The 13th Division, under Doppschutz, were evidently advancing by the main Doncaster road. Their advance guard, which had already occupied Rotherham, had also seized the bridge which the invaders had neither time nor material to demolish, and now swept on across it, although exposed to a heavy onslaught from that line of the British position between Tinsley and Brinsworth. Those sturdy, stolid Westphalians and bearded men of Lorraine still kept on. Numbers dropped, and the bridge was quickly strewn with dead and dying. Yet nothing checked the steady advance of that irresistible wave of humanity.
Down the River Rother, at Kanklow Bridge, a similar scene was being enacted. The railway bridge at Catcliffe was also taken by storm, and at Woodhouse Mill the 14th Division, under Von Kehler, made a terrific and successful dash, as they also did at Beighton.
The river itself was about an average distance of a mile in front of the British position, and although as heavy a fire as possible was directed upon all approaches to it, yet the Germans were not to be denied. Utterly indifferent to any losses, they still swept on in an overwhelming tide, leaving at the most not more than ten per cent. of casualties to be dealt with by the perfectly equipped ambulances in their rear. So, for the most part, the various regiments constituting the divisions of the two German commanders found themselves shaken, but by no means thwarted. On the west bank of the river, the steep slopes rising from Beighton to Woodhouse gave a certain amount of dead ground, under cover of which the foreign legions took refuge, in order to dispose themselves for the final assault.
A similar state of things had taken place to the south. General Graf Haesler had flung both his divisions across the river, with but little opposition. The 15th, composed mainly of men of the Rhine, under Von Kluser, crossed at Killamarsh and Metherthorpe Station, while the 16th, under Lieut.-General Stolz, crossed at Renishaw, and, striking north-easterly in the direction of Ridgeway, closed in as they advanced, till at length they were enabled to be within effective reach of their comrades on the right.
The German attack had now developed into an almost crescent-shaped formation, and about noon Von Bistram, the commander-in-chief, issued his final orders for the assault.
The cavalry of the VIIth German Corps under Major-General von Landsberg, commanding the 13th Cavalry Brigade, and the 14th Cavalry Brigade, consisting of Westphalian Hussars and Uhlans, under Major-General von Weder, were massed in the neighbourhood of Greasborough, whence it might be expected that at the critical stage of the engagement if the British defences gave way they might be launched upon the retiring Englishmen. Similarly in the valley over by Middle Handley, a little south of Eckington, were found the 15th and 16th Cavalry Brigades of the VIIIth Corps, consisting of the 15th of Cuirassiers and Hussars of the Rhine, and the 16th of Westphalians, and the Grand Duke of Baden’s Hussars, under that well-known soldier, Major-General von Briefen. All these were equally ready to advance in a northerly direction to strike the crushing blow at the first of the many important cities which was their objective.
Unless the scheme of von Bistram, the German generalissimo in the North, was ill-conceived, then it was plain, even to the defenders, that Sheffield must eventually give way before the overpowering force opposed to it.
Within the city of Sheffield the excitement now rose to fever-heat.
It was known that the enemy had closed in upon the defences, and were now across the river, ready at any moment to continue their advance, which, as a matter of fact, had developed steadily without intermission, notwithstanding the heroic efforts of the defenders.
In these days of smokeless powder it was hard for the Germans to see where the British lines of defence were actually located, but the heavy pounding of the artillery duel, which had been going on since early morning, was now beginning to weaken as the German infantry, company by company, regiment by regiment, and brigade by brigade, were calmly launched to the attack. They were themselves masking the fire of the cannon of their own comrades as, by desperate rushes, they gradually ascended the slopes before them.