The Third Army Corps, after a brief artillery duel, advanced on
Soissons to cover the work of the engineers who were building a
pontoon bridge for the French troops. The German fire was deadly,
yet though more than half their men fell, the engineers put the
pontoon bridge across. German howitzer fire, from behind the ridge,
however, soon destroyed the bridge. The Turcos crossed the river in
rowboats and had a fierce but indecisive struggle in the streets
of the medieval city. Meanwhile, with the failure of the pontoon
bridge at Soissons, General Pulteney struck to the northeast along
the road to Venizel. The bridge at that point had been blown up,
but the British sappers repaired it sufficiently to set the Eleventh
Brigade across, and even, despite the lurid hail of shot and shell,
four regiments gathered at Bucy-de-Long by one o'clock on that
Sunday, September 13, 1914. Over the heads of these courageous
regiments towered the great hill of Vregny, a veritable Gibraltar
of heavy guns with numerous machine guns along the wooded edge.
There was no protection, and no shelter against the terrible German
Maxim fire, so that the moment came when to attempt further advance
meant instant annihilation. Still, under cover of the success of the
Eleventh Brigade the engineers built a pontoon bridge at Venizel
and the Twelth Brigade crossed to Bucy-de-Long, with a number of
the lighter artillery.
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