BRITISH CAPTURE PERONNE.

Auckland Star, Volume XLVIII, Issue 67, 19 March 1917, Page 5

BRITISH CAPTURE PERONNE.

PRELUDE TO MOKE IMPORTANT SUCCESSES, RETIREMENT IN ARRAS DISTRICT ' ANTICIPATED. (Australian and X.Z. Cable Association.) .(Received 8.30 a-m.) LONDON, March 18It is officially announced that Peronne has been captured by the British - the dual objectives of Peronne and Bapaume thus falling within twentyfour hours of each other. In Paris, General Sir Douglas Haig's successes are considered a prelude to the capture of an important .junction at Croiselles, nine miles north-east of Bapaume. It is anticipated that the Germans will yield considerable ground in the Oise district. RAPID CONQUEST OF THE BAPAUME AREA. ENEMY'S MAIM ARMY RETREATS FAR BEHIND FRONT LINE. PATROLS PRESSING THE REARGUARDS EVERYWHERE. FINE WSATHEE AND HARD GROUND INCREASE ACTIVITY. [Reuters Telcgrami.l (Received 9.20 a.m.) LONDON, March 18. Reuters correspondent at the British headquarters in France reports that a rapid hardening of the ground and fine weather is responsible for the activity on the Somme and the Ancre. There was much fighting to-day. our patrols pressing the enemy rearguards everywhere. The sharpest conflict was at Bapaume, where the British fell upon the enemy before he could clear away. The covering troops began to withdraw immediately we advanced, and the rapidity of their retirement showed that the German main army has fallen back a considerable distance. Peronne was one of the great objectives of the British during the battle of the Somme, but the tremendous network of field defences.particularly round the Torbelle River and at Mont St. Quentin. held ur> the advance during last summer. The town stands in a strong position. Peronne .stands on the Somme, at its confluence with the Dorngt stream, 94 miles north-east of Paris. It lias been fortified for many centuries, but it possessed no modern defences when the present war began" It has had a very interesting history. and has been the scene of much fighting. It received a royal charter in 120!>. but was given to the Burgundians in 1435. and bought back by Louis XI.. passing again into the hands of Charles the Bold in 1465. On the death of Charles, Louis XI regained possession. In 1536 the Emperor Charles besieged Peronne without success, while it was the first town after Paris which proclaimed the League in 1377. Wellington captured Peronne in 1815, but its greatest misfortune occurred in the Franco-Prussian war. It was invested in December. 1870, and bombarded from December 28 to January 9, when, as-the result of an outbreak of smallpox it -was compelled to capitulate. Out of 700 houses. GOO _ were more or less Injured, and 82 buildings were set on lire- The population before the war was 4,500. Bapaume. the second objective of the Somme battle, is somewhat smaller than Peronne, having a population of 3,200. Fierce struggles took place here on January 2 and 3, 1871, between the French Army of the North and the German Army of Observation. The French lost 2,000 men, but claimed a ■victory. They/were, however, compelled to. give up the battlefield _v fey>" days