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Show TELLS HOW IT FEELS TO BEJiER FIRE American Correspondent in France Uses Trusty Typewriter Type-writer During Battle. HAS THRILLING TIME Views Portion of Big Fight From the Top of a Tall Tree. By HENRY G. WALES, International News Service Staff Correspondent. Cor-respondent. WITH THE AMERICAN ARMY IN FRANCE, April 15 (By Mail). American Ameri-can troops, in conjunction with French, are putting on a "show" within two miles Wiere I am writing this, and I have carried my little portable typewriter up here to record, under fire, the exact impressions im-pressions one gets when with the men In action. Every ttme our big guns bark or the French batteries come Into action in their carefully concealed hiding places I near by, the little typewriter leaps from this officers' mess table, and whenever a big German shell breaks hereabouts I jump a little myself. It is a little after 7 o'clock in the evening, eve-ning, and the preliminary artillery preparation prep-aration has just begun. From random firing, breaking casually along the whole line, the French and American guns just broke into concerted action. They are concentrati ng on two points in the enemy's en-emy's defenses, to smash up his positions, breach lanes through his barbed wire and break down the morale of such troops as he has posted up front. Erupp Batteries Busy. Already the Krupp batteries are beginning be-ginning to reply, all of them bending their efforts on counter battery work, trying to find the French and American guns and silence them with direct hits. "Whir-r-r-r-r," goes a big shell from an American piece in a wood behind and to the east of us. It screams overhead, making exactly the same noise that a subway train roars out of the gratings as it flashes up Broadway. We know it is not meant for us because we heard the gun report, and can make out the whistling whis-tling getting fainter and fainter as it tears through space toward a German battery. There is a flash far off to the west of us, and then a few seconds later the "cramp" of the bursting shell echoes back to us. But four successive flashes from the other side of the line indicate that no hit was registered, as the enemy is still battery firing in his precise "one, two, three, four" fashion, setting off his guns in turn. Jfr behind us another American bat-Jffcomes bat-Jffcomes into action with a rush, the :'-fcunlayers smashing out volley after vol- ley, in rapid succession. They are, in a rather exposed position and. are work--Vng their guns mighty fast, even though Tgy do heat them up, because they won't wafcle to continue firing long, for fear BVitSyc will spot them. Because of the lack of protection where they are, their flashes light up tho whole terrain like heat lightning in summertime. Good Vantage Point. "Go cross the road there and down that path of duckboards and you will come to a ladder leadin' up a high tree. Go on up there and you can see every -thin' fine," the cook advised me. I did as he advised. It was a very high tree and the observer's position was In the extreme ex-treme top. I found a French sublieutenant sublieu-tenant up there, with night glasses and a portable telephone, directing certain batteries bat-teries located- several miles to the eastward. east-ward. . "It's burning," he said In French, motioning mo-tioning toward two segments of the front about a mile apart, where the bursting shells were concentrated. From this vantage point I coul see quite over a low ridge in front of me to the advanced lines and could also discern niore clearly just where the French and American batteries were emplaced. And beyond, on the other side, I could see distinctly the flashes from the snouts of the enemy's guns as they popped again and again. Meantime the artillerv fire had been lncreas'r-e: In Intensity as more and more batteries came into play. Overhead the six-Inch and eight-inch shells were roaring roar-ing through the sky back and forth, with an occasional one breaking in the wood to the right, searching for the American battery there. Rockets Sent Up. Suddenly (he maJn concentration of shelling switched from one to the other or the two short segments of front which had been lmmmered, and In a moment up went a string of rockets from tho front line trenches. "Gas," salrl the French officer. "They f are signaling to the rear that gas shells iire coming in: Probably the telephono fnes have been cut by the enemy's fire, Ai they don't trust solely to carrier PiSVons." Tiiwthe rattle of machine guns roiled out, clear and distinct from every other noise, despite the tremendous booming of the big guns. But while this had been happening a wan of bursting flame sprang into being, marking a well-defined position along a short sector. It was the allied barrage of shell fire designed botli to prevent such f.ermans as had been trapped In the salient to be raided from getting back to llielr support positions and also to bar the enemy from sending up reinforcements reinforce-ments to his advanced positions which wcro In course of being raided. Big Guns Are Active. The curtain of riro was maintained with three-inch shells, chleflv shrapnel, with seine H. E high explosive mixed In. And the barrage did not in tho least In-lerfere In-lerfere with the bombardment whicli had it u60'"8 on before. That continued, trio bigger guns either maintaining then-destructive then-destructive fire, although with a longer rarVu6, smashing up the enemy's positions 'arther to the rear, or contenting themselves them-selves with counter-battery work, trying jo knock out such enemy guns as were hammering our front lines and trying to Prevent the raid. The enemy gunlayers ceased paying attention at-tention to American and French batteries Hid turned all their time to a concen-""J'ed concen-""J'ed Are on our first and support lines, while their own field guns, three-inchers. set up a rather feeble and wavering barrage bar-rage in No Man's Land, with tho pur-Pose pur-Pose of either preventing tho raiding Party from crossing or barring it from getting back if It had reached their lines. Return's to Earth. Then I crept carefully down the long ladders, back to the mess tent The crowd there had swelled to thirty or forty men, all quiet and serious ss tnc rooming room-ing of the big guns, the cracking of the light field pieces and the rattling of the machlnguns floated across the vallev to thcffTrs. fTadually the firing was dying down; Jonly the machine gun rattling continued. I descended Into the underground shelter to see what telephonic reports were com- Ing back. A tired lieutenant was sitting In his cubbyhole more than fifty feet underground. The apparatus was strapped I to his ears. f "Yes. they are coming in now," he replied, re-plied, "but there is no information yet. Fritzy put in quite pome bombardment on our advanced positions, but didn't ac- ' complish anything." |