--- title: "The Attack of the Dead Men: WWI's Most Brutal Last Stand at Osowiec Fortress" description: "Facing down fourteen German battalions, dozens of heavy siege guns, and thirty batteries of artillery, a far smaller force of Russian soldiers would be pinned down, shelled to pieces, and bombarded with chlorine and bromine gas at Osowiec Fortress in August 1915. But against all odds, their desperate counterattack would rout the German attackers, in perhaps the most brutal and death-defying last stand of all time. The episode has become known as the Attack of the Dead Men — a moment so extraordinary that it earned memorialization by the Swedish heavy-metal band Sabaton, who do not go around memorializing just any battle with their music.\n\n## Key Takeaways\n- Russia suffered catastrophic losses at Tannenberg and the Masurian Lakes in 1914, losing over 200,000 men and being forced into a defensive posture on the Eastern Front.\n- Osowiec Fortress guarded the only crossing point of the Biebrza River and the rail line connecting East Prussia to the Polish heartlands, making it strategically vital.\n- Two Big Bertha 420-millimeter howitzers — bunker-busters capable of penetrating forty feet of concrete — failed to force the fortress's surrender through months of bombardment from autumn 1914 to spring 1915.\n- On August 6, 1915, the Germans released thirty containers of chlorine and bromine gas into the fortress, killing the vast majority of its roughly 900 defenders.\n- Approximately 100 surviving Russian soldiers, poisoned and partially blinded, counterattacked against 7,000 German infantry, routing twelve battalions in a panic.\n- Lieutenant Vladimir Kotlinsky led the countercharge and was killed during the fighting; Wladyslaw Strzeminski assumed command, survived the war, and became a famous avant-garde painter.\n\n## Catastrophic Defeats and the Defensive Posture of Tsarist Russia\n\nIn the opening months of World War I, Imperial Germany unleashed absolute hell upon Tsarist Russia. Despite an early, enthusiastic Russian push toward German territory in 1914, with the goal of tying up German forces and ending the war swiftly, the legions of Tsar Nicholas II were unequipped to handle what was coming back at them. At the Battle of Tannenberg in August, the Russian First and Second Armies were nearly entirely destroyed, and after the loss of well over a hundred thousand men killed, injured, or captured, Russian forces were routed entirely from East Prussia. Just weeks later, another hundred thousand men were lost at the Masurian Lakes, and as many as three times that number became casualties of war during a pyrrhic battle against Austria-Hungary. The start of the war had been nothing short of catastrophic, and almost as punishment for their hubris, the Russians were forced back into a clearly defensive posture. But even despite their rather extreme difficulties trying to go on offense, the Russians had at least some options for defense. One of these options was Osowiec Fortress, located in what is today the nation of Poland, but was, in that time, territory controlled by Russia. Built over the course of several decades, Osowiec Fortress was located in and around swampland in the Biebrza Valley. Crucially, it also guarded the only crossing point of the Biebrza River, which came complete with a major rail line that had already been constructed. Cross the river, and the Germans could go from nearby East Prussia into the Polish heartlands, moving massive amounts of heavy equipment as they did so.\n\n## The Fortress That Would Not Fall: Big Bertha and Months of Bombardment\n\nOsowiec Fortress was not an easy capture for the Germans. It was built on difficult terrain, surrounded by bogs and marshes where artillery pieces could easily become stuck, and the nearby river was a natural barrier against encirclement. Not only that, but the fortress was made up of four separate forts, making it easier for each fort to provide covering fire and support the three others. World War I was a bad time for any army to be relying on forts for protection; artillery bombardment was usually enough to level them to the ground, with enough time and ammunition. But when Germany found their way to Osowiec Fortress in September of 1914, a six-day artillery shelling was not enough to get the job done. Under continual bombardment, the men inside were able to hold out, until it became clear to the Germans that they would need more firepower to break through. Their answer was Big Bertha, a truly massive artillery piece that the Germans had begun developing in secret before the war began. A 420-millimeter howitzer with the ability to fire projectiles weighing nearly a ton to a distance of almost six miles, Big Bertha had proven more than able to crack open French and Belgian forts on the Western Front. Although the Germans had constructed only twelve of the guns, they deployed a pair to Osowiec Fortress during the autumn of 1914. Big Bertha was an early bunker-buster, and its favored ammunition shell was built to penetrate some forty feet into concrete and soil before exploding, so as far as the Germans were concerned, the gun would be more than enough to bring Osowiec to its knees. Except Osowiec did not fall to its knees, not for months and months. Granted, it would be a little generous to say that the fortress withstood Big Bertha's onslaught gracefully; against this firepower, it took severe damage, and the troops inside could do little except just try their best to hold out. But through the fall of 1914, into the winter, and then the spring, Osowiec Fortress did not crumble, and the men inside did not capitulate. In March of 1915, the Germans tried again to take the fortress, and again they were repelled.\n\n## Von Hindenburg Assembles an Overwhelming Force\n\nThe delay had been acceptable during the winter months, when no competent military commander would be so foolish as to attempt a push into Russia, but now, with the year 1915 ready to unfold, Osowiec Fortress was an intolerable barrier to Imperial Germany's hopes of an offensive into Russia. Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg was the man Germany sent to battle if all other options had failed, and by July of 1915, Osowiec Fortress had proved so painfully intractable that von Hindenburg's presence was required. By this stage of their prolonged battle, Russian forces inside Osowiec were badly outnumbered. About five hundred regular troops of the 226th Infantry Regiment were in fighting shape inside the fortress, joined by about four hundred members of the local militia. And \"fighting shape\" is a fairly loose term here; like in much of World War I, anyone who had enough of their body functioning to hold a rifle was going to have to participate in the fight, or otherwise be condemned to certain death. The Germans had no such problems with manpower. At his disposal, Paul von Hindenburg had fourteen battalions of infantry, roughly eight thousand men — or, that is to say, nearly ten infantrymen for every one Russian defender of the fortress. He brought thirty batteries of artillery, as well as at least two dozen heavy siege guns, and an additional battalion of sappers, combat engineers who could tunnel underneath the fortress and attempt to get inside from below. By July of 1915, von Hindenburg's attack force was fully assembled, ready and waiting to march on Osowiec. The Germans also had another weapon: poison gas, which had been deployed for the first time in a major battle just a few months earlier in France. The Germans had brought thirty containers of the stuff, and they knew that the Russians had no means to protect against that attack. Osowiec Fortress had been under constant bombardment for nearly a year, long before the Russians or anybody else had known that chemical weapons would figure into the conflict. That meant that no gas masks had been delivered, and it is an open question whether the Russians were even fully aware by this point that poison gas had been deployed in the war.\n\n## Chlorine, Bromine, and the Hell Inside the Fortress\n\nThe Germans had every advantage, and they knew it; rather than risk men in an assault, they laid in wait until a day eventually came along where the wind would carry the gases perfectly into the Russian fortress. That day came on August 6, 1915, when in the early morning, the Germans began to shell Osowiec Fortress under a heavy barrage of artillery fire. As shells rained down, splitting new openings into the fortress's outer walls and ripping through the Russians' makeshift repairs, the Germans released all thirty containers of chlorine and bromine gas, and within just a few minutes, the noxious cloud had enveloped the entire Russian fortress — and with it, the Russians inside. Chlorine, when it comes into contact with human skin or is inhaled, reacts with the water inside the body to melt anything it can reach. It enters through the eyes and destroys the optic nerve, enters through the lungs and causes pulmonary edema, and as it travels through the esophagus, it causes the tissue to tear and dissolve. Bromine manages to be even worse; it burns the skin, eventually to the point that skin can melt entirely off of the body, and when it is breathed in, it does the same thing except moving outward, eating away at the internal organs with nothing the victim can do to stop it. This was the fate of the Russians inside Osowiec Fortress. Anyone caught outdoors was killed as their lungs dissolved, and the men inside who had at least tried to put rags over their mouths were forced to try and use those rags to keep themselves from decomposing where they stood. Using wet rags to do that, though, just intensified the effects of the chlorine, while doing very little to stop the bromine. The effects were devastating for the defenders; of the nine-hundred-odd men trapped inside, the vast majority were killed, and every man inside was poisoned, even as the fort continued to endure conventional shelling.\n\n## The Attack of the Dead Men: A Countercharge Beyond Comprehension\n\nAfter the fortress had been so thoroughly bombarded that no meaningful resistance could have survived, the Germans advanced with nearly their full infantry force. Twelve battalions, some seven thousand men, marched on the fortress, clad in gas masks and expecting only minimal difficulty. At the most, they would have to stomach the feeling of putting a few surviving Russians out of their misery, but as the Germans saw it, it was nigh-on-inconceivable that even the most bloodthirsty Russians would be able to resist. But inside the fortress, some hundred-or-so Russian defenders were still alive. It is impossible to know what within these men was keeping them from succumbing completely to the gas; certainly, whatever it was, it was not physiological. Their skin was horrifically burned or missing completely, their bodies were in the process of melting from the inside out, and many of them were partially blinded. Maybe it was some sense of duty that kept them from falling completely; maybe it was something their leader, Lieutenant Vladimir Kotlinsky, had said to rally them against certain death. Perhaps it was sheer desperation, the simple, animal urge to seek relief from agony even when that relief can never exist. But whatever it was, it was enough to get those hundred men standing again, clutching at their rifles, and ready to sally out in a counterattack. For all they knew, this was their last stand, but though they were certain to die, they resolved at least to die on the offensive. As the Germans advanced, they began to spot figures in what remained of the poisonous mix: Russian soldiers, some running, some crawling, most of them retching and spitting out pieces of their own lungs, and all of them looking like the first casualties of a zombie apocalypse. They were not just in ones or twos, either — they were attacking in dozens, they were armed, and they should have been dead.\n\n## Panic, Rout, and the Collapse of the German Advance\n\nFaced with such a sight, von Hindenburg's men did what any person might do: they panicked. At the front of their lines, the German troops turned and ran with such blind desperation that they trampled those unlucky enough to fall underfoot. Marching in formation, in tight quarters, men lost control of their bayonets, slicing at or even impaling the troops around them. With no time to pay attention to their surroundings, many became entangled and trapped in barbed wire. Those who had been told to man trenches left their weapons behind trying to get away; those who were running back toward the trenches fell into them. With what artillery and small arms they had left, the Russians opened fire against a force that should have been overwhelming, but had instead crumbled entirely. There is no telling how many Germans died during the Russian counterattack, no records that are known to count them, and certainly, no German present who was willing to catalogue such an embarrassing list of causes of death. Making matters worse, other German regiments advanced too quickly in the surrounding area, marching headlong into the thickest parts of their own gas clouds and suffering the results. When the Russian troops ran out of ammunition, they pressed their advantage with bayonets, even after the death of Lieutenant Kotlinsky. The Germans had, by this time, figured out what was happening and begun to regroup, killing some of the Russian defenders in the process, but they had little choice but to call a retreat. Those among their number who were thinking with clear heads knew that the remaining Russians would succumb to their wounds in time, and it simply was not worth sticking around in the interim. The Germans left the area by noon.\n\n## Aftermath and the Legacy of Osowiec Fortress\n\nThe few Russians left alive did not stick around long enough to be at Osowiec Fortress when the Germans inevitably returned. Instead, they demolished as much of the fortress as they could, relying on the help of two nearby Russian battalions that had not been at the fortress during the gas attack. Against all odds, some of the Russian soldiers and the Polish militia who had survived thus far were able to recover from their injuries. One of them, Wladyslaw Strzeminski, had assumed control of the men when Lieutenant Kotlinsky had died, and not only did he survive the entire war, but he later became a famous avant-garde painter. On the German side, Osowiec Fortress was eventually found empty and, at least technically, captured. This precipitated a much larger Russian retreat from the Polish territories, which the Germans could now move more troops and equipment into than ever before. The land around Osowiec Fortress would be declared the Kingdom of Poland just a year later, in 1916, when Germany and Austria-Hungary attempted to create a puppet state, but before long, Poland was able to become independent at the war's end. Had the Russians and the Polish militia not held out so long at Osowiec Fortress, that land might have been claimed by the Germans up to a year earlier, giving the Central Powers ample time to march on Moscow or set up a well-and-truly subservient Polish state. It was thanks to the dead men at Osowiec that the Russians were able to hold out so long. Without the defense of the fortress, and eventually the Attack of the Dead Men, World War I might have ended very differently. But at the expense of hundreds of Russian and Polish lives, and thousands upon thousands of profoundly traumatized German soldiers, Osowiec Fortress will forever remain one of the most legendary last stands in history.\n\n## Frequently Asked Questions\n\n### Why was Osowiec Fortress so strategically important to both Russia and Germany?\n\nOsowiec Fortress guarded the only crossing point of the Biebrza River, along with the major rail line connecting East Prussia to the Polish heartlands. Without the fortress, Germany could move massive amounts of heavy equipment directly from East Prussia into the Polish interior, making it an intolerable barrier to any German offensive push into Russia.\n\n### How did the German gas attack on August 6, 1915 work, and what made it so devastating?\n\nThe Germans waited for favorable winds before releasing thirty containers of chlorine and bromine gas into the fortress. Chlorine reacts with moisture in the body to dissolve tissue, attacking the eyes, lungs, and esophagus, while bromine burns the skin and eats away at internal organs. Of the roughly nine hundred defenders inside, the vast majority were killed, and every man was poisoned to some degree.\n\n### Why did Big Bertha and months of artillery bombardment fail to take the fortress?\n\nOsowiec was built on difficult swampy terrain where artillery pieces could easily become stuck, and it consisted of four separate forts that could provide mutual covering fire. Even though Big Bertha's 420-millimeter shells were designed to penetrate forty feet of concrete before exploding, the fortress absorbed the punishment from autumn 1914 through spring 1915 without capitulating, forcing Germany to resort to chemical weapons.\n\n### What happened when the surviving Russians counterattacked?\n\nApproximately one hundred poisoned and partially blinded Russian soldiers, some running and some crawling and most retching blood, sallied out against roughly seven thousand German infantry. The sight caused a mass panic among the German ranks — troops trampled each other, became entangled in barbed wire, fell into their own trenches, and abandoned their weapons. German regiments advancing in the surrounding area also marched into their own gas clouds. The Russians pressed the advantage with bayonets even after Lieutenant Kotlinsky was killed in the fighting.\n\n### What became of Osowiec Fortress and its surviving defenders after the German retreat?\n\nThe surviving Russian soldiers and Polish militia demolished as much of the fortress as they could before withdrawing, with help from two nearby Russian battalions. One survivor, Wladyslaw Strzeminski, assumed command when Kotlinsky died, endured the entire war, and later became a famous avant-garde painter. The Germans eventually found the fortress empty and claimed it, which contributed to a broader Russian retreat from Polish territories.\n\n## Related Coverage\n- [Did Rich Foreigners Pay to Shoot Civilians in Bosnia?](https://warfronts.pub/conflicts/did-rich-foreigners-pay-to-shoot-civilians-in-bosnia)\n- [Russia’s Death Toll Tops 100,000 as Ukraine War’s Human Cost Deepens](https://warfronts-prod.fulcrum-labs.workers.dev/conflicts/russias-death-toll-tops-100k-ukraine-war-human-cost)\n- [This Is Ukraine’s Moment of Truth.](https://warfronts.pub/conflicts/this-is-ukraines-moment-of-truth-1bmuupct)\n- [This Is Ukraine’s Moment of Truth.](https://warfronts.pub/conflicts/this-is-ukraines-moment-of-truth)\n- [South Sudan is on Fire. Here's Why. (And More)](https://warfronts.pub/conflicts/south-sudan-is-on-fire-heres-why-and-more)\n\n## Sources\n1. \n2. \n3. \n4. \n5. \n6. \n7. \n8. \n9. \n10. \n11. \n12. \n\n[1]: https://www.britannica.com/list/timeline-of-world-war-i\n[2]: https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/pathways/firstworldwar/document_packs/eastern.htm\n[3]: https://www.britannica.com/technology/Big-Bertha-weapon\n[4]: https://www.historicmysteries.com/osowiec-fortress-zombie/\n[5]: http://www.erjournal.ru/journals_n/1324195868.pdf\n[6]: https://medium.com/lessons-from-history/the-most-bizare-battle-in-history-the-attack-of-the-dead-men-6d32bec22ebb\n[7]: https://www.wearethemighty.com/popular/russian-troops/\n[8]: https://www.poland.travel/en/underground-tourist-routes/osowiec-fortress\n[9]: https://books.google.com/books?id=1oGXCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA318#v=onepage&q&f=false\n[10]: https://books.google.com/books?id=XEu2BQAAQBAJ&pg=PA135#v=onepage&q&f=false\n[11]: https://cherkasgu.press/images/books/pdf/ataka-mertvetsov-osovets-1915-g-mif-ili-realnost.pdf\n[12]: http://elib.shpl.ru/ru/nodes/14107-svechnikov-m-s-oborona-kreposti-osovets-vo-vremya-vtoroy-6-1-2-mesyachnoy-osady-ee-pg-1917\n\n" url: https://warfronts.pub/article/attack-of-the-dead-men-osowiec-fortress-wwi-last-stand.md canonical: https://warfronts.pub/article/attack-of-the-dead-men-osowiec-fortress-wwi-last-stand datePublished: 2026-03-04 dateModified: 2026-03-04 author: - name: Simon Whistler url: https://warfronts.pub/author/simon-whistler publisher: Warfronts image: "https://media.warfronts.pub/cdn-cgi/image/width=1600,height=900,fit=cover,quality=80,format=auto/articles/AJ9UiCdVSq8/hero.jpg" type: NewsArticle contentHash: bb14f5b77a6dee878e83ca3386b7b2a44a826af6b26c3e1cbe99a551fd1b43bb tokens: 5239 summaryUrl: https://warfronts.pub/article/attack-of-the-dead-men-osowiec-fortress-wwi-last-stand.md.summary.md --- Facing down fourteen German battalions, dozens of heavy siege guns, and thirty batteries of artillery, a far smaller force of Russian soldiers would be pinned down, shelled to pieces, and bombarded with chlorine and bromine gas at Osowiec Fortress in August 1915. But against all odds, their desperate counterattack would rout the German attackers, in perhaps the most brutal and death-defying last stand of all time. The episode has become known as the Attack of the Dead Men — a moment so extraordinary that it earned memorialization by the Swedish heavy-metal band Sabaton, who do not go around memorializing just any battle with their music. ## Key Takeaways - Russia suffered catastrophic losses at Tannenberg and the Masurian Lakes in 1914, losing over 200,000 men and being forced into a defensive posture on the Eastern Front. - Osowiec Fortress guarded the only crossing point of the Biebrza River and the rail line connecting East Prussia to the Polish heartlands, making it strategically vital. - Two Big Bertha 420-millimeter howitzers — bunker-busters capable of penetrating forty feet of concrete — failed to force the fortress's surrender through months of bombardment from autumn 1914 to spring 1915. - On August 6, 1915, the Germans released thirty containers of chlorine and bromine gas into the fortress, killing the vast majority of its roughly 900 defenders. - Approximately 100 surviving Russian soldiers, poisoned and partially blinded, counterattacked against 7,000 German infantry, routing twelve battalions in a panic. - Lieutenant Vladimir Kotlinsky led the countercharge and was killed during the fighting; Wladyslaw Strzeminski assumed command, survived the war, and became a famous avant-garde painter. ## Catastrophic Defeats and the Defensive Posture of Tsarist Russia In the opening months of World War I, Imperial Germany unleashed absolute hell upon Tsarist Russia. Despite an early, enthusiastic Russian push toward German territory in 1914, with the goal of tying up German forces and ending the war swiftly, the legions of Tsar Nicholas II were unequipped to handle what was coming back at them. At the Battle of Tannenberg in August, the Russian First and Second Armies were nearly entirely destroyed, and after the loss of well over a hundred thousand men killed, injured, or captured, Russian forces were routed entirely from East Prussia. Just weeks later, another hundred thousand men were lost at the Masurian Lakes, and as many as three times that number became casualties of war during a pyrrhic battle against Austria-Hungary. The start of the war had been nothing short of catastrophic, and almost as punishment for their hubris, the Russians were forced back into a clearly defensive posture. But even despite their rather extreme difficulties trying to go on offense, the Russians had at least some options for defense. One of these options was Osowiec Fortress, located in what is today the nation of Poland, but was, in that time, territory controlled by Russia. Built over the course of several decades, Osowiec Fortress was located in and around swampland in the Biebrza Valley. Crucially, it also guarded the only crossing point of the Biebrza River, which came complete with a major rail line that had already been constructed. Cross the river, and the Germans could go from nearby East Prussia into the Polish heartlands, moving massive amounts of heavy equipment as they did so. ## The Fortress That Would Not Fall: Big Bertha and Months of Bombardment Osowiec Fortress was not an easy capture for the Germans. It was built on difficult terrain, surrounded by bogs and marshes where artillery pieces could easily become stuck, and the nearby river was a natural barrier against encirclement. Not only that, but the fortress was made up of four separate forts, making it easier for each fort to provide covering fire and support the three others. World War I was a bad time for any army to be relying on forts for protection; artillery bombardment was usually enough to level them to the ground, with enough time and ammunition. But when Germany found their way to Osowiec Fortress in September of 1914, a six-day artillery shelling was not enough to get the job done. Under continual bombardment, the men inside were able to hold out, until it became clear to the Germans that they would need more firepower to break through. Their answer was Big Bertha, a truly massive artillery piece that the Germans had begun developing in secret before the war began. A 420-millimeter howitzer with the ability to fire projectiles weighing nearly a ton to a distance of almost six miles, Big Bertha had proven more than able to crack open French and Belgian forts on the Western Front. Although the Germans had constructed only twelve of the guns, they deployed a pair to Osowiec Fortress during the autumn of 1914. Big Bertha was an early bunker-buster, and its favored ammunition shell was built to penetrate some forty feet into concrete and soil before exploding, so as far as the Germans were concerned, the gun would be more than enough to bring Osowiec to its knees. Except Osowiec did not fall to its knees, not for months and months. Granted, it would be a little generous to say that the fortress withstood Big Bertha's onslaught gracefully; against this firepower, it took severe damage, and the troops inside could do little except just try their best to hold out. But through the fall of 1914, into the winter, and then the spring, Osowiec Fortress did not crumble, and the men inside did not capitulate. In March of 1915, the Germans tried again to take the fortress, and again they were repelled. ## Von Hindenburg Assembles an Overwhelming Force The delay had been acceptable during the winter months, when no competent military commander would be so foolish as to attempt a push into Russia, but now, with the year 1915 ready to unfold, Osowiec Fortress was an intolerable barrier to Imperial Germany's hopes of an offensive into Russia. Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg was the man Germany sent to battle if all other options had failed, and by July of 1915, Osowiec Fortress had proved so painfully intractable that von Hindenburg's presence was required. By this stage of their prolonged battle, Russian forces inside Osowiec were badly outnumbered. About five hundred regular troops of the 226th Infantry Regiment were in fighting shape inside the fortress, joined by about four hundred members of the local militia. And "fighting shape" is a fairly loose term here; like in much of World War I, anyone who had enough of their body functioning to hold a rifle was going to have to participate in the fight, or otherwise be condemned to certain death. The Germans had no such problems with manpower. At his disposal, Paul von Hindenburg had fourteen battalions of infantry, roughly eight thousand men — or, that is to say, nearly ten infantrymen for every one Russian defender of the fortress. He brought thirty batteries of artillery, as well as at least two dozen heavy siege guns, and an additional battalion of sappers, combat engineers who could tunnel underneath the fortress and attempt to get inside from below. By July of 1915, von Hindenburg's attack force was fully assembled, ready and waiting to march on Osowiec. The Germans also had another weapon: poison gas, which had been deployed for the first time in a major battle just a few months earlier in France. The Germans had brought thirty containers of the stuff, and they knew that the Russians had no means to protect against that attack. Osowiec Fortress had been under constant bombardment for nearly a year, long before the Russians or anybody else had known that chemical weapons would figure into the conflict. That meant that no gas masks had been delivered, and it is an open question whether the Russians were even fully aware by this point that poison gas had been deployed in the war. ## Chlorine, Bromine, and the Hell Inside the Fortress The Germans had every advantage, and they knew it; rather than risk men in an assault, they laid in wait until a day eventually came along where the wind would carry the gases perfectly into the Russian fortress. That day came on August 6, 1915, when in the early morning, the Germans began to shell Osowiec Fortress under a heavy barrage of artillery fire. As shells rained down, splitting new openings into the fortress's outer walls and ripping through the Russians' makeshift repairs, the Germans released all thirty containers of chlorine and bromine gas, and within just a few minutes, the noxious cloud had enveloped the entire Russian fortress — and with it, the Russians inside. Chlorine, when it comes into contact with human skin or is inhaled, reacts with the water inside the body to melt anything it can reach. It enters through the eyes and destroys the optic nerve, enters through the lungs and causes pulmonary edema, and as it travels through the esophagus, it causes the tissue to tear and dissolve. Bromine manages to be even worse; it burns the skin, eventually to the point that skin can melt entirely off of the body, and when it is breathed in, it does the same thing except moving outward, eating away at the internal organs with nothing the victim can do to stop it. This was the fate of the Russians inside Osowiec Fortress. Anyone caught outdoors was killed as their lungs dissolved, and the men inside who had at least tried to put rags over their mouths were forced to try and use those rags to keep themselves from decomposing where they stood. Using wet rags to do that, though, just intensified the effects of the chlorine, while doing very little to stop the bromine. The effects were devastating for the defenders; of the nine-hundred-odd men trapped inside, the vast majority were killed, and every man inside was poisoned, even as the fort continued to endure conventional shelling. ## The Attack of the Dead Men: A Countercharge Beyond Comprehension After the fortress had been so thoroughly bombarded that no meaningful resistance could have survived, the Germans advanced with nearly their full infantry force. Twelve battalions, some seven thousand men, marched on the fortress, clad in gas masks and expecting only minimal difficulty. At the most, they would have to stomach the feeling of putting a few surviving Russians out of their misery, but as the Germans saw it, it was nigh-on-inconceivable that even the most bloodthirsty Russians would be able to resist. But inside the fortress, some hundred-or-so Russian defenders were still alive. It is impossible to know what within these men was keeping them from succumbing completely to the gas; certainly, whatever it was, it was not physiological. Their skin was horrifically burned or missing completely, their bodies were in the process of melting from the inside out, and many of them were partially blinded. Maybe it was some sense of duty that kept them from falling completely; maybe it was something their leader, Lieutenant Vladimir Kotlinsky, had said to rally them against certain death. Perhaps it was sheer desperation, the simple, animal urge to seek relief from agony even when that relief can never exist. But whatever it was, it was enough to get those hundred men standing again, clutching at their rifles, and ready to sally out in a counterattack. For all they knew, this was their last stand, but though they were certain to die, they resolved at least to die on the offensive. As the Germans advanced, they began to spot figures in what remained of the poisonous mix: Russian soldiers, some running, some crawling, most of them retching and spitting out pieces of their own lungs, and all of them looking like the first casualties of a zombie apocalypse. They were not just in ones or twos, either — they were attacking in dozens, they were armed, and they should have been dead. ## Panic, Rout, and the Collapse of the German Advance Faced with such a sight, von Hindenburg's men did what any person might do: they panicked. At the front of their lines, the German troops turned and ran with such blind desperation that they trampled those unlucky enough to fall underfoot. Marching in formation, in tight quarters, men lost control of their bayonets, slicing at or even impaling the troops around them. With no time to pay attention to their surroundings, many became entangled and trapped in barbed wire. Those who had been told to man trenches left their weapons behind trying to get away; those who were running back toward the trenches fell into them. With what artillery and small arms they had left, the Russians opened fire against a force that should have been overwhelming, but had instead crumbled entirely. There is no telling how many Germans died during the Russian counterattack, no records that are known to count them, and certainly, no German present who was willing to catalogue such an embarrassing list of causes of death. Making matters worse, other German regiments advanced too quickly in the surrounding area, marching headlong into the thickest parts of their own gas clouds and suffering the results. When the Russian troops ran out of ammunition, they pressed their advantage with bayonets, even after the death of Lieutenant Kotlinsky. The Germans had, by this time, figured out what was happening and begun to regroup, killing some of the Russian defenders in the process, but they had little choice but to call a retreat. Those among their number who were thinking with clear heads knew that the remaining Russians would succumb to their wounds in time, and it simply was not worth sticking around in the interim. The Germans left the area by noon. ## Aftermath and the Legacy of Osowiec Fortress The few Russians left alive did not stick around long enough to be at Osowiec Fortress when the Germans inevitably returned. Instead, they demolished as much of the fortress as they could, relying on the help of two nearby Russian battalions that had not been at the fortress during the gas attack. Against all odds, some of the Russian soldiers and the Polish militia who had survived thus far were able to recover from their injuries. One of them, Wladyslaw Strzeminski, had assumed control of the men when Lieutenant Kotlinsky had died, and not only did he survive the entire war, but he later became a famous avant-garde painter. On the German side, Osowiec Fortress was eventually found empty and, at least technically, captured. This precipitated a much larger Russian retreat from the Polish territories, which the Germans could now move more troops and equipment into than ever before. The land around Osowiec Fortress would be declared the Kingdom of Poland just a year later, in 1916, when Germany and Austria-Hungary attempted to create a puppet state, but before long, Poland was able to become independent at the war's end. Had the Russians and the Polish militia not held out so long at Osowiec Fortress, that land might have been claimed by the Germans up to a year earlier, giving the Central Powers ample time to march on Moscow or set up a well-and-truly subservient Polish state. It was thanks to the dead men at Osowiec that the Russians were able to hold out so long. Without the defense of the fortress, and eventually the Attack of the Dead Men, World War I might have ended very differently. But at the expense of hundreds of Russian and Polish lives, and thousands upon thousands of profoundly traumatized German soldiers, Osowiec Fortress will forever remain one of the most legendary last stands in history. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### Why was Osowiec Fortress so strategically important to both Russia and Germany? Osowiec Fortress guarded the only crossing point of the Biebrza River, along with the major rail line connecting East Prussia to the Polish heartlands. Without the fortress, Germany could move massive amounts of heavy equipment directly from East Prussia into the Polish interior, making it an intolerable barrier to any German offensive push into Russia. ### How did the German gas attack on August 6, 1915 work, and what made it so devastating? The Germans waited for favorable winds before releasing thirty containers of chlorine and bromine gas into the fortress. Chlorine reacts with moisture in the body to dissolve tissue, attacking the eyes, lungs, and esophagus, while bromine burns the skin and eats away at internal organs. Of the roughly nine hundred defenders inside, the vast majority were killed, and every man was poisoned to some degree. ### Why did Big Bertha and months of artillery bombardment fail to take the fortress? Osowiec was built on difficult swampy terrain where artillery pieces could easily become stuck, and it consisted of four separate forts that could provide mutual covering fire. Even though Big Bertha's 420-millimeter shells were designed to penetrate forty feet of concrete before exploding, the fortress absorbed the punishment from autumn 1914 through spring 1915 without capitulating, forcing Germany to resort to chemical weapons. ### What happened when the surviving Russians counterattacked? Approximately one hundred poisoned and partially blinded Russian soldiers, some running and some crawling and most retching blood, sallied out against roughly seven thousand German infantry. The sight caused a mass panic among the German ranks — troops trampled each other, became entangled in barbed wire, fell into their own trenches, and abandoned their weapons. German regiments advancing in the surrounding area also marched into their own gas clouds. The Russians pressed the advantage with bayonets even after Lieutenant Kotlinsky was killed in the fighting. ### What became of Osowiec Fortress and its surviving defenders after the German retreat? The surviving Russian soldiers and Polish militia demolished as much of the fortress as they could before withdrawing, with help from two nearby Russian battalions. One survivor, Wladyslaw Strzeminski, assumed command when Kotlinsky died, endured the entire war, and later became a famous avant-garde painter. The Germans eventually found the fortress empty and claimed it, which contributed to a broader Russian retreat from Polish territories. ## Related Coverage - [Did Rich Foreigners Pay to Shoot Civilians in Bosnia?](https://warfronts.pub/conflicts/did-rich-foreigners-pay-to-shoot-civilians-in-bosnia) - [Russia’s Death Toll Tops 100,000 as Ukraine War’s Human Cost Deepens](https://warfronts-prod.fulcrum-labs.workers.dev/conflicts/russias-death-toll-tops-100k-ukraine-war-human-cost) - [This Is Ukraine’s Moment of Truth.](https://warfronts.pub/conflicts/this-is-ukraines-moment-of-truth-1bmuupct) - [This Is Ukraine’s Moment of Truth.](https://warfronts.pub/conflicts/this-is-ukraines-moment-of-truth) - [South Sudan is on Fire. Here's Why. (And More)](https://warfronts.pub/conflicts/south-sudan-is-on-fire-heres-why-and-more) ## Sources 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. [1]: https://www.britannica.com/list/timeline-of-world-war-i [2]: https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/pathways/firstworldwar/document_packs/eastern.htm [3]: https://www.britannica.com/technology/Big-Bertha-weapon [4]: https://www.historicmysteries.com/osowiec-fortress-zombie/ [5]: http://www.erjournal.ru/journals_n/1324195868.pdf [6]: https://medium.com/lessons-from-history/the-most-bizare-battle-in-history-the-attack-of-the-dead-men-6d32bec22ebb [7]: https://www.wearethemighty.com/popular/russian-troops/ [8]: https://www.poland.travel/en/underground-tourist-routes/osowiec-fortress [9]: https://books.google.com/books?id=1oGXCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA318#v=onepage&q&f=false [10]: https://books.google.com/books?id=XEu2BQAAQBAJ&pg=PA135#v=onepage&q&f=false [11]: https://cherkasgu.press/images/books/pdf/ataka-mertvetsov-osovets-1915-g-mif-ili-realnost.pdf [12]: http://elib.shpl.ru/ru/nodes/14107-svechnikov-m-s-oborona-kreposti-osovets-vo-vremya-vtoroy-6-1-2-mesyachnoy-osady-ee-pg-1917 <!-- youtube:AJ9UiCdVSq8 -->