Part 4

On a bare slope to the right of the battery stood an infantry regiment, which in eighteen days' fighting had been reduced to about half its strength. As we approached, we saw it drawn up under arms and in a hollow square. A priest was preaching. He was arrayed in rich blue vestments, which showed up in the dull earthen colour of the slope and of the soldiers. His strong handsome features and long hair recalled pictures of Christ. His deep voice carried without effort to the ranks in the rear. As I approached, he was saying, "Never forget that wherever you are and whatever is happening to you the eye of God is on you and watching over you." After the sermon followed prayers, a band of soldiers at his side, led by a tall Red Cross soldier, joining in the beautiful other-world chants of the Eastern Church; they were trained singers and sang just as in church, without any accompaniment and with perfect balance and rhythm, the tall soldier conducting them very quietly with his hand. At one point, the prayers for the Emperor, all crossed themselves. All fell on their knees again at the prayers for the Russian troops, for the armies of the Allies and that God should give them every success. Once more all knelt at the prayers for their slain comrades, while the beautiful "Eternal memory" was chanted by the little choir. The rest of the service was standing; the men remained firm and motionless, in fixed and silent attention. There were impressive moments when the priest placed a little Gospel, bound in blue velvet, on an improvised lectern of six bayonets crossed in front of him, and when turning to all sides shadowed the men with a little gold cross which he waved slowly with both hands. After the service the Colonel stepped forward and with a quick movement called for the salute to the flag, and every musket was raised with a dull rattle that sounded out over the vast open space under the grey sky. Next he read out in a loud clear voice a message from the Commander-in-Chief congratulating the regiment on the brilliant bayonet attack at Kazimierz, and called out: "For Tsar and country, Hurrah!" This cheer rose like low thunder and died away in distant peals. Some twenty to thirty men had received the cross of St. George for personal bravery, and these, at a word from the Colonel, stepped out and filed by with quick springing step, circling round the priest and the piled bayonets, then stopped in front of him to kiss the Cross which he pressed in turn to the lips of each. Then the whole regiment fell into movement and swung round the open square, the cross movements, carried out slowly and in perfect order, giving the appearance of a labyrinth. One could not tell which way the men would turn, but they swung round with precision and came forward with the strength of a great river. An officer had asked me to carry a postcard message for him, and while he wrote "I am alive and well" and a short greeting, we were caught in the current, which parted to each side of us at the words of the kneeling writer, "Brothers, don't come over me." As each section passed the saluting point, the officer ordered the salute, the Colonel replied with a word of congratulation, and the men gave a short sharp cry expressing their readiness for work. There was a remarkable regularity and springiness in the march of the men, and their motion was that of an elemental force moving well within its strength, like the flow of the Neva. After the march past the Colonel handed to us a whole bundle of postcards for home.

We passed from the bare grey slope with all this strong life on it and drove forward to the next village, lately held by the Germans and now abandoned. Here we saw a very different spectacle, showing the effectiveness of the Russian artillery. The houses were for the most part long and spacious, built of huge stones with a superstructure of wood and roof of thatch. Some of them still remained intact; but most had only the stone basis standing. Everywhere were groups of the bright orange-coloured peasants, just returned, and in one house stood an old woman making her first examination of her devastated home. We stood in the slush on the dirty lane listening to the last report of a mounted staff officer, and as the Germans were evidently retreating rapidly we turned back to Skiernewice. We had followed the Russian advance some seventy miles from Warsaw.

It is well to recognize the value of these operations. The Germans would obtain obvious advantages from a rapid seizure of Warsaw. So far western Poland, lying between the two military lines of defence, had been a kind of no-man's land, and as the main operations were to north or to south, the Germans had made here a number of raids and had secured partial and transitory successes. They now, as at Grodno, tasted the actual Russian line of defence. The Russian forces in the centre were much stronger than anticipated, and making a great effort, not only repulsed the attack but made any real success on the German side impossible. The political aspect of the attempt and the character of its failure are illustrated by the following incident. The King of Saxony, whose ancestors were kings of Poland, had sent a court official with presents and decorations for those who should take part in the capture of Warsaw, and this official was himself captured by Cossacks after the repulse. The Germans, on the failure of their attempt, withdrew quickly but in good order, leaving few prisoners and spoils of war. The country was not devastated. There had been, after the repulse, some disgraceful incidents, _e.g._ they had made a Polish landowner and his servants stand in the Russian line of fire: and clocks and ornaments were taken away. But I have no evidence of any atrocities such as those in Belgium, and these could hardly have escaped observation. The German troops seem to have been partly reservists, with whom excesses are less likely. The signs indicate that the retreat is definitive, and such is the inference from the reported incendiarism at Lodz, which is full of German factories.

_November 4._

Trustworthy eyewitnesses speak with great enthusiasm of the conduct of the Russian troops on the Upper Vistula, where more serious fighting is to be expected. The influence of the Commander-in-Chief has produced the selection of capable commanders everywhere, and the subordinate officers are full of spirit and energy. Here again the German heavy artillery commands respect, but the Russian field guns and howitzers are served with remarkable precision and alertness and meet with great success. The complete confidence of the Russian infantry in the effectiveness of the Russian artillery is a striking and general feature. The men are always keen for bayonet work, which the enemy consistently avoids.

The Russian cavalry has, by different accounts, shown great dash and has been handled with dash and skill. In a raid beyond the river on the enemy's communications, a Russian cavalry division came on Germans in the dusk, and the troopers with the baggage column in the centre left the baggage and, charging, completely routed the enemy. The division several times got into the German forces, taking many prisoners. Large numbers of stragglers have been taken by the Russians. A Hungarian division put up a good resistance for three days and then collapsed.

German officers pay ridiculously small sums for their keep; for example, two marks for two days' keep of three officers, and they appropriate valuables and take all stores. The population in southern Poland is in a state of profound distress, and the Russians are organising extensive relief work. The Germans compel captured officers to work with the men, spit at them and drive them about bare to the waist.

A competent eyewitness in East Prussia says that the German communications are very good, and that underground telephones are frequently discovered. Large forces are in close contact here, and the Russian counter-stroke has much impressed the enemy. Our men bear fatigue and privations with great endurance.

The Polish population shows the greatest alacrity in assisting the Russian troops both in the country and in the towns. All Poles now readily speak Russian. Yesterday the Warsaw Press entertained the Russian and foreign correspondents. There was a distinguished gathering, and both Russians and Poles spoke with striking frankness and feeling. One eminent Polish leader, Mr. Dmowski, said that all the blood shed between the two nations was drowned in the heavy sacrifices of the present common struggle. Polish politicians are keenly enthusiastic for France and Great Britain, and are studying the development of closer economic and other relations with Great Britain.

The Russian advance is now much more complete in southern Poland and is better lined up with the forces in Galicia. This advance tends to secure the Russian position on the northern frontier, where any German initiative becomes daily more hazardous. The ordinary fresh yearly Russian contingents mean an increase of half a million men. The arrangements for the wounded provide, if necessary, for over a million.

_November 8._

I have just made a journey over the country lying between Warsaw and Cracow, where the Russian advance is now proceeding. My previous communication spoke of the original line of Russian defence along the Bug, and the later and more advanced line along the Vistula and the Narew. Present events are rapidly converting the new advance west of Warsaw from a counterstroke into a general transference of the sphere of operations and a most valuable rectification of the whole Russian line.

In East Prussia the Germans are being slowly driven back by a double turning movement. Further westward the northern frontier of Poland is well secured. The Russians have now occupied and hold firmly Plock, Lodz, Piotrkow, Kielce and Sandomir, as also Jaroslaw and all the other passages of the river San. A glance at the map will show the importance of this line, which is only a stage in the general advance.

On the repulse of the German attack on Warsaw, the enemy was pressed back south-westward in three weeks of continuous fighting. Near Ivangorod, a famous Caucasian regiment forced the passage of the Vistula under the fire of German heavy artillery. The advance guard crossed the broad stream--here unbridged--in skiffs and ferry-boats, and held good under a devastating cross fire till the construction of a pontoon bridge allowed the passage of reinforcements. The supports coming along the river bank from Ivangorod had to advance through flooded swamps almost breast high. Their footing was made good at Kosienice, where desperate fighting took place. Later they made a series of brilliant attacks in forests, after which the Germans were thrown back on Radom. The general advance drove the enemy back beyond Radom and Ilza.

At the small town of Szydlowiec the German commandant threatened, as the Russians approached, to blow up the remarkable town hall, in Florentine style, conspicuous for thirty miles around, and the beautiful Gothic church, six hundred years old. The inhabitants offered to ransom them by a contribution of 5000 crowns. The offer was accepted; but twenty minutes later the town hall was blown up, and the church followed at the end of another quarter of an hour. This story was narrated to me with great indignation by the inhabitants.

Some miles in front of Kielce the Austrians--now abandoned by the Germans, who had retired--made a stand near Lesczyna on a high sandy position with a large fir copse in its centre and extending over a wide front. The attack on it was delivered by a Russian corps including a division mainly composed of Poles, and fell chiefly on an Austrian Polish regiment from Cracow. The assailants kept up a fire all day, and finally rushed the enemy's rifle pits with hurrahs. The Austrians left Kielce at night and in the early morning--some were captured by the Russians, who came in close upon their heels. They were pursued for some miles, and brought to action again later on the same day. Next day the Russian artillery was also heard to the south-east of Kielce. The Germans had retreated in the direction of Czenstochowa.

All this three weeks of fighting was in the characteristic Russian style: bayonet attacks were repeated for two hours; small units eagerly attacked larger ones of the enemy. In general the Russians outflanked the enemy, but in one case they broke through his centre. Often the Russian artillery caused him to decamp in the night.

Officers describe the enthusiasm of the rank and file as growing if possible greater. It is clearly visible in the rear of the army, and shown by the energy with which transport is being pushed up. The enemy has thoroughly destroyed the bridges, but they are quickly repaired, and meanwhile the ardour of the troops and of the transport trains minimises all delay.

It may be noted that the German rifle fire is superior to the Austrian. Some Austrian regiments have been found to be officered by Germans. The Austrian Slavonic regiments resist well for two or three days, but then break up and surrender in large bodies--they have sometimes asked for guides to take them to the Russian lines.

The inhabitants speak well of the Austrians, but with indignation of the Germans. Prisoners confirm the bad relations between the two allied armies, and Austrians and Germans when captured have to be kept apart.

I saw at Kielce ample evidence of the enthusiasm of the Poles for the Russian cause; they show the greatest courtesy and kindness, especially in the villages. I am told on good evidence that at Kalisz, when a German soldier defaced a portrait of the Tsar, a Polish official struck him in the face, and for this was bound to a telegraph post for two days, and then taken down and shot. All evidence of prisoners shows that the Russians are treating enemies as well as their own comrades--often I have seen them giving the captives the best of everything.

The following interesting proclamation was posted to-day by the commander of a Russian army corps at Radom, where the Germans had remained for over a month.

"Poles! Our wounded officers and soldiers, and also our prisoners who have fallen into the hands of the enemy and have passed through the town or province of Radom, speak with deep gratitude of your cordial treatment of them. You have tended the wounded, fed the starving, and clothed and sheltered from the enemy those escaping from captivity. You have given them money and guided them to our lines. Accept from me and all ranks of the army entrusted to me our warm and hearty thanks for all your kindness, for your Slavonic sympathy and goodness."

The theatre of the present operations is of crucial importance. Here Austria and Germany join hands. Serious reverses would compel them either to retreat on diverging lines, or to expose one or other of their capitals. Either event would have political consequences of the highest military significance.

_November 9._

I left Warsaw on November 2 by motor and arrived without incident at Radom (sixty miles to south-south-west). The town was held by the Germans for a month and four days. They made themselves objectionable to the inhabitants, taking all supplies on which they could lay hands; but I came on no evidence of any particular outrages. The inhabitants showed the heartiest friendship to the Russians, as is recognised in the proclamation of the Commanding General which I have already quoted. Nothing could exceed the care and thoughtfulness of my own Polish hosts; the Russian soldiers, for instance the one who accompanied our party, were on friendliest terms of intercourse with the Poles, and the objection which the Poles previously had to speaking Russian had vanished as if by magic. It should be noted that the inhabitants of all this area are particularly strong in Polish patriotism. Beyond Radom the excellent high road to Cracow, running on an embankment and lined with poplars, was broken at every bridge and cut up for some distance by a road plough. Side tracks had been made at every necessary point. We travelled in the midst of troops all hurrying forward to participate in the taking of Kielce. They moved slowly along the road in straggling groups like an enormous family on its way to a huge picnic, but the unity of each regiment is never lost and the most remarkable impression which one receives is that of destination--of movement to "the appointed place." Every artificial barrier was little more than an occasion for thought and effort: the Russian peasant, everywhere accustomed to obstacles of this kind, has all sorts of ready and resourceful ways of surmounting them; and they call forth all his brotherly instincts of joint work and mutual help. Any number of men run up from their loose ranks to push a motor or cart or transport wagon over a marshy stream, and the travellers call back from their vehicle, "Thank you, brothers." It is like a current that slows up and takes thought against some barrier, but whose general movement seems not even to be checked. Some of the side passages looked very bad indeed, but every one somehow got through, no matter what the size of their carriage. Often at such points there were companies that rested along the grassy banks of the road; in other places one saw, to the side, great parks of small grey wagons. Those carrying straw for the bivouacs were in front; but sometimes one came upon a resting battery. The brotherhood between officers and men is another notable feature of the march of a Russian army.

At Szydlowiec, seventeen miles south of Radom, I saw the first signs of devastation, but these were not the work of the advancing Russian artillery but had been perpetrated deliberately by the retreating Germans. The tower of the town hall was crumbled to ruins. The church is not large, but has a high pointed roof, of which the open woodwork still remains, with the cupola as if caught astride of it in its fall. Inside, the beautiful painted inner roof is mutilated, but the monuments of the ancient Szydlowiecki family, and notably the graceful figure of a sleeping woman, have for the most part escaped. The floor was covered with rubbish and the damage is estimated at a very high figure. While I was in the church, the dignified old priest entered with six young men, who knelt with faces full of reverence before they set to work to clear the nave of rubbish. The Pole who told me the story of the ruin of the church told it quietly but with flashing eyes. He said the inhabitants asked rather that the whole town should be destroyed and the church be left standing. The only excuse was a few shots from the advancing Russian infantry and artillery, and there was no regular fighting there, the Germans making no resistance and retreating too quickly to blow up the castle.

After Szydlowiec, the Cracow road on its way to Kielce (twenty-seven miles) passes through country of quite a different character. A long rise, and we were now close up among the troops. At one point the long train of wagons branched away to a village on our left, and out of it by another road there came in another stream of fighting men. We passed some two hundred Austrian prisoners in their blue shakos and uniforms; they were all Poles, with hardly any guard but giving no trouble; one of them courteously stepped out of the ranks to pick up my field glass, which I had dropped. These men, who talked freely to us, did not look at all miserable, only confused. The Russians behaved to them as to their own people.

At last we came to the hills above Kielce. It was now clear what had happened. Troops of all kinds were streaming into the town and all resistance was over. On the main street we were stopped for a few moments by a general and his staff. At the chief hotel large parties of officers were sitting down to lunch. All the streets were full of movement, but with no sign of any conflict or friction--horses, dismounting messengers, soldiers eating, talking or resting, the townspeople standing watching, satisfying the requirements or questions of the newcomers or joining in their talk. We had no difficulty in securing good rooms, and our lunch was as good as it would have been in Warsaw. Many of the troops had passed or were passing on along the broad road in the direction of Cracow. Mounting the high hill south-west of the town we could see the scattered stream of men, horses and carts going forward past pleasant houses, hills and villages, and the thunder of artillery came to us from beyond a ridge in the distance. Our plans, however, prevented us from going further. At the hotel the regiment which had done most of the fighting was sitting at dinner and singing the regimental song and the national hymn. The song began with a Mahometan word, "God has given us victory."

Next day, November 4, with villagers guiding and recounting to us, we went over the scene of the last Austrian resistance about six miles east of Kielce. A long curving line of rifle pits ran over a broad high front; sometimes the line ran along the inside of an extensive copse of small fir trees; some of the pits contained extemporised pallets of fir boughs, in others were bullets, weapons or even letters. The Russian advance was indicated by two hostile lines running almost side by side, where within a few yards I picked up undischarged bullets of the two armies. In a little wooded cemetery on the bare ridge lay a number of bodies, Austrian and Russian, brought in by the villagers for burial. It was not a sight to dwell on; but one thing that I shall not forget was the body of a young Austrian of not more than twenty, full of grace and beauty, the head thrown back, the breast bared, and the hand lifted as if waving on the attack. Outside, other bodies were still being brought in, the Russians greatly predominating in numbers. Some Austrian wounded still walked about the village. One, with whom I spoke, had the lower part of his jaw bound up and complained that he could drink nothing. He was greatly depressed but had no rancour and evidently felt at home with the villagers, who were of the same blood and behaved to him rather as people would to an interesting traveller in their midst. He was a Pole from no further off than Cracow, where he was a master--"professor" as he put it--in a secondary school, a very intelligent and educated man who seemed quite out of place in a uniform and on a battlefield. He told me how they replied all day as best they could to a cross fire, till in the evening the Russians came on them shouting "Hurrah!" A day earlier, and we should have seen this fight. The Germans had left them in the lurch--"as they always do," he added. It was in the main a battle of Poles against Poles. He himself was a "Pan-Slavist," he told me, but could not say so because of his post. If the Russians got Cracow and maintained the appointment of Polish civil officials there, including a Polish Governor, as at present, he felt certain that all western Galicia would be on their side. I left him a little tobacco and took the address of one of his colleagues in Cracow. Heavy firing from the south was all the time audible.