General Joffre announces intention to take offensive.
General Joffre announced to me his intention of wheeling up the left flank of the Sixth Army, pivoting on the Marne and directing it to move on the Ourcq; cross and attack the flank of the First German Army, which was then moving in a southeasterly direction east of that river.
He requested me to effect a change of front to my right—my left resting on the Marne and my right on the Fifth Army—to fill the gap between that army and the Sixth. I was then to advance against the enemy in my front and join in the general offensive movement.
Battle begins Sunday, September 6.
These combined movements practically commenced on Sunday, September 6, at sunrise; and on that day it may be said that a great battle opened on a front extending from Ermenonville, which was just in front of the left flank of the Sixth French Army, through Lizy on the Marne, Mauperthuis, which was about the British centre, Courtecon, which was on the left of the Fifth French Army, to Esternay and Charleville, the left of the Ninth Army under General Foch, and so along the front of the Ninth, Fourth and Third French Armies to a point north of the fortress of Verdun.
Battle concluded September 10. Germans driven to the line Soissons-Rheims.
This battle, in so far as the Sixth French Army, the British Army, the Fifth French Army, and the Ninth French Army were concerned, may be said to have concluded on the evening of September 10, by which time the Germans had been driven back to the line Soissons-Rheims, with a loss of thousands of prisoners, many guns, and enormous masses of transport.
About September 3 the enemy appears to have changed his plans and to have determined to stop his advance south direct upon Paris, for on September 4 air reconnoissances showed that his main columns were moving in a southeasterly direction generally east of a line drawn through Nanteuil and Lizy on the Ourcq.
On September 5 several of these columns were observed to have crossed the Marne, while German troops, which were observed moving southeast up the left flank of the Ourcq on the 4th, were now reported to be halted and facing that river. Heads of the enemy's columns were seen crossing at Changis, La Ferté, Nogent, Château Thierry, and Mezy.
German columns converging on Montmirail.