THE BALKAN WAR

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 10713, 13 November 1912, Page 5

THE BALKAN WAR

CABLE NEWS

{United Pratt Atsociation— By 'Electric Telegraph — Copyright.)

BATTLE OF PRILEH. A DESPERATE ENCOUNTER. (Received Last Night, 10.10 o'clock.) LONDON, November 12. The Daily Telegraph's Uskub correspondent reports that the battle of Prileh was fought in a defile. Owing to -iihe difficult nature of the pass the Servians used only two mountain guns. The Turkish army consisted of thirty-five battalions, with eight •mountain guns. They were entrenched in a position .of enormous strength. Part of the Crown Prince's army was ordered through the pass to dislodge the enemy in force. On the way to Monastir a defile, through which the Servians were compelled to approach the trenches, was so narrow that only one battalion could be deployed in the firing line. The sth Regiment furnished the first line, ' but despite heroic bravery were repulsed with heavy loss. Fresh troops ' met /with a similar experience throughout Monday.

Two mountain guns, on Monday night, were carried over the pass, and dug into the hillside where they could be fired at the Turkish trench-

The Servian attempt was then r< newed. At daylight on Tuesday, the latter with the 17th Regiment, despite fearful losses, captured a rugged steep hill commanding a part e the Turkish defences. The Turks desperately attempted to retake the hill, considering it to be the key to the position, but were repulsed with great carnage. The ground was strewn for miles with dead and dying.

FIERCE FIGHTING. APPALLING SCENES. (Received This Morning, 12.10 o'clock.) LONDON, November 12. Darkness enabled the Ser.vi-.ms to gain'further positions, by the use'of the bayonet. The ground was covered with ice and snow, and the hardships suffered were terrible. At dawn on -Wednesday fresh Servians occupied the firing line, and with two guns supporting them, made a determined attack. For some hours the issue hung in the b.ilance, the Turks tenaciously holding the trenches. Finally the Servians advanced into the defile to within three hundred, yards of the Turks, and charged. The Turks threw boulders, crushing scores of men, but the Servians clambering on in the face of a deadly fire, i sprang into the trenches, bayonetting ' and smashing the Turks- with their clubbed rifles when their bayonets snapped. Soon the enemy wave in full flight. The scene was appalling. Many scores of dead and wounded lay in the trenches, while snow was trodden and transformed into a crimson mud. The fugitives joined the garrison a,t Monastir. forming a totil force of forty-fire battalions and forty guns.