World's War Events $v Volume 3 - Beginning with the departure of the first American destroyers for service abroad in April, 1917, and closing with the treaties of peace in 1919. by Various
page 66 of 495 (13%)
page 66 of 495 (13%)
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taking a division over it at a point where even the wary Bulgar had
deemed it impossible was one of the finest exploits in the annals of mountain warfare. "The Italians have fought the Austrians at a greater altitude in a number of places in the Alps, and in our wars with the Himalayan tribesmen we have sent our Gurkhas twice as high. But all of that was after more or less preparation. Here, the Greeks simply started off and went over that range with only their rifles and the packs on their backs. I know of nothing to compare with it save the taking of Kaymakchalan by the Serbs last November in the operations which freed Monastir. Not many in Saloniki have had much good to say of the Greek as a soldier of late, but you may be sure that we can do with more men of the kind that crossed that mountain range, and there is no reason why Venizelos should not be able to bring them to us." [Sidenote: A favorable position for observation.] The hill from which we were to follow the action jutted out of the mountains into the plain like the bow of a battleship. So favorable was its position for observation--from its brow a wide expanse of mountain and valley was spread from twenty to sixty miles in three directions--that the British and French as well as the Greeks maintained posts there. We found the officers in both of the Allied "O. Pips" [signal corps talk for O.P., meaning observation post] highly enthusiastic over the work of the Greeks in their attack of the preceding day. [Sidenote: The evening bulletin.] |
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