ced as high a value on the height
for military purposes as the French. They had spent the winter in
adding to what nature had made nearly perfect--the impregnability
of the entire sector. They intrusted its defense, when an attack
seemed likely, only to first-line troops, the Tenth Division of
the Fifth Corps from Posen holding it when the French made their
successful attack. To gain the height it was necessary for the
French to climb the slimy sides, which were swept by machine-gun
fire. The Germans knew the exact range of every square foot of
the slopes. There was no place that offered even a slight shelter
for the attacking force. The weather was at its worst. Yet, in
spite of the many difficulties which seemed insurmountable, the
French soldiers had won the most decisive engagement in this part
of the campaign.

It is true the Teutons occupied the lesser spur of Combres; but
that gave them little or no advantage, for no attack could be made
from it without subjecting the attacking party to a leaden hail from
St. Remy and Les Eparges. But the German salient still remained,
and the French continued their pressure on it. They pushed forward
in the north to Etain, and took the hills on the right bank of the
Orne, which hampered their enemy in his use of the Etain-Conflans
railroad. They closed in on the reentrant of the salient to the
north--Gussainville; and they used the same tactics in regard to
Lamorville, because it dominated the Gap of Spada; and to the north of
it they exerted a pressure on the Bois de la Selouse. The engagements
on the south of the salient were fought desperately. The part of the
top which falls away to the Rupt de Mad was held by the French. That
section is covered with a low wood, which develops into presentable
forests in the region toward the Moselle Valley to the east. The
Teutons had taken every advantage of the ground in constructing
their fortifications, and the French found a hard task before them.
They proceeded against their opponents in the Bois d'Ailly, the Forest
of Apremont, the Bois de Mont-Mare, the village of Regnieville,
and the Bois le Pretre. Though each success was not large, the
entire effort was effective in pushing in the southern side of
the salient. This brought the soldiers of the republic to within
about four miles of Thiaucourt, which, with the control of Les
Eparges, threatened St. Mihiel.

The French heavy artillery shelled the southern front of the trenches
a