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Show I BATTLE WHICH BROUGHT TO RUMANIA ITS FIRST GREAT '. : DISASTER OF THE WAR IHermannstadt, Transylvania, Oct. 13. One of the battles of the present war which future generations will study is the one which led to the complete com-plete rout and disorganization of the First Rumanian army southeast of this city. For several reasons the battle bat-tle in question is by far the most interesting in-teresting of the European war. It caused the retreat of the Rumanian forces which had invaded Transylvania Transylva-nia and called for a flank maneuver whose success was possible only with an enemy who took too much for granted. When General Falkenhayn's forces reached the country north of Hermannstadt, Hermann-stadt, the general military situation was not favorable for the central powers' pow-ers' troops. The invading Rumanian troops had occupied good positions and had the advantage of numerical superiority. supe-riority. Kronstadt and the country north of that city had been occupied. The entire valley of the Alt was in the hands of the Rumanians, and the Germans Ger-mans and Austro-Hungarian troops depended de-pended for transportation upon a few single-handed railroads of little strategic strate-gic value. Gradually contact was established with the enemy by advancing the central cen-tral forces' right wing. The Vulcan pass was taken. Thls done the Teutonic Teu-tonic army pressed slowly forward along the Transylvanian Alps, driving H, tention of the Rumanian general staff to push as far west as the Theiss riv-i riv-i er was wrecked. B Hermannstadt had not been occupied by the Rumanians, a failure due to lack of initiative. The city could have been taken without much fighting, but already the Rumanians had been given several good examples of Falkenhayn's strategy. The Rumanians lay south of the city in a half circle, refrained Hj from offensive maneuvers and so gave Falkenhayri the very opportunity he needed to set his great drive in mo-tion. mo-tion. Slowly the imperial troops were advanced towards the hills north of the Alt, while against the Ghost forest in the east central cavalry was thrown to protect the left flank. This was the situation on Septem-ber Septem-ber 23. The Rumanians had the Red Tower pass in their rear, and a frontal at-tack at-tack might do no more than throw them upon this. It was necesasry to Ht close the pass. This could be done t only by sending troops through "the in mountains west of the pass, a very iH difficult maneuver since the mountains ppB have no roads of any sort. Artillery and a supply train were out of the Question. Crossing the Mountains. General Falkenhayn decided to at-pfll at-pfll tempt the flank movement wTIth soma 1 German alpine troops, of which Ba- ppfl varian mountaineers were but a small , contingent, many of the "alpine" sol- PB diers being In reality natives of Meck- H lenburg, men who in all their lives had J never climbed a mountain. I Three battalions set out The men I carried food, for four days and their PB regular Issue of ammunition. Reserve PB supplies were carried on a hastily or- PB ganized pack train. Through the foot- PB v hills of the mountains a road could be PB used, then pathB were followed, and PB finally the crests near the Rumanian j border had to be gained through dense forests and across boulder fields. PB An old feature of the maneuver PB was that the contact established with the Rumanian border guards did not result in the commander of the First Rumanian army taking some precau-tionary precau-tionary measure for the protection of PB his flank. The German flankers had daily sklrmishea with the Rumanian border troops, but never met serious opposition. The flanking force was to reach the Red Tower Pass on September 26, on which day a frontal attack was to be made from the direction of Hermannstadt. Her-mannstadt. Despite great hardships and the abandonment at the .village of Dus of the pack train, the Germans succeeded in reaching the heights above the Alt defile on the morning of the 26th. Some engineers descended descend-ed into the gorge and blew up the road at two points where revetments made this feasible. Bven then the Rumanians seem to have felt abso-! abso-! lutely secure. The fact that In their rear an enemy was destroying their one direct line of communication does not seem to have troubled them much. Probably the thought that the road through the Alt valley and to Kronstadt Kron-stadt was-pen may be responsible for this. The original program had called for a general attack at 7 in the morning on the 26th. The flanking troops were in telephonic connection with headquarters, and so learned that the attack from Hermanstadt had been postponed. The situation of the alpine troops was far from reassuring. A movement on their own flank might be undertaken by the Rumanians at any hour. The 26th passed. The flanking body had been divided Into three columns, as the pass was ap-j ap-j proached. The one advancing close to the Rumanian" hordrrr reached thf nasa close to Riul Vatului, the Rumanian border point. The central column neared the gorge three miles above, while the third body squeezed itself through, botwoon the Rumanians at Hermannstadt and the central range. Slaughter Was Terrific. September 27 passed without the frontal attack occurring. It was learned, however, that the Rumanians were taking their artillery through the defile. On the following day the flanking flank-ing bodies began to be pressed by the Rumanians. Reinforcements could not be brought into the mountains at short notice, so that, the prospects semed not the brighte'st. On September 29 a strong artillery fire in the north announced that the frontal attack-was being made. The alpine troops advanced to positions directly di-rectly overlooking the road In the defile. de-file. Already the road was filled with the van of the van of the retreating Rumanians. It was caught in the machine-gun and rifle fire of the Germans ,(t two points, one south, the other immediately north of the village ot Veres Torony. The slaughter was terrific, as The Associated Press correspondent cor-respondent is able to testify from a visit to the spot. In the few minutes the narrow road was filled with dead men and animals. From Boicza the Rumanian retreat was pressing upon those on the road, who on their right had unscalable precipices upon which perched the enemy, and on their left another precipice and a deep river. Men, animals ani-mals and wagons plunged through the road's guard rail Into the surging torrent tor-rent below, never to come to the surface sur-face again. Their bodies were still resting on the rock ledges and sand banks when the correspondent went over the ground. At Veres Torony there is a stone bridge across a mountain stream emptying emp-tying into the Alt from the west A German machine gun platoon reached a height nearby and took the bridge under fire. Soon the space between the ramparts was filled with dead and wounded men and animals. Death reaped its fullest harvest here, Those who were not cut down by the hail of bullets plunged over the bridge into the water, where wounded men and animals formed a writhing mass. Defeat Became Rout. The cry came "sauve qui peut." An entire army, or that part of it whira had been driven Into the gorge melted melt-ed of a sudden into a panicky, fleeing mob. Again the river claimed hundreds hun-dreds of victims, and thoso lucky enough to reach the other sido fell under the machine gun fire of the Germans. The pressure forcing tho Rumanians Ruman-ians into Red Tower Pass was exerted exert-ed by the frontal attack which Falkenhayn Falk-enhayn engineered from the north. Had it been posslblo to close the Alt valley east of Hermanstadt the entire First Rumanian army would have been annihilated. As it was this route was in part open, though to close it had been intended and had been tho cause of the delay of tho frontal attack. With every stick abandoned, the remainder re-mainder of tho first army dispersed in the foothills of the Fogaras mountains, moun-tains, and later reached Kronstadt. At Boicza tho remnants of tho Rumanian Ru-manian train were seen by tho Associated Asso-ciated Press corespondent. Tho Imperials Im-perials had taken away whatever had value. Over a square mile of meadow land and fields tho wreckage of the train spread. Imperial artillery had i wrought havoc with tho column. The 1 fragments of thousands of army vehicles, vehi-cles, farm wagons and carts told an awful tale of the surprise Falkenhayn had worked on tho Rumanians. Out of the wreckage loomed high the kitchen wagon of tho commander of tho Thirteenth Rumanian division. On the ground lay tons of Rumanian general gen-eral staff maps 'showing Hungary as far as Budapest and Silesia. Bundles of Rumanian flags, intended to proclaim pro-claim Rumanian sovereignty in tho invaded in-vaded districts were also in evidence, as was the stationery which Bucharest Buchar-est had prepared in advance for the civil administration of tho annexed territories. No dream was ever moro rudely shattered. With the Red Tower Pass taken, the Imperial troops advanced east through the Aalt valley and set out to clear the Ghost Forest of tho Second Rumanian Ru-manian army, whihe was thrown upon Kronstadt. Fogaras was taken. Tho Rumanians were forced beyond Riul Vatului, or better the reinforcements brought into the pass from the south were halted there by tho Germans. |