POINT OF ATTACK WELL CHOSEN.

Auckland Star, Volume XLVII, Issue 49, 26 February 1916, Page 5

POINT OF ATTACK WELL CHOSEN.

"THE FINAL OFFENSIVE AGAINST THE FRENCH." GERMAN PRISONERS ADMIT HEAVY LOSSES. MTEB ATTACKS OK BEAUMONT FATU (Received 8.5 a.m.) PARIS, February 25. fhe point of attack on Verdun, amid the wooded hills of Brabant-sur-Meuse, was well chosen, because there is equality of elevations between French and German. The Germans further to the east would have had to scale the edge of the heights from the plain of the Woevre. The French were obliged to evacuate the hamlet of Haumont on Tuesday, but General Humbert holds the high hill to the souths The magnitude of the operations was revealed on Tuesday, but the enemy effectives were only fully deployed on Wednesday, when dense masses of the Fifth German Army were flung, rank after rank, in the old phalanx formation, against the French trenches between Brabant and Orncs. As a result of the fighting two dangerous French salients were disclosed, due to the evacuation of Haumont. Throughout Wednesday night fighting was incessant, attack after attack being launched on the village of Beaumont without result. In order 'to avoid useless waste of life General Humbert ordered the French front to be straightened out, and Brabant was evacuated at midnight, so quietly that the German infantry did not leave the trenches. Since then successive German attacks have been delivered on the villages of Samognei x and Beaumont without result. Prisoners admit that some German units were completely wiped out, and state that General yon Dcimling, on the eve of the battle, in an army order to the Fifteenth Corps, wrote that the final offensive against the French was commencing, and that he hoped the corps would distinguish itself as hitherto. The French losses were strrprisingly small, despite the fact that gas shells were used in great quantities, the French generals not exposing their men. The element of surprise was entirely wanting. The French had been bringing up reserves and had ample artillery and enormous reserves of shells. The only thing feared is fresh devilry like lie first gas attack on Yprcs.