Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1919-03-21
CITY BOY HELPED
SILENCE BIG GUN
Philadelphia Sailors Bat
terry Destroyed One Ger
man 75-Mile Ordnance
MANNED NAVAL PIECE
Shell, Weighing l470 Pounds,
Put Great Boche Terror
Out of Commission
MANNED NAVAL PIECE

At least one of the seventy-hNe mile
guns used by the Germans was put out
or commission by a fourteen-inch Ameri-
can naval gun, This is verified by the
records submitted TO Washington.
The battery which silenced the Ger
man gun contained several Phiiadcl-
phia boys. sailors. One Of them was
j. Wilbur Batezel. 5TO5 Leonard street,
Frankford, frst-cIass ship filter. who
returned 70 his home recently after be-
ing released from the navy.
Five of these heavy naval guns. man
ned by sailors in marine uniforms, were
stationed behind the American lines
Battery No. J. of which Batezel was a
member was in the Compegne Forest
August "a
An Allied aviator reported the position
of The big German gun behind the
Boche lines at Tergniel to this battery.
One projectile. weighing 1870 pounds.
was fred by the sailors and the German
terror was silenced forever. The target
was twenty miles away. Batezel and
his pals were promoted shortly after.
Apparently nobody OH this side knew
that we had those big guns in action"
ss i'd the modest sailor lad today. After
the armistiCe was declared. we saw what
havoc had been wrought by our guns.
After we turned them loose the Ger
mans were terror stricken.
The damage done by their greatly
exploited seventy-mle gun was no
greater than that wrought by our five
irch projectiles. We learned flom
prisoners captured later. that when our
naval guns turned loose, the morale of
the Germans within our range collapsed
entirely.
Three of these gufs were stationed
al Nerdun, one was near St. Quentin and
ours was at Compiegne. The approx
mate weight of each gun was ninety
eight tons. 1t could hurl 1470-pound
shell twenty-eight miles and a record of
thirty-iive miles was made with a shell
Weighing 1870 pounds.
Accurate Aim Puzzled
After hostilities ceased, we were in
formed by German and Russian prison.
ers that the moral effect OF our guns on
the Germans was far greater than that
which the big Berthas had on the
French. They could not understand how
any shell could find a target so far
behind their lines. And every gun sent
forth a giant shell every three minutes.
Could you blame the Germans for be-
coming demoralized?
"These guns, mounted on railroad car
riages. We're shifted from place TO place
so quickly that the Boches thought the
Allies had hundreds of them.
We saw an interesting performance
by one of our shells. 1t landed in
ten-acre turnip patch far behind the
German lines and uprooted every turnp.
AT Laon We learned from the French
after the Germans had evacuated that
a shell landed in a moving picture thea
tire where the Germans were being en-
tertained. OF the hundred soldiers and
officers. sixty were horribly mangled.
The only evidence that the other forty
ever existed was the indenti1cation tags
scattered about.
Il and the other boys could tell in
cident after incident where these guns
performed wonders. but the most amaa-
ing stunt was performed by a shell
which struck a supply train in motion.
Two box cars heavily loaded, were lifted
up and placed on the storehouse plat
form short distance away The re-
mainder of the train disappeared"
Batezel enlisted as a seaman at the
navy yard, April 16, 1917. After a
course on the long-distance gun range
at Sandy Hook, he was sent to Brest.
where his battery landed June 9. 1t went
into action at st. Nazaire at once and
remained there until the Big Bertha was
put out OF business. The battery was
then moved TO Scissors and sent 1873
rounds to the F'ritzes at Laon 10 let
them know that the Yanks were there.
Having cleaned the Germans out
there, they proceeded to Nerdun on
October u. Up to this time. not one
man had been lost from any of the
Ave batteries. At Nerdun three sailors
were killed. When the armistice was
signed, the battery was at ST. Paul
Forest.