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The St. Mihiel Salient from The History of The A.E.F. by Shipley Thomas Captain of the 26th U. S. Infantry. The St. Mihiel Offensive began on September 12, 1918.
Map of the patrol for the United States 94th Squadron for September 3 to 26, 1918. The period covered the St. Mihiel Offensive and the beginning of the Meuse-Argonne Offensive. From Fighting the Flying Circus by Capt. Edward V. Rickenbacker who took command of the Squadron — the Hat in Ring Squadron — on September 24.
German pencil sketch dated April 14, 1916, of the Vardar River valley in Macedonia. Mount Dudica is on the current (2018) border between Macedonia and Greece.
Map of the the Balkan Front — Germany's Southeast Front — with the mountain passes between Austria-Hungary and Romania. From the Reichsarchiv history of the wars in Serbia and Romania, Herbstschlacht in Macedonien; Cernabogen 1916.The capitals of Belgrade (Serbia), Bucharest (Romania), Sofia (Bulgaria), and Constantinople (Turkey) are prominent, as is Salonica, Greece, the Allied entry port into the country.
Photograph of a French aviator downing a German observation balloon near St. Mihiel on September 16, 1918, the last day of the American St. Mihiel Offensive. That same day American airmen Frank Luke and Joe Wehner downed three balloons in the sector.
"At 1 a.m. on 12 September more than 3000 artillery tubes for 4 hours fired 1.1 million shells at the Germans — the greatest single artillery bombardment in the war. Thereafter, nearly 20 divisions of the American First Army, supported by 267 light tanks under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel George C. Patton, Jr., as well as about 1400 Allied aircraft attacked the eight war-weary and understaffed German divisions of Composite Army C in the form of two sharp pincers of a set of forceps on both sides of the salient. Victory was never in doubt — especially since Ludendorff on 11 September, the day before the attack, had ordered Army Group Gallwitz to evacuate the salient in case of attack. The Americans in effect 'relieved the Germans' in the St Mihiel salient. The moral fibre of the Germans can be gauged by the fact that they received the newly arrived Austro-Hungarian 1st and 35th divisions with cries of 'war prolongers'." ((1), more)
"On our trip up this same road the following day Reed Chambers and I saw the retreat of the Huns and the advance of our doughboys in full swing. The Huns were falling back northward with an unusually strong rearguard protecting their retreat. Already they were out of reach of our guns' accurate aim, for the day was again cloudy, with occasional rains and no airplanes were able to regulate the gun fire.But closely pressing them from behind came our eager doughboys fighting along like Indians. They scurried from cover to cover, always crouching low as they ran. Throwing themselves flat they would get their rifles into action and spray the Boches with more bullets until they withdrew from sight. Then another running advance and another furious pumping of lead from the Yanks. . . .Coasting along some eight or ten miles farther I saw the whole country was swarming with the retreating Huns. I noted the progress of our own troops below and marked down their positions on my map. . . ." ((2), more)
"It did not take the Voivode long to make up his mind. A signal was dispatched to every unit between the Vardar and Monastir—Mettez en route quatorze officiers et huit soldats—and each battery commander knew that on September 14 at 8 A.M. he was to open fire. There were barely two hours to wait.The machinery of the great offensive was put in motion. Over five hundred guns poured their shells into the enemy defenses along eighty miles of front. By the standards of Verdun it was nothing, but it was without precedent in the Balkans. And as the gunners had their day, 36,000 French and Serbian and Italian infantrymen had their rifles ready. Behind them were eighteen squadrons of cavalry. The Bulgars and the Germans caught unprepared in this sector were outnumbered three to one. Just one more dawn and all the seventy-five Allied battalions would be moving forward. Just forty-eight more dawns and the Serbs would re-enter their capital city." ((3), more)
"On September 15, agreeably with the general forward movement of the Allies on all the fronts, the so-called Salonika Army developed an offensive against Bulgaria, having for its central objective the important town and railway junction of Uskub. It was indeed a heterogeneous army that advanced under the orders of Franchet d'Esperey, the ultimate successor of Sarrail. Eight French, seven British, six Greek (Venizelist), six Serbian, and four Italian Divisions—all under strength, wasted with fever, and modestly equipped with artillery, set themselves in motion against the mountainous frontiers of Bulgaria. Seventeen Bulgarian and two Turkish divisions, gripped and guided by a few German battalions and batteries and the prestige of Mackensen, constituted a force ample for a successful defence of such difficult country. But the Bulgarians would fight no more." ((4), more)
"'How would it be if we left the airdrome just in time to get those balloons at dusk, when their observers are taking a last look at our troop movements? Wehner can get one about seven-ten, I'll get another about seven-twenty, and between us we ought to get the third about seven-thirty. Just start burning flares and shooting rockets here on the drome about that time and we'll get back all right. I'll promise you that.'" ((5), more)
(1) American Commander-in-Chief John J. Pershing launched the St. Mihiel Offensive, the war's first American offensive, on September 12, 1918. The American First Army attacked with support from the French, including their Renault tanks and British and French planes. German commander Erich Ludendorff had earlier determined the war could not be won, but was pulling back to eliminate the salient and shorten his line.
The First World War: Germany and Austria Hungary 1914-1918 by Holger H. Herwig, page 423, copyright © 1997 Holger H. Herwig, publisher: Arnold, publication date: 1997
(2) Eddie Rickenbacker, America's leading ace of World War I, writing of his flight over the battlefield on September 13, 1918, the second day of the St. Mihiel Offensive. He and Reed Chambers were part of the 94th Aero Squadron.
Fighting the Flying Circus by Eddie Rickenbacker, page 186, copyright © 1965 by Doubleday & Company, Inc., publisher: Doubleday & Company, Inc., publication date: 1965 (1919)
(3) French General Louis Franchet d'Esperey commanded Allied forces — French, British, Italian, Greek, and Serbian — on the Balkan Front, but the plan for an offensive through the mountains between Greece and Serbia, and the detemination that weather conditions were right to execute it, belonged to Serbian Voivode (Field Marshal) Zivojin Mišić. The Bulgarians and their German allies had kept an Allied army penned in and languishing in the region for two years, and were unprepared for the assault when Mišić started up his fourteen officers and eight soldiers. The Vardar River valley was the most obvious route for an Allied invasion, and was heavily defended. Monastir was a Serbian town on the Greek border that had been taken by French, Serbian, and Russian troops on November 19, 1916.
The Gardeners of Salonika by Alan Palmer, pp. 199–200, copyright © 1965 by A. W. Palmer, publisher: Simon and Schuster, publication date: 1965
(4) Summary from Winston Churchill's history of the war on the Allied Balkan offensive that French General Franchet d'Esperey opened on September 15, 1918. General Maurice Sarrail had originally led Allied forces in the region, forces that had been invited by Greek Prime Minister Eleftherios Venizelos but opposed by Greek King Constantine. With French and British firepower backing him, Venizelos won and the King was deposed. German Field Marshal August Mackensen had been victorious on the Russian Front and in the conquests of Serbia and Romania. Bulgaria was war weary. By September, 1918 German forces on the Western Front had been driven back from all the territory taken in their spring and summer offensives.
The World Crisis 1911-1918 by Winston Churchill, page 834, copyright © by Charles Scribner's Sons 1931, renewed by Winston S. Churchill 1959, publisher: Penguin Books, publication date: 1931, 2007
(5) American Lieutenant Frank Luke to his commanding officer Major Hartney on September 16, 1918. Luke had a short and spectacular career as a pilot, downing four German airplanes and fourteen German observation balloons between August 16 and September 29, 1918 when he died after being shot down over Murvaux, France after shooting down three balloons. Joe Wehner partnered with Luke, sometimes providing cover from enemy planes while Luke went after a balloon. Wehner was killed on September 18. Frank Luke was the leading American 'balloon buster' of the war, but was surpassed by the Belgian Willy Coppens, with 37 victories, 35 of them balloons. Coppens survived the war.
The Balloon Buster by Norman S. Hall, page 88, copyright © 1928 Liberty Weekly, Inc., renewed, 1956, Lorraine Lester et al., publisher: Bantam Books, publication date: 1966
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