PRZEMYSL BATTLE IN FILMS

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2681, 29 January 1916, Page 13

PRZEMYSL BATTLE IN FILMS

RUSSIAN-AUSTRIAN WAR PICTURES. The scene is tlie extreme front Russian trench along tlie Wrka River position under heavy lire of rifle, machine guns, and cannon. With his camera placed above the parapet, Mr. R. R. M'Cormick, of the "Chicago Tribune," formed a perfect target for the opposing Austrian, sharpshooters. There was a distinct chance that he would not live to finish the picture, but he took that risk, and determined to keep the crank of his machine going, to get as much of the scene as he could, before the bullet bearing his name and address arrived. Doing precisely' the same thing in the Austrian trenches was A. K. Dawson, another American kinematographer. They were photographing the Galician and Carpathian operations of tlie Russian and Austrian armies from both sides. M'Cormick accompanied the Russians on their advance on Przemysl, nnd Dawson was with the enemy in. the' Galician drive. A few months later in the "Chicago Tribune" office .the films they secured were joined up and edited. Tlie result is the most comprehensive motion-picturo record of the war in the Eastern theatre yet secured.

During the battle of Przemysl, Dawson was as much 1 in it as any soldier, especially in the final charge on tlio fortress. The actual battlo pictures be thus secured are unique.* In. fact, that can be said about the whole series, bocause it affords an -opportunity of seeing both sides at once. Thus, at one •moment one is in-the Russian trenches watching big thirty-live and forty centimetre guns discharging a ceaseless hail of death, and the next instant ono sees the effects of these projectiles bursting over the Austrians. During the final bombardment of Przemysl 700,000 shells were fired in four hours. The batteries doing this are shown in .tlio films, wreathed in clouds of smoke, which do not have time to lift before anothor big volume is discharged in the air. Some of these mortars were so big that they liad to be hauled' by traction engines over tlio Galician roads.