ACHIEVEMENTS OP FIELD ARTILLERY. 
17 
Another correspondent, who rode over the Turkish position the 
night it was taken, thus describes what he saw: — 
“ The parapets and ditches of the Awly-Yer redoubt looked indeed 
very much like those of the Great Yagni twelve days before, after it had 
just been stormed. Rows of dead Turks, some horribly disfigured by 
shell fragments, were to be seen upon the earthworks and at the 
bottom of the ditches. Some were literally torn to pieces by the 
shrapnels. I think most of them were killed by the artillery, which 
indeed had done its duty this time.” And in another passage he adds— 
“I don’t think that the Russians have sustained great losses by the 
assault, because in the first place the shrapnels had told terribly on 
the Turks, and had greatly diminished their number and demoralised 
them before the storming began.The inside of 
the redoubt, comprising the whole natural platform of the hill, was 
ploughed with shells and strewn with their fragments, and bullets 
flattened on the stones.” 
Finally, the Correspondent of The Times corroborates the other 
witnesses as follows :— 
“ The fight on the Olya Tepe for a time was conducted with equal 
gallantry; four battalions holding it behaved in a marked manner. 
Their losses, however, were most severe, for the Russian artillery, 
which now fired mostly timed fuzes, burst their shells on the summit 
of the conical hill with deadly accuracy.” 1 2 
That the Russians had a great preponderance of artillery, both as 
regards numbers and weight of metal, at Aladja Dagh. is true, but so 
had they at Plevna and yet accomplished but little, and to have done 
as much as they did in the battle we have just dealt with remains a 
great performance, considering that the guns were brought into action 
within from 1500 to 1800 yards of troops behind strong earthworks 
armed chiefly with a rifle but little, if at all, less effective as a military 
weapon than the most improved weapon of to-day. 3 Had the Russian 
gunners hung back out of reach of the bullets of their opponents their 
performances 3 would in all probability have been as small as they had 
been in the summer; as it was, the}^ lost comparatively little, and did 
a great deal. Practice once more belied theory. 
But ere the final issue of the campaign was declared, the Russian 
guns were to give one more example of what they could accomplish, by 
1 “Armenia and tlie Campaign of 1877,” by C. B. Norman. 
2 The following account of what the bullet of the Peabody-Martini was capable of is interesting— 
one of the Correspondents of the Daily Neios writes from before Plevna :—“ The penetration'of 
the Peabodj - Vf artini bullet is simply remarkable. At the distance of 2000 yards from the Turkish 
lines I have dug them out ot a foot of solid earth of a threshing floor. At the distance we now 
are from those who hold the rifles nothing short of a thick earthwork will stop them, for they skip 
merrily through rhc roofs of the houses, and through the mud fences and bury themselves deep in 
the earth.” “ Daily News War Correspondence,” page 603. 
3 Speaking of the Russian artillery at the Aladja Dagh. the official account says:—“It was 
worked on this day with a precision and activity which had not distinguished it on former occasions, 
and, as was remarked by an independent witness on the Russian side, instead of confining itself to a 
shell fire at impossible ranges -where neither accuracy nor effect could be expected, and. where its 
fire was soon masked bv the advance ot its own troops moved forward' this time in support of the 
infantry, and materially co-operated towards the general result of the day. It is also worthy of 
rem irk th at, whereas the Turkish artillery fire was almost exclusively one of common shell with 
percussion, fuzes, the Russian gunners recognised on this occasion the superiority of shrapnel fired 
with time fuzes, and used it in large quantities .with great effect.”. . _ . ; 
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