Metal cross grave marker of Army Reservist Paul Schwarz, who died on April 12, 1918, likely in Operation Georgette, the Lys Offensive, launched April 9. From the Laventie German Military Cemetery, Laventie, France.
Paul SchwarzErsatz-Reservist12.4.1918Paul SchwarzArmy ReservistApril 12, 1918
"After crossing the Lawe Canal, General von Quasts's troops seized Locon and Estaires and, farther north, Hollebeke. On the 12th Merville and Merris fell into their hands, and their advance guards were already on the edge of the Nieppe Forest. The depth of the progress had thus attained 11 miles. Faced with this development of the battle, Field Marshal Haig saw his resources being rapidly used up, and he deemed it more than ever essential that the French co-operate in Flanders."
The British were in increasingly difficult straits on April 12, the fourth day of German commander Erich Ludendorff's second great offensive of 1918, Operation Georgette, the Lys Offensive. On the first day, after a two-day preliminary bombardment, the Germans demolished a half-strength Portuguese line, then spread north and south striking the British to either side. The offensive, a pared-down version of a previously rejected plan, was an attack on the Lys River in Flanders along the Franco-Belgian border. British commander was Douglas Haig already badly weakened by Operation Michael in March, looked to newly appointed Commander-in-Chief Ferdinand Foch for reinforcements.
The Memoirs of Marshal Foch, translated by Col. T. Bentley Mott by Ferdinand Foch, pp. 286–287, copyright © 1931 by Doubleday, Doran & Company, Inc., publisher: Doubleday, Doran & Co., publication date: 1931
1918-04-12, 1918, April, Paul Schwarz, Operation Georgette, Georgette, Lys Offensive
