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Pen and ink drawing on a German field postcard of a field hospital on the Lens-Arras road.
Map of the Northwestern Front from March 21 to August 21, 1918. Despite the caption, the map shows primarily the German offensives against the British sector, Operations Michael and Georgette. From The War of the Nations Portfolio in Rotogravure Etchings. © Copyrighted 1919 by the New York Times Company
Allied Commanders Henri Philippe Pétain, Douglas Haig, Ferdinand Foch, and John J. Pershing. Foch was Allied Commander in Chief, the other men commanders of the French Army, the British Expeditionary Force, and the American Expeditionary Force respectively. From The Memoirs of Marshall Foch by Marshall Foch.
Headstone of an unknown officer of a Canadian regiment at High Wood Cemetery, Longueval, France. © 2013 by John M. Shea
British infantry, artillery, cavalry, and a tank, likely on the Arras front, 1917. From The Nations at War by Willis J. Abbot 1918 Edition.
"I drew up my men in the sunken road, and gave orders to advance in two waves. 'Hundred yards apart. I myself shall be between the first wave and the second.'It was our last storm. How many times over the last few years we had advanced into the setting sun in a similar frame of mind! Les Eparges, Guillemont, St-Pierre-Vaast, Langemarck, Passchendaele, Mœuvres, Vraucourt, Mory! Another gory carnival beckoned." ((1), more)
"Next to attack was Mangin, with an opening move on 17 August, developing into a full and very successful local assault between the Aisne and the Oise on the 20th. A further assault by the British 3rd Army opened on the 23rd, followed by a second combined Rawlinson and Debeney attack which in the event achieved little. Yet another British attack, by the 1st Army on the northern end of the Cambrai to the Aisne Hindenburg Line, opened on 26 August and was complemented by renewed vigorous pressure by Mangin at the southern end, forcing the Germans to withdraw from positions carefully prepared for the winter." ((2), more)
"What do you think of the news? Peace seems impossible before Autumn 1919 at any rate; but it is best to hope that Fritz will see reason.An officer-friend turned up here and took me to London where we had a little music and chocolate together and lemonade at St Albans — spirit and matter mixed. But it was delightful to see him; with talk of the Old Batt: and the changes in the Staff; gossip of the Front etc. He says his Brigadier has a great admiration for the French Staff and a contempt for ours — All daily orders are issued from Foch, and he believes that a vast improvement in all ways has come since the General took command. It was good to hear intelligent shop-talk again, and words like Merville, Lestrem etc floating on the air." ((3), more)
"But the defence of even the strongest positions relies upon the men behind the guns, and during the days immediately following the arrival of the Canadians on the northern hinge of the Line, opposite Arras, it became increasingly evident that morale was not very high amongst the Germans holding it. Artillery bombardments from the guns still in position 'to guard the coalfields behind Béthune' caused a certain amount of damage to the wire belts, but even more to the fighting spirit of the defenders, for during August 28th the Canadians broke through the belts and into the line, and by the 29th they had killed or captured the majority of the occupants and driven the survivors either south into the main Siegfried Position or straight back into the Drocourt—Quéant Switch." ((4), more)
"The battle during the latter part of the week was really a preparation for a coming greater blow. We were clearing up ugly corners and securing good 'jumping-off' places. The Canadians were working in the closest coöperation with the British. The famous British division on our left flank, under the direction of the Canadian command, was pushing forward. British artillery coöperated. One never knew, moving behind our lines, whether one were coming on a Canadian or an Imperial battery. A degree of unity was attained between Imperials and Canadians such as had never been reached in any previous operation of the war.Every one knew at the week-end that a fresh blow was coming." ((5), more)
(1) Excerpt from German Lieutenant Ernst Jünger's memoir Storm of Steel writing of a German attack on August 24, 1918. Jünger was wounded on the third day of Germany's 1918 Somme Offensive, Operation Michael, in March, 1918, and returned to his regiment on June 4. The last German offensive of the war, the Champagne-Marne Offensive, ended on July 17. The counter-offensive that would end with Allied victory, began the next day. It was Jünger's last battle of the war, as he was seriously wounded, shot through the lung, later in the day. He survives, continues to fight, and eventually, with help from his men, escapes capture, ending in a German hospital the next day. There he resumes reading Lawrence Sterne's Tristam Shandy. Jünger was awarded the Pour le Mérite on September 22.
Storm of Steel by Ernst Jünger, page 280, copyright © 1920, 1961, Translation © Michael Hoffman, 2003, publisher: Penguin Books, publication date: 2003
(2) Summary of Allied attacks after Battle of Amiens, begun on August 8, 1918 through August 26. French General Charles Mangin had struck the first blow in July in the Second Battle of the Marne, to begin reducing the Marne Salient, eliminating it entirely with subsequent attacks. In the Battle of Amiens, Generals Henry Rawlinson commanding the British 4th Army and Marie-Eugène Debeney the French 1st Army had driven the Germans back 12 miles, and continued their attacks later in the month.
Paths of Glory: The French Army 1914-18 by Anthony Clayton, page 173, copyright © Anthony Clayton 2003, publisher: Cassell, publication date: 2005
(3) Ivor Gurney, English poet, composer, and private in the Gloucestershire Regiment, writing to the composer Marion Margaret Scott, on August 28, 1918 from Middlesex War Hospital, Napsbury. He had been sent back to the United Kingdom after being gassed in September, 1917, then suffered a mental collapse in March, 1918.
War Letters, Ivor Gurney, a selection edited by R.K.R. Thornton by Ivor Gurney, page 257, copyright © J. R. Haines, the Trustee of the Ivor Gurney Estate 1983, publisher: The Hogarth Press, publication date: 1984
(4) The Third Battle of the Scarpe was fought from August 26 to 30, 1918. The town of Monchy-le-Preux was taken on the first day. The Scarpe River flows by Arras. Drocourt is north of the river, and northeast of Arras, Quéant is south and southeast.
1918, the Last Act by Barrie Pitt, page 220, copyright © 1962 by Barrie Pitt, publisher: Ballantine Books, Inc., publication date: 1963
(5) Excerpt from a piece by Frederick Arthur McKenzie on the Canadian role in the Batle of Amiens and subsequent offensives. Our quotation is from the description of the Third Battle of the Scarpe, fought from Monday, August 26 (during which the town of Monchy-le-Preux was taken) to Friday the 30th, 1918. Some Canadians, like others in the colonial troops of the British Empire, believed the British commanders were incompetent and less sparing of the lives of Empire soldiers than of those of Great Britain.
The Great Events of the Great War in Seven Volumes by Charles F. Horne, Vol. VI, 1918, pp. 285–286, copyright © 1920 by The National Alumnia, publisher: The National Alumni, publication date: 1920
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