END OF THE BATTLE
After September 22, 1914, there was a lull in the fighting at Rheims,
and as afterward appeared, this was due mainly to another change of plan
on the part of the German Staff. But it was no part of General Foch's
intentions to leave the bombardment of the cathedral unrevenged. He had,
indeed, caused an unparalleled slaughter on the night of September 19,
1914, as has been stated, but his troops were avid for reprisal and the
French strategist knew well how dangerous it is to allow an army, eager
for action and revenge, to eat its heart out vainly. He was too wise to
run the risk of a countercharge, but four days later his opportunity
came, and he took advantage of it to the full.
At dawn on September 26, 1914, a detachment of 15,000 Germans, including
all that remained of the famous Prussian Guards Corps, that same body
that had fought so marvelously on many occasions, and which had suffered
the most cruelly in the affair of the marshes of St. Gond, made a sortie
from the base line at Nogent l'Abbesse to destroy the railway line
between Rheims and Verdun, this line was, indeed, the principal link of
communication to that all-important fortress that protruded its
bristling salient into the heart of the German position. A French
aviator, who had climbed into his machine when it was yet dark, in order
to do a little daybreak scouting before the light should be sufficiently
bright to make him an easy target, saw this movement and reported it
immediately to General Foch. That commander, who knew how to use
cavalry, ordered a regiment at the gallop to occupy the village of
Auberive, on the Suippe, and there harry the advancing column
sufficiently to give him time to bring up the light artillery and to
bring into action a large body of infantry encamped at Jouchery, five
miles away.
Before six o'clock, the cavalry were in Auberive. The men worked like
fiends. The streets were rapidly barricaded, machine guns hoisted to
roofs and other points where they might command a wide sweep of fire.
Then the cavalry rode forward to meet the advancing column. Not knowing
what might be in front of him, the German commander halted, awaiting
reports from his air scouts. The halt was but three-quarters of an hour,
but that was of vast importance. The scouts reported only a regiment of
cavalry ahead, but a powerful detachment of French artillery on the road
from Jouchery. The German leader detached 2,000 of the Death's Head
Hussars, his crack cavalry, to cut off, or at all events to delay, the
French guns. He was aware that the artillery would have no anticipation
of this and, in the surprise, the guns might be captured. Meantime, he
hurried his advance to Auberive, captured the village, though after
another hour's delay, caused by the resistance of the cavalry, who
retreated to St. Hilaire.
Meantime, at St. Hilaire, the surprise charge of the Death's Head
Hussars was launched. It was scarcely a question of minutes, it was
rather a matter of seconds. But the French artillery knew their light
fieldpieces as thoroughly as the Germans were masters of the heavy guns.
In less than two minutes the artillery teams were unharnessed, the guns
were in position and the gunners took their places when the Hussars were
so near the voices of their leaders could be heard. Thirty seconds
earlier, and the Hussars would have been in among the guns and made a
notable capture. There was just time enough for a man to breathe twice,
when the order came to fire. The Hussars were at less than a hundred
yards' range. As the shrapnel burst, the front squadrons seemed to
stumble and fall. The ranks were so near that the change from living
human beings into mangled pieces of flesh and rags could clearly be
seen. More than one veteran gunner felt squeamish at the sight. But the
rear squadrons, though their horses' hoofs were squelching in the blood
of their comrades of a moment before, never blenched or faltered but
swept on at a thundering gallop. Again the guns spoke, and again. That
was all. Amid the vines, here and there a writhing figure could be seen,
or a wounded horse endeavoring to rise, and here and there a straggler
striving to escape. It was level open country; twice again the guns
roared, five rounds in all, and all movement ceased. The engagement had
lasted less than five minutes and of those two thousand splendid
horsemen not one escaped. The French artillerists picked up the wounded
and sent them back to Rheims to receive nursing and care, and then
hurried on to the action whither they were bound when surprised by the
Hussars.
The infantry of the Germans and of the French were now coming to hand
grips. A battalion of Zouaves was creeping round to attack the advancing
column in the rear. The German commander at Nogent l'Abbesse learned
from his air scouts what was happening. He saw the peril of the
advancing column, that it was almost surrounded, and he threw further
columns into the fray, to cover the retreat. The sortie on the railway
had now become impossible. General Foch had moved too quickly. But, even
so, the peril was great, for the German force was almost cut off. It
meant the loss of 15,000 men and artillery, or it meant the sacrifice of
some one corps to cover the retreat. The latter course was chosen.
Three thousand of the Guards Corps, the flower of the Prussian Army,
were sent like a catapult at the gap in the French line, immediately in
front of Rheims. Five times they charged, and with such heroic daring
and such penetrative energy that General Foch did not dare break from
his position. As they came up for the fifth assault, a wild cheer of
admiration broke out along the French line. But the rifles spoke
steadily, none the less for that. After the fifth assault, barely a
hundred men were left, nearly all wounded. They reversed rifles, a sign
of surrender, and in all honor they were received by General Foch, who
conducted them to the hospital in the rear. They lived up to the full
the most heroic traditions of the old Prussian corps and they saved that
whole German force from destruction. Still, with the annihilation of the
Death's Head Hussars and the remainder of the Prussian Guards Corps on
the same day, the forces under General Foch felt that in part Rheims had
been avenged.
The other section of this second phase of the Aisne consisted of the
trench warfare, which solidified from September 19 to October 6, 1914,
under conditions of extreme difficulty and more than extreme discomfort.
It was practically the establishment of a trench campaign that lasted
all winter, and revived the centuries-old fortress warfare, applying it
under modern conditions to field fortifications. The French during that
winter on the Aisne never quite succeeded in rivaling the mechanical
precision of the German movements; the Germans, on the other hand, never
showed themselves to possess the emotional fervor of the French with the
bayonet.
In many places German and Allies' trenches almost touched each other.
The first two weeks at the Aisne were one continual downpour, and the
foundation of that ground is chalk. On the sides of the plateau of
Craonne, after two weeks' rain, the chalky mud seemed bottomless. "It
filled the ears and eyes and throats of our men," wrote John Buchan, "it
plastered their clothing and mingled generously with their diet. Their
grandfathers, who had been at Sebastopol, could have told them something
about mud; but even after India and South Africa, the mire of the Aisne
seemed a grievous affliction." The fighting was constant, the nervous
strain exhausting, and the cold and wet were even harder to bear. There
had as yet been no time to build trenches with all conveniences, such as
the Germans possessed on the crest of the ridge, and the trenches of
the Allies were a chilled inferno of woe.
A stretch of waste ground lay between the trenches, and often for days
at a time the fire was too heavy to rescue the wounded or bring in the
dead. The men in the trenches, on either side, were compelled to hear
the groans of the wounded, lying in the open day after day, until
exhaustion, cold and pain brought them a merciful release. In letters
more than one soldier declared that the hardest thing to bear was to
hear a fellow comrade shrieking or groaning in agony a few steps away
for hours--even days at a time--and to be able to do nothing to help.
The stench from the unburied bodies was so great that officially all the
tobacco for the whole battle front was commandeered and sent to the
trenches under the plateau of Craonne and on the hill to the westward,
where the British First Army Corps was placed. Such, for the two weeks
between September 22, 1914, and October 6, 1914, was the trench warfare
during the second phase of the battle of the Aisne, a condition never
after repeated in the war, for such a feat as the crossing of the Aisne
could scarcely be duplicated. It was gallant, it was magnificent, and it
was costly--the British casualty list for September 12 to October 6,
1914, being, killed, wounded and missing, 561 officers and 12,980
men--but it was useless, and only served to give the Allies a temporary
base whereby General Foch was successful in checking the German attempt
to capture the Rheims-Verdun railway. It was a victory of bravery, but
not a victory of result.
During all these operations the Belgian army, now at Antwerp, had
harassed the German troops by frequent sorties. The capture of the city
was at once undertaken by the German Staff, following the stalemate
created by the operations at the Aisne.