NEW ZEALANDERS IN THE BATTLE.

Taranaki Daily News, 5 July 1918, Page 7

NEW ZEALANDERS IN THE BATTLE.

TOWNS AND FARMS IN FLAMES. HOW OUR ARTILLERY FOUGHT. From Malcolm Ross, Correspondent with the New Zealand Forces in the Field.) Divisional Headquarters. 12th April. Standing near the old mill on a height that overlooks the new Northern battlefield, one sees much of the country in which the division made its home when it first came to France. Fading in the grey April distance are the pleasant fields and forests through which we walked or rode in the halcyon days of our first summer in Franco* Dotted in between are the towns and villages in which we billeted. Some of these are in flames; in others shells are bursting. Southward the building of Bailleul still cluster about the square, fifteenth-cen-tury .belfry of the Hotel de Ville and the spire of the church of St Vaast. Many thousands of the British armies in France have passed through the picturesque old Flemish town It had been shelled and bombed, but the people ttayed on, and the shops were still open when last I passed through it. There was as Officer's Club there where one could lunch or dine. On the outskirts there was a British aerodrome- In the village square the Duke of Connaught. inspected the New Zealand Regiment of which he is Colonel-in-Chief. The King, too. has passed that way. On the day on which Hooked at it from this height it was a No Man's Land, with all the shopkeepers and lace-makers fled away as if it had been stricken by a plague, as, in very truth, it had been. The smoke of burning houses rose from the centre of the town, and drifted across the steeple /4 St. Vaast Later, the Germans pushed out their line across the Cassel road, and the old town we knew so well was no longer ours One looked also towards many other towns and villages well known to us— Steenwerck, Vieux Ecrquin and Neuf Berquin, Sailly. and the little village of La Mottc au Boijt, where, in the hospitable chateau of the Baronne—Lady An?ar we called her—there was always a welcome for Australians and New Zeahnders His Majesty the King and many of the most famous generals in the British army had visited the chateau, which, enclosed in the splendid, woods and encircled by the moat and the canal, was so peacefully secluded as almost to make one forget the war. It was General Birwood's first headquarters in France. In the surrounding villages the Australians and the Now Zealanders first billeted, and the trenches farther on—so quiet in those days as to I be known as "The Nursery"—the Angara first fought. The German line now runs up to the corner of the splendid wood, and German guns are shelling the chateau. One shell had landed in the pond and had killed the two swans that foivyean had made tneir home there. The chateau itself had not been hit, but no doubt it will go the way of all such country homos in the war /one. Meantime fui English officer had managed to salve for the Baronne two lorry loads of tin' treasures she most valuedi Farther afield. Armentieres was also in the hands of the enemy. But by this time there was little of Armentieres left, nnd months ago the civilians had all none.

[/joking northward one picked out other towns with strange sounding Flemish name I ', towns with which the Xew Zealanders had become familiar in more, recent months—Gotlcwaersvelde ( ,; Gertie wear* velvet," the Tommies used to call it), Steenwoorde, Boeschepe : Heningbelst, Abeele, Ooderdom, Poperinghc. and the remnants of Ypres. behind which the cnemv were cnee more creeping down the blood-drenched salient. Gravenstafel and Passchendai-le /were memories of the past. Messines, too had gone, as had Flers in the Southern Drive. Tliere and then one realised that much of the ground that we had won back in France and Flanders w:» once more in German hands. Well, they were welcome to it so long as our armies had the grit to stem the tide and win the final victory, however far oil' that might be

From the mount to which I had climbed there was a splendid view of this new battlefield. Oue east, at Wvtsehaet, where the "situation was obscure," shells were bursting The enemy, we were told, was at the Cross Roads, while we held the Hospice. The last time f saw the Hospice it was just a brick hea.p with nearly all the bricks broken. The German line row bulged round much of this land to the south and south-east. You can trace it by the smoke of bursting shells, and all through the battle zone were firo= Away to the north, beyond Bailleul and well hack of the German lines a great column of smoke, probably from an ammunition dump, was ascending to heaven The yellow flame of the German guns was clearly seen against the green of the plain in broad daylight. On the slopes below, a few hundred yards distant, their shells were 'bursting about one of our batteries that had lately come into action. As i looked a shell burst in a farm house that went skyward in a cloud of red dust. A few days hefore the old men and women were working about that farm us if, for them, the var was at an end. With much toil they had sown their crops, and already there was promise of an a.bmid<iiit a harvest that they would never reap- French soldiers —their sky bluo uniforms a pleasant note of color in the, landscape—were, even now. skii'inishing through the fields to get the cattle, away from the shells that were bursting unpleasantly close, Some German shells screamed overhead, searching for victims The windmill beside which 1 stood had been hit earlier in the day p .ut with all these signs and sounds of war the predominant nota was of ar. unspoiled rural landscape, with red farm houses amidst their treos, With pleasant green fields and darker woods, and. over all. the groat cloud forms inkiiv "hap" after a storm of snow and hail At intervals the sun burn (hnuyh flooding the hind with light .I:h'o!j Rnysdael would have loved i i paint the scene. It iva« as yet me-].oiled by the pock marks of modi-pi war. Tt was a battle zone that was new

As ! mule in*' way back drtwn the hill to i.iv .'ar i passed a column o c tho Fret'.:'!! <>n ih" way up. Pin?, sturdy fellow* thev ~l'ii'. v.'uli smart-looking officer-:. .11 tiieir skv blue—a pleasing con;:'■': In ;hc famil..v: drab of out own khaki I --':;u'il i'-r .-ar at tlie corner ■jf a New Zealand Camp, a few miles

tack, where some of the shells which passed over my observation post had been falling. Other shells fell while X was there, ami the unpleasant reck of the high explosive filled the nostrils for some time after their smoke had drifted away. That night our men who had helped to stop the gap at Meteran were coming hack to camp, having done their first trick in the trenches ,and done it well. ,

One looked across the green country towards Ploegstecrt, where a brigade of our artilllry had done splendid work. This 'brigade, when the Northern battle began, had its 'batteries south of the Douve, with the iPlce£#teert Wood behind, and fronted the ground we fought over for the capture of Messines and the the Biver Lys south of Warneton. Roughly speaking, the front they covered was from the (Douve to Pont Rouge, once a little village oaths Lys, 3000 yards south of Warneton.

Early on the morning of the 10th April the enemy attacked under cover of a fog, and communication with a British battery an the group was soon lost, as by 7 o'clock it had been overwhelmed by the enmy after our own infantry had retired past the battery positions. Our own battery, which was in a position surrounded by shell holes and morass, quickly became involved in this retirement, and by 8 o'clock in the morning groups pf German infantry, were working through and around the wood and village of (Ploegsteert. That morning the colonel in command of the brigade had received orders to keep ijn touch with the situation on the spot, fighting as he thought fit, and, if necessary, to retire in a north-westerly direction. This gave him practically a free hand. The howitzer battery soon found itself in a very serious position. It was in front of its own infantry, tat it fought on at point-blank range until the last of its ammunition was used up. A desperate effort wan made to get one of the guns away, and it was got out on to the road by 1 o'clock in the afternoon. It was impossible to get the gun away, and it was doeided to abandon it. Already the enemy were at Hyde Park corner, and the guns were almost surrounded. Tho battery commander had been wounded in endeavoring to locate the enemy, The breech-ibloeks and sights of the guns were carried off, practically under the eyes of.the advancing enemy. Then began a systematic withdrawal of the other batteries, one being first withdrawn to cover the withdrawal of the other two remaining batteries, the enemy having appeared on the Messines Ridge overlooking the position. All three batteries were successfully withdrawn and were again in action' by half-past eleven. Another battery—an English one—fought from its position on Hill 63 until dusk, training its guns on Messines and Ploegsteert, while its personnel engaged the enemy with Lewis gun and rifle fire, after which it withdrew to Neuvc Eglise and, rejoined its own brigade. ,

From the wagon lines a couple of teams were sent up in the hope of taking out two of theg uns from our howitzer battery, but after getting as far as Hyde Park corner they came up against the enemy in considerable numbers, and bad to retreat hurriedly under machinegun fire

All next -lay and the 11th, the situation was unpromising and very uncertain, and tiie infantry were compelled to fall back. At 7 p.m. the enemy attackHill (S3, so well known to the New' Zealnnders in the Messifles fighting, and as they succeeded in capturing it the situation became critical The remaining Xew Zealand batteries had therefore to tie further withdrawn to previously reconnoitred positions. Ammunition was brought up to these positions bv the Brigade Ammunition Column, nd during the night the batteries wore onre more in action. On the 12th thev got good shooting, on observation, and they must have killed and wounded main- Germans on Hill A3 and m the destroyed village of Neuvc Eglise, where, preliminarv to the Messines New Zealand infantry were billeted. 'There was much enemy movement now on Hill fi-1 and at Ncuve Eglise, and next morning the situation became more critical »nd threatening from the direction of the latter place, so the New Zealand batteries were further withdrawn to position between Dranoutre and Locre, from which they resumed firing, mainly from direct observation. On the 14th our infantry had posts still holding out in the vicinity of Nenve Eglise, but the enemy had gained possession of Hill 75, which ..ave hem direct observation on to the batteries, which once more had to be further withdrawn. Meantime our howitzer battery had got new guns and was again in action.

On the. liith the enemy attacked and took TJnvolsherg, thus completing their chain of heights along the NeuveEgliseHill 63 system. The enemy had now very much improved observation, and in this he was aided by his low-flying aircraft, so a final position for the batteries had tc be found still further back. By this time, the advancing tide was being stemmed, and soon the critical stage of the br.ttle had come to an end—at least for the time being. During these operations, which rebound greatly to tho credit of the New Zealand Artillery, the infantry fre. quently reported that tho shooting of the batteries was splendidly effective. This was especially the case at Neuve Eglise. The forward observing officers did .One work during a, very trying lime. The communications had pretty well all broken down from various causes, and the artillerymen had to use up a lot of wire re-establishing them at new positions. At night signalling lamps; flashed the messages back from the forward observing offices to the bitlevies.

Such a difficult vithdrawU as this brigade took part in as not accomplished without losses, and the on horses was, of course, not inconsiderable. The strain on the personnel ,as great, and that they should have come trough it so satisfactorily speaks volumes Tor the grit and steadiness of the young New Zealander.