The city of Paris, at the same time, quietly celebrated the great change in the situation wrought in one short month. Just four weeks before, on July 18, the residents of Paris had been awakened by the sounds of such a cannonade as they never had heard before. It was General Mangin's counter-preparation against the great German attack which the enemy believed was to bring him to the gates of Paris. In the meantime the Germans, who were at the gates of Amiens, Reims, and Compiegne, had been soundly beaten and outgeneraled at every point, and the initiative had been forced from them by the military genius of Marshal Foch. The effect upon the Germans was apparent from the fact that General Hans von Boehm, the German "retreat specialist" had been appointed to the supreme command on the Somme front. The German withdrawal north of Albert was looked upon as the first application of his tactics. It was General von Boehm and his former command, the German Eighth Army, that stood the brunt of the Allied pressure in the Marne salient previous to the retreat of the Huns to the north of the Vesle river, where they were still standing in the middle of August. BOLSHEVIKI EXECUTE EX-CZAR Former Czar Nicholas of Russia was executed by the Bolsheviki in July, 1918, having been held as a prisoner since his dethronement. [Illustration: BATTLE LINE ON THE WESTERN FRONT AUGUST 21, Shaded portions of map show territory gained by American and Allied troops during July and August, 1918. Most of the territory gained by the Germans in their 1918 offensive was recaptured by the Allies before September 1, 1918.] CHAPTER III AMERICANS AT CHATEAU THIERRY _Personal Accounts of Battle--Gas and Shell Shock--Marines Under Fire--Americans Can Fight and Yell--Getting to the Front Under Difficulties--The Big Day Dawns--The Shells Come Fast--A Funeral at the Front--_Impression of a French Lieutenant-- Keeping the Germans on the Run._ The name of Chateau Thierry will be long remembered in the United States, for it was there the American fighting quality was for the first time clearly impressed upon the Germans, to their immense astonishment, and with far-reaching effect. The German people and the German army had been told that the United States had no army, navy, or fighting quality; that the talk of an American army in Europe was "Yankee bluff," and nothing more; that even if we could raise an army we could not send it across the ocean, first because we had no ships, second because if we had ships the submarines of Germany would surely sink them. Yet here at Chateau Thierry they were confronted by United States troops and soundly beaten.