Dated:
Opatov, Poland,
May 31, 1915.

For the last three days I have been with a certain army of the Russians that occupies the strip of Poland between the Pilitza river and the Vistula on the south. I feel intense regret that the restrictions of the censor proscribe the identification of military units or of their definite location. These wonderful corps, divisions and battalions should, in my view, have all the honour that is their due, but the writer can only abide by the wishes of the authorities by whose kindness and courtesy he has been able to visit these positions.

Leaving Warsaw in a motor car in the evening, and running until an early hour in the morning, we found ourselves the next day at the head-quarters of one of the really great army commanders of Russia. With him and the members of his staff we spent the chief part of the morning, when every opportunity was given us to study the situation within his jurisdiction. To go to the Front, as I have often written before, means a two to three days’ trip, and the inspection of a single detail of the vast operations that have been conducted. At the suggestion of the Commander we decided to visit a certain army corps in the south, whose success in the operations attending the change of front had been so extraordinary, that everyone at the staff was filled with pride and eager to have its work appreciated. Before going on to describe the work of this particular corps it is proper to mention a little more particularly the work of this one army as a whole since the beginning of the war.

This army stood before Lublin during the crisis in the early days of the war, and by uniting with that of Plevie, and the two joining with Russky to the east of them, there resulted the first great crash to the Austrian arms in Galicia. Later, this same army came back north and was engaged in the terrific fighting around Ivangorod, which resulted in the defeat of the enemy and their expulsion from Poland last autumn.

In the advance after the taking back of Radom and Kielce, the army came under the very walls of Cracow, and in all of its divisions and brigades there was scarcely a battalion that did not distinguish itself in that terrific fighting. When the Germans began their second invasion of Poland last autumn, this army regretfully fell back to its positions on the Nida river, and when the last storm broke in Galicia and the retirement of the army of the Dunajec rendered a change of the Russian-Polish line a strategic necessity, the army with all its numerous corps was again called upon to fall back in order that the Front as a whole might be a symmetrical one.

During this change of front we heard a great deal in Warsaw, from people who delight in circulating false stories, of Russian disasters in Southern Poland. I have been particularly interested, therefore, in checking up this movement on the ground and getting at the actual facts of the case. As a fact, the Russian retirement was made amid the lamentations and grumbling of the whole army. The private soldiers, who do not follow strategy very closely, complained bitterly that they, who had never met defeat, and before whom the enemy had always fallen back when they attacked, should be called upon to retreat when they were sure, regiment by regiment, that they could beat twice their numbers of the enemy. The Germans and Austrians advanced with great caution for several days. Knowing, however, the location of the new Russian line, they imagined that their adversaries would fall back on it in a few big marches and await them there. Besides this, both Germans and Austrians had been carefully fed with reports of the Galician movement to the effect that the Russians were retiring in utter defeat, that even in Poland they were panic-stricken and would probably put up but a feeble fight even on their line.

I could not in the brief time which I had for this trip visit all the corps involved in this movement, and at the suggestion of the General of the army, visited only the — corps, whose operations may be regarded as typical of the whole spirit in which this front was changed. Regarding the movement as a whole it is sufficient to say that in the two weeks following the change of line in Poland, the corps comprising this one army made the enemy suffer losses, in killed, wounded and prisoners, which the General estimated at nearly 30,000, of whom about 9,000 were prisoners. All of this was done at a comparatively trifling loss to the Russians themselves. From which very brief summary of the change of front it will be realized that this particular army has neither lost its fighting spirit nor has its moral suffered from the retirement to another line.

There are so many big movements in this war that it is utterly impossible for one observer to describe more than a trifling fraction of the achievements that are made here. Since the General Staff have given me what appears to be a free range in the north-eastern armies, I have had so many interesting opportunities that it is difficult to pick any one in preference to another. What I am writing in this story is merely the narrative of a single corps during this change of front, and I think it a significant story, because I believe it typifies not only the corps of this particular army, but practically all the corps now in the field on this Front. General Ragosa, who commands this corps, and who has entertained me for the best part of three days, has given me every opportunity to study his whole movement and permitted one of his officers to prepare sketches, illustrating his movement. The General himself, like most men who deal with big affairs, is a very modest and simple man. To talk with him one would not guess that the movement which has resulted so successfully for his corps and so disastrously for the enemy, was the product of a programme worked out in the quiet of a remote head-quarters and carried successfully through under his direction by means of the field wire stretched through the forest for the 30 kilometres that separate his head-quarters from the fighting line.

When I suggested to him that his fighting around Opatov made an extremely interesting story, he only shrugged his shoulders and replied, “But in this war it is only a small fight. What is the operation of a single army, much less the work of one of its units?” Yet one feels that the success of this war will be the sum of the work of the many units, and as this battle resulted in the entire breaking up of the symmetry of the Austro-German following movement, and is one of the few actions during the recent months of this war which was fought in the open without trenches, it is extremely interesting. Indeed, in any other war it would have been called a good-sized action; from first to last on both sides I suppose that more than 100,000 men and perhaps 350 to 400 guns were engaged. Let me describe it.

General Ragosa’s corps was on the Nida river, and it was with great regret that the troops left the trenches that they had been defending all winter. Their new line was extremely strong, and after they had started, it was assumed by the enemy that they could leisurely follow the Russians, and again sit down before their positions.

But they were not counting on this particular General when they made their advance. Instead of going back to his line, he brought his units to the line running from Lubenia to and through Opatov to the south, where he halted and awaited the advancing enemy who came on in four divisions. These were the third German Landwehr division who were moving eastward and a little to the north of Lubenia. Next, coming from the direction of Kielce was the German division of General Bredow supported by the 84th Austrian regiment; this unit was moving directly against the manufacturing town of Ostzowiec. Further to the south came the crack Austrian division, the 25th, which was composed of the 4th Deutschmeister regiment from Vienna and the 25th, 17th and 10th JÄger units, the division itself being commanded by the Archduke Peter Ferdinand. The 25th division was moving on the Lagow road headed for Opatov, while the 4th Austrian division (a Landwehr formation) supported by the 41st Honved division (regiments 20, 31, 32 and one other) was making for the same objective. It is probable that the enemy units, approaching the command of Ragosa, outnumbered the Russians in that particular portion of the theatre of operations by at least forty per cent. Certainly they never expected that any action would be given by the supposedly demoralized Russians short of their fortified line, to which they were supposed by the enemy to be retiring in hot haste.

General Ragosa wishing to finish up the weakest portion first, as usual picked the Austrians for his first surprise party. But this action he anticipated by making a feint against the German corps, driving in their advance guards by vigorous attacks and causing the whole movement to halt and commence deploying for an engagement. This took place on May 15. On the same day with all his available strength he swung furiously, with Opatov as an axis from both north and south, catching the 25th division on the road between Lagow and Opatov with a bayonet charge delivered from the mountain over and around which his troops had been marching all night. Simultaneously another portion of his command swept up on the 4th division coming from Iwaniska to Opatov. In the meantime a heavy force of Cossacks had ridden round the Austrian line and actually hit their line of communications at the exact time that the infantry fell on the main column with a bayonet charge of such impetuosity and fury that the entire Austrian formation crumpled up.

At the same time the 4th division was meeting a similar fate further south; the two were thrown together in a helpless mass and suffered a loss of between three and four thousand in casualties and nearly three thousand in prisoners, besides losing a large number of machine guns and the bulk of their baggage. The balance, supported by the 41st Honved division, which had been hurried up, managed to wriggle themselves out of their predicament by falling back on Wokacow, and the whole retired to Lagow, beyond which the Russians were not permitted to pursue them lest they should break the symmetry of their own entire line. Immediately after this action against the Austrians, a large portion of the same troops made a forced march back over the mountain which had separated the Austrians from their German neighbours and fell on the right of the German formation, while the frontal attacks, which had formerly been feints, were now delivered in dead earnest.

The result was that Bredow’s formation was taken suddenly in front and on its right flank, and on May 18 began to fall back until it was supported by the 4th Landwehr division, which had been hurriedly snatched out of the line to the north to prevent Bredow from suffering a fate similar to that which overtook the Austrians to the south. After falling back to Bodzentin where it was joined by the supports from the north, the Germans pulled themselves together to make a stand. But here, as in the south, general orders prevented the Russians from moving further against their defeated foe lest in their enthusiasm they might advance too far and leave a hole in their own line. Thus Ragosa’s command after four days of constant action came to a stand and their part in the movement ended.

But the trouble of the enemy was not over. Ragosa at once discovered that the 4th Landwehr division that had been hurried up to support retreating Bredow, had been taken from the front of his neighbouring corps, and this information he promptly passed on to his friend commanding the — corps who gladly passed the word on to his own front. The regiments in that quarter promptly punched a hole in the German weakened line, and with vicious bayonet attacks killed and captured a large number of Germans, also forcing back their line. Something similar happened in the corps to the south of Ragosa’s corps who were in a fever of excitement because of the big fighting on the San, which was going on just to their left while Ragosa’s guns were thundering just to the north. The result was that out of a kind of sympathetic contagion, they fixed bayonets and rushed on the enemy in their front with a fury equal to that which was going on in both corps north of them. Thus it came about that three quarters of this particular army became engaged in general action by the sheer initiative of Ragosa, and maintained it entirely by the enthusiasm of the troops engaged. These corps even in retreat could not be restrained from going back and having a turn with the enemy.

The change of front in Poland resulted in losses in killed, wounded and prisoners to the enemy, approximating in this army alone between 20,000 and 30,000, with a loss to the Russians probably less than a third of that number, besides resulting in an increase of moral to the latter, which has fully offset any depression caused by their retirement. In talking with their officers, and I talked with at least a score, I heard everywhere the same complaint, namely that it was becoming increasingly difficult to keep their soldiers in the trenches. So eager is the whole army to be advancing, that only constant discipline and watching prevent individual units from becoming excited and getting up and attacking, thus precipitating a general action which the Russians wish to avoid while the movement in Galicia is one of fluctuation and uncertainty.

Little definite information was available on this Front as to what was going on further south, but certainly I found not the slightest sign of depression among either men or officers with whom I talked. As one remarked, “Well, what of it? You do not understand our soldiers. They can retreat every day for a month and come back as full of fight at the end of that time as when they started. A few Russian ‘defeats,’ as the Germans call them, will be a disaster for the Kaiser. Don’t worry. We will come back all right and it cannot be too soon for the taste of this army.”

WITH THE ARMY IN SOUTHERN POLAND