The Marne - Part 3. Outcome uncertain in the fog of war

The Taxi Cabs of the Marne

Although the stage was set for the great counter offensive, it still seemed that the Germans were advancing. On 7 September they captured the key village of Sainte-Geneviève, due north of Paris, and were close to achieving a breakthrough against the beleaguered French outside Paris, within sight of the Eiffel Tower. Encouraged by Gallieni, Joffre took the decision to despatch emergency troop reinforcements from Paris.

The famous 'taxi cabs of the Marne' were despatched on 7 September using a fleet of Parisian taxi cabs, some 600 in all, ferrying reserve infantry troops to the front. The cabs carried forward just 4,000 men, a single brigade, to join the 150,000 soldiers of Sixth Army but the morale boost provided was much greater. Gallieni deserves his place among the inspirational figures of those moments. 

The battle was not won at a stroke. Complex actions took place, and the fate of the war hung in the balance for days. 




Even while Joffre was still cajoling Sir John French to fight, Maunoury began to push eastward, crowding Kluck’s right flank along the river Ourcq, a tributary of the Marne.
Although the battle started officially on 6^th, it was this action of Maunoury on the 5^th against Kluck’s flank guard that was decisive. Later that night Kluck moved his whole 1^st Army back to north of the Marne, and this in turn impacted on Bulow’s 2^nd army on Kluck’s left, which was also force to wheel to west and face Paris. This opened up a dangerous 30miles gap between 1^st and 2^nd armies.

 

Gen Michel-Joseph Maunoury's interventions
at the Marne were decisive

Nevertheless, the German order of the day on the 6^th was for a general offensive across the whole front. Over at the eastern end, the Germans could make little progress against Verdun and strong defence from the French armies. There were huge numbers of casualties - this time more of them German rather than the slaughter of French that had occurred in late August. Through the centre, Joffre’s forces held firm, despite gruesome fighting. On the left, d’Esperay’s 5^th and Maunoury’s 6^th attacked strongly. On 5 September, Kluck’s formations held a west–east front. By the close of the 6th, his army was redeploying on a north–south line, and he was counter-attacking Maunoury fiercely. Kluck's response to Maunoury's attacks was the most significant event of 6 September. The German commander shifted men fast from his left, in front of the BEF, which was doing nothing to inconvenience him, to reinforce the threatened sector

Foch’s newly formed Ninth Army held a ridge line sixty miles south-east of Paris behind a poplar-lined stream named Le Petit Morin, in the marshes of Saint-Gond. It was a desolate, uninviting region, offering attackers only a few causeway crossing places. At 11.40 a.m. on 7 September, Franchet d’Espèrey issued a general order: ‘the enemy is in retreat along the whole front. The Fifth Army will make every effort to reach Petit Morin river [at Montmirail] tonight.’ The fighting in the marshes of Saint-Gond continued bitterly. The French 75s halted Bülow’s attempts to advance, and later that day the German commander ordered a withdrawal behind the Petit Morin.

By the following day, the central and eastern parts of the German front were at a complete standstill, and the beginnings of trench warfare were developing as they dug in. At the western end, the opposite was happening. D’Esperay (and the BEF, arriving belatedly) were pouring through the gap created by Maunoury’s attack on the German right flank. 120,000 men pushed north, and cavalry charges were used successfully to support the advance. Kluck had left a single weak corps of 22,800 reservists to screen his rear, facing Paris in positions centred upon the heights of Monthyon, north-west of Meaux.  

Throughout this day, the outcome of the battle, perhaps also of the war, still hung in the balance. In the confused melee both sides found themselves faced with a succession of revolving doors – they advanced in one sector, only to find themselves driven back in another. 

French soldiers get limited protection
from a ditch at the Marne

This was the moment when the fate of the Western Front hung by a thread: Castelnau was telling Joffre that he might have to abandon Nancy; Ninth Army’s right wing had crumbled; Maurice Sarrail’s Third Army was conducting a ferocious struggle to defend the Revigny Gap covering Verdun. Messages of elaborate courtesy but increasing urgency flew from Joffre to British GHQ, pleading with Sir John French to hasten the advance of the BEF. Yet at every approach to woodland, British commanders halted to reconnoitre. Their units crossed the Petit Morin almost unopposed, but by the evening of 8 September had still not reached the Marne.