The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1918-11-04
KEEP ON AT huns
Allies Smash Them While
Morale Is Low.
Boche Ready for Hard Fight on
Mouse River.

With Americ Armies in France.
Nov. 4.-The Americans and French
are continuing their pressure on the
whole thirty mile front from the
region of Attigny eastward to the
Mouse.
American big guns are bQmbarding
the regions of Contains, Montmedy.
Longuyon and Domremy. The Franco
American advance also has brought
many important German positions
| within the range of our 75's which will
add their voice to the artillery chorus
as soon as they can be established on
the newly won heights.
The doughboys are now less than
| four miles from Stenay. the all-im-
portant crossing of the Mouse. posses
sion of which will render most diff
cult the German retirement along the
| southern borders of the Ardennes.
Hun Morale Low.
The Germans are now facing the
| Lost serious problem of morale since
the beginning of the war. This does
not mean their morale is completely
broken. On the contrary, it is such
| that they still have a lot of hard fight
| ing left in them, but their commanders
! are resorting to statements that the
allies contemplate destruction and de-
vastation in Germany, and that cOnse-
quently the troops must fight harder
| than ever.
These statements are being made
with the idea of bucking up the boche
soldiers.
Many enemy divisions have had no
| relief for weeks, owing to the constant
allied assaults and grumbling has
broken out. The seventy-sixth divi-
sion,- opposing the Americans at one
point. presented a petition to the COM
manding general, demanding to be
rx<,x
change in discipline, the general re-
piled to the petition. stating that the
allies politicians are planning the de-
struction of Germany and that the
troops must fight on. He also revealed
their desperate situation, telling the
the line here they must be put in
elsewhere.
| Demanding Rest.
The commanding officer of another
unit. which recently arrived from
Russia, was relieved because the men
| wrote on the railway cars in which
they travelled"
Leave, or liberty"
A movement apparently Is wen I'M
| der way to convince the soldiers that
unless an armistice comes they must
fight to prevent devastation Of their
homes.
Gather Up Planes. o.
In making his preparations to fight
it out along the Mouse, the boche is
gathering one of the greatest concen-
trations of airplanes he has ever
made. Three new fighting circuses
were identified during Sundays bitter
air fighting, in which twelve eneHy
planes and one American, machine
was brought down.
/ Captain Rickenbacker scored his
twenty-third and twenty-fourth VIC
tories. shooting down a Fokker and
setting fire to a balloon. The pilot OF
the Fokker w>s identified as a mem.
Der of Baron Richtofen's old circus.
Lieutenant Cook, Indiana, brought
down another boche, and Lieutenant
Healy with Lieutenant Holder destroy
ed a balloon.
200 Allied Planes in It.
During a single flight 200 allied
planes dropped tons of bombs or
Damvillers, shot up roads and trenches
and cleared the air of boche planes
which were conducting an active
, propaganda campaign by flying ovel
the American lines and dropping bis
, packages of leaflets with such head
lines as What are we fighting for? p
and THE German people offer. peace
. with the German arguments taking the
: nature of an appeal for terms OF ar
/. armistice.
l.. No Star for Him.
|. Captain Rickenbacker. by the way
denies the story cabled from Pari.
that he is engaged to a movie star
| w 10 ic ;pr