A DARING ADVENTURE

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2691, 10 February 1916, Page 6

A DARING ADVENTURE

— : —♦ — : — "HOW WE CAPTURED A GENERAL" RUSSIAN SOLDIER'S STORY ■r i (By Mr. H. Hamilton Fyffe, in the , "Daily Mail.") e- Petrograd. To hear the man talk one would not ■y think he had done anything particular. It 'was only when he warmed up 1- the exciting part of the story, tho ;o rousing of .the house .after they had ie crept into it, that he seemed to dwell upon the. exploit with pleasure in reT , calling its incidents. Yet what he '■ described was really the most .daring adventure which has been indulged in during the war, To penetrate tliir- ,> teen miles deep into the enemy's lines, [ to attack the headquarters of a divij sional staff, and- to carry off the [. general with several of his officers, gct--0 ting clear away' again, prisoners and j all—this is the kind of raid with' which ■ we are all familiar in fiction of tho .' "Three Musketeers" . type. But here ! it actually happened.'' It was men■l tioned in the official bulletin. It has been the talk of the —th Army and of other armies for days past. The way of its happening was this. e The Pfnsk Marshes, e In the Pinsk marshes , there is a 1 little town called Neeol.' Near this l. Lhe Prussian general commanding the ; 82nd Division had ma.(le himself as , comfortable as he could iu a substantial . country house. The house stands in a - garden. There are no other houses , quite near. ' Of course, the staff of the ; Russian division which lay to the east- - ward knew ail about it. They had ; local eyes and .ears at their nervice. - But. it was not anyone upon the staff 1 who conceived the bold idea of raiding 3 the Prussian general's headquarters. It w;\s to the ambitious imagination , of a young officer in charge of a scouting party that the thought of this triumph presented itself. He know . the country. Among the swamps a small number of men might pass by ( paths known only to the peasants, with such a secret movement as would ( escape the notice of any German out- ' post. Tile house, he learned, was not | closely guarded; it would be some few [ minutes before help could arrive. A kidnapping expedition would be risky. Its success must depend upon the swift . and ruthless energy, with which the attack was made. Any delay would mean certain failure. It would be "touch and go" in deadly earnest. He resolved, however, to risk it. Others were easily found to share the peril—and the hoped-for glory. Preparations were scarcely needed. This was fortunate, for if such plans are talked about they have a way of becoming known to outsiders; the enemy's gold can often buy the secret. All that had to be done was to secure a guide, knowing every track across tho marshes who could bo trusted, and to wait for a dark night. ! A Risky Business. ' The nigho came, solidly biack, with a low sky trom wiiich scattered snowflakes 1011. The scouting party was paraded. Without being toid tnat anything, special was their night's worit, they started off. Scouts gcuerally put ' soma food! into their haversacks, for they never know how long they may be "way. Sometimes they have to hide for days before they get a chance to return with their 'information, picked up liter- : ally "under the enemy's nose." They ■ were well provided this time, and when their guide joined them they were told to eat something and to make tea before they sot otf on their fifteen-mile tramp across the bittfer bogland. They were also taken now into their officers' confidence. At last, after hours of tramping through desolation, they saw lights far away. These were tho lights of tho little town. Again they took a bite, while the officer ill command explained to them what each must do. They had crossed one river already. They had another i to ford .now. Then they would be close t to tho house which they had come .to 1 raid, tho house where the general and I his staff were probably asleep, unsus- ? picious, little thinking that before i morning they would be prisoners in the c Russian lines. i . Now they moved more carefully than £ over. Beyond the Stokhod River they L wore among the enemy's dotachincnta, i; They had 1 pierced deep into the country t occupied by tho "Niemtsi" (Russian foi- li "Germans," literally "the dumb ones," i: becauso long ago the first Germans who ii were seen by .the Russim peasanto n could not speak Russian and to then, s were .tlieroforo "dumb"'). Here it is im> li possible to hold a continuous front. The t marshes prevent it. This marsh wiiich our scouts had crossed seemed to the I enemy to be uncrossable, and therefore* c a secure barrier. Very soon t'hoy wert> s t-j be roughly undeceived. t Enemy Surprised. t There wore no sentries outside the * garden. The raiders got into it and . had surrounded the house before they 9 ' were noticed. Sentries back and from, ~ kept guard, ruifearing. Suddenly death look them in the darkness Before tho life was out of them the Russians were in the house, flic teller of the story f entered' a room where a soldier sat with ' receivers over his ears sleepily. waiting for a telephone message. This roon, ' was lighted up. The rest of the house * seemed to be dark. The soldier did not look round. He hoard someone enter, but evidently thought it a comradc. P There was a pause of half a minute. The house was so still that those who 'liad got into the telephone room felt " doubtful what to do next. Death stood by the German soldier's elbow. Then a voice in the next room cried out ? sharply: "Wer da " ("Who's that?"), and the German 'soldier's life was over. 'The telephone instrument was smashed 1: at once. Next moment the whole alace was in an uproar. }' Shots were fired. Shouts came from D all sides. Soldiers appeared buckling j:' their belts. All who showed themselves 11 to the scouts left outside the house w wore either bayoneted or bombed. The bursting of the hand-grenades, the yells of the terrified Germans, the leaping flames of a fire started by an overturned lamp, the hoarse bellowing of orders wiiich could not be obeyed, tho hard breathing of those who were engaged in death-struggles within tho B house—all combined to make .up a scene wilder and grimmer than any which could be imagined. t Now picture the general's bedroom, j It was next to the room where the 'j soldier with the telephone sat Our v scouts running in saw "a man no longer young," half-dressed, just as he had lain down on the bed. Half-asleep still, iut sufficiently awake to be furiously angry, and very much "rattled" at the same time. A battle is one tiling. To be kidnapped is quite another. A pitiable plight for "one no longer voung." ]~ No escaping this ignominious fate, j however. Seized is the angry, general and hustled out. With liini three of his S 1 officers, one of them, like himself, of ta general rank, the headquarter's doctor; t, a few privates. Hustled out through the garden, down tho river hank, over the river, now they can go more gently. And now the.v hear the rattle of rifle fire. Assistance lias arrived. They hear their men shouting. But they are beyond reach. Those who had been left behind soon followed. The Germans were arriving . in numbers 100 formidable. Our scouts t} made for ihe river, crossed it, and were e i lost in the gloom of the farther bank, y Only two were left behind with death wounds. Nine were wounded nlMitly. p All got back safeLv Vafore daylight, I