I’m afraid that our nation in its headlong careering towards victory will scarcely be able to bear this misfortune.
Helmuth von Moltke – writing on the German retirement from the Marne.
For Major Tom Bridges and the officers and men of the 4th Royal Irish Dragoon Guards their first encounter with their German adversaries, in what was to become known as the First Battle of the Marne, came on 6 September at the small hilltop village of Pécy, northwest of Provins. Having been in retreat since 23 August after the BEF’s clash with the German First Army at Mons, the regiment was now south of the Marne River and under orders to move north as advance guard for the 2nd Cavalry Brigade. After an opening skirmish with units of Alexander von Linsingen’s II Corps, during which 24-year-old Sergeant Evelyn Whiteman and Lance Corporal William Ticehurst, both of B Squadron, were killed by shell fire, Bridges and his men were astonished to see ‘the enemy column wheel round in the road and retire to the north.’2 Bridges admits that their own response to this unexpected enemy retirement took the form of a rather ‘impotent sniping’, and by nightfall they had lost the opportunity to strike back at an enemy who had been pursuing them for two weeks.3 As the regiment moved north towards Coulommiers they were completely unaware that Allied forces were now embroiled in the Battle of the Marne and that the wider strategic plan would conclude with the German retreat to the heights of the Chemin des Dames which ran along the northern edge of the Aisne River valley.
The First Battle of the Marne was fought between 5 and 11 September 1914. It was, in the opinion of Holger Herwig, ‘the most significant land battle of the twentieth century,’ and the most decisive since Waterloo.4 Why? Because the Marne was the final stroke which brought the German operational strategy – masterminded in 1905 by the Chief of the German General Staff, Count Alfred von Schlieffen – to an end and changed the course of European history. Schlieffen’s master plan was for a war on two fronts but not at the same time: a rapid forty day advance through Belgium and Northern France to encircle the French armies concluding in a victorious entry into Paris before unwieldy Russian forces in the east were able to mobilize effectively against them. Although more recently some historians have argued that there was in fact no ‘Schlieffen Plan’, the balance of evidence does not support this rather blinkered view of German military aspirations in the years preceding 1914. That there was a German war plan for 1914 is not in dispute, the original Schlieffen blueprint for war was inherited by Helmuth von Moltke when he was appointed Chief of the General Staff in 1906 and it was a version of this plan which the German OHL used in its preparations for war in Europe. Unquestionably the Schlieffen Plan had been modified by von Moltke – who admittedly had reservations about some of its aspects – but the fundamental goals were similar: the French armies would be ruthlessly and rapidly crushed in a battle of encirclement or Kesselschlacht.
German military planners were confident that the strike against France would be concluded before Russian forces could mobilize effectively against them and with France defeated, German divisions could be transferred quickly to the Eastern Front by rail. The essence of the plan was speed and therein lay its Achilles heel, there was no real alternative plan to fall back upon and success depended almost entirely on maintaining the timetable of advance. The great fear was the prospect of fighting a war on two fronts resulting in the division of resources.
However, despite the initial success in the opening weeks of the war, by the end of August it was becoming increasingly clear that the plan was slipping behind schedule. Contrary to expectations, Belgian forces had vigorously resisted the invasion of their country and the First Army, under the command of General Alexander von Kluck, had unexpectedly encountered the BEF at Mons on 23 August and again three days later at Le Cateau. The German Second Army, under the command of General Klaus von Bülow, had been held up by the French Fifth Army on the Sambre during the Battle of Charleroi, and in the east the Russian Army had mobilized in just ten days which had the immediate effect of drawing off two whole army corps which were transferred to the Eastern Front. Moreover, the German Second Army had been stopped in its tracks again for some thirty-six hours by the French Fifth Army at Guise on 29 August when General Charles Lanrezac had launched his counter attack.