Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1919-01-19
FRENCH WANT ONE
 0f "b|G BER7hAS"
FRENCH WANT ONE-24 Germany's Super Cannon, Which Bonn.
 barded Paris, As Souvenir of Ger man Frightfulness That Failed.

Paris, Dec. 15.-( (Corresponrence of
 The Associated Press. .)-The French
 people want one of the German Big
 Berthas" or supercannon which bom-
 barded Paris to display in the Place de
 Ia Concorde as a souvenir of German
 frightfulness that failed of it's pur-
 pose to destroy rFench morale.
 The armistice does not stipulate
 that one of these instruments shall
 be surrendered but there is a move
 ment to urge the government to de-
 mand it. There is no expectation
 that the Germans will include one of these weapons among the 2,500 guns ] they are required to give up under the armistice.
 Facts obtained by military experts show that the first guns that fired up- on Paris on March 23, last numbered three. They were installed near Mont
 Joie, in the forest of Saint Gobain Two were on the same railroad spur
 leading out of Laon while the third was little further east in the vicin- ity of Creepy.
 According to the latest informa- tion, the guns were pointed at an an gle of more than 65 degrees, a charge of three hundred pounds of powder propelling the projectile to height of one hundred thousand feet (nearly
 19 miles) on its murderous mission to
 Paris. When exeryshot ten or twelve
 marine guns of sixteen or seventeen
 inch calibre fired simultaneously up- on targets unknown in order to con- ceal the location of supercannon. The shell was of 210 millmetre calibre
 (about eight inches). It weighed three hundred pounds but the charge of ex- plosive contained therein varied be- tween thirty and forty pounds.
 In the manufacture of the shell re- sided an innovation of the Germans. It is said to have been made of special steel treated with tungsten so as to offer the maximum of resistance for a minimum weight. The gums only protection was in camouflage and it proved to be no protection at all as allied aviators soon located them. There is report that several aviators Americans, French, British, lost their lives in locating the first three Berthas in the forest of St. 1 Gobain but upon that point officials l are silent.
 However on March 27 one of the Berthas was blown up by an aerial l torpedo which tore a hole in the | ground more than fifty feet in diame- ter, a photograph of which has been ! taken. The second was put out of 1 business in the last days of April, while the third of the original three was silenced in May.
 It is now asserted that two of these ! guns were remodeled into a larger calibre, nine inch, and that these re- modelled guns were the ones which re- sumed the shelling of Paris late in , May last. r l Subsequently, the Germans succeed i ed in utilizing larger calibered guns for long distance firing for, in August they used marine gun from near Soissons, firing twelve and a half inch shell. They were preparing to subject Paris to an intensive lombard ment such as Dunkirk had to suffer when they were driven out of their Chateau Thierry line by the of the Allies.
 Commandant Mirbel, the military expert, who organized the Turkish artillery before the Germans assumed charge of the military affairs of that country, told The Associated Press that the whole secret of the German long distance gun lay in the invention of a special high explosive powder which could only be used in construct ed with special steel of extraordin- ary resisting power. The Germans had commenced the generalization of the process and they were manufac- turing several guns similar to their Soissons one but Marshal Foch's of- fensive deranged their plans.