The Defence of Port Arthur
Having established themselves firmly in Kwan-tung by the end of May,
the Japanese once more assumed the offensive.
The first army under General Kuroki advanced rapidly towards Liaoyang,
making flanking movements eastward, and at Motienling Pass threatening
not only the Russian position at Liaoyang but opening a route for a
flanking movement further north upon Mukden.
The second army, under General Oku, advanced on Kaiping, thence north
upon Tashichiao, to new and old Newchwang and Haicheng.
The Takushan army, co-operating with General Oku’s force, advanced from
its landing point west of Antung to Haicheng, forming the connecting
link between the first and second armies.
The third army under General Nogi, landed at Dalny, swept through the
Kwan-tung peninsula southward, and attacked Port Arthur. Every mile
of this ground was savagely contested, the Russians being driven
from position to position, and gradually retiring upon the outer
defences of the fortress. Altogether some two months were passed in
opposing the Japanese advance. For days together the town would be
continuously bombarded from the sea. As General Nogi advanced he was
aided by a terrific bombardment of the coast from Dalny to Takushan,
just outside the north-east forts of Port Arthur. The main weight of
this advance was borne by General Fuchs and his Siberian division.
The Russians repulsed an attempted landing at Kerr Bay, where General
Nadin was severely wounded. The naval authorities were busy in clearing
the navigable channel so that the repaired battleships might leave
the harbour for the outer roadstead, and the torpedo-boat flotilla
was occupied every day, being repeatedly driven in by the Japanese
squadron blockading the port. From the Liaotishan forts at the southern
extremity of the peninsula the Japanese vessels were cannonaded
whenever within range, and there, and elsewhere, new batteries were
established to command the coast immediately under the great forts.
The fortifications on the Metre Range, High Hill and the heights
outside the line of the land forts, were hurried to completion, and
temporary forts were improvised in many situations, this work being
directed by General Kondratiev, who had with him all the artillery
officers who could be spared from the batteries, which were manned by
the minimum number of hands compatible with efficiency. A completely
covered shell-proof trench connected all the forts of each group on the
hills, and trenches and entanglements were provided for the outworks
protecting the forts. By the exercise of ceaseless vigilance and making
a determined opposition to every change of position the Japanese
attempted, General Fuchs delayed the close investment of the fortress
until July had passed. In these contests the Japanese lost heavily,
lost far more heavily than the Russians, who almost invariably acted
entirely on the defensive, resisting with stubbornness and allowing
themselves to be driven out of a position when their commanders knew
that by falling back upon the next defence they would be in a better
position to injure the enemy still more. The Japanese advance was slow,
but none the less sure; they sacrificed life without stint to obtain
possession of any subsidiary position they deemed of importance. The
Russians husbanded their resources as well as they were able.
The attacks on the Russian positions, on the town, the harbour and the
forts, were incessant, and the havoc wrought was terrible. The town
became untenable; the inhabitants had to seek shelter in cellars, in
specially excavated shell-proof caves, under the face of the gravel
pit, in the stone quarries; but safest of all were the refuges in the
great forts.
The source of the town water supply was controlled by the Japanese,
but the great freshwater lake behind Golden Hill and the many wells
furnished sufficient for all needs. But life was intolerable. The
furious bombardments rained shells everywhere. The hospitals were full;
men scarcely able to walk were sent into the forts and the trenches.
The medical stores became exhausted, and that wonderful explosive
Shimose, burst shells into rugged splinters which made the ugliest
of wounds and mutilated the human form beyond recognition. Men were
blown to ribands. Others were stripped of flesh, and skin and limbs;
the victims were mutilated, sickening spectacles; they uttered piteous
cries and harrowing moans. Shocking remnants of living sentient men
struggled helplessly to rid themselves of torn, mangled, and peeled
limbs, or twitched and sprawled helplessly, attempting to hold together
all that remained of their poor, bleeding, lacerated bodies. Shapeless
and discoloured human flesh strewed the ground; it became impossible
either to gather or bury many of the dead.
Until the Russians were really hemmed in the fortress itself there
seemed to be opportunities for escape. Day by day junks arrived with
fresh provisions; they brought news, they would carry away whoever
thought the risk of running the blockade to be less than that of the
bombardment.
These junks, and an occasional steamer, would clear from Chifu for
Newchwang or _vice versa_. Their course required them to round
Liaotishan. When they reached that point, if there were no Japanese
vessels between them and the coast they ran into Pigeon Bay or Louisa
Bay, or some other creek near the spot, discharged their cargoes, and
as soon afterwards as opportunity served, continued their voyage. If
Japanese vessels were in sight, they held to their course past the
promontory, and, if intercepted and boarded, produced for the benefit
of the Japanese papers which proved the ostensible trade they followed.
The great firm of Kunst & Albers had enormous shipments afloat for
their depôts at Vladivostok, Port Arthur and the Amur when war began.
These cargoes were delivered at their branch establishment at Kiaochow
(Tsintau), which suddenly assumed vast importance. The staff there
was strengthened, particularly in the shipping department. The stores
arriving were reshipped quickly by coasting steamers and junks. Under
the German, the Norwegian and the Chinese flags they reached ultimately
that port where prices ruled highest. In July access to the creeks
became more difficult; early in July Louisa Bay was not safe, and a
month later Pigeon Bay could not be approached from the land side
without great risk, and junks had then to sail up the eastern coast
to the entrance of Port Arthur itself, a point usually under close
scrutiny.
The entrance to the port was cleared; the torpedo-boat flotilla made
reconnoitring excursions from time to time. In the middle of June the
_Lt. Barukhov_, one of the Elbing torpedo-boat destroyers captured from
the Chinese in 1900, made a trip to Newchwang and back, escaping the
blockading steamers with ease. She was sunk in Pigeon Bay in July when
reconnoitring.
The fleet was of so little use to the defence, and so coveted by the
Japanese, that it was determined in July to make a sortie at the first
favourable opportunity; disperse on meeting the enemy, and by taking
every which way then, baffle pursuit and so most would have a good
chance of making a neutral port before being overtaken.
Before this final sortie was attempted the navigable channel was
cleared of the Russian mines, the approaches were protected with new
defences--mines, booms, chains and sunken craft. The torpedo-boat
flotilla reconnoitred daily. When all was ready, the sortie was made.
There was a running fight, and four of the ships reached neutral
ports. The _Novik_, in attempting to reach Vladivostok, was attacked
by Admiral Kamimura’s squadron and was beached by Captain Essen near
Korsakov port on Saghalien island. With this sortie on August 10, the
supposed value of the Russian navy at Port Arthur disappeared from
the list of the forces available for the defence of Manchuria. The
_Poltava_, _Peresviet_ and _Sevastopol_ returned to port damaged, and
the last was further injured by a mine whilst manœuvring on August 23.
The result of the battle of Tashichiao, and of General Kuropatkin’s
attempt to advance southward, was known about three days after the
evacuation of Newchwang. At the time General Alexeiev was losing the
battle of Ma-shan and General Kuropatkin’s army had to retreat on
Liaoyang without attempting to hold the fortified position at Haicheng,
General Stoessel decided to abandon the campaign in the Kwan-tung
peninsula and withdraw all his forces into the fortress of Port Arthur.
The Japanese investing force thereupon established a line of batteries
across the peninsula on the north of the Sui-shi valley, from Hao-sui
bay, south of the Dalny peninsula on the east, by way of Sui-shi-tung
and Ho-shi-tung to Louisa Bay on the west.
It was evident to General Stoessel that General Nogi would attempt to
carry the fortress by a frontal attack, and that in all probability
he would follow the same route as had been taken ten years before,
when Marshal Oyama had captured the fortress from the Chinese. On
that occasion General Nogi, who was now commanding the attack, had led
the central division of General Yamaji’s force, which had forced its
way into the line of forts by the gap through which the Dalny high
road passes. As on that occasion, the central attack was made almost
simultaneously with a flanking attack on the north-eastern side--more
directly towards Golden Hill, and a simultaneous flanking attack from
the north by the gap through which the railway now runs. Consequently
the troops defending were most strongly disposed to resist attacks by
those routes.
Surely enough the Japanese attempted to repeat the success of 1894 by
identical tactics; but before these could be commenced the Russian
forces at the extremities of the line would have to be displaced, as
otherwise they would attack the advancing column on both the flanks.
The Russian eastern position was Takushan, where a stout resistance was
made. This point was held by four guns and three thousand infantry. The
Japanese shelled the position from upwards of 3,000 yards with siege
guns, and later with four howitzer batteries. On August 9 the defending
force abandoned the position after inflicting severe losses on the
Japanese. Casualties: Japanese, 1,400 men out of action; Russians, 900.
The Russians were next called upon to defend the heights commanding
Louisa Bay, and abandoned the hills on the south-east after several
engagements spread over some days.
On August 17 General Stoessel received a demand from Major Yamoka
asking for the surrender of the fortress. The demand was refused.
The Russians had made every preparation for attack, and were confident
that each attempt would be repulsed, guarded as the positions were with
the guns of the forts, machine guns, masked forts, the great trench
with its hidden batteries commanding every section of its whole length,
the wire entanglements, mines and numerous obstructions. If these did
not render the fortress impregnable, they gave its defenders such an
immense superiority of position that it seemed no number of men the
attacking force could bring against it in succession would be able to
overwhelm the many defences which had been constructed.
It appears that General Nogi intended to make a direct attack on the
Panlung forts behind Takushan simultaneously with one on Kikwan fort,
which, if carried, would leave the town at the mercy of the invaders
and isolate every other fort of the inner ring of defence.
The general bombardment commenced on August 19, and was directed mainly
upon the Panlung and Kikwan forts, but the only real damage done was
the ignition of the powder magazine in Kikwan on the following day,
when the defenders took to the covered way connecting the forts, and
withdrew to the south Kikwan fort.
At the same dates the forts south-east of Louisa Bay were again shelled
from concealed batteries on the flats near the seashore.
By night the Japanese infantry attempted to storm the position, but
were stopped by the wire entanglements, which they did their utmost
to cut, even to bite through, and at last rendered ineffective by
attaching lines to the poles and pulling the whole obstruction away
bodily and rolling it aside. Metre Hill was stormed and captured on
August 20, and was then shelled unceasingly for days by the Russians,
who maintained also a constant machine-gun and rifle fire in the hope
that the position would be rendered untenable. About the same time
the Japanese seized Sui-shi-ying, also a position a quarter of a mile
nearer to Wolf Mountain, but from this they were driven by machine-gun
fire from the Metre Hill batteries.
On August 21 the bombardment of the Kikwan forts became hotter and
hotter, and late in the day two infantry regiments, who had with them
scaling ladders, carried the outer defences of the Kikwan fort by storm
and occupied the fort by morning.
The adjoining fort, East Panlung, was one of the most fiercely
contested of all the siege. It had been admirably strengthened. The
besiegers were forced to attack in close formation; the entanglements
and obstructions concentrating them to points upon which machine-gun
fire converged, and decimated the attacking companies, whose survivors
were so few when they reached the parapet that the defenders had little
difficulty in repulsing them. The Japanese were as determined to win
the position as the Russians were to hold it. Lieut. Kitagawa was
fortunate enough among the besiegers to reach the fort and to plant
the flag on its wall. He was followed by a few desperate men, who
swarmed over the breastwork, and were supported by new arrivals. In
the hand-to-hand conflict inside the fort the Japanese were winners,
There was a desperate and long-continued struggle, fought out with
rifles, bayonets, swords, grenades, and even stones--whichever weapon
or missile came first to hand. The Russians late in the afternoon took
to the covered way and fell back by it, still fighting ferociously,
to Wantai Hill fort, for that far did the victorious besiegers pursue
them towards the town. During the night the Russians made several
ineffectual attempts to recapture the position.
The Japanese held also the North Kikwan fort, but from that they
were driven out in a close encounter on the following day, after the
position had been mercilessly shelled for hours.
The attack had proceeded almost without intermission for four days, and
the besiegers had secured only a dangerous footing on the Kikwan fort
as the result of a most strenuous and determined attack by all ranks.
At this one vantage point the Japanese began to mass troops,
distracting the attention of the Russians from the manœuvre by a
demonstration in force against the Tung-yen redoubts.
The Russians during the night made an attempt to retake the lost
positions. A sortie from Wantai Hill was made an hour before midnight
on August 23; the Russians drove the Japanese back on Panlung, thence
down the hill to a position near the railway, where a knoll afforded
them cover until reinforcements arrived. At one in the morning the
Russians withdrew to the forts before the Japanese, and by the covered
way to the south fort, which they held against the Japanese, who,
however remained in possession of the outer works of the Panlung
fortifications.
An attack was delivered at the same time on Etseshan, but the Russians
with their search-lights so exposed to fire the progress made by the
Japanese that the attack was pushed on in half-hearted fashion only,
and ere dawn broke it was definitely abandoned.
For six days and nights there had been fighting almost without a
moment’s intermission. Notwithstanding the tremendous efforts made,
the attack was ineffective. Everywhere the invaders had been repulsed.
Even at sea the _Retvizan_ from the entrance to the harbour, with some
torpedo-boat destroyers, had driven away some Japanese gunboats and
destroyers firing at the south-eastern forts at the time the general
attack had been planned to take place. The Japanese fleet did not take
any great part in these assaults.
During the fighting much rain fell. The night was made lighter than day
by the numerous brilliant search-lights from the Russian positions.
The Japanese were everywhere delayed by obstructions, and hampered
by the light thrown upon their attempts during the night to cut wire
entanglements or remove them. A strong electric current was passing
through the wires of the entanglements, and thus it was injury or death
to whomsoever tried to cut them: yet there were seen occasionally
Japanese lying on their backs and with their teeth attempting to nip
through the dead wires of these murderous traps. Under the search-light
the men shammed to be dead or wounded: when this was understood the
Russians failed to respect the Red Cross flag.
Undaunted by death, recking nothing of the fate of those who
had preceded them in the same endeavour, the Japanese advanced
relentlessly, unceasingly, as those impelled by instinct. There were
no bugles, no drums, no music, no hurrahs, no cries of “Banzai,” but
in absolute silence the besiegers went on, now in the glare of the
brilliant, blinding electric light, then a little time in its shadow or
suddenly exposed by floating lights from rockets and star shells--and
in the end all failed.
An eye-witness writes of the attack on Etseshan: “I watched the assault
of a ghostly mass of moving figures, through which continual lanes were
made by our guns, admitting glimpses of the scenes behind. These gaps
were closed up as if by magic, and the mass surged onward, while our
men, forsaking the trenches sought the shelter of the forts. On they
came until close to us. The mines exploded and the earth opened. Bodies
were hurled into the air, and then sank again to earth. Hands clutched
rifles, and in the moonlight bayonets looked like fireworks shooting
upwards and descending point downwards into the body of a man--but in
silence.”
A correspondent with the Japanese forces states that the mines seemed
to be but little used, and were found to be ineffective. The losses of
the Japanese he estimates at 14,000, in addition to 8,000 incapacitated
through illness, and 16,000 suffering from beri-beri. The losses were
made good from men of the second reserve landed at Dalny, and the work
of the besiegers never slackened.
The attack having been repulsed, General Stoessel determined upon a
sortie in force, to drive the Japanese from the positions they had
established in the Sui-shi valley.
During the six days’ fighting and the lull that followed, the Russian
gunners and scouts had managed to locate the positions of different
masked batteries, and these positions were subjected to a heavy
fire. A general advance was made at early dawn on August 27, during
a thunderstorm, but it was repulsed, and then General Stoessel
attempted to accomplish piecemeal what he had wished to win at a single
engagement.
There was almost incessant shelling of the Panlung positions held by
the Japanese. Sniping was practised day and night, and night after
night sorties were made from Kikwan, Wantai and Erhlung to retake the
forts, but they were repulsed, the Japanese losing on an average a
hundred men as the result of each assault. By September 8 the Panlung
forts were no longer tenable, and were relinquished.
On August 27 two Japanese guns were silenced by firing from Kuransky
battery.
Pushing on towards a successful counter attack, General Stoessel
had scouting parties sent into the Sui-shi valley; in the course of
these reconnoitring expeditions some men of the 26th Rifles reached
Sui-shi-ling and encountered the Japanese guard. Returning they
attacked one of the Japanese trenches, the occupants decamping and
leaving their weapons in the trench. The Russians followed them for
some distance without being opposed, and ultimately returned to the
redoubts. Other pioneers found the Japanese trenches deserted, and
scouting parties went far afield, for the besiegers appeared to have
withdrawn from immediate proximity to the Russian fortifications.
The Japanese retreated still further north, on their positions being
shelled on August 28, but at five o’clock on the following day returned
to the attack by opening fire on the redoubts from Fort 3 to Fort 13,
and shelling Small Eagle’s Nest (Etse-shan) with shrapnel and five-inch
shells.
That evening Lieut. Ivashenko led a detachment of the 26th Siberian
Rifles and some of the Kwan-tung Marines (3rd company of Port Arthur
Marine Guards) from Rock Ridge towards the Japanese redoubt, and
occupied the trenches about 9.30 in the evening. The Japanese opened
fire from machine guns and met the men’s bayonets with rifle fire, but
retreated into the redoubts, a position so small a force could not
attempt to storm.
The night of August 30 passed quietly, the outposts of both sides
keeping within their former respective lines. At ten o’clock on the
following morning it was observed that a party of Japanese cavalry in
file was approaching a village just back of Angle Hill (Antszshan), and
that ten wagons, escorted by fifteen troopers, were making for the same
place. Fire was immediately opened on them and successfully scattered
the train.
About twelve o’clock midnight, August 30, the search-lights revealed
a Japanese torpedo-boat near White Wolf Bay, not far from one of the
sunken steamers. She fired on the search-light, but was driven off
by fire from Tiger Tail coast forts and shots from the guardship and
fortress, apparently suffering some damage.
Although the Japanese seemed to be paralyzed by the non-success of
their persistent attack, they maintained a constant fire on the Russian
positions, and on the town. On August 29 a shell falling in China
Town caused a fire which spread with alarming rapidity. The town fire
brigade were successful in confining the outbreak to some stores of
butter and matches. The volume of dense smoke which arose from the
conflagration spurred the Japanese gunners to renewed effort, with the
result that much damage was done in the town and the fire brigade also
suffered.
Port Arthur was at this time in ruins. The houses and stores in the
Old Town were demolished or uninhabitable. The townsmen, as well as
the troops, lived in the bomb-proof trenches, or in caves, some of
which suffered at times, for there seemed to be no spot absolutely safe
from the rain of shell. Most of the fighting was done in the trenches
outside the line of forts, and even civilians were requisitioned to
take their turn, but these had ten days off duty after a term at the
front. The soldiers got little rest, and all prayed that soon the guns
of Kuropatkin’s army might be heard as he approached to raise the siege
and relieve the fortress.
With September General Nogi put aside for a time direct assaults
and frontal attacks. The engineers were set to work with a view to
undermining a coveted position and by sapping and blasting create a
breach which could not be repaired, a breach by which the Japanese
could effect an entry more easily.
The approach by parallels had been proposed in June, and was abandoned
only when it was discovered that the material was hard and unsuited to
mining. The progress was very slow even after a fair start had been
made.
The artillery duel was maintained, the Japanese bringing up many
reinforcements of every arm. On September 3 the Etseshan battery was
silenced by ten-inch shells, and the breastwork brought down by the
fire.
The Japanese, before reaching the line of forts, had still to capture
the Tung-yen Redoubt before Erhlung-shan, and the works on Métre hills
before Antszshan and Etseshan, also lunettes near the railway to the
south of Sui-shi.
It was not until September 20 that the attack on these positions became
possible.
The tactics employed were the same throughout. First, there was a
general artillery fire upon the redoubts and the forts behind them,
all along the line in fact. This heavy bombardment raged from early
dawn until past mid-day. Then it was concentrated upon the advanced
positions it was intended to assault.
Saps were run to within fifty yards of the lunettes. From these covered
ways two regiments, well provided with hand grenades, suddenly rushed
on the position. A hard fight ensued, but the attacks were repulsed
from all three lunettes assaulted. The next morning, by using scaling
ladders, the Japanese got into the lunettes, drove the Russians from
them into their trenches, and pursued them. In this way the three
lunettes under Kikwan and Antszshan were taken. On the 19th and 20th
the Japanese from their trenches also assaulted Tung-yen, which was
held by two companies, having three field pieces and a number of
machine guns. There was a deep moat around the position, and batteries
placed to command all approaches should the redoubt be stormed. A
breach was made by artillery, and the little garrison dismayed by
constant shrapnel fire. It was then attacked simultaneously on opposite
sides, but both attacks were repulsed. After further cannonading
the Japanese made another attack on the position; they reached the
enclosure, used bombs and hand grenades with great effect in their
hand-to-hand encounter, but when the Russians gave way they took their
guns with them, and inflicted very heavy loss on the besieging force.
Nevertheless the position had been gained, at the cost of a thousand
lives perhaps, yet gained to the besiegers, and lost to the defenders,
who thereby risked being driven within their line of forts.
The next position the besiegers had to secure was the low plateau
at the foot of the forts, known as Métre Hills, between Wolf Hill,
Antszshan, Etseshan, and Louisa Bay. This position was protected by
wire entanglements, trenches, sandbag protecting screens, and a roof
of bullet-proof steel plates over important coigns of vantage. Railway
metals were also utilized to keep the earthworks solid, and the
armament included field guns, machine guns, and two heavy howitzers.
The position was taken after being subjected to long-continued
bombardment. First 180 Métre Hill, the main position, was made quite
untenable by shell fire; on the morning of September 21 the attack was
directed to 80 Métre Hill, which was captured by infantry that same
afternoon, the shrapnel fire being continued even after the infantry
were over the earthworks. 203 Métre Hill was attacked by one regiment
from a sap at the same date, but these men were killed in crossing
open ground extending about 300 yards. Another attack by two forces
acting conjointly was repulsed at dawn the next morning, with very
heavy loss. At noon a corner of the position was entered and secured.
It was shelled from all the batteries commanding the position; from
Antszshan to Liaotishan. Attacks were made afresh on the two succeeding
days, and the Russians then not only repulsed these, but continued to
hold the plateau, with the exception of 180 Métre Hill. The Japanese
sacrificed 2,400 men to obtain that one position, and lost over 1,000
in establishing themselves in the Tung-yen redoubt.
At the end of September the Japanese, after two months of unremitting
assault, had failed completely to break through the line of forts. The
Russians not only repulsed the besiegers with great loss, but were able
to make some successful counter attacks.
Mr. Norregaard, _Daily Mail_ representative with General Nogi’s army,
states that the fighting is of a most determined character. Quarter
is rarely sought or given. “Both sides use hand grenades filled
with gun-cotton, and with a fuse that burns for fifteen seconds.
These grenades were often picked up and re-thrown. They proved
very effective. Latterly, also, they have been fired from light
bamboo-hooped wooden mortars, whose range varies from 50 to 200 yards
with a regulated charge. Both Russians and Japanese frequently throw
stones at each other. It is generally impossible to cut the wire
entanglements.”
The position of the besieged did not improve. A correspondent wrote in
October: “Our principal forts are uninjured, but the houses in the town
are badly damaged. Most of them are in ruins, and the harbour works are
in a sad plight. Some of our ships have been injured by falling shells,
and it is impossible with our scant resources to repair them. We have
not a single bottle of anæsthetics. The food is of the coarsest, and
even that is beginning to be scarce, while there is much disease.”
The month of October brought no relief to the garrison, no change in
the tactics of the besiegers. For a short time the attention of the
gunners was given to the town, the fleet, and the harbour. In this
bombardment the _Peresviet_ and the _Pobieda_ were hit five times.
Then the besieged attempted a counter attack, directing themselves
particularly to the sappers mining under the Russian trenches, and to
the Japanese siege line at the foot of the hill forts. The Japanese
repulsed the attack, and retained their positions. On the 11th they
captured the railway bridge at the foot of Kikwan fort, but nearer
the town. On the two following days the harbour was shelled, and two
vessels were set on fire. On the 16th, after a desperate battle, the
Japanese captured the centre fort on Erhlung-shan, the most important
of the positions secured to that date.
On October 24 the Russians countermined the Japanese traverse under
Kikwan, and blew it up with dynamite. The same day there was again a
large fire in Russia-town.
The progress of the besiegers is slow, but now apparently more sure.
General Nogi reports: “The right column and a part of the central
column occupied at sunset of October 30 crest counterscarp of
Sungshu-shan, Erhlung-shan, Tung Kikwan-shan north forts, and destroyed
some of their flankers and outer trenches. Another part of the central
column, despite the enemy’s fierce fire, assailed and carried Fort P,
situated between Panlung-shan and Tung Kikwan-shan north forts.
“Russians delivered repeated counter assaults against this fort, and we
lost it at 10.30 p.m.; but General Ichinohé successfully re-occupied it
at 11 p.m. The General captured three field guns, two machine guns,
three Fish torpedoes, and many other trophies, and found forty Russians
dead. The left column captured in the same day Kobuyma Fort, situated
in the north-east of Tung Kikwan-shan.
“On October 31 we attacked the harbour and the shipyard with large
calibre and naval guns, hitting the _Gilyak_ several times, and sinking
two steamers.
“On November 1 two steamers in the western harbour, of about 3,500 tons
each, and on November 2 another steamer of about 3,000 tons, were sunk.
Violent explosions, probably of powder magazines, heard twice in the
north end of the city.
“We commenced at noon, November 3, a heavy bombardment with naval guns
against the shipyard and other places in the east of the harbour, where
fire broke out at a quarter-past twelve p.m., raging till four the
next morning. On the same day our bombardment with large calibre guns
inflicted considerable damage on Fort 4.”
The saps were driven nearer to 203 Métre Hill, and at the end of
November another, and this time successful, attempt was made to carry
the position by storm. The position, and others, were shelled heavily
from dawn until mid-day on November 30. A strong storming party then
rushed to the south-eastern corner, but was repulsed. The cannonading
was resumed; later in the day a second party essayed to reach the
fortifications, but was repulsed; another charge had no better success.
At five in the afternoon a fourth party made a hasty charge, reached
the breastworks, and fighting ferociously won; some men reached within
a hundred feet of the summit. It was seven o’clock before these could
be reinforced to an extent which enabled them to carry the position,
which they occupied at eight o’clock that evening. The Japanese losses
were very heavy, and the Russians left many dead in the fort. The
position has been shelled repeatedly since the end of November, but it
would seem that the Japanese cannot now be driven from the Métre range
of hills by gun fire, nor is it likely that the Russians can afford
to lose the men which all attempts to regain the fortress by direct
assault would entail.
At the end of November, therefore, the Russians hold still intact the
fortress of Port Arthur; some of the outworks of the forts on the north
and west are in the hands of the besiegers, but it is not proved that
they can hold these positions, as from the forts immediately behind
them they can doubtless be fired upon in such a way that it will be
impossible for the besiegers to use guns from any of these positions.
If this be so, they have gained, by sacrificing nearly 20,000 men,
only a stepping-stone which may be of use to them in reaching the line
of forts by assaults, nothing more.
In any event, it would appear that Port Arthur will be won little by
little; it will be captured piecemeal at an enormous sacrifice of life,
but that it will be captured no one has any doubt. General Stoessel is
unlikely to surrender until he is stormed in his stronghold on Golden
Hill or on Liaotishan. His losses have been heavy, but not so great
as those of the besiegers, and in the struggle to come he will have
advantages the outer defences did not place at his disposal, so that
the Japanese losses may be even more appalling than the figures yet
published indicate. But the siege cannot continue indefinitely. One of
the latest messages received from within the fortress states: “There
will come a time when there will be no bearing the inconveniences of
the siege, due to sickness, scarcity of food, and cramped quarters;
no enduring the unceasing hell of bursting shells--shattering houses,
killing unfortunate friends, and tearing huge holes in the ground--to
say nothing of the miasma arising from a thousand corpses rotting on
the hills and in the ravines round the forts. Lately the bombardments
have increased in fury, and the fiery messengers of hate and
destruction greet us every minute.”