Diary of Captain Delvert (May 18–24)
“Thursday, May 18.—My trench by the side of the railway commands the ravine of Vaux, which is riddled like a sieve with shell-craters full of water.
“That ruin in front, some sixty or eighty yards from the village, is the ‘western house of Vaux’ mentioned in the communiqués.
“The village is now nothing more than a mass of crumbling walls, which our 155 mm. guns are constantly battering.
“In front of headquarters is Fort Vaux. To the north and east it is surrounded by the Boche trenches.
“The dreariness of the landscape is beyond description. At this moment (7 P.M.) it is bathed in the soft, warm, purple light of the setting sun. The ridges of the hill are bare, without a blade of grass. The Fumin Wood is reduced to a few tree-stumps ranged like the teeth of a comb along its summit, like that wood of ‘the Hand of Massiges’ which our troopers have nicknamed ‘the Cock’s Comb.’ The soil has been so much churned up by the shells that the earth has become as shifting as sand, and the shell-holes make the place look like a range of dunes.
“All of a sudden the cannonade, which had slackened off a little, breaks out in all its fury. In one minute we count eight Boche shells whistling over our heads.
“On the ridge of Vaux, which shows up purple against the setting sun, the black clouds of our 155’s rise in every direction. It is an orchestra of Hell.
“The Commandant’s office is a shell-hole covered with a few beams and a little earth. Under the floor are corpses, perhaps those whom the shell has buried.
“The occupants go to sleep on the floor, their heads resting on their knapsacks.
“The men are crowded together in recesses that certainly would not shelter them from the rain.
“Let us wait!
“Friday the 19th.—The cannonade never stops day or night. It deafens our ears and clouds our brains.
“To-day, since 6 P.M., the hillsides of Vaux have been disappearing under our shell-fire.
“From here one can see them falling right on to the white lines formed in the ground by the Boche trenches and communication passages.
“At night, in the starlight, green rockets shoot up from our front lines at the bottom of the ravines. ‘Lengthen the range! Lengthen the range!’ cry our poor comrades.
“Other shouts are then heard from all sides.
“Red rockets on the Hardaumont plateau. We are attacked. Fire, lads, fire! Bar the way in front of our trenches!
“Red rockets from Fort Vaux. Red rockets down there, far off, behind Fumin. How many desperate appeals all over this gloomy countryside!
“Meanwhile, the Boches from their lines send up other kinds of rockets, trench flares or ‘star-shells.’ These flash forth from the darkness every moment in order to ensure that no shovelful of earth shall be removed by the victims marked out for annihilation by the shells.
“The whistling of the projectiles which cross each other above our heads is so loud that you might imagine yourself to be by the sea, with the swell of the waves, as they rise and fall, crashing in your ears. The explosions, with their tremendous uproar, produce the effect of a continual thunderstorm, accompanied by periodic flashes of lightning.
“Saturday the 20th (11 P.M.).—The lake, with its dreary waters and its sombre setting, runs right up to the three ridges that shut in the horizon. The moon hangs over this distant quarter like a silver veil, dotted with darker specks along the summit of the hills. At the foot of our trenches she sheds her shimmering light over the marsh of the ravine, so that it forms a burnished island amid the ripple of the waters.
“To the right, on the dyke, a procession of funereal shadows glides past in silence.
“It is the relief that is going by.
“At a steady pace, never stumbling, it climbs up towards the Hardaumont plateau, where our shells are crashing, and the white, red, or green cones rise unceasingly into the sky—a firework display given by men marked out for death.
“Sunday, May 21.—The fine weather continues. So does the cannonade.
“Midnight.
“This evening, at nightfall, the Boche sent us tear-shells. These gases are extremely unpleasant. Your eyes smart, you weep, you choke, you get a splitting headache. What a torment!
“The cannonade becomes fast and furious.
“The 24th will soon have to attack on the hillsides of Vaux in front of R¹. All my men are at their posts. The hill that commands Fort Vaux stretches out its dark line beneath the half-red disc of the moon. It is reflected down below, a motionless shadow, in the marsh at the foot of our trenches.
“The horizon, the fort, the ravine, and the distant dip of the Woevre are wrapped in a silvery mist.
“Near me, right and left, I see in the darkness, above the trench, the dim glint of the men’s helmets. I think of the terrace of Elsinore and of the sentries relieving each other there during the night.
“Here the sentries get no relief. Under those helmets their eyes are watchfully sweeping the ravine, the embankment slope and the ballast of the railway. On all sides there spurts up the lurid flame of the crashing shells. The splinters fall like a heavy shower of rain into the marshes; others come humming like a top and land in the trenches.
“The half-hidden, sinister struggle goes on.
“At ten minutes to two the cannonade grows more intense. Rifles and machine-guns spit and crackle. The night is made hideous with a confused uproar that re-echoes in the valley.
“Red rockets dart up incessantly from the German lines. On the parapet, with straining eyes, our rifles in our hands, dumb with horror, we witness a mysterious duel, in which we hear the din without seeing the actors. Green rockets flare up from our trenches. ‘Lengthen the range!’ is the cry, while a Boche machine-gun emits its crisp, abrupt note.
“Another machine-gun that the artillery preparation has forgotten.
“The valley is filled with a dense vapour, a blend of dust and smoke, which hides everything from view.
“On the Hardaumont plateau dawn begins to appear.
“But the struggle goes on without respite. It rages more and more furiously in the fog, a fog through which the rockets cleave a fiery trail and the red flames of the shell-bursts are constantly darting up. From all sides the bullets whistle around us. The youngsters of the 1916 class, now receiving their baptism of fire, cluster round the sides of the parapet. We officers and N.C.O.’s, our rifles in our hands, spur them on to fight. Very soon each finds his mark among the Boches, who can be seen—now that day has risen—gradually receding all along the hillsides of Vaux.
“Monday, May 22.—A cartridge-base of 130 mm. has entered my dug-out, broken my bâtman’s leg, and flattened itself out on the wall near my head.
“11 o’clock.—German counter-attack on the trench taken this morning by the 129th. Boche detachments are crossing the slopes. We fire at them; they can be seen lying down flat on the ground, then proceeding again at the double. There is one who still lies prone. He must have been hit. One must admit that they are brave soldiers, these fellows.
“They have reached the trench. A hand-grenade duel begins. An appalling fire is directed at Fumin, through which other units of the 124th are to come as reinforcements.
“To our left, Douaumont has been recaptured since this morning.
“Wednesday, May 24—1 o’clock in the morning.—This time it is Hell indeed. The night is as black as ink. The little valley now seems a gigantic chasm girdled by fantastic hills, great sombre masses with vague outlines. At the bottom of the chasm the pools of the marsh glitter mysteriously in the dark. Dim vapours rise incessantly, accompanied by a terrific noise; red and white gleams cut athwart each other, so that out of the shadows there suddenly leap up mountains of darkness which appear for a moment to be encircled with light, then vanish at once into the night.
“Through the heavy air, in which one can scarcely breathe for dust and smoke, there is all the time an invisible gliding to and fro, a frightful whistling, roaring, and crackling, and a spurting of flames that seems endless.
“Is it the Twilight of the Gods? the Götterdämmerung which haunted the sublime imagination of their barbarian giant? Is the earth yawning, and is that savage world whose monstrous maw wellnigh devoured humanity sinking into a fiery pit? No. It is merely an episode of the war: the German counter-attack on R¹.
“Perhaps it will get a line in the communiqués.
“8 o’clock.—The hillsides of Vaux seem more sinister than ever.
“All along the German trench that is being fought over, rigid bodies stiff and stark in blue greatcoats, black trails. The soil, in places, looks as if it were burnt. One corpse has been stripped of its greatcoat.
“We can see that naked back in the sunlight.”...
Each episode of the combat is linked up with the operation as a whole. The attack on Douaumont will have an immediate effect on the rest of the fighting. The battle on the Verdun front is a part of the single battle that is being waged on all the fronts. Accordingly the beleaguered islet of Vaux is about to rivet the attention of the entire globe.
Our troops have been unable to hold their ground in Fort Douaumont, of which they only occupied the superstructure and a part of the casemates. On May 24 a German counter-offensive has succeeded in enveloping and retaking the earthwork. It seems as if the daring enterprise of May 22 had aroused their anger as a strip of red cloth excites a bull. They nearly lost Douaumont; so outrageous an insult decides them to rush on Verdun with redoubled fury. They devote to the onslaught a new force, the 1st Bavarian Corps. On May 25, 26, and 27 they pounce upon Thiaumont Farm, in the direction of Froideterre. From May 31 onwards they move slantwise on their left and, flinging themselves at Fort Vaux, will not resign themselves to abandoning the prey which they covet and which they thought was in their grip eight months ago.
Their plan will be to outflank the fort to the west by way of the ravines of Le Bazil and Les Fontaines, and to the east by way of Damloup.
On May 31 our line is carried up again beyond the Le Bazil ravine so as to wind round the Hardaumont salient, which belongs to us, through La Caillette Wood. Then it runs back, crossing the ravine by the dyke, passes in front of the entrenchments R³, R², and R¹, envelops the fort at a distance of barely 200 yards from the counterscarp, sweeps down into La Horgne bottom, is thrust out into a point at Damloup village, and bends back into La Gayette bottom in front of La Laufée.
The Hardaumont salient and Damloup village run out from the line like spires, and their defence is a hazardous business. The entrenchments have been broken up. What sort of a barrier can the fort still provide?