End of the French defence at Verdun

The British chronology of the war records under 31 August 1916 the end of the Battle of Verdun, which had begun on 21 February. In a footnote it explains that this is the French date for the end of the “defensive battle of Verdun”, while the German list extends it to 9 September. Nothing in particular happened on the Meuse that day. The date is a nominal boundary between half a year of French defence and the later French attacks, which the chronology counts as separate offensive battles. On our timeline the Battle of Verdun covers the whole of this period, up to the end of the second French counter-offensive on 18 December 1916.

August on the right bank of the Meuse

After the failed assault on Fort Souville in July the German command no longer tried to break through the front, but the fighting on the right bank of the Meuse did not stop. According to the American historian Robert Doughty, on 1 August the Germans advanced 800–900 metres towards Fort Souville in a surprise attack, and French counter-attacks over the next two weeks recovered only part of this ground. The fiercest fighting was for two points that had been contested since June. The ruins of the Thiaumont work, taken by the Germans on 23 June, were retaken by the French on 1–4 August, but on the evening of 8 August a strong German attack drove them out again. According to the Michelin guide to the battlefield, published in 1919, the work changed hands sixteen times from 23 June. From mid-August the French gave up costly frontal attacks on Thiaumont and began slowly to encircle it.

The French occupied the ruins of the village of Fleury on 2 and 3 August, taking about 1,350 prisoners according to the Michelin guide, but soon lost them and on 5 August retook them only in part. For the next two weeks the chasseurs alpins fought for them with grenades, crater by crater. During the night of 17/18 August the Moroccan colonial infantry regiment (Régiment d’infanterie coloniale du Maroc), which together with the Zouaves and colonial riflemen (tirailleurs) of the 38th Infantry Division had been fighting in the area for about ten days, took the rest of the ruins. Sources give the date as 17 or 18 August. Fleury, which according to various accounts had changed hands a dozen or more times since June, now stayed in French hands. The village was wiped off the face of the earth and never rebuilt. On 23 August the council of the commune of Allemagne (“Germany”) in Normandy decided to change the name of its village in Fleury’s honour to Fleury-sur-Orne.

The Germans go over to the defensive

On the German side Verdun had ceased to be the main objective as early as July, when the offensive on the Somme and the Brusilov offensive forced the Supreme Army Command to move divisions and heavy artillery to other fronts. The 5th Army of Crown Prince Wilhelm was ordered to go over to the defensive, with leave only for local attacks. In August its chief of staff, General Konstantin Schmidt von Knobelsdorf, lost his post; since February he had in effect directed the offensive and had argued longest for continuing it. Around 20 August he was transferred to command X Corps on the Eastern Front, and his place was taken by General Walther von Lüttwitz. On 29 August, two days after Romania entered the war, the Kaiser dismissed Erich von Falkenhayn, the author of the plan to attack Verdun. His place was taken by Paul von Hindenburg and Erich Ludendorff.

The new Supreme Army Command soon turned to the question of Verdun. On 2 September Hindenburg ordered all attacks there to stop, and from then on the 5th Army was only to defend the positions it had won. The French command, Generals Philippe Pétain and Robert Nivelle, soon began to prepare the recapture of the lost ground. In the following weeks the French improved their positions around Fleury and Thiaumont bit by bit, and on 24 October they struck at Fort Douaumont, opening the first of two autumn counter-offensives.