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By July 1, 1916, the magnitude of the Russian success was no longer hidden from German or Austrian. Upward of 400,000 prisoners were claimed by the Russians, whose estimates of prisoners had hitherto proved reliable; guns, supplies, munitions had been captured in incredible amounts, and an Austrian collapse like to that of Lemberg seemed at hand.
This marked the culmination of a successful Teuton campaign in Galicia, including the recapture of the strong fortress of Przemysl, as well as Lemberg, and the driving of the Russian invaders back to their own borders.
"Two of these requisites we already have; but the escapement announces that arms of the latest improvements cannot be furnished, because the government has not got them." "Well, the old ones will answer." "They would if we had enough flints; but they are not to be had, because the insurrectionary Poles have captured the flint depot in Lemberg." "Each man certainly could get a flint for himself."
In these figures the booty taken by the Allied troops fighting in the Carpathians, and north of the Vistula, is not included. This amounts to a further 40,000 prisoners. Przemysl surrendered to the German's on June 3, 1915, only ten weeks after the Russian capture of the fortress, which had caused such exultation." General von Mackensen continued toward Lemberg, the capital of Galicia.
This meant a retreat not for days, but perhaps for weeks. It meant that Przemysl must be given up, and Lemberg, and even Warsaw, but the safety of the Russian army was of more importance than a province or a city.
In this situation Germany, seemingly on the point of taking Verdun, had to turn her attention toward the east and direct new troops and new reserves of munitions and guns to Volhynia and Galicia to save Lemberg.
But during the early summer of 1915 a German army under General von Mackensen had been sent into Galicia to cooperate with the Austrian forces in freeing Przemysl and Lemberg after they had assisted in throwing back the left wing of the Russian forces then fighting in Galicia and in forcing them to relinquish their hold on the mountain passes of the Carpathians.
As soon, however, as the Austrians realized the impossibility of an advance on Warsaw they concentrated their large and overwhelming forces in an attempt to outflank the right wing of the Russian army, which was drawing slowly but surely towards Lemberg, On the other Russian flank the two Russian army corps, after crossing the River Zlota Lipa without much opposition, continued their advance to the River Knila Lipa, where they found the bridges had all been destroyed by the Austrian advance guards.
When war between Italy and Austria broke out the Austrians had already commenced the vast operations which flung Russia from the Carpathians and behind Lemberg.
At several points the Russian cavalry led the attack after the artillery had done its work. A division of young Russians, by an impetuous attack, captured a bridge-head on the Styr and took 2, German and Austrian troops and much rich booty. In Galicia the Russian armies crossed the Stripa and by June 10 were once more too near Lemberg for the comfort of the Austrian garrison.
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