I could not in the brief time which I had for this trip visit all the corps involved in this movement, and at the suggestion of the General of the army, visited only the — corps, whose operations may be regarded as typical of the whole spirit in which this front was changed. Regarding the movement as a whole it is sufficient to say that in the two weeks following the change of line in Poland, the corps comprising this one army made the enemy suffer losses, in killed, wounded and prisoners, which the General estimated at nearly 30,000, of whom about 9,000 were prisoners. All of this was done at a comparatively trifling loss to the Russians themselves. From which very brief summary of the change of front it will be realized that this particular army has neither lost its fighting spirit nor has its moral suffered from the retirement to another line.
In the trenches near Opatov.
There are so many big movements in this war that it is utterly impossible for one observer to describe more than a trifling fraction of the achievements that are made here. Since the General Staff have given me what appears to be a free range in the north-eastern armies, I have had so many interesting opportunities that it is difficult to pick any one in preference to another. What I am writing in this story is merely the narrative of a single corps during this change of front, and I think it a significant story, because I believe it typifies not only the corps of this particular army, but practically all the corps now in the field on this Front. General Ragosa, who commands this corps, and who has entertained me for the best part of three days, has given me every opportunity to study his whole movement and permitted one of his officers to prepare sketches, illustrating his movement. The General himself, like most men who deal with big affairs, is a very modest and simple man. To talk with him one would not guess that the movement which has resulted so successfully for his corps and so disastrously for the enemy, was the product of a programme worked out in the quiet of a remote head-quarters and carried successfully through under his direction by means of the field wire stretched through the forest for the 30 kilometres that separate his head-quarters from the fighting line.
When I suggested to him that his fighting around Opatov made an extremely interesting story, he only shrugged his shoulders and replied, “But in this war it is only a small fight. What is the operation of a single army, much less the work of one of its units?” Yet one feels that the success of this war will be the sum of the work of the many units, and as this battle resulted in the entire breaking up of the symmetry of the Austro-German following movement, and is one of the few actions during the recent months of this war which was fought in the open without trenches, it is extremely interesting. Indeed, in any other war it would have been called a good-sized action; from first to last on both sides I suppose that more than 100,000 men and perhaps 350 to 400 guns were engaged. Let me describe it.
General Ragosa’s corps was on the Nida river, and it was with great regret that the troops left the trenches that they had been defending all winter. Their new line was extremely strong, and after they had started, it was assumed by the enemy that they could leisurely follow the Russians, and again sit down before their positions.
Second-line trenches, Opatov.
But they were not counting on this particular General when they made their advance. Instead of going back to his line, he brought his units to the line running from Lubenia to and through Opatov to the south, where he halted and awaited the advancing enemy who came on in four divisions. These were the third German Landwehr division who were moving eastward and a little to the north of Lubenia. Next, coming from the direction of Kielce was the German division of General Bredow supported by the 84th Austrian regiment; this unit was moving directly against the manufacturing town of Ostzowiec. Further to the south came the crack Austrian division, the 25th, which was composed of the 4th Deutschmeister regiment from Vienna and the 25th, 17th and 10th Jäger units, the division itself being commanded by the Archduke Peter Ferdinand. The 25th division was moving on the Lagow road headed for Opatov, while the 4th Austrian division (a Landwehr formation) supported by the 41st Honved division (regiments 20, 31, 32 and one other) was making for the same objective. It is probable that the enemy units, approaching the command of Ragosa, outnumbered the Russians in that particular portion of the theatre of operations by at least forty per cent. Certainly they never expected that any action would be given by the supposedly demoralized Russians short of their fortified line, to which they were supposed by the enemy to be retiring in hot haste.
General Ragosa wishing to finish up the weakest portion first, as usual picked the Austrians for his first surprise party. But this action he anticipated by making a feint against the German corps, driving in their advance guards by vigorous attacks and causing the whole movement to halt and commence deploying for an engagement. This took place on May 15. On the same day with all his available strength he swung furiously, with Opatov as an axis from both north and south, catching the 25th division on the road between Lagow and Opatov with a bayonet charge delivered from the mountain over and around which his troops had been marching all night. Simultaneously another portion of his command swept up on the 4th division coming from Iwaniska to Opatov. In the meantime a heavy force of Cossacks had ridden round the Austrian line and actually hit their line of communications at the exact time that the infantry fell on the main column with a bayonet charge of such impetuosity and fury that the entire Austrian formation crumpled up.