THE BATTLE OF THE MARNE.•
NEARLY throe years have passed since Marechal Joffe) fought and won the gigantic battle of the Marne, the first and also the last open battle fought in the West by the massed armies. At the time we were given a very imperfect account of the details of the conflict, and the French and British Staffs have boon far too busy ever since to compile a complete official narrative, which when it appears will doubtless fill several bulky volumes like those of the official history of the war in Manchuria. Major Whitton's book, in which the despatches and many unofficial accounts are carefully collated, is a very useful and well-written narrative of thoso Septem- ber days during which the invader was checked and flung back, and his whole plan of campaign was brought to naught. He de- scribes briefly and clearly the course of the war up to September 4th, when Mardchal Joffre issued orders for a general attack, to begin on the Gth, but the interest of tho book centres in the battle itself.
Thorn have been two rival theories of the Marne. The common view was from the first, and is still, that General Mounoury's flank attack on the Ourcq upon General von Kluck, who commended on the Gorman right, was the deciding factor. The other view, which was put forward later, and still has some advocates, is that General Foch, in the French centre, determined the victory by driving a wedge through the German lines opposite to him, in the marshes of St. Gond, duo south of Epernay. Major Whitton adopts the earlier theory, and supports it by a good deal of evidence. It has to be re- membered, of course, that the doings of General Muunoury's 6th Army, which was based on Paris, and which fought desperately for a week in tie Meaux-Senlis region within cony reach of the capital, were naturally reported more fully than the work of the armies further to the oast. The British Army was co-operating mainly with General Maunoury, and the British correspondents in Paris would thus naturally attach special importance to the loft, or western wing, of the French hosts. Still, oven if we make allow- ance for this, there seem, little doubt that General Mammary 's army really played the leading part, and that the reinforcements hurried out to him in long processions of taxi-cabs on September 9th enabled General Maunoury to press his attack at a critical moment., so that at 8 p.m. General von Kluck felt bound to i.ue orders for a general retreat. This was Marechal Jollres design, expressed in his orders of the 4th :— " Advantage meat be taken of the risky situation of the German let Army to concentrate against it the efforts of the Allied Armies on our extreme loft. All preparations must be made during the 6th for an attack on the Gth September. The following general arrangements are to be carried out by the evening of the 5th September ;—(a) All the available forma of the 11th Army north- east of Meaux are to bo ready to cross the Ourcq between Lies, and May-on-Multion, in the general direction of Château Thierry. (6) The British Army is to establish itself in the line Changis- Coulominiors, facing east, ready to attack in the general direction of Monttnirail."
Major Whitton shows that those orders could not be executed literally. General von Kluck, though caught in the midst of hi: audacious flank march across the Allied front, offered such a vigor- ous resistance, and brought up his corps south of the Mame to re- inforce his right so rapidly that General Maunoury, instead of out. flanking the enemy, was in grave danger, on September 8th, of being himself outflanked in the direction of Smalls. The Gth French Army could not cross the Ourcq on September 6th ; it did not pass the river till early on the 1001, after four days of the most desperate • The Marne Campaign. By Major F. E. Whitton. Lone.: Constable and Co. tiOs. eat net.'
fighting. Late on the 9th, the 4th French corps, which was almost worn out in defending the extreme left against the Gennan outflank. ing attack from Santouil, received the order from General Maunoury to hold its ground to the last man, and this devoted corps was ten or twelve miles west of the river. Tho result was that the British Army, whose movements depended on General Maunoury, could not carry out the programme allotted to it. General French had two rivers, the Grand Morin and Petit Morin, to cross before lie could push his loft wing up to Changis on the Marne, in face of General von Marwits with a very largo force of cavalry and artillery. Instead of moving from west to east, he had to fight his way from south to north, bearing to his left, well away from Montmirail, which fell to the 5th French Army on his right. 'The uppercut stoatsss of the British advance is thus fully explained, and Major Whitton does well to make the matter clear. His one very large map, giving the position on the evening of the 9th, is excellent, but needs to be sup- plemented by maps illustrating the situation from day to day, such as are given in M.flustave Habilis invaluable little chronicle of the battle.
Although Major Whitton does not think that General Foch in the centre delivered the decisive stroke, he gives a fairly complete account of the admirable work done by that commander and his colleagues. English readers need to be reminded that while General Mautioury was attacking the German right, the enemy wore trying their 'utmost to smash in the French centre, eolith of Chalons, and also to break their extreme right east of the Meuse and in front of Nancy. Had not the French hatch the Grand Couronnd on the 13th September against the Bavarian attacks, deli. ored under the eyes of the Kaiser himself, and repulsed with awful slaughter, and had not Fort Troyon held out, though reduced to a heap of ruins, Verdun would have been outflanked from the south, General Sarrail on the right would have boon in danger of destruction, and the whole battle might have been lost. The French armies all deserve the highest prides) for the determined valour with which they fought through that terrible week. General Foch had, perhaps, to sustain the most a iolont Gorman assaults, orpocially from the Guards on his left which was temporarily thrust back; but Ootiond Frenchwt d'Esperoy on his loft, and Generals Langlo do Cary and Sarrail to his right, wore also very heavily engaged, and displayed the high°t ability in performing their tasks. if wo beer in mind that the whole of the Allied Armies were fighting hard from the 8th to the 12th September, we shall understand why the pursuit of the retreating enemy could not be pressed. If Mareehal Joffro had had a frail: army in reserve to hurl at the Germans:, if we had had a new Expeditionary Force ready to march on Lifle,the invaders might well have been thrust back in confusion to the frontier. But it is unprofitable to consider such possibilities. In the circumstanc., the Allies did extremely won to arrest the invaders, and compel them to retire ninny tMlee northward. The greatest battle over fought ended in an Allied victory which changed the whole course of the war, and altered the whole outlook for Europe.
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