THE SHELLING OF DUNKIRK.

Gisborne Times, Volume XLV, Issue 3977, 9 July 1915, Page 3

THE SHELLING OF DUNKIRK.

RANGE OF TWENTY MILES. >-• ' BIG NAVAL GUNS USED. Alexander Powell, the correspondent ol' an American newspaper syndicate, who was in Dunkirk when that town was shelled recently, gives the following account of the bombardment:—Let me put it up to you my friends. Mow' would you feel if you were sleeping quietly in, let us say, a lake front hotel, and along about 6 o’clock in tlie morning something dropped from the clouds and blew 7 a hole in the pavement of Michigan Avenue largo enough to bury a horse in? And what would be your sensations if, still bow'ildered by the suddenness of your awakening, you ran to the window to see what had happened, anti something that sounded like an approaching express train came hurtling through the air, with the crash of an exploding powder mill, and transformed a building adjoining into a heap of pulverised stone and concrete? A STARTLED AWAKENING.

Well, that is precisely how I was awakened in Dunkirk yesterday morning, and it is the fashion in which tens pf thousands of helpless and harmless folk dwelling in the qitics and villages of North-Eastern Fram-e are being awakened these beautiful spring mornings.

Dunkirk, a fortress of the first-class and the fourth commercial port of the Republic of France, rises from the sand dunes of the French coast, barely a dozen miles from the t Belgian frontier. In normal times t lose vo 40,000 persons dwell within its ramparts; 'but since the war the population of the city has been immensely increased, as its excellent harbor and railway connections and its proximity to the firing line in Flanders have made it a supply and hospital base of great importance. CALM OF DUNKIRK INVADED. A fortnight ago all France was astounded to learn that Dunkirk had been subjected to a terrific German bombardment. fc’o incredible was it that at first the military authorities refused- to believe the shells had come from a land battery, and it was announced officially that German’ wai ships had crept down the Channel coast, and had bombarded Dunkirk from the sea'. Aerial reconnaisances, howevci, soon established that the Germans had succeeded in mounting one or more loin naval guns at an advanced point, and had actually shelled the city at a range of 20. miles. •ANOTHER AND ANOTHER.

It must have been about G in the morning when i was awakened by a splitting crash, which made my cecfroom windows rattle. A moment later came another, then another—each louder, and therefore nearer, than the one preceding. All down the corridor the doors began to pen, and I heard voices excitedly enquiring what was happening. I did not have to enquire. I kmjw from experience. A German TaßP'l"; was raining death on the city from ttie clouds.

The anti-aircraft guns mounted on the ramparts opened fire. Suddenly, above the tumult of bells and horns and hurrying footsteps, came now an inconceivably terrifying sound—a low, deep-toned roar, rapidly rising in a crescendo—like an express train approaching from far down in a subway. As it passed above our beads it sounded as if a giant in tho sky was tearing mighty strips of linen—then an explosion which was brother to an earthquake. The housetops seems to rock and sway. The hotel shook to its foundations. From beyond the housetops, in. the direction of the railway station and receiving hospital, a mushroomshaped cloud of green-brown smoke suddenly shot into the air.

Out in the corner a woman screamed hysterically: “My God! My God! They have begun again with the big. cannon.” I began to dross. Just as I was struggling into mv coat there caTi.e another whistling roar and another terific detonation. Meanwhile, high in the air, above the quivering city, circled the German Taube, informing by “aerograms’’ the German gunners, more than 20 miles away across tho Belgian border, where their shells were hitting. Think of it! Think of bombarding a city at a range of 20 miles, and every shot a hit! This is the marvel of this modern,warfare.