THEIR PART IN THE ADVANCE

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LII, Issue 249, 16 October 1918, Page 4

THEIR PART IN THE ADVANCE

THRILLING .SCENES IN NEW COUNTRY.

SHARP FIGHT AT' LESDAIN AND .ESNES.

(Special from the Official New Zealand War Correspondent.)

BY CABLE, Oct. 8.

I An unsual quiet reigned on our '■ front last night. At intervals a Boche shell whistled drearily overhead and crashed in an adjacent village. The night was cold and wet. With the first glimmer of the dawn ,in the leaden east, the whole scene [ changed, and tiie front for miles bei came suddenly ablaze with flashing | guns, while the drumfire of the bar- : rage rolled across the valleys and ' hills.' It was l 4.30 when the New Zealander,, moved , forward beyond St. Queritin 'Canal to the attack on Lesdairi and Esnes, two villages beyond ! Crevecoeur, which had already fallen !to 'them. The Otago arid Canterbury j troops were on the right, the Rifies on j the left. . Early in the advance the opposition, mostly from machine-gun i and riflte-fiire, was imet in front o;f Lesdain, at the beet crushing factory, and frcm the village itself; but this was soon overcome, and our troops were,killing the Bosches in ,tho street . and on either side. Several prisoners . were taken here. Pressing .on with j their usual; determination, our men. I crossed a tramway and ahead- of it met with more opposition in a sunken . road, where, there were several deep German dugouts. ■ j As tlie morning wore on the weather ; improved, arid the battlefield presen.tjfd a most -wonderful sight. Along • the crest of the ridge ahead the i Stoke s shells mingling with ,the darkjer 'bursts of the high explosives rose lin columns straight in the air, and i at intervals the play of the sunlight on this smoking line, was most pictur--1 esque. Our men could be seen about | Seranviller s .on the left and ahead of t Lesdain, making towards the lines. An aeroplane signalled- the oncomi ing of the enemy on, our left; the artillery opened fire oil them, and the lattack faded away. ' Presently we could see .the black bursts of the Boche shells in Seranvillers, (indicating that it had fallen to the division on our left. Prisoners began to come down in- droves, and the 'New Zealand cage was crowded with men and' officers of the 38th, 201 st, and Ist and sth Bavarian divisions. - Non-coms., officers, and men admitted their defeat and said that Germany was done, i At 9.30 the explosions-of a great Ger- | man dump -behind Soranvillers added jto the picturesqueness of the scene. In Lesdain some men of the Rifles had ! stiffish fighting,; .but the honours of the | fight were .entirely- with them. They | killed several and : captured many, ini eluding a battalion commander. Our ; Lewis gunners shot from their hips, land there was a lot of rifle work. Two I hundred and fifty prisoners were : counted.,

At 9.30 our artillery put a barrage on Esnes. W e watched the smoking town and saw- our men, -South Islanders, go gallantly forward -to the attack. After a time ithe shelling died down, and they had won their -second objective. .Some mines were discovered in Esnes. •

GERMANS IN RETREAT. A Squadron of cavalry attached to us "was now sent to Esnes, and exploited the advance towards Caudry, a. town of considerable size, which 3)ad quite recently housed French civilians.. We could plainly discern its undamaged church arid houses and chimney 'stacks, and. up\ th(*- slope • in frbnt of it there .were many retreating"' ■ Germans. • Between nine and ten there were sign,, of a- counter-attack from the direction of Awoingt, on. our left, with tanks, -both German arid ofd British ones convex-Led ; but the German infantry- had not the courage to come | on, and two of their, tanks were left in our hands- Men of the .Rifle Brig- ' ade -were now seen away beyond , Seranvillers, and the South Islanders were beyond Esnes. All their objectives were' taken splendid style, ; and they were now exploiting still further ahead. During these operations our artillery ' got on to the enemy massing for a counter-attack, and. did some splendid shooting. They must have killed and wounded many Boches. At a ■ rc-ugn estimate, . our' prisoners muf-t -Do about three times our ca'sualj ties. Wte capture-d> several guns. I j saw our o\vn"'artillery teams bringing Jin three high " velocity seventy-sevens (field guns), and there were several ( Others. I walked across the battlefield through Lesdain and into Esnas, . and saw myself ' many enemy " deadi j but few of our own. The "/story v pf j itho battle could be read as one walked along. Withdrawing the; cloak from the face of one of our. men. near Lesdain, I found- he was a greatly-esteemed, major, who ha s been with us from, the very ptart. Near: j him was a lieutenant, who -by a- shell 'had met a painless death; and further on a Canterbury. corporal. 1 , These had been killed while advancing gallantly, over quite open ground in the attack. There were a few privates dead here jand .there. About Lesdain there were; jimany Grman dead. Cn a piece of flat' 'lftnd to the left of Esnes road, the venemy dead were thickly . strewn, ."all j killed by one New. Zealand platoon, i j'But. the grimmest sight of all was in j ja sunken road -beyond Lesdain, wheije - lay a New Zealand private and twelve j dead prisoners whom. he was taking i ! back, all killed by- the one German j shell. As I left, two'fires were burn-j ; ing in : German! territory, jiorth of 1 Caudry. ..One, was the "biggest fire i i . have yefc seen on the battlefield. I

HASTY FLIGHT OF THE ENEMY

J 'October Bth, 'Evening. !. Touch was obtained with the res enemy by ,the New Zealanriera j this morning, at Fontainc-au-Pere, where they were held up by machinegun fire- from the village. Some of the were firing from the church steeple. I went again .through' Esnes to Gonghart, where I could seo the . Rifle Brigade men on the left, and the Otago troops oti the right of 'the village. Our supports had dug themselves in in small oblong pits behind, the forward risie. An enemy 'balloon was up, and the {3-ermari girns were firing at our me n oh the left, but the fire wa s not heavy, and the men A >'® r e sheltered from anything, but dihits. From this vantage point, there; was a magnificent view of the country ahead. We had come well east of Oainbrai, which was. still burn.-

ing. Caudry, to the right, was. also smoking, tut the fields were green with.. late crops, where the, French, civilians had. -but recently been, -culti-. vating.- One' had come at last into a pleasant land, where-the ..villages', ■were undestroyied, and the roads were good, except where the bridges were blown in. In the houses there were evidences of the hasty flight of the (French in-, habitants. "Women's and children s. clothing, good crockery, and glassware, and remnants of food were littered about the rooms. In one house, stooda sewing machine with a garment a woman 'had been making still in *t. One wondered what had. happened to the late occupants' of these pleasant village homes. Now their belongings were strewn .to the four winds of lieavtn. On my way back 1 saw-ono of the most comical sights of tho war. A New Zealand ammunition column swung-..round the corner of a villago street in a strange guise. The riders and men on the limbers had discarded. their steel helmets and .were • Hveariii'g " bell-toppers, .howler and felt hats. They were the cynosures of all eyes, and the roads they passed along became gay with thg smiles .of the long columns of infantry, moving forward.

A VAST FORWARD! MOVEMENT,

j Advanced Headquarters, Oct. 9 : This morning everyone -was moving forward. The guns, transport, and in- ! fantry of ,two armies strearnejl along the roads in endles s line. The Boche had gone i n the\ night. .There was an •d«i that lie would go. after, yesterday's British advance, and al} night Jong the gums thundered, harassing his positions in and about Cambrai. This morning oup barrage., came down on no one, and the New Zealanders, advancing behind it, occupied Longsart. At ten ■ o'clock we were, riot yet in touch with the enemy. The South Island troops, with the Rifles, a squadron of cavalry, and an extra machine-gun company, are continuing the advance, and " Headquarters -:aromoving forward. , Though the enemy ; is retiring to the Soleismes-le CSteiyii line, in front of which is tho iSellis river and the railvyay, the" . Hiridenburg line_ is gone for ever. A great; fir© is burning in" Cambrai, an enormous volume! of smoke rising 2000 feet in .the still air. 'On our right other fires have been burning • since yestbVday afternoon, and the whole eastfern horizon is grey with smoke. Hindenburg's and Ludendorff's destroying angels are -busy with their ' aware of the disaster that hag' 6v6'r--■taken them, ' t '• .* ' „ ■ ' ■ 9th October. ; ! It has been an l extraordiiiary day. The (headquarters of divisions and all the services "are streaming forwardVijnto new territory, with villages from, which the 'French civilians as well as the enemy had hurriedly withdrawh. Tlie New Zealand headquarters, which had . "been split in two for ; some days, has now moved well forward 'beyond the St. Quentin Canal, and houses in which there was a litter, of rubbish and dugouts still smelling ; of Boche occupation. We had weird meals a.ti od|d hours, andi strange things happened. Advanced . dressing station's got ahead of the regimental aid, posts and the ammunition refilling point was almost at our front line. '-If:,. prists ' wonderful how the ammunition -arid supplies arrived. Well • forward one saw Maori Pioneers eating Taw -carrots from garden plots, and onr infantry digging ipotatoes or cutitang cabbages that, pither'tho G|er>riAn £ i, l or the French " had sown'., . Tho day was fine, . anil our men, ' 'in high ' spirits, were ; thoroughly §njoyiiig itherryjetoes. Theiy were again - r in t'jjuch _with tho enemy, who did not seem in great force, and. apparently •vVas fighting a rearguard action in' the villages. 'One had to be caj-eful of booby traps. Bits of wire pulled by* the unwary might , explode a concealed shell or a mine. We were warned- not to light a fire in any stove in-. ;eaee'.'ii would melt some connection .that would fire a mine. Darkness still fell upon us looking for somewhere to sleep, -with a strange '/.quiet',." , for there w/as ' iio -'sound of grin' ' ribr -bursting s shell. ' Gradually;, "howeVer, things straightened themselves out, and i%e t dined at an ultra'-faslnonablo hoiir. Along the road lay dead horses and dead 1 Bodies that there liad as yet not been time 1 to, bury. To-morrow we may move again. It i fi all strangely interesting and good- to bo in the midst of such moving scenes.