On This day in World War 1

Sorry, been away from technology for a few days.

August 15th, 1914, a VERY busy day in the war.

Western Front: Fierce fighting goes on in Lorraine. Contrary to common perceptions, the French often gave as good as they got in confused encounters in misty forests that left hundreds of thousands of casualties by the end of the month. On this day, the French were still making progress.

The Belgian fortress at Liege is effectively reduced to rubble.

Eastern Front: The Russian invasion of East Prussia begins, based on a promise that the Russians gave to the french, despite the fact that only half the men assigned to the armies had even been successfully mobilized up to that point.

Balkans Front: The Battle of Cer begins, with the Hapsburg army invading Serbia. The Battle would last until the 25th and end in a humiliating defeat for the Hapsburg’s.

Africa: The first meeting of dissatisfied Boers takes place. This would eventually lead to a boer revolt against South Africa.

30 years latter, and the fact that for us Yanks and Brits, our perception of WW1 is OVERWHELMINGLY from British sources. As such, it tends to gloss over things the French did.

Fact is, the French fought hard, and they fought well. And in my opinion, they ended up being the best army in the war overall.

August 16th: French and British warships blockade the Adriatic, bottling up the paper tiger that was the Hapsburg fleet.

In France, the first of the BEF begins to land and assemble.

As for the French being reckless, they certainly were, but it’s often overlooked that the Germans were no better when it came to launching massive frontal offensives against well dug in opponents. It wasn’t a cult like it was in the French Army, but the Germans were just as prone to throwing large columns of men (at least the French used lines!) into the teeth of waiting French 75mm’s all along the Franco-German border that fall. The Germans did overall have a far higher concentration of heavy artillery though, which did allow their offensives to at least cause more casualties than a French offensive did to the Germans, even if the Germans failed to gain ground.

August 20th:

Western Front: The Germans being a counterattack against the French in Lorraine. German heavy artillery outclasses anything the French can throw at it and the German army throws the French back to Nancy, erasing all gains the French had made, although the Germans fail to follow up quickly enough and the French are able to get entrenched in solid positions.

Brussels is occupied by the Germans, who march through to display all their military might.

Eastern Front: The Battle of Gumbinnen-After some skirmishing on the previous night, the German 8th Army (made up mostly of native East Prussians) under Maximilian von Prittwitz (dat name) moved into position to attack the Russian 1st Army under command of the mustachioed Paul von Rennenkampf.

The Russians were well aware of the German intentions and were able to set up strong positions. The entire battle was effectively dictated by the Russian artillery formations, which had long been the most effective part of the Tsar’s armies.

German general François’s corps was able to push back the Russian 28th division, after the latter’s artillery ran out of ammunition after whipping out the first waves of Germans (German infantry still tended to attack in column formation, leading to deadly results when faced with artillery). Their artillery out of action (the Russian armies effectively had no logistics, with the men surviving with what they had with them when they were ordered to advance), the 28th Divisions was mauled by the Germans until the 29th showed up later to stabilize the line.

Else where on the front though, Russian artillery and well dug in infantry blunted the other German corps advance, and counter attacked. The Germans completely broke and ran away in a mob like panic more often associated with the Russian army. 6,00 prisoners were taken and the German 8th army thrown back.

However, using up almost all of their ammunition, and taking a fair few casualties of their own, the Russians decided to consolidate their positions and wait for a logistics line to be established. This would have disastrous consequences, when Russian Theater Commander Yakov Zhilinskiy ordered the Russian 2nd Army under Samanov to advance without protection from the 1st Army, eventually allowing the Germans to concentrate their forces against it.

East Africa: The German forces push the British out of a small town called  Taveta and cut the Ugandan railway.

Save your applause gentlemen, just hoping to educate and honor the brave chaps who served in the Great War  :-)

August 22nd.

Western Front:

The Battle of Lorriane as the German 6th and 7th Armies under the Crown Prince of Bavaria, Ruppercht, continue to advance against the French along the border. The French 1st and 2nd armies under overall command of Noël de Castelnau continue to fall back. On this day, Castelnau recieved word that his son had been killed in the fierce fighting. As his staff rushed to consol him, he stood silent and firm, before uttering “Nous continuerons Messieurs (We will continue gentlemen).”

Meanwhile, in the Ardennes forest, the French 3rd(Pierre Ruffey, the lone proposer of heavy artillery in the French army) and 4th(Fernand de Langle de Cary) armies moved forward to strike the German 4th(Albrecht of Württemberg) and 5th(Crown Prince Wilhelm) armies. Unknown to the French due to horrid weather conditions, the Germans heavily outnumbered the advancing French troops.

The Germans moved to attack the French armies, and both sides stumbled upon each other in heavy fog and dark forests on the 21 of August. unorganized fighting broke out all along the front.  In some places, quickly entrenched German infantry threw back waves of Frenchmen who’s commanding officers though digging in to be beneath a Frenchman. In other, German units wandered blindy into carefully waiting French 75’s, slaughtering entire regiments before they knew what happened. Both sides moved up during the afternoon to prepare for action the next day.

And of course, the Battle of Charleroi, the most important of all the battle fought that day (tied with Lorraine for the most important battle of the campaign) when the German 2nd(Karl von Bülow) and 3rd(Max von Hausen) attacked the French 5th Army under Charles Lanrezac. The Germans had to attack across a river to get at the French, but instead of digging in, most of the French corps (most…more will be discussed on the 23rd), simply waited by the river unprotected to throw the Germans back with their bayonets. German machine guns and artillery had a field day, and by the end of the night the Germans had 2 immovable bridgeheads, wrecking most of the French III Corps in the process.

The Great Retreat had begun, even if most didn’t know it yet.

Eastern Front: The Russian 2nd Army under Samanov beings to advance into East Prussia from Congressional Poland after the 1st Armies victory at Gumbinnen the day earlier. This was pushed from Russian higher command, Yakov Zhilinskiy, more than Samanov, who argued his troops weren’t ready. But Zhilinskiy insisted, despite knowing that the 1st army was yet in no position to support the 2nd Army. The 2nd Army began the advance with no logistics, little supplies, and many units not yet at full strength.

The Germans, on their part, were preparing a total retreat to the Vistula, despite arguments from most of the divisional commanders at the time.

Africa: German militia from German Southwest Africa invade South Africa.