PRIMITIVE DEFENCES.

Auckland Star, Volume XLIV, Issue 78, 2 April 1913, Page 5

PRIMITIVE DEFENCES.

AKOTHER TURKISH MYTH. BRICK FORTS AMD OLD GTTNS. SOFIA, April I. The final assault concluded upon a front of two or three miles, along which the fire of 160 gun 3 was concentrated, each shell containing 201b of melinite. These fell in flights of 15 to 20 at a time, the bombarded heights being invisible in smoke and dust. A tempest of 30,000 shells silenced the forta at five on Tuesday evening. The bombardment continued during the night, while the infantry ercpt up on Avi3 Taba, which could only be stormed from the south-east. Its capture rendered the whole of the eastern position untenable. Examination shows that Aivas Taba had merely brickwork defences, and the much vaunted fortresses of Adrianople were miserabi"! primitive works, the caiiements being of brick, with a slight surface of earth and the gun emplacements hollowed from the soil. There was not a cement wall, no protecting works, fosses, scarps, or counterscarps, and the guns were fairly old, hence the modern fortifications of Advianople proved another Turkish myth. Throughout the siege Chukri Pasha concealed the insufficiency of his big guns by moving them to the . points attacked, securing a superiority in gun fire. Ivanoff's general assault exposed this trick. The inhabitants are in perfect health, and the troops were well fed. Chukri Pasha maintained the men's courage by daily bulletins of victories at the chief points in the Balkans, by stories of a Graeco-Bulgarian war, and of a general Turkish advance.