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This was the first German offensive movement since their retreat from the Marne, and it was powerful and well handled. General Foch fell back into defensive positions, but had much ado to hold his own. He evaded giving battle around Rheims and took up a position at Souain, which he held with the jaunty obstinacy he had displayed so often in the retreat through northern France.
This wooded region extends over a width of more than a mile. The arrangements made for the attack contemplated, after the capture of la Poche, the surrounding of the woods of the Trou Bricot. The junction was to be made at the road from Souain to Tahure, with the troops assigned for the attack on the eastern border of the hollow at Souain.
To the north of Perthes, a comparatively tranquil region of uniform aspect, forming between the wooded hills of the Trou Bricot and those of the Butte du Mesnil a passage two miles wide, barred by several lines of trenches and ending at a series of heights the Butte de Souain, Hills 195 and 201 and the Butte de Tahure, surmounted by the second German line.
At dawn the reconstituted regiments made another forward rush which enabled them to establish themselves in immediate contact with the second German position from the Butte de Souain to the Butte de Tahure, and even to seize several advanced posts in the neighborhood.
The hollow, in which lies the pretty village of Souain and where the first German line follows its edge. The road from Souain to Pomme-Py describes the radius of this semicircle. The farm of Navarin stands on the top of the hills two miles north of Souain.
In the region of Lombaertzyde on March 15, the French artillery very effectively bombarded the German works. When the Germans attempted to recapture the small fort which was taken from them on the night of March 1 they were repulsed and left fifty dead. The French losses were small. To the north of Arras, a brilliant attack by the French infantry enabled them to capture, by a single effort, three lines of trenches on the spur of Notre Dame de Lorette, and to reach the edge of the plateau. The French captured one hundred prisoners including several officers. They also destroyed two machine guns and blew up an ammunition store. Farther to the south, in the region of Eeurie-Roclincourt, near the road from Lille, they blew up several German trenches and prevented their reconstruction. In Champagne the French made fresh progress. They gained ground in the woods to the northeast of Souain and to the northwest of Perthes. They also repulsed two German counterattacks in front of Ridge 196, northeast of Mesnil, and extended their position in that sector. In the region of Bagatelle in the Argonne two German counterattacks were repulsed. The French demolished a blockhouse there, and established themselves on the site of it. Between Four-de-Paris and Bolante the Germans attempted two counterattacks which failed. At Vauquois the French infantry delivered an attack which gave it possession of the western part of the village. Here they made prisoners. At the Bois-le-Prêtre, northeast of Pont-
The territorial gains may be thus summarized: The troops of the Republic had scaled the whole of the glacis of the Épine de Vedegrange; they occupied the ridge of the hollow at Souain; debouched in the opening to the north of Perthes to the slopes of Hill 195 and as far as the Butte de Tahure; carried the western bastions of the curtain of le Mesnil; advanced as far as Maisons de Champagne and took by assault the "hand" of Massiges.
The left took possession of the woods lining the road from Saint-Hilaire to Saint-Souplet as far as the Épine de Vedegrange. Along the whole extent of the wooded heights as far as the western side of the hollow at Souain the success was identical.
Sector of Souain: The German lines round about Souain described a wide curve. Close to the French trenches, to the west at the Mill and to the east at the wood of Sabot, they swerved to the extent of about a mile to the north of the village and of the source of the Ain.
I do wish, for many reasons, that you could have heard the recitation by Brochard of Jean Bastia's "L'Autre Cortege," in which the poet foresees the day "When Joffre shall return down the Champs Elysées" to the frenzied cries of the populace saluting its victorious army, and greeting with wild applause "Pétain, who kept Verdun inviolated," "De Castelnau, who three times in the fray saw a son fall at his side," "Gouraud, the Fearless," "Marchand, who rushed on the Boches brandishing his cane," "Mangin, who retook Douaumont," and "All those brave young officers, modest even in glory, whose deeds the world knows without knowing their names," and the soldier heroes who held the frontier "like a wall of steel from Flanders to Alsace," the heroes of Souchez, of Dixmude, of the Maison du Passeur, of Souain, of Notre Dame de Lorette, and of the great retreat.
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