100 Years Ago Today

[Sailor Steve]

September 4:

At 0600 SMS Emden moves into the bay at Simalur. Once again they are disappointed by the absence of the expected collier, and once again Emden has to take coal from Markomannia. At 0900 the ships are in position and coaling begins. This lasts all through the daytime heat, and at 2300 hours the job is still not done. The crew knock off, planning to continue early in the morning. The ship's second torpedo officer, Prince Franz Joseph of Hohenzollern, wrote an amusing account of sleeping on in a hammock on deck with his assistant, Lt.z.S Schall on a mattress underneath. The Prince was awakened by a loud yowling sound in the wee hours of the night. Upon investigation he discovered that the ship's cat had given birth to four kittens, between the legs of the still-sleeping Lt. Schall.

[TarJak]

4 September

The cruiser HMS PSYCHE, (later HMAS PSYCHE), and survey ship HMS FANTOME, (later HMAS FANTOME), joined the contraband patrol in the Bay of Bengal.

[TarJak]

5 September 1914

British and French forces dig in and cease their retreats along the Western Front.

Battle of the Ourcq (Maunoury's 6th Army) begins at mid-day.

Reims and Pont-a-Mousson occupied by the Germans.

Austrians defeated by Russians at Tomashov.

Germans attack Abercorn in East Africa.

H.M.S. "Pathfinder" sunk by German submarine.

Wilson liner "Runo" blown up by a mine.

Agreement of London signed: Great Britain, France, and Russia pledge themselves to make no separate peace with the Central Powers.

[Jimbuna]

Originally Posted by Sailor Steve

Source please? Since no one has successfully mounted a machine gun to an airplane yet, I'm curious as to what they were "dogfighting" with. Pistols?

Or fists, bricks and rope even.

Enemy pilots at first simply exchanged waves, or shook their fists at each other. Due to weight restrictions, only small weapons could be carried on board. Intrepid pilots decided to interfere with enemy reconnaissance by improvised means, including throwing bricks, grenades and sometimes rope, which they hoped would entangle the enemy plane's propeller.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dogfight

[Jimbuna]

5th September

Western Front

End of the Retreat from Mons

Lille evacuated by German forces

The German 1st Army reaches Claye, ten miles from Paris

Kluck receives orders to halt and face toward Paris, but most of 1st Army continues advancing south

Advancing to its attack positions on the Ourcq, French 6th Army unexpectedly collides with Kluck’s right flank near St. Soupplet east of Paris: the first battle of the marne to sep.10: Kluck is alerted to the danger to his right wing

GQG pulls further back to Chatillon-sur-Seine - Joffre tells his staff “Gentlemen, we will fight on the Marne.”, and issues a proclamation to his troops, concluding with “Under present conditions no weakness can be tolerated.”

Colonel Hentsch from OHL persuades Kluck to withdraw north of the Marne

Joffre forcefully confronts the vacillating Sir John French, and exclaims “…the honor of England is at stake!”; with tears in his eyes, Sir John finally agrees to cooperate in a counteroffensive

The final day of retreat by the BEF; British forces turn about and begin advancing eastwards

(to Sep.06) After a prolonged bombardment, German forces storm four of the bypassed Maubeuge forts

An advance party of Kluck’s 1st Army reaches the Villiers-St. Georges area, a few miles north of the Seine near Provins: the furthest-south German penetration into France of World War I

Battle of the Ourcq (Maunoury's 6th Army) begins at mid-day. 5 - 9 September, 1914
The advance towards Paris of five of the German Armies stretching along a line from Verdun to Amiens was set to continue at the end of August 1914. The German First Army was within 30 miles of the French capital. By 3rd September the British Expeditionary Force (B.E.F.) had crossed the Marne river in a retreat to the south and was in a position east of Paris between the French Sixth and French Fifth Armies. However, the commander of the German First Army made a fateful change to the original directive of The Schlieffen Plan, making an assumption that the Allies were not in a position to hold out against an attack on Paris from the east. The original Schlieffen Plan directive had been for German forces to attack Paris from the north in an encircling manoeuvre. Launching an attack east of Paris on 4th September the German First Army made progress in a southerly direction. However, the change to the Schlieffen Plan now exposed the right flank of the German attacking force. From 5th to 8th September the French Armies and British First Army carried out counter-attacks against the German advance on a line of approximately 100 miles from Compiègne east of Paris to Verdun. The Battle of the Ourcq River was carried out by the French Sixth Army against the German First Army of General von Kluck.
On 9th September the German First Army began to pull back as the British First Army moved in on its left flank. With no option but to make a fighting withdrawal, all the German forces in the Marne river region retreated in a northerly direction, crossing the Aisne to the high ground of the Chemin des Dames ridge.
The First Battle of the Marne was a strategic victory for the Allied Forces. It marked a decisive turn of events for the Allies in the early weeks of the war and Germany's Schlieffen Plan was stopped in its tracks. One of the famous events in the crucial defence of Paris is that 600 Parisian taxis were sent from the city carrying French reinforcement troops to the fighting front.

Foch’s forces become fully independent of French 4th Army and are officially constituted the 9th Army

German 6th Army takes Reims and Pont-á-Mousson, north of Nancy

A General Directive from OHL details Moltke’s halt order of Sep.04

Eastern Front

On the Southwest Front, the Austro-Hungarians were defeated by the Russians at Tomashov, in Kholm province in Poland. The Russian 5th Army moved in the rear of the Austro-Hungarian 4th Army at Rava Russka.

Naval and Overseas Operations

East Africa: German forces cross frontier of North Rhodesia. Defence of Abercorn

H.M.S. "Pathfinder" sunk by submarine in the North Sea (first British warship so destroyed).

Wilson liner "Runo" blown up by a mine.

Political, etc.

The "Pact of London," otherwise known as the "Entente Treaty" was signed between Great Britain, France, and Russia, each agreeing they would not make a separate peace with the Central Powers. German forces were now only 16 km from Paris.

Prussian War Minister Falkenhayn writes: “Only one thing is certain: our General Staff has completely lost its head.”

When asked the line of retreat from in front of Paris, Gallieni replies “Nowhere;” he gives secret orders to destroy vital resources and bridges in Paris in the event of defeat

Noted French Catholic-socialist-patriot-poet Charles Péguy is killed in action by German rifle fire near Villeroy.

Ship Losses:

HMS Pathfinder ( Royal Navy): The Pathfinder-class cruiser was torpedoed and sunk in the Firth of Forth by SM U-21 ( Kaiserliche Marine) with the loss of 256 of the 270 people on board.
Runo ( United Kingdom): The passenger ship struck a mine and sank in the North Sea with the loss of 29 of the 300-plus people on board.

[Sailor Steve]

Originally Posted by Jimbuna

Or fists, bricks and rope even.

I read the article and was prompted to join the discussion group for that page. The complaints discussions are quite lengthy, as there are a great many errors on that page. I asked for help with a [Citation needed] note for that sentence, since I've been hearing that story since I was a kid, and have yet to find a single instance of anyone actually claiming to have done any of those.

As for the dogfight mentioned, the Wiki article does make reference to a fight between a Serbian and an Austro-Hungarian pilot with a pistol in late August, with good reference, but I can't find anything about a fight over Paris on September 4th.

[Sailor Steve]

September 5:

In order to make desperately-needed engine repairs HMS Dresden puts into a secluded bay at Isla Hoste, at the very tip of South America, on her way from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific, where Kpt.z.s von Lüdecke hopes to join von Spee's squadron.




A further note on U-21 and HMS Pathfinder: Ten u-boats had been sent out on the very first war patrol. They had sunk nothing, and only eight had returned. On August 14th three of them - U-19, U-21 and U-22 - had been sent out again to patrol between Scotland and Norway. They had sighted a cruiser and a destroyer but hadn't been able to attack.

The German high command decided to try a new tactic. Rather than going in large groups the u-boats would now be sent out alone, or at most in pairs. The commanders responded by making trips to every British North Sea port, and periscopes were sighted almost daily. At one point a periscope was seen off Scapa Flow and Admiral John Jellicoe ordered every ship at the base to put to sea. This would infect the fleet so badly that it would come to be known as "periscopitis". On the side of the u-boats there are stories of the boats stopping at the Orkney Islands and huntin wild goats and sea birds.

At one point U-20 and U-21 made a sweep into the Firth of Forth, but could not reach the main anchorage.

On September 5th Kapitänleutnant Otto Hersing had just surfaced U-21 for a battery recharge off the Isle of May, at the mouth of the Firth of Forth, when the light cruiser Pathfinder was sighted. He immediately dove the boat, but was forced to watch as the cruiser sailed away. Hersing surfaced and resumed charging the batteries. The weather worsened and the waves were rising when a ship was spotted. It was Pathfinder, patrolling in a pattern that brought her right back into U-21's sights. Hersing waited until the right moment and fired a single torpedo. It struck Pathfinder behind the bridge and apparently set off a magazine. The ship sank in just four minutes and the era of modern submarine warfare had begun. HMS Pathfinder was the first ship ever sunk with a self-propelled torpedo.



In Langini Bay at Simalur SMS Emden resumed coaling at 0600 hours. The job needed to be finished quickly as the Dutch regulations only allowed one 24-hour stop by beligerent warships every three months. At 0800 Emden was approached by a small steam yacht flying the Dutch flag. A local government official came on board and insisted that Emden leave immediately, as her 24 hours were long past. Captain von Müller called for senior engineer Friedrich Ellerbroek, and pointedly asked him when the engines would be ready for sea. Ellerbroek caught on immediately and said repairs would take at least two more hours. Von Müller invited the official in and offered him whisky and soda. The crew had the coaling finished by 1100 and Emden was on her way, steaming south-eastward until the island was completely out of sight, then turning north toward the trade routes from Khota Raja to Colombo.

[Sailor Steve]

September 5 - Some interesting addenda:

On August 30th a special edition of The Times contained a dispatch from correspondent Arthur Moore. The story mentioned the "terrible defeat" suffered by the British Army at Mons and described the the troops as "the broken bits of many regiments." On September 5th First Lord of the Admiralty Winston Churchill wrote a letter to the owner of The Times. "I think you ought to realise the harm that has been done by Sunday's publication in The Times. I never saw such panic-stricken stuff written by any war correspondent before, and this served up on the authority of The Times can be made, and has been made, a weapon against us in every doubtful State."

Prime Minister Asquith asked Churchill to write a letter for publication, describing the retreat in detail. Churchill wrote "There is no doubt that our men have established a personal ascendancy over the Germans, and they ar conscious of the fact that with anything like even numbers the result would not be doubtful." Of course the numbers were not even close to even, but the British were only a small part of the Allied army at that time.

The Belgian underground was doing their part. They had torn up so much of the railway system that the Germans had to devote 26,000 railroad workers just to try to make repairs, and they were losing ground. The distance from the rail head to the front line was 20 miles on August 25th. By September 4th the German 2nd Army had to move men and equipment more that 100 miles to get to the fighting.

At the beginning of the Battle of the Marne General Joffre wrote "At the moment when the battle upon which hangs the fate of France is about to begin, all must remember that the time for looking back is past; every effort must be concentrated on attacking and throwing the enemy back."

"I visited the Divisions and found the men very elated at the idea of moving forward rather than backward."
-General Sir Horace Lockwood Smith-Dorrien, diary

Among the first French troops to attack the German line were 5,000 Moroccans. As they came under heavy fire a French battalion charged to their rescue. First killed was the French Captain. Lieutenant Charles-Henri de la Cornillière led the soldiers forward until he himself was mortally wounded. As his men started to shout "The lieutenant is killed!" and show signs of panic, de la Conrillières dying words were "Yes, the lieutenant has been killed, but keep on firm!" This incident became famous among French patriots.

It was also on September 5th that the Daily Opinion first ran the picture of Lord Kitchener, drawn by Alfred Leete.


It would later become the legendary recruiting poster:

[TarJak]

6 September 1914

Some 30 miles northeast of Paris, the French 6th Army under the command of General Michel-Joseph Manoury attacks the right flank of the German 1st Army, beginning the decisive First Battle of the Marne at the end of the first month of World War I.

After invading neutral Belgium and advancing into northeastern France by the end of August 1914, German forces were nearing Paris, spurred on by punishing victories that forced five French armies into retreat after the Battles of the Frontiers at Lorraine, Ardennes, Charleroi and Mons. In anticipation of the German attack, the anxious French government appointed the 65-year-old General Joseph-Simon Gallieni as the military governor of Paris. Gallieni, predicting that the Germans would reach Paris by September 5, did not wish to sit idly back and wait for invasion. In the first days of September, he managed to convince the French commander in chief, Joseph Joffre, to spare him an army—Manoury’s 6th Army—from the front in order to aggressively defend the capital.

At the same time, General Alexander von Kluck, at the head of the German 1st Army, was disobeying orders from its own headquarters to double back and support General Karl von Bulow’s 2nd Army, thus protecting itself from possible attacks from the French on its right flank, from the direction of Paris. Not wanting to subordinate himself to Bulow’s command, Kluck ordered his forces to proceed in their pursuit of the retreating French 5th Army, under General Charles Lanrezac, across the Marne River, which they crossed on September 3. When Gallieni learned of Kluck’s move that morning, he knew the French 6th Army—the new army of Paris—had been given its opportunity to attack the German flank. Without hesitation, he began to coordinate the attack, urging Joffre to support it by resuming the general French offensive earlier than army headquarters had planned.

On September 4, Helmuth von Moltke, chief of the German general staff, learned that Kluck had disobeyed orders, and that his troops—exhausted and depleted of resources, having outrun their lines of supply over the course of their rapid advance—had crossed the Marne. Fearing the attack from Paris on the 1st Army’s exposed flank, Moltke ordered that the march of the 1st and 2nd Armies towards Paris be halted in order to face any threat from that direction. The order came too late, however, as Gallieni had already readied his army for an attack, and Joffre—with help from the British minister of war, Lord H. H. Kitchener—had obtained the promised support of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF), commanded by Sir John French, for the French 5th and 6th Armies in their renewed offensive against German forces at the Marne.

On the morning of September 6, the 150,000 soldiers of Manoury’s 6th Army attacked the right flank of the German 1st Army, whose turn to meet the attack opened a 30-mile-gap between Kluck’s forces and Bulow’s 2nd Army. Acting quickly, the French 5th Army—under a new leader, General Louis Franchet d’Esperey, appointed by Joffre to replace Lanrezac—and divisions of the BEF poured into the gap and simultaneously attacked the German 2nd Army. Fierce fighting continued over the next several days, with Manoury’s exhausted army managing to hold its ground only after being reinforced on September 7 by a corps of 6,000 rushed from Paris in taxi cabs. After Franchet d’Esperey’s 5th Army launched a successful surprise attack on the German 2nd Army, Moltke ordered a general German retreat on September 9. Over the next few days, Allies slowly pushed the Germans back towards the Aisne River, where the 1st and 2nd Armies dug in, beginning the entrenchment of positions that would last well into 1918.

The Allied check of the German advance during the Battle of the Marne made the struggle one of the most decisive battles in history. Events at the Marne signaled the demise of Germany’s aggressive two-front war strategy, known as the Schlieffen Plan; they also marked the end of the general belief, held on both sides of the line, that the conflict that broke out in the summer of 1914 would be a short one. As the historian Barbara Tuchman wrote as a conclusion to her book The Guns of August (1962): "The Battle of the Marne was one of the decisive battles of the world not because it determined that Germany would eventually lose or the Allies ultimately win the war but because it determined that the war would go on. There was no looking back, Joffre told the soldiers on the eve. Afterward there was no turning back. The nations were caught in a trap, a trap made during the first thirty days out of battles that failed to be decisive, a trap from which there was, and has been, no exit."

[Aktungbby]

[Jimbuna]

6th September

Western Front

General fighting all along the line, from the vicinity of Paris to Lorraine

A copy of Joffre’s order of Sep.04 falls into German hands - Moltke notifies his armies that they’re facing a general French counteroffensive

The advancing I Corps on the right of the BEF begins to engage Kluck’s 1st Army - British II Corps begins to advance across the Grand Morin River

Battle of the Marne: General offensive by French and British.

Foch’s 9th Army and Langle’s 4th Army are heavily engaged from Sézanne to Vitry le François: Foch is pushed south of the St. Gond Marshes

A German attack briefly routes the left flank of Sarrail’s 3rd Army, stalling its planned offensive and taking Revigny

German advance also checked at Beauzec, near Verdun, and at Jezanville, near Pont-a-Mousson.

Along most of its front, the cautiously advancing French 5th Army easily pushes back the German 2nd Army’s right wing to Sep.07, taking Courgivaux - in 5th Army’s left wing, Petain takes Montceaux-les-Provins after hard fighting

Germans reach Provins, the most southerly point of their advance.

Northeast of Paris, after some initial gains by French 6th Army, Kluck’s right flank holds its ground; heavy fighting at Etrépilly

In response to pressure from the French 6th Army, Kluck skillfully transfers two of the four corps advancing southeast of Paris to his right flank; Bülow weakens his right - a dangerous gap is developing between the German 1st and 2nd Armies

The German 7th Army is disbanded; part is sent to the right flank near Paris

Eastern Front

In Poland, the centre of General Dankl's Austro-Hungarian 1st Army was broken at Krasnostav by the Russian 5th Army, forcing them to fall back to the San River.

In Poland, the General P.A. Lechitskiy's Russian 9th Army was moving south of Ivangorod toward Sandomir.

In Galicia, the Russian 8th Army was advancing on Grodek, southwest of Lemberg. Heavy fighting continued through the 12th.

Southern Front

Serbian Invasion of Syrmia begun: the Save crossed at Novoselo: Obres occupied: failure to take Mitrovitsa.

Naval and Overseas Operations

Cameroons: British reverse near Nsanakong.

Affair of Tsavo (East Africa).

Political, etc.

Great Britain: The Admiralty announce organization of a Royal Naval Division.

War Minister Sukhomlinov reported to the Tsar that “a list of the most important measures of the War Ministry from 1909 to March 1914 fell into the hands of German intelligence through Pashkevich and Dumbadze.” Both men were friends of Sukhomlinov. The Tsar paid no attention to the report.

The American military attaché in Paris reports “mutterings against the leaders of the government and army”

Ship Losses:

Argonaut ( United Kingdom): The trawler was shelled and sunk in the North Sea by two cruisers and four destroyers (all Kaiserliche Marine). Her crew were taken as prisoners of war.
Chameleon ( United Kingdom): The trawler was shelled and sunk in the North Sea by two cruisers and four destroyers (all Kaiserliche Marine). Her crew were taken as prisoners of war.
Imperialist ( United Kingdom): The trawler struck a mine and sank in the North Sea off the mouth of the River Tyne with the loss of two of her crew. Survivors were rescued by the trawler Rhodesian ( United Kingdom).
Lobelia ( United Kingdom): The trawler was shelled and sunk in the North Sea by two cruisers and four destroyers (all Kaiserliche Marine). Her crew were taken as prisoners of war.
Harrier ( United Kingdom): The trawler was shelled and sunk in the North Sea by two cruisers and four destroyers (all Kaiserliche Marine). Her crew were taken as prisoners of war.
Pegasus ( United Kingdom): The trawler was shelled and sunk in the North Sea by two cruisers and four destroyers (all Kaiserliche Marine). Her crew were taken as prisoners of war.
Pollux ( United Kingdom): The trawler was shelled and sunk in the North Sea by two cruisers and four destroyers (all Kaiserliche Marine). Her crew were taken as prisoners of war.
Rideo ( United Kingdom): The trawler was shelled and sunk in the North Sea by two cruisers and four destroyers (all Kaiserliche Marine). Her crew were taken as prisoners of war.
Rhine ( United Kingdom): The trawler was shelled and sunk in the North Sea by two cruisers and four destroyers (all Kaiserliche Marine). Her crew were taken as prisoners of war.
Seti ( United Kingdom): The trawler was shelled and sunk in the North Sea by two cruisers and four destroyers (all Kaiserliche Marine). Her crew were taken as prisoners of war.
Valiant ( United Kingdom): World War I: The trawler was shelled and sunk in the North Sea by two cruisers and four destroyers (all Kaiserliche Marine). Her crew were taken as prisoners of war.

[Sailor Steve]

September 6:

Maximilian von Spee's squadron arrives at Kiritimati, or Christmas Island, some 1162 nautical miles south of Hawaii, to find SMS Nürnberg waiting for them, having returned from Honolulu with supplies and news of the war in Europe. Spee then dispatches Nürnberg to destroy the wireless station at nearby Tabuaeran, or Fanning Island. Part of the news Nürnberg had brought was of the capture of German Samoa by New Zealand forces on August 29th. Spee decided to take Scharnhorst and Gneisenau to see what could be done.



At the siege of Tsingtao the first attack ever made from an aircraft carrier is launched from IJNS Wakamiya. A Farman seaplane is lowered into the water by crane, takes off and proceeds to bomb the Austro-Hungarian cruiser Kaiserin Elisabeth and the German gunboat Jaguar. As with prior attempts in the European war, the 12-pound bombs all miss. Meanwhile Wakamiya's other three planes carry out more successful attacks on radio stations and supply huts.



In the Indian Ocean SMS Emden encounters heavy rain squalls. This is a relief as water supplies have been running low and there has been only enough for drinking, so the men and their clothes have been going unwashed. Every available container is put out to collect the rainwater. After showers and laundry the crew sets about scrubbing their ship clean for the first time in weeks.

[TarJak]

7 September 1914

A joint Australian army-navy expedition, the AN&MEF sailed for German New Guinea from Port Moresby embarked on board the auxilliary cruiser HMAS BERRIMA, escorted by HMAS AUSTRALIA, HMAS SYDNEY, HMAS ENCOUNTER, HMAS WAREGO, and HMAS YARRA, together with submarines HMAS AE1 and AE2.

On 2 September Sydney, Encounter, Berrima and Aorangi received orders to sail for Port Moresby where they arrived on 4 September to take on coal and oil and rendezvous with the remainder of the RAN fleet, the Kanowna and several colliers. While in Port Moresby the ANMEF’s military commander, Colonel W. Holmes, inspected the men of the Kennedy Regiment who, although full of enthusiasm, were deemed to be unprepared and ill-equipped for active service. Consequently he recommended that they be returned to their home state. It transpired that the matter was resolved for him when the firemen in the ship in which they were embarked, the Kanowna, mutinied, refusing to carry out their duties. This demonstration was centred on them having not volunteered for overseas active service. Kanowna was subsequently ordered to proceed directly to Townsville, taking no further part in proceedings.

The rest of the force, then comprising Sydney, Encounter, Parramatta (Lieutenant W.H.F. Warren, RAN), Warrego (Commander C. L. Cumberlege, RAN) Yarra (Lieutenant S. Keightley, RAN), AE1, AE2, Aorangi, Berrima, the oiler Murex and collier Koolonga sailed on 7 September bound for Rossel Island and a rendezvous with HMAS Australia which took place two days later. There Admiral Patey, Colonel Holmes, Captain Glossop, Commander Stevenson and Commander Cumberlege, of the destroyer flotilla, discussed the final plans for the attack on German New Guinea culminating in the release of an operational order for an attack on Rabaul.

Two points had been chosen for the landings, one at Rabaul, the seat of Government, the other at Herbertshöhe on the Gazelle Peninsula, New Britain. It was decided that the naval contingent should undertake the landing at Herbertshöhe. Patey’s orders were that should a preliminary reconnaissance of Blanche Bay reveal it to be empty of enemy ships, Parramatta was to examine the jetty at Rabaul and report whether Berrima could berth there. Sydney, which had embarked 50 men of the naval contingent prior to sailing from Port Morseby, would meanwhile transfer 25 of them to the destroyers Warrego and Yarra for landing four miles east of Herbertshöhe. The remaining 25 remained in Sydney to be landed at Herbertshöhe along with a 12 pounder gun. From there they would proceed inland to locate and destroy the enemy wireless stations. Intelligence indicated that two enemy wireless stations were operating in the area, one inland from Kabakaul at Bitapaka and the other at Herbertshöhe.





Elsewhere in the Pacific, a three funnelled warship flying the French flag, dropped anchor just off the North-West corner of Fanning Island, a low coral atoll in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Two boatloads of men rowed ashore. they were from the German cruiser NURNBERG and the proceeded to wreck the cable station on the island. They harmed noone, but a demolition crew blew up the generators and accumulators and used axes to smash up the control room instruments and batteries. The landing party also looted all the gold sovereigns from the superintendent's safe where they found Alfred Smith's treasure map showing where he had hidden the spare instruments and the Fanning Island Volunteer Reserver's arms and ammunition. These were duly dug up and destroyed.



Meanwhile, the NURNBERG's companion ship, the Bremen class crusier LEIPZIG, had earlier hauled up the Fanning-Fiji cable, but dragged it out only as far as the shallow reef, where fortunately for the British, it could quite soon be dredged up and reconnected.

[Jimbuna]

7th September

Sir John French, commander in chief of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF), begins his first official dispatch from the Western Front during World War I, summarizing the events of the first several weeks of British operations.

"The transport of the troops from England both by sea and by rail was effected in the best order and without a check," French began. "Each unit arrived at its destination in this country [France] well within the scheduled time." The decision to send British troops to fight in France had been made on August 5, 1914—the day before Britain’s formal declaration of war on Germany. Initially, the BEF deployed only 100,000 men, the largest number that the small, professionally trained army could put in the field. On August 23, some 35,000 soldiers of the BEF saw action for the first time against the Germans at the Mons Canal, in southwest Belgium near the French border. The Battle of Mons—the fourth of the so-called Battles of the Frontiers—stalled the German advance by one day, ending nonetheless in a British retreat.

French subsequently took his men out of the front line, planning to let them rest behind the Seine River west of Paris. Under pressure from his French counterpart, General Joseph Joffre, as well as his own government, to rejoin the fray and offer support to the beleaguered French forces, he capitulated. As he recounts at the end of his first dispatch: "On Saturday, September 5th, I met the French Commander in Chief at his request, and he informed me of his intention to take the offensive forthwith, as he considered conditions very favorable to success." The offensive began the following morning, as British and French forces halted the German advance in the decisive Battle of the Marne.

Naval Operations:

Naval operations started against Duala, Cameroons, with armoured cruiser Cumberland (Cn - returned to UK January 1915), old light cruiser Challenger (Cn - left for East Africa in 1915), gunboat Dwarf, local converted gunboats of the Niger Flotilla - Alligator, Balbus, Crocodile, Ivy, Moseley (believed Mole), Porpoise, Remus, Vampire, Vigilant, Walrus taking part.



Escape of Goeben - light cruiser Gloucester shadowed Goeben & Breslau off Cape Matapan, Greece.

Ship Losses:

Revigo ( United Kingdom): The trawler struck a mine and sank in the North Sea. Her crew were rescued by the trawler Andromeda ( United Kingdom).

[Sailor Steve]

September 7:

With the railway lines choked and 10,000 reserves stuck in Paris, On September 6 General Joseph Galieni suggests using taxis. A fleet of taxicabs is hastily organized and on the 7th somewhere between 600 and 1,000 cabs transported the infantry to the front. They kept their meters running and were later reimbursed the sum of 70,012 francs. The troops arrive in time to help General Manoury fend of a heavy German attack, preventing a possible breakthrough.

Kaiser Wilhelm visits the front lines, but when within sound of the artillery fire his escort decides the danger from capture by a French cavalry patrol is too great, and the Kaiser is hastily driven back to the rear area.

"Terror often overcomes me when I think of this, and the feeling I have is that I must answer for this horror."
-General Helmuth von Moltke, describing the number of deaths at the Battle of the Marne in a letter to his wife on September 7, 1914

"It is now certain that England is bringing over great numbers of troops from Asia."
-Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz, letter home the same day


SMS Emden arrives at the Khota Raja-Colombo steamship route. After a day's cruising and seeing nothing, von Müller decides to move on to the Colombo-Rangoon route, crossing the Negabatang-Khota Raja line along the way.