Field Marshal Haig's troops won another notable victory on November 4, 1918, when attacking on a thirty-mile front between the Scheldt and the Oise-Sambre Canal, with the French cooperating on the right, a drive was made into enemy positions and over 10,000 Germans and 200 guns were captured. The British drive, in which troops of the First, Third, and Fourth Armies participated, resulted in the capture of Landrécies south of the Mormal Forest, Catillon, and a considerable number of smaller towns, and advanced the British lines more than three miles to the east of the Oise-Sambre Canal. North of this stream, in the great Mormal Forest, the British won strongly fortified positions and advanced to the center of the wood.
To the south the Fifth French Army under General Debeney, linking up with the British, forced the passage of the canal and made an advance to a depth of two miles beyond it, driving the Germans from a number of villages of great strategic importance. In this advance the French bagged 30,000 prisoners and a large number of cannon.
King Albert's army in Belgium continued to gain victories and to press the German retreat. He had completed the work of forcing the enemy across the Terneuzen Canal, which runs northward from Ghent and is close to the suburbs of the city on two sides. South of Ghent the west bank of the Scheldt was now in the hands of the Allies.
British and French armies in Belgium continued to crush and overrun the German positions. In the morning of November 5, 1918, the British forced their way through the greater part of the Mormal Forest, the infantry being east of a line through Locquignol and Les Grandes Pâtures. They had overcome the formidable defenses on the western fringe of the forest and had now confronting them only hastily improvised machine-gun posts. The French continued to drive the Germans before them between the Sambre Canal and the Argonne Forest, clearing the enemy out of wide stretches of territory and carrying their line forward more than six miles. The towns of Guise and Marie were captured during this advance and 4,000 Germans and 60 guns.
On November 6, 1918, a German delegation left Berlin for the western front to conclude an armistice with Marshal Foch, representing the Allied armies. The negotiations led to a cessation of hostilities on November 11, 1918.
The victorious sweep of the Allies continued undiminished from the Scheldt to the Meuse, where the Germans were being driven back along the whole front. On November 6, 1918, the British, advancing east of the Mormal Forest, occupied a number of villages and the important railway junction at Aulnoye. The French armies made a bound of from five to seven miles along the whole front. Vervins, Rethel, and Montcornet, all important places, were occupied and the advance continued.
Crossing the Belgian border north and east of Hirson, French cavalry occupied a number of villages and the important fortress of Hirson, advancing their line nine miles at some points. Along the entire thirty-mile front from the junction of the French and British armies to the Meuse east of Mézières, now strongly invested, the French pushed on with irresistible ardor. The water barriers of the Thon and the Aure were forced, and the plateaus to the north occupied. On the British front the same story of victory was repeated. Field Marshal Haig's troops completed the capture of Tournai, and Antoing, to the south of that Belgian city, was occupied. On November 9, 1918, the British had driven forward to the outskirts of Renaix, twelve miles northeast of Tournai. The Second and Fifth Armies meanwhile had gained the east bank of the Scheldt throughout their entire front. These operations took place north of the Mons-Condé Canal, along the line of which the British were advancing on Mons. South of the Belgian frontier they took the important town of Maubeuge, and pressed on toward the Belgian frontier on both sides of the Sambre, meeting with only feeble resistance from the disorganized enemy.
The remaining inhabitants of Tournai, which the British entered on November 8, 1918, received their liberators with wild demonstrations of joy such as only a people were capable of who had lived for years under the tyrannic rule of the Germans. For three weeks before the British captured the town the inhabitants had been living in cellars in hourly fear that the furious gunfire would smash the buildings above their heads and that they would be buried in the ruins. There was also the dread that asphyxiating gas would creep into their hiding places and destroy them with its fumes. A month before British occupation the Germans had carried away all the able-bodied men in the place, numbering more than 10,000, leaving their women-folk to weep for them. For a week previous to the British entry Tournai was under bombardment day and night. Then forty-eight hours before the Germans were driven out more terrible sounds were heard by the frightened people hiding in the cellars, explosions that shook every building as by an earthquake. The Germans were blowing up the bridges over the Scheldt Canal, and their retreat from Tournai had begun.
Though German delegates were on their way to the French front to arrange for an armistice, the Allies continued to fight and advance with the same irresistible ardor as if there had been no question of a cessation of hostilities. In southern Belgium the British continued to carry their lines forward, reaching on November 10, 1918, the Franco-Belgian frontier south of the Sambre. North of the Mons-Condé Canal they pressed on beyond the Scheldt, capturing Leuze, while British cavalry advanced to Ath, which lies sixteen miles east of Tournai.
Farther to the north the British captured Renaix and carried their line to a point four miles to the east of that place.