WAR NEWS BY MAIL.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 309, 8 June 1915, Page 6

WAR NEWS BY MAIL.

The Neuve OhapeEle Fight.

HEROISM OF BRITISH TROOPS.

GERMANS FALL LIKE CORN. MAGNIFICENT CHARGES. The following brilliant story of the great Neuve Cliappellc victory, which came to liand by the latest English mail, is the first full and independent account of this glorious achievement. * Neuve Cliappellc, says the writer, has above all things shown the British soldier that in him the Herman has met his master and that, given proper artillery support, the offensive can be taken against the German line, strong though it is, with every chance of success. When the German official history of the war comes to be written it will be seen how close we were to turning this brilliant,)' fought engagement into a victory which would have exercised a decisive influence on the rest of the campaign. The issue at stake after the capture of Neuve t'happelle on the morning of March 30 was great enough to justify far greater losses than those we sustained in the magnificently executed attempt to push forward the advantage already gained. If we were prevented, mainly by unfavourable weather conditions, from benefiting to the full by our success, ,ve held the ground we had won, despite repeated and desperate counter-attacks by fresh German troops hastily thrown into the field. We were pioncors at Neuve Chapelle, Imbued with the fighting spirit of fathers, our army, after months of inaction, was the first to put the, last lesson learned during the long winter in the trenches. Like 'ill pioneers, we had to pay the price, but the lives so freely, so gallantly, given will not have been laid down in vain.

ASSEMBLING THE TKOOPS. The dawn which' broke reluctantly through a veil of clouds on the morning of Wednesday, March 10, seemed as any other to the Germans behind the white and blue sandbags in their long line of trendies curving in a semicircle albout the battered village of Neuve Cliappellc. For weeks past the German airmen had grown strangely shy. On this Wednesday morning none were aloft to spy out the strange doings which as dawn broke might have been descried on the desolate loads behind the British lines. From ten o'clock of the preceding evening endless files of men marched silently down the roads leading towards the German positions, through Laventie and Kichebourg St. Vasast, poor shattered villages of the dead, where months of incessant bombardment have driven away the last inhabitants and left roofless houses and rent roadways. MEN FROM EVERY COUNTRY.

Watch the troops as they go by. Here come Indians, dark faces beneath' slouch hats, kukris slung behind their waistbelts; not Gurkhas these—they are farther down the road—but Gaiiiwalia, a tribe akin, of similar cast of face with a strong Mongolian strain, but men of sturdier build. Here are the Leicester.-!, "The Tigers" as they call them from their badge; here territorials of the Royal Fusiliers; here the Lincolns and the Berks; the silver cross of the Rifle Brigade; the star and bugle of the Scottish Rifles; the Black Watch in their bonnets; the Northants, the Worcester, heroes of Ypres. Halted by the roidsido are the Middlesex, the West Yorks, (he Devons; every burr of Britain from Land's End to John o' Groats is beard ( " these deserted highways. Two days before, in a quiet room >.hero Nelson's prayer stands ou the mantle-shelf saw the ripening of the plans that sent these sturdy sons of Britain's four kingdoms marching all through the night. Sir John Frenoh met the army corps commanders and unfolded to them his plans for the offensive of the British Army against, the i Gorman line at Neuve Chapelle."'The I onslaught was to be a surprise. That I was its essence. The Germans were battered with artillery, then rushed before they recovered their wits.

THE PLAN OF ATTACK,

The village was to lie our first objective. This attained, the troops were to press on to the Bois du Biez, a wood thick in parts but consisting of trees of different ages. Simultaneously with the, attack on Neuve Chapelle an assau't was to bo launched against the road running from the Moulin do Pietre to Pietre. Shattered houses turned into strongholds through the installation of machine guns by the Germans, barred the way to the ridge on the fringe of the wood and at the elbows of the Pietre Road. The attack on the whole German position was entrusted to the Indian Corps on the right and the 4th Army Corps in the. centre and on the left. After the first line of German trenches, in some places only 80 yards distant from ours, had been captured, the ground was to be consolidated—i.e., put in a state of defence—and the Indians were to sweep on to the Bois do Biez, whilst the 4th Corps, attacking from the west and north-west, were to occupy the village and then press on towards the ridge. The whole experience of this war has gone to show that infantry cannot .id vance against machine guns defended by barbed-wire entanglements. A machine gun, firing (JOO shots a minute, can reap down advancing infantri- like r-:;j corn. A great general lias truly said that two men with a machine gun can hold up a brigade. Concentrated artillery fire is therefore the indispensible preliminary to an offensive hi the present trench warfare. That is why guns and shells are needed—as many as possible—and that why the strikes which delayed their production are so fiercely resented by our army in the field.

BRAVERY OF THE GERMANS.

The Germans left alive in the trenches, half demented witli fright, surrounded by the welter of dead and dying men, mostly surrendered. The Berkshires were opposed with the utmost gallantry by two German officers, who had remained alone in a trench serving a gun. But the lads from Berkkshire made their way into that trench and bayonetted the Germans where they stood, fighting to the last. The Lincolns, against desperate resistance, eventually occupied their section of the trench and then waited for the Irishmen and the Rifle Brigade to come and take the village ahead of them.

Meanwhile the second 30th Gahrwalis on the right had taken their trenches with a rush and were away towards the village and the Biez Wood. Things had moved so fast that by the time the troops were ready to advance against the village the artillery had not finished its work. So while the Lincolns assembled the prisoners, who were, trooping out of the trenches in all directions, the infantry on whom devolved the honor of capturing the village waited.,

BLOODY WORK IN THE VILLAGE

There was bloody work in the village of Netive Chappelle. The capture of a place at the bayonet point is generally a grim business, in which instant, unconditional surrender is the only means by which bloodshed, a deal of bloodshed, can be prevented. If there is individual resistance here and there the attacking

ARTILLERY TO CLEAR THE WAY

Our artillery was to prepare the way for the assault on Neuve Chapelle. A few hours before dawn everything was ready for opening, on the stroke of 7.3''., the most formidable concentration of fire from guns of all calibres that the present war has yet seen.

The battalions which were to open the attack were now wedged together in trenches and ditches waiting for the. fust gun to give the signal of battle. Behind

their sandbags, a while line ju.-t visible in the half-light dawn, the German:, kept watch, unconscious of the inl'-rui about to break loose on them. .Not r.ll were unconscious. Prisoners tiikiii ill tile tight relate that in one section of the German trenches a captain became aware of unusual movement in the British liii'-s opposite him, anil soon discovered thai. the enemy trenches were full of mm. '!■■ sent an urgent message back to his anillery requesting the battery command"!to open fire. The latter replied politely that he had strict injunctions not in open fire without express orders from the corps commander. "Also. . . bedaucrc sehr. . . ." ("I regret extremely. . .. .".) TlilC I'TItXT GUX.

Of a sudden the deep boom of a British gun struck on the ears of our waiting troops. But the bombardment was not yet. For an hour or two the guns boomed intermittently, "registering," as it is called—that is, making sure of their respective ranges—rather like a eri.-keter having a few balls at the nets before he goes in to bat. Then daivn broke softly, the shadows melted, and the clouds drifted away, and here and there a British aeroplane sallied pluekily forth over the Gorman lines to De grelted by white 'balls of shrapnel smoke hanging motionless in the clear morning air. Then hell broke loose. With a mighty, hideous screeching burst of noise hundreds of guns spoke. The men in the front trenches were deafened by the sharp reports of the field guns spitting out their shells at close range to cut through the German's barb-wire entanglements. In some oases the trajectory of these vicious missiles was so llat that they passed only a-.few feet above the British trenches. The din was continuous. An ollicer who had the curious idea of putting his'ear to the ground said it was as though, the earth were being smitten with blows by a Titan's hummer. After the first few shells had plunged screaming amid clouds of earth and dust into the (iernian trenches, a dense pall of smoke hung over the flerman lines. The sickening fumes of lyddite blew back into the British trenches.

THE HORROR OF THE SHELLS. In some places the troops were smothered in earth and dust or even spattered with blood from the hedious fragments of human bodies that went hurtling through the air. At one point the upper half of a German officer, his cap crammed on his head, was blown blown into one of our trenches.

Words will never convey any adequate idea of the horror of those 35 minutes. When the hands of the officers' watches pointed to five minutes past eight, whistles resounded along the British lines. At the same moment the shells began to burst farther ahead, for, by previous arrangement the gunners, lengthening j their fuses, were ' lifting" on to the vilI lage of Neuve Chappelle, so as to leave the road open for our infantry to rush in and finish what the guns had begun. The shells were now falling thick among the houses of Neuve Chapellc, a confused mass of buildings seen reddish through the pillars of smoke and flying earth and dust. At the sound of the whistle—alas ! for the bugle once the herald of victory, is now banished from the fray—our men scrambled out of the trenches and hurried higgekly-pig-geldy into the open. Their officers were in front. Many wearing overcoats and carrying rifles with fixed bayonetu, closely resembled their men. | It was from the centre of our attack-1 ing lino that the assault was pressed home soonest. The guns had done tluir work well. The trenches were blown to unrecognisable pits dotted with dead. The barbed-wire had been cut like 30' much twine. Starting from the Rue Tilleloy, the Lincolns and the Berkshires were ofr the mark first with the orders to swerve to the right and left respectively as soon as they had captured the first line of trenches to let the Royal Irish Rifles and the Rifle Brigade through to the village.

troops cannot discriminate. They must go through, slaying us they go such as wjipo.se them (tin; Germans have a monopoly of finishing oil' of wounded men), otherwise the enemy's resistance would not be broken and the assailants would he, sniped anil enfiladed from hastily nn pared strongholds at half a dozen different points.

I.IKI' AX EAUTiIQUAKIO. The village was a sight that the men , say they will never forget. It looked :n | if an earthquake had struck it. The |v.ib-j iislied photographs do not give any id> a '■ of the indescribable ma.-,s of ruins to I which our guns reduced it. The ehe.ns is so utter that the very line of til. i street is all but obliterated. ! It was naked a ::cciie of o'csohition into which the Kifle Brigade-the first regiment to enter tha village, 1 believe -'-raced headlong. The din and confusion were indescribable. Through the ibid; pall of shell-smoke (iermaiis were seen on all sides, some emerging halfdazed from cellars and dug-outs, their Lauds above their heads others dodging rchind the shattered houses, others firing from windows, from behind carts, eieu from behind the overturned tombstones. Machine-guns were firing from the houses on the out-skirts, rapping out their nerve-racking note above the noise of the rifles.

A iiille Brigade subaltern falling over u sandbag into a (Senium trench came upon two officers, hardly more than boys, their hands above their head's. Their faces were ashen grey, they were trembling, (bio said gravely in good E:i;..lish, " Don't shoot ! I am from Jxmddii also!" They were mercifully treated.

.fust outside the village there was a scene of tremendous enthusiasm. The Bide Brigade, smeared with dust a::d blood, fell in witli the 3rd Gurkhas, with whom they bad been brigaded in India. The little brown men were dirty but radiant. Kukri in hand, they had tholoughly gone through some houses et the cross-roads on the Hue du Boiu and silenced a party of Germans who were with some machine g»ns. Riflemen and Gurkhas cheered themselves hoarse. Then they pushed on to where a fringe of scraggy trees on the horizon marked the Bois du Biezc.

It was. now half-past eight, Xeuve Chapelle is ours, but the German resistance is not broken. Only a few hundred yards from where, Riflemen and. Gurkhas aro fraternising in the first (lush of victory Englishmen are traversing the the last stern stago of a soldier's career in the field, tho path of death.

HOW BRAVE MEN MED. If you would hear the manner of their death then follow me first to the extreme right of the line to that duster group of ruined houses known as Port Arthur. We are with the Ist 29th Garhwalis, a tough regiment that showed its worth in Burniah and in the Tirah campaign. Whistles hlown. the men leave their trenches. Instantly they are withered by a fearful blast "of fire. Tim German trench is untouched. So is the barbed wire, '2(10 yards of it. The Garhwalis never waver. All the officers of the leading companies are killed right ahead of their men. Tho battalion staggers imdcr the blast of fire, loses ita direction, swings to the right, and captures after a fierce in-tight with the bayonet and knife, a section of trench there, only to be cut oil' in the upshot by the Germans in the intact trench. On their left the Leicesters have gone through with a rush. ■ Handy men with the bayonet, hardly a man in the battalion, the 2nd, that does not do his work. So gallantly, indeed . did tho Ti"ers bear themselves this day that after the fight the divisional general visited them in their billets to congratulate them on the good showing they made. The Leicesters come in for fire from the German trench which has been left intact.. It is a bad gap in our attacking line and must be closed.

KXAMPLK OF THE OFFICERS. Five of the Garwhalis' officers are dead now, killed in the first line after prodigies, of bravery. In this light the battalion is to lose 20 officers and 350 men killed and wounded. The Germans have started to shell the Garhwali trenches. But the men, though without ;•>£- fleers, are steady. These stout little hillmen have seen their officers fall, fearlessly exposing themselves. They remember and it keeps them firm. Now the Leicester* are going to effect a junction with the marooned Garhwalis. A bombing party is creeping down the communication trench to pelt the Germans into the open. Cricket is good training for bomb-throwing, and the Tigers fling their bombs into the crowded German trenches as fast and true as though they were throwing down a wicket. As the Germans are driven out into the open they are shot or bayoneted or slashed with the kukri. The captain lays out five Germans with his revolver.

TERRITORIALS' CHARGL

I The day is wearing on. The attack has dragged badly at this point in the line. The Seafor'ths, with kilts flying, are despatched to execute a flank attack on the German trench. From the front a territorial battalion of the Royal Fusiliers, the 3rd, London, Regiment, delivers a splendid charge. The men come tearing across the pitted fields strewn with dead, bayonets well down, cheering as they go. They drop men as they plunge along—but who cares in such a charge under the eyes of the elite army?—the, regulars cheer them as they swing past, and they carry in their stride the last German stronghold and the gap is closed. As the sun sinks bluod-rcd behind the grim skeleton that was once the village of the New Chapel, our men dig themselves in on the new line we have won between the village and the Biez Wood.

GLRMANS ON THE RUN

Tt was l.:10 in the afternoon when the village and environs were, in our hands, but the advance was still delayed by the •''dragging - ' of the brigades where the battalions had been held up by the parked wire. The conditions were ideal for a further advance towards the Aubers Ridge. The (ie-rmans were on the run, The total demoralisation of the prisoners proved that. In point of fact it was not till :). r io that the advance could proceed. At this moment the enemy's opposition was still so paralysed that our men were able to form up nnsYathcd in the open outside the village before advancing. Opposite the wood the soldiers got out of the trenches and walked about, The whole, of our left attacked the Pietre road, but the German machine guns posted in the houses on the road held us up. The Gurkhas on the right penetrated into the Hois de Hie/,, but a Herman stronghold at a bridge over the little stream, known as the Kivierc des Laves, enfiladed I'.ie Indians, and the Gurkhas were unable t) )■( tab their advantage.

i-'ikst o>ux7k;:-at - ."A'

-Jii--t before d-n-n t!:<- ?:: :.i morning the Germans mad ■ their li-! attempt to deprive lis of our ci;-fer. . Their ciunf :".'- -.'id v e i i:r--.!cd them •'" -. e were check- ■ '■ b- iliii;e fatal ■;.■ o-.V.dd* o:i the 1 Vire road. I'i (he meantime <>;- tr; !i •!-• had been ->idily shelling the ■■<•'• with a view to hindering the an■'•:■.! "f the German reinforcements, whh'h veiv hrown (n be. en route. Two Ccr.'xn regiments posted

in the wood are believed to have been deeimated. For days afterwards the. enemy was observed to be, bringing dead bodies out of the wood and burying them in the fields in the rear. All that day the Germans shelled our new line. Our troops stood it inipertnrbiibly as ever, though we had some losses. During the night the expected Herman reinforcements begun to arrive—Bavar ian and Saxon regiments, which had been resting at Tourcouig, after a .-pell in the German trenches round Vpres. Dawn had not broken. 0 n the morning of .March I -2 when the Germans opened (ire on Neuve t'hapcllc. Ku'rvbody in the British lines knew that this 'was the harbinger of a eounter-attal-k, one of tho.-e. thrusts tn masse beloved of Gorman eommanders. At 5 a.m., sure enough, before it was light, surging masses of grey coats appeared in front of our left, ease of Xeuve Chapelle and south of Port Arthur on our extreme right.

"A GHASTLY BUSINESS." I'll is German counter-attack was a ghastly business. The few prisoners who were taken say tiley were told that there had been "a slight mishap," and that "a few British soldiers" were in Xeuve Chapelle and iiad to be driven out. The attack was ill-timed and illprepared, in front of the Worcester*, the enemy—they were Bavarians—advanced in column of route, an ollicer on horseback with drawn .sword in their midst. A non-commissioned ollicer was seen (hiving (lie men along with a whip as though they had been a herd of cattle.

. The slaughter was ■ sickening In front of one of the brigades the Bavarians, .oming along at the ambling trot adopted by the tienun.ii infantry at the assault, and bawling "llourra!" in the approved fashion, blundered into the lire of no fewer, than -21 niaehinc-gu.-.fli The tiles of men did not recede or stagger. They were just swept awav. One moment one had the shouting, ambling crowd before one's eyes; the newt moment where it had been Jay a writhing, convulsed pile of bodies -heaped up on the brown earth. When day broke, amid the rattle of iiiaoliinc-giins and rifle-fire, the' (lennan corpses were seen to make rampants, behind which the wounded took cover. In one case at least the Germans, feverishly digging themselves in, were actually se»n to use thi! corpse of one of their comrades to finish oil' the parapet of their trench. All through the morning the German woundud crawled into the British lines, where they were well cared for and sent down in our amibiilaifces. The Gurkhas stood up on the paiiapul and culled to the Germans to come in. .A. man in the Rifle Brigade wdio had crawled out of tlie trench came back with ifinc Ge.rmais, gingerly -tailing behind him on all fours.

It was now clear that the preliminary to any successful advance must he the destruction by artillery of the three German stronghold's—tho two on the Pictrc road and the bridgehead over the Eiver I.ayes. But the'weather allied itself with our existing difficulties. The clear atmosphere prevailing during the first day of the, fighting had given way to mist, impeding the artillery Observation work and making it increasingly hard to distinguish friend from foe amid a network of trenches, which in some places were only 50yds apart. With hopes high and oourage undaunted our troops went forward again against the German line protecting the ridge. The 2nd Scots Guards, tho Ist Grenadiers, the Borderers, and the 2nd Gordons, with their Territorial'battalion, the oth, were among tlin regiments taking part in the assault. 'With incredible tenacity, using grenade and bayonet, mart of the attacking troops worked thoir way right up to the houses about the Moulin do Pietre.

GALLANT SOLDIER'S HEATH. Here it was tlmt the fltli Coitions lost their colonel. Lieutenant-Coione.l Maclean. A sifbaltern, hearing lie had been killed, hastened to his side, and found hlin still alive, lying in the open behind the trench with a bullet in his back and sinking fast. He was suffering grievously. The young officer fetched the colonel pome morphia, which eased his pain. "Thank you," said the dying man; "and now, my boy, your place is not here. do albout your' duty!" So he dismissed him, and died a little while later, p, very gallant gentleman. Orders to our troops were to break down the German barrage of fire at all costs. All that human men could do against tho <.'eninan lino they did with that self-sacrifice and steadfast courage tOiat they had shown tlirougliout the two days' fighting. At half-past twelve the Rifle Brigade went forward in the face of the ratal devastating fire, and actually managed to reach the trench in front of it, 1100 yards away, at heavy cost. TJic German fire was so terrific and continuous i(/ha>t the wounded who strewed the ground did not dare lift their heads for fear of being shot. At live anoMier attempt was made to get forward, limit the front line only succeed- \ ed in reaching the same grouiid as the Rifle Brigade already held. There wc roaiiaincd until nightfall, when, it becoming apparent that no advantage was to lie derived from holding the flooded trendies we had gained at the cost of so many valuable lives, the order was given to fall tack on the positions 'from whioli the afternoon attack -was made.

The fighting was now practically over. The C'eamans 'hud apparently realised that the re-capture of Ncuv'e Chapclle and their trendies opposite the Bois du Biez was impossible, and settled down to strengthen t'heir positions protecting the Aubers ridge. Nevertheless, throughout the 13th, they kept up a violent) bombardment of our new line without/ however, achieving any success.

OIBX SLEET STANDING,

The IStli was a hard day for our anny. The troops were worn out witih three days' lighting. In many cases the men fell asleep standing up nt tlieir loop-, holes, and a sergeant tella how lie went down tlie line of Ji-is trench after dark, tugging at a leg here and tliere to make sure thait the anen were still awake. -More than once he found himself plucking tlhc I>oot of a dead German. On the 14th most of the troops -which had taken part in this historic engagement had been relieved. The victory of Xeuve Ohapelle has welded the British .Army in itlm .field even closer together than before. The array unites in mourning for the brave men that died, as in admiration for the countless deeds of individual heroism the fight brought forth and satisfaction at the important results achieved.

No one rejoices more <it the splendid manner in which the army stood the fe-t than ;*ir John French, who, in a stirring «pivial order to Che Ist Army, expressed his "fervent and most heartfelt appreciation of the magnificent gvillantry and devoted tenacious courage displayed by all ranks." With his eulogy will (lie mingled -the warmest thanks of England.