CHAMPAGNE - La Main de Massiges
- by Pierre Grande Guerre
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- 27 Apr, 2019
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Year of visit: 2005, (2014)
A visit to the east hand of the Champagne-sector, linking up with the Argonne. Along the D 566 from Cernay-en-Dormois, lies now such a peaceful place: Massiges. We visit "la Main de Massiges, the Hand of Massiges, a natural German fort.
These hills dominating the valley of the Aisne are situated to the north of the village of Massiges.
The Hand owes its name to the contour lines on the military maps, which take the form of a flat right hand.
This view of the "ring finger" is from the valley, which belonged to the French troops.
It was finally taken only during the victorious offensive of 1918.
The statue of "La Vierge aux Abeilles" in Massiges. "The Virgin of the Bees", was placed on another spot during the war, some 50 meters away from here. The French soldiers removed the statue to the temporarily grave-yard. At the same time they used it as a dressing station and a place to worship the Madonna, before they went upwards the Hand to fight in the first lines. The Madonna was many times hit by bullets and grenades. In one of the holes some bees started to make a beehive. That's why the French soldiers called the Madonna "The Virgin of the Bees". |
This is Monsieur Albert V., who lives only 3 houses (about 50 m.) to the right from the statue of the Madonna of the Bees.
Monsieur V. also claims that during the war the soldiers removed the Madonna statue from the corner of the street to his garden.
For years he has been collecting relics of the period by digging in his own grounds. He created a small museum in one of his sheds, filled with soldier artefacts and relics found in the former trenches.
We were very grateful to Monsieur V. for inviting us is garden and for showing his impressive collection. Our visit to Monsieur V.’s collection interfered with the planned time to visit the Main itself.
Continue to the next chapter: "MARNE - The Retreat from Mons - 1914"
Inleiding: Franz Von Papen & Werner Horn; schaker en pion
Onlangs stuitte ik in een oud boek (1) van 1919 op een opmerkelijk verhaal over een Duitse Luitenant, die in begin februari 1915 een half geslaagde bomaanslag pleegt op een spoorbrug over een grensrivier tussen de Verenigde Staten en Canada. Ook al staat de bekentenis van de dader, Werner Horn, deels in het boek te lezen, de naam van zijn opdrachtgever zal Horn blijven verzwijgen. Na wat verder zoeken vond ik ook de naam van Horn’s opdrachtgever, Franz von Papen, een van de aangeklaagden van het latere Neurenberg Proces in 1946.
In een Grote Oorlog als de Eerste Wereldoorlog is Horn’s aanslag op de brug uiteraard slechts een bescheiden wapenfeit. Toch vermoed ik dat dit relatief onbekende verhaal, dat de geschiedenis is ingegaan als de “ Vanceboro International Bridge Bombing ”, nog interessante kanten kent. Het is onder andere een spionageverhaal over hoe in een groter plan een sluwe schaker zijn naïeve pion offert.
Beknopte situatieschets Canada en de Verenigde Staten in 1915
This trip we start at the Léomont near Vitrimont and we will with some exceptions concentrate on the Battle of Lorraine of August-September 1914 in the area, called, the “Trouée de Charmes”, the Gap of Charmes.
After the Léomont battlefield we continue our explorations to Friscati hill and its Nécropole Nationale. Next we pay a visit to the battlefield of la Tombe to go on to the Château de Lunéville. There we cross the Vezouze to move on southward to the Bayon Nécropole Nationale. At Bayon we cross the Moselle to pass Charmes for the panorama over the battlefield from the Haut du Mont. North-west of Charmes we will visit the British Military Cemetery containing 1918 war victims. From Charmes we go northward to the battlefield of the First French Victory of the Great War, the Battle of Rozelieures of 25 August 1914. North of Rozelieures we will visit the village of Gerbéviller. From there we make a jump northward to visit the ruins of Fort de Manonviller to finish with an interesting French Dressing Station bunker, west of Domjevin.
During this visit, we try to focus on the day that the momentum of the battle switched from the French side to the advantage of the Bavarian side: the day of 20 August 1914, when the Bavarians rapidly re-conquered the territory around Morhange , being also the day of the start of their rather successful “Schlacht in Lothringen”.
We will visit beautiful landscapes of the "Parc Naturel Régional de Lorraine", memorials, ossuaries, and cemeteries. Sometimes we will divert to other periods of the Great War, honouring Russian and Romanian soldiers, who died in this sector. We start our route at the border village of Manhoué, and via Frémery, Oron, Chicourt, Morhange, Riche, Conthil, Lidrezing, Dieuze, Vergaville, Bidestroff, Cutting, Bisping we will finish in Nomeny and Mailly-sur-Seille, where the Germans halted their advance on 20 August 1914, and where they constructed from 1915 some interesting bunkers.
