The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1916-08-28
BRITONS IN DRIVE
 PRAISE THEIR FOES
Survivors of SOmme Offensive Admit That Germans Are
 sDeViliSh Good Soldiers"

diers," in the opinion of British en- listed men who have been in the thick
 of the great allied offensive in France. | and who have been invalided home to recuperate from their wounds. The British government is recording for future historians stories of the great push" as told by officers and enlist ed men. and at intervals some of these stories are being made public by 1 the British Intelligence Office in Lon | don.
 A British official in New York re- | ceived in the mail yesterday two of i these stories, one told by all enlisted
 men and the other by an officer, both | of whom had arrived home badly wounded. Their stories follow:
 "Pozieres is just a dust heap: and not much heap, either" said Lance Sergeant. the left side of whose tunic
 hung in blood-stained ribbons over the snowy bandage that supported his l had managed, to gather eleven separ- ate pieces of a German bomb. without in any way affecting his good spirits or | that cheery, casual sort of sang-froid l which appears to be one of the most universal characteristics of our new army.
 1 "Only for their dugouts and trenches and some of the cellars over where the houses used to stand our artillery would have killed everything in Pozieres that had any life in it. But, thanks to the warrens they had dug out for themselves, the Boches were able to just fill the air with bull lets all round the village-a wonder full thing. In a push like this you don't wonder at the number of casu- alties; but what you do wonder at is how in the world anybody gets through. : "I think I must have seen scores of broken machine guns in that place. to say nothing of all they had doing regular business up to the very end. I fancy the Hun had made up his mind that whatever happened we could not possibly break through there We'll. he's had to learn a lot O. different lessons this month, and l reckon he won't forget in a hurry the one he learned at Pozieres. Mind, sir, I'm not saying anything against him. No, I don't hold with all this talk about Master Boche being chap who can't stand up to a square fight; and all that I know they
 stood up to 1t all right at Pozieres;
 and I know they must have lost some
 good few thousands before we got the
 place. I say they're soldiers. all right; they're doing their job, and
 they'll stick most anything that any
 one could stick; except just the one
 thing; they can't stand our chaps
 when we get near enough to give 'em
 the cold steel. They don't like the close work We'll, after all, nobody
 can't expect 'em to be just like Eng
 lishmen, now can they sir? 'Twouldn't
 be reasonable. But accordin' to their
 lights, an as Boches, mind, I think
 they're pretty good. an pretty tough;
 I'll say that for 'em.' --
 And just then I lost the Lance Ser
 geant; and afterward hunted in vain
 on the landing stage for his stretcher.
 He must have got away by the first
 train; and now, suppose, I shall
 never know his regiment or name; since I had not had time to note these
 when he was carried ashore. There
 was a tremendous essential vitality about the man, liked his almost regal English arrogance. His was the
 point of view of the men who fought under Nelson and Wellington. There's
 more of that fine and simple spirit
 left among us than some folk think;
 and the life of the new army has
 brought out a lot of it It is a real
 asset in war: and, too. in peace, I
 fancy. It has played part in the
 development of the British Empire. I
 am sure of that.
 A few minutes later was talking
 with the intelligence officer of a bat talion which has suffered heavy loss
 es. and inflicted vastly heavier ones,
 at Longueval I was asking about
 our artillery; their part in the push, and how they kept up the work of
 preparation for our splendid infan- try.
 'sWe11. I can only speak of what I've seen. of course" said the intelli- gence officer; that's up to Tuesday. the 18th. around about Longueval. There, and up till then, the work they have done for us Is simply splendid. couldn't help wishing some of tho intuition workers could have seen it. so they'd know what their wors in the war amounted to. The infantry have played the game. you know [ They've gone down smiling; where they've had to go; and. by the Lord. [ they've made Fritz pay; they've made 1 him pay for every casualty he's scored1 against us
 "Our boys haven't thought of them selves; they haven't tried to spare themselves; and they've taken their dose like the sportsmen they are, where 1t was coming to them All this rot about classes has got to go by the board. as l, see 1t. Give 'em the chance that all sorts have in war, and I tell you our fellows are all gentlemen.
 But what I was going to say was about munitions Fine as our men have been, they couldn't have accom- plished anything much in this push, put for the artillery, you know: and he artillery couldn nave done much Tor 'em but for the enormous stores i, 'f munitions they've been laying up. We used to grouse sometimes because hey wouldn't give us half as much leavy stuff over the front as we asked or. But you can understand it easy though once you've lived through two [ IT three weeks of this push We're lsing shells instead of flesh and blood low. Last year we. were using flesh { md blood instead of shells But to 'ring the thing off they have to use ammunition in a way that nobody yer dreamed of couple of years !. go.
 They don't have to shoot men.