The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1917-08-11
! (Copyright 1917. by the International
 News Bureau)

(Copyright 1917, by the Internationa News Bureau) A graphic description of the mos extraordinary incident of the war b1 Percival Phillips, British War Core spondents' Headquarters in France.
 The Messines Ridge was captured Attacking at dawn on a. front of more than nine miles British divisions, in cluding some of the finest fighting men of the United Kingdom and the Dominions overseas, swept over the slopes of this heavily fortified barrier between Ypres and Armentieres anc firmly established themselves beyond its crest.
 They took thousands of prisoners more than 2,309 were accounted for at one part of the front alone be- fore noon-and far greaer number of Germans were killed by our guns
 The victory is a triumph equally for the Irish troops-Catholics, Prot estants, Home Rulers and Orange men went up the ridge together-fol the historic line regiments Of Eng land and Scotland, and for the .4a,,nch battalions of Australian an6 New Zealand men.
 l. tanks, for the innumerable airmeT ! who b1ackened the sky at dawn are ruled it thereafter. and for the plod' ding sappers and miners who laborec for months that one of the most de- structive networks of mines ever ex ,,ploded-over a million pounds of am incl were used to alter the geography of this Sutilated fringe of Belgium could be sent aloft at the moment ol attack in. great binding shoes of gol den flame. It was a triumph for the . eunners whose true and deadly bar rage paved the way to victory.
 It is most important success Gal though not great battle in the same sense that the battles of he Somm' and Arras were great tbttles), for thorn is plucked from the left flanl { of our long front.
 No longer can the nests Of Ger man batteries dominate the shattered salient of Ypres, nor can their ob servers sit among the brick piles tha were Wyfschaete and Messines ant watch every movenfent in the Brit ! ish trenches below. They have beer driven below, as the Canadians drov' back the Germans on Vinay Ridge tt the plain of Douai.
  be of immeasurable benefit in the flu fure. At this time it is impossible to state all the details of our new DO ,eition,SSbusit is certain that we holt the entire ruins of the Villages O 4 Wytschaete and Messines and tn line beyond them that gives us the en . tire crest and portion of the ia slope.
 The new positions were not takel without some very hard fighting, bu on the whole the resistance was. il my. opinion, much less than expected and comparatively few ''stronl points'', in the crowded area of ma chine gun forts tried to hold out af '; ter they had been surrounded. {. Messines Ridge is hardly nApre thai a slight undulation at the edge o the great plain of the Scheldt-a fev fields, bits of woodland tilted abov the marshy ground, at no point nor than two hundred feet high, dotte' with compact little farms and toppe by nearly straight road that run from Ypres through the two village named.
 Since December 1914 the German have scanned the position on the yves tern slope with trenches, a laby < rinth of tunnels, and concerted re doubts, weaving into this nest of de fences the remains of Wyasctaaete and little woods and many isolate patches of timber since shorn int ragged stumps by the British shells
 Behind the ridge sheltered man German batteries, and infantry rein 'forcements were largely increa:\ during the last few weeks, for tn enemy appeared to fear an attac somewhere in this region and h steadily added to his reserves in me and guns
 The ridge was as strongly protect ed as any part of the old Germa trench system, and many natural oh i stacles greatly increased the difficul ty of taking it. It was blotched w ruined buildings-some of them, lik the Red Chateau and the White Cha teau and the pile of masonry know as Hell Farm" notorious in trenc ,history-and every foot of groun was rendered doubly valuable by req chine gunners and snipers.
 Our men might well have had t fight every foot of the way, but the went easily up the slope, and tn stiffest resistance they had to met
 
 made by certain German units in tn AArras battle. l
 In and round Messines there wer isolated combats, while the garriso of Wytschaete only chung to it's tim bered lairs until the British fan crept round them and enveloped tn cellars and the few remaining wal that represent the village.
 Tho mines undoubtedly shook tn Hun-<hey set the earth rocking UT der my feet three miles distant--an his opposition may have been weak ened by these frightful blasts of fire but he was disinclined from the fir. to 'sdo or die" or to continue an ir possible struggle.
 This appalling upheava1 of tn earth at dawn was the climax t months of patient, laborious prepara tion. Battles that may be fought an won in a day may we'll require half year,s work by the army that is dc terrained to win. and. the effort of ou troops today was only made possibl by the united exertions of man strangely diverse organizations @ tended~oVax a long period and a wid area
 zheortfs.battanons of this spIendi attackfng foroe might move smoothl at the Gppointsd time. hundreds ( gunners toiled for weeks at intricat tlme-tab1es Gangs of expert miner -a x-r-