THE ROUT.

Waipawa Mail, Volume XXXVII, Issue 7913, 2 August 1917, Page 1

THE ROUT.

PANIC RUTHLESSLY SUPPRESSED. BRITISH HELP TO STEM THE RETREAT. Times Service. LONDON, July 31. Mr Wilton writes that the Russian staff is more hopeful. The panic is being suppressed ruthlessly. Three divisions of cavalry have taken up positions along the front of retreat, and attempts to spread panic resulted in prompt executions. Plundering was similarly punished. Deserters and spies who enjoyed immunity under the committees lie dead on the highways with a paper pinned on the corpses notifying that “Here lies a traitor. ’ ’ Detailing the experiences of the British armored cars Mr Wilton supplies interesting peeps of the retreat. The advancing Germans shouted “Hurrah, good Russians,” and the latter flung their rifles down and ran for their lives. In another place everybody, in a panic, ran away before the Germans. Near Kozowa suddenly appeared British machine guns and killed hundreds of the enemy. Each car fired 3000 rounds. The Austrian advance was often incredibly slow. The Russian lines were not occupied for two days after the evacuation. The hottest fighting occurred at Darahow, where the British ambushed the enemy in houses and courtyards, destroying them wholesale. The respite enabled the Russians to rally, entrench and drive out the Germans. At 4 in the morning of the 24th a corps commander informed Commander Locker Lampson that two divisions had bolted, leaving a 15miles gap. He ordered the British cars to protect this huge space. Working along the roads the cars caused great execution among the enemy. They encountered large forces at a fifty yards range and mowed them down. Several cars were destroyed by direct hits of shells. The drivers, heroic but wounded, continued to drive. Some were 20 hours in their seats. The enemy cavalry and infantry repeatedly showed unwillingness to advance against the cars without the support of heavy guns, which were slow in coming. AN ENEMY ACCOUNT.

A correspondent of the “Berliner Tageblatt” supplements Mr Wilton’s story, revealing how a number of subordinate officers in several Moscow regiments and the sth Siberian Army Corps sacrificed themselves and were battered in the trenches vainly endeavoring to stay the retreat. The 11th Army steadfastly held the east bank of the Sereth while the British guns stationed on low hillocks near Tarnopol swept the lines of advance with splendid accuracy. The rapid advance of the enemy’s field guns ultimately outnumbered and silenced the plucky batteries. When the Russians fired Tarnopol before retreating the Belgian tanks fought gamely in the streets, endeavoring to cover the evacuation of the wounded and stores during the last terrible scene when the German guns and aeroplanes rained a shower of shells on the panic-stricken, fleeing mob of mutineers and civilians.