A FIGHT TO THE DEATH.

Taranaki Daily News, 7 November 1916, Page 5

A FIGHT TO THE DEATH.

NEW ZEALAfIDERS' GRIM OBSTINACY. . AGAINST GREAT ODDS. WONDERFUL HEROISM. REPEATED BAYONET CHARGES IN NIGHT BATTLE (By Philip Qibbs, the Daily Chronicle's Special Correspondent.) With the British Armies in the Field, T , September 23. .It was inevitable that after the great battle of September 15th our line should have ragged edges and rtm up or down into small salients. This was due to the greater progress made by different bodies of troops; and to the way in which isolated groups of Germans'held on very stubbornly to these stretches of ground not. jn the general line of our advance. During the past forty-eight hours a good deal hasbeendonetoelearoutthe.se pockets, or wedges, and to straighten out ths line from Coureelette eastwards. This morning our troops did a useful bit of work in such a place between Coureelette and Martinpuieh, knocking out a strong post and taking some prisoners, with whom were two officers. Elsewhere strong posts thrust out by us beyond the main trenches have been linked up, so 1 that the line now runs in a reasonably even way from the north of Coureelette across the Bapaume Road, above Martinpuieh, and so on to the north of Flora. , This linking-up and clcarine-up work, now dene to a great extent, puts us in a stronger position of defence, to hold what we have gained, against any attempts made by the enemy in counterattack. He has mJ>.do many attempts since September 15th to drive our iroopu out of the high'ground, which is vital to his means of observation, and the failure of them has cost him a great price in life. ' DESPEfcATE THRUSTS. Among the- most, desperate thrusts, pressed with stubborn bravery by bodies of German soldiers, collected hastily and flung, with but little plan or preliminary organisation against our lines-, wore, those directed upon the New Zcalanders, who repelled them after hard and long conflicts fought out for the ,most with naked steel. In all the fighting since July Ist there has not been anything more fierce or more bloody than these hand-to-hand struggles on the left of Fler:;, and the New, Zcalanders have gained a greater name' for themselves (it was already a great name since Gallipoli) as soldiers who bate to £lvc up what they have gained, who will hold on to ground with a grim obstinacy ngßinst heavy odd.s. and if they are ordered to retreat because of the . military situation round them come back again with a stern resolve to "get the goods." This is not only my reading of the men, and I do not pretend to know them well, but is the summing-up of an officer, not from their own country, who has solm them fight during these last few (Ui.v?, and v/ho spoke of them with a thrill ni' admiration in his voice, after watching the stoicism with which they endured great slielifire. the iipirit with which they attacked after great fatigues and hardships, and the rally of men, discouraged for- n while by 'their loss of ollieers, which swept the Germans back .into panic-stricken fligiii. A WEEK'S STRUGGLE. ■ This struggle-covers a week's fight : ng since Septmber 15th, when at dawn the Now .Zcalanders advanced in waves to a series of positions which would bring them up to the Jcft of Flers if they had the hick to get as- far. On their right were, the troops, whose capture of Flers village I 'have already described, and on their left other troops attacking High Wood and the ground north ot it. The men of New Zealand went forward with hardly a cheek, to the German switch trench 500 yarls from the starting line. They were men of Auckland, Canterbury, Otago, and Wellington, and they put their trust in the bayonet and desired to get close to their enemy. They had their desire. In flio swite'i trench the Gennans defended themselves to the last gasp, and, as far as I can make out. only four of them were left alive after that frightful eueuunter. It was a light to the death on both sides, and the New Zcalanders did not cross that ditch atv/ull strength On the way up they lost under shrapnel and machine-gun fire, (hi the other side- o. 1 " the ililc-h their lines werj lliiimei. But they were on the other side, and Ihe ditch behind them was a grave upon- which they turned theiv hacks to get across Ihe next -treteh of ground to trenches SOO yards ahead. IN OPEN ORDER. The New Zealand Rifles covered this | ground quickly, moving in open order, but keeping in touch with each other by fine discipline and an esprit de corps which is better than discipline. That .next system of trench work, two lines heavily wired and deeply dug, part of the famous Flers line, was a great, obstacle. Our gun-fire, grand as it had been, had not laid all the wire low nor destroyed the trenches. A swish of machine-gun bullets showed that the enemy was alive and savage. An infantry assault on - such a line had to he paid for, sometimes by great numbers of dead and'wounded. But it was the day of the Tanks. Two of them had tried to keep pace with the New Zealand attack, but had lagged behind l.'ke short-winded creatures suffering from stiteh—and no wonder, looking at the shell craters and pits across which they had to bring their long bodies, crawling in and crawling out. with their tails above their heads and their heads above their tails. But they arrived in time to attack the Flers line, and in a very deliberate and stolid way they sidled along the barbed wire, smashing it into the earlh, before poking their big snouts over the Gorman parapets, hauling themselves up, and tiring from both flanks upon (he German machine-gun teams. With this noteworthy help, which, saved time a,nd trouble and life, the New Zealanders took the double trenches of the Flers line, and again pushed cm, another 700 yardj, across a sunken road with stoeo banks aad very dens dmw.uti.

whore the enemy did not stay to meet them until they had established themselves on a line running westwards from the top of Flers village, now in the hands of our English lads. One of the Tanks followed them, getting down the steep bank with its nose to earth, and lumbering up the other side like a huge elephant (without a trunk).

A German battery KSOO yards • cway searched for it with shell-live, but did not get within hitting di,stancs of its armoured skin. Eventually if was the German battery that was" knocked out by our guns." I ' However, this was a side-show, and tlie tanks must not r takc all the- glory away from the infantry, who had not armoured skins, alas! and who were facing murderous lire elsewhere.

They had been ordered to swing left to make a Hanking front up the edge of a valley running north-west of Fiers, right away beyond the village, aid-this' they did most gallantly, although at the time they stuck out like' a' thin wedge, into German territory, bemuse at that time tliey had to support on their left (out English fellows ,as I have described in an earlier dispatch, had been having a fearful time in and beyond High Wood), and on the right tile other English troops were busy with the capture of Flers. , HAZARDOUS POSITION It was clearly and undciiiAbly a hazardous position for the New Zealanders all alone out there, and they were ordered to fall back to the line going straight westwards from the top of Flers village, which they helped to •hold, on the night of the 15th to 10th. From that day onwards the wiemy wade repeated "counter-attacks. Scme'timeg they were in feeble strength, shattered quickly, but they grew in intensity and numbers as the' days passed, while the New ZealaiideW were still in a rather precarious position, ''a rocky position," say? one of their officers, owing to'the wca&ieiw on their left flask.

Right down on that flank Hermans were still .holding out in '' uheljfcr jtera with a way, open behind them, so .'that supports illicit come down to dfiive a v.edge between the Nov Zen-landorii and the English troops north of High Wood. This was attempted by sofbethifig like a brigade of Germans, who advanced in six or seven waves upon the English soldiers—who were outnumbered by more than two to one—in a steady, determined way. They were met out in the open with the bayonet. It- the old way of fighting men '-oetirp men, staring into each other's, eyes. Staffing to theto own strength and skill with sharp steel, and not to •engines of war witli high explosives or quick-living guns. LIKE THE TOURNEY DAYS If men fight, it is the best way, though not pleasant and agreeable "for' ladies to watch from silken canopies, as in the old days of the turney; 'when gentlemen hacked at each otlfer" with •ax-as just for fun. A New Zealand 'officer watched it from a little distance, arid his breath came quick when be described it to me. The German rank* were broken, and a remnant iied. * r Hut \tj was not so long or so bloody a fight as what the New Zealander.? themselves had to encounter three days ago. The enemy struck a blow against the New Zealand troops, at the joining point between those men and their cohiriidw o.i the left, who had come up to the .west of Flers. , -,v. The New Zcalanders—who wire Canterbury men—were beater back twice, and twice regained the ground. All through the night of September 20th until the dawn of the 21st there ,ie was violent bomb-fighting and bayonet fighting. There was no straight line of men, British on one side, German an the other. It was a. confused mass, isolated bodies of men struggling around ;l-ell-crnters and, bits of trench, single figures fighting twos and"threes, groups Joining to form lines which surged backwards and forwards, and a night horrible, with the crash of bombs- and the cries of the dying. OFFICER'S SPLENDID COUIIAOE. ', One New Zealand officer, a, very splendid heroic man, was the life and soul of this defeuce and counter-at-tack. There were moments when some of his men were disheartened because their line' had fallen back, and the number of their wounded lay too thick about them. He put new lire into them by the Hame of his own spirit. He led them forward again, rallying the gloomy ones, so careless of his own life, so eager for the honor of New Zealand, that they followed him under a' kind of spell, because of the magic in him.

They thrust back the enemy, put him to flight down the valley, remained masters of the ground when the dawn brightened into the full light of day, revealing the carnage that had been hidden in the night. It was not the end of the lighting here. In the afternoon the enemy came again, in strong numbers forward by their high command, men at the end of far telephones, desperate to retake the ground, and ordering new assaults which were sentences of death to German soldiers not nt the end of far telephone:-', but very near to British - tayo; nets. BAYONET TO BAYONET. They came on thickly, these doomed men, shoulder to shoulder, and it was again the captain of the Canterbury's who led his men 'against them in a great bayonet charge, right across the open. It was, bayonet against haoynetjfor the Germans stood to receive the charge, though with blanched faeec. For the New Zealanders came upon them at the trot, and then, spraug forward with bayonets as quiet as knitting needles. . The Germans cried out in terror. Down the hillside, beyond, those who could not escape ran, and /ell a- they ran. It wa? a rout, and the end of tho countei-attack. The New Zenlanders were now sure of themselves. They knew that with this bayonet they can meet the Germans as their masters. So scornful are they of (heir bayonet lighting that they lave it in their hearts tn pity them, and say, "Poor devils!'' To my siind, and to others, iiis i'.nesi heroism was shown by the Ne\» Zealand stretcher-bearer.?. They did not rharge with the bayonet. All their duly was to go out a?ros« ope:i country iiv eool blood to pick iip mo:i lying !':srs in blood that was not eool uiilcjk had lain there too iong. Th?y had to go ♦.h.-c-ugh «J.!roe« o? live-point n'uiM. which tore up the ground about them. »c<! buried iheiu. and mangled mnny «? them. And they want quite steadily and quietly, not j n-nfl* iv,* twige, but haw* »***« '>**iy/r;vH! I

more than (>0 of thwn had fallen, and''' hour after hour they carried ©lit thftil), work of rescue quite -'careless of tiwitt* selves. ' ■■■""', ''l am not "a. sentimentalist,'' eaii a. New Zealand ollicer to-day, as ho kofced' at mc with grave eyea, remembering tliose scenes, ''but the. work of those men seemed to me very noblo and good."! In Mow Zealand, and ia the qvieti farmsteads there, those word* will %ej read gladly, I think. And if any words of mine could gha a. little extra share of honor to these 1 colonial boys, who huva come solar overseas to fight by the side of English;'.* soldiers, I should be glad, and proud, too, having a heart very full of admiration for the valour of these mep, who have fought in these great battles, as well ns any-troops who Shared tbe day; with them.