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Updated: July 7, 2025
But, in spite of all preparations, General Foch found himself hard-set to hold his own on September 5, 6, 7, and 8, 1914. The battle continued incessantly, by night as well as by day, for the artillerists had found each other's range. There was comparatively little hand-to-hand fighting at this point, General Foch only once being successful in luring the Germans to within close firing range.
In the first place, no man would act as herald, since he would be shot or stabbed the instant his errand became known; in the second, as Hozier had explained to Iris, the gunboat could slip her cable very quickly, and Russo's artillerists might miss a moving object. As it was, every gun scored, though the elevation was rather high.
This, with the added advantage of the natural slope of the ground, enables him to deliver upon the brave Union artillerists a concentrated fire, which is terribly destructive, and disables so many of Rickett's horses that he cannot move, if he would.
"It's always hard to hold these gunners down when they are on the target like that." He spoke as if it would have been difficult for him to resist the temptation himself. The wireless station got two extra shells for full measure. Perhaps those two were waste; perhaps the first two had been enough. Conservation of shells has become a first principle of the artillerists' duty.
"But why British artillerists, brother, why not our own people?" "Because you have no properly trained gunners. You know how strong Algiers was, and yet it was attacked with success, twice by the French, twice by ourselves, and once by us and the Dutch; but it is a rule that a strongly defended fort cannot be attacked successfully by ships.
Shot after shot found its mark, but still the fleet continued on its course. Then, after the bonfires died down, houses were set on fire to enable the artillerists to see their targets, but before daylight the whole fleet had run the gauntlet and lay almost uninjured below Vicksburg, ready to cooperate with Grant's advancing army.
Luckily, the rebels had left the larger and unwieldy trunks on the ground, which served as a good cover for the skirmish-line, which crept behind these logs, and from them kept the artillerists from loading and firing their guns accurately. The assault had been made by three parties in line, one from below, one from above the fort, and the third directly in rear, along the capital.
Skirmishers exchanged occasional shots, and artillerists from time to time tried the range of their guns.
He had made the plans which were so definite in the bold outline to which he held all subordinates in a coördinated execution; and I should meet the men who had carried out his plans, from artillerists who had blazed the way to infantry who had stormed the enemy trenches. There was no mistaking his happiness. It was not that of a general, but the common happiness of all France.
The breech-loader seems to be useless as a cannon, because that in which it has the advantage, namely, rapidity of loading, is useless in a field-piece, where, even now, artillery-men can load faster than they can fire safely. Napoleon III. has made his rifled cannon to load at the muzzle, and practical artillerists commend his decision.
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