In the night from the 15th to the 16th of June the enemy began his retreat in front of the allied troops in an easterly and northeasterly direction. He was now unquestionably withdrawing to his defenses on the Wereszyca and the so-called Grodek position. The Wereszyca is a little stream that rises in the hilly lands of Magierow and flows in a southerly course to the Dniester. Insignificant as the streamlet is in itself, it yet forms, because of the width of its valley and the ten rather large lakes in it, a locality peculiarly well fitted for defense.
Whatever was lacking to the situation in natural strength had been supplied by art. This the Russians displayed above all in the Grodek position which, joining the Wereszyca on the north at Janow, stretches for a distance of more than 70 kilometres in a northwestern direction as far as the region of Narol Miasto. Thousands of laborers had here worked for months to construct a fortified position which does honor to the Russian engineers. Here extensive clearings have been made in the forests. Dozens of works for infantry defense, hundreds of kilometres of rifle trenches, covering and connecting trenches, had been dug, the hilly forest land quite transformed, and finally vast wire entanglements stretched along the entire Wereszyca and Grodek front. Taken as a whole this position formed the last great bulwark with which the Russians hoped to check their victorious opponents and to bring their advance upon Lemberg to a permanent halt.
The Russian army found itself incapable of acting up to these expectations of its leaders. A cavalry regiment of the Guard, with the cannon and machine guns assigned to it, succeeded on the 16th of June, on the road Jaworow-Niemirow, in making a surprise attack on a Russian infantry brigade marching northward to the Grodek position and in scattering it in the forests. In the evening the city of Niemirow was stormed. On the 18th of June the armies of General von Mackensen deployed into line of battle before the Russian positions. On the following day they moved to the attack. Early in the morning the decisive onslaught was made on the Grodek position and in the evening on the Wereszyca line. Very soon the hostile positions on both sides of the Sosnina forest were taken. Four of the enemy's guns were captured, and the Russian positions on Mt. Horoszyko, which had been built up into a veritable fortress, were stormed.
The main attack was made by regiments of the Prussian Guard. Before them lay, to the west of Magierow, Hill 350. Even from a distance it can be seen that this elevation, rising to a height of fifty metres above the slope, is the key to the whole position. The defenses consisted of two rows of trenches, lying one over the other, with strong cover, and with wire entanglements and abattis in front of them. At daybreak began the artillery battle. This already at six o'clock in the morning resulted in the complete subduing of the Russian artillery, which, as always in the recently preceding days, held back and only very cautiously and with sparing use of ammunition took part in the battle. At seven the hostile position was considered ripe for storming and the infantry attack ordered. Although the forces manning the heights still took up the fire against the attackers, it was without, however, inflicting on them losses worth mentioning. The German heavy artillery had done its duty. The enemy was so demoralized that, although in the beginning he kept up his fire, he preferred to absent himself before the entry of the Germans into his trenches.
More than 700 prisoners and about a dozen machine guns fell into the hands of the attackers. In the ditches that were taken alone there lay 200 dead Russians. In the meantime the attack was directed against the neighboring sections. Soon the Russians found themselves compelled also to vacate without giving battle the very strong position running north of the street that leads to Magierow, with its front toward the south. Since the German troops were able to penetrate with the fleeing enemy into Magierow and to advance north of the city toward the east, the position at Bialo-Piaskowa also became untenable. The Russians flowed backward and only at Lawryko again tried to get a firm footing. Late in the evening a Guard regiment took the railroad station of Dabrocin, where but a short time before the Russians had been trans-shipping troops, and thus won the Lemberg-Rawa-Ruska road. The adjoining corps in the evening stood about on a level with the regiments of the Guard. Again penetration of the Russian front had succeeded to a width of 25 kilometres, and the fate of Lemberg had been decided here and on the Wereszyca. This line was stormed late in the evening and partly in the early morning hours of the 20th of June. The German corps, which on this day had been joined by the German Emperor, stormed the hostile positions of Stawki as far as the Bulawa outwork. Since the morning hours of the 20th of June the enemy, who in places had already withdrawn in the night, was in full retreat toward the east along the whole front. The pursuit was at once undertaken. On the evening of the same day Royal and Imperial troops stood close before the fortifications of Lemberg.
THE FALL OF LEMBERG
A semi-official report dispatch by the Wolff Telegraphic Bureau from Berlin, June 28, reads:
From the Great Headquarters we have received the following telegram about the taking of Lemberg:
The Russians entered Lemberg, the capital of Galicia, a city of 250,000 inhabitants, in the beginning of September, 1914. They at once restored to the city its Polish name, Lwow, and during their reign in the beautiful town made themselves exceedingly well at home. They began promptly to develop Lemberg into a great fortress and for the further protection of their new possession to construct the fortified lines of Grodek and Wereszyca. The protective works of Lemberg built by the Austrians were strengthened and extended by the Russians, especially along the south and southwest fronts. The existing depot facilities were enlarged and a number of railways, both field and permanent, extended throughout the domain of the fortress. To guarantee the maintenance of the fortress of Lemberg, even in case the Grodek position should be penetrated and have to be given up, a strongly fortified supporting work had been built. This ran along the heights to the west of the Lemberg-Rawa-Ruska railway to the vicinity of Dobrocin.
After the armies of General von Mackensen had broken through the Grodek and Wereszyca position, German divisions and allied troops struck these supporting works. The centre of the Army Boehm-Ermolli simultaneously approached the west from Lemberg. The main body of this army attacked sections of the hostile army which had prepared for renewed resistance behind the Szczerzek and Stavczonka streams and in contact with the fortress on the south. This position on the evening of the 21st of June was successfully penetrated at several points and the attacking troops were pushed closer to the defenses on the west front of Lemberg. German connecting troops under the leadership of General von der Marwitz on the same day stormed the most important points of the stubbornly defended supporting position. They thus compelled the enemy to evacuate this position in the whole of its extent and opened for the adjacent Austrian troops the road to the defenses on the northwest front of the fortress. In consequence the Austro-Hungarian troops were able on the 22d of June to take the works on the northwest and west fronts.