Wear and tear of men

The units could not hold out for long at Verdun and divisions often had to be relieved. At the height of the battle, the front required two new divisions every three days. At this rate, 90 divisions out of the 103 in the French army passed through Verdun, some of them several times. The relays themselves were the cause of severe losses, as the routes identified by the Germans were systemati-cally bombed, The Germans did not relieve their units, but rather replenished them, perhaps with fewer losses! On the right, troops disembarking from trucks to get in line,