GERMAN ONSLAUGHT.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 16038, 24 January 1918, Page 8

GERMAN ONSLAUGHT.

ATTACKS ON CAMERA L FRONT. WAVE AFTER WAVE ALL DAY. The German attempt to retrieve the defeat inflicted by Sir Julian Byng’s surprise attack on November 20 was made lon days later. 'Die encircling attack, as General von Manvitz described it, was delivered in two blows directed at the ends of the Hindenburg salient. He struct first in the south, sending the Thirty-fourth Division against Gonneliou Ridge, and two hours later the greater eliort became manifest in the north, where infantry in mass began the ait-day series of rushes across the open ground against Bourlon Wood and southward between that hillock and Moeuvres. The German commander allowed time for us to concentrate troops to hold his storm troops south of Cambrai, hoping perhaps that meanwhile the battering ram built up by six good infantry divisions around Bourlon would gain sufficient impetus to drive right through, the British front, twisting to the left ns it-plunged forward, and sweeping the contents of the salient into a confused mass between the contracting jaws of the pincers. The correspondent of the- London Times says tho first intimation of a large movement on the part of the enemy was the heavy shelling which began shortly before 7 .JO a.in. An immense number of gas shells was used, both on the northern side, conspicuously on Bourlon Wood, and on some sections on the south, and on the latter side an infantry attack was launched almost simultaneously with the beginning of the shelling. The new line wa» not defended by a formal trench system with thick wire entanglements. The Gormans had practically open positions confronting thorn everywhere. ATTACK'ON HINGE OF NEW LINE The attack upon the southern side seems to have been launched upon some 12,000 yards of the front from Crevecoeur to tho east and south of Gonnelieu. Gonnelieu was the point from which the extreme right of our recent advance started; and, therefore, was tho hinge or angle formed by our old lino and our new. Evidently it was a point by driving a wedge in which tho enemy could hope to gain the largest results. .His hopes might have been realised with any troops who fought less well than ours. About- this hinge or angle Were certain English county battalions which have seen very hard fighting this summer. The Germans attacked in groat weight, much heavier than we ever use. Cavalry supported the infantry. The Germans succeeded in penetrating our linos to the south-east of Gonneliou, and, advancing across open country, reached the village of Villers-Guislain. From tho breach made there they endeavoured to push north-eastwards. They were strengthened by other troops on their right, which poured in through the widening breach in our lines. Our first thin lino of troops had resisted as far as it- wan possible to resist, but the enemy came on in masses, and, whatever gaps machine-guns or rifles might make in them, more masses followed. With every hundred yards of advance, however, their attack lost momentum. By half-past ten their rush was definitely held, the west edges of Gouzeaucourt and Gauche Wood marking the farthest limit- of the advance. They wore able to maintain themselves in those positions for something over four hours. Then our counter-attack fell upon them, with tanks assisting. By three o’clock tho German lino began to give way and -our mc|i forced an entrance into Gouzcaucourt, and large numbers of Germans .streamed out of the" village back eastward.' While the majority of tho enemy infantry fell back, a number of machine-gunners and snipers continued to try to hold ihe village, and fought hard. Steadily, however, - we fought our way through! the village, and the whole place was again in our hands.

UNPARALLELED SLAUGHTER. The attack on the northern side of the salient furnished certainly tho heaviest, and perhaps tho most dramatic, fighting of a dramatic day.. In effect, it was one massed onslaught upon our positions all tho way from near Gautning, by Fontaine, past Bourlon Wood, to and beyond Moeuvros. As on tho south, the front was nob much under 12.000 yards, nearly seven miles. It was in stern earnest everywhere, but where tho enemy made the supremo effort was on Bourlon Wood and to tho west of it towards Moouvrcs. But it was in the open country to the west of the wood that the most extraordinary fighting went on. How. many massed waves of Germans came on hero no one seems to know, but. from half-past nine o’clock until dark they never stopped. Wave after wave, attack after attack, mass upon mass, our gunners and observation officers say that the ground was isimply black with Gormans. And by the end of the day much of the ground was still black with dead. At places field guns wore brought up with tiio infantry presumably with some idea of their being useful against tho tanks, and our guns got on ta them. and knocked them nut in some cases before they bad fired more than a single round. Our guns, machineguns, and rifles were all busy. It was like fighting successive swarms of bees, and, if the bees came on long enough and thick enough, some of them will ultimately get somewhere.

So there was a time when some of the Germans actually got forward nearly 2000yds., and are said to have touched the Cambrai road at the sugar refinery above Graincourt, but they could not stay there. It was only the apex of the swarm that peached that 'point. Both to the right and the left the oncoming flood was held, and then the apex which had thrust forward—-I know I am mixing metaphors—was forced back again,, and the flood retreated on itself until hy the end of a dreadful and bloody day the whole gain that the enemy had made at the price of so awful a number of lives, was represented on the map hy a little bay or dent in our positions in tbo open country where it means nothing. Rarely have a few yhrds of ground been won at such a terrible cost.