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From Losnitza, where the main column of Austrians crossed the Drina to Valievo, runs the River Jadar, along a level valley, which narrows as it nears Valievo. On the left-hand side of the Jadar Valley rise the southern slopes of the Tzer Mountains, covered with cornfields, prune orchards, with here and there a stretch of thick timber.
Here it was that he struck the Western Morava and the railroad passing along it eastward from Ushitze to its junction with the main line. Farther to the westward his cavalry, on October 26, 1915, had occupied Valievo on the Upper Kolubara and one of his divisions had crossed the Maljen Mountains, where the Austrians had been so humiliatingly defeated the year before.
Two days later, early in the morning, two Austrian aeroplanes whirred over the River Save and circled over Krupani, Shaoatz and Valievo. The last doubts were then dispelled; the attack was coming from the east. And finally, on August 12, 1914, the message flashed over the wires that the outposts had seen boats in movement, full of soldiers, behind an island on the Drina, opposite Loznitza.
Though we shall see that they did not reach it at their first attempt, there is no doubt that the main objective of the Austrians was the little town of Valievo, lying some distance back from the Jadar and the field of battle. For at Valievo is the terminus of a light railway which joins with the main line running from Belgrade down to Saloniki.
The former kingdom was divided into five territorial divisional districts Nish, Valievo, Belgrade, Kragujevatz, and Zaitchar. Each of these territorial divisional districts was subdivided into four regimental recruiting districts, each of which provided one infantry regiment of four battalions and one depot battalion.
Their object was to envelop the Serbs and seize, firstly, Valievo, their advanced base, secondly, Kraguievatz the Serbian arsenal, and, finally, Nish, to which the Serbian Court and Government had withdrawn.
But individually her troops were far better fighters than their opponents, and the Crown Prince, Marshal Putnik, and General Míshitch, the commander of the 1st Serbian Army, quite outclassed Potiorek in tactics, strategy, and knowledge of the terrain. By 10 November the Austrians were in Valievo, and Potiorek was inclined to rest on his laurels.
But their principal armies were centrally grouped along the line Palanka-Arangelovatz-Lazarevatz, while weaker, though important, detachments were stationed in the vicinity of Valievo, a branch railroad terminus, and Uzitze.
But new Russian attacks having compelled Austria to recall many of her troops, the remaining Hapsburg forces in Serbia were almost destroyed in the bloody defeat of Valievo in December. To offset this the Germans soon won one more great victory in East Prussia, at the Mazurian Lakes, where another Russian army was well-nigh destroyed by the quick-marching, better-trained German troops.
In addition the Austrians also threw bridges across the river at Amajlia and Branjevo. Thus it will be seen that the invasion covered a front of considerably over a hundred miles and that six strong columns of the enemy had crossed, all of which naturally converged on Valievo. For Valievo was the terminus of a small, single track railroad which joined the main line at Mladenovatz.
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