The Picardy night is numbed with clouds. In the clearing of Rethondes, in the forest of Compiègne (Oise), it is the exhaustion that dominates: Marshal Foch, commander of the French armies, crushes a yawn in the palm of his hand. On this November 11, 1918, after 1,560 days of a conflict that killed 8 million people across Europe, generals and decision -makers were washed out.
With a heavy hand, Matthias Erzberger, the representative of the German delegation, affixes his signature at the bottom of the treaty. At 5:12 am, finally, the Armistice of the First World War was ratified. The plenipotentiaries of the belligerent nations rise, but no handshake is exchanged.
The “der of the ders”, this war which we hoped would be the last of human history, therefore ends the eleventh day of the eleventh month. Is it to strengthen this digital symmetry that we set at 11 a.m. the entry into force of the armistice? The fact remains that the jubilation scenes do not wait for the fateful schedule to wake up the country. The tricolor newspapers print special editions celebrating victory; triumphant bugs shake the trenches; At the rear, we sing “La Marseillaise”, while the bells of the churches and the firefighters spread the good news.
Latest fights, last sighs
Alas, the Great War is not – Encura – finished. Marshal Foch said it by telegraph to all officers: the fights will not stop at 11am. In the meantime, the shells are raining. In the northeast of France, machine guns spit their last cartridges.
Here is what the battalion chief Charles de Menditte reports, commander of the 415e infantry regiment, engaged in the final battles of Vrigne-Meuse, in the Ardennes: “Around 6:30 am the noise of the armistice circulates. At 8:30 am, the opinion is official. Meanwhile, we continue to shoot the regiment’s front and the German shells fall on Dom-le-Mesnil. I pass the good news to the regiment and we wait! 10:45 am: The shells still fall into the village. 10:57 am: The machine gun still pulls. ”
What a mess! Supervised by General Boichut, the Battle of Vrigne-Meuse costs a hundred hairy lives in the last hours of the conflict. Fearing that this unnecessary sacrifice is criticized, the French staff will decide to anti -ter death reviews of November 11 on November 10, in order to avoid the removals of bereaved families and public opinion.
Among the victims, Augustin Trébuchon, a 40 -year -old Lozérian shepherd who had survived the battles of Verdun (1916), Chemin des Dames (1917) and La Marne (the second, in 1918), three memorable butcheries of the conflict. The unfortunate man was killed around 10:50 am, which would make him the last French soldier who died in combat in 1914-1918.
At the same time, 80 kilometers south-east of Vrigne-Meuse, another unit is offensive. 313e US Army Infantry Regiment tramples in Chaumont-Devant-Damvillers (Meuse), held in respect by two German machine guns stationed at a crossroads. Camouflaged in the mist, the patient squad. In a few minutes, the eleven strokes will sound and the war will be officially over.
There is a soldier, however, that this perspective hardly enchanted. Former bank employee in Baltimore (Maryland) mobilized in September 1917, Henry Gunther looks sad. Promoted sergeant a few months earlier, he was demoted in the ranks after recommending a friend, in a letter, to avoid conscription. He must redeem himself, at all costs, before hostilities stop!
It is 10:59 am when his bayonet emerges from the mist. To everyone’s surprise, Henry Gunther decided to load enemy positions. His superior officer tries to hold him back. In vain. Opening round eyes, German machine gunners enjoin him by great signs of arms to stay with his unit. In vain. Henry Gunther continues his charge. A few seconds later, he was mowed by an unnecessary burst. “Almost when he fell, the shots stopped and a terrible silence reigned”said his military file.
11,000 (useless) victims in one day
Considered the last soldier who died in combat during the First World War, Henry Gunther, 23, entered history for this absurd bravado, a few seconds from the ceasefire. His brothers in arms will pee to explain his gesture. Did he want to wash his honor after being fallen from his rank? Receive a medal to impress her young fiancée, who will unnecessarily await his return to Baltimore? He hoped to shower, by a heroic act, the antiiallemand feeling that persisted in the ranks of the American army, he whose grandparents had left Germany for Maryland at the end of the XIXe century? We will never know.
In the end, the glory he hoped to reconquer, Henry Gunther will obtain it in death. Because it is posthumously that he will receive the Distinguished Service Cross and will be restored in his sergeant grade. Anecdotal on the scale of the conflict, its history recalls the vain sacrifices made in the final upheavals of the Great War. Historians estimate that November 11, 1918 made around 11,000 victims on the Western front – a multiple of eleven – including nearly 3,000 dead.
