The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1917-09-21
Clouds of AerOplanes Sweep
Death on Enemy Lines.
Artillery Fire in Latest Drive
Outstrips All Previous.
ENGLISH ADVANCING FURTHER
Rough Ground and Mud Kept
Tanks Out of Battle.
Five Lines of Barrage Shells
COmbed Ground Ahead.
-Bv WILLIAM PHILIP SIMMS.

With the British Armies in the
Field, Sept. 21.-Behind an inferno of
bursting steel, British troops carried
on still further today into German
positions along the Ypres Menin road.
Probably the greatest artillery duel of
the whole war ragged last night over
the eight miles on which Field Mar
shall Haig's troops struck early yester-
day morning. The Germans poured
terrific barrage to cover their counter
attacks and the British imposed a wall
of shells before the enemy's advances,
or ahead of their own troops.
Shaken German prisoners examined
today after the first sweep of the
great offensive declared the British
barrage fire heralding the infantry as
ksault was the most deadly in the his
tory of the war. The first push car
ried the British forward nearly a mile.
Shells Like Loom of Death.
The British were not content with a
single wall of bursting shells ahead of
their troops. Not even two or three
or four walls were enough-but actual
ly five distinct lines of fire We're
thrown to pulyeriZe resistance. With
almost superhuman ingenuity, the
five lines of fire were made to merge
in forward and backward and sideway
sweeps.
1t was veritab1e loom of death"
into the enemy lines. Barrage passed
thru barrage until it seemed the air
was clogged with shells
| . The Germans everywhere put ur
stubborn resistance, especially from
dugouts and machine gun emplace-
ments of concrete which had survived
the terrific barrage fire. The enemy's
guns retaliated heavily in spots, es-
| pecially on the Anzacs to the right of
the attacking center.
| Iverness Copse, Glancorse wood,
| Nome BosScher wood and Dumbarton
lakes were scenes of particularly
fierce fighting. The enemy was keenly
! alive to the importance of holding the
| heights which formed the center of
the attack and they struggled des-
| perately against the British wave I'm
| like previous offensive blows struck
recently, the British used very few
/ tanks The ground was not favora BILE
for their utilization. Also they were
| not needed as the depth of the Brit
ish artillery fire was greater than has
| hitherto been seen anywhere in the
| war.
First Aero Cavalry Charge.
The ground over which the advance
was made was muddy. Heavy show
ers during the night made the going
| even heavier. Thruout the morning
the clouds hung only six hundred feet
above the ground and a high wind
whipped singing mist in the faces OF
the fighters.
According to prearranged plan
| great numbers of British airmen par
ticipated in the attack. They earned
the right to be called aerial cavalry
hereafter At five hundred feet alti-
tude and less during the thickest of
the infantry fighting they swooped
above the German lines watching for
| open bodies of troops, and finding
them, ducked down sometimes so low
that their wheels seemed almost to
/ touch the helmets of the Teutons,
their machine guns spattering death.
| 1t was the first battle in which the
airmen were formally assigned to the
task of machine cunning infantry.