Battles of Warsaw and Dęblin begin

The British chronology of the war records under 9 October 1914 the first German offensive against Warsaw and the start of the battles of Warsaw and Ivangorod, that is, Dęblin. That day troops of General Paul von Hindenburg’s German Ninth Army reached the Vistula. After nearly two weeks of marching across the Kingdom of Poland, they ran into the main Russian forces for the first time.

Which date?

Polish studies, and following them our page on the battle, usually start it on 28 September, when the Ninth Army set out from the area of Częstochowa and Upper Silesia. For the first days, however, it was above all a march. The Germans and the Austro-Hungarian First Army advancing beside them trudged along sodden roads, brushing aside only weaker Russian detachments, while at the same time supporting the Austro-Hungarian counter-offensive in Galicia. Older British studies, including the 1922 Encyclopaedia Britannica, separate this stage from the battles of Warsaw and Ivangorod proper. They date those from the moment the Central Powers’ troops reached the Vistula and clashed with the Russian armies, that is, from 9–10 October.

On the Vistula

Hindenburg initially intended to cross the Vistula between Zawichost and Ivangorod and strike the Russians from the north. When his troops reached the river, it turned out that the Russians had shifted their main forces north, to the area of Ivangorod and Warsaw. On the left bank they held bridgeheads at the Dęblin fortress and near Kozienice. German attacks on the bridgeheads failed, and the Russian III Caucasian Corps itself went over to the attack at Ivangorod.

The northern wing of the Ninth Army, the group of General August von Mackensen, therefore turned towards Warsaw. After several days of fighting at Grójec and Mszczonów, around 10 October the Germans threw back the approaching Siberian troops. Over the following days they took, among other places, Błonie west of the city. By 12 October they had seized the left bank of the Vistula right up to Warsaw, and their vanguards stood some fifteen kilometres from the city and its forts. At about this time the Germans found on a fallen Russian officer orders showing that the Russians were concentrating about fourteen divisions against Mackensen’s five.

Illusions quickly end

Although the Germans stood at the gates of Warsaw, the Russians had the advantage. Corps after corps was brought into the city by rail, and the Russian command was preparing a counter-attack from Warsaw into Mackensen’s flank and rear. As early as 15 October the Russians pushed back the German left wing at Błonie and Grodzisk. Meanwhile panic broke out in Warsaw, and the Russian authorities prepared to evacuate. The fighting on the approaches to the city and on the Vistula lasted into the second half of October and ended in a German retreat.