THE RAID INTO ALSACE.
Perhaps you wonder, as the Belgians did, what the French and the British were doing while the Germans were battering down the forts of Liége. You will probably ask why they did not rush at once to the help of the gallant Belgians, and fight the Germans on their own frontier. The answer is that neither France nor Britain was prepared for war. Both were hoping against hope that Russia and Austria would come to some peaceful arrangement. The fact that neither we nor the French were prepared shows clearly that we had no desire for war. The fact that within twenty-four hours after the declaration of war the Germans had three army corps in front of Liége shows equally clearly that they had long determined to fight.
All that the Belgians could do was to hold up the German advance for a short time. As the terrible hours slipped by, the people grew very anxious, and on every lip were the questions, "Où sont les Anglais?" "Où sont les Français?" A solitary motor car appeared, decorated with the Union Jack, and as it passed through the towns and villages the people cheered it to the echo. "The British are coming!" they cried. "Hurrah! hurrah!" Alas! both the French and the British were too far away to help the gallant Belgians struggling in the forts at Liége.
While the French were mobilizing as rapidly as possible they sent a brigade, with some cavalry and artillery, into Upper Alsace. I need not tell you what their object was. You will remember that ever since 1871 most Frenchmen have longed for the day when Alsace should again belong to France. The Alsatians have been harshly treated by the Germans. The German soldiers stationed in their towns have always been bitter against them because of their French sympathies.
In the year 1913, at the little Alsatian town of Zabern, a German lieutenant is said to have offered a reward to any of his men who stabbed a "Wacke," the German nickname for a native of Alsace. Disturbances arose, and in the course of them the lieutenant drew his sword and cut a lame cobbler over the head. The people of the town were very angry at this treatment, but when they protested their chief men were seized and imprisoned. An appeal was made to the Prussian Parliament. The War Minister supported the soldiers, but the Parliament stood up stoutly for the people of Zabern, and a military court sentenced the lieutenant to forty-three days' imprisonment. A higher court, however, did away with this sentence, and also found that no blame attached to the colonel of the regiment. While the trials were taking place the Crown Prince sent a telegram to the colonel praising him for what he had done. Thus, you see, the Germans had overthrown the rule of law in Alsace, and in place of it had set up the rule of the sword. Knowing all this, the French thought that the Alsatians would welcome their former fellow-countrymen with open arms, and would rise as one man against their oppressors. The appearance of French soldiers in Alsace would be a sign to them that the day of deliverance had arrived.
We must not think of this advance into Alsace as part of a well-thought-out plan by the French commander-in-chief. The forces employed in the work were far too weak to hold Alsace, even if they had been able to conquer it. From the point of view of strategy it was a mistake.
Look at the map on page [98], and find, to the south of the Vosges Mountains, the great French fortress of Belfort. From this place you will see a little plain across which an army can move easily to the Upper Rhine. While the Germans were advancing on Liége, French airmen flew across the plain and discovered that only a few of the enemy's troops were on the left bank of the Rhine. The French thereupon determined to occupy the country up to the left bank of the river. On the evening of Friday, 7th August, the day on which von Emmich asked General Leman for a truce so that he might bury his dead, a French brigade marched out of Belfort and crossed the frontier. Just before sunset it reached the little town of Altkirch, about a dozen miles inside German territory, and there found small bodies of Germans lining the trenches and awaiting an attack. The French infantry advanced with great spirit, carried the trenches, and by bayonet charges put the Germans to flight. Cavalry at once followed up the retreating enemy, and worked great havoc on them.
Then the French entered Altkirch, bearing before them the tricolour. The townsfolk rushed out of their houses to welcome them, and when they saw the flag under which they had lived and prospered forty-four years ago, they raised cheer after cheer. Already some of the villagers on the frontier had torn up the poles which marked the border-line between France and Germany.
In less than an hour the French were on the outskirts of Mulhouse, the largest and most important manufacturing town of Alsace, nine miles to the north of Altkirch. The people of Mulhouse have always been deeply attached to France. When the town became German in 1871, large numbers of them left their homes and settled in France and Algeria, in order that they might not be severed from the country which they loved so well. Mulhouse was occupied with but little resistance next day, and that evening General Joffre sent out the following message to the people:—