Tulsa daily world. [volume] (Tulsa, Indian Territory [Okla.]) 1905-1919, 1917-08-18
BRITISH GUNNERY
ALMOST PERFECT
Establishes Wonderful Barrage
Behind Which Infantry
Advances Consistently.
GERMANS UNABLE TO STAND
Driven Back From Prepared
Gun Emplacements Many
Trapped in Own Forts.

BRITISH FRONT IN FRANCE
AND BELGIUM. Aug. 17.-There was
niue change this morning along the
'front.' OF the new British offensive be-
gun yesterday morning in Belgium.
Several German counter attacks wer-
I'puIsed IN the course of the night ard
llshtlng IL continuing with the entente
allles hol lling tcnaciously the positions
winch they secured Yesterday and
carrying out consultations
German troops last night made a
determined attempt to recover "A small
section Of ground taken by the Cana
Glahs yesterday afternoon cas- of
Lens. but three successive counter A.
tacks were driven OF with heavy
losses to the enemy.
British BarraGc Perfect.
Evidence continues of the wonuer-
tul efficacy of the British barrage fire
yesterday morning on the north end
Of the British line where the advance.
was so successful
The correspondent visited the
casualty clearing station for the
LdhEemarck region and talked with "a
Brltish artillery observation officer
VINO was wounded in the fighting near
langemarck. lie said:
Il have seen much modern artil-
lery work, but frankly never
dreamed there could be such perfec-
uon achieved in barrage fire as we
accomplished Thursday morning. |
was stationed in an advance post
where | could see the full effects of
our fire on the Langemarck region.
Nhlle directed the firing of the guns
IN the rear was amazed to see what
our gunners could not see.
AT the jumping-off hour. which
was 4:45 o'clock, the British batteries
cropped barrage in front of our in
fantry for the advance. 1t was as
mo a solid curtain of steel had been
cropped before our men. 1t moved
forward with the mechanical pre-
cision of clock work. All our guns
broke out with such hurricane of
fire that l was stunned with the et-
feet.
Infantry Keeps Close.
Il tried to say something to a COM
panion standing beside me, but could
not make him hear my loudest shouts,
SO deaienlng was the thunder from the
breaking shells. The barrage moved
forward with such accuracy that our
infantry was able to keep quite close
TO it without danger, for there was
no waNerinS OF the barrage line.
straight on over LangemarCk and the
surrounding region passed the bar
rage with the infantry trailing. 1t
was not more than thirty minutes
from the start before we were in the
town itself. 1t was S o'clock when
our gunfire finally rested on German
positions far to the rear and there
they continued to hammer away while
the fighting went on about Lange-
marck.
The Germans undoubtedly wero
expecting our attack for their counter
Garage was dropped back on our lines
almost as soon as our advance began.
The German counter battery work was
nil, but or the other hand our bat
torles were doing excellent execution
against the enemy guns whivch wd,
indicated by the diminution of their
firing progressed. As early as 6
o clock | saw one big German gun
being hastily removed from the heigur
north of Langemarck and rushed to
position further back.
Trapped in Own Forts.
AS it was our troops had destroyed
most of the concrete machine gun
redoubts which represent the main
defenscs in this section, but there
still remained many underground for
tifications which had to be fought thru
and silenced with bombs or left be-
hind with the Germans still in tnein.
There was a typical example of
this at a point southwest of LangeSI
marck known as Aubongite. Here
the Germans had constructed a steel
and concrete dugout with heavy steel
on top. Ii would hold per-
haps fifty to seventy-five men with
machine guns The artil-
lery had been unable to shell then,
out and when the infantry advanced
the Germans crawled into their hole
and closed the iron doors over them. |
Ihcreswas no bombing them out, but
the Germans themselves were prisoii-
crs. They dared not open their doors
TO fire machine guns for fear oi
bombs, so we pushed ahead and left |
the Germans there with SQUAD of |
hcmbers sitting outside ready to
throw explosives when the door |
opened. The situation was not with
out humor and for all | know 1t re-
nains the same but sooner or later the |
Germans must give in"