On 31st May the fortress fell, and at 3.30 on the morning of 2nd June von Mackensen entered the city. The Russians had held it a little over two months. The capture of Przemysl was a great feather in von Mackensen's cap, but it was no great prize. He found it little more than an empty shell. Guns, rolling stock, and supplies had been moved eastwards, and only a little booty fell into his hands.
Why, you ask, did not von Mackensen push on more quickly and keep the Russians on the run? You must remember that his great weapon consisted of an enormous number of heavy guns which could only be moved slowly. As soon as the great machine lumbered up, the Russians were bound to retreat, but while it was slowly advancing to a new position, they were able to hold back the enemy on the wings and send away eastward all the valuable contents of the city. The great danger was always in the centre, where von Mackensen was making his terrible thrust; on the wings the Russians were able to delay the enemy.
The fall of Przemysl compelled the Russians to give ground once more, and on 14th June their line ran as shown in the map on page [293]. While the retreat was proceeding, Brussilov scored a victory. When the German right wing had pushed through the forests from Stryj, had crossed the Dniester, and was travelling by bad country roads, Brussilov caught it at a disadvantage. A three days' battle followed, in which the enemy was flung back across the Dniester with heavy loss. Some 17 guns, 49 machine guns, and more than 15,000 prisoners were captured, including a whole company of the Prussian Guard. Successes on the wings, however, could avail nothing while von Mackensen was blasting his way through the centre.
A glance at the map shows you what a very strong position the Russians held from Grodek southward. In front of the city for fifteen miles there is a series of shallow, swampy lakes, with but few roads crossing the dry ground between them. Farther south lies a great district of marshes. The Russian lines behind the lakes and the marshes could not be forced, but they would be turned if the Germans could break through to the north of Grodek and force the line of the Dniester to the south of the city.
Von Mackensen now moved on a broad front towards Rava Russka, and as soon as his great guns began their terrific onslaught on the Russian lines, the fate of Lemberg was no longer in doubt. On 19th June he broke through, and on the same day the German right wing crossed the Dniester. Next day a fierce battle was fought for Rava Russka. Von Mackensen won it, and then swung his forces southwards in the direction of Lemberg. The Grodek position had been turned, and once more the Russians were forced to retreat. The way to Lemberg was open, and on 22nd June the Austrians entered the city. After nine months the capital of Galicia passed once more into their hands. Vienna, Buda Pest, and scores of other places in Austria-Hungary broke into loud rejoicing. Towns and villages were bedecked with flags, and joyous peals rang out from every belfry.
There was good reason why the Austrians should rejoice at the recovery of Lemberg. They had not only regained the capital of Galicia, but they were once more masters of a city that afforded them a splendid jumping-off place for carrying the war into Russia. As you see by the map, Lemberg is almost on the Russian frontier, and six lines of railway meet in it. So long as the Austrians could hold on to Lemberg, Galicia was safe. Its recapture was, therefore, a triumph for von Mackensen; but though he had reconquered a province and its capital, he had not brought the war any nearer to its end. He had neither shattered the Russian armies nor split them in twain.
It is said that one day in June, just before the fall of Lemberg, the Kaiser met von Hindenburg and his Chief of Staff, von Falkenhayn, in the castle at Posen. The Kaiser was in high spirits, and he declared that the moment had now arrived for the capture of Warsaw. He already saw himself riding into the city at the head of his troops as the conqueror and deliverer of Poland. The two generals gladly agreed with his proposal. They believed that the Western front could be held without much effort, and that with the mighty engine of artillery which they now possessed they could batter through the Russian lines, and seize the great city which had so long defied them.
After the fall of Lemberg, Warsaw formed the apex of a great salient. It could only hold out so long as the two great railway lines which meet in the city were in the hands of the Russians. The first of these routes runs north-east through Grodno, Vilna, and Dvinsk to Petrograd. The other line runs south-east through Ivangorod, Lublin, Cholm, and Rovno to Kiev.[54] Von Mackensen was already pushing northwards towards this southern line of railway, and the Russians were falling back before him. It was now the business of von Hindenburg to advance from East Prussia and capture the northern line. Once the railways were cut, Warsaw would fall. Von Falkenhayn, however, hoped to do more than merely capture the city and a few more thousand square miles of Polish ground. He hoped to make an end of the Russian armies in the salient, and this he proposed to do by carrying out a great enveloping movement. While von Mackensen was pushing on towards the southern railway, he would make a fierce thrust at the northern part of the same salient, in order to cut the Petrograd line between Warsaw and Bialystok. But this was not the whole of the plan. A German army under von Buelow had already overrun Courland,[55] and was not far from Riga. While the two thrusts were being made at the salient, this force was to hack its way south, seize Kovno and Vilna, and cut the Petrograd line far to the eastward. The Russians in the salient would thus be taken in flank and in rear; they would be squeezed between the enemy on the north and the south, and probably would be surrounded and forced to surrender. Russia would thus be crippled for many a month to come, and then the might of Germany could be flung against the Western front.
We will now follow the fortunes of the three great thrusts that were about to be made—the thrust against the southern railway, the thrust against the Petrograd railway between Warsaw and Grodno, and the thrust against the same railway still farther east. Before the end of June five German armies, with von Mackensen in the centre, were moving steadily northwards to cut the southern railway line between Lublin and Kovel. They had now left the railways of Galicia behind them, and were crossing a country of forests, marshy plains, and bad roads. The great guns moved slowly, but the armies met with little opposition, and by 2nd July they were less than thirty miles from the railway.