Army of the Rhine

“ Not inappropriately it happened that the IInd Corps of the Second Army [124] was chosen to form part of the Army of the Rhine. The Yorkshire Dragoons were detailed to act as Advance Guard to the Infantry of the 9th, 29th and 41st Divisions; and ‘consequently,’ we read, ‘in most of the towns and villages through which they passed, they were the first British troops which the [202] inhabitants saw. The march through Belgium was a triumphal progress.’
But we must not anticipate the day of triumph, amply as the Yeomen had contributed to it. ”

“ Loud protests are sometimes made by well-fed, well-to-do people as to the impropriety of helping the starving children of Central Europe. Very different was the attitude of the soldiers who had overthrown the German military power. It is to the eternal honour of the conquering army which marched into the Rhineland, that its first act was one of pity and mercy to the hungry women and children of Cologne. ”

“ A French army carrying on military operations against Germany would make the Rhine its first base; but if driven from this it would form a second base on the Meuse or Moselle, a third on the Seine, and a fourth on the Loire; or, when driven from the first base, it would take others perpendicular to the front of defence, either to the right, on Béfort and Besançon, or to the left, on Mézières and Sedan. ”

“ Not the thousands of prisoners which you will see sent into captivity across the Rhine! What has the government to lean on—a government discredited, impotent, beaten! What in the world can prevent a change, an uprising, a revolution? Why, even if there were no such thing as the Internationale and its secret Central Committee—to which I have the honor to belong”—and here his sneer was frightful—“I tell you that before a conquering German army had recrossed the Rhine this land of chattering apes would be tearing one another for very want of a universal scape-goat. ”

“ Picture to yourself the French forces occupying Switzerland and France on the left bank of the Rhine as far north as Strasburg; and on the opposite side of the river, the long line of the Austrians, their left on the borders of eastern Switzerland and in the Tyrol, their right extending far to the north, even to Mayence, and their centre, forming the main part of the Austrian army, occupying the Black Forest with advanced brigades and outposts pushed forward almost to the banks of the Rhine. ”

“ Once across the Rhine, the soldiers who made up the remains of the French army expected to see an end to their hardships as soon as they set foot on the soil of their motherland; but they were much mistaken, for the government, and the Emperor himself, had so much counted on success, and had so little foreseen that we might leave Germany, that nothing had been made ready at the frontier to receive and re-organise the troops. ”

“ In the Franco-German War of 1870–71 he commanded this regiment in the army of the Rhine, until promoted to be general of brigade on the 30th of August. At the battle of Sedan he led the brigade of Chasseurs d’Afrique in the heroic charge of General Margueritte’s cavalry division, which extorted the admiration of the old king of Prussia. Made prisoner of war at the capitulation, he returned to France during the siege of Paris by the French army of Versailles, and commanded a brigade against the Communists. ”

“ Then the grenadiers entered the water. ‘Soldiers of the Rhine!’Rhine!’ exclaimed Bernadotte, ‘the army of Italy has its eyes upon you.’ Each division displayed the utmost bravery in the charge; we can make no distinction between them.”
“No, indeed,” observed a grim-visaged Guide, who sat next to Bessieres. “OurBessieres. “Our soldiers called the troops of the Rhine the contingent, and treated them with the greatest contempt before the battle. A number of sabre cuts were exchanged on account of this raillery. But 84the contingent proved themselves worthy of any army at Tagliamento. ”

“ If a French army should approach from the Rhine by way of Bavaria, and should find allies in force upon the Lech and the Iser, it would be a very delicate operation to throw the whole Austrian army into the Tyrol and into Bohemia, with the expectation of arresting in this way the forward movement to Vienna. ”

“ As it was necessary to guard, or at least to watch over the immensely long frontier formed by the Rhine from Basle to Holland, we settled, as best we could, the numerous sick and wounded in the hospitals of Mainz. All fit men rejoined the core of their regiments, and the various units of the army, which for the most part consisted only of a small cadre, were spread along the river. My regiment, together with what was left of Sebastiani's cavalry corps, went down the Rhine by short marches ”

“ Unhappily, they found upon him a letter from Napoleon to General Rapp, of which I preserved a copy:
"Abandon Dantzic, break the blockade, unite with the garrisons of Stettin, Custrin and Glogau, march along the Elbe, arrange with St. Cyr and Davoust to concentrate the forces scattered at Dresden, Forgau, Wittenberg, Magdeburg and Hamburg; roll up an army like a snow ball; cross Westphalia, which is open, and come to defend the line of the Rhine with an army of 170,000 Frenchmen which you will have saved! ”

“ The powerful fleet of war-ships and transports was to be utilized to land a considerable force in Northern Prussia, which should there engage a part of the Prussian troops, while the main body of the German army, it was assumed, would await the first French attack behind the strong defensive line of the Rhine. A French force was to cross the Rhine promptly, at and below Strasburg, thus avoiding the great German fortresses ”

“ No more personnel is allowed in Germany, the army of occupation being fully equipped, and if there is nothing to do, one ought to go home. If, after the signing of the Peace, it seems necessary to keep our army over here some time, I shall make an effort to be sent to the Rhine. ”

“ It was evident that such a retreat, conducted without order and without plan, was likely to be attended with the total destruction of the remnant of the army before it could reach the Rhine. By the actions on the Unstrut and Saale, at Eisenach and Hanau, this force was actually so reduced, that, on its arrival at the Rhine, it must probably have entirely lost its military consequence. ”

“ Twenty-four hours will suffice for our neighbours to concentrate on the Rhine the forces of Prussia, Austria and the Confederation, and on the morrow an army of 400,000 men could invade our territory by that breach of forty leagues between Thionville and Lauterburg, which are the outposts of Strasburg and Metz. ”

“ Withdrawn with their divisions after a few days of advance which counted them as "expended," the regiments were sent to recuperate in the Vosges, whence they started on the short march to the Rhine after the armistice.
We know how, in framing the armistice terms, as one after another strong demand was included, an apprehension developed in certain Allied quarters lest the Germans, with such a large army still in being, might become desperate and continue the war. ”

“ Again the Rhenish people turned their eyes upon their capital, Cologne; but such masses of troops had been concentrated there that a rising would not have had the slightest prospect of success. In the manufacturing districts on the right bank of the Rhine the revolt really broke out. The immediate occasion was an order issued by the Prussian government to mobilize the army-corps of the Rhine province for the purpose of sending it against the defenders of the national constitution in the Bavarian Palatinate and in Baden, where provisional governments had been set up by the revolutionists. ”

“ Four hundred thousand [Pg 10] men were to cross the Rhine before the Prussians were ready, and by a bold, vigorous dash to separate Northern from Southern Germany; whilst, at the same time, thanks to some brilliant success, Austria and Italy would speedily be compelled to ally themselves with France. Had it not been rumoured, too, at one moment, that the Seventh Army Corps, to which Maurice's regiment belonged, was to put to sea at Brest in view of landing in Denmark and creating a diversion which would compel Prussia to immobilise one of her armies? ”

“ The Po rises in the French Alps, and flows east through northern Italy. The Danube rises in western Germany, and flows east through Bavaria and Austria. The Rhine rises in Switzerland, flows north into Lake Constance, thence, forming the outlet of the lake, flows west to Bâle, where it turns abruptly and flows north for the rest of its course.
Early in April, 1800, an Austrian army of one hundred and twenty thousand soldiers, commanded by Marshal Kray, guarded the right bank of the upper Rhine. The right wing extended beyond Strasburg; the left, well up into the Alps east of Switzerland ”

“ He now left behind him Gustavus Horn, one of his best generals, with a force of 8,000 men, to complete and retain his conquest. He himself with his main army, reinforced by the late recruits, hastened toward the Rhine in order to secure this frontier of the empire from the Spaniards, to disarm the ecclesiastical electors, and to obtain from their fertile territories new resources for the prosecution of the war. Following the course of the Main, he subjected, in the course of his march, Seligenstadt, Aschaffenburg, Steinheim, the whole territory on both sides of the river. ”

“ The same thing applies to the drafting of officers to hold the highest administrative positions in the state.
There are twenty-five army corps all placed in strategical position. The strongest is in Alsace-Lorraine and along the Rhine; the second in importance garrisoning the Prussian-Russian border. The whole country is subdivided into Bezirks commandos (districts posts) whose business is to have on record not only every able-bodied man--reservists--but every motor, horse, and vehicle available; also food and coal supply--in fact, everything likely to be wanted or useful to the army. ”

“ AN M5 LIGHT TANK guarding a road in the U. S. Ninth Army area, 22 January. With the collapse of the German salient in the Ardennes, preparations were made for the offensive to the Rhine by 21 Army Group. The Germans held the triangle south of Roermond between the Meuse and Roer Rivers. This was a serious threat to the left flank of the Ninth Army and had to be eliminated before the army could advance across the Roer to the Rhine plain. The task of eliminating this salient was assigned to the British Second Army and by 26 January was completed. ”

“ The German civilian officials and the police work under the military authorities, and have worked without difficulty or friction. The Occupation has a fine and honourable record. The behaviour of the troops has been good. Soldiers have won real popularity in the country districts. Incidents and brawls will of course occur from time to time among large bodies of men, but they have had no racial or political significance. The forces on the Rhine are at present one of the great factors making for peace and order in Europe. ”

“ The light cavalry had been much improved and the heavy cavalry on the whole proved a fair match for their opponents.
27. The French Army.—After the peace of Tilsit the Grand Army was gradually withdrawn behind the Rhine, leaving only three commands, totaffing 63,000 men, under Davout in Prussia, Oudinot in west central Germany, and Lefebvre in Bavaria, to assist the princes of the Confederation of the Rhine in the maintenance of order and the enforcement of the French law of conscription, which was rigorously insisted on in all the States comprised in this new federation. ”

“ The XVIIIth was employed in the covering army, and in the middle of October, a few weeks before the place was taken, all the British infantry were embarked on river boats and floated down the Rhine to Nimeguen, where after a ten days’ voyage they disembarked, so greatly reduced by their losses in the campaign that for administrative purposes the fourteen regiments were treated as seven provisional battalions. The troops marched to their winter quarters to enjoy a well-earned rest and to discipline the recruits who joined them from home. ”

“ It is impossible to forget the sufferings and trials which have led up to our presence on the Rhine, even though the sufferings are not confined to one side. A very small grain of imagination is necessary in order to realise what a military occupation would have meant to us. Admittedly, if the war had come to a different end, we should have felt to the full the weight of the Prussian jackboot. The Boche as a conqueror can be intolerable—swollen-headed, swaggering, brutal. Victory would have intensified tenfold every bad quality the race possesses. ”

“ As provided in the military clauses, Germany will not maintain any fortifications or armed forces less than fifty kilometers to the east of the Rhine, hold any manœuvres, nor maintain any works to facilitate mobilization. ”

“ An army of principles will penetrate where an army of soldiers cannot—It will succeed where diplomatic management would fail—It is neither the Rhine, the Channel, nor the Ocean, that can arrest its progress—It will march on the horizon of the world, and it will conquer. ”

“ If the people had been educated, we should have known what was going on upon the other side of the Rhine; we should have had national armies, able generals, a watchful commissariat, a sound organization, enlightened and conscientious deputies; we should have had all that we are now wanting; we should not have placed the power of making war or peace in the hands of an imbecile; we should not have stupidly attacked the Germans, and the Germans, seeing us ready to receive them, would have been careful not to attack us. ”