"The line of retreat of the Austro-German forces was blocked with debris of every kind—valuable military supplies, telephone and telegraph installations, light railway and other stores, bridging material—in fact, everything needed by a modern army was flung away in flight. Over 1,000 wagons with commissariat supplies alone were captured."
Forty-five thousand Austro-German prisoners were reported to have arrived at Lublin. Russian correspondents with the armies in Galicia asserted that German troops were interspersed with Austrian troops in the intrenchments in order to raise the morale of the Austrians. One correspondent declared that while the Austrians often took flight the Germans were ready, to the last man, to perish.
ON THE FIRING LINE IN RUSSIAN POLAND
—VIVID DESCRIPTION BY AN AMERICAN EYEWITNESS
The first American permitted to witness actual battles near the eastern frontier of Germany was Karl H. von Wiegand, who wrote as follows from the firing line near East Wirballen, Russian Poland, October 9:
"The German artillery today beat back, in a bloody, ghastly smear of men, the Russian advance.
"Yesterday I saw an infantry engagement. Today it was mostly an artillery encounter. The infantry attack is the more ghastly, but the artillery the more awe-inspiring. This was the fifth day of constant fighting and still the German trenches hold.
"Today's battle opened at dawn. With two staff officers assigned as my chaperons, I had been attached overnight to the field headquarters. I slept well, exhausted by the excitement of my first sight of modern war, but when dawn once again revealed the two long lines of the Russian and German positions the Russian guns began to hurl their loads of shrapnel at the German trenches.
"We had breakfast calmly enough despite the din of guns. Then we went to one of the German batteries on the left center. They were already in action, though it was only 6 o'clock. The men got the range from observers a little in advance, cunningly masked, and slowly, methodically, and enthusiastically fed the guns with their loads of death.
"The Russians didn't have our range. All of their shells flew screaming 1,000 yards to our left. Through my glasses I watched them strike. The effect on the hillock was exactly as though a geyser had suddenly spurted up. A vast cloud of dirt and stones and grass spouted up, and when the debris cleared away a great hole showed.
RUSSIANS TRY NEW RANGE