Show GERMAN LINES MEt MELT T BEFORE FRENCH GUNS Losses in Fighting Around Fort Vaux Surpass All Pr Previous vio s Records T euton Bodies Lie in Heaps After Assault I PARIS PARIS March 13 The The German losses in n the fighting fighting a around und I Vaux last Friday and Saturday surpass all previous records in inthis f this war this v war r according to officers who have returned from Verdun Time and time again I and with extraordinary courage the Germans in columns four deep rushed from their trenches only to melt away under the fire lire of the French 7 75 and and millimeter guns When the sm smoke ke and dust dusl cleared nothing was to tobe b be seen but heaps of bodies The spur on which the fort is situated el ed Is almost perpendicular in places The German lines were forced to halt but many many Bavarian reservists climbed climber up UI on on one another's shoulders an struggled up the slope clinging to angles an an- l s of rock and grasping tufts of grass Tass Again and again these theM human pyramids collapsed into shapeless shapeless' gray masse masses At the lowest estimate the at attackers attackers attackers at- at lost two-thirds two of their tives The fighting was extremely desperate desperate desper desper- ate when regiments from the Fifteenth I i and Eighteenth German army corps at attacked attacked at- at tac tacked cd the village of Vaux Vau on Friday Dawn was breaking and over the countr country coun- coun tr try hung hun huna a heavY white mist making everything invisible beyond a hundred yards This enabled the Germans to get within rushing distance of tho French front trenches but although they outnumbered the defenders six to toone toone toone one it took four distinct assaults before the first column of Germans won the shelter of a small group of houses beyond beyond beyond be be- yond the church of Vaux They then organized an assault upon the church and the French being unable to bring up reinforcements on account of the German curtain of fire withdrew their advanced elements Five times the north Prussian regiments rushed to attack the church but every time they left the shelter of the ruined houses they were beaten back by th the fire from machine guns and the shrapnel from th the French millimeter 58 guns In the meantime in their rear a 3 curtain of fire was kept up by the I French and 2106 so that it was ImI impossible impossible im Im- im- im possible for munitions and reinforcementS reinforcements reinforcements reinforce reinforce- I ments to be brought up for their benefit benefit ben ben- benefit and the fight died down clown on Friday night nig-hl from sheer exhaustion |