AN OFFICIAL COMMUNIQUE.
GERMAN RIGHT AND CENTRE
RETREATING.
FIRST PHASE OF THE BATTLE.
ENTIRELY IN THE ALLIES'
FAVOUR
GENERAL SITUATION TRANS-
FORMED,
(Received Sept. 13, 5.5 p.m.) Paris, Sept. 11 (evening)
A communique states that at the very outset of the operations the German right wing, which on Sunday was north of Provins, was obliged to fall back because of the danger of envelopment. The enemy by a clever and rapid movement escaped from the Allies' j grip, and the greater port of its force threw itself upon our enveloping wing rorth of the Marne and west of _ the Ourcq, but the Frenchmen, aided bravely by the British, inflicted considerable losses and gained the necessary . time to allow the offensive to make pi ogress. , Elsewhere the enemy were now reti eating towards the line of the Oise. j In the meantime the Anglo-French south of the Marne continued the, offensive- and opened out, some from ' south of the Crecy Forest" and others from north of Provins. South of jSsternay.Von Kluck's and Yon Buelow's annicrs were falling back before the Allies. The most desperate fighting occurred j between the plateaux to the north of j Sezanne and Vitry le Francois, where the left of Yon Buelow's army, the! Saxon army, and part of the King of Wurtemburg's army were engaged. The Germans, despite repeated and violent attacks, failed to break our centra. | Our success on the plateaux north or j Sezanne enabled us in turn to take' the offensive, and in the course of Thursday night the enemy stopped fighting on the front between the St. j Gond and Sommcsons district. They fell back west of Vitry le Francois. Fighting continues on the Ernain river* between Argonne and the Meuse, where the Crown Prince's army and the other portion of the King of Wurtemburg's army were operating. There was a-i alternate advance and retreat without any great change. Thus the first phase of the battle in the Marne is in our favour, since the German right wing and the centre are retreating. There has been no notable change in the Vosges around Nancy, which the Germans tried to bombard with longrange guns. The general situation has been completely transformed in the last few days, both strategically and tactically. Not only have we stopped what looked like a victorious German march, but tliey have fallen back at nearly every point. Official.—The German right abandoned great quantities of munitions. The coitre has given way along the entire front from Sezanne to Revigny. The German army corps reported yesterday to have been cut off in the
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Bibliographic details
Colonist, Volume LVI, Issue 13573, 14 September 1914, Page 5
Word Count
432AN OFFICIAL COMMUNIQUE. Colonist, Volume LVI, Issue 13573, 14 September 1914, Page 5
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