A GRIM EXPERIENCE

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 193, 4 January 1913, Page 1 (Supplement)

A GRIM EXPERIENCE

INCIDENT OP THE BALKAN WAR. Gen oral Martinoviteh, in according facilities for myself and three other Brftish correspondents to witness the bombardment of Tarabosh (reports the Central News' war correspondent at Antivari), promised that we should go right into the lines of action. He was even bettor than his word, for I spent two bonis under fire in a Montenegrin battery. As we went along the track to the guns the first Turkish shell came screaming overhead. The two ollicors who were escorting u s ordered us to lie down. At the time of our arrival a lively bombardment was proceeding. The battery was made up of fiin howitzers and am siege guns, and was well hidden. Iho gunner, were working the gnus smartly and with great cheerfulness, little heeding the splashes of blood around them, which told of the previous day's casualties. The surrounding earth was pitted by the explosion of the enemy's projectiles, some of the holes torn by the bursting shells being lift deep. Xear one of the gtnis lay a bloodistainod shell-carrier, which, with its deadly loud, was on the point of beiii" lilted to the gun breech, when Turkish shrapnel slew one -Montenegrin artilleryman and wounded another. Within 10 seconds the very shell, ensanguined as it was. cra,he;l into the Tarabosh forts, and vengeance having boon done, the gunners removed their dead and wounded comrades. It was hard to realise on this pleasant hilltop, bathed in golden sunshine, that such grim work was going oil. It was hard to believe that disobedience to the commanding ollicer's half-laughing request) to seek cover might mean a, shattering death front the ■unseen thing which screamed through the aiir above, us—that even shelter might not avail against I lie mighty power of its explosion. The Turkish aim was always good, and nearly as accurate as that of the .Montenegrin gunners, who -wined able to pitch their missiles just where (.hey chose. The links woke up in the afternoon, and lor a couple of hours Muritzan was subjected to a searching lire. The Montenegrin gunners were undaunted, and sent back shot for -hot, until the air scorned alive with .-bricking projectiles. Vet beneath Tarabosh a Turkish 'hamlet appeared to be slumbering peacefully and behind us the Adriatic shone like molten silver.