And I'm back to the norm with not meeting deadlines, yay.
But it's done! More footnotes might be added tomorrow.
Part One-Hundred Eleven: The French Advance Falters
The Piombino Offensive:
As the French successfully captured and secured Piombino, General Joffre made plans to expand the French offensive into central Italy and open up a third front for the Italians. With Barcelona in French hands and the Spanish front secure, tens of thousands of soldiers were ferried to reinforce and expand the new Tuscan front. Starting in early July after the increase in troop numbers, the French pushed out from their initial positions around Piombino and Follonica. To the north, French armies pushed along the coast toward Cecina and the port of Livorno. The northern advance encountered little of the Italian army at first, but soon faced Italian forces that had amassed at Bibbona five miles south of Cecina. The Italians held off the French in a series of confrontations over the next two weeks, and for four days had made the French retreat south to the hamlet of Bolgheri. However, with much of the Italian army that had been sent to the area still at better positions closer to Livorno, the French were able to push north and take Cecina in the beginning of August.
Meanwhile the French also pushed south from Follonica. The goal of the southern advance was to capture the cities of Grosseto and Orbetello and expand the front to include a wider coastal area. When the Piombino Offensive began, Grosseto was more well defended than Cecina. The French brigadier-general opted to direct the advance south directly over the hills near Gavorrano and Scarlino, thinking that the Italian army had the valley to the north well defended. However, the southern advance was disorganized and the advance was slower than the French anticipated. Despite this setback, the French army was still able to force the Italians back from Grosseto by the middle of August. The French success in Grosseto did not last though, as Italian soldiers were sent from Rome in the south and Perugia in the east. The French army attempted a further push south to Orbetello aided by the French naval presence in early September. However, a timely arrival of the Sicilian fleet and a concentrated attack on Grosseto divided the French operations and forced them back to Follonica. This Italian victory at the Battle of Grosseto in early October was significant as it marked a turning point for the Italian forces in the Tuscan front, and also invigorated Italian support for the war. Pictures and glorified accounts of the battle by noted propagandist Gabriele D'Annunzio helped spur public support for the Italian government.
On the Banks of the Ebro:
While the French forces had occupied much territory in northeastern Spain in the first year of the Great War, there was still a strategic weak point in the French offensives. The focus on the advances on the Basque country and Catalunya had left Zaragoza in Spanish hands, and the Spanish had begun using the city heavily as a supply depot and rail connection for both fronts. The use of Zaragoza was key in September when the French army in Catalunya attempted to capture Tarragona. By the end of July, the French had resumed their advance on Tarragona and encamped at Vallmoll seven miles north of the city. Recalling the success in the siege of Barcelona, the French army moved southwest in order to cut the city off from access via land. The French army continued its encirclement throughout August and September, seizing Reus and the coastal town of Cambrils. However, during the next months the French were unable to secure Cambrils or gain long-standing naval support. The French navy arrived off the coast of Tarragona again in early October and blockaded the port, but were again chased away by the New Coalition navy two weeks later. In November, increased pressure on the French at Lleida and a new attempt by the Spanish to break the encirclement forced the French to give up the assault on Tarragona. The Battle of Reus in December emphasized the French failure as the Spanish army cut off French forces near the village and resulted in the capture of 10,000 solders and 30 guns by the Spanish. The Spanish gained a further victory in Catalunya in early 1908 with the recapture of Lleida in late January.
Meanwhile, the French advance in the Basque country was also facing difficulties going into the fall and winter months. The assault on Bilbao, like the assault on Tarragona, was being stymied by a lack of support from the French navy. The British Atlantic fleet had begun setting up a more successful blockade of the western coast of France with much of the French navy tied up in the Mediterranean or along the Channel. The British victory at the Battle of Pertuis d'Antioche[1] in October further hindered French naval operations in the Atlantic as the majority of the French Atlantic squadron was holed up in La Rochelle harbor well into 1908. While Bilbao would eventually fall to the French in March, the delay in capturing the city allowed the Spanish to shore up their defenses along the Ebro. A renewed French push toward Tudela in January was stopped 20 miles upstream at Calahorra as the French came up against the dug-in Spanish forces. The fighting at Calahorra, part of the ongoing Battle of La Rioja, lasted a month before the French retreated. Calahorra was also significant because it saw the first use of modern airships in war. The Spanish engineer Leonardo Torres y Quevedo had worked on developing larger and more sturdy airships around the turn of the century. The first military airship, the Spanish España, was built in Guadalajara in 1905 and was used for reconnaissance throughout the Battle of La Rioja.
[1] The Pertuis d'Antioche is a strait between two islands off of La Rochelle.
