Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1900-04-05
MODERN BATTLE
BY JULIAN RALPH

What Ii q modern battle show does
It look and sound?
Really, the field OF operations ID 30 ex-
tenslve and the range Of modern guns
is so great that battle conditions have
altered until there is no longer anyl
general clash of battle. or even any
possibility OF grasping or viewing an
engagement from any single point.
There Is no great resembling noise !
In war nowadays. You hear one of our
big guns loosed three miles over on the
left. II you are near one 1t makes q tre-
mendous noise. yet l have not heard |
one explosion as loud as good strong
clap of thunder.
You hear the guns of the enemy
cough far in front OF you, and their |
shells burst within your lines with a
nearer. louder sound but not q really
great or deafening noise, by any means.
Our guns create almost no smoke, tho
5iyuIiie sneiis throw up clouds of dust
and smoke where they fall miles away
Because the Beers are using old-
fashioned powder in their cannon there
is u small white cloud wherever one is
fired. ard a squirt of red sand where
their shells dig into the veldt. The
smoke of war, therefore. and the So
called roar of battle" are both alike
occasional, scattered, inconsiderable.
The rifle has been the principal fea-
}ture of our battles. 1t sounds, as I
wrote once before. like the frying OF fat
or like the cracking and swapping of
green wood in bonfire. If you are
within two miles of the front you are
apt to be under fire. and then you hear
the music of the individual bullets.
Their song is like the magnifled note
of a mosquito 1890" they go over
Your head: sz-z-.-z;" they finish as
they bury themselves in the ground.
This is sound only to be heard when
the bullets are very close. You pick upi
your heels and run 100 or even fifty
yards. and you hear nothing but the
general crackle OF rife fire in and be-
fore the trenches
E The "putt-putt' Cor vickers- Norien-
ifeldt) gun is able to interest you at a
distance of three miles. Its explosions
are best described by the nickname
given TO the gun by one regiment: The
bloomin, door-knocker" Its bullets or
shells are as big as the bowl of large
briar-root pipe, and they tear and slit
the air with terrible sound, exploding
when they strike.
The scene of battle-the general view
is exceedingly orderly. There may be
devil of q scrimmage when a COM
pany or two are storming kopje, but
level Your glass on such a hill and
what do you sea fringe OF tiny Jets
of fire from the top, where the Boers
are, and a lot of our men in kka XII ris-
ing as they make their way upward.
The great general view is of an ar
rangement as methodical as chess
board. There are several battalions
fla on their faces in two or three long
lines. Over here is a battery in perfect
order, With its Timber of horses at rest
near by Another battery equally we'll
arranged. as IL to have its photograph
taken, is to be seen in the middle field;
a third is on the farther side. The
cavalry is sweeping across the veldt in
perfect rank and alignment. There is
no confusion anywhere-nothing Is he'll
t3ter-skelter.
IL is just without the range of fire
that YOU see and realize the horrors OF
war. 1t is there that the wounded crawl
and stagger by You: 1t is there that
they spend their final output of energy,
and fall down to lie until assistance
l'comes; it is there that you see the.
stretchers laden with their mangled
freight, and the sound ones bearing the.
wounded on their backs and in their
ARMS.
Better yet-if so cheerful phrase be
permissible in such case-to know
a hal fa1f "A
upon a kopje that has Just been
;stormed, or a trench that has been car,
ried. Go to such a place today, twenty
centuries after Christ came with His
message of peace on earth and good will
Ito men. and behold what you shall see.
Here. said to the photographer in
such a place-I think 1t was Belmont
snap this scene. Look at the
wounded all over the ground. Quick!
Out with your camera!'
4 oh, can't" said he. Its too hor-
1 rible,,'',
.As you please" said. "but that is
! what the public wants
You read in the writings OF those who
know nothing of war about the writh-
Iings of the wounded and the groaning
or. the battlefield. There is no with
\ ing. and the groans are few and faint
There was one man who was simply
chewed UP by a shell at Aiagersfontein,
and his sufferings must have been aw-
sul. He kept crying, Doctor can't you
/ Iy anything
Another begged to be killed, and the
first wounded man l saw in this war.
kept saying in ever so low a voice. "oh,
dear. dear. dear! oh. dear, dear, dear.
But there is much less groaning than
you would imagine-very little, in fact.
1 have had half a dozen men describe
I how it feels to be wounded All who
4 had bones shattered by expanding bull
4 lets used nearly the same language to
4 describe the sensation.
You feel" they said, Exactly as II
i you had received a powerful shock
from an electric battery. and then
comes a blow as IL your foot Cor arm,
or whatever part 1t may bel was
crushed by a stroke with tremendous
mallet.''
4 1t is much the same in lesser de-
gree il a bone is struck by Mauser
4 bullet: but II the smooth, slender, clean
i little shot merely pierces the flesh. a
burning or singing sensation is the In
4 Simultaneous result
4 In this army of Lord Methuen's, the
q great majority of the wounds have been
4 in the arms and feet but other pOinta