The Battle of the Marne

by G. H. Perris

II. The British Manœuvre

To understand how this withdrawal, so big with results, was possible, and to do justice to Sir John French’s command in regard to it, we must leave Lamaze and Vautier at grips with the two German corps on the Ourcq, and turn for a moment to the situation south of the Marne.

The OURCQ Front.
Afternoon of Sept. 6.

On September 3, the British Army lay just south of Meaux, from Lagny to Signy Signets, having destroyed the Marne bridges behind it at General Joffre’s request. Kluck, as we have seen, was then approaching the river from the north-west, coming on at a great pace. Several of his Staff officers, pelting eastward from Meaux in an armoured automobile at nightfall, did not see that the last arch of the Trilport bridge was broken, pitched over, and were drowned. A little study of the map will show that Kluck’s rapid movement—his pontoon corps established bridges of boats across the Marne on the night of the 3rd, and the next day his patrols were beyond the Petit Morin and on the Grand Morin—required not simply a farther retreat, but a different direction of retreat, of the British force. To throw it up against the neighbouring French columns, those of the 5th Army (commanded by General Franchet d’Espérey since the evening of September 3) was exactly what Kluck was aiming at. To avoid such a calamity, and perhaps to tempt the rash commander farther south, Joffre asked Sir John French to retire some 12 miles farther, drawing his right south-westward, pivoting on his left. This manœuvre, which to the British commander could only seem the natural pursuance of the French Army Orders of September 2, by him received on the following day, was carried out on September 4. The Expeditionary Force, as it was called, had been on the Continent for hardly three weeks, had fought in that time two great battles and many smaller engagements, and had retreated 160 miles in twelve days, losing much material and nearly a fifth of its original strength, about 15,000 officers and men. Behind the Forest of Crécy, close to the railway junctions south of Paris, it was able, on the night of September 4 and during the 5th, to pick up much-needed reinforcements, bringing its effective strength up to five divisions and five cavalry brigades, with guns and supplies.

At midday on September 5, when the battle of the Ourcq was beginning, the I German Army had reached the following positions:—Marwitz’s IX Cavalry Division was north of Crécy, the II near Coulommiers. Richthofen’s V Cavalry Division was at Choisy, south-west of La Ferté-Gaucher, the Guard Cavalry a little farther east, near Chartronges. The II Corps was extended from the Marne near Montceaux to the Grand Morin west of Coulommiers. The IV Corps was on the latter river about La Ferté-Gaucher. The III Corps was on the great highroad about Sancy and Montceaux-les-Provins; and the IX north of Esternay. The general strategical significance of these dispositions will presently appear; for the moment, we are concerned with them specially in relation to Maunoury’s and the British Armies. Twelve hours later, Kluck’s front was advanced a little farther, extending from near Crécy-en-Brie, along the Grand Morin, by Coulommiers and La Ferté-Gaucher, to Esternay, with the cavalry of Marwitz before the centre and left. The bulk of this force was aimed at the 5th French Army; but the II and part of the IV Active Corps faced the British. Such was the position at the moment when Kluck, informed of the danger to his rearguard, decided to send back to the Ourcq his II Corps, bringing the western wing of the invasion to a sudden and humiliating end.

Neither at French nor at British Headquarters were these dispositions exactly known; still less could the German commander’s intentions be known. The last stage of the British retirement, asked for by General Joffre, had taken the body of Sir John French’s troops out of direct contact with the enemy. They had to embody newly-arrived men and guns, and then to return over this ground. Joffre’s order of September 4 had named as the British line for the evening of the following day “the front Changis–Coulommiers, facing east, ready to attack in the general direction of Montmirail”—due east, that is to say, not north-east. It is evident, from this instruction, that the Generalissimo (1) did not anticipate any serious resistance west or south of Coulommiers, for the British could not be fighting on their north flank while marching due east, and they could not start from Coulommiers when the enemy was 8 miles farther south; and (2) did not anticipate a sudden withdrawal of Kluck northward, which would require the British to turn thither in aid of Maunoury. When Joffre and French met at Melun on September 5, the instruction was modified, but not radically; it was now, in Sir John’s words, “to effect a change of front to my right—my left resting on the Marne, and my right on the 5th Army, to fill the gap between that army and the 6th.” The right of the 5th Army, however, was not at Coulommiers—both Changis and Coulommiers were in the hands of the enemy—but Courtacon, 12 miles farther to the south-east; and to join the 6th and 5th Armies implied a north-easterly, not an easterly frontage. Joffre so far recognised the difficulty of filling this wide space with five divisions as to instruct Gallieni to send across the Marne the 8th Division of the French 4th Corps; and this came in, with prompt effect, between Meaux and Villiers-sur-Morin, 5 miles farther south, beside the British 3rd Corps, at 9 a.m. on September 6. There then still remained a space of over 20 miles between the 6th and 5th Armies, and it is, therefore, idle to suggest, as some zealous partisans of Gallieni have done,[59] that the British commander was needlessly nervous as to the continuity of the line, when it became evident that considerable bodies of the enemy were spread across his path.

The BRITISH Turn-About

It was not till September 7 that any need appeared to help Maunoury. But, as we now know, Kluck ordered the withdrawal of his II Corps to the Ourcq at 3.30 a.m. on September 6—2½ hours before the beginning of the Allied offensive. The withdrawal was well covered, and was not observed for twenty-four hours. The change of direction of the British advance toward the north could not be effected with the instancy that paper strategists have imagined; and the necessity of keeping touch with d’Espérey continued. The question whether the British advance was timid and halting must be judged in the light of the facts not as we now know them, but as they revealed themselves from day to day; and in the light not of Gallieni’s desires or needs only, but of the whole battle, and particularly of the instructions given to the British Army by General Joffre, who alone was responsible for the whole battle. That Maunoury would be seriously engaged with Kluck’s rearguard on the afternoon of the 5th was not anticipated by the French; it could not, then, be anticipated by the British. Since criticisms are raised as to one side of a converging movement, it must be pointed out that, if the French attack on the Ourcq had been delayed for twelve hours, and had not anticipated the general offensive, all would have been well. Kluck would have been unable to evade one assailant in order to throw all his force upon the other; and the tasks of Maunoury and the British would have been more advantageously divided. We are here, apparently, in face of one of those failures of information and agreement which are liable to occur, even under the best leadership, between armies of different nationality when plans are suddenly changed. It may now be recognised that the battle of the Marne would have yielded a completer, cheaper, and speedier victory if the rectangular movement of the French 6th and British Armies had been more exactly designed and timed to a strict simultaneity. There was a lack of assimilation. Perhaps the British were slow in getting under weigh; it is much more certain that Gallieni was precipitate.

The front of the British 3rd (incomplete), 2nd, and 1st Corps at the opening of the offensive lay, then, from Villiers-sur-Morin, across the edge of the Forest of Crécy, by Mortcerf, Lumigny, Rozoy, and Gastins, to near the Forest of Jouy, where Conneau’s Cavalry Corps connected with the infantry of the 5th Army. The battle here opened with an enemy attack. To mask its withdrawal to the Ourcq, a part of the German II Corps had delivered, early on the morning of September 6, a blow at the British right, and fighting was sharp till noon over the farmlands of the Brie plateau between Hautefeuille and Vaudoy—that is, 8 miles south-west of Coulommiers. “At this time,” says Field-Marshal French, “I did not know that a retreat had really set in, or how the various German corps and divisions were placed.” Columns of the IV Active Corps were still farther south, to the east of Vaudoy, on the Provins road, with large forces of cavalry and the III Corps on their left. It was a delicate part of the front, the space between the British and 5th French Armies. During the afternoon, while the khaki line slowly progressed over the stubble fields and broken forest around the villages of Lumigny, Pezarches, and Touquin, unmistakable evidence began to come in that the German foreguard had become a rearguard, and that the body of the II Corps had been in retreat all day. The charred walls of the hamlets of Courchamps and Courtacon, destroyed with deliberate ferocity, marked the most southerly points of the invasion in the western field.[60] To the Allied soldiers who knew not Maunoury, it must have seemed that their offensive was commencing magically well. About 10 a.m., the British left and centre—the 4th Division and the 2nd Corps—had been surprised to find the pressure on their front suddenly relieved. On their right, the 1st Corps soon saw its way free, and strode northward. At 6.30 p.m., the IV Active Corps received orders to follow the II Corps back to the Ourcq. Thus, by evening on September 6, Sir John French was able to reach the Grand Morin, from Crécy-en-Brie eastward, with scouts beyond the stream at Maisoncelles. Coulommiers, where Kluck had had his headquarters, was occupied during the night.

The Allied plan was now fully revealed. Instead of presenting on the Grand Morin an ironclad face, safe in flank and rear, the I German Army had been suddenly thrown on to a rectangular defensive on a front of 50 miles between Betz and Courtacon, against attacks converging from the west, south-west, and south. That evening, at Joffre’s request, the British line was directed more to the north, thus emphasising the effect of Maunoury’s move. From this moment, the withdrawal of the whole of Kluck’s forces over the Marne must have been envisaged. On the following day, September 7, in fact, the III and IX Corps (west of Montmirail), were preparing to follow the IV Active Corps across the Marne; but the Allies were then aware of what was happening. Marwitz’s Cavalry Corps covered the movement along the Grand Morin, with one division to the west, one to the east, and one 4 miles north of Coulommiers, while Richthofen’s Divisions operated farther east, all available artillery supporting them. The task was fulfilled with much resource and energy; but the position was not one that could be long maintained, for the British 3rd Corps was at Maisoncelles, 4 miles beyond the Grand Morin, and the French 8th Division threatened the German flank at double this distance northward by occupying St. Fiacre and Villemareuil. At noon, Marwitz gave way, falling back to the Petit Morin, from La Ferté-sous-Jouarre south-eastward. By evening, the British 3rd and 2nd Corps were beyond the Grand Morin at La Haute Maison and Aulnoy; the 1st was held back somewhat from Chailly to near La Ferté-Gaucher, in touch with the French 5th Army. General de Lisle’s Cavalry Brigade, with the 9th Lancers and the 18th Hussars, showed especial vigour. The men were full of cheer, and ready for anything; but Sir John French was a careful commander. The measure of the enemy’s retreat could not be immediately taken through the curtain of cavalry and artillery—aviation was in its infancy in those days. All the strength available was in line; and it was so thin a line as to tempt surprise. The Field-Marshal considered the alternative of sending direct help round to Maunoury, but concluded that the best aid would be to drive rapidly to and across the Marne.[61]