Richmond times-dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1914-current, 1915-07-21
'. NJ. |. BOY, WITH ALLIES,
IN TERRIFIC FIGHTING
Ills Company Badly Cut Up, but He
Escapes Only With Bad Bruise
on Forehead.
WENT ABROAD ON CATTLE BOAT
Russell Kelly, in Recent Letters
Home, Writes of Battle Near Sou.
chez and Not Far From Celebrated
Labyrinth"

} NEW YORK, July 20-When Rus
sell Kelly, twenty-five years old. son
OF Il New York attorney, and for a
while Il student at Virginia Military
institute. got the war fever last fall,
ne TOOK Job on cattle boat. work.
ed his way to Bordeaux and enlisted
IN the famous French Foreign Lee
gion.
In recent letters home he tells of
taxing part In terrific fighting at La
Iareette, near Souches and not far
from the celebrated "labyrinth." His
company was badly cut UP, but he
escaped with n bad bruisc on the
forehead, caused by the vacuum of a
great smell which passed few inches
from his head.
Under date of May 90. he writes:
After our attack of MAY o-10, wa
went to the rear, about ten miles from
the front, and were rcorganizcd We
needed II. as / understand more than
half OF the regiment were either kill
ed or wounded. The general reviewed
us and distributed five military med
ais.
The recruits came up from VAL
bonnie and Lyon: so we are ready to
go back. We have a new captain in
place of the one who was killed The
one we lost was very game man;
lie led us without sword or any side
arms. only using his swagger stick
Our new captain is a Swedc Many
German prisoners have passed us late
iy; one day as many as 500 went by;
they looked we'll. BY strange COIN
cidcnce. the same Bavarian troops who
taccd US In Champagne arc against
us here. and yesterday we recognized
among the prisoners man who de-
serted from us in Champagne. I guess
1t Is all over with him: II should be-
You remember In my letter from
Lyon | spoke about three brothers
they were. Well, they are inseparable
IN death, as they were killed side by
side
After leaving our trenches and
crossing the Germans. which were
battered TO pieces by the lombard
ment' our first stop was in the shell
ter of "a road. Here the good blocking
Italian. the fellow who hit me with
Il brick in the scrap | wrote about,
became reckless AMI tried to survey
the landscape. He was killed Instant
y by bullet through the heart No
conrulsive tossing Of the arms one
reads about or sees In the movies; he
just sank down and IL was all over
soon after we left this position. his
chum, the other Italian. was shot
through the leg. There was absolute
l. no ill-fccling between us on ac-
count of our scrap.
STRAIN TO NERVES
W Ai'fNis FOh
We advance by sections When
the order comes we jump up, and car
rying the sack as shield, run about
100 feet: and talk about Ty Cobb slid
ing into second base. IL isn't II circum-
stance to the way hit the grit and
what strain to the nerves waiting
for our turn to advance, fellows all
around being hit. In couple Of cases
| have seen men lifted from the
ground. so hard were they hit. One
ieI'cw very near me- got hit and be-
gan to squeal almost Immediately a
second bullet hit him, and he made for
the rear on all fcurs. crying like a
bany.
Yield was full Of such sights Hut
compared to the shells. the bullets are
nothing: Give me most anything but
an artillery bombardment! Shortly
after we gained the crest of the hill
their artillery came up and began fr-
ing on us; II was terrible, The way
those shells would tear by and dig "A
hole FIVE feet deep was enough for
the most solid nerves. AT nightfall
we intrenched. but we're on the watch
all night
The next day their artillery opened
on us and their infantry started an
attack. hut We stood firm and smear
cd them"
In Il letter dated June 10. he says:
The German trenches are built much
better than ours. Some OF the huts i'm
which the men lived were twenty feet
underground. They used a great num-
Der Of dirt sacks. There must be a
shortage OF material in Germany as
these sacks were made from every
thing; mostly from cheap. light calico,
hardly strong enough to hold the
earth
They had an extensive system of
mines. and We made the attack (May
9th) just in time, as Pavelka and I
Investigate thde saps with the aid OF n
candle. They were all loaded and wired,
ready to be set off. One had been ey-
plodcd. The Germans, in digging, must
have lost their bearings, because the
hole was actually nearer their own line