. On the IV Corps front, the 51st Division was held at Flesquières and this left the attacking divisions on each flank exposed to enfilade fire. The commander of the 51st Division, George Montague Harper had substituted his own drill for the standard one laid down by the Tank Corps. Flesquières was one of the strongest points in the German line and was flanked by other strong points and its defenders under Major Krebs acquitted themselves well against the tanks, almost 40 being knocked out by the Flesquières artillery. There is little evidence for Krügers actions, although it is possible that he may have been responsible for as many as nine tanks, twenty-eight tanks were lost in the action, through German artillery-fire and breakdowns. Haig concluded that skirmishing infantry was needed, to bring the artillery crews under small-arms fire to allow the tanks to operate, the Germans abandoned Flesquières during the night
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