The Liège Forts
in WW1
by
Josh Burkey & Robert Robinson
Alfred von
Schlieffen was born in Berlin in 1833. He was a graduate of the
Berlin War Academy in 1861 and served as a staff officer during the
Austro-Prussian War 0f 1866. In 1891 he replaced Helmuth von Moltke
as Chief of the German General Staff. Schlieffen and others in the
German high command feared that a resurgent France, wishing to
recover the territory lost in the Franco Prussian war of 1870, and
Russia would join together to attack Germany. His main concern was
to devise a plan that could deal with a war against Russia in the
east and France in the west. Four years after being given this
problem he devised a solution in what became known as the Schlieffen
Plan.
This strategy involved a German pre-emptive invasion of Belgium and the Netherlands followed by a right-wheel flanking movement southwards, cutting off Paris from the sea (very like 1940). This came close to being implemented in 1905 but British intelligence became aware and a stiff (but covert) diplomatic note made it very clear to the German government that an invasion of a neutral Belgium would cause Britain to declare war. As Germany did not feel strong enough then to take on Britain, France and Russia the scheme was shelved. In 1906 von Schlieffen retired (he died in 1913).
However before the war the plan was dusted off and revised. Germany was poised for a pre-emptive invasion of France, this hinged on being able to take Paris quickly and move out from there, unfortunately a significant series of fortifications and traps stood in their way. They saw a solution to this in the revised Schlieffen plan having the main invasion force hit Liege and Namur, and then, after smashing through the forts, they would use Belgium’s roads and railways to quickly move troops through into northern France and down just west of Paris and encircle the French army before it could mobilize.
Liege was defended by twelve forts these being in clockwise order Liers, Pontisse, Barchon, Evegnée, Fleron, Chaudfontaine, Embourg, Boncalles, Flemalle, Hollogne, Loncin and Lantin. An old citadel and the antiquated Fort Chartreuse defended Liege proper.
The ‘modern’ forts in the outer ring were built in the 1880s when the largest siege gun available was 210 mm. The forts had a handful of large calibre guns, ranging from 120 mm to 210 mm supplemented by a number of 57mm quick firing guns, with concrete intended to be able to resist shells from a 210mm siege gun.
The fighting lasted from the 4th of August to the 16th. The German army began its attack on Liege on the 4th August 1914. At this time the heavy siege guns had not arrived but the field guns opened a bombardment. A night attack on the 5th/6th August was beaten back by the Belgian defenders the Germans sustaining heavy losses. On the 7th Ludendorff, then a liaison officer, found the 14th Brigade without a commander and assumed command. He was able to take advantage in the fact that the Belgian forts were not positioned so as to be able to give effective mutually supporting fire and infiltrated his force between Fort Evegnee and Fort Fleron, meeting no resistance.
A surprise raid on the Belgian commander General Lehman’s headquarters drove him into Fort Loncin and in the meantime Ludendorff moved on Liege which had just suffered a Zeppelin raid. The outdated Citadel and Chartreuse where easily overcome which effectively gave Ludendorff control of the city. The forts ringing Liege were in the main still intact having been effectively bypassed but they still had to be taken as they dominated the German line of advance along the railway.
An infantry attack on Fort Barchon on the 8th was driven off but a second assault succeeded on the 10th and the neighbouring Fort Evengee fell soon after. Fort Fleron remained intact but effectively out of the game as the cupola hoisting mechanism for the main guns was irretrievably jammed. The German heavy artillery then arrived on the 12th August this being made up of 420 mm Krupp howitzers and 305mm Skoda howitzers. By 12.30 on the 13th Fort Pontisse had been smashed to rubble.
In the next two days the same fate befell six more forts (including the disabled Fleron that attempted to resist with its secondary guns). Despite German insistence that their situation was hopeless the remaining forts stayed defiant. The coup de grace was Fort Loncin. Within 2 hours and 20 minutes of the big 420mm guns opening fire the fort exploded, a 420mm shell having penetrated the concrete covering and exploding in the main magazine. After the fall of Loncin the remaining two forts surrendered without further resistance.
General Lehman survived the destruction of Fort Loncin and provided the following account to Leopold the King of the Belgians of the destruction of the Liege forts culminating in the disaster at Loncin
“Sire: -- After honourable engagements on August 4th, 5th and 6th, I considered that the forts of Liège could only play the "role" of "fort d'arret." I nevertheless maintained military government in order to coordinate the defence as much as possible, and to exercise moral influence upon the garrison. Your Majesty is not ignorant that I was at Fort Loncin. You will learn with grief that the fort was blown up yesterday (16th August) at 5.20 p.m., the greater part of the garrison being buried under the ruins. On the 11th the Germans started bombarding us with 7- and 10-centimeter cannon. On the 12th and 13th they brought their 21-centimeter guns into action. But it was not until the 14th that they opened their heaviest fire and began their destruction of the outer works. On that day, at 4 o'clock in the afternoon, a German officer approached to within 200 yards of the fort with a signalling flag in his hand; and shortly afterwards, the siege gunners, having adjusted their range, began a fearful firing, that lasted a couple of hours. The battery on the left slope was destroyed, the enemy keeping on pounding away exclusively with their 21-centimeter cannons.
The third phase of the bombardment began at 5 o'clock in the morning of the 15th, firing being kept up without a break until two in the afternoon. A shell wrecked the arcade under which the general staff were sheltering. All light was extinguished by the force of the explosion, and the officers ran the risk of asphyxiation by the horrible gases emitted from the shell. When firing ceased, I ventured out on a tour of inspection on the external slopes, which I found had been reduced to a rubble heap. A few minutes later, the bombardment was resumed. It seemed as though all the German batteries were together firing salvoes. Nobody will ever be able to form any adequate idea of what the reality was like. I have only learned since that when the big siege mortars entered into action they hurled against us shells weighing 1,000 kilos (nearly a ton), the explosive force of which surpasses anything known hitherto. Their approach was to be heard in an acute buzzing; and they burst with a thunderous roar, raising clouds of missiles, stones and dust.
After some time passed amid these horrors, I wished to return to my observation tower; but I had hardly advanced a few feet into the gallery when a great blast passed by, and I was thrown violently to the ground. I managed to rise, and continued on my way, only to be stopped by a choking cloud of poisonous gas. It was a mixture of the gas from an explosion and the smoke of a fire in the troop quarters. We were driven back, half-suffocated. Looking out of a peep hole, I saw to my horror that the fort had fallen, slopes and counter-slopes being a chaos of rubbish, while huge tongues of flame were shooting forth from the throat of the fortress. My first and last thought was to try and save the remnant of the garrison I rushed out to give orders, and saw some soldiers, whom I mistook for Belgian gendarmes. I called them, then fell again. Poisonous gases seemed to grip my throat as in a vice. . On recovering consciousness, I found my aide-de-camp, Captain Colland, standing over me, also a German officer, who offered me a glass of water. That I did not lose my life in that catastrophe is due to the fact that my escort, Commandant Collard, a sub-officer of infantry who unfortunately perished, the gendarme, Thevenim, and my two orderlies, Vanden Bosche and Jos Lecocq, drew me from a position of danger, where I was being asphyxiated by gas from the exploded powder. I was carried into a trench, where a German captain named Guson gave me a drink. They told me I had swooned, and that the soldiery I had taken for Belgian gendarmes were, in fact, the first band of German troops who had set foot inside the forts. After which I was made prisoner and taken to Liège in an ambulance. In recognition of our courage, the Germans allowed me to retain my sword. I am convinced that the honour of our arms has been sustained. I have not surrendered either the fortress or the forts. Deign, Sire, to pardon my defects in this letter. I am physically shattered by the explosion of Loncin. In Germany, whither I am proceeding, my thoughts will be, as they have ever been, of Belgium and the King. I would willingly have given my life the better to serve them, but death was denied me.”
So great was the destruction at Loncin that over 350 men, more than half the garrison remained buried in the ruins and it remains a war grave to this day.
The ease with which the Belgian forts were overcome was in part due to a number of technical factors including inferior concrete (lacking steel reinforcement and poured in layers which, although cheaper, left weaknesses in the overall structure) and design faults which concentrated the main guns above a single magazine. This may have given the Germans a false impression of the ease with which modern forts could be overcome and resulted in an over optimistic view of the cost and likelihood of success of the Verdun offensive of 1916. Certainly the Germans had expected to push through Belgium faster than they did and the delay, no matter how short, derailed the Schlieffen time table giving the French time to mobilise and the BEF to deploy.
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