The Guns of August

  “It’s mad!” he protested. “The troops are exhausted. They don’t sleep or eat—they’ve been marching and fighting for two weeks! We need arms, ammunition, equipment. Everything is in terrible shape. Morale is bad. I’ve had to replace two generals of division. The Staff is worth nothing and good for nothing. If we had time to refit behind the Seine .…”

  Like Gallieni, d’Esperey believed there was no choice. His immediate and bold response, like Gallieni’s, proved a deciding factor and one that probably would not have been forthcoming from his predecessor. Other unreliable commanders were also weeded out. General Mas de Latrie was removed that day to be replaced by the dashing General de Maud’huy, taken from Castelnau’s Army. By now the Fifth Army had undergone the replacement of its commander, 3 out of 5 corps commanders, 7 out of 13 divisional generals, and a proportionate number of generals of brigade.

  Encouraged by the “intelligent audacity” of d’Esperey’s reply, Joffre told the Operations Staff to make the battle orders conform to his conditions of place, although retaining September 7 as the date. He received an equally affirmative reply from Foch who announced himself simply as “ready to attack.”

  Henry Wilson on reaching British Headquarters found a dismaying answer. Murray, without even waiting for the return of Sir John French, had issued orders for a further retreat of ten to fifteen miles in a southwesterly direction to begin that night—“It is simply heartbreaking.” Wilson also found Murray’s memorandum of Gallieni’s plan. He immediately sent off a wire to Paris saying, “Marshal not yet returned” and reporting the proposed retreat. He seems not to have reported it to d’Esperey, perhaps in the hope of persuading Sir John French to cancel it.

  When Sir John returned, he walked into an unnerving confusion of plans and proposals. There was a letter from Joffre written prior to the day’s events, proposing British action on the Seine; there was Gallieni’s proposal to Murray; there was Wilson’s agreement with Franchet d’Esperey; and there was Murray himself earnestly whispering retreat. Bewildered by so many calls for action, and unable to decide which took precedence over what, Sir John took refuge in no action at all. He let Murray’s orders stand and informed Huguet for the benefit of all French petitioners that, “owing to the continual changes,” he preferred to “restudy the situation before deciding on action.”

  At about the same hour Gallieni returned to Paris from Melun. He found Wilson’s telegram and also one from Joffre sent at 12:20 P.M. confirming the preference expressed over the phone at noon that Maunoury’s attack should take place south of the Marne on September 7. This was not new, but together with Wilson’s message it seems to have had decisive effect on Gallieni. Time was escaping and Kluck advancing. He saw his moment slipping away, and determined to force the issue. This time he called GQG himself. Joffre tried to evade him by putting Belin on the telephone, but Gallieni insisted on speaking personally to the Generalissimo. According to a record of the conversation made by Joffre’s aide-de-camp, Gallieni said, “The Sixth Army had made arrangements to attack north of the Marne and it appeared to him impossible to modify the general direction to which the army was already committed, and he insisted that the attack should be launched without any change in the conditions of time and place already laid down.”

  Confronted voice to voice by his former superior, Joffre may have felt again the moral authority that a man of Gallieni’s commanding temperament exerted. Or, as he afterward claimed, he may have felt forced, though “unwillingly,” to advance the general offensive to an earlier day for fear that Maunoury’s movements, precipitated by Gallieni, would disclose the whole French maneuver to the enemy. He had assurances of readiness to fight from both Foch and Franchet d’Esperey and he thought the latter, by the spell of his magic energy, had secured a similar commitment from the British. He did not know it had become unpinned. In any event he authorized or acquiesced in attack by the Sixth Army north of the Marne and agreed to begin general action on September 6, “as Gallieni desired.” Gallieni instantly, at 8:30 P.M., confirmed his marching orders to Maunoury, who was already moving. At GQG the staff revised the positions of attack to suit the advanced date. At 10:00 P.M., two hours after Moltke signed the Order halting the German right wing, Joffre signed General Order No. 6.

  “The time has come,” it began in full consciousness of a historic moment, “to profit by the adventurous position of the German First Army and concentrate against that army all efforts of the Allied Armies of the extreme left.” Movements prescribed for the Sixth, Fifth, and British Armies were those of Franchet d’Esperey’s reply. Separate orders to join the offensive were issued to the Third and Fourth Armies.

  The night was not over. Hardly was the Order signed when word came from Huguet of Sir John French’s refusal to ratify any plan for joint action and of his desire to “restudy” the situation. Joffre was stunned. The momentous decision had been taken; orders were on their way; in thirty-six hours the battle to save France would begin. The ally whose participation had been planned for the sake, as Foch once said, of a single dead British soldier, but who had been left by a trick of fate holding a vital place in the line, was backing out once again. Because of the time required for encoding and dispatching, the orders were not intended to reach the armies until next morning. As the only means of persuasion he could think of, Joffre sent a special copy of Order No. 6 by personal messenger to British Headquarters. When the officer reached Melun at 3:00 A.M., the three corps of the BEF had already begun the night march of retreat ordered by Murray that afternoon.

  The enemy, too, at dawn of September 5 was on the march too soon. Thrusting forward in his effort to roll up the French flank, Kluck already had his army on the roads before Moltke’s orders to turn and face the danger on his flank arrived by wireless at 7:00 A.M. Four corps, spread out over thirty miles of country, were headed for the Grand Morin. Kluck did not stop them. He either did not believe or did not heed the warning about a French concentration of troops on his flank. Assuming that the German Armies “were everywhere advancing victoriously along the whole front”—it was the Germans’ habit to believe their own communiqués—he did not think the enemy could have forces available to threaten his flank. He, too, had begun to notice signs that the French retreat was perhaps not altogether disorganized and so felt it all the more urgent that no letup of pressure should give the enemy time to halt and “regain freedom of maneuver as well as offensive spirit.” Disdaining Moltke’s directive, Kluck advanced with his army, moving his own headquarters twenty-five miles forward to Rebais between the two Morins. By evening troops of the German First Army reached a line within ten to fifteen miles of the BEF and Franchet d’Esperey’s Army, with outposts less than five miles apart. It was to be their last day of advance.

  A representative from OHL with plenary powers came to Kluck’s headquarters that evening. With unhappy experience both of wireless and Kluck’s temperament, Moltke sent his Chief of Intelligence, Colonel Hentsch, on a 175-mile drive from Luxembourg to explain in person the reasons for the new Order and to see that it was carried out. To their “amazement,” Kluck and his staff learned that Rupprecht’s Armies were held up in a deadlocked battle before the French fortress line, as was the Crown Prince’s Army before Verdun. Colonel Hentsch described the evidence of French troop movements which had led OHL to calculate that “very strong enemy forces” were being shifted westward in a threat to the German flank. It was under these circumstances that OHL dictated the horrid necessity of retirement. The First Army must return north of the Marne. Though it was little consolation, Colonel Hentsch said “the movement could be made at leisure; no special haste was necessary.”

  Disturbing confirmation came from the IVth Reserve Corps which had been left as flank guard north of the Marne. It reported encountering and engaging in combat an enemy force of at least two and a half divisions supported by heavy artillery. This was, of course, part of Maunoury’s Army moving forward toward the Ourcq. Although the French attack was
“successfully repulsed,” the Commander of the IVth Reserve had ordered a retreat as soon as it was dark.

  Kluck gave in. The extra distance he had dragged his army forward in the last two days since crossing the Marne had now to be retraced. Orders were drafted to begin the retirement of two corps next morning, September 6, with the others following later. After the march he had made from Liège to a level with Paris, it was a bitter moment. If he had stayed in echelon behind Bülow as ordered, if he had even halted his army that morning at seven o’clock, he would have been in position to face the threat to his flank with his whole army together. According to General Kuhl, his Chief of Staff, “Neither OHL nor the First Army Staff had the remotest idea that an immediate offensive by the whole French Army was imminent .… Not a sign, not a word from prisoners, not a newspaper paragraph gave warning.” If Kluck did not know what lay ahead, there was one thing he could not help but know: to break off pursuit and pull back now, with four days left of the German schedule, was not a prelude to victory.

  September 5 seemed a darker day to the Allies. With nothing but defeats so far, their representatives met in London that morning to sign the Pact binding each other “not to conclude any separate peace in the course of the present war.”

  In Paris, Maunoury asked Gallieni, “In case we should be overwhelmed, our line of retreat will be …?” His eyes clouding over, Gallieni answered, “Nowhere.” Preparing for possible disaster, he issued secret orders to each regional commander of the Paris camp to report all resources in his district which must be destroyed rather than fall into the hands of the enemy. Even bridges in the heart of the city like the Pont Neuf and the Pont Alexandre were to be blown up. “A void” must be left in front of the enemy in case he should break through, he told General Hirschauer.

  At GQG a report from Castelnau was received which seemed to threaten disaster even before the offensive could begin. Pressure was so severe that he felt he might be forced to evacuate Nancy. Joffre ordered him to hold for another twenty-four hours before making a decision, but agreed that if it then seemed unavoidable, he approved the second line of defense suggested in Castelnau’s letter.

  In transferring one corps from the Third Army and two corps from the Moselle front, Joffre had taken a grave risk in order to gain this time the numerical superiority which he had not had for the opening offensive. The reinforcements were not yet in the battle line. When it came to informing the government of the decision to fight, Joffre carefully included an alibi for himself in case of failure. His telegram to the President and Premier said, “Gallieni having attacked prematurely, I have given the order to suspend the retreat and, in my turn, resume the offensive.” Afterward, at a time when Joffre was systematically trying to minimize Gallieni’s role at the Marne and even expunge certain things from the records, this telegram was unearthed by Briand and shown to Gallieni. “That ‘prematurely’ is worth gold,” he said.

  On the morning of September 5 Joffre’s uncertainty about British intentions became “altogether agonizing.” He begged Millerand by telegram to exert the government’s influence. The imminent battle “can have decisive results but in case of a reverse can also have the gravest consequences for the country .… I count on you to call the Field Marshal’s attention to the decisive importance of an offensive without arrière-pensée. If I could give orders to the English Army as I could to the French Army in the same position, I would pass immediately to the attack.”

  At three o’clock that morning Henry Wilson received Order No. 6 from Huguet who, however, did not permit Captain de Galbert, the officer who brought it, to see any of the British chiefs. At the center of every discord during this period, with a curiously malign consistency, the figure of Huguet appears. Deciding that the situation required someone of higher rank, Captain de Galbert started back at once for GQG. At 7:00 A.M. Wilson took the Order to Sir John French and during the course of the morning persuaded him to cooperate. Meanwhile de Galbert arrived back at GQG at 9:30 with no definite news but with a report that British sentiment seemed “lukewarm” toward an offensive. The Mayor of Melun had told him Sir John French’s baggage was being moved back to Fontainebleau.

  Joffre felt he must have the British Army in the battle line “at any price,” even at the price of motoring the 115 miles to Melun. Sending a telephone message ahead to expect him, he set out with his aide and two staff officers. Despite roadblocks and the ineluctable stop for lunch, his racing chauffeur brought him to the château where Sir John French was quartered by 2:00 P.M.

  The Field Marshal was standing at a table waiting for him flanked by Murray, Wilson, Huguet, “looking as usual as if he had lost his last friend,” and several other members of his staff. Joffre walked over and for once took the floor at the outset. Instead of his usual laconic sentences, a passionate flood of speech poured forth punctuated by a gesture of his forearms which “seemed to throw his heart on the table.” He said the “supreme moment” had arrived, his own orders were given and whatever happened the last company of the French Army would be thrown into the battle to save France. The “lives of all French people, the soil of France, the future of Europe” depended upon the offensive. “I cannot believe the British Army will refuse to do its share in this supreme crisis … history would severely judge your absence.”

  Joffre’s fist crashed down on the table. “Monsieur le Maréchal, the honor of England is at stake!”

  At these words Sir John French, who had been listening with “passionate attention,” suddenly reddened. Silence fell on the company. Slowly tears came into the eyes of the British Commander in Chief and rolled down his cheeks. He struggled to say something in French and gave up. “Damn it, I can’t explain. Tell him we will do all we possibly can.”

  Joffre looked inquiringly at Wilson who translated, “The Field Marshal says ‘Yes.’” It was hardly needed, for the tears and the tone already carried conviction. Murray hurriedly put in that the British troops were now ten miles farther back than the positions called for in the Order and could start only at 9:00 A.M., not 6:00, as Joffre asked. It was a voice of caution that would continue to make itself felt. Joffre shrugged. “It cannot be helped. I have the Field Marshal’s word, that is enough.” Tea was then served.

  The move of GQG to Chatillon-sur-Seine, planned before the offensive, had been accomplished during his absence. Joffre returned there by evening, about the time Colonel Hentsch was warning von Kluck. Entering the Operations Room to confirm a decision already taken, Joffre said to the assembled officers, “Gentlemen, we will fight on the Marne.”

  He signed the order that would be read to the troops when the bugles blew next morning. Ordinarily the French language, especially in public pronouncements, requires an effort if it is not to sound splendid, but this time the words were flat, almost tired; the message hard and uncompromising: “Now, as the battle is joined on which the safety of the country depends, everyone must be reminded that this is no longer the time for looking back. Every effort must be made to attack and throw back the enemy. A unit which finds it impossible to advance must, regardless of cost, hold its ground and be killed on the spot rather than fall back. In the present circumstances no failure will be tolerated.”

  That was all; the time for splendor was past. It did not shout “Forward!” or summon men to glory. After the first thirty days of war in 1914, there was a premonition that little glory lay ahead.

  Afterword

  THE BATTLE OF THE MARNE, as all the world knows, ended in a German retreat. Between the Ourcq and the Grand Morin, in the four days that were left of their schedule, the Germans lost their bid for “decisive victory” and thereby their opportunity to win the the war. For France, for the Allies, in the long run for the world, the tragedy of the Marne was that it fell short of the victory it might have been.

  Maunoury’s attack on the German flank and von Kluck’s turnabout to meet it opened a gap between the German First and Second Armies. The issue of the battle depended on whether the
Germans could succeed in crushing the two wings—Maunoury and Foch—before Franchet d’Esperey and the British succeeded in exploiting the gap and pushing through the German center. Maunoury, when almost defeated by Kluck, was reinforced by the IVth Corps, of whom 6,000 detraining in Paris were rushed to the front by Gallieni in taxis, and managed to hold his ground. Foch, pressed hard in the Marshes of St. Gond by Hausen’s Army and part of Bülow’s, at a critical moment when his right was driven back and his left ceding, gave his famous order, “Attack, whatever happens! The Germans are at the extreme limit of their efforts .… Victory will come to the side that outlasts the other!” Franchet d’Esperey pushed back Bülow’s right; the British entered the gap too slowly and hesitantly; Colonel Hentsch made his historic reappearance to counsel retreat, and the German Armies withdrew in time to avoid a piercing of their line.

  So close had the Germans come to victory, so near the French to disaster, so great, in the preceding days, had been the astonished dismay of the world as it watched the relentless advance of the Germans and the retreat of the Allies on Paris, that the battle that turned the tide came to be known as the Miracle of the Marne. Henri Bergson, who had once formulated for France the mystique of “will,” saw in it something of a miracle that had happened once before: “Joan of Arc won the Battle of the Marne,” was his verdict. The enemy, suddenly halted as if by a stone wall springing up overnight, felt it too. “French élan, just when it is on the point of being extinguished, flames up powerfully,” wrote Moltke sorrowfully to his wife during the battle. The basic reason for German failure at the Marne, “the reason that transcends all others,” said Kluck afterward, was “the extraordinary and peculiar aptitude of the French soldier to recover quickly. That men will let themselves be killed where they stand, that is a well-known thing and counted on in every plan of battle. But that men who have retreated for ten days, sleeping on the ground and half dead with fatigue, should be able to take up their rifles and attack when the bugle sounds, is a thing upon which we never counted. It was a possibility not studied in our war academy.”