Evening star., 1914-11-22
BATTLE Of CHAL0NS
MOST TERRIBLE OF WAR
German Officers Letter, Printed in
Stockholm Paper, Tells of Un-
precedented Slaughter.
Correspondence of the Associated Press

correspondence OF the Associated Press.
PARIS, November 5.-The AftenbIatt
Of Stockholm publishes a letter from
German officer to a friend in Swe-
den giving the following Impressions
of an engagement near Chalons dur
ing the battle of the Marne:
In the neighborhood of Chalons 1
took part in the most terrible battle
that l have ever seen. / was. however.
at Liege. at Namur and at Longwy.
Since it was impossible for our ar
tillery to silence the French batteries,
we decided to charge, thinking the
French and English would fly before
the German bayonet; the experience
proved that our ideas on that subject
were entirely erroneous.
Two of our regiments were ordered
to take the allies position by storm.
The French. however, were ready to
receive US and there ensued such a
butchery as never was seen in this or
any other war. A detachment of French
concealed among the trees threw them
selves on us. They were mostly turcos
and zouaves. strong devils against
whom it is impossible to fight. A
Zouave, with a gun. bayonets fixed, is
the most Internal thing that can be
described.
Two Regiments Decimated.
Savage cries of pain and of anger
resounded through the wood. A great
many men fell there and saturated the
ground with blood. Soon the French
artillery came into action. and it's pro-
Jectiles completed the work Of the bay
onet. Our men beat a retreat at full
speed across the wood now in flames
Those who had escaped the bayonet
fell under the rain of bullets and lay
burning in the thickets. Only so men
of my regiment returned. OF the other
only IL came back. and of the II sur
vivors all were more or less grievously
wounded.
II followed the campaign in Man
churia. but think in the course of the
Marne more victims fell than were
counted in the battles of Mukden and
OF Liao-Yang."
Another evidence of the murderous
character of the fighting in this battle
is furnished by a French soldiers let
Toulouse.
Slaughter Is Terrible.
We have been fighting for three
weeks to the east of Eerdun in the re-
sion of the Tournon. Genicourt and
Saint Mediel forests" he wrote. I'VE
advance, but very slowly because the
'boches' tGermans) are strongly en-
trenched. For ten days we occupied
trenches only 800 yards from theirs, and
they did all that was humanity possible
to break through. They charged as
many as ten times a day. and at night
they tried to approach by creeping
along the ground. But all their as
saults were repelled with great
slaughter: 5000 German bodies were
left in front of our trenches.
After every repulse each Of our men
grabbed two or three mausers with
ammunition from the bodies of the dead
and stood them alongside in the
trenches. and when the enemy came
back he was received by fire from his
own weapons.
ITO guard against surprise at night
we took all the empty beef cans. tied
them to cord and piled them SO that
when the Germans came creeping to-
ward our lines and the cord was touch
ed they made enough noise to give
the alarm. One night when the cans
ratified we replied with immediate
volleys. and there was no more dis
turbance that night. In the morning
we counted 500 dead Germans lying
on the ground within hundred yards
0f the trenches.