Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1905-05-29

of some of the smaller Russian trench
es. Going into action each man car
ried on his shoulders a pair of small
sand bags and for many these bag:
| were the only shelter for hours and
days. To raise a head or even an arm
drew fire. For the first day they got
no warm food only the rations carried
in their haversacks. All of this time
the nights were several degrees below
freezing and the days the temperature
hardly rose above freezing point. The
losses of this contingent. most Of them,
In the first nights work, reached fif-
teen hundred, including sixty officers.
The nOn-combatants gave a splendid
exhibition of their devotion to duty.
with almost the same risks and with
out the opportunities for glory of the
men in the fighting line.
All supplies Of rations and ammu-
milton had to be taken across the
river and the open fields under fire
from the Russian batteries. and during
the last stage of the. trip before the
Russian rifles. South of the river bed
was the plain at least mile wide
with no shelter and over this went
pack trains. carts and hospital men
bringing back the wounded the
stretcher bearers carrying bodies to
the cremating fire behind Witesan. For
two days this zone was swept by an
almost constant artillery fire, and for
three days the roads and approaches
were shelled at intervals for several
hours. Yet on the plain the engi-
neers were calmly repairing the tele-
phone lines. while the men Of the hos
pital corps plodded back and forth on
their journeys.
One of the base hospitals was stu
ated in a Chinese hamlet back of a
low hill on the border of the plain and
was frequently struck by shells. The
road from this hospital to the head
quarters Of the division, which were on
the reverse of small slope further to
the front. ran for several hundred
yards in sight of Russian battery.
The Russian guns were sending a shell
every few minutes during the night as
well as the day. The carts and horse
men We're sent across the road and at
full speed to present the least possible
target. One Of the roads to the river
q
down the farther side Of the slope and
this road was shelled frequently The
shrapnel burst in cornf1eld so near
that frequently they kicked up clouds
of dust almost at the back wall of the
generals house but never quite
reached It.
In this village there were Chinese
stOlidly going about their work and
children playing In the fields during the
most incessant fire. Four soldiers
came across the field to the village
bearing the body Of an officer while
shrapnel were dropping all about them.
but although they shuffled along at as
fast gait as their burden would per-
NIT they did not drop 1t.
Two days after the cOntingents OF
General Kurokfs left division had Sc
cured their fOothold across the Shaho
the center division which had been
meeting strong opposition beyond the
bend Of the river east in very noun
famous tract also swung over. The
plan was for them to cross when the
other division did but the Russians in
front Of them were too strong. Their
experience was almost the same as
that Of the left division. They found
the approaches to the Russian trench
es bristling with wire barriers, with
pitfalls, and all the devices which the
Russians have learned to employ