Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun

Just as the Engineers marched out of camp on their way to Kinchau, the brooding cloud on the summit of Mount Sampson began to send forth flash after flash of vivid lightning, green, blue, and sun-bright, which lighted up not only the rugged slopes of the mountain itself, but also those other and more deadly slopes of the Nanshan Heights, while peal after peal of thunder crashed and rolled and reverberated among the ravines which scored the sides of the mountain. It was a weird enough scene of itself, but its weirdness was intensified by the Russian searchlights, which were turned on with the first crash of thunder, which the Russians appeared to mistake for the roar of Japanese guns. As a matter of fact they appeared to be a bit panicky that night, for not only did they turn on the searchlights at the first sound of thunder, but the occupants of the forts and trenches on the crest and side of Nanshan Heights at once opened a terrific fire from every piece, great or small, that could be brought to bear upon the foot of the slope, which was instantly swept by a very hurricane of shrapnel and rifle bullets, while the Japanese, safely under cover, looked on and smiled.

For two hours that storm raged with such fury that the volleying peals of thunder quite outroared the booming of the Russian artillery and rifle-fire, which gradually died down as the Muscovites began to realise that there was no attack; and about two o’clock in the morning the storm passed away, still rumbling and muttering, to the eastward. But during that two hours of elemental fury, a Chinese village in the neighbourhood was set on fire and practically destroyed, while several Japanese soldiers were struck by lightning, and either killed outright or more or less seriously injured.

With the passing of the storm a thick, white mist arose from the low ground, completely blotting out everything beyond a few yards distant; and under the cover of this mist the Japanese made their dispositions for the coming battle, entirely unseen by the enemy, and probably unheard also, for it was a revelation to me to see how quietly large bodies of men could be moved when the necessity for silence had been fully impressed upon them.

As the dawn gradually brightened the sky behind the ridge of Mount Sampson, the Russians again became uneasy, and their rifles once more began to speak from the trenches, a shot here, then another shot yonder, followed by quite a spluttering here and there all along their front; but their artillery remained silent, for the fog was still so dense that nothing could be seen at which to aim.

Protected by the cover of the fog, the Japanese soldiers went to breakfast, fortifying themselves with a good meal, in preparation for the arduous labours of the day that lay before them; and I did the same, for I knew not how long it might be before I should again have the opportunity to eat or drink; also, following the example of several of the officers and men, I filled my jacket pockets with biscuit, and provided myself with a good capacious flask of cold tea, having done which, I felt ready for anything.

We had barely finished breakfast when the sun showed over the ridge of Mount Sampson; and almost immediately the thick curtain of fog, which had thus far so effectually hidden the movements of the Japanese troops from the enemy, began to lift and thin. This was the signal for the final movement prior to the storming of the Nanshan Heights; and that movement was directed against the city of Kinchau, it being known by this time that the devoted band of engineers who had been dispatched at midnight to blow in the gates of the city must have failed in their mission, otherwise some of them at least would have been back to report.

To the 1st Division was assigned the task of taking the city; and they did it in brilliant style. Marching upon the southern gate, a party of four engineers was sent forward to blow in the massive barrier, which was protected by steel plates and bands, secured by heavy steel bolts, and loopholed for musketry. The devoted quartette succeeded in placing their blasting charges and igniting the fuses under a heavy fire, not only from the loopholed gate, but also from the walls, but in so doing they were so severely wounded that after they had lighted the fuses they were unable to effect their escape, and received further severe injuries when the explosion occurred and the gate was blown off its hinges. Then the waiting 1st Division, straining like eager hounds held in leash, rushed forward through the thick, acrid smoke, with levelled bayonets, yelling “Banzai Nippon!” as they ran; and as they charged impetuously in through the south gate, the enemy went streaming as impetuously out through the west gate, about half a mile away.

Kinchau was now in the hands of the Japanese; but this was not sufficient for them, they must needs pursue the flying Russians; and they did so with such furious impetuosity that they literally drove them into the sea—that is to say, into the waters of Kinchau Bay, where the luckless Russians, to the number of five hundred, were either shot down or drowned, almost to a man, only ten of them surviving and being taken prisoners. I had a distant view of the whole affair from a knoll on the northern spur of the Nanshan Heights, where I had taken up a position which commanded a view, not only of practically the whole of the ground over which the stormers would have to pass, but also of the bay and our fleet, to which I should probably be required to signal from time to time as the fight progressed.

Meanwhile, the mist had by this time lifted, revealing a flotilla of our torpedo-boats and destroyers feeling their way into the bay and keeping a bright lookout for possible mines. Well astern of them came the Akagi and Chokai; and still farther out were the old Hei-yen and the cruiser Tsukushi, cautiously creeping in, with leadsmen perpetually sounding on either beam. The bottom, about where they were required to be, was flat, and the tide was on the ebb, the great fear of the skippers of those two craft, therefore, was that they might touch the ground and hang there, left by the tide, exposed helplessly to the fire of the Russian guns. Thanks, however, to my labours of a few days earlier, they were all able to get close enough in to open upon the Russian works at extreme range, although, until the tide should rise, they could not bring a thoroughly effective fire upon the Russian batteries and so put them out of action.

But if we had ships, so, too, had the Russians, in the shape of the gunboat Bobr and five small steamers in Hand Bay, on the side of the isthmus opposite to Kinchau Bay, the Nanshan Heights being between them, so that each was hidden from the sight of the other. The Bobr was likely to prove a very awkward customer for us; for she mounted one 9-inch and one 6-inch gun, which, although they were a long way from being up-to-date, were still quite good enough to out-range the Japanese field-guns and severely pepper our left, which occupied the ground at the head of Hand Bay. The steamers which accompanied her were, our spies discovered, fitted up expressly for the purpose of quickly ferrying troops across from one side of Hand Bay to the other, according as they might be wanted, instead of being obliged to march round the head of the bay in the face of our troops. Thus the Russians were in a position to either harass our left flank and rear, or to rush reinforcements across the head of the bay—a distance of about a mile—as circumstances might require.

The Bohr began the day’s proceedings by opening fire with her 9-inch gun upon the artillery of our 3rd Division, which had taken up a position upon the lower slopes of Mount Sampson, from which it could reach the Russian batteries established upon the crest of the Nanshan Heights. The gunboat’s fire did very little mischief, but it seemed to be regarded by both sides as a signal to begin the fight, for at once our batteries got to work, their shells dropping with most beautiful precision upon the guns and trenches of the Russians. I was so stationed that I had a most excellent view of practically the entire scene of operations, and no sooner did our artillery open fire than the Russian batteries replied with a crash that seemed to make the very air quiver.

A land battle is a very different spectacle from a sea battle, in this respect: that, in the latter, a shell either hits or misses its mark, and if it misses there is a splash or two and that ends the matter, so far as that particular shell is concerned. But ashore, every shell, whether or not it finds its mark, hits something, though it be only the ground, and immediately there is a violent explosion, a flash of fire, a great cloud of smoke, and a violent scattering of dust, clods of earth, and stones—if nothing worse. Thus, I must confess that for a few seconds I was perfectly amazed to see the slopes of Mount Sampson, on the one hand, where our artillery was placed, and the Nanshan Heights, on the other, where were situated the Russian batteries, suddenly burst into great jets of flame, clouds of smoke, and flying debris, as the shells showered down upon them. The explosions of shrapnel were easily distinguished from those of common shell, for the former almost invariably burst in the air, the smoke from the explosions standing out against the background of sky or hill like tufts of cotton-wool that had suddenly sprung into existence from nowhere.

Very shortly after the artillery duel began, I saw the Japanese infantry moving out to storm the Nanshan Heights, and I smiled to myself at the acuteness of their leaders, for the men began their advance in such open formation that a shrapnel shell seldom succeeded in accounting for more than one man, and often enough it failed to do even that. Of course they were seen from the trenches, and a terrific rifle-fire was opened upon them, but for the same reason it was very ineffective—at the outset at least, for a rifleman had to be a crack shot to bowl over his man at a distance of close upon a mile. And if one wished to get his man, he had to aim at him, and correctly