IN THE FIRING LINE.

Press, Volume L, Issue 15138, 30 November 1914, Page 8

IN THE FIRING LINE.

VIVID PICTURE OF WAR.

cted LETTER FROM DR. MARTIN. r 01 Mr :l at. Em- "DEVILISH AND AWFUL." and gun new ider (special to "the press.'') WANGANUI, November 29. the A vivid and very graphic description li'in of tho great war as seen from an army icon surgeon's viewpoint, i* given by Dr. ■■^! i " A. Martin, of Palmerston, in the course l" 0 i- ol a letter to a local resident. Dr. mis. Martin is well-known throughout New ■. is Zealand, and only a ie\r months ago the took an active part in the effort to lies. f c „ nt i a radium hospital for the )0 « North Island. He was Homo on holitf |e day leave when the war broke out, and are immediately offered his services, which but were accepted. He is now the surgeon ?nt. w jtf, t j !o \; 0 ].•; f lo i ( i ambulance, at,"7 l ( tachod to the FiTth Division of the Bri- ', n . u tish Expeditionary Force in France, will The Fifth Division, which is under ext General Smith-Dorrien.. has done notr< '"' able seivice in the great campaign. '•"■ X '"The .South Afrk-an war," says Dr. Martin, "wa» a serious business enough, t!,,. During my timo on the field there, I the realised how terrible and ghastly a in t/u'ng war is. The South African war n . u ' was a mere boxing match compared to Sine *''' s °l°' Jt b' alK l pitiless war. wii "THE DEVIL'S ORCHESTRA." "We wake in the morning to the ice sound of heavy artillery firing: we iro rho to sleep with cannonades* for a lullaby; nso we listen during the long day to the 1""° devil's orchestra of lyddite, melinite., =■ ,j shrapnel, Maxim and rifle fire; we sco *- 0 the shrapnel bursting everywhere on my our front, and see the earth ploughed use up by the hellish lyddite shell, g® WAIL IN THE SUPERLATIVE. ts- "In describing events in the war, one c l unconsciously has to turn to superla- .. tives and sounding words and phrases. [ ay 'Devilish, hellish, bloody, awful and iis " tei "rible,' are words that come most ' A trippingly to tho tongue. Tho war is k *j'_ superlative in all its moods and tenses, superlative in the number of men engaged, in the extent of the battle -, front, in the duration of the battles, j-_ in the misery that it has caused and is lg" causing, in the awful loss of life, in the mutilating wounds caused bytheshrapl',j s ne l> ' n tlio number of tho missing, in •j. the atrocities, inhumanities and bleeding cruelties of the enemy in their wan- ';. ton destruction of all that is sacred and revered. 'Few, few shall part where -. many meet.' nd "AWFUL WOUNDS." ns • "' As a "'""geon, what appeals to mc ■/j, is tho state of tho wounded and dyer ""g- The wounds caused by bursting eh B^"f a P. ne l «' ,l '° rao&t severe. The shrap- ",. nei rips, tears, lacerates, and penetrates tho human tissues in a terrible he "* ariner > anu ' our work consists in re- ; pairing and making good, as best wo '"' can. Our best, alas, too often is of ' litfclo avail in the face of the anatomi- *~ cal devastation produced. One man, -*"". for instance, had his lower jaw shat- , tered to a pulp, and his, tongue cloven m two. Another man had his skull "J smashetl, and his brain welled out lv oyer Ins face. Another was made compel ? } y Mnd-. Another had tho • „7 froni of his abdomen ripped ; ro **;P en ' aml n, ' s bowels protruded. o Another had a knee-joint blown 70 oDcin ' a nant l smashed and an ankle shattered, and tso on and so on. One >tr could multiply and enumerate without ■* 3 end. Of bullet wounds so far wo have not had many. Wo do get a few, but . the bullet wound will kill outright, or ' " make a wound from which the soldier "■ will recover. The bullet wound is a i clear drillod hole, and our surgery 7 genorally saves these. i i'r POOR,GERMAN MARKMANSHIP. ■ "V "The German infantry, as a mass, ; : e are bad rifle shots, but they have sharp- *" shooters with them, and these are good i Jt rifle shots. Some of these sharpshooters I ■ v are foresters taken from the Imperial \ <"*• Forest Guard of Germany, trained to j " shoot deer, goats, and pigs. ( " s "One of these riflemen recently got j if up a tree and picked off several of our ** men of the Norfolk Regiment. A Nor- t 3 " folk sergeant got him later on. The 3 c Prussian, winged by an English bullet, . ""*■ fell out of the tree like a ripe acorn. ] ■r THE STATE OF THE TRENCHES, " ir "The wounded are transported as i r 5 quickly as possible from the front to , is the base, and many are sent back to 5 ii England. In addition to wounded, we j io get many sick of dysentery, l-heuma- » >}' tism, lumbago, and influenza. One can . ie understand the reason for the many J, 6iek if one considers the life many of , 3.. the men lead cooped up all day in wet, * ie muddy trenches, very little sleep, no f, hot drinks of any sort owing to the j \S danger of lighting fires, shrapnel, i >r Maxim, and rifle fire over them all day, ] n their comrades wounded, dying, or t- dead; no wonder they get sick, sick j d physically and sick mentally. Many + >r of tho men are played out. They-'have a in many cases lost their elan, ~ their \ >. dash, and their moral. The cure for this is a rest in a rest camp, good warm t food, good beds, and freedom from mdd jury. But this cannot bo done. They c i- are wanted at tho front, and there l >, they must be. y 0 "KRUPP'S AGAINST THE WORLD." i' f n "A word must be said 'about the Ger- . s man artillery. It has been said that t i- this is a"war of Krupp's against the 0 world. It is due to the great Krupp y works at Essen that the Germans havo s been able to beat down tho fortresses £ t of Liege, Namur, and Maubeugo. Tho f - big siege guns have been a revelation J 1 and a wonder. They are the most h i powerful engines of destruction in the;' i world to-day. They can batter down a x< - fort at a distance of soven miles. They n b are well served, too. It is reported n 3 that they* are fired and controlled by fj i trained men from Krnpp's works. Wo *' ; have nothing in our artillery to com- : pare with this goluith gun of 17 inches ' v calibre that can hurl a shell seven miles j"*' | and smash "a fort at that range. h ; "A. SURPRISE FOR ENGLAND." - "This gun is one of the surprises of . . the war to the Allies. It was said by a ' ■ German officer —a prisoner—that Gori many had two surprises for the Allies, s.' France got hers when she learned of the rh existence of this big gun; the other sur- 0 | pri<=e is yet to come, and it is for Eng- ti land. What is it? • hi SCENE OF CARNAGE. g "I was calfed at the double to attend n ; some wounded in a narrow road under s b shell-fir© two weeks ago. The scene de- cc fied description —I was absolutely silent F; ■with the ghastly horror of the scene. m In the road lay mangled and bleeding m : men, mangled and bleeding horsea, dead E; men lying in all sorts of convulsive at- a r titudes, upturned waggons, and smash- e h ed and splintered wood. Add to this be tho agonised groans of our wounded dii men, the screams of dying horses, and w< that impalpable, but nevertheless real, la feeling of standing for a moment in the a l< face of the Creator, and one can per- th haps then feebly v picture this scene of th carnage, of the solemnity of death, and isl of the pitiless woe of the devastation, pc Where could one find here a trace of jn< the.glory,- pomp, and magnificence of an war? ...... on "In the battlefield and in the W3 trenches mail is brought veiy close to an his Creator. The most flippant becomes mc grave, and the'blasphemer ceases to pa . 1. _ y-L i. ,i

blaspheme. A simple faith in the Great x_.chite_t of the Universe is something good out here. '"LORDS OF THE UPPER BLUE." "AYe havo one thing at the front that is of entrancing interest and pride, and that is the work of our airmeu. Our flying men in their aeroplanes are our pride and the enemy's fretful annoyance. Daily five or six of these planes rise, buzzing and whizzing from our line, soar high up into the blue, and scout over the enemy's position. They are met with shrapnel fire from the German aeroplane guns. These shots can be seen oursting above, below, and around them. Generally the planes escape, j but sometimes th°v are hit. The daring of the aviators is magnificent, their coolness, intrepidity, and dexterity admirable: something to look forward to. "BAD FOR3I TO 'GROUSE."" "Although we have rough and hard times out here, we all try to make the best of it. It is bad form to 'grouse.' If one would like bacon and eggs for breakfast and only gets indifferent tea and ration biscuit, it is 'Kismet.' and one tries to feel that a simple life and a simple diet is good for one. We all agree that the diet is simple, but none of us can agree that our life is simple. Just now it is decidedly complex. We are -ill looking forward, of course, to the time when we again havo the Germans on the run, and this time we hope to Follow them into Germany, and to bivouac our tired battalions in tho Unter den Linden. But all this is on the knees of the gods. youvou can believe mc. that I shall appreciate the ouiet repose of Palmerston North after this period of 'battle, murder, and sudden death' is over.*'