Standing at the door of the car, Gallieni said to the panicked and restless French soldiers in front of him: "French soldiers, I am Joseph Simon Gallieni, and I order you, in my capacity as the military governor of Paris, to immediately go to the infantry trenches on the front line and stand by!" ”

The French soldiers with rifles on their backs looked at each other, they obviously did not expect to meet Gallieny, who had been hailed by many in recent days as the "Savior of Paris" and "Second Commander-in-Chief of the French Army" in such a terrible place on such a bad night, and the veteran had undoubtedly suppressed the panic caused by the German shelling of these French officers and soldiers, and they turned one after another, some taking their rifles from their shoulders, and some of them were empty-handed. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 At the orders of the elderly non-commissioned officer, the soldiers formed a simple marching column and went down the main road towards the burning town.

Galieni sat back in the car with a frown, and at this time, the adjutant cautiously asked him: "Where are we going now?" ”

Gallieni did not answer the question, but muttered to himself: "Is it such a coincidence that the headquarters of the 3rd Army and the headquarters of the 4th Corps were destroyed by German artillery?" ”

His adjutant should have said, "I guess it's just that the phone line just happened to be blown up." ”

Gallerien shook his head: "If this is caused by chance, it can only be said that God has decided to abandon France." ”

The adjutant's eyes widened: "You mean ......"

Gallieni lowered his head and thought: "Keep going!" ”

Looking at the burning town in his sight, the driver probably felt that he had misheard, and looked at Gallieni's lieutenant in confusion, and received an affirmative signal from him, so he drove forward silently. They had not gone far before hundreds of French soldiers came along the road like fleeing civilians, each of them moving forward at their own pace, some throwing away all their belongings, some carrying their rifles, some walking side by side with five or six people, and some wandering slowly alone. The depressing performance of these French servicemen was not entirely due to the terrible shelling of the Germans. For half a week, almost all the French troops were digging fortifications incessantly, and the soldiers lacked sleep and were fed up with good and bad food, so they were exhausted.

Since the group of soldiers who had just turned around and returned to the front did not have enough effect on their companions, Gallieni had no choice but to ask the driver to slow down, lean out of the window, and shout to the dejected French soldiers: "Go back to the front!" Hold your ground and defend Paris! ”

Perhaps it was Gallieni's general's hat that served as a deterrent, or perhaps it was his pistol and strict battlefield regulations that terrified the soldiers, who turned their heads and headed towards the front line with the rumbling of artillery, but after a few minutes, someone suddenly shouted: "German cavalry!" They're surrounding us! ”

Suddenly, the soldiers fled in all directions in panic, and a few of them knew that they must not be in a mess in the face of the cavalry, so they shouted loudly for the soldiers to stop and prepare for battle, and about sixty or seventy soldiers obeyed their call to assemble along the road, put on their bayonets, and lined up, but there was no German cavalry in this vicinity, and not even a shadow of a war horse was seen.

Gallieni's driver drove the car to the side of these soldiers, and the white-haired military governor of Paris was about to get out of the car, when a bullet suddenly flew in the distance and hit the canopy of the car only a dozen centimeters away from his head, Gallieni's adjutant was shocked, and the surrounding French soldiers searched around with rifles, but the surrounding vision flickered and dimmed, and it was impossible to distinguish whether someone was deliberately attacking.

"It looks like the Germans have infiltrated our defense zone!"

Gallieni said quite calmly, and the doubts in his mind also found a reasonable answer, as for how the Germans got in, and how many of them were, these things are not important now, the point is that they are trying to destroy the French army's communication and command system, and create confusion among the French officers and soldiers - although this method is despised by the orthodox professional soldiers, Wilhelm II's army burned and plundered all the way, many towns and villages were razed to the ground, and the rules of civilization did not apply to this army from hell at all.

As long as the German shooter disguised as a French soldier was still nearby, it would be very dangerous to continue to stay in the car, Gallieni quickly opened the door and got out of the car, easily dropped the eye-catching general's hat with a big red background and gold decoration in the car, stuffed his eyes into his breast pocket, and said to the infantry officer next to him: "Mr. Ensign, if you and your soldiers can help me find the headquarters of the 3rd Army as soon as possible, you will be awarded a medal for your important contribution to the defense of Paris." ”

Although the task was somewhat daunting, the young French officer's encouragement was evidently motivating the young French officer, and he quickly made a division of labor, ordering some of his soldiers to turn back and inquire about the headquarters of the army group, and to escort Gallerien and his lieutenant to Scherer with the rest of the men. The closer you got to the burning town, the worse the situation along the way, because the Germans did not expect to cover the area far from the forward positions as soon as the shelling began, and the French troops camped in and around the town not only suffered heavy casualties, but also suffered a very heavy blow to their morale, and if the Germans broke through the forward positions at this time and rushed over, they would probably not be able to organize even decent resistance.

Along the way, the accompanying officers and soldiers drove the scattered troops back to the front line under the banner of Gallieni, which certainly had a remarkable effect, but also brought a lot of hidden dangers to Gallieni's personal safety, and Gallerini did not care about this, he cared about whether the steel defense line he had built could withstand the heavy blow of the German army. After tossing and turning for almost an hour, the group finally found the headquarters of the 3rd Army, which was temporarily placed in a shelter.

In the first weeks of the war, the French 3rd Army was under the command of General Luff. To be fair, this commander, despite his lack of brilliance and his mistakes, was the unfortunate scapegoat for a series of defeats for the French, and the 3rd Army was taken over by General Saraj, the former commander of the 4th Corps.

Seeing General Saraj and his staff officers busy in the humble but safe temporary headquarters, a large stone in Gallieni's heart finally fell. He didn't bother to take a sip of water, and hurried to Saraj to find out about the various departments at the front. Although Saraj's command was unable to contact all the troops, it maintained contact with at least the 2th and 5th main corps.

"There are two telephone lines and two telegraph lines to Paris, all of which are currently cut off; We had two ordinary telephone lines and one temporary telephone line for field use with the 4th Corps, and the two open lines were broken, but the dark lines remained open. Sarailo said with great rejoicing, telling Gallerien that since only a small number of alert troops were deployed in the forward positions in peacetime, and the main combat units were on standby in infantry trenches and shelters, so far the losses of the divisions on the front line had not been very large, and they should be able to withstand the German ground attack. However, the coverage range of the German heavy artillery worried Saraj and his staff that if they continued to bombard the rear of the French positions with heavy artillery while the German tanks and infantry units were charging, it would have a rather negative impact on the tactical movement of the French forces.

Listening to Saraj's explanation, Gallieri was speechless, he should remember that before the outbreak of the war, there was an officer named Philippe Petain who emphasized the value of heavy artillery in the military press and some internal occasions, but such minority rhetoric was completely drowned in the tide of offensive thinking, so that the French army put the bet of defeating the opponent on the 1897 75mm field rapid-fire gun, this artillery has its own uniqueness, but it is only an oversized shotgun, The number of German heavy artillery is seven times that of the French army, light howitzers are equipped to the infantry division level, heavy howitzers are equipped to the infantry army level, and the regimental artillery group has a range of more than 10 kilometers.

The heavy German shelling finally stopped near six o'clock in the morning, and in the early autumn morning, a thin layer of fog rose in the fields, and the prolonged shelling produced a large amount of smoke and dust, which made the view of the forward positions very poor. Fearing that the German infantry might attack at any time, as soon as the shelling ended, the French soldiers in many defense areas heard a series of orders from the officers:

"All on standby!"

"Ready to go!"

"Get into position!"

In the morning mist, the French soldiers marched through the communication trenches to the designated place in the order of battle. However, only half an hour later, the Germans began to shoot again, the artillery fire was still very fierce, and the rear of the forward position was covered by fire, and the French officers and soldiers who had just arrived at the front line were entangled between going and staying, when suddenly someone shouted: "The Germans are coming!" ”

On the forward positions, many French soldiers were busy poking their heads out, trying to find the enemy and open fire on them, machine guns clicking, machine guns roaring, hundreds of rifle fire sounded like a rainstorm, countless bullets burrowed into the dust and mist, and if there were German infantry there, they would surely have suffered many casualties.

This time, the German artillery fire lasted only a quarter of an hour, and the sudden pace of the sudden pace threatened the approach of an experienced and resourceful commander like Gallieni, who believed that the attack must be of considerable proportions, and as soon as the telephone line to Paris was connected, he ordered two infantry divisions in reserve to march to Villeparisi, which was to hold this vital military stronghold anyway.

As the early morning sun gradually dispelled the mist that had shrouded the fields, the German shelling stopped, the chaotic gunfire on the French positions subsided, and there was a brief but eerie silence on the battlefield. At 7:10, in a forward post on the French Ville-Parisi front, the sentry saw through his telescope one after another slowly advancing gray iron bumps, and then a large wave of gray people, such a strong attack lineup made this French soldier who had experienced many battles shudder.

(End of chapter)