Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1917-11-16
U.SBARRAGE FIRE.
FOHS HUN RAIDERS
Attempted Attack on Lines
y, Broken Up by Rain
~'-- of Shells
SAMMEES ARE KEPT BUSY
AMERICAN FIELD HEADQUARTERS.
IN FRANCE, Nov. 16.

AMERICAN FIELD HEADQUARTERS,
a IN FRANCE. Nov. 16.
American artillerymen planted roarins
barrage Of shells over the front OF trenches
held by American nfantrymen early Thurs
day and defeated German plans for a raid
Fighting activity along the American
front" Is now reaching a hot stage Every
sort Of war activity short of general as
sault is being experienced by the Sammees
in the front-line trenches.
On Tuesday and Wednesday nights
American patrol parties. scouting over No
Mans Land encountered German recon-
naissance units There were brief. hurried
exchanges of shots in the dark. and the
enemy scurried away.
meanwhile the enemy artillery fire had
been increasing steadily. Wednesday night
n reached a crescendo. Then early in the
morning, the Boches suddenly loosed a
spray of machine-gunfire at communication
trenches-the lines by which REINFORCE
nents and supplies are sent to the front
fighting lines.
Alive to the fact that this might forecast
n raiding attempt. the Americans sent up
flares They flooded the irregular ground
in front Of the fighting lines with light and
disclosed a group Of Germans approaching
the American trenches.
Word hurriedly went back from the Amer.
,can commanders of the menaced trench sec
tion for a barrage. The American artil-
lerynen got the word by telephone and bent
to their guns with top speed activity. Their
battery rosred in n tattoo of fury. Over
in front of the American lines the ground
was churned up by the shells as they fell
thick and fast and near the wouid-be raid.
ers.
Then the Boches gave it up and scurried
hack to the safety of the trenches and dug.
outs. The rest of the night was marked
by increased German gunflre. The Amer
leans kept on the alert throughout the dark
hours.
The American soldiers killed and wounded
in the recent German bonbardment were
in shack near American support lines
when single Boche shell struck their
position.
A Pennsylvania boy. wounded in the arm.
body and head by pieces of this missile. to-
day told of his experience as he lay on a
portable table in a base hospital
"Our platoon had been in a shack near
the support lines" he explained. "All of
sudden the Boches began shelling us. Our
platoon comma nder said. Down in the dug
outs. men!' We hadn't any more than done
that very thing when a shell caved in our
roof. Some of us in the party were killed
and some Of us were wounded"
Close by the Pennsylvania was another
portable table and on 1t lay an American
soldier from Eckman, w. Va.
In hustled a surgeon, who didn't want
his patients interviewed. He hurried me
out of the room. but not before I caught
a glimpse Of the Eckman boy being wheeled
into the operating room and caught a whiff
of the ether. The West Virginia soldiers
eye had been shot out.
Patrol encounters are now becoming
regular every-night occurrence. In the
clashes of the last few days there have
been no American casualties whether the
Germans have been equally lucky against
the American rifemen is not known. Dawn
light over No Mans Land fails to reveal
any bodies
Lively gunfre, increasing and diminish.
ing by turns. occupies the daylight hours
Today the guns on both sides were booming
away in rapid succession of roars
Boche propaganda appeared in the midst
OF the American troops today. A German
balloon laden with anti-American pamphlets
fell In a training camp.