FALL OF PRZEMYSL

The town and fortress of Przemysl formally surrendered to the Russian General Selivanoff on Monday, March 22, 1915. The first investment began at the early stages of the war in September, 1914. On the 27th of that month the Russian generalissimo announced that all communications had been cut off. By October 15, 1914, the Russian investment had been broken again, and for a matter of three weeks, while the road was open, more troops, provisions, arms, and munitions were rushed to the spot. As we have seen, however, the Russians recovered their lost advantage, for, after the fall of Jaroslav, the fortress to the north of Przemysl, their troops were hurried up from east, north, and west, and within a few days the Austrians were sent back along the whole front. From the region of Przemysl three railroads cross the Carpathians to Budapest, along all of which the Russians had pushed vigorously, besides advancing on the west. As regarded railroad communications, the fate of Przemysl was sealed by the capture of Chyrow, an important junction about twenty miles south of the fortress. Przemysl itself was important as a road junction and as a connecting link with the Uzsok and Lupkow passes. The garrison prepared to make a stubborn resistance with the object of checking the Russian pursuit. A week later the Russians had broken up their heavy artillery and had begun a steady bombardment. 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. In the fourteenth century Casimir the Great and other Polish princes endowed it with special civic privileges, and the town attained a high degree of commercial prosperity. In the seventeenth century its importance was destroyed by inroads of Tatars, Cossacks, and Swedes. Przemysl is situated on the River San, and was considered one of the strongest fortresses of Europe.

The original strategic idea embodied in the purpose of the fortress was purely defensive; in the event of war with Russia only the line of the San and Dniester was intended to be held at all costs, while the whole northeastern portion of Galicia was to be abandoned. With the fortress of Cracow guarding the west, Przemysl was meant to be the first defense between the two rivers and to hold the easiest roads to Hungary through the Dukla, Lupkow, and Uzsok passes. Within the last ten years, however, the Austrian War Staff altered its plans and decided upon a vigorous offensive against Russia should occasion offer, and that Eastern Galicia was not to be sacrificed. Hence a network of strategic railways was constructed with a view to attacking the prospective enemy on a wide front extending from the Vistula near Cracow on the west to the Bug on the east, where the latter flows into Austrian territory and cuts off a corner of eastern Galicia. The plan does not appear to have worked successfully, for, before the war was many days old, the Russians had taken Lemberg, swept across the Dniester at Halicz, across the San at Jaroslav, just north of Przemysl, and had already besieged the fortress, which at no time imposed any serious obstacle in the path of their progress. Perhaps the only useful purpose that Przemysl served was that it restrained the Russians from attempting an invasion of Hungary on a big scale, by holding out for nearly seven months. Not having sufficient siege artillery at their disposal, the Russians made no attempt to storm the place. General Selivanoff surrounded the forts with a wide circle of counterdefenses, which were so strongly fortified that the garrison would have found it an almost hopeless task to attempt a rush through the enemy's lines. The Austrian artillery was naturally well acquainted with the range of every point and position that lay within reach of their guns; and Selivanoff wisely offered them little opportunity for effective practice. Considering it too expensive to attack by the overland route, he worked his way gradually toward the forts by means of underground operations. To sap a position is slow work, but much more economical in the expenditure of lives and munitions. The weakness of Przemysl lay in the fact that its garrison was far too large for its needs, and that provisions were running short. In the early part of the campaign the Germanic armies operating in the San region had drawn freely on Przemysl for supplies, and before these could be adequately replaced the Russians had again forged an iron ring around the place. The Russian commander, moreover, was aware that a coming scarcity threatened the town, and that he had only to bide his time to starve it into submission. Whilst he was simply waiting and ever strengthening his lines, the Austrians found it incumbent on them to assume the offensive. Several desperate sorties were made by the garrison to break through the wall, only to end in complete disaster. General Herman von Kusmanek, the commander in chief of the fortress, organized a special force, composed largely of Hungarians, for "sortie duty," under the command of a Hungarian, General von Tamassy. These sorties had been carried out during November and December, 1914, especially during the latter month, when the Austro-German armies were pouring across the mountains. So critical was the Russian position at the time that the relief of Przemysl was hourly expected. According to an officer of General Selivanoffs staff, "The Austrians in the fortress were already conversing with the Austrians on the Carpathians by means of their searchlights. The guns of Przemysl could be heard by the Austrian field artillery. The situation was serious, and General Selivanoff took prompt measures. He brought up fresh troops to the point of danger and drove the sortie detachments back to the fortress." It is stated from the Austrian side that one of the sortie detachments had succeeded in breaking through the Russian lines and marching to a point fifteen miles beyond the outer lines of the forts. A Russian official announcement states that during two months of the siege the Austrian captures amounted only to 4 machine guns and about 60 prisoners, which occurred in an engagement where two Honved regiments fell on a Russian company which had advanced too far to be reenforced in time. On their part in repulsing sorties by the garrison, frequently made by considerable forces, the Russians made prisoners 27 officers and 1,906 soldiers, and captured 7 machine guns, 1,500,000 cartridges, and a large quantity of arms. In two sorties the garrison in the region of Bircza had more than 2,000 killed and wounded, among them being many officers. No further sorties were undertaken in that particular region. During January and February, 1915, very little fighting took place around Przemysl; sorties were useless as there was no Austro-German force anywhere near the fortress, and the Russians were tightening the pressure around it. The only means of communication with the outer world was by aeroplane, so that, despite the rigid investment, the Austro-German war staff were kept fully informed of the straits in which Przemysl found itself. General Boehm-Ermolli, with Army A, was making desperate efforts to extricate himself from the Russian grip round Uzsok, Lupkow, and Dukla; he did not get beyond Baligrod, as the crow flies, thirty miles south of Przemysl.

On March 13, 1915, the Russians stormed and captured the village of Malkovise, on the northeast, breaking through the outer line of the defense. From this position they began to bombard parts of the inner ring. About the beginning of the third week in March, 1915, a new spirit of activity appeared to seize the beleaguered garrison: they commenced a terrific cannonade which, however, elicited no response. It was but the energy of despair: they were firing to get rid of their ammunition, hoping at the same time to hit something or somebody. The end was at hand.

On March 18, 1915, a Petrograd "official" laconically reports that: "In the Przemysl sector the fortress guns continue to fire more than a thousand heavy projectiles daily, but our troops besieging the fortress lose only about ten men every day." It is also on March 18 that General von Kusmanek issued the following manifesto to the defenders of Przemysl:—"Heroes, I announce to you my last summons. The honor of our country and our army demands it. I shall lead you to pierce with your points of steel the iron circles of the enemy, and then march ever farther onward, sparing no efforts, until we rejoin our army, which, after heavy fighting, is now near us."

Just before the surrender two Austrian officers escaped from the fortress in an aeroplane. These reported concerning the last days of the siege:

"On the 18th of March the last provisions had been dealt out and at the same time the last attempt at breaking through the line of the besiegers had been ordered. This was carried out on the night of the 19th of March. It was shattered, however, against the unbreakable manifold ring of the Russian inclosing lines and against the superior forces which were brought in time to the threatened points. Our men were so weakened by their long fasting that it took them fully seven hours to make the march of seven kilometers, and even in this short stretch many of them had to lie down from exhaustion, yet they fought well and were bravely led by their officers. "In spite of all this," Captain Lehmann, one of the escaped officers, reported, "the heroic garrison fought on, after their last sortie, for fully forty-eight hours, against assaults of the Russians which now set in with terrific violence. The men of the fortress were fully informed of the situation by an announcement of the commander. They knew that the provisions were at an end and this very knowledge spurred them on to make their last sacrifice. Practically all the nations of the monarchy were represented in the fortress. Tyrolese Landsturm held the south, Hungarians the west, Ruthenians and Poles the north, and lower Austrians the east. To this last battle the troops marched out singing, striving thus to master their weakness. On this, occasion the above mentioned notice had fallen into the hands of the Russians and the prospect had thus been opened to them to seize the fortress with little effort. 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."

Starvation is conducive neither to good feeling nor heroism, especially when it is superimposed upon an unbroken series of more or less disastrous experiences. Misfortune and the so-called "tradition of defeat" had dogged the steps of Austria's troops from the beginning of the war; unlucky generals—Dankl, Auffenberg, and others—had been relieved of their commands and replaced by "new blood"—Boehm-Ermolli, Boroyevitch von Bojna, and Von Pflanzer-Baltin. Of these three, two had as yet failed in carrying to success the German plans which had taken the place of those of their own strategists. Hence it is not at all improbable that the reports of dissensions among the garrison, which leaked out at the time, were substantially accurate. That jealousies broke out among the numerous races forming the Austrian Army—especially between the Slavonic and Germanic elements—is supported by strong evidence. The sentiments of the Slav subjects of Austria leaned more toward Russia than the empire of which they formed a considerable portion, while there was never any love lost between them and the Magyars. However that may be, the Slav regiments were reported to have refused obedience to the general's order for the last sortie, which was eventually undertaken by a force composed of the Twenty-third Hungarian Honved Division, a regiment of Hussars, and a Landwehr brigade, altogether about 30,000 men. Everything depended upon the venture, for not only were all their food supplies used up, but they had already eaten most of their horses. Instead, therefore, of making southward to where their comrades were fighting hard to tear themselves away from the Carpathian passes, the sortie turned toward the east, in the direction of Mosciska, twenty miles off, which was supposed to be the Russian supply base. This attempted foraging expedition—for it was nothing else—can only be defended on the broad general principle that it is better to do something than nothing as a last resort. Supplies were essential before any more could be undertaken to cut a passage through the strong double set of Russian lines that lay between the Carpathians and Przemysl; but that these supplies were stored at Mosciska was a pure speculation. Further, considering that the whole country was in their opponents' hands, a strength of 30,000 men was insufficient to attempt so hazardous an adventure. Even if they succeeded in breaking through, their return to the fortress was not assured. In that case, if they could not get back, they would have to go forward: eastward lay Lemberg, held by the Russians; northward was the Russian frontier, and southward stood the Russian forces holding the passes. Thus, in any case, however successful the expedition might prove, it meant breaking at least twice through lines which the enemy had spent months in strengthening or fortifying. Undeterred by the almost certain possibility of failure, the expedition of the "forlorn hope" set out across the plain of the San—and speedily came to grief. They had to pass by the strongest Russian artillery position, which was stationed in the low hollow through which the railway runs to Lemberg. Here a terrific hail of shells burst over their heads; rattle of machine guns and rifle fire tore great holes in their ranks; the stoutest courage and bravest hearts were unavailing against an enemy who could not be reached nor even seen. The number of killed and wounded in that fatal sortie has not been made public; that it was an enormous figure is certain. The Russians took 4,000 prisoners of those who survived the ordeal, and captured the forts on the western side directly after the struggling remnants had regained their starting place. General von Kusmanek issued his manifesto in the morning, and by the same night the sortie ended in disaster. Like the misdirected charge of the Light Brigade at Balaclava in 1854, it was "brilliant, but it wasn't war."

One more attempt was made on Saturday, March 20, 1915, toward Oikovice, but it was easily frustrated by the vigilant Russians. On Sunday and Monday, the 21st and 22d of March, a number of explosions were heard in and around Przemysl. The Austrians were destroying everything possible previous to surrendering. Large quantities of explosives were thrown in the river; all kinds of arms were destroyed or rendered useless; three bridges were crippled; the few remaining horses were shot, and a railway bridge over the Wiar, which possessed no strategic value, was also destroyed. 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. He was blindfolded, driven by automobile to Russian headquarters, and ushered into the presence of General Selivanoff. When the bandage had been removed from his eyes, the Austrian officer handed over a letter of capitulation from General von Kusmanek, which ran as follows:

"In consequence of the exhaustion of provisions and stores, and in compliance with instructions received from my supreme chief, I am compelled to surrender the Imperial and Royal Fortress of Przemysl to the Imperial Russian Army."

The Russians took charge without any triumphal display. Some officers were sent to receive the surrender and take stock of the spoils. General von Kusmanek himself supplied the inventory, in which were listed 9 generals, 93 superior officers, 2,500 "Offiziere und Beamten" (subalterns and officials), and 117,000 rank and file, besides 1,000 pieces of ordnance, mostly useless, and a large quantity of shells and rifle cartridges.

General Artamoff was appointed military governor and to superintend the process of dispatching the prisoners into Russian territory, which was carried out at the rate of 10,000 a day. Extensive arrangements were set on foot to supply the inhabitants with food, drink, and other necessaries of life. As the Russians had not bombarded the town, its natural and artificial beauties had suffered no damage beyond that which the Austrians had themselves inflicted; only the outskirts and the fortifications had been injured by fire and explosion.

Thus fell, on March 22, 1915, Przemysl, "by its own momentum like an overripe fruit," and with a garrison twice as large as would have been adequate to defend it. To Austria the blow was a severe one, for it cost her about four army corps; the immediate advantage it brought to the Russians was the release of Selivanoff's army of 100,000 men, who were urgently required elsewhere. It was only a week earlier that the commander in chief of all the Austro-Hungarian armies, the Archduke Frederick, had granted an interview to an American journalist (Dr. J. T. Roche), in the course of which he stated: "We have only recently reached the point where we are really prepared, to carry on a campaign as it should be carried under modern conditions of warfare. 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."[Back to Contents]