Army and Nancy to envelopment. Castelnau ordered a withdrawal from Nancy but the move was circumvented by his staff; Castelnau was ordered by Joffre to maintain the defence of the Grand Couronné for another The Germans had retired during the afternoon and the French reoccupied the height. German attacks continued until the morning of 8 September but then diminished as Moltke began to withdraw troops to the right flank of the German armies. Moltke sent Major Roeder to the 6th Army with orders to end the offensive and prepare to retire to the frontier; only now did Rupprecht find out that the armies near Paris were under severe pressure. The attacks by the 6th Army diminished and on 10 September it began to withdraw towards the frontier. On 13 September, Pont-à-Mousson and Lunéville were re-occupied by the French unopposed who then closed up to the Seille river, where the front stabilised until 1918. First Battle of the Marne, 5–12 September Joffre used the railways which had transported French troops to the German frontier to move troops back from Lorraine and Alsace to form a new Sixth Army under General Michel-Joseph Maunoury with nine divisions and two cavalry divisions. By 10 September twenty divisions and three cavalry divisions had been moved west from the German border to the French centre and left and the balance of force between the German and the Third, Fourth, Ninth, Fifth armies, the BEF and Sixth Army had changed to Late on 4 September Joffre ordered the Sixth Army to attack eastwards over the Ourcq towards Château Thierry as the BEF advanced towards Montmirail and the Fifth Army attacked northwards, with its right flank protected by the Ninth Army along the St Gond marshes. The French First–Fourth armies to the east were to resist the attacks of the German between Verdun and Toul and repulse an enveloping attack on the defences south of Nancy from the north. The 6th and 7th armies were reinforced by heavy artillery from Metz and attacked again on 4 September along the Moselle. On 5 September the Sixth Army advanced eastwards from Paris and met the German IV Reserve Corps, which had moved into the area that morning and stopped the French short of high ground north of Meaux. Overnight the IV Reserve Corps withdrew to a better position east and French air reconnaissance observed German forces moving north to face