Battle of Cantigny, 1918

The battle, stage by stage

1. 27 May 1918

   The lines before the attack

   Since late April the U.S. 1st Division (Maj. Gen. Robert L. Bullard), serving under the French X Corps, has held the front west of Montdidier, the first American division in line opposite the German Eighteenth Army of Gen. Oskar von Hutier. In front of it, on a rise northeast of Villers-Tournelle, stands the ruined village of Cantigny, taken by the Germans in March; it gives them observation over the American lines and hides their own rear. The American front line is little more than a chain of shell holes and trenches about 500 yards west of the town, under almost daily high-explosive and gas fire. Cantigny is held by two regiments of the 82nd Reserve Division with a third regiment, of the 25th Reserve Division, nearby. The 28th Infantry (Col. Hanson E. Ely), which has rehearsed the attack on similar ground, moves up with three battalions in line: the 3rd north, the 2nd in the center facing the village, the 1st south.

2. 28 May, 4:45 – 6:45 AM

   The bombardment

   At 4:45 AM the guns fire registration rounds, and at about 5:45 the full bombardment begins: roughly 228 pieces of the 1st Field Artillery Brigade and the French X Corps, massed back toward Rocquencourt, including French 220-mm and 280-mm howitzers and the eight 155-mm Schneider howitzers of Maj. Robert R. McCormick's 1st Battalion, 5th Field Artillery. Heavy guns pound the German batteries with high explosive and gas while howitzers and mortars hit the village and the trenches beside it. Many of the defenders shelter in cellars. Twelve French Schneider tanks of groupe AS 5 under Capt. Noscereau come up behind the center battalion. (The CMH history calls them Renault FTs, but the FT's first combat came only on 31 May; other accounts agree they were Schneider CA1s.)

3. 28 May, 6:45 – 7:20 AM

   Over the top behind the barrage

   At 6:45 AM (by the CMH account the first men moved out at 6:40) the infantry advance in three waves behind a rolling barrage that moves 100 meters every two minutes, the 28th's machine guns firing ahead of them. By the CMH account they reach the German front line in about ten minutes. The tanks knock out machine-gun posts west and north of the village, though some stall in shell holes, and French flamethrower teams (CMH: with two battalions; Company G of the 2nd Battalion in the village) burn out cellars and dugouts while engineers help clear them. The flank battalions push round the edges of the village.

4. 28 May, about 7:20 AM – noon

   Cantigny taken

   By about 7:20 AM the objective is reached: a line some 500 meters north of the village, astride the road about 300 yards beyond the cemetery, that curves round about 400 yards into the fields east of it and back to the old line in the south, on a front of about two kilometers. The assault takes between about 150 (CMH) and 230 (Cochrane: 225 men and 5 officers) prisoners. The 2nd Battalion holds the village; by the CMH account the flank battalions had not yet fully taken their objectives. The 28th Infantry and the 1st Engineers rework the German trenches, string wire and set up strongpoints (three, by the ABMC account), one of them in the village cemetery. The tanks, unable to get through the rubble of the village, work round its edges before withdrawing. A first hurried German counterattack, reportedly from the Bois de Framicourt, is broken up by artillery.

5. 28 May, afternoon – night

   The French heavy guns leave

   On 27 May the Germans had opened their great offensive on the Chemin des Dames, and the French command orders the long-range guns away to the Aisne immediately after the assault; from the afternoon the American heavy howitzers have no counter-battery support. German artillery, including 210-mm guns by one magazine account (Military Heritage, 2014), shells the new line for most of the next two days and cuts the telephone wires. Between about 5:00 and 8:00 PM the first coordinated counterattacks come out of the Bois de Framicourt; they are beaten off, though parts of the 1st and 3rd Battalions fall back briefly. Ely warns that without heavy-artillery support he may have to pull back; Bullard replies: "The position must be held. The Commander in Chief expects it." The two companies of the 18th Infantry and a company of the 26th go in to strengthen the line.

6. 29 May

   Holding on

   At about 3:30 AM the Germans attack again (elements of Reserve Infantry Regiment 271, by Cochrane's account), and two more counterattacks come from the Bois de Framicourt in the morning; rifle and machine-gun fire and the American barrage break them up. Accounts of the afternoon differ: the CMH history describes an attack on the southern edge, ordered by von Hutier, broken up before it reached the infantry, while Cochrane's study records a strong attack at about 5:45 PM that forced the left of the line back several hundred meters. Under shellfire and gas the men wear their respirators for hours at a time. At 8:55 PM Ely reports that his front line has been "pounded to hell and gone" and must be relieved.

7. 30 – 31 May

   The line held

   The last German attack comes early on 30 May from the Bois de Laval (Lalval), northeast of the village, across the open fields, about 5:30 AM by the ABMC account (an ASC history gives 3:45), and is stopped by American infantry with artillery support. The CMH history records only "a single probe" of the southern positions that day. On the night of 30–31 May (CMH: continuing through the 31st) the exhausted 28th Infantry and its attached companies are relieved by the 16th Infantry (Cochrane; the CMH history says the 18th). American losses run from 941 (CMH) to about 1,070 (the division's estimate: 45 officers and 1,025 men, 199 of them killed), and ABMC gives 1,603 as a high figure. German losses in the two 82nd Reserve Division regiments were 1,437 by the CMH count, plus 324 in the 25th Reserve Division regiment. The 1st Division held the sector until relieved on 8 July.