Russians retake Stanisławów

On 4 March 1915 Russian troops reoccupied Stanisławów, an important railway junction in eastern Galicia. This is the date given by the British chronology of the war, and Ukrainian studies of the town’s history agree with it, according to which the second period of Russian rule in Stanisławów lasted from 4 March to 8 June 1915. Some texts give the date 19 February. This is the same day, counted according to the Julian calendar then in use in Russia.

Austro-Hungarian rule in the town thus lasted only two weeks. The troops of General Karl von Pflanzer-Baltin had entered Stanisławów on 20 February, after a victorious march through Bukovina and Pokuttya. It was the greatest achievement of the winter offensive in the Carpathians, but at the same time the most advanced and least protected point of the front. The Austrians had no way of quickly reinforcing this wing, because it was supplied by only a single mountain railway line through Máramarossziget.

Lechitsky’s counter-offensive

The Russians had a dense railway network in Galicia and could move troops much faster. As early as the second half of February the leading units of General Platon Lechitsky’s 9th Army, reinforced with formations brought in from other sectors of the front, were gathering north and west of Stanisławów. According to a post-war Austrian account published in the Encyclopaedia Britannica, Lechitsky went over to the attack on 28 February with four corps.

Pflanzer-Baltin’s right wing, clearly weaker in numbers, fell back fighting and gave up Stanisławów. The Austrians halted only on a new line north of Obertyn, between the Dniester and the Carpathians. They held it mainly because on 4 March itself XI Corps, brought from another sector of the front, came up to help. Also helpful was the offensive of the Austro-Hungarian 2nd Army in the Bieszczady, which was to break through to Przemyśl and drew part of the Russian reserves upon itself.

The front on the Prut

The Russians did not stop at once, however. By 10 March they had reached the Prut in northern Bukovina, threatening Czernowitz, retaken in February. Their attack on Austria-Hungary’s eastern wing came to a halt only around 18 March. After that the front in this sector stabilised for several weeks.

For the inhabitants of Stanisławów the change of rule meant the return of the Russian military administration. Ukrainian historians of the town write of repression of the civilian population, the taking of hostages and the new authorities’ particularly hostile attitude to the Jews. The Russians held the town until 8 June 1915, when, after the breakthrough at Gorlice, the armies of the Central Powers were already driving them out of the whole of Galicia.