THE BATTLE OF THE AISNE.
When Sir John French came to think over the operations of the day, he was uncertain in his own mind as to the intention of the enemy. Did they mean to make a great stand on the Aisne heights, or were they merely fighting a rearguard action in order to gain time in which to prepare for some new movement? It was most important that the Germans should be made to reveal their plans; so Sir John decided to put the matter to the test on the morrow by making a general advance.
All night long the engineers were hard at work strengthening the new crossings and repairing the old bridges, so that they would bear the weight of heavy guns and lorries. The infantry were no less busy, digging themselves in on the ground which they had won the previous day. The real attack was to be made by the First Army Corps, under Sir Douglas Haig, and we will now follow the fortunes of his command. On September 13 he had fought his way northward for about two miles, and was now holding the hillsides and the woods around the village of Troyon, directly to the north of Bourg. You must not confuse this Troyon with Fort Troyon, which was mentioned in Chapter XXVII. Fort Troyon is an outlying fort of Verdun, on the right bank of the Meuse; the Troyon of which I am now speaking is a tiny village about three miles north of Bourg, on the Aisne. To the north of Troyon are steep wooded slopes, and to the west is an undulating and densely-wooded country, rising towards high hills. Dense woodlands lay between Troyon and the position which the First Corps now held.
Shortly after midnight on 14th September Haig mustered his 2nd Infantry Brigade, which was billeted in the village of Moulins,[127] about a mile to the south of Troyon. Rain fell at intervals, and heavy mist made the dark night still darker. Silently the battalions of the King's Royal Rifles, the Royal Sussex, the Northamptonshire, and the Loyal North Lancashire regiments, with the 25th Artillery Brigade, took their places, and waited for the word of command. The German position which they were about to assault was the strongest along the whole line. The enemy had dug deep trenches and gun pits, and the ranges were well known, so that a fierce struggle might be expected. Both sides were on the watch, and every now and then the crack of rifles and the screech of shells broke the silence, while searchlights from the heights swept the scene. Brigadier-General Bulfin, who was in command, had sent out a patrol of officers to discover the position and strength of the enemy. Shortly before 3 a.m. it returned, and reported that the enemy was strongly posted near a sugar factory to the north of Troyon.
Then the word was given, and the King's Royal Rifles and the Royal Sussex Regiment moved forward in silence. There was no talking in the ranks; the orders were given in whispers, and were quickly passed along the line. Everything depended on taking the enemy by surprise. As the British moved on in dead silence there was a sudden sharp cry of pain. A stray shot had hit a man in the arm, and he could not repress a cry. But the brave fellow silenced his moans immediately by thrusting a piece of turf between his teeth. He held it there until he was sufficiently recovered to crawl back to his own lines.
The German outposts were now reached. The British moved rapidly forward, and soon drew near to the factory near which the Germans were posted. They were met by a fierce fire from the factory and from the guns in the entrenchments near at hand. Our men flung themselves to the ground, and began creeping forward, taking cover with great skill. It was a scene worthy of the brush of Rembrandt.[128] Away on the left rose the dusky heights; in front the factory loomed darkly against the sky; from windows and loopholes came thin sparks of flame; all around were wooded slopes wrapped in gloom. Along the British front the darkness was relieved by flashes of light from the rifles of the widely-extended infantry. From the distant trenches came the thunder of guns. All the time a light rain was falling, and a soaking mist made the darkness more obscure.
The German fire was so hot that the British were brought to a standstill. Shortly afterwards the Northamptons appeared on the east, and began moving towards the hills. Very slowly they gained ground, but all attempts to oust the Germans from the factory failed. The darkness, the mist, and the sodden ground prevented our artillery from lending effective aid.
The eastern sky began to pale; the shadows slowly fled from the woods, and dawn was at hand. The thin British line could not be expected to hold its own when the full light of day revealed them to the German marksmen and gunners, so reinforcements were hurried up, and a desperate attempt was made to advance. But little headway was made until the Guards' Brigade arrived. The Grenadier, Coldstream, and Scots Guards, as you probably know, rejoice in a long and proud record of military glory. For two hundred and fifty years they have played a leading part in our wars, and on their colours are blazoned some of the most glorious victories in British annals. Every man of the Guards' Brigade who advanced in the gray of that September morning was eager to prove himself worthy of the name and fame of his regiment. "Fix bayonets!" was now the order, and away swept the British, unsupported by artillery, towards the enemy's trenches. There was fierce hand-to-hand fighting for a few minutes. Then the Germans, unable to stand the fierce onset and the thrust of cold steel, broke and fled, leaving five guns and more than three hundred prisoners in the hands of the victors.
The factory, however, still held out. It was a solid stone building, with every door bolted and barred, and every window lined with rifles. The Loyal North Lancashires, who lay before it, heard the shouts of their victorious comrades to the right and left, and now strained every effort to win a like success. Towards midday some of them rushed a door of the factory, battered it down, and forced their way in over barricades and the piled corpses of the slain. In a few minutes the factory was in British hands. The Loyal North Lancashires poured into it, and held it throughout the day.
In the full light of that cold and windy morning, the British saw clearly that the task before them was enough to make the stoutest heart quail. The Germans had retreated to a line of trenches on a stretch of rising open ground. To carry these trenches meant an advance through a tornado of lead from rifles and machine guns. Behind the trenches was concealed German artillery, which was dropping shells on them so fast and furiously that advance was impossible. There was a great sigh of relief when, about nine o'clock, British shells began to whistle over the heads of the infantry. At last the artillery had come to their aid.
Now we must leave these gallant men for a moment and see what was happening to the Allies on either flank. To the right of the 1st Division the Moroccans, who had already taught the Germans to fear them, were holding their trenches valiantly. To the left of the 1st Division was the 2nd Division, advancing towards Braye, which you will see on the extreme right of the picture-diagram (page [249]). Its right wing had been checked by German artillery and rifle fire, and was now held up. Between the firing lines of the 1st and 2nd Divisions there was a stretch of ground left open, and Sir Douglas Haig saw at once that the enemy would probably try to thrust in a wedge at this point. He therefore hurried the 3rd Infantry Brigade into the gap, but only just in time. Almost immediately it was fiercely shelled, and a strong force of Germans was seen advancing. Two battalions of the 3rd Brigade at once dashed towards them; a battery of field guns galloped up, and opened fire at short range, and the enemy hastily withdrew.
Later in the day the enemy actually gained a footing between the First and Second Corps, and threatened to cut the communications of the latter. Sir Douglas Haig at this time was very hard pressed, and he had no reserves. The only reinforcements which Sir John French possessed consisted of three brigades of Allenby's cavalry. They now galloped up, dismounted, and took their places in the firing line. By their timely help the enemy was driven back, and the danger was averted.
Desperate fighting continued the whole of the morning and far into the afternoon. Attack and counter-attack continued almost without a pause. The Germans rolled forward in waves, only to be beaten back; the British advanced in their turn, only to suffer a like fate. In each case it was as though lines of breakers were dashing against the cliffs of a rocky seashore. Big guns thundered; Maxims and rifles cracked unceasingly. Huge siege guns, with a range of 10,000 yards, also hurled their enormous shells upon the British. These were the guns which had battered down the forts of Maubeuge a few days before.
About four in the afternoon the German counter-attacks grew so weak and infrequent that Sir Douglas Haig thought the time had come for a general advance. Our men pushed forward gallantly, but every inch of ground had to be won at a heavy price of dead and wounded. The officers suffered very severely; one brigade lost three of its four colonels. By this time the long day's struggle was beginning to tell upon our gallant fellows. Nevertheless before night fell a long stretch of difficult and dangerous ground had been won; six hundred prisoners and twelve guns had been captured. For the first time our men occupied an entrenched position on the plateau itself. In his dispatch Sir John French pays a high and well-deserved tribute to Sir Douglas Haig and the First Army Corps. He says: "The action of the First Army Corps, under the direction and command of Sir Douglas Haig, was of so skilful, bold, and decisive a character that he gained positions which alone have enabled me to maintain my position for more than three weeks of very severe fighting on the north bank of the river."
Very briefly I must sum up the work of the French on 14th September and the following days. The 6th French Army, to the left of the British, had made good progress on the 14th; but by the evening of the 15th had been driven back to within only a few hundred yards of its crossing places. Soissons had been heavily shelled, and part of it had been burned down. The French left, however, was still moving up the Oise towards Noyon.
The 5th French Army, to the right of the British, had crossed the river on the 14th, and had begun its assaults on the plateau above Craonne. If it could seize the long, steep-sided spur of Craonne, it would be able to turn the German positions on the whole line of heights. The Germans, however, stubbornly held their own, and the French could make no progress.
The 9th French Army, which had played such a leading part in the Battle of the Marne, had driven the Germans into Rheims, from which they fell back almost without firing a shot. The French were elated at the capture of this historic city. But von Buelow had not been defeated; he had moved back for the purpose of protecting the left of von Kluck's position on the heights of the Aisne. He halted, as we know, on the ridge along the northern bank of the Suippe, and Foch's attempts to force him from this position not only failed, but he himself was driven back by the Germans towards Rheims. The enemy captured the hill of Brimont, north of the city, and brought up heavy siege guns to bombard it at long range. More important still, the Germans had worked round on the east, and had won another hill to the east of the city. They could not, however, capture an adjoining hill, which was part of the defences of Rheims.
Eastwards of Rheims the 3rd and 4th Armies were fighting hard with some of the Saxon and Würtemberg troops, and also with the army of the Crown Prince. South of the Argonne the German retreat on this part of the line had also come to an end, and here, too, the invaders were holding an entrenched position of such strength that it resembled a fortress.
The next day, 15th September, was not so favourable to the Allies as the preceding day. On the British left two of our divisions were severely handled, and one of them was forced back at evening almost to the line of the stream. The 3rd Division, however, retook some high ground from which it had been thrust back on the previous day. On the British right there were constant attacks and counter-attacks, and the Guards' Brigade did yeoman service. It was during this part of the fighting that Bombardier Ernest Harlook, of the 113th Battery, R.F.A., won the V.C., as we shall read later.
Next day there was not much fighting on the British front. News arrived that the French 5th Army had been obliged to fall back, and that the Moroccans, on the British right, had retired, and thus left open the flank of our First Corps. Next morning (17th September), however, there was good news from the left. The French 6th Army had won back all the ground which it had lost, and was now in a strong position on the edge of the plateau. The British divisions which had been driven back to the stream were not molested; but the 1st Division, perched high up on the plateau at Troyon, came in for a bad time.
The Northamptons, on the extreme right, had clung to their positions, in spite of every effort to dislodge them. On the morning of the 17th the Germans in the opposite trenches showed a white flag as a token of surrender. They were called upon to come forward, and they did so, right to the edge of our trenches, and then most treacherously poured in a hot rifle fire. Many of our men were shot down; but happily there was a British machine gun, manned by a detachment of the Queen's, on the flank of the trench, and only 400 yards away. It opened fire at once, cutting a lane through the mass of the Germans, and killing three hundred of them. About one hundred of the survivors held up their hands and were made prisoners, while the rest fell back to their own trench. The trap had failed. Shortly afterwards a battalion of the Guards arrived, and drove them still farther back, with more loss.
On the next day (18th September) there was a lull in the fighting, though the 1st and 2nd British Divisions made a general attack, during which the Gloucesters, charging through the darkness, carried a line of the enemy's trenches. The whole French line to the east was making no progress, and it was now clear that the German positions could not be carried by a frontal attack. In five days' furious and deadly struggle but little ground had been gained. The forces opposed to each other were too evenly matched, and the trenches of the enemy were too strongly defended to be captured without a terrible loss of life. All that the Allies could do was to dig themselves in deeply, and slowly and painfully creep forward to the German lines by sap and mine.
It was clear that the Germans had recovered from their retreat, and were now in such a position that they could defy our attacks. A deadlock had set in all along the line. All dreams of rapidly driving the enemy out of France had been rudely dispelled. General Joffre, however, was equal to the occasion. He was ready with a new plan. What it was, and how it succeeded, we shall learn in a later chapter.