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Picardy (BATTLES OF a series of bloody)

BATTLES OF, a series of bloody battles constituting the great German offensive against the Allied lines on the western front, beginning early in March, 1918, centering toward Amiens, in Picardy, officially known as the Department of the Somme. It constituted one of the chief efforts of the Germans to break through the Allied front and gain a decisive victory and was perhaps the most critical moment of the war.

Beginning in the first week of March, 1918, the German forces began a number of local attacks and raids in force, obviously with the purpose of feeling out the weakest point in the Allied lines.

Here, and at this time, the American troops first took part in the fighting to any significant extent.

On March 21 the Germans launched their great offensive, over a front fifty miles in width, extending from the river Oise, in the neighborhood of La Fère, to the Sensée river, near Croisilles.

The British, under General Sir Hubert Gough, held the front from the Oise to a point north of the Omignon river, where another British army, under General Sir Julian Byng, continued the line on to the Scarpe river, joining here a third British force under General Sir Henry Thorne. Facing the three British armies was an equal number of German armies.

Here was the main point of attack, arate the French from the British. The German objective was Amiens, which was then the most important strategical point in northern France.

About fifty German divisions entered into the first attack. Among the points against which the Germans first directed their efforts were Bullecourt, and Noreuil, west of Cambrai, the St. Quentin Ridge, on the right of the Cambrai salient, and Rossoy and Hargicourt, south of Cambrai.

In the afternoon of March 22, 1918, and later in the evening, the British began to give way before the tremendous German pressure, and next day were forced to retire along the whole front across the Somme, pursued closely by the Germans.

This was probably the most critical moment of the campaign. The British and the French had been thrown out of touch with each other, and unless the gap could be filled, the Germans would have accomplished their main immediate object.

It was then that General Carney, with General Byng's army on the north, one division of mixed units, got in touch over the eight mile gap, and the French General Fayolle saved the situation in the south over a thirty mile gap between the British and the French. Meanwhile, however, the Germans were announcing a decisive victory at home, and that the Kaiser was in personal command of the operations.

Nevertheless, the temporarily demoralized British forces held their positions along the Somme, and during the next few days the Germans were unable to make any further advance, though their tremendous attacks in mass continued.

On March 26, 1918, the Germans began an attack on the Allied lines south of the Somme and succeeded in capturing Roye. West of this point and Noyon the British, American and French troops held the Germans back. About 840,000 of the latter were pressing the attack.

The German losses were tremendous; much heavier than were those of the Allies, who were in defensive positions.

By the end of the first week, however, the Germans had won back most of the line they had lost when retreating from the Somme in 1916, on the fifty mile front from the Oise to the Scarpe.

The offensive had not achieved the high degree of success that the Germans had expected, but the Allies had nevertheless suffered a defeat of considerable magnitude. They had lost considerable territory, but, on the other hand, they had lost over half a million men, whereas the