The Marne, 1914

by Holger H. Herwig

  Bülow then invited Hentsch, Lauenstein, and First General Staff Officer Arthur Matthes, as well as Captains König and Koeppen, into his study in the Renaissance castle. No protocol was kept. According to Hentsch’s report of 15 September and Lieutenant Colonel Matthes’s post meeting notes, Bülow began with a description of Second Army’s situation.24 It was “extremely serious and even dangerous.” After a month of unceasing campaigning, Second Army’s combat effectiveness had been reduced to the point where it was “in no condition” to deliver the “final and decisive blow” that was now being asked of it. Bülow, still without any reports from First Army headquarters at Mareuil, then turned his anger on Kluck. In nonobservance of Moltke’s General Instruction of 5 September, First Army had turned southeast and crossed the Marne ahead of Second Army. Kluck now threatened to withdraw III and IX corps from Second Army’s right flank, thereby widening the distance between the two armies by fifteen kilometers. The two cavalry corps and Jäger units that had been thrown into the breach would soon be overrun. Unless Kluck at once broke off the battle with Michel-Joseph Maunoury’s Sixth Army at the Ourcq and closed up with Second Army, “hostile columns, brigades or divisions” could break through the gap. There were no reserves to fall back on. “First Army simply and solely is responsible for the current crisis.”

  At this point in the discussion, either Bülow or Matthes uttered what soon became a fateful word, “Schlacke.”25 Captain König reiterated this fact in formal replies to the historians of the Reichsarchiv in March 1925 and January 1926, and on both occasions testified that the word cinders had been applied to Second Army. The term would be central to all subsequent discussions, both at Montmort and Mareuilsur-Ourcq. It undoubtedly stemmed from the fact that Second Army had been constantly on the march for a month, that it had fought at least three major engagements with French Fifth Army, that its right wing was being exploited by the enemy, that it already had to pull three corps behind the Petit Morin, that the men were at the end of their physical capabilities, and that Second Army’s overall strength was little more than three corps.

  Hentsch spoke next. In what Captains König and Koeppen described as “calm, measured terms,” Hentsch described the state of Kluck’s First Army east of Paris as “serious” and in danger of envelopment. It could not be counted on to prevent the enemy from crossing the Marne. It simply had to pull back from the Ourcq and he, Hentsch, “had the full power of authority to order this if necessary in the name of the Oberste-Heeresleitung.” The boldness of the statement took Bülow by surprise. While conceding the potential “danger” east of Paris, he remonstrated that a breakthrough “had not yet become reality.” Again, he argued that the best solution was to order Kluck to close and protect Second Army’s right wing. Hentsch demurred. First Army was no longer able to perform such a complicated maneuver in the midst of battle. Bülow countered that it was not yet too late. But time was fast running out for Kluck. If the Allies broke through at the Marne, Bülow lectured Hentsch, they would have two enticing options: “either to turn against the left flank and rear of First Army or against the right flank of Second Army; both could lead to a catastrophe.” Hentsch agreed. He again reminded Bülow that he had “full power of authority” to order Kluck to withdraw from the Ourcq.

  An orderly called Lauenstein to the telephone. Louis de Maud’huy’s XVIII Corps had broken through Karl von Einem’s VII Corps at Marchais-en-Brie and was threatening Montmirail. Bülow now became alarmed. Second Army’s front was in danger of being breached. He immediately ordered his right wing (Kluck’s III and IX corps as well as his own X Reserve Corps) to fall back fifteen to twenty kilometers behind Margny and Le Thoult-Trosnay to escape envelopment, at least for the moment. It should be noted that he did this before Kluck actually took back his III and IX corps and quick-marched them to the Ourcq. The plight of the German position was becoming ever more apparent. Bülow mused aloud that should the French “compel a retreat by force of arms” through a “hostile country in which practically every inhabitant might be armed,” this could easily have “incalculable consequences.”26 Therewith, as Captain König clearly remembered, the word retreat had been uttered for the first time.27

  All present at the meeting agreed that First Army’s situation was “desperate;” none had faith that Kluck’s right wing could envelop Maunoury’s left. Furthermore, all agreed that the last possible moment to order a general retreat would come as soon as major Allied forces crossed the Marne. For reasons that he never explained, Hentsch decided to spend the night at Montmort rather than to push on to First Army headquarters. Unsurprisingly, the mood at dinner that night was “depressing.” At 9:30 PM, just before going to bed, Hentsch sent off a cryptic note to Luxembourg: “Situation at 2. Army serious, but not desperate.”28 What was Moltke to make of that?

  From 5 to 6 AM on 9 September, Hentsch, Lauenstein, and Matthes held a final meeting in the château’s gardens. Bülow, undoubtedly exhausted from the previous night’s momentous discussions, preferred sleep to another meeting with Hentsch, whom he described as the “horrible pessimist” from the OHL.29 The talks merely fleshed out what had already been agreed upon: Second Army could hold its present position only if First Army disengaged at the Ourcq and withdrew eastward along the north bank of the Marne to link up with Bülow’s right wing; if Kluck refused, Lauenstein was prepared to issue orders for Second Army to fall back behind the Marne. Hentsch concurred. At 6 AM, he departed Montmort for the eighty-kilometer drive to First Army headquarters at Mareuil. Moltke that day gave vent to his growing pessimism in a letter to his wife. “It goes badly. The battles east of Paris will not end in our favor. … And we certainly will be made to pay for all that has been destroyed.”30

  Bülow, having risen and been briefed by Lauenstein and Matthes on their talks with Hentsch, reviewed the morning’s reconnaissance report from Lieutenant Berthold of Flying Squadron 23. It confirmed his worst fears: “Advance by 5 hostile columns in a northerly direction in the region of Montmirail—La Ferté.”31 They were obviously advancing from the Petit Morin toward the Marne into the gap between First and Second armies. For Bülow, the last moment to order a general retreat had arrived. “Second Army initiates retreat,” he tersely informed Hausen and Kluck on his left and right, respectively, at 9:02 AM, “right flank on Damery [sic].”32 When shortly thereafter a message arrived from Mareuil stating that First Army was withdrawing its left flank (Alexander von Linsingen’s II Corps) toward Coulombs, Bülow (incorrectly) assumed that this was because Hentsch had ordered Kluck also to begin the withdrawal.33 Bad communications yet again bedeviled the Germans.

  How does one account for the bizarre meeting at Montmort? On the surface, it seems ludicrous that a mere lieutenant colonel was able to move Prussia’s most senior field commander into ordering his army to retreat without having suffered a major defeat. Even more ludicrous is that Bülow made absolutely no effort to contact either Moltke at Luxembourg or Kluck at Mareuil—by telegraph, rider, automobile, or airplane. Incredibly, four trains of Bülow’s Telephone Section 2 sat idle at Dormans studying handbooks on how to install and repair lines and equipment; they took no steps whatsoever to establish telephone communications with Kluck, less than sixty kilometers away as the crow flies.34 Surely, Bülow and Lauenstein could, and should, have overruled a lieutenant colonel and taken responsibility for coordinating their intended action with the OHL and First Army.

  The truth of the matter is that the order to retreat was issued not by Hentsch or by Moltke, but by Bülow, with whom responsibility for setting in motion the German retreat from the Marne must rest. To be sure, Bülow was between a rock and a hard place by the evening of 8 September. Franchet d’Espèrey’s Fifth Army was hammering Second Army’s exposed right wing, over which it enjoyed a four-to-one numerical superiority. The BEF at last was advancing into the gap between the two German pivot armies and harassing Kluck’s lines of communication. Could Bülow simply stand on the Marne for another day or two and hope
and pray that Hausen’s Third Army would yet defeat Ferdinand Foch’s Ninth Army in the Saint-Gond Marshes; or that Kluck’s right wing would sweep around the left flank of Maunoury’s Sixth Army northeast of Paris? If either or both Hausen and Kluck were victorious, the campaign could be salvaged at the eleventh hour. If not, the sheer weight of numbers that favored Franchet d’Espèrey would crush Second Army’s right wing—while the three corps of the BEF and the French cavalry corps would assault Kluck’s rear on the Ourcq.

  Some scholars have viewed Bülow’s decision on the fourth day of the battle to avert a pending “catastrophe” by way of a timely retreat as “a sound one.”35 At the time, Lauenstein crowed to Deputy Chief of Staff von Stein that “Germany will one day thank General von Bülow that he issued the order to retreat.”36 Few German military writers, either at the time or subsequently, have agreed with either view. They are right. Quite apart from the sudden and impulsive nature of the decision and Bülow’s refusal to seek input from Moltke or Kluck, it did not correspond to the situation on the ground. There had been no major breakthrough. Kluck was rallying his army corps to crush French Sixth Army on the Ourcq. Rudolf von Lepel’s infantry brigade, marching southwest from Brussels, was about to strike Maunoury’s left flank. Second Army had merely to close up its front and stand firm at the Marne. Time was not yet of the essence. Bülow, who had viewed Kluck and First Army as a “thorn in his side” ever since their turn toward the south after the Battle of Guise/Saint-Quentin, allowed emotions to dictate operations.

  BATTLE OF THE MARNE, 9 SEPTEMBER 1914

  There remains the larger question concerning the fitness to command of Bülow and Lauenstein. The German official history and most eyewitnesses declined after the war to address the question, content merely to regurgitate “recollections” of what was said that 8 September. General Karl von Einem of VII Corps was an exception. After the war, he ruefully informed the historians of the Reichsarchiv, “General Lauenstein gave the impression of a sick man, Bülow was old and deaf.”37 The only military scholar to undertake “an attempt to elucidate psychological conditions” was Swiss lieutenant Colonel Eugen Bircher. After spending a decade sifting through every available scrap of French and German published sources, Bircher concluded that neither Bülow nor Lauenstein was in top form, physically or mentally, at the Marne.38 Bülow, a first-rate organizer and reformer of Prussian army doctrine before the war, had long suffered from thyroid gland illness, which had left him with severe arteriosclerosis. Under extended combat and fatigue, this condition flared up anew and made him edgy, agitated, and hard of hearing. At age sixty-eight, he was four years beyond what constituted mandatory retirement in the French army. During the night after he made his momentous decision to retreat, Bülow suffered three “crying fits” at Saint-Quentin, his new headquarters. The next day, he extended a dour greeting to Pastor Paul Le Seur: “If you think that you are seeing the commander of Second Army, then you are mistaken! That, I once was.”39 Wilhelm II promoted Bülow to the rank of field marshal in January 1915 and three months later bestowed on him the order Pour le Mérite. That same year, Bülow suffered a stroke that paralyzed his left side; he died at Berlin on 31 August 1921.

  Lauenstein, while in the rank of captain, had developed chronic thyroid eye disease,* which attacked his heart as well as nervous system; its symptoms included extreme nervousness, muscular tremors, palpitation of the heart, and protrusion of the eyeballs. Although only fifty-seven years old in 1914, the stress and strain of four weeks of constant combat had severely tested his nerves. Captain Koeppen, who was at the critical meeting in Montmort, later informed the Reichsarchiv that on 8 September, Lauenstein had made a “sick, almost apathetic impression” on him.40 Bülow’s chief of staff seemed to suffer from heart palpitations during the meeting and managed to get through it only “with strong means, especially alcohol.” Lieutenant Colonel Matthes, in fact, had taken Lauenstein’s place in decision making. Incredibly, Wilhelm II awarded Lauenstein the Iron Cross, First Class, for his role in the Battle of the Marne. Lauenstein died of heart disease in 1916. The degree to which these physical ailments affected their decision making that 8 September remains an interesting, but open, question.

  HENTSCH ARRIVED AT MAREUIL-SUR-OURCQ at 11:30 AM on 9 September after a five-hour detour via Reims, Fismes, and Fère-en-Tardenois. If the sight of wagon shafts turned away from the front had already alarmed him at Montmort, what he witnessed en route to Mareuil unnerved the staff officer.41 At Fère-en-Tardenois, he encountered ammunition and supply trains, horse-drawn artillery, weary infantrymen, and columns of wounded cavalrymen fleeing from the front helter-skelter for fear of being cut off by advancing French forces. At Neuilly–Saint-Front, he could not get through, as the town was “plugged up” by countless people running in terror of what they thought to be bombs falling. Finally making his way through Neuilly “by the repeated use of force,” Hentsch headed south. At Brumetz, he had to turn around when informed (incorrectly) that British cavalry was already in the area. Then panicked Landwehr soldiers fired at his car, taking it to be part of a French advance guard. At every stop, he was told that the enemy had driven German cavalry from the Marne and had crossed the river in pursuit.

  General von Kuhl, First Army’s chief of staff, met Hentsch on a dusty road at Mareuil. He quickly brought his former assistant up to speed: First Army that morning had been seriously threatened by Maunoury’s attacks on the Ourcq; aviators had reported the British advance into the gap between the two German armies in the area north of the Petit Morin River stretching from Montmirail west to La Fertésous-Jouarre; and Hans von Gronau’s IV Reserve Corps had been ground down in the fighting. But the arrival of Ferdinand von Quast’s IX Corps and Friedrich Sixt von Arnim’s IV Corps had stabilized the situation.42 The two officers then entered Kuhl’s operations room. No protocol was kept. Neither cared to send for General von Kluck, who was a mere two to three hundred meters away at his command post. Obviously, two General Staff officers could decide First Army’s operations without its commander. Kuhl announced that First Army’s right wing was about to turn Maunoury’s left flank, and that he viewed the BEF’s advance into the gap “not at all tragically” since the British had reeled back in confusion ever since Mons and Le Cateau. “We knew from previous experience,” one of Kuhl’s staff officers later stated, “how slowly the British operated.” In any case, the two German cavalry corps would be able to “deal” with the BEF. A second staff officer recalled that Hentsch was “dumbfounded” by this optimistic evaluation of the situation.

  Hentsch then made his formal presentation. Fifth Army was tied down at Verdun; Sixth and Seventh armies likewise were pinned at Nancy-Épinal; and Bülow’s VII Corps had not “withdrawn” behind the Marne but had been “hurled” back across the river. To wit, the time for a general retreat had come. Third Army was to withdraw northeastward of Châlons, Fourth and Fifth armies via Clermont-en-Argonne to Verdun, Second Army behind the Marne, and First Army in the direction of Soissons and Fismes to close up with Second Army. A new German army was being formed at Saint-Quentin, whereupon the offensive could be renewed. Knowing that Bülow had ordered Second Army to fall back on Dormans, Hentsch took a charcoal pen and drew the lines of retreat for First Army on Kuhl’s staff map.

  Kuhl “vigorously” objected.43 First Army’s right wing was about to break Maunoury’s left; the attack had to be given a chance to succeed; a retreat by his exhausted and disorganized forces was out of the question. And how, he demanded to know, had Bülow come to retreat behind the Marne? Hentsch obfuscated. “The decision to retreat,” he coldly replied, “had been a bitter pill for Old Bülow to swallow.” He then repeated the unsubstantiated but critical comment made by either Bülow or Matthes at Montmort that Second Army had been reduced to “cinders” by Franchet d’Espèrey’s vicious attacks. Finally, Hentsch pulled his ace out of his sleeve: He had come with “full power of authority” and “in the name of the Oberste-Heeresleitung” ordered First Army
to retreat. It was less than a clinical staff performance.

  Kuhl was thunderstruck. If Second Army had indeed been reduced to “cinders” and was being forced to withdraw from the Marne, then “not even a victory over Maunoury” could spare First Army’s left flank from certain destruction. In the terse verdict of the German official history, “The dice were cast.” Kuhl had no direct telephone line to Luxembourg, and he chose not to use one of his aircraft to send a staff officer to Montmort to confer with Bülow or Lauenstein. Later on, he simply informed Kluck of his discussion with Hentsch. “With a heavy heart, General von Kluck was obliged to accept the order.”44 Kuhl, who understood the inner workings of the General Staff system better than anyone, conceded at Hentsch’s requested Court of Inquiry in April 1917 that the lieutenant colonel had “not exceeded his authority.” Erich Ludendorff, then deputy chief of staff of the German army, concurred. “He [Hentsch] merely acted according to the instructions he received from the then Chief of the General Staff [Moltke].”45

  Hentsch, “psychologically deeply shaken” by the gravity of his action and fearful that he would be “blamed for the unfortunate termination of the [Schlieffen-Moltke] operation,”46 departed Mareuil at 1 PM—not to brief Second Army on his discussions with Kuhl but to inform Third, Fourth, and Fifth armies of the decision to retreat. Fifteen minutes later, Kluck issued formal orders “at the behest of the OHL” for First Army to break off the battle with French Sixth Army and to withdraw “in the general direction of Soissons.”47 Thus ended First Army’s bloody thirty-day, six-hundred-kilometer advance on Paris.