United States or Mexico ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
By November 12, 1914, Przemysl was once more completely besieged by General Selivanoff with not more than 100,000 troops. Przemysl is one of the oldest towns of Galicia, said to have been founded in the eighth century. It was once the capital of a large independent principality.
There was a time, when the Russians were taking Przemysl, when Rumania's tide seemed to be at the flood if ever it was going to be.
While the forts of Przemysl were being smashed in the north, Von Linsingen was pounding and demolishing the Russian positions between Uliczna and Bolechov. Heavy mortars and howitzers were at the same time being placed into position in front of the Russian trenches between Holobutow and Stryj.
Now that our organization has been completed and all branches of the service are working harmoniously, we entertain no doubts as to our ability to hold the enemy at all points and to drive him back from that section of Galicia which is still in his possession." Three days before the fall of Przemysl the Russians abandoned the defensive and commenced a vigorous attack on the Carpathian front.
On March 22d Przemysl fell. The capture of Przemysl was the greatest success that Russia had so far attained. It had been besieged for about four months, and the taking of the fortress was hailed as the first spectacular success of the war. Its capture altered the whole situation.
A German division arrived at Lubaczovka, due north of Jaroslav, and half of the Germanic circle around Przemysl was now drawn. The German plan was an advance in force from the Sieniava-Jaroslav front against the Przemysl-Lemberg railway, the most vulnerable point of the Russian line of retreat from the fortress.
South of the village of Naklo, between Przemysl and Mosciska, a hill 650 feet high was violently attacked; it commanded the only line of retreat from the fortress still left open. To the south of the town the Russian counteroffensive tried to outflank the Austrian troops which had approached close to the fortress and the railroad to Lemberg.
Over the slushy roads of the valleys and into the snow-laden passes the Germanic armies advanced, each of the widely deployed columns with a definite objective: From Dukla, Lupkow, and Rostoki to relieve Przemysl; from Uzsok through the valley of the Upper San to Sambor; through Beskid and Vereczke northward to Stryj, thence westward also to Sambor; over Wyszkow to Dolina; via Jablonitza to Delatyn; and across Kirlibaba and Dorna Vatra into the Bukowina.
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.
Lemberg had been in Russian possession for 293 days. A German attack near Rawa-Ruska was repulsed by the Russians on June 25, 1915. For two days the "phalanx" rested to replenish its stock of shells; when these had arrived along the Przemysl line, Von Mackensen turned northward in the direction of Kholm on the Lublin-Brest-Litovsk railway.
Word Of The Day