The Last Days of Fort Vaux, March 9-June 7, 1916

by Henry Bordeaux

Part I

“General Headquarters of the Attacking Troops
North-east of Vaux, June 4.

“On June 2, at four o’clock in the morning, the four attacking companies were drawn up in a semicircle round Fort Vaux, at about 100 yards’ distance; at one swoop they pushed forward even to the ditch, which, 10 yards broad and 5 deep, encloses the whole earthwork, in the form of an irregular trapezoid, within its sheer walls built of large square stones. Across the appalling curtain fire of the French we had only been able to convey a part of our war material up to the heights of the fort: flame-throwers, hand-grenades, axes, and wire-cutters.

“In consequence of the long bombardment with heavy guns, the fort, though very massively built, was no longer capable of defending the surrounding space effectively; but the dug-outs, hollowed out deep in the rocks and covered with reinforced concrete, had held out. The flanking transverse passages of the fort, too, were still factors to be reckoned with. Accordingly the first problem was to make their artillery and machine-guns harmless; for these, with their raking fire, churned up the bottom of the ditch, and prevented us from crossing and reaching the interior of the fort. Each of the two breastworks in front showed an open breach, caused by very heavy projectiles, in the gigantic blocks of concrete of which they were formed. The damage was repaired, up to a point, by sandbags; and, to protect the breach, they had placed there a machine-gun which might be able to operate towards the glacis. The principal obstacle, however, was still the guns of the transverse passages, which from their narrow concrete embrasures could sweep the short line of the ditches with a pitiless fire. Access to either of the breastworks was impeded by the fire of a 37 mm. revolving gun, a 55 mm. gun, and by two machine-guns. Not a cat could have passed through.

“First of all, the machine-gun, which at the very breach prevented our approach, was silenced by hand-grenades. Then the pioneers crept right up to the upper edge of the escarped wall, above the western transverse passage, set up the flame-throwers, and, from above, with the aid of a crank shaft, inserted the tubes of the flame-throwers into the embrasures. A flame of two yards, accompanied by dense smoke, drove the garrison far away from its guns.

“At this point some thirty pioneers, taking advantage of the breaches in the masonry, contrived to get down into the ditch and, on the other side, to reach the top of the main parapet, where they lay down and improvised a sort of shelter in the rubbish-heap. This little band was at once cut off, the French having reopened fire with the machine-guns; these made a retreat impossible for them, while in the transverse gallery the smoke had dispersed. In the tremendous din of the German curtain fire, about 200 yards behind the fort, cries could not be heard at 20 yards. The officer in command had to signal with his cap, which he waved in the Morse code.

“At 7 A.M. we succeeded in capturing the second transverse gallery, the eastern one, after which the garrison, through a breach made by the shells, was nearly overwhelmed by a bomb attack; thirty men were captured, and the machine-guns, with an abundance of munitions, fell into our hands and were made use of.

“But in the case of the other transverse gallery, the smoke had only counteracted the effects of its fire for a brief spell; it was therefore essential to take it, no matter how. Bags were filled with hand-grenades and passed along the wall until in front of the embrasures, where they were made to explode. This, however, could not be done without considerable risk to the brave pioneers, for the French had placed another machine-gun in a doorway not far from the embrasures, and could thus shoot from below at any head overlapping the upper edge of the wall. For all that, about 5 P.M., the explosions were successful, and we were at last able to penetrate into the transverse gallery which we had first attacked. The garrison, by a deep corridor passing underneath the bottom of the ditch, had taken refuge in the interior of the fort. It had been a lengthy operation, for the explosives, in view of the French curtain fire, could only be placed on the slope in small quantities, and even then the danger was terrible. During the interval of waiting, the pioneers and the infantrymen, who were not working directly at the explosives, dug trenches above, on the glacis, and farther west, by the side of the fort; they occupied these positions with the machine-guns taken from the enemy to meet a possible attack from the south-west.

“About 7 P.M. we pushed forward towards the gorge of the fort, after crossing, behind the first parapet, the second ditch, which under the bombardment had become a wide excavation containing enormous masses of shattered concrete. The armed turrets on the first parapet—an observing-station at each of the two breastworks, a big cupola in the middle, provided with two guns, and a raised and armoured machine-gun shelter at the left-hand breastwork—were unfit for further use and stripped of their thick revetment of concrete; the iron rods of the framework stuck out all over them like the prickles of a hedgehog. In the same way the infantry position higher up on the cavalier had been completely ripped up by the German shells.

“At this point the officer commanding the pioneers wanted to make his way into the earthwork itself, and that by the same underground passage which the defenders of the smoked-out transverse gallery had followed. There was a deep stairway, then a short landing, then a steep flight of stairs going up to a stout oaken door, which prevented one from going farther. Pioneer-Lieutenant Ruberg decided to blow up this door by putting against it all the hand-grenades required and taking advantage of the ensuing confusion to storm the position with his troops. In order that the force might not itself be wiped out by the explosion, it was essential that it should gain enough time to be able, once the match was lighted, to go down the staircase and climb up the other side; this would necessitate a cord burning at least twenty seconds. Lieutenant Ruberg, for want of explosive petards, accordingly tied together a dozen grenades. He was fastening them up against the heavy door, when he heard behind it a whispering on the part of the French, and the slight crackle that denotes a Bickford cord. There was no time left to think matters over, for in half a minute at the most the door would blow up from inside, and in that case the French would have the moral superiority in the assault. The great thing was to anticipate them. The Lieutenant motioned to his men to be on their guard, pulled out the normal detonator of one of the hand-grenades, which acts in five seconds, and rushed to the foot of the staircase in order not to be blown to pieces. When he was half-way, a formidable explosion took place: the charge laid by the French, acted upon by the other, exploded simultaneously. The pressure of the air threw the Lieutenant a few yards farther, and he received several splinters in his back. His pioneers darted forward into the corridor and reached a crossing, but were then confronted by two machine-guns placed at about a right angle ten paces to the rear, so that it became impossible to push on any farther. They had to possess their souls in patience throughout the night. From now on there were two commandants of Fort Vaux, a French commandant below ground and a German commandant above him. The French could not poke their heads out anywhere without being greeted at once with bullets or bombs; and the Germans, for the time being, were unable to advance. A horrible stench emanated from all the open cracks in the ceiling of the casemates. The corpses of the French killed in the previous fighting still lay there; there was no means of either pulling them out or of burying them in the thick, hard stone. In the course of the night a dozen French tried to find a way out. Some of them were killed, others taken prisoners by outposts placed at the south-west of the fort.

“On June 3, at five o’clock, a French airman flew above the earthwork in order to reconnoitre the position with accuracy. He came down very low, perhaps 100 yards above the ground, in order to see better, but he flew with such zigzags and so rapidly that the sensitive spot, the heart of the aeroplane, could not be hit in those few seconds. He made his escape; and ten minutes later a withering shell-fire of 22 cm.’s burst upon the trenches of the gorge which we were occupying, so that we had to take refuge as quickly as possible in the casemates that we had captured.

“To-day, June 4, is the fourth day that the fort has been shared by the two sides; the French are within like mutinous prisoners defending themselves against their warders. It is a situation which has never been prolonged to such an extent in the whole history of fortress warfare.

“The conduct of the French garrison is admirable; but still more admirable is the heroism of the German companies, which day and night, without a wink of sleep, without a drop of water, almost without food, withstand the most terrific fire, and will not let go their hold until this last corner of the underground passages of Vaux is in our hands.

“Kurt von Reden.”