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Yet the hordes still came on, with a bravery never surpassed, and, in spite of every effort, in spite of a superb display of courage and tenacity, the French were forced to retire up the slopes towards Bezonvaux, and so in the direction of the fortress of Douaumont perched up aloft and looking down upon the scene of this sanguinary conflict.
Towards the former of these two places the garrison of Ornes was also compelled to beat a retreat, finding itself at Bezonvaux, at the mouth of a ravine, which ascends the heights leading to that fortress already mentioned, which was to be the scene of a terrible battle in days now near at hand.
Only a desperate rally enabled the French to keep their front intact while their left was withdrawn from Champneuville and Talou hill to Vacherauville and the Poivre hill, and their right from Bezonvaux and the Bois des Caurières to the Douaumont plateau.
Fighting continued there until late in the afternoon, when the German garrison in Bezonvaux Redoubt, about five kilometers beyond the original French line, surrendered. It was especially encouraging to the Allies that in this impressive victory only four French divisions participated, while it was known from prisoners taken that the Germans had five divisions in the field.
In this advance the French troops captured the villages of Vacherauville and Louvemont, the fortified farm of Chambrettes, and the fortified fieldworks of Hardaumont and Bezonvaux. The results gained by the French in this advance compare favorably with General Mangin's sensational exploit on October 24, 1916, when Fort Douaumont was taken.
Let us but say that they had been driven in four miles from the northern posts they had held, and on the east had been forced to fall back via Bezonvaux. But those positions had been but flimsily held, but indifferently fortified, when compared with the main defensive positions arranged by our allies.
Those defences, placed at intervals along the chain of hills right from Apremont away to Bezonvaux, had been the greatest secret which France possessed.
The French center included the Bois de la Ville, Herbebois, and Ornes, with the woods of Beaumont, La Wavrille, Les Fosses, Le Chaume, and Les Caurières as the second position. The French right included Maucourt, Mogeville, the Haytes-Charrières Wood, and Fromezey, with a second position covering Bezonvaux, Grand-Chena, and Dieppe.
At this moment the line of the American sector, from right to left, began at Port-sur-Seille, thence across the Moselle to Vandieres and through the Woevre to Bezonvaux, in the foothills of the Meuse, thence along to the foothills and through the northern edge of the Woevre forests to the Meuse at Mouzay, thence along the Meuse connecting with the French under Sedan.
"Well, you are wanted, wanted badly, for we've fought our way back from Ornes and Bezonvaux, and there are precious few of us left to do more fighting. You are fresh at the game eh? my comrades." "Fresh!" ejaculated Jules, looking quite indignant. "Bien! But I hardly meant that," the poilu told them. "In appearance you are not fresh. No, certainly not; far from it.
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