GENERAL SMIRNOFF FIRING THE CAMOUFLET.
Heavy and continual bombardment of the position was carried on on the 26th and 27th. At 11 a.m. on the 27th the Commandant, accompanied by Lieutenant Hammer, arrived in the fort, where everything was ready for firing the camouflet. All the Fortress guns were ordered, in case of a successful explosion, at once to open fire on the enemy's batteries if they should concentrate their fire on the fort. At this time the enemy were methodically shelling this fort, Kuropatkin Lunette, and B Battery with 11-inch shells, which were detonating every two or three minutes. After an inspection of the tamping,[29] the electric leads were extended from the station in the casemate to the outer parapet, when, taking advantage of the interval between the shells, the General went on to the parapet and pressed the firing-key.
Above the caponier rose a cloud of dust and smoke, out of which projected planks, stones, and bodies. We had succeeded,[30] and the garrison breathed again. The awful, weary hours of waiting had passed. Congratulating every one, the General went down into the inner courtyard. His presence as Head of the Fortress at the most dangerous place in the defences soon became known, and inspired every one to further efforts.
On the 28th the Japanese blew a breach through the wall of Caponier No. 3. They followed this up with an assault, but were repulsed. The same afternoon batteries were shelling the road from Little to Big Eagle's Nest, from the saddle of Ta-ku-shan. This only emphasized what the loss of that hill meant to us. One cannot help asking why, when Velichko drew out the plans of the Fortress, he did not insist on Ta-ku-shan being fortified? It was a natural fort! Could he not realize the difficulty of defending a fortress when its roads are under shell-fire from the very commencement, and he our leading Professor of Military Engineering? On the western front there was considerable activity towards Wolf's Hills, the trenches of Siu-shuing village.
So far, Smirnoff had endeavoured to imbue the men with the idea of no surrender, but General Fock now wrote a memorandum in which he persuaded General Stössel to lay mines under our forts in order that they might be blown up when it was decided to abandon them! Smirnoff protested most vehemently, trying to show that mining our own forts (to say nothing of the danger to the men in them) would sap at its very roots the principle that a fort might perish but must never surrender, and would consequently demoralize the troops.
Stössel believed Fock, and insisted. The Commandant then sent Grigorenko to him, who submitted a detailed report, in which he pointed out most clearly that the results of the explosions of such mines would, generally speaking, be inconsiderable, whilst the mines, if laid, would constitute a great danger to the garrison, as a chance 11-inch shell might cause a premature explosion. But Stössel had made up his mind, and ordered chambers to be made in the forts for the laying of charges. In Chi-kuan-shan, however, the Commander, Lieutenant Floroff, said point-blank that so long as he was in the fort it should not be mined.
General Stössel was in the habit of issuing frequent orders direct to General Biely, Commanding the Fortress Artillery, and gave the strictest instructions that not a gun was to be mounted without his special sanction. As he never visited the fronts attacked, and, therefore, could not judge of the state of affairs himself, the result of this order could have been merely to make unpleasantness for General Smirnoff and to interfere with his work. Though things were usually done in the end as Smirnoff wished, all this hindered progress and made matters very difficult. When systematic attacks began before the general assault of October 30, Stössel, ignoring the Commandant, told General Biely to open fire from the north-east front on to the ground near to the fortifications at sunset—at first at intervals, more often between 7 and 8 p.m., and again intermittently from then till 10 p.m. His ostensible reason was that the enemy would attack at that time. Of course, they did not do so, but despite the protests of Smirnoff, Biely, and Kondratenko, he insisted upon this cannonade—an utter waste of ammunition, when every shell was valuable.