Battle of La Malmaison 1917
Recorded location from Wikidata; battle sites are often approximate.
Key facts
| Date | 23 October 1917 – 27 October 1917 | Wikidata |
|---|---|---|
| Year | 1917 | Wikidata P580 (start time) |
| Era | World War I era (1914–1918) | derived from year |
| Location | France | Natural Earth (modern borders) |
| Continent | Europe | Natural Earth |
| War / conflict | Nivelle Offensive | Wikidata P361 |
| Participants | French Third Republic, German Empire, Max von Boehn, Paul Maistre | Wikidata P710 |
| Coordinates | 49.4714, 3.4861 | Wikidata P625 |
About the battle
The Battle of La Malmaison (Bataille de la Malmaison) from 23 to 27 October, was the final French action of the 1917 campaign in the First World War, which had begun with the Nivelle Offensive. The French captured the village and fort of La Malmaison and took control of the Chemin des Dames ridge. The German 7th Army (General Max von Boehn) had discovered French preparations for the attack and also identified the date and time. Boehn chose to defend the front positions, rather than treat them as an advanced zone and to conduct the main defence north of the Oise–Aisne Canal. The German artillery was outnumbered three-to-one and on the front of the 14th Division, 32 German batteries were confronted by 125 French, which silenced most of the German guns before the attack. Gas from French bombardments on low-lying land near the Oise–Aisne Canal in the Ailette valley, became so dense that it was impossible to carry ammunition and supplies forward or to remove the wounded.
Battalions from specialist German counter-attack divisions (Eingreifdivisionen) had been distributed along the front line and were caught in the French bombardments, German infantry shelters having been identified by French air reconnaissance and systematically destroyed.
Text adapted from the Wikipedia article Battle of La Malmaison (revision 1370267687), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section; shortened by selecting paragraphs and trimming at a sentence boundary; formatting and citations removed. No text added.
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Browse more: battles in France · Europe · World War I era battles