Fernand Louis Armand Marie De Langle De Cary (1849-1927) was born at Lorient July 4, 1849, entered the St. Cyr military school in 1867 and left at the head of his class in 1869, being commissioned to the Chasseurs d'Afrique.

After the war he received army staff training and served for a time as a professor at the French military academy.

In concert with General Pierre Ruffey and his Third Army and General Charles Lanrezac and his Fifth Army, he was ordered by Joseph Joffre to attack the Germans advancing south through the heavily forested and ravined Ardennes.

He continued at the head of the Fourth Army (though its strength was greatly reduced for the benefit of Ferdinand Foch's newly created Sixth Army) in the Marne and Aisne operations and in the trench warfare fighting of 1915.

The German attack erupted onto Verdun in February, 1916, and the fears that he had expressed earlier about conditions there proved to be only too well founded, thus the army command was radically reorganized by Joffre who wanted more aggressive commanders, and Langle was replaced by Philippe Pétain, officially on grounds of his age, 66 (the official retirement age being 65).