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Show GERMANS DESTROY FIDOS BUILDINGS THE MARKET PLACE AND CITY HALL OF YPRES BATTERED BY VIOLENT BOMBARDMENT. Furious Blizzard Prevents Action by Infantry, so Big Guns Are Put lito Action and Do ireat Damage. Paris. The German guns have destroyed de-stroyed W6 famous Halles (Market Place), and city hall of Ypres. The French war office made this announcement an-nouncement Sunday night, adding that the havoc was wrought as a result of a. most violent bombardment. Heavy cannonading was reported also at JSoiasons and at Vailly, on the Aisne, hut the greatest damage was done at "Ypres. The historic Halles was the most considerable edifice of its kind in Belgium Bel-gium and dated from the year 1200. The three early Gothic facades of the Halles des Drapiers, or cloth hall proper, -were of three stories and were flanked by corner turrets. It was in the cloth hall that some of the finest examples of the cloth making industry, which, in Ypres, dates back to the eleventh century, were exhibited. exhib-ited. The east side of the Halles was bounded by a charming renaissance structure erected in 1620-24. The Hotel Devllle (town hall) -was an unpretentious structure dating originally from the fourteenth century and located at the north end of the cloth hall. The day was confined entirely to artillery activity! The fury of the blizzards which have been raging in Flanders and in France for the past four days precluded the possibility of action by infantry except trench work, which was carried on under great difficulties, dif-ficulties, owing to the frozen condition condi-tion of the ground. The dead and wounded have been reclaimed from the "No Man's Land" "between the trenches, and great trains of the latter have been sent south, where the victims may receive auooor long delayed. The dead have been Interred in long trenches, sometimes some-times made by blasting the frozen .ground, but behind most of the fighting fight-ing lines excavations for burials have not been found lacking, for the hostile hos-tile shells from cannon and mortar have torn great holes in the ground where they struck. In Flanders the flooded region has become a great field of ice and tho German trenches have become untenable unten-able because of the untold agonies the troops are compelled to suffer to oc cupy them. In these ditches the Ice las no chance to form because of the constant trampling, but the water is frigid and many cases of frozen feet and limbs are reported to have demanded de-manded the attention of surgeons. |