The Birmingham age-herald., 1915-07-14
B|G AUSTRIAN GUN IS THAN TEUTON Used Effectively Against
 Russians in Tarnow GREAT DESTRUCTION But One Shot Fired Into Tarnow Was Sufficient to Force Removal of Rus
 sian Headquarters - Austrian
 Gunners Are Excellent
GREAT DESTRUCTION

ldFnOWi 4ustrlan Gnuc1ei June 70 ! Correspondence of the Associated Press ] The German 42-centimeter mortars, with which Liege was battered Into submis- sion, are declared not to have been as effective as the Austro- Hunga rian weap- ons of the same calibre-two of which were used against the Russian troops in Tarnow in the great May victory in west Galicia. They have left few. but unmis- takabe signs of their power in the shape of demolished houses and big craters in Tarnow, fired at a range of Ave to eight miles. The first shell. landing in the city at the time 1t was occupied as Rus sian headquarters, caused the Russian general and his staff to abandon their comfortable quarters in Tarnow, the largest city In the radius of many miles, and decamp to a spot 10 miles to the rear. Thereafter the Austrians fired only five shots more from their big mortars into the city for 1t is, after all, an Aus trian town and they had no desire to damage unnecessarily their own property
 Twice Moved Forward
 As the advancing Austro-Hungarian army slowly pushed forward against Tar now-the spot to which the Russians clung longest during the big May battle. In an attempt to save the enormous quan- tty of supplies stored in this vicinity and to give other parts of their army a better chance to retreat undisturbed-the big l617-inch twins were twice moved for ward to spots from which they could drop shells into the supply trains and on the men attempting to save the stores
 The correspondent of the Associated Press, now visiting the battlfelds in western and middle Galicia on which the great victory of the allied German and Austro- Hungarian armies was won has not been permitted to see the new guns, but he has seen the Sites from which they were fired and the destruc- ton caused by the shells At one place the guns were concealed behind vil- lage' where the glazier Is now replacing window panes destroyed by the concus- sion of the discharge. At another place the guns were emplaced near a railroad station-this spot having been chosen for convenience in erecting the guns in their foundation of cement and in the thirS site they were located in a valley.
 Damage in Tarnow
 In TarnOW one shot struck apnar- entity by error, a peasants house of brick Ii is now a mere mass of bricks curiously level with the ground house and all having apparently been sNal- lowed up Tn the crater made by the bursting she'll Three persons were killed in this house A block away is one of the city schools. which the Aus trians believed rightly, was being used as quarters for Russian soldiers. gaping clift 30 feet wide and extending from cellar to roof of the four-story building shows with what precision the gunners found their mark. A second school building a half mile away was hit squarely on the roof The wall on the side toward the courtyard is torn out bodily. On the other side facing the street hole 20 feet in dia ni eter was carved out neatly in the thick brick and concrete wall, the aperture being as nicely rounded as If the circle had been laid out with pair of com passes. The brickwork circle came out with such accuracy and force that it has left its imprint. again as a care fully rounded semi circle, In the nigh fence of grated iron before the scho building. The roof Is, of course gone and from, various windows the interior woodwork projects In tangled masses
 Another shell struck the cavalry bar racks in the great courtyard of which Russian soldiers at the moment were busily loading supplies for the retreat Horses and men were blown to pieces by the air pressure from the explosion or killed by the shower of bricks, roof tiles and fragments of shell. In the low one-story building surroudng the barrack square Is at one ponl a great gap which the correspondent paced out as 24 yards-the measure of the force of the explosion
 The new 42-centimeter shells weigh over 2500 pounds-more than those of the Krupp guns, and each shell costs over $500.