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From that time on each day marked a new German victory, and in spite of the most desperate fighting the Russians were forced back until, on the 11th, the bulk of their line lay just west of the lower San as far as Przemysl and then south to the upper Dniester. The armies were in retreat, but were not routed. In a fortnight the army of Dmitrieff had fallen back eighty-five miles.
Regarded merely as a short cut to Przemysl and Lemberg, the Uzsok was a useful possession provided always that the northern debouchment could be cleared and an exit forced. But the Russians held these debouchments with a firm grip, and the pass was consequently of no use to the Austrians.
Depleted by disease, subsisting on horseflesh, and surrounded by a superior force of Russians, the garrison of Przemysl was forced to surrender, but fell with honor, the gallant character of the defense under General von Kusmanek being conceded on all sides. The Russian commander who received the surrender was General Seliwanoff.
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.
At that point Brussilov's center withstood for several days the Austrian second army which was commanded by the German General von Linsengen. The Russian success here saved Lemberg, prevented the relief of Przemysl and gave time to send reinforcements into Bukovina. The Austrian third army, moving on Bukovina, had the greatest Austrian success.
With difficulty these extricated themselves and retired behind the San. Przemysl fell, Lemberg was lost and Dubno and Lutsk, two of the three Volhynian fortresses, fell. The Russian armies in Poland were thus threatened with complete envelopment; they were caught between the closing jaws of the pincers, which were Mackensen and Hindenburg.
These tactics of destroying approaches naturally isolated the town more than ever, and made it exceedingly difficult afterward to convey food supplies to the starving population. On Monday morning, March 22, 1915, the Austrian chief of staff appeared outside the lines of Przemysl under a flag of truce.
Reinforcements, however, now reached the Russians; Stanislau was recaptured, the Austrians lost much of what they had gained, and on the 22nd Przemysl weakly surrendered. Its fame as a fortress had been enhanced by its five months' siege since October, but it did not redound to the credit of its defenders.
For two days and nights all the works of Przemysl were taken under, an uninterrupted terrible artillery fire, including that of modern howitzers of all calibers, up to eighteen centimeters. Then followed an assault at night on the east front, which, however, was again bloodily repelled."
With these they blasted away Russian line after line, driving the Russians finally almost completely out of Galicia, after retaking Przemysl on June 3, 1915, and Lemberg on June 24, 1915. In the north, in the meantime, the Germans had received reenforcements filling the gap that Von Mackensen's Galician operations had caused.
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