The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1914-10-14
THE WAR REVIEWED;
What Two MONTHS OF Fighting
has SHOWN THE WORLD
GERMANS WIN At first

dERMANS WIN Al FlkSl
The Invaders Of France Now Seem
Deadlocked in the Grip Of the
Allied Armies, While the Russian
Millions Are Brings Pressure Upon
the Eastern Side of the Empire.
Under the walls of the eastern
forts of Liege the first shots of the
Belgian campaign were fired on
August 4. Monday then marked the
close of the second month of the
great war, supplied an appropriate
calendar division at which to meas
ure the progress Of the several cam
paigns.
The honors of the first month un-
doubtedIy rested with the Germans.
Thirty days after the artillery Of the
Kaiser awakened echoes not merely
I-of the hills above the Vesdre and
Ourthe valleys but throughout the
civilized world his gray uniformed
masses were on the Marne and the
Seine, the roar of his cannon at
Meaux and Lagny was plainly audible
| on the boulevards and along the
uuays of the French capital. Five
weeks after Germany had despatched
her first declaration Of war, that to
Petrograd, her massive military ma
chine had oyerrun Belgium and
reached the gates of Paris.
Looking eastward, if the success
was less complete there was still lit
| the cause of German pessimism. 1t
was true that about Lemberg the
main Austrian army had been beaten,
was falling back in retreat which,
as it turned out, was to become a
rout, but north and east in Poland
and before Lublin and in Loz Aus
trian and German soldiers were still
advancing.
In East Prussia, too, on Sedan day
Gen. Won Hindenberg had won the
sweeping victory Of Tannenberg-
'sthe Sedan of the East" German
journals named it. The destruction
of Gen. Rennenkampff's force, the
right wing of the Russian battle line
from the Carpathians to the Baltic,
seemed quite as probable as the rout
Of Austrian army corps on the San
and the Vistula.
Plainly, indisputably, German had
won the first round. On September
4-and to get just appreciation OF
the situation on October in its
proper relation to that of month be-
fore it is necessary to recall what the
world expected on the earlier date
the press of London and Berlin alike
talked frankly of the possibility that
in a few days Paris might fall, the
French government had fed to Bor-
deaux, all the parallels and prece-
dents of 1870 were on the lips and
in the minds of men.
For two weeks defeated French
and English armies had retreated
over the fields of Flanders, Picardy,
Artois and Champagne-these prov
inces were lost and there existed the
grave possibility that the morale OF
the allied armies had been shaken
| possibly destroyed.
! Change in Situation.
But on October who could mis-
take the change? The battle of the
Marne had been fought. The south
ernmost foethold of the Germans,
that on the Noyon Hills, was nearly
seventy miles from Paris and eighty
from Lagny, the high water mark OF
the advance of Won kluck. Eastward
| the German line now ran straight
across the plain of Chalons north of
Verdun, no longer surrounded, the
army of the Crown Prince was rest
| ing from Varnnes and the vicious
thrust through the barrier forts at
St. Mihiel seemed to be frustrated.
More than this, after week OF re-
treat and three more weeks Of des-
| perate, tremendous, heroic efforts the
| German masses had been unable to
get on foot again, to step out once
more toward Paris. To Noyon and
| the Craonne plateau north Of Sois-
sons Won Kluck had come back on
September -. Won Buelow had been
driven north of Rheims in the same
general movement, and on October
4 neither the German right nor the
center had regained a single mile OF
territory on this front.
Three weeks of the most confused
and bloodiest fighting the Western
world had known found the Germans
and the Allies facing each other,
deadlocked on lines swept by the
heaviest artillery of three nations,
cut and scanned with the trenches and
entrenchments which were daily
growing and more and more taking
on the character of those lines below
Richmond where Grant and Lee did
battle from July, 1854, to April,
1856.
Meantime to the west and north
new allied armies, gathered from
every quarter of the globe, regiments
of Sikhs and Gurkhas touching ell
bows with Moroccan goums and bat
talions Of black soldiers from the
Senegal and the Niger, British regu-
lars recalled from Hindustan and
Egypt, strengthened or about to be
strengthened by Colonial troops from
Canada and Australia, were moving
upon the flank and rear of the Ger
man armies; Asia, Africa, America
and Australia were beginning to con-
tribute the first levies from resources
which should henceforth be ineXhaus-
tible
AS a result of this thrust all north
west France had been recovered.
Amiens, Lille, Arras, cities and re-
gions, which had been occupied by
Germans in early September, had
paid ransom to their conQuerers, were
now redeemed. All the main rail-
ways from Paris to the Channel were
in allied hands once more and hav-
ing been reconstructed were convey
ing fresh troops far northward as the
campaign developed toward the Bel
gian line.