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Meuse-Argonne - Meuse-Argonne Meuse River-Argonne Forest (World War I), 1918. With the elimination of the Saint-Mihiel salient, the Allied commander in chief, Marshal Ferdinand Foch,
stood ready to launch two all-out attacks against the Germans on the Western Front. The offensive was planned as a huge pincers: British and French armies attacking from the west, the
American Expeditionary Force from the south. On September 26 Gen. John Pershing's First Army jumped off, three corps abreast-Ill, V, and I from the Meuse River westward to the far side of the
Argonne Forest. A few minutes earlier the French Fourth Army (Henri Gouraud) had begun its advance on the left (west). Holding a defensive zone almost 12 miles deep were the German armies of
Gen. Max von Gallwitz on the east, those of Crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm on the west. In hilly, tangled terrain, German resistance held the French army to a gain of nine miles during the
first five days of the assault. The Americans pushed five miles along the heights of the Meuse but only two miles in the more difficult Argonne. After a pause of three days, the Americans
resumed the attack on October 4. For the next four weeks a series of grueling frontal attacks gradually pushed back the German defenders. This was the fighting that produced the famed Lost
Battalion (Charles Whittlesey) of the 77th Division and the exploits of Sgt. Alvin York (132 prisoners captured). On October 12 Pershing divided his command. General Hunter Liggett took over
the First Army, while Gen. Robert Bullard assumed charge of the new Second Army, which was making a secondary attack east of the Meuse. Finally, on October 31, the Argonne Forest was cleared,
marking a ten-mile American advance. At the same time Gouraud's French Fourth Army had reached the Aisne River, 20 miles from its starting point. On November 1 the Americans and French resumed
their offensive against the German armies, which were now under Gen. Wilhelm Groener, who had replaced Gen. Erich Ludendorff as chief operations officer on the Western Front. By the time of
the armistice, on November ii, the Allied units had moved forward another 21 miles to reach Sedan on the east and to within 6 miles of Montmedy, on the west. The battle cost the Germans 100,000
casualties; American losses were 117,000. Meanwhile the western arm of the pincers had been equally effective. See Marne River II; Saint Mihiel; Cambrai-Saint-Quentin; World War I.
Photo - An American gun crew from Regimental Headquarters Company, 23rd Infantry, 2nd Division, firing 37mm gun during an advance against German entrenched positions.
Department of Defense. Department of the Army. Office of the Chief Signal Officer, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Map - Sedan–Verdun and vicinity: The Meuse–Argonne offensive, September–November 1918 (c. 1938)
| Tommy Trampp |
