The Birmingham age-herald., 1915-12-19
The Most Elaborate Defense Works Crumbled Under
 Hail of Shells
CONTINUED FOR
 THREE WHOLE DAYS
Then Infantry Charged and Germans Were Overwhelmed-P0int Was Regarded as Impregnable,
 But Were Shot to Pieces

Chalons France December 5.-(Corre-
 spondence of the Associated Press)
 There was still wreckage enough remain
 ing on the battlefield of Champagne
 three weeks after the battle was fought
 to give some idea of the havoc of de- struction when it was fresh after the
 advance. Within space of 15 miles In
 length by from one to three in breadth
 at least 100000 men were engaged on
 both sides; 25000 prisoners were taken and at least two or three shells for every
 man engaged was fred
 That sheet of preparatory shell fire which had descended upon 15 miles of German front trenches had meant swath of slaughter to start with. For three days, night and day, this bom- bardment continued According to the ac- counts of German prisoners they could only hug the shelter of their subterranean
 chambers under their crumbling para l pets. wall of artillery fire back of the
 trenches kept the supplies from reaching them. In front of the trenches the con
 tinued crash of shrapnel blasts was cut 1 ting the barbed wire. For months the | French had been accommodating ammuni-
 tion which they poured out from every
 caibre of gun,
 NO PEACE IN TRENCHES
 This shell fire not only killed and 1 wounded Germans, not only made the l most elaborate trenches into dust heaps, 1 but filtered the field with smashed Ger i man caissons, transport wagons, clothing, 1 equipment and all the impedimenta of an army. There peace in the Ger 1 man trenches for the first time in three 4 days as the wave of French infantry ! rushed for the German trenches. Then l the French guns stopped firing lest they i kill their own men, The wave had not
 more than 200 yards to go Estimate the
 time that it takes the average man to run 1 that distance and you have the time it 1 took the French soldiers to reach the
 wreckage which had been the German trenches and grapple with any survivors as in the dugouts In some places the wave { swept on beyond the trench like the tide
 running up an inlet. The Germans be-
 tween such forces were caught in pair K Of pinehers. This accounted for the pris- | oners who were taken in patches. They were surrounded by infantry with no | way of retreat open to them.
 N ''Only the little things now remain, II said French soldier who was salvaging + in the ruins of the German redoubt of + La Poche-'the pocket"-in the famous II Trou Bricot sector. At the start, of course we buried the dead and gathered K up the broken machine guns which had |s beAn destroyed by gun fire
 | The town of Ypres, in the British lines, |ls probably remains the most colossal eX- N ample of shellfire. But Ypres was a h town It was not built to withstand \ shelfire, but as home for men time of Il peace In Trou Bricot the Germans, with the science and amazing industry II which characterize their operations, had Il. set out to build themselves bastion Il which would withstand the kind of fire < they had visited upon Ypres. They had been at work for many months per fecting it from time to time, enlarging Y and strengthening it, busy ants in a Il hill. It was a vast warren of sandbags Il bristling. with machine guns-a knuckle- N like salient in the German front line. II Small forests of barbed wire guarded it N right and left. It was a sproof against X shrapnel as slate roof against hail. The K explosion of any high explosive shell was M localized in one of a multitude of cham Il bers built with a view to receiving such Ei visitors. Shafts in the earth underneath E the whole offered further protection. In the center was sort of well in the midst l of the walls of sandbags wheer the l cupants might enjoy immunity from any, thing except bombs from the air
 N NO TIME TO REPAIR IT But the French guns showered tons upon tons of shells upon La Poche for those three days. When a chamber was E destroyed they gave the Germans no time to repair it. For P hours the blasts of E' explosions were tearing at that redoubt- . hurricane of all the big calibres from Es6 to 15-inch with some smaller ones thrown in for good measure. Underneath Y La Foche at the end of a. French mine E <ol br,u .l,, of rl,of h was fired just before the infantry r charged. ~lt carried Germans and sand Ia bags heavenward in a cloudy 200 or 300 feet high, and left crater of at least 100 feet in depth and 150 feet in width K Any Germans who survived were in the pail of dust from it as the French in- E fantry charged over the bare space where the barbed wire had been destroyed by E guns which were given this part of the E work to do. In 10 minutes from the time E that the French infantry left their E trenches they were in full possession of N La Poche.
 Ut was easy, monsieur said a sol dier, easier than some much simpler Notifications which we found later on where the shells had not fallen so thickly 4 We rushed in and we looked around--for somebody to fight with But there was
 no one. For the most part there was
 nothing but the fragments of men: and
 there were men lying about trying to
 apply first aid bandages and a few
 stunned, unhurt. What could they do
 but yield? Those who sought refuge
 down that shaft there were all buried
 alive; and We dug out few who still
 had the breath of life in them from that
 shaft yonder."
 From the highest point of the ruins
 one looked right and left along the front
 line of German trenches which had been
 so elaborately dug and were broken, half
 filled ditches as the result of that ter
 rifle concentration of gunfire; and the
 same thing was to be seen in the region
 of Loos where the British guns had
 wrought the same kind of havoc.
 Old Lady Drives Auto
 From the New York World.
 Baskerville. Ia.-Estherville now claims
 <o hava tha oldoSt Iadv artou1ohiIa ex