FEROCIOUS BARRAGE

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIV, Issue 106, 31 October 1942, Page 7

FEROCIOUS BARRAGE

COVER FOR ADVANCE

(Official War Correspondent, N.Z.E.F.)

EL ALAMEIN FRONT, Oct. 25. The tremendous effect of the artillery barrage put down for the initial attack on the German and Italian defences on the El Alamein line has been shown by the hundreds of dazed prisoners, and in reports of the infantry who advanced behind our continuous line

of creeping explosions.

Even the German prisoners were glad they were able to. be captured. They had not .believed that an attack of such ferocity could;;be launched so suddenly. Soihe ' prisoners came through the barrage to surrender. Many had dressed hurriedly and had not even stopped to lace their boots. Infantrymen who made the long advance towards, the second objective spoke this morning: of the. huge pattern of shell bursts:in front of them. "Some of the ground We went over had shell holes a few ie'et'-apart'all-over it," one Bren-gunner said. "Parts of it looked almost like a carpet of shrapnel. We were told to catch the Germans by surprise. We did, and there were shells bursting in front of us' all the way.'^ Many platoons met little opposition in the second advance till they were close to theirs objective. The first line of trenches they came to had been left hurriedly by the Germans. Some idea of the intensity of the barrage can be gained 'by-comparing1, it with the. defensive fire our' guru laid down against the Afrika Korps attack in the south of the line at the"end "of August. -In four hours in.-this latest attack one gun alsne fired more than. twice the number of rounds put through in the whole of: their defensive action. Guns were put in their lines as carefully and secretly as the infantry .movements before the attack, were made. The gunners, who had: prepared gun positions and dug: in supplies of ammunition, were keen to begin the battle, but not a shot was fired before the barrage began. • ■

"Everyone gave a hand to keep the guns going," an artillery officer said today. "Some of the ack-ack gunners joined in our gun teams, and cooks and bottle-washers and every spare man in. the regiment helped with the ammunition.'' -Asked to compare the fire of our guns with other artillery barrages he knew of in this and the last war, he. said that probably no heavier qoncentratipn of .fire had ever been put- down in the Russian war. "I would compare if with the barrages of July, 1-91.8,':' he said. "The difference is that very little lof our fire was wasted." •■