Les Marais de Saint Gond. By Charles le Goffic (Paris: Plon. 1916). A standard work on this part of the battle.
“Mondemont.” Article by “Asker,” in L’Illustration, July 3, 1915. Many valuable articles will be found in the files of this weekly journal.
La Victoire de Lorraine. By A. Bertrand (Paris: Berger-Levrault. 1917).
Morhange et les Marsouins de Lorraine. By R. Christian-Frogé (Berger-Levrault. 1917).
Sous Verdun. By M. Genevois (R. Hachette. 1916).
Die Schlacht an der Marne. By Major E. Bircher, of the Swiss General Staff. Contains a bibliography of 150 works and a number of useful maps and plans (Berne: Paul Haupt).
[56] Avec Charles Péguy de la Lorraine à la Marne, by Victor Boudon (Paris: Hachette). Péguy, a sort of mystical Tory-Socialist, or, as M. Lavisse says, “Catholic-Anarchist,” was author-editor of Les Cahiers de la Quinzaine.
[57] M. Hanotaux (p. 126) says that Gallieni’s order of September 4 was “an order for deployment, not for the offensive,” and he adds that the Governor intended that the cavalry should feel the way. There is no evidence of cavalry activity on the 5th; and it is manifest that the encounter before St. Soupplets was a complete surprise for the 6th Army.
[58] Sir John French, in his dispatch, says: “I should conceive it to have been about noon on the 6th September, after the British Forces had changed their front to the right, and occupied the line Jouy le Chatel–Faremoutiers–Villeneuve le Comte, ... that the enemy realised the powerful threat that was being made against the flank of his columns moving south-east, and began the great retreat which opened the battle.” This is a significant mistake. We now know that Bülow sent a first warning of an Allied concentration towards the west on the afternoon of September 5 to Kluck, who by then had his own information from the IV Reserve Corps. A few hours later Kluck was fully aware of his danger; and, as he has since stated to an interviewer, decided “in five minutes” how to meet it.
Field-Marshal French (1914, ch. 5), wrongly, I think, considers that Kluck “manifested considerable hesitation and want of energy.”