MOROCCAN TROOPS STRIKE TERROR INTO THE ENEIM

New Zealand Herald, Volume LI, Issue 15749, 26 October 1914, Page 5

MOROCCAN TROOPS STRIKE TERROR INTO THE ENEIM

EVIDENCE OF INCOMPETENT LEADERSHIP. GERMAN DIVISION WITHOUT AMMUNITION OR FOOD. London, October 23. A German officer who participated in the fighting at Roye and Noyon says: We had to dig up the soil of a whole forest to bury our dead. The voice of conscience is choked, and the finer sentiment of humanity suppressed. When we come across a house nothing remains inside. We thought the trenches impregnable, but were forced to retreat. The Moroccan troops are a terror to our men. No sooner havp we taken shelter in a wood than a hail of bullets comes' from the branches, where the Moroccans have climbed. Tho Seventeenth Division has neither ammunition nor food. Our leaders seem quite incompetent, and many men are dying from fatigue. Our ill-fed horses drop at an appalling rate. He adds that any successes the Germans score arc neutralised by the terrible losses. Their men fight bravely, the writer says, but the allies are becoming more and more audacious and warlike. The Turcos and Zouaves he describes as hardy fighters and deadly marksmen. The writer adds that the Germans had a victory at Rernoncourt, in the Vosges, but the victory, he deplored, was a veritable slaughter. Some of the victims were youthful members of the house of SchleswigHolstcin, of whom few remained.