17
(_Colored Map_) _Front Insert_

Verdun Front, February 1, 1917 38

Allies' Gain at the Somme, up to February, 1917 66

Attack in the Riga Sector 87

Teutonic Invasion of Rumania 104

New German Submarine War Zone of February 1, 1917 207

The Entire Western Front, August 1, 1917 220

The German Retreat on the Western Front, March 18, 1917 233

Taking of Vimy Ridge by the Canadians, April 9 and 10, 1917 240

The French Offensive on the Craonne Plateau, Champagne 257

The Taking of Messines Ridge, June 7, 1917 266

The Somme Battle Front, August 1, 1917 283

The Russian Offensive and Retreat in Galicia 446

The Entire Eastern Battle Front, August 1, 1917 450

PART I--WESTERN FRONT--SOMME AND VERDUN

CHAPTER I

FRENCH AND BRITISH ADVANCES

The first month of the Allied offensive on the Somme front closed
quietly. The British and French forces had every reason to feel
encouraged over their successes. In the two thrusts since July 1,
1916, they had won from the Germans nearly twenty-four square miles of
territory. Considering the extent to which every fraction of a mile
was fortified and defended, and the thoroughness of the German
preparations to make the district impregnable, the Allied gains were
important. As a British officer said at the time, it was like digging
badgers out of holes--with the proviso that every badger had machine
guns and rifles at the hole's mouth, while the approach to each was
swept by the fire from a dozen neighboring earthworks.

It was estimated that in the first month of the Allied offensive on
the Somme the German casualties amounted to about 200,000 men, while
the Anglo-French forces lost less than a fourth of that number. The
Allies claimed to have captured about 13,000 prisoners and between
sixty and seventy field guns, exclusive of machine guns and the
smaller artillery.

With the capture of Pozieres it might be said that the second phase of
the Battle of the Somme was concluded. The Allied forces were well
established on the line to which the second main "push" which began
July 14, 1916, wa