From ‘News of the Week’, The Spectator, 13 February 1915:
FROM the eastern theatre of war there have been received daring the week details of the gigantic dimensions of Field-Marshal von Hindenburg’s grand attack upon the Russian centre—i.e., upon the force on the Bzura which bars the German advance on Warsaw. On a very narrow front, not more, it is said, than seven miles, the Germans concentrated some hundred and fifty thousand of their best troops and burled them in close formation, five deep, upon the Russian trenches. This mighty mass of battalions, brigades, and divisions was supported by the fire of no fewer than a hundred batteries, or six hundred guns. The gun and rifle fire of the Russians swept away the beads of the formations as they advanced. Yet the Germans swept on “in a blacker, incessanter line” till they reached the trenches and filled them as the tide fills the moat of a child’s castle, leaving a dreadful froth of dead and wounded on the trenches’ lip.
Britain’s best politics newsletters
You get two free articles each week when you sign up to The Spectator’s emails.
Already a subscriber? Log in
Comments
Join the debate for just £1 a month
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first three months for £3.
UNLOCK ACCESS Just £1 a monthAlready a subscriber? Log in