CAPTURE OF VIMY RIDGE.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 14287, 2 May 1917, Page 8

CAPTURE OF VIMY RIDGE.

GROUND TAKEN DEAR TO HEARTS OF FRENCHMEN.

Canadian Headquarters m Fraaiee. Tlie crest of the Vimy. Ridge, has been ' oal'ried. The .strongest defensive position of til© enemy on the Western front lias 'been Raptured by the. army of Sir Douglas llaig, and the Canadian corps hud the place, of . hollor m . the .-great eventj ..,• being strortgjy' supported by some of the moat famous of the British regiments. • . , . , . : '•■■-.•.-: : Tile attack was .preceded by a. bombardment which continued for. . - several days, and m which guns of the.heaviest calibre, formerly used on ' only ■■>■ the biggest battleships,, took < part. The results of this a>rtillevy .' concentration as revealed by aerial observation, w.ei'e the same as m the battle of .the Somme. Aeroplanes, flying low, could find./on.ly shapeless masses of churned up I earth, where the-, enemy's first , lin© i had been. By . Saturday ... afternoon, Thelus, .the chief Yilia.ge.hekl by the enemy on the ridgie and lying due east of Neuvjile St. Vaast, was. pounded out of all. ie-. cognition, with only two houses stanij- 1 ing. Prisoners taken to-id of heavy; enemy losses. Even m, deep > dugouts,; Arh ere the Germans had hoped, to be; reasonably safe' m > that .rain, of ..death,: no safety was. to be found anywhere.' In a desperate attempt to blind: the: eyes of the attacking army, the Germans. on Saturday endeavored to destroy our. observation balloons. i <v I . LIT UP BY; MOON. ...-.= ■ | Saturday night, our gun&:, -continued; the work of destruction under condi-j tions. which made a spectacle that was majestic ; and - . a.we-inspirhig. , •> A- fullmoon m .the- east .lit - up. the country-; side with mellow beams on the horizon, ■while the flash of the guns made!.a.continuous play, like that of the Northern Ligbts m the Dominion,! 'or distant, sheetiightning. - • This was sharply broken now; andi again by, a column of reddish yellow flames, where', on the ridge, high explosives were bursting. - ; The gunners, -with tireless energy, continued . the cannonade throughout Eester Sunday. -• . , ■ . ..: , • On Monday morning came the- supreme moment, when our. infantry" was called upon to go out and, reajp the 'fruits of months of preparation. They had endured, unwaveringly, the answering fire of the; enemy, which, however, was not comparable- -to ours. Soiru;, impatient to be at .the. foe, had gone out on small wars of their- own, and it is recorded that m one of the individual encounters m, "No 'Man's Land," &> Canadian,;. meeting a German, pursued him after emptying' .bis revolver at him. The Canadian. " calst about for some other weapon. -The only one within reach, was -his steel .helmet, and with the sharp edge of that he killed the armed German. VGREAT OCCASION '" Such was the spirit of the infantry, who, m, the grey preceding the dawn, sprang from tljeir, shelters, when, the appointed time. came. ,It \yas .the great occasion and "greatly they me,fc it..; Erom the ci-aters which had been; organised alon^ the scar.re 4. front and which resembled the, opening .made m quarrying operations ,the distance, to the top of the ndge ranged. from 1200.'. yards to a little short of a mile. Thereafter the ground falls easterly toward the great plain of. Camlira.i. ".... :; ': Upj the ridge, iainid tl^e ,' shattered German trendies, our mciv swarmed m successive waves. On the northerfi end a few trees along the skyline marked where the woods of La Folie had been. The troops advanced through the remains of an orchard. ' Within half an hour 'after the first German distress rocket had ' "been sent j up, calling for barrage fir© from, the Teuton artillery and indicating "a surprise attack, our objective- was obtained with slight loss. ■■'•■• ■•'." ' . •■' ;• • • ; >The "tanksi' 1 which" 'aocompanied our advancing infantry up : to- the ridge, •had 'little to do, but 'were' seeri m action later near the crest of Vimy, on the extreme north of the line, at a point cast of Souchez. where much hard fighting took place m 1915, when thousands of> men fell. .. ■ . ... . i Til© enemy , put . up a stiff fight at Rill -145, -which had been . vprovided t skillfully with concealed maohine-gun jjositions. Long a-ffcer they; had been driven from the surrpunding ground, the Germans on the. hill continued to sweep iioints of approadi --Avith their machine-guns. • , ■ /< ••• SliiNT UP, RESERVES. .Kncouraged, by this show of resistance on what otherwise . was a stricken field, the enemy began, to- send up Reserves m, trains from , Lens and) Douai, and perhaps, a<. greavter distance, with the intention/ of making, a /counterattack, iTliat .attack was, .never made; As reports, came m ,fro.m< the, .front and from the 1 aviators' of this massing, of the enemy beyond Vimy and ..the trenches' m the vicinity, a '.tremendous barrage was tiuned on it by out heavy guns ; the range being too great for field artillery. Probably for the first , time "in ' tfie war 12-inch weapons AVere . u^ed for this purpose at very lorfg range. This splendid co-operation of . -tlie . artillery aim m preventing a (heavy counterattack did ' much to- 'lessen our casualties on a difficult part of the froiit. On, the southern end of the 1 Canadian sector, the, Germans yielded : ground more readily than m the north. 'Many; prisoners were taken,, and as for Thelus, which had been -strongly held 1 before,.' our guns- hammered itto : pieces. It did not Jong hold out.- V- - -

By 12 : 30 o'clock, seven hours : after the battile begun, no organised, body of tho enemy remained on Vimy ridge' except the most concealed of the? ma-chine-guns on Hill 145. .- •' P* • . A Of the casualties, it caiPonly be said at this moment that -they are surprising--ly light, espedaJly m view -of;, the importance of , the: ground, ,>von. The prisoners taken m ithe Canadian advance alone probabjy ; amount clos.e ..to. , -200 Q .: The Britisli! troops.,''in the adjacent sector captured ... oyer .3000. . • ,-• - Our men splendid . and , are proud , that they ; were counted; .worthy to furnish a,-, striking -.force m so im-* portant aii.>operatioii as the recaptureof Vimy rife?. . . , X, . .. ,.., . . „.-■ . IS DEAR TO FRA-NCK. , V 4. ' No ground m all ; France is. more dear to the hearts \ of the' French .people' than the front .m which the Canadians set out to drive the enemy 'from - his' position on \ the ; ridge of ,-••. V"imy.t .■-The* chapel of Notre "Dame del A/Lo^tte, Souches* and the , i sugar rf . refinery . ; are,. there, to conquer the.. cvui\i,bliilgi • ruins of which, men during the w^jj<*4iadi died: m, thousands,; , <the ,. Neuyrlle. ; $ii ■ Vaast". '' ; these are- the names thaitt'-wdl :, 6,6,;- forever glorious- for the- Canadian Imemory m. France. ■;. „ . X.yX : xyy • - In tho spring of 1915, before jthe.'tre-. mendous ..-..dramas -Of ..Verdun. : and the Somme .had, been ,- conceived,. ,tlie^ army of France made^ the -Hi-^t great attenipt to drive 'the "entrenched enemy from

his positions here. The progress made, reckoned m miles, was almost negligible, but the French learned on tho ridges and m the long shelterless slopes of 4his difficult ground, th? lessons that enabled them and their allies to win at Verdun and the- Somme. .:■ -

"STRANGE ENGINES t>F WAR." LONDON, April 10. Tlie Daiily, 'Elxpross corrcspyndeut with the British a,rmies says :-— . | , "The Canadians hays 1 Vimy Ridge and j are sitting on. the far slopes; .looking down on the plain of Oouai. •..•: They took it with coniparativtiy little lighting, pushing f romi one .line to the next as punctually as' 'though -.meeting their enemies by appointment. There, as elsewhere, m, -the Arras-Viniy ;areas, most of the prisoners were brought out of the dugouts m a most 'docile condition. "Tlie Canadians... took niore than 2000 Germans at Vimy Ridge alone, while on the adjoining Qinadian front there .were .1054 men> ; and 26-.- officers . in- : one cage alone before, 3 .o'clock m tlie. afternoon. Another^,. correspondent speaks of prisoners arriving yin endless procession." ..One of. the most i*«markable features of .tlie fighting -was the large, number of .weapons .employed, which were not m Use ; in. earlier, wars. The tanks played an important part, armored : cars were also m action supporting, the infantry. Airmen . speeding at ,130 miles • an hour .despite conditions, iVerg-ing on those of a -.hurricane ; were active above. . .."Strange engines of war" are also mentioned by the Daily Mail correspondenti i As regard^ British casualties the Daily Mail correspondent says: — "Our 1 losses, considerable at . places, are not half what - were expected, and were amaaingly .light on. certain fronts." Tlie Daily Telegraph's military correspondent says yesterday's victory was by far the most successful day's work accomplished by the i British army since the outbreak of the war. •'..-.> i.^BLOW AT.VTTAL. CORD...', . "The*: "victory aims a. blow ab a vital cord of ,the German host, by .which they maintain" their : connection- withy thsir i army covering Lille, and* 1 French and-. Belgian, manufacturing disfsricts. .It .also imenaces the right, flank: of- the Bavarian 'Crown Prince's army, , which is delaying Sir Douglas Haig's advance upon Cambrai." : "XdXiXy '-■•'* Sii *'" i, -' ; K'--