Verdun 1916
Page 27
The renewed German attack achieved very little. Höhn’s Bavarians made minor gains near Froideterre, while the Guard Ersatz Division faltered in the face of machine-gun and artillery fire. The 21st Reserve Division secured a small piece of Souville Ridge. The French counter-attacks ended this last German offensive with heavy casualties. On 3 August, General Nivelle’s 2nd Army drove the Germans from the Ouvrage of Thiaumont and the ruins of Fleury, but the Germans retook the ruined ouvrage the next day. Fleury continued to change hands as well. In August, the French exerted heavy pressure on both the east and west banks smashing German positions with their artillery. As Höhn’s Bavarian divisions neared exhaustion, the 14th Division came from the west bank to replace the 4th Bavarian Division on 6 August and the 33rd Division from Mudra’s XVI Corps in the Argonne relieved the 6th Bavarian Division on 8 August. The Crown Prince shifted additional divisions, including Mudra’s remaining division – the 34th, to the east bank to shore up the position. Mudra received the depleted Alpine Corps to replace his two divisions. The 1st Division had already departed for the Eastern Front. The German front at Verdun had become a patchwork of formations.
Meanwhile, Nivelle’s 2nd Army and Pétain’s Army Group Centre finally wrested air superiority from the Germans and obtained new artillery and fresh troops. On 17 August, following a heavy bombardment, the French launched three attacks against the Western Attack Group that stubbornly clung to its positions. Meanwhile, French artillery laid down several heavy barrages on the east bank. French troops forced Höhn’s Group and the XVIII Reserve Corps out of Fleury. The next day, additional units stormed the ruins of the Ouvrage of Thiaumont and cleared the Germans from the area south of Fort Vaux. On the east bank, the combatants were locked in heavy fighting. On 19 August, a French artillery barrage smashed a German counter-attack and the battle raged among the ruins of Fleury until 20 August. The 50th Division had partially restored the front shattered on the 18 August. The Guard Ersatz Division was relieved by the 14th Bavarian Division, which had to be relieved before long by the 84th Division. As attacks and counter-attacks succeeded each other throughout the month of August, the German divisions were slowly decimated, but the lines around Verdun hardly budged.
General Knobelsdorf conferred with Falkenhayn about continuing the offensive operations against Verdun. This time, Falkenhayn did not share Knobelsdorf’s enthusiasm for continuing the status quo because Germany’s overall position appeared bleak at this point. Operation Gericht had failed to achieve his goals, the situation on the Somme was worsening and Rumania was about to enter the war. The Crown Prince, who was often dismissed as an amateur but had more aptitude than was attributed to him, sent a letter to Falkenhayn explaining the futility of continuing the attack. Knobelsdorf, on the other hand, insisted that he had to take the heights between Fleury and Fort Souville in order to secure the front east of the Meuse and prevent the French from dominating the lowlands to the east. General Lochow, who commanded the Eastern Attack Group, disagreed with Knobelsdorf and warned that an assault on Fort Souville would lead to endless combat and a repeat of the effort to take Fort Vaux. Falkenhayn’s response came in a letter dated 21 August: ‘The general situation renders it urgently necessary to keep the enemy in the Meuse area under the impression that the offensive on the German side has not been abandoned but will be systematically continued. It is left to the Army Group Command to decide how this can best be accomplished with the necessarily limited means at its disposal …’.
Falkenhayn’s letter brought the conflict between the Crown Prince and Knobelsdorf to a head the week the French launched fierce attacks. Fed up, the Crown Prince asked his father, who was also disillusioned at the time, to transfer Knobelsdorf. On 27 August, Knobelsdorf was heading to the Eastern Front to command the X Corps. He was replaced with General Walther von Luttwitz from the Eastern Front and harmony was restored at headquarters. Meanwhile, Austro-German resistance finally stiffened against Brusilov’s offensive in August. However, on the 27th, the Rumanians finally joined the conflict, which threatened to tip the balance.62 A few weeks later, the Russian momentum floundered, but not before changes were set in train in the West. Hindenburg replaced Falkenhayn, who was put in command of the 9th Army in preparation for the invasion of Rumania. Hindenburg concluded that Germany’s situation was unfavourable ‘for lack of men we could not contemplate the idea of a relief attack either at Verdun or the Somme, however strong were my own inclinations for such a measure’.* He requested the Kaiser’s permission to end the Verdun Offensive explaining that the ‘battlefield was a regular hell and regarded as such by the troops’. In retrospect, he thought, it would have been better to abandon the gains the Germans had made and consolidate the situation at Verdun. ‘The flower of our best fighting troops had been sacrificed …’ at Verdun, he concluded.
The Germans bagged 65,000 French prisoners between February and the end of August at Verdun without managing to turn the tide. With the Hindenburg/Ludendorff team in command, they needed to find a way to replenish the fighting strength of the army. Hindenburg and Ludendorff met with the commanders of the 1st, 2nd, 4th and 5th armies on 8 September and informed them that, as a result of the battle on the Somme, Landwehr and Landsturm units would serve on the front to free first-line divisions for operations on the Somme Front. They also ordered each German division to release one regiment to form a new division. The 5th Army provided the 4th, 19th Reserve and 10th Ersatz divisions. The front was readjusted so the headquarters of the X Reserve Corps moved to the southeast and the XVI Corps (now Mudra Group) took command of all troops on the Argonne Front (21st Reserve, 9th Landwehr, 19th Reserve and 16th Bavarian divisions and Alpine Corps).63 Mudra’s sector extended from 3rd Army to Franke’s Group (2nd Landwehr and 4th divisions) holding Hill 304.
The Eastern Meuse Group under Lochnow split into four commands: VII Reserve Corps (three divisions), 54th General Command (three divisions), XII Corps (three divisions) and XV Corps (two divisions). In early October, XV Corps (30th and 39th divisions) left 5th Army and XVIII Corps returned from the Argonne to take over a sector of Eastern Meuse Group in the Woëvre. In mid-October, Viktor Kühne’s 54th General Command and one of its divisions came off line, but the Crown Prince received no replacement.64 The 5th Army’s reserve had one division on the left bank and two on the right bank and was no longer the formidable force it had been in early 1916. During this time, the French made no grand offensive in the area, but their artillery and aircraft asserted their presence as Pétain and Nivelle built up their forces. The German expenditure of artillery shells dropped to about 25 per cent of the June levels, but the French fired about seven times as many rounds as the Germans. Fewer than 70 of the Crown Prince’s 140 original heavy artillery batteries remained.
During much of September and October, the German positions began to crumble under heavy French bombardments and almost daily rains made it difficult for the soldiers to repair and improve them. Nivelle continued rotating divisions at the front. On the east bank, activity was maintained as fresh divisions came to occupy the area between Thiaumont and Chapitre woods. Among them was the 7th Division, which took its place on line in late August and assailed German positions in early September and on 20 September. The 73rd Division arrived at about the same time and took part in the fighting in Chapitre Woods during the first half of September. The 67th Division engaged in combat on the west bank in March, rotated out of Verdun and returned in September to serve on the east bank until it was replaced at the end of the month. The 73rd Division reached Verdun in late August, took part in the fighting in Chapitre Woods in early September and withdrew. The 38th Division (North African troops) was involved with the fighting around Avocourt Woods and Hill 304 for months in August. It moved to the east bank at the end of September to prepare for the impending offensive. The 55th Division, which had been involved in combat in the same area on the west bank until 20 June, did not move to the right bank until 21 September. The 130th Division participated in
the June fighting to stop the German advance between the Ouvrage of Thiaumont and Chapitre Woods. Between 21 and 23 June, it fought for control of Fleury before moving to the Argonne for a couple of months. It returned to the east bank on 29 September to the same sectors and remained there until it was relieved on 23 October.65
German topographic map with wooded areas added showing the main area of the battle over the forts for control of the Meuse Heights.
Other divisions replaced most of the units on the east bank in expectation of the long-awaited offensive. General Arthur Guyot de Salins’ 38th Division spearheaded the attack on Fort Douaumont on 23 October.66 General Charles de Lardemelle’s 74th Division retrained in August before moving into position with the objective of retaking Fort Vaux. General Fénelon Passaga’s 133rd Division, stationed near Switzerland, arrived on 11 September with the objective of clearing Caillette Woods. The 37th Division, commanded by General Noël Garnier-Duplessix, had been at Verdun in February and incurred heavy losses. In July, it took part in the attack on Fleury and went to rest at the end of the month. On 27 September, it returned to take part in the offensive. General Joseph Mangin’s 55th Division, which was on the west bank near Hill 304 from June until 1 September moved to the east bank on 21 September. It remained there until to 2 November. The 63rd Division of General Joseph Andlauer, which had participated in the failed relief effort of Fort Vaux in June, was sent to the Vosges. It returned to the east bank in October. General Louis Arlabosse’s 9th Division was at Vauquois until about October before it moved to the east bank to support the attack on Fort Vaux. Thus, on 23 October, only a handful of German divisions faced an onslaught of seven relatively fresh divisions of the XI Corps.
Fort Douaumont after the battle. The MG turret was replaced with a turret from another fort after the war. Abri VI was converted to an observation post, which was destroyed more than once after 1916. The cloche attached to Abri VII is all that remains of the structure.
Sections of forts including defensive chicane built to protect entrances and tunnels. 1. Obs Cloche, 2. 75 Turret, 3. Converted to Bunker 1917, 4. Gorge Coffre, 5. Double Coffre, 6. Cas. Bourges.
The French finally launched their offensive on 24 October after a day of intense bombardment. The preliminary shelling began on 20 October after the weather cleared. The ordnance included gas shells, which kept the Germans tied down while the French guns systematically destroyed their positions. General Charles Mangin (XI Corps) was in charge of operations on the east bank. Pétain had obtained two of the huge 400mm railway howitzers firing a 900kg round up to 15,000m and 370mm mortars that lobbed a 489kg round about 5,000m.67 On 23 October, the 400mm rounds inflicted the most serious damage Fort Douaumont suffered in the entire war. Fires broke out in the fort and the likelihood of another explosion like the one of 8 May became very real. The Germans had evacuated Fort Douaumont the next morning leaving behind thirty men and one officer who desperately tried to organize a defence. Shortly before noon, three French divisions advanced on a 7km front shrouded in a thick fog behind rolling barrages. General Passaga’s 133rd Division led the way and took control of the area between Fort Douaumont and north of the village of Vaux. Fog temporarily delayed Guyot de Salins’ 38th Division in Caillette Woods, but its battalions took Douaumont village at 2.45 pm and the fort about an hour later, taking prisoner the remaining Germans. The German 25th Reserve Division of the VII Reserve Corps, the XII Corps 9th Division and 54th Division, which held the area between Thiaumont and Chapitre Woods, quickly capitulated. Only the reserves on the steep slopes north of Douaumont village held back the French while the 33rd Reserve Division checked the French infantry. The French 74th Division on the right had to be replaced by the 9th Division after incurring heavy losses in its attempts to reach Fort Vaux. The XVIII Corps 50th Division held Vaux Hill for a few days. The 5th and 10th divisions rushed to the front to fill the gaps and in a few days relieved the shattered 9th Division and 25th Reserve Division. The 4 days of battle resulted in 47,000 casualties for the French.
The French renewed the attack on 25 October and on 2 November Fort Vaux fell, but a day after the garrison evacuated it. On 1 November, pioneers brought explosives and prepared the fort for demolition. The explosives blew the 75mm gun turret out of its well and propelled it into the fossé. French troops entered the abandoned fort on 2 November. Despite all the damage, the fort could be repaired, except for the gun turret block, like Fort Douaumont.68
A new offensive launched by the French in December ended by mid-month. The French troops drove the Germans back over Côte du Poivre and took Louvemont, Bezonvaux and Damloup to the south. The threat to Verdun was over. The French set about restoring and improving their forts and added new positions and underground galleries during 1917. The number of French and German casualties can only be estimated. The French incurred 300,000–500,000 casualties including about 150,000 dead. Germans casualties ranged between 280,000 and 430,000. These numbers were smaller than for the French, but did not reach the ratios Falkenhayn had optimistically expected to achieve. At this point, the Germans retained about 5km of conquered territory of limited military value.
* Pétain, Verdun, p. 112.
* William, My War Experiences, p. 203.
* Pétain, Verdun, pp. 133–4.
* William Martin, Verdun 1916: They Shall Not Pass (Oxford: Osprey, 2001), p. 69.
* William, My War Experiences, p. 217.
* William, My War Experiences, p. 221.
* Paul von Hindenburg, The Great War (London: Greenhill Books, 2006), p. 121.
Chapter Six
Conclusion
‘The Mill of the Meuse’
A phrase sometimes attributed to General von Falkenhayn
The Battle of Verdun embodies most of the ideas we have formed about the First World War. Except for the tank, all the weapons associated with the war played a significant role on this battlefield. The artillery churned up the entire battleground and pockmarked it with deep craters that persist to this very day. Both sides used a variety of deadly gases extensively. They were not only released from canisters at the front, but also pumped into artillery shells and fired into enemy trenches and on enemy batteries with large-calibre guns. Airpower increased in importance providing aerial photos for intelligence and directing artillery fire. Before long, control of the air became more critical and both sides formed fighter or pursuit units to clear the skies of the enemy. The Germans began to use storm-troop tactics on a large scale and adopted flamethrowers. Other innovations in the military arsenal included more powerful artillery, mainly for the French, steel helmets, etc. Both sides used some of their biggest guns at Verdun: the German 420mm weapons and the French 400mm railway guns. Trench warfare reached its zenith as much of the battle revolved around control of the forts of the Verdun ring. Like most of the battles on the Western Front, Verdun turned into a massive stalemate during over a half a year of fighting. On 23 June 1916, when the German advance reached its zenith, the Kaiser’s troops had taken little more than 10km since February. In June, their progress had dwindled to about 2km, most of which was lost within a matter of weeks. Falkenhayn had hoped that the battle would force the enemy into capitulation. For the French, on the other hand, the Battle of Verdun was a matter of national pride and morale rather than strategic importance. The main leaders of the battle – Joffre, Pétain and Falkenhayn – were eventually removed from key commands, although Pétain, the hero of Verdun, made a quick comeback. Others such as Nivelle and Mangin rose to higher command, but lost their ascendance because they emphasized the offensive. Hindenburg and Ludendorff, who replaced Falkenhayn, only played a role in winding down the battle. Crown Prince Wilhelm, who performed well under the restrictions imposed upon him, was to receive more than his fair share of the blame, but remained in command. The battle brought down many commanders, but it also saw many others rise to higher positions. Sadly, more than ½ million men died or lay wounded as a result of a conflict that accomplished nothing but
a stalemate.
The ossuary was built after the war. Skeletal remains found since then that cannot be identified are placed in various rooms on the lower level. The unidentified remains of about 130,000 soldiers are interred here. The cemetery has 15,000 graves. Middle: victory monument. Bottom: monument to member of parliament and army sergeant André Maginot on the battlefield. The defeat of the Germans at Verdun, with the help of Maginot, inspired a new philosophy regarding the role of forts which culminated in the construction of the Maginot Line.
The battle concluded in December 1916. The decisive victory General Falkenhayn had hoped to achieve did not happen. Instead of ‘bleeding the French army white’, he almost crippled the German army. After General Hindenburg replaced him, Falkenhayn took over the command of an army in the Rumanian Campaign where he redeemed his reputation. Crown Prince Wilhelm took command of an army group, but he could never shake off the blame and regret for the needless expenditure of life during the battle that earned him the undeserved sobriquet of ‘The Butcher of Verdun’. ‘The mill on the Meuse – he wrote – ground to powder the hearts as well as the bodies of the troops.’* Falkenhayn, whose strategic and tactical plan had prevented the Germans from taking Verdun early in the campaign, never spared a thought for the men who lost their lives or their health fighting in the trenches. His only concern appeared to be continuing the battle even when it became apparent that the only obtainable objective was increasing the number of casualties.