IN A STORM OF BULLETS

Evening Post, Volume XCVI, Issue 43, 19 August 1918, Page 7

IN A STORM OF BULLETS

Terrific intensity of fire

AN AUSTRALIAN EXPERIENCE,

LONDON, 17th August. Mr. Keith, Murdoch, correspondent at Australian Headquarters, describing the intensity of the* fire faced by the Victorians in a gallant but ineffective uttempt to cut off a large body of tho enemy, says:—"Aeroplanes, flying low, machine-gunned and bombed them, whfle the rattle of the machine-guns on the ground rose to the intensity of a shrieking! wind. Anti-tank guns added to the inferno. Two land mines exploded, hurling some of the men into tho air. Never since the Lone Pine and the Nek has a considerable body of Australians mot such, an intense machine-gun fire. It was at such a short range that some bullets hit through tho tanks and killed a.nd wounded the inmates. Our men were m a semi-circle of heavy fire, with the heavy barrage from the more distant machine, guns beating across tho line of retreat. The tanlcs, as they crawled home, with storms of bullets beating against their sides, and .making tens of thousands of sparks, moved like dazzling patches of brilliant colours,'

The correspondent, describing the good work by the New South Wales men in the recent fighting, gives an instance of a prominent cricketer and footballer, who, when his men were under heavy machine-guij fire, took charge of the whole operation of his section. He reorganised the men, and rushed two rnaehine-guns, single-handed, ahead of our objective. He was wounded in, the leg, but hobbled with the aid of a stick for three hours. He wai? again wounded in the thigh, but earned on for an hour. The fire was heavier than ever previously experienced. An Australian graphically declared that while the machine-guns were going one could not have placed a threepenny-piece between the bullets. The officer had sustained forty-six shrapnel wounds in the Ypres battle. The cor. rr- adds : "After the Australians' fin i. objective had been reached they came across saveral cows calmly grazing in ,an orchard, and promptly milked them."