The task of modernizing the Verdun forts began in 1887 with
Fort Douaumont, whose prime position protected the approaches to the city from
the north and east and, in particular, from Metz. It was a gigantic task. The
earth covering was first removed and the masonry was strengthened with pillars
and concrete supports before being covered by a buffer of sand approximately
one metre thick. Then, using for the first time a ‘continuous pour’ process, a
thick layer of special concrete was poured on top of the sand. The eastern side
of the barracks, some of the artillery bunkers and the tunnel into the barracks
from the main entrance were covered with one and a half metres of concrete. The
western side of the barracks and the remaining artillery bunkers, which were
intended to form a strong ‘keep’ or redoubt for last ditch defence, received a
covering two and a half metres thick. After completion, the whole of the
concrete carapace was covered with a layer of earth between one and four metres
deep. In 1888 a thick layer of special concrete was also applied to the open
southern façade of the barracks. All in all, between April 1887 and November
1888 the work of strengthening Fort Douaumont required approximately 28,000
cubic metres of concrete and a team of some sixty construction workers.
To protect Fort Douaumont further, earth was banked up
around the lower floor of the barrack block, covering it completely and
effectively burying half the fort. The upper floor was now at ground level. To
make the ditch less vulnerable to bombardment, the scarp wall was replaced by a
sloping earth bank. To defend the ditch, strong, concrete galleries were
constructed in the counterscarp, facing the fort itself. Armed with revolver
guns and light cannon and later with searchlights, these galleries – single at
the northern corners but double at the apex of the fort – were designed to
sweep with enfilading fire any enemy who managed to penetrate into the ditch.
Connected to the barracks by long underground tunnels, the counterscarp
galleries could be reinforced regardless of enemy fire. The original gateway
was scrapped and a new entrance – an independent blockhouse protected by double
flanking galleries and a drawbridge – was constructed in the gorge (south) side
of the fort. From the blockhouse a tunnel ran under the rampart to an entrance
on the lower floor of the fort.
The armament of the fort
The original plan for the armament of Fort Douaumont had
provided for twenty guns mounted on the parapet but the revolution in high
explosives and artillery in the 1880s meant that henceforward guns had to be
protected if they were to remain operational at all times. As a first step, ten
of the guns were dispersed in batteries outside the fort but the introduction
of steel-reinforced concrete in 1897 made it possible to construct shell proof
gun positions in the fort itself.
The first protected guns at Fort Douaumont were installed in
1902-1903 in a new type of strong concrete bunker known, from the experimental
range on which it was first tested, as a Bourges Casemate (Casemate de
Bourges). Embedded in the southwest corner of the superstructure and shielded
from direct fire by a long wall forming a protective wing, this bunker was
strengthened with a layer of concrete almost two metres thick. It was armed
with two quick-firing 75mm field guns installed in two chambers placed in
echelon, whose embrasures allowed for fire in one direction only. The fixed
guns, which had a range of 5,500 metres, were sited so as to cover the
southwestern approach to the fort and to cover with flanking fire the defensive
works situated along the ridge between Fort Douaumont and the Ouvrage de
Froideterre. An observation post and magazines completed the installation.
The construction of the Bourges Casemate marked the
beginning of the period that turned Fort Douaumont into a modern, armoured fort
of enormous strength. Between 1902 and 1913, further armament was provided in
the form of guns housed in retractable steel turrets of very advanced design
which, by rotating through 360°, covered all the approaches to the fort. The
turrets were activated by a vertical movement that raised them into the firing
position and lowered them again once the gun had ceased firing. Raising the
turret exposed the gun embrasures and allowed the guns inside to fire. When
retracted, the guns were hidden from view and entirely protected by a steel
dome which, in the case of the bigger turrets, was strong enough to withstand
even direct hits by the heaviest shells. The turret was set in a reinforced
concrete unit that also housed the activating machinery, magazine, replacement
guns and range-finding equipment. Each one was coupled with an observation post
protected by a dome of steel twenty-five centimetres thick and connected to the
gun by speaking tube or telephone.
Four such turrets were installed in Fort Douaumont and
linked to the barracks by underground tunnels. Two lighter models housed twin
eight millimetre Hotchkiss machine guns that were mounted one above the other
and fired alternately to avoid overheating. Intended for the close defence of
the fort, the machine guns were installed at the northeast and northwest
corners of the superstructure where the visibility was best. On the eastern
side of the fort a short-barrelled 155mm gun capable of firing three rounds a minute
over a range of 7,500 metres protected the vital north and northeast fronts. An
armoured observation post at the entrance to the turret communicated with it
through a speaking tube while another some distance away communicated with the
gun crew by telephone. Twin short-barrelled 75mm guns housed in a similar
turret in the escarpment to the north completed the armament. The 75mm guns,
which together were capable of firing more than twenty two rounds a minute over
a range of 5,500 metres, were intended to sweep the intervals between the
forts. Their considerable firepower more than compensated for the dispersion of
the remainder of the fort’s artillery in external batteries. By 1913, all the
gun turrets, observation posts and the Bourges Casemate had been linked to the
barrack block by strong underground passages so that they could be accessed at
all times without going outside.
Mighty though it was, Fort Douaumont formed only one element
in a strong and extensive ‘centre of resistance’ which also included Douaumont
village, six ouvrages, five combat shelters, six concrete batteries, an
underground shelter for reserves, two ammunition depots and a whole series of
concrete infantry entrenchments. A revolving turret for twin 155s on the slopes
to the south of the fort and another for a 75mm gun on the ridge to the east
should have completed the defence but neither emplacement was complete when war
broke out. A machine gun was mounted in the observation post on the ridge,
while the incomplete 75mm gun turret became a shelter.
Access to the fort
Fort Douaumont was an immense structure, measuring almost
300 metres from north to south and 400 metres from east to west. It was
protected on all sides by an open glacis offering wide fields of fire in every
direction and surrounded by a belt of wire thirty metres deep, which was
attached to metal picket posts set in concrete. At the top of the glacis, a
line of stout spiked railings two and a half metres high ran along the
counterscarp. On the floor of the ditch – approximately six metres below the
top of the counterscarp – a further line of railings was set at an angle along
the base of the scarp. The outer wall of the ditch was strengthened by a facing
of masonry on three sides of the fort, but on the south side, where the inner
wall was strengthened and provided with flanking blockhouses, it consisted of
only a bank of earth.
The fort was accessed by means of a wagon road that led up
the glacis on the south side of the fort, passed a guard house and came down in
the ditch close to the main entrance or ‘peacetime gate’. The road then ran
across a drawbridge and entered a tunnel under the rampart. This led to the
‘wartime gate’, which allowed direct entry to the lower floor of the barracks.
At the end of the tunnel, two ramps provided access to the upper floor of the
barracks and to the covered wagon roads that passed through the barrack block
at each end. Emerging from the barracks on the north side, the wagon roads
became the Rue du Rempart, which served the adjoining artillery shelters and
ammunition depots. Access to the fort on foot was also possible by means of
steps cut into the rampart, which led to a footbridge spanning the gap between
the tunnel and the wartime gate. On the top of the rampart, two light steel
domes allowed for observation over the south side of the fort
The barrack block was a two storey building. The lower
floor, known as the ‘wartime barracks’, comprised the fort’s administrative
services, siege headquarters for the commandant and his staff, depots,
magazines and two groups of cisterns each holding 520 cubic metres of water.
The upper floor, or ‘peacetime barracks’, provided accommodation for the
garrison of 850, workshops, magazines and kitchens as well as a bakery and an
infirmary. Staircases or metal ladders linked the two floors and on each level
the barrack rooms opened onto a principal corridor. On the upper floor the
corridor ran throughout the whole length of the barracks and joined the covered
wagon roads at either end of the building.
One year before the outbreak of the war, Fort Douaumont was
complete. The strongest and most modern of all the forts around Verdun, it was
the cornerstone of the whole defensive system. Its construction, modernization
and armament had required a total of twenty eight years and had cost 6,100,000
gold francs.
War
As early as September 1914, Fort Douaumont’s 155mm gun was
in action against German positions to the north of the sector. The Germans soon
replied with a barrage of medium and heavy calibre shells that caused some
slight damage but left the fort’s vital organs unscathed. The operation was
observed by a prominent guest, Crown Prince Wilhelm of Germany, who had been
invited by the commander of V Reserve Corps, General Erich von Gündell, to view
the shooting from his newly built observation tower, the ‘Gündell-Turm’. The
French were not impressed and the tower soon became a favourite target of French
gunners.
In December 1914 the 155mm gun was again in action, this
time against the Jumelles d’Ornes, two hills that formed an important German
observation post to the northeast of the sector. That brought retaliation from
the Germans in February 1915 in the form of a ‘shooting match’ (Wettschiessen)
between two of their biggest guns – a 420mm Krupp mortar and a 380mm ‘Long Max’
naval gun – during which thirty four huge projectiles were hurled against the
fort and its immediate surroundings. Despite a great column of smoke which rose
above the glacis and at first led the Germans to believe that the fort had been
put out of action, only limited damage was done. On the eastern side of the
barracks where the concrete carapace was only one and a half metres thick,
three shells falling close together brought down the roof of the bakery and a
nearby corridor, while the blast from a fourth fissured the floor and walls of
the gallery leading to the 75mm turret. The guns, however, were unharmed. One
420mm shell striking the reinforced concrete collar of the 155mm turret left a
deep hole but only slightly affected the turret mechanism and repairs were
carried out within a day or two. Another fell without exploding close to the
Rue du Rempart, where it was defused and sent to Paris for exhibition.
The fact that such a shell had hit the concrete covering of
the fort and failed to explode probably encouraged the French High Command in
its comfortable belief that the most powerful of the forts around Verdun was
impregnable. Indeed, had the whole mighty system not been disarmed in the
second year of the war, that belief might well have proved correct.
