THE ANZAC GUNS

Evening Post, Volume XCIV, Issue 40, 16 August 1917, Page 4

THE ANZAC GUNS

GREAT WORK BELOW YPRES

WHOLE DAY UNDER FIRE.

LONDON, 6th August.

On sth August I mentioned some Australian artillery having been involved in the great battle of 30th July, but only yesterday did I hear what a splendid part that artillery had played (writes Captain C. E. W. Bean, Australian Press Representative witn the Commonwealth Forces). The guns were ordered to advance at a stated time in accordance with the plan. In most parts where the battle went as planned, this advance was carried out smoothly and punctually. One portion of ths Australian guns was in action in the new position within less than an hour after they had ceased firing from the old.

It so happened, however, that a couplo of other brigades were behind the portion of the lino where the chief trouble was met with. '"When these guns were duo to advance the infantry'was still held up by formidable opposition not far beyond the German front lino system. Tfie situation was obscure, but so far as tho I artillery knew the battle was proceeding according to programme here as elsewhere. At the exact moment the teams came up, batteries limbered up and filed off at a walk, men and horses looking magnificent as they came down the slope, passing other batteries drawn up waiting to join the column. As they advanced they came in view of some of the enemy's positions at a considerable distance. Scattered shells began to drop round the teams, not doing any arm. But when the leading batteries began to come over tho ridge, immediately behind the new positions, they suddenly same under observation of the enemy, who was still holding a portion of the heights beyond. "SPOTTED" BY FRITZ. Almost immediately shells began to drop more thickly. As the news got round among the group German batteries covering that part of the line, one after another turned their fire on to the crest over which our batteries were firing. ! Then, for the first time, the column broke into a trot, coming with perfect steadiness through a tornado of' shellfive. The leading batteries made their way through a maze of shell-holes to the new positions, the gunners flogging and almost lifting the horses by their immense effort, through deeply-pitted ground. At that moment the tail of the column was blocked by a gun sagging into a shell-hole. A 5.9 shell plunged fair into the midst of one of the waiting tuams, killing and wounding every horse. Not a minute did the work falter. Those batteries which had already downed trails continued to steadily pick up their task exactly where arranged.

Machine-gun fire was hissing on them in constant bursts from guns they could not see. The limbers had just moved and the guns were in position, when with a whirr overhead a German aeroplane, flying under the low clouds, wheeled over them. They could see the pilot in his seat and the bombs as he dropped them one after another over the batteries. But his journey was too hurried for aim. Every bomb fell wide. He then turned to his machine-gun. Six times during the day German machines, among 1 the whirling collection which circled low overhead, fired on these gun crews with machine-guns. Tho Australians rigged up a Lewis gun which they found in a crater, and a Vickcrs gun left in the trenches. These, with batmen as signallers and spare men using rifles, were turned on the attacking planes, whilst the battory continued its work. So thick and so low under the clouds were the machines that it seemed barely possible for them to avoid each other or distinguish the enemy. Through all this, under the fire of heavier shells, as the day went on, tho Australian batteries carriad out every order which reached them through the long day, exactly as if on the practice ground. "I liked those first six hours," said one of the men to me. " better than any other day of my life."