AVALANCHES OF DEAD ON SLOPES OF VAUX.

Auckland Star, Volume XLVII, Issue 64, 15 March 1916, Page 5

AVALANCHES OF DEAD ON SLOPES OF VAUX.

WHOLE ENEMY BRIGADES CEASE TO EXIST. STRUGGLE TO BE RENEWED WHEN NEW FORCES ARRIVE. LONDON, March 14. French officers agree that the carnage last Friday on the slopes befpre Fort Vaux, at Verdun, surpasses all description. Avalanches of dead and* dying rolled down the slope, to lie in gigantic greyish heaps at the bottom. The attackers became nauseated through climbing over the bodies of their, comrades, and the assault was spent before the horror of these mountains of corpses. Thousands of dead now cumber tlic sinister slopes of Vaux. v The ferocious struggles have so terribly broken the Germans that whole brigades have ceased to exist.' The Seventh and the Twenty-seventh Divisions bore the brunt of the fighting at Bethincourt and Goose Hill, and were severely handled. The Third German Army Corps suffered so severely at Vaux and Douaumont that the few men emerging from the fight were sent to the rear. The Eighteenth Army Corps and the Bavarian Divisions lost whole battalions. Telegrams from neutral sources report, that an enormous number of /wounded Germans are arriving at Aix la Chapcllc, both night and day. The lull at Verdun is due to the Germans awaiting supplies from Metz. Troops frc-n; the home depots in Germany are flocking to Verdun. It is expected that the struggle will be renewed in a few days. The French airmen have performed splendid feats in watching the enemy supply trains and reserve formations, spying out the gun positions, raiding at nights the lines of communication, and blowing up the munition depots.