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Show GREAT BATTLES HAVE BEEN WON French and Americans Push Ahead in Three Days of Furious Combats. i IN SIGHT OF LAON Elite of German Army Decisively De-cisively Defeated and Enormous Enor-mous Death Toll Taken. WITH THE FRENCH ARMY IN FRANCE, Sept. 3. (By the Associated Press) Localization in the activity of the infantry in the past two days has given the appearance of the relinquishment relin-quishment of the pressure on the flying fly-ing German lines from the Somme to Soissons. The altered face of the battle bat-tle Is due to changes in the conditions of the ground and tactics and though the fighting has been confined to comparatively short sectors north of Soissons, north of Ndyon and around Nesle, engagements of the utmost Importance Im-portance have been in progress in which the Allies have gained advantages advan-tages that explain the enormous sacrifice sac-rifice the Germans made to hold them 'at those points. Mangln Pushing Forward North of Soissons General Mangln's forces, after three days of furious combats, have pushed forward on the plateau that overlooks the valley of the Ailette behind Chemln des Dames and from where the citadel of Laon, one of the stoutest pillars in the German Ger-man secondary line of defense, may plainly be seen. The French and Americans met around Juvigny the elite of the German Ger-man army, Prussian grenadiers, storming storm-ing battalions and hardy mounted infantrymen. in-fantrymen. They defeated them decisively, de-cisively, taking an enormous death loll from theii ranks and sending a goodly number of captives to the rear. The Associated Press correspondent saw a column of prisoners filing back over the plateau to the west where white wood crosses over fresh graves marked the sceno of other recent defeats. de-feats. Some were young, but all were sturdy and humiliation and depression showed in their faces rather than the satisfaction exhibited by other prisoners pris-oners over their final retreat from the inferno of war. American Use Shock Cars The Americans co-operated in the attack on Juvlgnj' with the type of tanks which the French have named "chars d'nssaul" or shock cars. These engines of war havr; been called "armored "ar-mored infantry." They have all the suppleness of troops afoot and they advance rapidly into the enemy's positions po-sitions dealing death with gruesome profusion from their quick firers and cannon. One of these cars manned by a Fronch lieutenant killed 200 Germans Ger-mans before Juvigny. He had just abandoned a damaged tank to take the place of a wounded man in another. His pilot, whose orders were to stay by the disabled car, was unable to resist re-sist the enthusiasm of the charging troops past his abandoned 'post and fell in with a platoon of Americans short of officers. The pilot showed them the route and fought with them all afternoon. "It is good to see how those Americans Ameri-cans fight," this boy said. "We are glad to fight with them. Together we will get the Germans." |