FRICOURT AND LA BOISELLE.

Taranaki Daily News, 29 August 1916, Page 7

FRICOURT AND LA BOISELLE.

GALLANT FIGHTING BY BRITISH TROOPS. DEADLY WORK IN A DOUBLE CALIENT. . (From Malcolm Ross, Official Cor* respondent with N.Z. Forces). War Correspondents' Headquarters, France, July 2. Tiie great battle of the Homme along an extended front became really a series ot battles, and some of the fiercest fighting lias taken place in the vicinity of the battered villages of Fricourt and La Boiselle—strong points in the German line that for a time held up our attack. This was really a battle in itself, and I had the rare good fortune to watch it from an adjacent slope within easy range and right out in the open. It was a unique position, from which in this war one could witness a real battle. Well within a complete circle of gun-fire, and even within the range of the machine gung and rifles, had they cared to snoot, wo could follow almost every movement of our troops, in places even with the unaided eye. Both villages had been battered beyond recognition by our intensive initial bombardment, but the enemy still clung tenaciously to the positions. Prisoners said afterwards that they had been told to hang on at all costs. For superb gallantry in the face of great odds I have seen nothing to equal this figbt since the attack on Clmnuk Bair—the highest point we gained on the Gallipoli Peninsula—by the New Zealanders. For hours our bombardment of the trenches and ruins of these villages made of them a veritable inferno. That which was the German front line trench at La Boiselle had in places become almost a level road. Trees in the adjacent woods had been shot to bits, and bricks and mortar had crumbled till the houses were shapeless ruins. Mametz, a village to the right, had already been taken, and when we arrived on the scene our troops were trying to get round the Fricourt Wood from there, while another body was endeavoring to join with them round the other side of the wood.

Gallant work was done at Mametz, too. The men from one unit got into the German line with a single casualty, and were in the second lme with only two. One roan himself took twenty prisoners. Other unit* were not so lucky. They came up against machine-gun fire and wore also heavily bombed. In one spot, lying amongst the grass in the line in wliich they wero advancing, were the bodies of six-men and a little doj*— the mascotte of the regiment—that had gone into the fight with them. One regiment had taken many prisoners and was tremendously bucked up. Another had "got it in the neck" and was correspondingly depressed, but they continued bravely fighting, and in the end tlio Germans were worsted. Xe.vt day, as our men advanced from this position to get round Frieourt Wood, the German gunners put a very hot barrage of high-explosive and some shrapnel in the hollow through which they had to pass, yet they got there all the same. The enemy also "crumped" our firing line, but were too late. Our men had already advanced. "Woolly Bears," that burst with a peculiar tearing noise, were mixed with the other stuff. An officer told me that our shelling had been most effective. .He hud wandered into a German redoubt that had been greatly strafed and found it a heap of tumbled earth. Some cheery pioneers from a Northern county were already at work digging a communication trench soon after our troops had taken the German line. With their more peaceful implements of war they streamed down laden with beams of stout timber. When we arrived on the scene the real battle for La Boiselle was just commencing, and the last of the main German force was already in process of being cleared out of l<'ricourt. We got so close to the fighting that, with the unaided eye, we could clearly see the troops going into action. They streamed round one corner of the Frieourt ruins and swung to the right of the wood.- Others came up out of the hollow of the valley more to the left. These also advanced, but almost at the same time we heard the crackle of a machine gun and could see that they were held up. The gun wag hidden somewhere in the wood. Most of them took shelter on the edge of a little copse, at a place that had been Frieourt Farm. The trees of the copse had been torn and dismembered by our shell fire. They were living skeletons. Farther round on the left on the crest of a ridge overlooking a chateau in a beautiful wood was all tliat remained of La Boiselle after our guns had been at J it for about a week. It-was very:., very-! little, but such ruined villages afford a pood deal of shelter to an enmey, and with their deep dug-outs, in which both men and machine guns lmvo been saved, they are the very devil to clean up in an advance. In one case our men went right through a village—so quick was their advance—and the enemy afterwards canu out of their 'bunny-lioles" and fought. But they failed to save the position. Many of the Germans who remained were killed and wounded. The others were taken prisoners. Wliil. our men were held .ip at the end of Frieourt Wood our gunners were mercilessly shelling the La Boiselle position, still strongly held by the Germans and commanded by their artillery fire, as by our own. The high-explosive sent the i-nrlli tearing heavenward, and the already broken brick walls of farm uul cottage disappeared in clouds of red dust. At intervalsbig shrapnel or "universal"' shell would burst in the air. spattering the ground • with its pellets and leaving behind it a beautiful rolling cloud of light grevish green smoke. That was 110 doubt to cateli any German who might take it into his head to cut and run for better shelter. But all the time ve watched not a" man showed himself, So terrible was the shelling that one thought nothing could have lived within its zone. For hours the terrible "preparation for our advance went on. Away on the left a battery of heavy guns, with fine teams of black horses, swung into action right in the open. This was a splendid and a cheering sight a sight such as one had not expected in this war of trench and wire and dug-out. On the slopes of the Fricourt-La Boiselle Ridge our men. were nonchalantly walking about, and the stretcherbearers were going and coming in the open. Amongst the uniforms I noted some that were strangely grey, and, looking through my glasses, I saw that they were Germans, right among our men. But they were German prisoners: There' must have been a whole company it' them, under the gleaming bayonets of half a dozen guards. They were marched down the valley to n barbed-wire enclosure well away from the battleground. Other "tommies" were bringing in prisoners in twos and threes from the captured trenches on the FricourtLa Boiselle ridge. At intervals for fully half an hour we hatched one humorist slowly bringing'big. man in. The pris.

oner reined to, bo shamming and was reluctant to come. Apparently ht> thought he was going to ,his doom". Oceassionally there would be a bit of an argument, in which a threatening bayonet point played a part, but the "tommy" persevered. He made the man cross the trenches in front of him, and when it was his turn to clamber up the other side he made the prisoner stretch out his hand and help him tip the other side. The position at both Fricourt and La Boiselle was intensely interesting. In modern wai in such a country one might not see such a battle in a lifetime. So we ventured along a little farther to where a small group of our soldiers were' lying on the yellow earth of a communication trench. The group consisted of a colonel, u major, and some signallers. Amongst them was a big handsome young Australian, whose father wag a Broken Hill millionaire. He had been in England when the war broke out, and had joined the artillery. He was enthusiastic and seemed to be thoroughly enjoying himself! For some hours wo lay beside these men on the yellow clay watching the wonderful battle spectacle, and listening to one end of messages; going and coming over the field telephone. Expressions of delight were sandwitched in between orders and messages to the guns. "There's another blighter! "His hands are up! His hands are lip!" "There's another fel-i low in a long coat by the Crucifix!" The "crucifix" and the "Poodle" came into it a good deal. The "Poodle" turned out to be a voolly-looking tree on the far ridge just in front of the other German line. "The ''Crucifix" was a real crucifix still standing amidst a small clump of naked trees on the horizon. Crucifixes seeia to have a way of escaping shell fire, and in these cases the French peasants regard them with a sort of superstitious awe. Interspersed with such talk were other sentences of a more technical, kind, such as putting "No. 4 gun on to Burnham Wood," or "No. 3 on to X 20 ak 10," "dripping twentyfive," or "twenty minutes more left," or right, as the case may be. The Germans were shelling our troops in a place called by these enthusiasts "Losenge Wood," and our aforesaid guns were now cheerfully strafing the Germans just over the ridge. The shells tore past, and we watched them bursting just over the crest of the ridge. Our infantry had been in Crucifix trench, and others advancing to the further attack were now held up at "The Poodle." The shelling was to let them get on. This they subsequently did. and by next day the whole Fricourt Wood was surrounded and the position made good. Another battery commander wanted to know over the 'phone'if he could "chip in," but an officer replied: "No, Major Blank's battery will do the necessary." It was very much as if a man were sitting in his office ordering a ton of coal for his household or arranging a deal in shares or produce. They could not, of course, see their own guns. Neither could the gunners see what they were shooting at—it was all done with scientific accuracy from the map and from obcrvation in this forward position. The position at Fricourt having been satisfactorily cleared up, we again turned out attention on La Boiselle, which was more than ever now being whipped with a rain of shells. Other batteries, including some "heavies" far back were doing this. It seemed as if the gunners had warmed to their work. One could imagine them stripped to the shirt going for all they were worth. Their shelling was dreadfully effective and terribly accurate. Presently thy banged in a tornado of shrapnel, and then suddenly "lifted." From that we knew that the. infantry attack on La Boiselle was just on the point of being launched., and, sure enough, in a minute or two we saw the first men debouching from a communication trench and creeping up across a battered German trench in. the direction of what had been a village. fibers-follow-ed, and soon there was a little group in a. very exposed position waiting foi their chance to go forward. It was now the turn of the German gunners. They put a heafy barrage in the hollow to the,left to endeavor to prevent our men coming up, and they also shot at the little group crouching on the white chalky rubble of a damaged trench, on whicfi they were finding all too inadequate shelter. The ground was whipped with shrapnel and high explosive, and a German machine gunner, who had evidently lived through our fire, now bravely emerged from his "bunny hole" and commenced firing. There was also the, crackle of rifle fire now mingling with tli * reports of the guns that were banging away all around us. and with the noit" of the bursting shells immediately ir front. One felt very sorry for the little si'ouji of brave men crouching there in . '''e open. Presently there was a burst oi -hell beside them and another right over Uicm. The smoke of the shell niul the wliippc J-up dust obliterated them for a n";m_;t. When it cleared we saw man after m. n get tip, and crouching low, advance into the village against the r chine-gun fire from the leafless vocd fid the ruined houses. There were s'me seven or eight who did not move. They still lay in strangely huddled attitudes, motionless on the light earth of the battered trench. They were still there next day—in the same strange attitudes. Death had caught them in the very hour of victory. But other gallant fellows came on through the pitiless hail of German shrapnel to take (heir places. They came singly anil in twos and threes. Some dropped, but there was no flinching—no turning hack. It was all very sad, but finely inspiriting. It made the pulses thrill. One felt proud to be of the breed. In this manner did we gain our footing in La Boiselle. And all the time with this wonderful battle panorama being unfolded before us, on a slope decked with red poppies and blue cornflowers, the swallows were flitting about, and in the blue above a soaring lark was putting all his soul into his song!