Bkimberl at 18:42, 13 July 2009

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−		+	<p align="right"> [[Main_Page \| WWI Document Archive ]] > [[Diaries, Memorials, Personal Reminiscences]] > [[A German Deserter's War Experience]] > '''XII AT THE MARNE---IN THE MAW OF DEATH''' </p><hr>
−	~~Go To~~ [[~~XIII THE ROUT OF THE MARNE~~ \| '''~~Next Chapter~~''']]	+

Hirgen at 04:51, 31 October 2008

2008-10-31T04:51:01Z

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	all the rest, lay down on mattresses that were lying about the		all the rest, lay down on mattresses that were lying about the
	rooms and slept---slept like door-mice.		rooms and slept---slept like door-mice.
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		+	Go To [[XIII THE ROUT OF THE MARNE \| '''Next Chapter''']]

Hirgen at 01:50, 2 September 2008

2008-09-02T01:50:51Z

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<CENTER>XII 

AT THE MARNE ---IN THE MAW OF DEATH </CENTER>

 WE got in the neighborhood of the line of defense, and were
received by a rolling fire from the machineguns. We went up to
the improvised trenches that were to protect us, at the double-quick.
It was raining hard. The fields around were covered with dead
and wounded men who impeded the work of the defenders. Many of
the wounded contracted tetanus in consequence of contact with
the clayey soil, for most of them had not been bandaged. They
all begged for water and bread, but we had none ourselves. In
fact, they implored us to give them a bit of bread. They had been
in that hell for two days without having eaten a mouthful.

 We had scarcely been shown our places when the French began
to attack in mass formation. The occupants of those trenches,
who had already beaten back several of those attacks, spurred
us on to shoot and then began to fire themselves into the on-rushing
crowd as if demented. Amidst the shouting and the noise one could
hear the cries of the officers of the infantry: "Fire! Fire!
More lively!" We fired until the barrels of our rifles became
quite hot. The enemy turned to flee. The heap of victims lying
between us and our opponents had again been augmented by hundreds.
The attack had been beaten back.

 It was dark, and it rained and rained. From all directions
one heard in the darkness the wounded calling, crying, and moaning.
The wounded we had with us were likewise moaning and crying. All
wanted to have their wounds dressed, but we had no more bandages.
We tore off pieces of our dirty shirts and placed the rags on
those sickening wounds. Men were dying one after the other. There
were no doctors, no bandages; we had nothing whatever. You had
to help the wounded and keep the French off at the same time.
It was an unbearable, impossible state of things. It rained harder
and harder. We were wet to our skins. We fired blindly into the
darkness. The rolling fire of rifles increased, then died away,
then increased again. We sappers were placed among the infantry.
My neighbor gave me a dig in the ribs.

 "I say," he called out.

 "What do you want? " I asked.

 "Who are you?"

 "A sapper."

 "Come here," he hissed. "It gives you an uncanny
feeling to be alone in this hell of a night. Why are you here
too?---They'll soon come again, those over there; then there'll
be fine fun again. Do you hear the others cry?"

 He laughed. Suddenly he began again: "I always shoot at
those until they leave off crying that's great fun."

 Again he laughed, that time more shrilly than before.

 I knew what was the matter. He had become insane. A man passed
with ammunition. I begged him to go at once and fetch the section
leader. The leader, a lieutenant of the infantry, came up. I went
to meet him and told him that my neighbor was continually, firing
at the wounded, was talking nonsense, and was probably insane.
The lieutenant placed himself between us. "Can you see anything?"
he asked the other man. "What? See? No; but I hear them moaning
and crying, and as soon as I hit one---well, he is quiet, he goes
to sleep---" The lieutenant nodded at me. He took the gun
away from the man. But the latter snatched it quickly away again
and jumped out of the trench. From there he fired into the crowd
of wounded men until, a few seconds after, he dropped down riddled
by several bullets.

 The drama had only a few spectators. It was scarcely over when
it was forgotten again. That was no place to become sentimental.
We continued shooting without any aim. The crying of the wounded
became louder and louder. Why was that so? Those wounded men,
lying between the two fighting lines, were exposed to the aimless
fire of both sides. Nobody could help them, for it would have
been madness to venture between the lines. Louder and more imploring
became the voices that were calling out, "Stretcherbearer!
Help! Help! Water!" For an answer they got at most a curse
or a malediction.

 Our trench was filled with water for about a foot water and
mud. The dead and wounded lay in that mire where they had dropped.
We had to make room. So we threw the dead out of the trench. At
one o'clock in the night people came with stretchers and took
away part of the wounded. But there was no help at all for the
poor fellows between the lines.

 To fill the cup of misery we received orders, in the course
of the night, to attack the enemy's lines at 4:15 o'clock in the
morning. At the time fixed, in a pouring rain, we got ready for
storming. Received by a terrible fire from the machine-guns we
had to turn back half-way. Again we had sacrificed uselessly a
great number of men. Scarcely had we arranged ourselves again
in our trench when the French began a new attack. They got as
far as three yards from our trenches when their attack broke down
under our fire. They, too, had to go back with enormous losses.
Three times more the French attacked within two hours, each time
suffering great losses and achieving not the slightest success.

 We did not know what to do. If help did not arrive soon it
would be impossible for us to maintain our position. We were tormented
by hunger and thirst, were wet to the skin, and tired enough to
drop down. At ten o'clock the French attacked a fourth time. They
came up in immense masses. Our leaders recognized at last the
danger in which we were and withdrew us. We retreated in waves
abandoning the wounded and our material. By exerting our whole
strength we succeeded in saving the machine-guns and ammunition.
We went back a thousand yards and established ourselves again
in old trenches. The officers called to us that we should have
to stay there whatever happened; reinforcements would soon come
up. The machine-guns were in their emplacements in a jiffy. Our
opponents, who were following us, were immediately treated to
a hail of bullets. Their advance stopped at once. Encouraged by
that success we continued firing more wildly than ever so that
the French were obliged to seek cover. The reinforcements we had
been promised did not arrive. Some 800 yards behind us were six
German batteries which, however, maintained but a feeble fire.

 An officer of the artillery appeared in our midst and asked
the commander of our section whether it would not be wise to withdraw
the batteries. He said he had been informed by telephone that
the whole German line was wavering. Before the commander had time
to answer another attack in mass formation took place, the enemy
being five or seven times as numerous as we were. As if by command,
we quitted our position without having been told to do so, completely
demoralized; we retired in full flight, leaving the six batteries
(36 guns) to the enemy. Our opponent had ceased his curtain of
fire fearing to endanger his own advancing troops. The Germans
used that moment to bring into battle reinforcements composed
of a medley of all arms. Portions of scattered infantry, dismounted
cavalry, sappers without a lord and master, all had been drummed
together to fill the ranks. Apparently there were no longer any
proper complete reserve formations on that day of battle.

 Again we got the order, "Turn! Attention!"

 The unequal fight started again. We observed how the enemy
made preparations to carry off the captured guns. We saw him advance
to the assault. He received us with the bayonet. We fought like
wild animals. For minutes there was bayonet fighting of a ferocity
that defies description. We stabbed and hit like madmen---through
the chest, the abdomen, no matter where. There was no semblance
of regular bayonet fighting; that, by the way, can only be practised
in the barracks yard. The butt-ends of our rifles swished through
the air. Every skull that came in our way was smashed-in. We had
lost helmets and knapsacks. In spite of his great numerical superiority
the enemy could not make headway against our little barrier of
raving humanity. We forgot all around us and fought bloodthirstily
without any calculation. A portion of our fellows had broken through
the ranks of the enemy, and fought for the possession of the guns.

 Our opponent recognized the danger that was threatening him
and retired, seeking with all his might to retain the captured
guns. We did not allow ourselves to be shaken off, and bayoneted
the retiring foes one, after the other. But the whole mass of
the enemy gathered again round the guns. Every gun was surrounded
by corpses, every minute registered numerous victims. The artillery
who took part in the fight attempted to remove the breech-blocks
of the guns. To my right, around the third gun, three Germans
were still struggling with four Frenchmen; all the others, were
lying on the ground dead or wounded. Near that one gun were about
seventy dead or wounded men. A sapper could be seen before the
mouth of the gun. With astonishing coolness he was stuffing into
the mouth of that gun one hand grenade after another. He then
lit the fuse and ran away. Friends and enemies were torn into
a thousand shreds by the terrible explosion that followed. The
gun was entirely demolished. Seventy or eighty men had slaughtered
each other for nothing---absolutely nothing.

 After a struggle lasting nearly one hour all the guns were
again in our possession. Who can imagine the enormous loss of
human lives with which those lost guns had been recaptured! The
dead and wounded, infantry, cavalry, sappers and artillery, together
with the Frenchmen, hundreds and hundreds of them, were covering
the narrow space, that comparatively small spot which had been
the scene of the tragedy.

 We were again reinforced, that time by four regular companies
of infantry, which had been taken from another section of the
battle-field. Though one takes part in everything, one's view
as an individual is very limited, and one has no means of informing
oneself about the situation in general. Here, too, we found ourselves
in a similar situation. But those reinforcements composed of all
arms, and the later arrivals, who had been taken from a section
just as severely threatened as our own, gave us the presentiment
that we could only resist further attacks if fresh troops arrived
soon. If only we could get something to quiet the pangs of hunger
and that atrocious thirst!

 The horses of the guns now arrived at a mad gallop to take
away the guns. At the same moment the enemy's artillery opened
a murderous fire, with all sizes of guns, on that column of more
than thirty teams that were racing along. Confusion arose. The
six horses of the various teams reared and fled in all directions,
drawing the overturned limbers behind them with wheels uppermost.
Some of the maddest animals ran straight into the hottest fire
to be torn to pieces together with their drivers. Then our opponent
directed his fire on the battery positions which were also our
positions. We had no other choice---we had either to advance or
retire. Retire? No! The order was different. We were to recapture
our lost first positions, now occupied by the French, who were
now probably getting ready for another attack. Had we not received
fresh food for cannon so that the mad dance could begin again?
We advanced across a field covered with thousands upon thousands
of torn and bleeding human bodies.

 No shot was fired. Only the enemy's artillery was still bombarding
the battery positions. We were still receiving no fire from the
artillery; neither did the enemy's infantry fire upon us. That
looked suspicious; we knew what was coming. We advanced farther
and farther without being molested. Suddenly we found ourselves
attacked by an army of machine-guns. An indescribable hail of
bullets was poured into us. We threw ourselves to the ground and
sought cover as well as we could. "Jump forward! March, march!"
Again we ran to meet our fate. We had lost already more than a
third of our men. We halted again, exhausted. Scarcely had we
had time to take up a position when we were attacked both in front
and the flank. We had no longer strength enough to withstand successfully
a simultaneous frontal and flank attack. Besides, we were being
almost crushed by superior numbers. Our left wing had been completely
cut off, and we observed our people on that wing raising their
hands to indicate that they considered themselves prisoners of
war. However, the French gave no quarter ---exactly as we had
acted on a former occasion. Not a man of our left wing was spared;
every one was cut down.

 We in the center could give them no help. We were getting less
from minute to minute. "Revenge for Sommepy!" I heard
it ringing in my ears. The right wing turned, drew us along, and
a wild stampede began. Our direct retreat being cut off, we ran
backwards across the open field, every one for himself, with beating
hearts that seemed ready to burst, all the time under the enemy's
fire.

 After a long run we reached a small village to the northeast
of Vitry-le-François. There we arrived without rifles,
helmets or knapsacks; one after the other. But only a small portion
could save themselves. The French took plenty of booty. All the
guns we fought for were lost, besides several others. Of the hundreds
of soldiers there remained scarcely one hundred. All the others
were dead, wounded or missing. Who knew?

 Was that the terrible German war machine? Were those the cowardly,
degenerated Frenchmen whom we had driven before us for days? No;
it was war, terrible, horrid war, in which fortune is fickle.
To-day it smiles upon you; to-morrow the other fellow's turn comes.

 We sought to form up again in companies. There were just twelve
men left of our company. Little by little more came up from all
directions until at last we counted twenty. Then every one began
to ask questions eagerly; every one wanted to know about his friend,
mate, or acquaintance. Nobody could give an answer, for every
one of us had been thinking merely of himself and of nobody else.
Driven by hunger we roamed about the place. But our first action
was drinking water, and that in such quantities as if we wanted
to drink enough for a lifetime. We found nothing to eat. Only
here and there in a garden we discovered a few turnips which we
swallowed with a ravenous appetite without washing or even cleaning
them superficially.

 But where was our company? Nobody knew. We were the company,
the twenty of us. And the officers? "Somewhere," a soldier
observed, "somewhere in a bomb-proof shelter." What
were we to do? We did not know. Soon after a sergeant-major of
the field gendarmes came up sitting proudly on his steed. Those
"defenders of the Fatherland" have to see to it that
too many "shirkers" do not "loiter behind the front."
"You are sappers, aren't you?" he roared out. "What
are you doing here? 30th. Regiment?" He put a great many
questions which we answered as well as we were able to. "Where
are the others?" "Over there," said a young Berliner,
and pointed to the battle-field, "dead or prisoners; maybe
some have saved themselves and are elsewhere!" "It doesn't
matter," roared out our fierce sergeant-major for whom the
conversation began to become unpleasant. "Wait till I come
back." "Where are the officers?" Again nobody could
answer him. "What are their names? I daresay I shall find
them. Maybe they are at Vitry?" We gave him their names---Captain
Menke, First Lieutenant Maier, Lieutenants of the Reserves Spahn,
Neesen and Heimbach. He gave us a certificate with which to prove
the purpose of our "loitering" to other overseers and
disappeared. "Let's hope the horse stumbles and the fellow
breaks his neck." That was our pious wish which one of our
chaps sent after him.

 We went into one of the houses that had been pillaged like
all the rest, lay down on mattresses that were lying about the
rooms and slept---slept like door-mice.

XII AT THE MARNE---IN THE MAW OF DEATH - Revision history

Bkimberl at 18:42, 13 July 2009

Hirgen at 04:51, 31 October 2008

Hirgen at 01:50, 2 September 2008