L' ASSAUT CONTRE VERDUN (21 Fevrier - 31 Mars 1916). Traduit de l'espagnol par Gabriel Ledos. Preface de Maurice Barres. [With PROFUSE MARGINAL ANNOTATIONS by LINCOLN MACVEAGH].

Paris: Librairie Armand Colin, 1918., 1918. Good. FROM THE LIBRARY OF AMBASSADOR LINCOLN MACVEAGH WITH PROFUSE ANNOTATIONS PENNED BY HIM THROUGHOUT - Octavo, 8 inches high by 5-1/4 inches wide. Hardcover, the original yellow wraps are bound into three-quarter brown morocco & green marbled boards. The top edge is gilt. The boards are rubbed with some wear to the edges. The leather is unevenly darkened with minor rubbing to the joints. xvi, 365 & [1] pages, illustrated with 7 full-page maps, 7 textual maps and a large folding map. A column clipped from a newspaper titled "Requiem Sounded for Verdun Dead" is pasted onto the front endpaper. The original wrappers, contained within, are soiled and the pages are darkened and occasionally fragile. Good. First edition in French, translated from the Spanish by Gabriel Ledos. From the library of Lincoln MacVeagh and his wife Margaret with their "Arcades ambo" bookplate, signed "Lincoln MacVeagh / Villerupt, France, January 1919" by ambassador MacVeagh. The book is also signed by his wife with her nickname "Peggy MacVeagh" at the head of the title page. More than 85 pages of text have annotations in ink by Lincoln MacVeagh. On the preliminary leaves of the book are the following: 1) A Magazine photo annotated by MacVeagh "Petain being congratulated after raising Baton & Joffre, Foch, Haig, Pershing & others. General Weygand is at the left of the photo." 2) A Magazine photo annotated by MacVeagh "Petain raising the baton of Marshal of France from President Raymond Poincare, at Metz. Somewhere in the background are General Cronkhite commanding the IX U.S. Army Corps at St. Mihiel, his c.gs Brig Gen. Naylor, Col. Waldron C gs. 8 Div (U.S.) & Capt, MacVeagh, A.D.C. together with Capt. Michel Good(?), Liason officer. None of these were invited, but dropped in to Metz that morning on a sight-seeing tour from St. Mihiel, and naturally stayed to see the show. Petain was taking the baton as we arrived, and thereafter was only raised. Clemenceau stood behind Poincare." An original 3-3/4 inch high by 5-3/4 inch wide original photograph annotated by MacVeagh "Fini la Guerre!" "Wilson, as he appeared to us in the Champs Elysees Nov. 1918." A folding plate from a publication: "Verdun, the Fortress and Battlefields North and North-West: A Panoramic Map.". On the half-title of "Livre I" MacVeagh has drawn a diagram with notes, "Schematic plan of Battle of Verdun, Feb - March 1916". Following are a few examples of the profuse notes that MacVeagh has written in the margins. Page 11: "An example of the quickness of the French to learn from experience. Another example is the flexible defense of entrenched zones adopted by Petain." Page 13: "The French neutralized the success of Strantz at St. Mihiel by taking and holding Les Eparges." Page 17: "A. Strategic Reason I. to anticipate a general offensive on the part of the Allies." Pages 18/19: "Verdun held & the French was a constant menace to the German communications - a thorn in the side of the German Front. (It was from Verdun northward that the first blow of the war was struck, ending in the breaking of the German System of Communications at Mezieres, the cutting off the Champagne armies from Metz, then the armistice!)." Page 21: "To distract public attention from the difficulty of supporting life under the Blockade & Hearten the people in a great victory." Page [61], the half-title of Livre II: "The attack on Verdun was planned as a frontal attack between Brabant on the Meuse and Ornes at the eastern declivity of the Heights of the Meuse. Subsidiary attacks were made on the left of the Meuse and south along the heights of the Meuse, The axis of the main attack was the road Beaumont - Vacherauville. The attack never progressed beyond the line Ft Douaumont (not the village) - Cote du Poivre, which is the most thoroughly destroyed bit of landscape I have seen in France." Lincoln MacVeagh dates his reading and annotations at the end of the text on page 350. ".…