Battle of Mościska and Lubaczów ends

On 15 June 1915, according to the British chronology of the war, the Battle of Mościska and Lubaczów came to an end. Three days after the crossing at Sieniawa and two days after the start of the main attack, the troops of General August von Mackensen broke through the second line of the Russian defence. That day the commander of the Russian 8th Army, General Aleksei Brusilov, ordered a retreat to the last fortified line in front of Lviv.

Two days of attack

The main blow went in at dawn on 13 June, after a bombardment by some 700 guns and howitzers. It went best in the centre of the front of the German 11th Army, where the Austro-Hungarian VI Corps and the Prussian Guard were attacking. The Russians lost their first line but were not routed. During the night they broke contact with the enemy and on 14 June took up position on a second, previously prepared line 15–20 kilometres further back, running through Krakowiec and Oleszyce. That day the Guard and the Austro-Hungarian 12th Infantry Division drove the Caucasian Grenadier Division off the hills near Wielkie Oczy. The front commander, General Nikolai Ivanov, formed General Olokhov’s group near Lubaczów to strike at the flank of the attackers, but its corps were drawn into the fighting before they had time to assemble.

The last day

On 15 June there was heavy fighting along the whole front, in the heat. The Austro-Hungarian 2nd Army spent the whole day taking hills, villages and woods east of Mościska, and the German Beskiden Corps stormed the hills near Bonów only late in the afternoon. In the direction of the main thrust, near Nahaczów, the Russians threw parts of two fresh divisions into the battle. Their columns were seen before noon on the road from Jaworów. Even so, in the evening the Kraków 12th Division took the Russian fortifications west of the village and threw the defenders back beyond it, and the Guard broke into the positions near Lipowiec. On the left wing the German 20th Infantry Division reached the southern edge of Lubaczów, and the 19th Division drove the Russians out of Oleszyce. On the San the Austro-Hungarian 4th Army advanced beyond Sieniawa.

According to the Austrian official history, the 11th Army alone had taken 34,000 prisoners since 13 June. Mackensen, however, was surprised by the stubbornness of the defenders, as the Russians kept bringing more divisions into the fight, and his own troops also suffered heavy losses.

Retreat to Gródek

Brusilov no longer had the strength for a battle in the open field. According to Austrian figures, many of his divisions numbered 2,000–3,000 bayonets, and some regiments had dwindled to the strength of a battalion or a company. Ivanov ordered him to stop the enemy on the roads to Rawa Ruska and Lviv. Brusilov judged that he could do so only on a fortified position and ordered his corps to retreat to a long-prepared line running from the Rawa Ruska area through Magierów and Gródek along the Wereszyca (PL). On this same line, in September 1914, the Battle of Gródek and Rawa Ruska had been fought.

During the night the Russians abandoned their positions. When the troops of the 2nd Army went in to the assault before dawn on 16 June, they found mostly empty trenches. Only Lubaczów, defended by Siberian units, still had to be taken that day. The struggle for Lviv was beginning.