Overview

"A compelling first-hand account of the Third Battle of the Aisne, this title contains an introduction by Malcolm Brown. In 1918, the Germans launched the Spring Offensive. Aware that American troops would soon be arriving in Europe, the Germans saw this as their last chance to win the war. If they could overcome the Allied armies and reach Paris, victory might be possible. The German offensive was initially a great success. Striking at the Allied line's strongest point, the Chemin des Dames, they burst their way through and made quick progress towards Marne. However, the advance eventually stalled. With supply shortages and lack of reserves, this was to be the 'last ebb' of the German war effort. Sidney Rogerson, a young officer in the West Yorkshire Regiment, describes the experiences of his battalion from the Aisne through to the Marne. Fighting under French command, the West Yorkshires were inadequately supported by artillery and practically without help from the air. The four tired divisions were forced to fight and run twenty-seven miles across wooded downlands and three rivers surviving on only emergency rations. In ""The Last of the Ebb"", the author vividly conveys the great bravery and extraordinary resilience of the West Yorkshires, who were able to face up to the terrible ordeal of such a battle without loss of morale. Remarkably for a book of this period, an account by Major-General A. D. von Unruh, which gives the German perspective of the offensive, has been included."

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9781853677380

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'Rogerson records without heroics or hysterics what his battalion experienced' - The Spectator review of Twelve Days on the Somme

Author Information

Sidney Rogerson was commissioned straight from Cambridge University Officers Training Corps into the West Yorkshire Regiment. After the First World War, he worked for the War Office, at the personal request of Winston Churchill. The author of six books, including Twelve Days on the Somme, he died in 1968. Malcolm Brown is a freelance historian at the Imperial War Museum and the editor of T. E. Lawrence in War and Peace.

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