They were not about to let the humiliation of 1870 happen to them once again. In the end, Falkenhayn's grim plan almost worked unfortunately for him, he nearly bled his own army to death in the process.įor the initial attack-the largest mankind had ever seen up to that time - the Germans amassed 1200 artillery pieces, including several giant 420mm "Big Berthas." After the opening barrage, Crown Prince Wilhelm's 140,000 man-strong Fifth Army stormed up from the east bank of the River Meuse toward Fort Douaumont, the largest and most powerful of the French forts.įrom the outset, the French fought with a frenzied ferocity. An attack here, Falkenhayn had reasoned with bizarre logic, would force the French to use every man they had to defend it-thereby "bleeding" the French army to death and knocking France out of the war. No longer of any military value, the forts' real worth was symbolic-they represented French pride and independence, indeed the French nation itself. His idea was to strike a fatal blow at the roughly 20 sunken forts located in the hills near Verdun. The battle was designed in December 1915 by the enigmatic Erich von Falkenhayn, the German army's chief of staff. This is a land where sadness hangs in the air like a living presence. The dead are everywhere: the ossuaire, Verdunts massive Art Deco war memorial, contains the remains of 130,000 French and German soldiers alone. To this day, the land around Verdun is torn and scarred by the war: thousands of shell holes pock the countryside, trenches slice through woods and fields, huge mine craters gape up at the sky, and rusting clumps of barbed wire and the broken hulks of fortresses litter the area. Extending from 21 February to 15 December 1916, it is the longest battle history has ever known. Voices from Verdun by O'Brien Browneįew stretches of land in Western Europe are as blood soaked as the Verdun battlefield, where 80 years ago 700,000 to 800,000 Frenchmen and Germans were killed, wounded or captured in perhaps the most terrible battle of the Great War. About half of all casualties at Verdun were killed.From the Winter 1998 Issue, Volume Seven, Number One:įrench colonials rest amid the descruction at Verdun. It is estimated that the German Army suffered 434,000 casualties. The French Army lost about 550,000 men at Verdun. Verdun, the longest battle of the First World War, ended on the 18th December. Over the next six weeks the French infantry gained another 2km at Verdun. The French now counter-attacked and General Charles Mangin became a national hero when the forts at Douaumont and Vaux were recaptured by 2nd November, 1916. ![]() However, the scale of the German attacks were reduced by the need to transfer troops to defend their front-line at the Somme. The French held this strategic point until it was finally secured by the Germans on 29th May, and Fort Vaux fell on 7th June, after a long siege.įurther attacks continued throughout the summer and early autumn. The Germans advanced 3km before they were stopped in front of the area around Mort Homme Hill. On the 6th March, the German Fifth Army launched a new attack at Verdun. The German advance was brought to a halt at the end of February. Of the 330 infantry regiments of the French Army, 259 eventually fought at Verdun. He arranged for every spare French soldier to this part of the Western Front. ![]() He gave orders that no more withdrawals would take place. On 24th February, General Henri-Philippe Petain was appointed commander of the Verdun sector. By 24th February the French had moved back to the third line and were only 8km from Verdun. ![]() The following day the French was forced to retreat to their second line of trenches. A million troops, led by Crown Prince Wilhelm, faced only about 200,000 French defenders. The German attack on Verdun started on 21st February 1916. ![]() Although he admitted he would be unable to break through at these point on the Western Front, he argued that in defending Verdun, the Germans would "bleed the French army white". In December 1915, General Erich von Falkenhayn, Chief of Staff of the German Army, decided to attack Verdun. During the First World War Verdun was a fortified French garrison town on the River Meuse 200km east of Paris.
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