ENEMY REPORTS OPENING OF A FIERCE STRUGGLE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIV, Issue 16670, 15 October 1917, Page 5

ENEMY REPORTS OPENING OF A FIERCE STRUGGLE.

PENETRATION OF LINES BY BRITISH ADMITTED. Australian find N.Z. and Router. (Reed. 5.5 p.m.) LONDON, Oct. 13. A German official communique states: The English yesterday penetrated between the station and village%f Poelcapelle. We threw back the enemy on both sides of the Pendsbeck. The enemy directed strong pressure upon Passchendaele village, which we retain, the enemy gaining only a narrow strip of the fprefield. The artillery fire increased to drumfire between the River Lys and the Comines-Ypres Canal. The battle is still in full swing on the Langemarck-Zonnebeke front. Fighting continues in some places where the English penetrated our lines north of Poelcapelle and south-west of Passchendaele. An earlier message stated: Between the River Lys and the YpresMenin Road firing increased suddenly to drumfire in the morning. New enemy attacks then commenced on wide sectors. Intense artillery firing is in progress north-east of Soissons, east of the Meuse, and at Monastir. Beuter. AMSTERDAM, Oct 12. Herr Wegener, correspondent of the Cologne Gazette, in a description of what he terms "tremendous development of the British war maohine," says that beyond the German lines is an enormous war camp. Networks of railways are springing up, and bridge after bridge has been built over the Yser Canal. The country is covered with ammunition dumps, aerodromes, and encampments. Masses of airmen are' using unexampled new tactics, and much use is made of intermittent drumfire, designed to destroy the nerves. What the German soldiers endure is beyond description-