Rushing the Trenches
Once again, then, the bugles rang out for attack, and the Japanese threw themselves with desperate bravery upon the Russian entrenchments. The wire entanglements gave as much difficulty as ever, and the slopes of the hill were one blinding sheet of flame; but still the Japanese pressed forward, climbing over their own dead and working their way gradually through the obstacles placed in their path. By a piece of good fortune the electric wires connected with a large mine field were discovered just in time and cut, and thus a dreadful disaster was averted. But brilliant as was the dash of the 1st and 3rd Divisions on the Russian right, the defence of the Czar's troops was stubborn and hardly contested, and it was not till the 4th Division on the extreme left had carried through their flanking operation that the issue of the day was put beyond doubt. Here the gunboats in the bay rendered invaluable service. They steamed close in and poured in a heavy fire upon the Russian batteries, covering the advance of the infantry through the shallows. In this gallant operation the commander of the Chiokai, Captain Hayashi, was killed, and several other casualties were sustained by the crews engaged. But the work was accomplished. Climbing the hill like cats, the Japanese soldiery broke through the entanglements in face of a galling fire and rushed the trenches, bayonetting the defenders where they stood. Nothing could stop that mad onslaught, and after a fierce hand-to-hand conflict on the summit the flag of the Rising Sun floated triumphantly over the position which the Russians had so fondly, and indeed so naturally, deemed to be impregnable.
The Russians in Flight
General Stoessel, finding that there was no use in continuing the sanguinary conflict now that his flank was turned, ordered a general retreat. The Japanese, however, in spite of the tremendous fatigues to which they had already been subjected since dawn, fiercely pursued their retiring enemy, with the result that the Russians found it impossible to make a stand at their second line of defence at Nankuenling, and were compelled to flee as far as the immediate neighborhood of Port Arthur itself.
Tremendous Moral Effect
The moral effect of this great victory of the Japanese was tremendous. The Russians, and with them a great many Continental critics, had attempted to minimize the importance of the battle of the Yalu. The Japanese, they said, were in overwhelming numbers, the position was one that could be easily turned, and General Sassulitch ought never to have tried to stand his ground. But such criticisms were silenced by Kinchau. The little Japs were seen to be equal, if not superior, man for man, to their Russian opponents, and the fierce, almost fanatical, fervor of their patriotism proved a factor in the struggle the importance of which few people had properly estimated. It was felt at once by military men in Europe, that if 12,000 Russians, armed with heavy guns, could not hold such a post as that of Nanshan against the onslaught of the Japanese, the fall of Port Arthur itself, provided there were no effective diversion from the north, was merely a question of time.
Terrific Casualties
Nor were the material fruits of General Oku's success less striking. His losses in personnel, of course, were heavy, amounting to 133 officers, and 4,062 non-commissioned officers and men killed and wounded. The casualties of the defenders were naturally not so great, but over 500 Russians were left dead upon the field, and it is estimated that their total losses in killed and wounded must have numbered over 2,000. Sixty-eight pieces of artillery and ten machine-guns fell into the hands of the victors.
AFTER FOUR MONTHS.