The Birmingham age-herald., 1915-09-08
Germans Spray English Front With Liquid Fire
 for First Time
TEUTONS DEPENDING
 ON GUNS ABSOLUTELY
Artillery Fire in Ypres Salient Is AL most Incessant-Chucking Bombs Into Trenches Whose Occupants
 Won't Surrender Occupation

British Headquarters in France, Au-
 gust 2o.-tcorrespondence of the As
 sociated Press )-The British have retaken the mine crater at Hooge in one of the most picturesque actions seen along the British front for a long time. Hooge is
 the name of what was once a village m a region as flat as a billiard table. It is in the Ypres salient, where. it is gener-
 ally agreed. more blood has been spilled than over any similar length of line on Souchez, where the French made their first attack in May and June.
 The blowing up of a mine under the German trench recently made Hooge
 about the hottest place in the Ypres sa- lient. It was one of the largest mines
 the British have exploded, and it made
 hole in the earth about 40 feet deep and 70 feet across The British charged and took possession of the position.
 In reply to the mine, the Germans brought up their fiame-ejector apparatus
 which they had tried on the French be- fore, but now used on the British for the III St ilIlt ATOuDu lHo eQSt Oi tHe HllIie- crater the Englishmen and the Germans were. at one place, only five feet apart The crater was so big and it had so dis figured the landscape that it was difficult to "consolidate' the position, as the of- ficial bulletins say, particularly when showers of bombs from either side pun ished any enterprise on the part of the other.
 On top of a. bombardment of all the neighboring part of the British line where the trenches were farther apart and of bombardment with mortars and bombs where they were close together, the Ger
 mans suddenly sprayed the British front with fire over a section where their in fantry attacked. The British had to give
 up their crater and Hooge. too, and some
 800 yards of trenches. When they set out to recover the lost ground at first they found the Germans had the line bristling with machine guns, so they regained one end of what they had lost
 Terrible Fighting
 The rule in the Ypres salient seems to be never to lie down tamely after any set-b back. Both sides fight to recover a loss no matter what the cost Sangui- nary battles are waged for a few acres of ground. All one day the British kept dn dlnOSt cOItlnuOuS roar or smells over other parts of the salient. They made the German trenches boil with dust under clouds of shrapnel smoke. The German guns replied. They threw in some more 17-inch shells into the ruins of Ypres and into other points which they had not con- sidered worthy of 17-inch before. The thunders of this artillery duel could be heard 30 to 70 miles to the rear. It made sound like the roll of a drum with al-
 most no interval between the shots. Noth- ing heavier had been heard since Souchez. About the next morning guns which had been silent before came into action. They were all directed on the German | trenches at Hooge, sending tons of hsgn explosives and storms of shrapnel Then l at 4:15 by all the watches of gunners and infantrymen the guns stopped The next | minute British major at the head of a battalion line leaped over the parapet. As he said he found nobody at home" !" The Germans were in their dug-outs, &C., cording to the custom on such occasions, taking shelter from the tornado of she'll fire which makes even a lookout hardly possible. Turning the corner of a tra- verse, tho major fairly bumped into a German V ho had come out of his dug-out
 to see why the shelling had stopped. Captures German Officer
 You're lnif1e!' said the major, put ting his revolver muzzle to the Ger mans breast. He promptly agreed that he .was.'' as the major expressed it. The happiness of the officers and men as they told the story of that fight to the correspondent turned on grat- itude to their artillery support. Tt | shows what artillery can do," said the | colonel, "and what the infantry can do when the guns give them that kind of aid. Their work was perfect straight On there in front of the mems noses ! with no shells bursting short and then they all stopped like an orchestra at the end of a piece. My only trouble with the men was to hold them back l from the front line. If there is any thing that puts spirit into the men it | is that kind of support. We got four good machine guns and I don't know how many were destroyed. Germany is
 one big battery. She does it with ar- tillery and machine guns. Guns against her guns and we shall be all right. Yes, we had a fine show"
 He kept on speaking of the guns
 and so did the other officers and men with the depth of feeling expressive 6 | of realization that the guns meant life
 and death and success and failure for | them. Singularly enough the British loss in taking the trench was less than in losing it. They got about a thou