TEUTONIC ANTICIPATIONS.

Taihape Daily Times, Volume 7, Issue 135, 10 February 1915, Page 3

TEUTONIC ANTICIPATIONS.

GERMAN NAME TOR RETREAT.

A military writer has given some fads, small and great, amounting altogether to a complete confutation c* a contention which only Germans could be capable of hoping to foist upon infworld, whose credulity they have so thoroughly plumbed *or years past through their State-aided nows facseries. They say their retreat from tne Vistula was a strategic move, die a ran marching on Warsaw included a brilliant body of distinguished names, many of the principal military names of Germany. many minor Gorman 3’iinces. and a large contingent of lesser sate:-, litres. These brought mountains of baggage and sported the finest gabi uni forms in public places as early as then arrival at Lodz. Printed invitations to a ball on a certain evening at Warsaw were found, on certain officers. Many officers leaving Lodz consigned their heavy baggage to residents well known to the German authorities, with orders to send it on by a certain date to cor tain addresses given in Warsaw, whore

tliov would then be in residence, the addresses varying from select- private houses to ordi»»<’v hotels, bur ail marked out beforelmr-V!) by the German spy system, which could produce billeting lists for the German armies in any country in Europe, England included, at a moment’s notice. Receipts Tor commandeered horses and property were made payable at Warsaw on and after October 19th. .

These arc small but significant facts, but in the military sense the more telling arc the facts regarding the character of the fighting. The Germans got at one point within five or six miles of Warsaw and Prushkoff, on the railway. Their big guns carry much‘further than that, but as they expected to march into Warsaw they were not used. Caught by the Grand'Duke’s strategic trap, the Germans did not retire, butfought a series cf desperate battles, lasting several days. At PrushkofT alone eight thousand Germans werkilled fighting with the utmost stubbornness. With cavalry in the rear, and cavalry, guns, and infantry on their left flank, the Germans at last' begun that retreat for forty miles of unbroken run until they reached the River Skernjavka, where, finding a wooded height commanding the surrounding eou "try, they attempted another stand. The whole area between Skierniewice and Jcshow is hilly and admirably suited to the purpose. It was strongly fortified, and such numbers of guns were mounted hero that the attacking Russians

lost their sense of hearing from the unceasing roar during 5(5 hours. The position being first isolated by the capture of entrenchments about the village of Medio and the village itself, after prolonged bayonet attacks the Russans in two nights got within charging reach of the heights notwithstanding the appalling artillery fire, and took them on the third day. The carnage in this region was unparalleled. Before Lodz again the Germans had prepared a triple line of entrenchments, but after their expedience at Modlo the Germans could, not get their men to make another stand. At Lodz itself a series of orders and counter-orders produced a confusion eloquent of the state of mind of the German generals, and very far removed from an orderly strategic retirement. When the Russians entered they captured a number of German soldiers who had hidden themselves away to escape further hardships. Numbers were also captured owing to the premature destruction of bridges, again showing the degree or disorder unfitting the men of a strategic retirement. The conclusion is that the German rereaf from before Warsaw was in of fact a hurried flight, with desperate attempts to hold posx-

lions upon which to rally. P.rally, flu entrenched positions behind the It ;ii i. seem not to have been readied by fleeing Germans, who were unable to cross the river.