St. John's Daily Star, 1915-12-21

              the st john's daily star newfoundland volume 1 tuesday december 21,1915 no 208 british evacuate anzac and suvla b but campaign not given up all the troops with their guns and stores successfully transferred with insignificant losses to another sphere—turks kept in absolute ignorance of the movement until the man and equipment had departed london heaves sigh of relief over success of the undertaking—dar danelles expedition not to be aban doned ondon dec 21 operations on other sectors of the front on the gal hppoli peninsula than those from hich the troops were announced to day to have been withdrawn are con tinued it is intimated in an official statement issued tonight the withdrawal was effected without any knowledge of the movement on the part of the turks it is declared further details of tn evacuation of anzac and suvla zones have been re ceived says an official statement without the turks being aware of the movement a great army has been with drawn from one of the areas occupied on gallipoli peninsula although in closest contact with the enemy by this contraction of the front op erations at other points on the line will be more effectively carried out sir charles monroogives great credit for this skilfully conducted transfer of forces to the generals commanding and to tbe royal navy losses incurred insignificant enemy kept in ignorance of evacua tion move of british troops i ondon dec 20.—the following official statement was issued here to-day all troops at suvla and danzac to gether with guns and stores have been successfully transferred with insig nificant losses to another sphere the sulva bay and anzac cove positions are no the north coast of gallipoli peninsula anzac cove is about sixteen miles from the top and sulva bay is five miles further on as no mention is made in the british an nouncement of the allied position in the sedd-el-bar positions at the top of the peninsula it is not clear whether the withdrawal of the troops indicates a direction to abandon efforts to force the dardanelles or means merely a readjustment of the allied forces there has been no previous hint of such a movement although the ques lion had been ; raised in england whether in view of the failure of the allies to make appreciable headway at the dardanelles and the urgent need for additional troops at saloni ka the dardanelles forces would be withdrawn official turkish communications re ceived yesterday spoke of heavy firing from land and sea by the allies but mentioned no movements out of the ordinary although this bombardment may have been conducted to cover the withdrawal gallipoli fight is not abandoned other parts of peninsula held with strengthened forces ondon dec 20.—"thank god they are safely out of there without serious loss is an expression fre quently heard to-day in connection with the transfer of troops from sulva and anzac zones to another sphere ol operations although this is invari ably coupled with regard that it shoulc have been regarded as necessary tc e.acuate hard won footholds on the peninsula obtained at such heavy cos in casualties the toe of gallipoli peninsula with oed dul bahr commanding the en trance of the dardanelles apparently still is held as no mention is made c the transfer of troops from thir region the war office statement leaves iic public to draw its conclusions as ie the destination of the british forces which must be well over 100xkx strong but it is widely conjecture that any southward sweep ol teutonic or culgar armies in the balkans whe ther from the north west or east will sooner or later come into contact with them and the transfer is connecter with the determination on the part o the entente powers not to remain on the defensive near the eastern theatre of war longer than is requisite to as sure the success of a forward march in giving the commons information as to the wal of the sulva and anzac lorccs premier asquith addec that the transfer had been made in pursuance ol a decis:on reached by the cabinet some time ago ihe operation were so successfully carried out said the premier as to re flect the utmost credit upon the gen eral on the spot upon the admiralty the staff and all ranks both of the army and navy his lordship bishop jones visited si thomas's sunday schools sunday afternoon and received a hearty wel come from the superintendents rev a clayton and mr h v mott the teachers and children costly trial was failure thousands of lost at an zac and suvla jondon dec 21.—the withdrawal of the british troops from the suvla bay and anzac zones ends more suc cessfully than most military men thought possible an unfavorable chap ter for the british armies in this war thousands of lives were sacrificed in gaining these positions and other thou sands in holding them the question has been constantly discussed as to why the generals com manding the dardanelles expedition did not try to make a landing near the centre of the peninsula in the begin ning and cut off the turk foothold higher up the peninsula the turks were fully prepared to meet it and noreover rfro british arrangement acked several essential features par ticularly a supply of drinking waters dn landing the soldiers found barbed wire entanglements stretching clear out under the water when they jumped from their small boats to add tc their sufferings the supply of drinking water was very short john redmond irish nationalist leader said m a speech in the house of commons that the sufferings of the rish troops on gallipoli were worse known in the present war to w k germans got bad beating on west front jfarled gas attack near ypres but were beaten back by british artillery fire ondon dec 21 rotterdam cor respondent of the daily mail tele graphs that the germans got a bad beating in their gas attack near ypres yesterday their death roll was very heavy and their men were dismayed by the terrific british artillery and ma chine gun fire german attack on british lines at ypres which is officially declared to have been a complete failure is believ ed to have been the beginning of the general german offensive in the west expected for some weeks and strongly indicated by the regrouping and rein forcing of the german lines vk parisians cheer general french demonstrations in french capital in honor of retiring british general paris dec 21.—field marshal sir john french who was recently succeed ed by sir douglas haig as command er-in-chief of the british forces in france and belgium was received this afternoon by president poincare long before the arrival of the field marshy at the palace elysee crowds gathered to greet him when his auto entered the court yard there were cheers for the dis tinguished british soldier for king george and britain manifestations of regard for the field marshal were re peated as he left the palace sees president poincare field marshal french accompanied by several british officers were pre sented to president poincare in con versation with the field marshal pres poincare took the opportunity to thank him for the services he had rendered on behalf of the allies earlier in the day general joftre the french commander conferred the war cross on field marshal french jap fleet defending suez canal minister says that mikado warship are stationed in the grea waterway which has been verj strcngly forlified and that there k a big british forci in egypt await inj a"y move the germans maj make—wrong season of the yea fcr a german effort of this kind jos angeles dec 20.—japan ha entered the european theatre wit a powerful fleet which has been sen to the suez canal according to a m papajian former minister of the ir terior of egypt who is at precent i los angeles great britain realizes that she can not lose the canal which is a vita element in her life as a unified em pire declared papajian bey for thi reason the canal has been remarkabl fortified and the japanese fleet is or hand ready for business every effort has been made to keej the news of the presence cf the japan se fleet from spreading at the canal and i have heard nothing of the flee in this country they are there never theless in speaking of the conditions ii egypt to-day papajian bey said z rebellion may and probably will break out any day in egypt however it will not be successful there are about 60.000 british troops there and some 50.000 egyptian troops in the interior there are several regiments of blacks who are fine fighters and who will fight for the empire papajia bey scoffs at the idea of a german in vasion of egypt early m january and february at least are not months when it is pos sible for an army to cross the desert sands between turkey and egypt he asserted then the red sea forms a natural barrier as effective rs an,army many ships and transports would be needed and germany could not pro cure them muknnn honry can't spiel christiania dec 21.—henry ford has received information that he wou!c be prohibited from holding meetings a copenhagen it was learned today he will go there however and select dele gates to accompany his peace party to the hague 44 a ir fights in single day british bring down trvo enemy planes — one of ours missing i ondon dec 21 official op posite our southern and centre positions line we bombarded several parts of the enemy's trenches hostile artillery heavily shelled ypres and st je*n this afternoon i was also active against our front line of support trenches south-cast o ypres during the day we replied b helling the enemy's front line irenche ilong zonnebeke sandvoorde chelu velt and tenbteil early today the enemy made a boml lg attack near the quarries northwes f hulluch the attack was repulsed yesterday there was considerable a vity by the onemy's aeroplanes the ttempted to prevent our reconnai ance machines carrying out their work ut the attempts were unsuccessful during the day there were forty-foui ombats in the air two enemy aero slants being felled within the enemy ines and others driven down in a dam lged condition one of our machines is missing m m ifc mit hun losses now total 2,287,083 latest casualty list contains names of 42,825 germans dec 21.—according tc nieuwerotlerdam constantinople cour ant the prussian lists of losses numbei ed 390 to 399 contains 42,825 names making the total 2,287,083 says the amsterdam correspondent of reuter'j telegram company he continues there are besides 234 saxonian 315 wurtembergian and 240 bavarian lists fifty from the navy and some lists of german officers an non-commissioned officers in the turk ish army totototototo greeks prepared meet invaders have disposed troops in readiness to strike effectually at any point jjew york dec 20.—a cable from london to the herald says that the correspondent of the daily chronicle at athens telegraphs that general yon mackenzen with his army weak ened is insisting that the bulgarians shall join in an attack on salonika which the allies are making impreg nable while king ferdinand has re iterated his pledge that his troops will not invade greece a despatch from sofia reports the arrival there of twenty-four seven and a half inch guns to be used in the re duction of salonika the greek army is now so disposed that it can strike speedily and effec tively at any point for there is not the slightest doubt that if the bulgars violate greek territory the hellenic troops will attack them greeks and bulgars clash fight on albanian territory the encounter resulted from a bulgarian surprise attack and reports from italian sources say that several greek offi cers and soldiers were killed or wounded although creek officials say none were kill ed and few wounded ondon dec 21.—a fair degree of quiet continued on the war fronts during the past twenty-four hours none of the oft repeated threa's of a big offensive in france norh russia galicia or the balkans have yet act ually materialized persistent reports of a graeco bul garian encounter resulting from a bul gar surprise attack have been cleared up by the greek statement that the en counter took place on albanian territ ory no one was killed and but few were wounded it is announced from paris that no enemy detachment has yet crossed the greek frontier meanwhile work on the defensive lines around salonika are being active ly pushed greek villages in the neigh bourhood of the lines are being evac uated by the populations greek milit ary circles declare that they are con vinced that the forces opposing the allies will not attempt to cross the iron tier the bulgars because they realize the danger of provoking greece and the germans because they are grateful for greek neutrality they realize the tremendous cost which the enterprisenvould entail several greeks killed paris dec 21.—fighting between j small detachments of greek and bulgar troops is reported in a despatch from brindisi italy it is said that several greek officers and soldiers were killed or wounded the greek government hastily forward ed reinforcements to the scefie of fighting derby's report not yet complete and asquith's eagerly-awaited state ment has to be postponed london dec 20.—the eagerly awaited figures on earl derby's recruiting scheme will not be available to-morrow as expected premier asquith explained in the commons this afternoon that the com plexity of classifying the figures made it impossible to complete the work last week but earl derby hoped to send in the general result to-night the cabinet had decided that under these circumstances no considered statement could be made in the com mons to-morrow but he hoped to make it before adjournment marriage also makes a man a santa claus for life labor has failed to do urgent duty lloyd george tells'commons minister of munitions describes to bri tish parliament the difficulties of trying to speed up the output of high explosives and guns—appeals for factory volunteers only brought in five or six thousand men where eighty thousand were required��urgent need also for two or three hundred thousand unskilled workmen but the trades unions are standing in the way of the employment of these ondon dec 20.—lloyd george minister of munitions gave an ac count bf his stewardship to the house of commons to-night beginning with he oft-repeated story of insufficiency 3f munitions in the early days of the war and the history of the establish nent of his department to remedy his situation the minister gradually warmed to sis subject and reached a climax with he declaration that the success of the allies in this war depends on the att itude of organized labor whether it will allow the government to recruit t sufficient number of skilled men for he factories which the munitions de partment has brought into being many men wanbd we want eighty thousand skilled tien and from two to three hundred thousand unskilled men for these new factories he said we must reduce the proportions of our orders which go abroad and develop our home re sources ; upon the supply of labor depends i think our success in this war upon this depends whether we can reduce war costs by scores of millions pounds upon this depends whether we can sup ply our troops with the right sort of guns to enable them to make the ne;:t year's campaign a success here only organized labor can help us few volunteers we have done our best to get skill ed labor by a system of munitions vol unteers it is no use my going into the question why we got only five or six thousand men although that story may have to be told later the whole question depends upon organized labor and unless it allow us to out unskilled workers on work which hitherto has been the monopoly for skil led labor we cannot perform this task there can be only one appeal namely to patriotism victory depends upon this hundreds of thousands of precious lives depend upon labor's an swer it is a question of whether we are going to bring the war to an end in a year or linger along in the blood stained path labor has the answer efforts put forth dealing with the problem and ex plaining the steps taken to speed up the output lloyd george mentioned par ticularly the purchase of machinery from america and the acquisition by the government of sufficient raw mater ial for many months to come for its allies as well as for itself he emphasized the unexpected suc cess which has attended the munitions work in ireland and thanks he said to the assistance of mr john redmond the establishing of new national fact ories which he said now numbered thirty-three he declared they had been conspicuously successful in minimising labor difficulties and enabling the gov ernment to check prices many private works there were also hundreds of private factories under the cooperative scheme that previously had not been engaged in munition work these factories alone he said were now making three times as many shells as the whole united kingdom was making last may referring to american orders lloyd george said that david a thomas comes back speaking in the highest possible terms of the services rendered this country by j p morgan & co not merely in the selection of firms for contracts but in fact they have sav ed us many million pounds by their ef forts to reduce the inflated prices pre vailing before they took the matter in hand british attack turk positions in mesopotamia losses of the enemy since de cember vst are estimated at at least 2500 men ondon dec 21—that parties of the british mesopotamia army which have been holding positions on the tigris river at kut-el-amara have been sallying forth to attack turkish advanced trenches was announced of ficially to-night as the operations of this expeditionary force the losses of the turks since dec ist are estimated to have been at least 2,500 british restrict exports london dec 21.—an order-in council issued tonight indicates the further tightening of restrictions on ex ports no further exports of pig iron scrap iron steel scrap or hematite is permitted rigid restrictions are laid down for the exportation of vegetable fibres and yarns made from them — i !.■■ ladies and gent's fur lined coats no advance on former prices liberal discounts for spot cash value par excellence bowring brothers limited read the daily star mm it mil 1 read the daily star now due 1 schooner ida m zinck with a cargo of choice screened sydney coal price 7.80 per toh while discharging book you orders now to secure delivery united coal company