Page:EB1922 - Volume 32.djvu/211

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PRYOR—PRZEMYSL, SIEGES OF
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but as a general rule protozoological research and teaching are still being carried out under unfavourable conditions by hard- worked professors of other subjects. The valuable work already done by many of these men is surely a sufficient pledge of the profits that will accrue when more adequate provisions are made.

If we turn to the United States we find that Columbia Uni- versity has a professor of protozoology and Johns Hopkins an assistant professor. There is also an American professor of protozoolory in the Philippines. But with these exceptions, and a few of lesser importance, protozoology is advancing in America and elsewhere by the labours of zoologists and medical men whose appointments were not primarily established for the furtherance of the science.

RECENT LITERATURE. The most trustworthy of recent books deal- ing with the Protozoa as a whole are those of E. A. Minchin, An Intro- duction to the Study of the Protozoa (1912), and F. Dollein, Lehrbuch der Protozoenkunde (4th ed., Jena, 1916). See abo D. Bruce and others (19031919), Reports of the Sleeping Sickness Commission, i.-xvii. (Royal Society, London); C. Dobell (1911), "The Prin- ciples of Protistology" (Arch.f. Protistenkund? , vol. xxiii., p. 269) ; C. Dobell and others (1921), A Report on the Occurrence of Intestinal Protozoa in the Inhabitants of Britain (Medical Research Council, Special Report Series, No. 59, London) ; C. Dobell and F. W. O'Connor (1921), The Intestinal Protozoa of Man (London); S. P. James (1920), Malaria at Home and Abroad (London); H. S. Jen- nings (1906), Behavior of the Lou'er Organisms (New York) ; A. Laveran and F. Mesnil (1912), Trypanosomes et Trypanosomiases (2 ed. Paris) ; E. L. Walker and A. W. Sellards (1913), " Experimen- tal Entamoebic Dysentery," Philippine Journ. Sci. (B. Trop. Med., vol. viii., p. 253). (C. Do.)


PRYOR, ROGER ATKINSON (1828-1919), American jurist and politician (see 22.533*), died in New York City March 14 1919. In 1912 he published a volume of Essays and Addresses.


PRZEMYSL, SIEGES OF, 1914-5. The Galician town of Przemysl (see 22.534) was first fortified in 1854, when Austria mobilized against Russia. The completely exposed position of the N.E. frontier made it imperative to lay out fortifications. The Archduke Charles had already, in 1824, called attention to this weak point. In case of an invasion of East Galicia by the Russians, the first natural obstacle capable of bringing them to a halt would be the river beds of the lower San and the Dniester, and the obvious thing to do was to strengthen this line by con- structing a series of fortifications. On the San it was originally intended to build out Jaroslau as a fortress, but the decision in 1854 fell on Przemysl. In later years a row of smaller bridge- heads and points d'appui arose along the Dniester, which greatly increased its value as an obstacle. In the course of one year a fortified ring of no less than 65 forts had been erected round the town of Przemysl. The year 1870 saw the building of a perma- nent ring of forts finished, but the works were not a match for a bombardment by modern siege guns, owing to the very niggardly expenditure sanctioned. Although after 1888, and in the last years before the World War, the modernization of the fortress from a technical standpoint was begun and some modern self- contained forts were constructed, it was in 1914 still in a very unsatisfactory condition. The short time available for equip- ment between the first days of mobilization and the first siege by the Russians was indeed spent in feverish activity, but only a very small part of the neglect of the past 10 years could now be made good. The works on the ring of forts, which was 48 km. in circumference, were more or less out of date. Only 1 2 of them could be considered " bombproof," while all the rest were only " shellproof ," and even so only against 24-011. bombs and 15-cm. shells of old-fashioned construction. The points d'appui for the infantry and the battery emplacements lying between the forts were almost without exception only splinterproof shelters, and some were mere field fortifications constructed of wood and earth. The infantry line running through these was protected by wire obstacles, generally only three rows deep. In front of the line of the ring of forts one enormous task had to be undertaken in preparing for the defence the clearing of the foreground. No less than 18 villages and from 7 to 8 km. of forest were levelled to the ground. Numerous barracks, ammunition magazines, communications, bridges and other buildings, had still to be erected within the ring. The armament of the fortress was also

on a very low footing, consisting of about 1,000 guns in all, of which more than half were short-range weapons for ditch defence, andmtradilores. These were 12- and 15-cm. cannon dating from 1861, 15-cm. mortars dating from the 'eighties, and 8-cm. cupola, disappearing cupola, and minimum port guns of old construction. About 450 of the guns were distant defence guns, being for the most part old g-cm. field guns (M 75/96) with a range of only 6 km. Of modern guns the fortress at the beginning of the war had altogether only four 30.5-011. mortars, with a range of 9-5 km., and 24 8-cm. field guns dating from 1905, effective up to 7-5 kilometres. The distant defence guns also included some 12-cm., 15-cm. and i8-cm. siege cannon, dating from 1880, 10 lo-cm. and 15-011. cupola howitzers made in 1899, 15-011. mobile howitzers of the same year, and 24-cm. mortars made in 1898. As regards munitions the average provision was 500 rounds per gun, and not even that in the case of the modern mortars. For all the four 30-5-011. mortars taken together there were 300 rounds in the fortress. Of machine-guns there were altogether 114, one-third of which were built into the forts, leaving two- thirds for mobile use.

For the purpose of provisioning the fortress an estimate of 85,000 men and 3,710 horses had been established. In peace tims one month's supplies were stored in the fortress, with the understanding that an increase to three months' should be made during the arming period. The Austro-Hungarian Higher Com- mand did its utmost at this time to increase the store of supplies, and, by making full use of the available railways and motor columns, succeeded in provisioning the fortress for four months and a-half. These precautions were all the more justified as, at the last moment, the garrison was augmented by the addition of the 23rd Honved Inf. Div., two field tramway sections and other minor formations, which brought up its strength to 130,000 men and 21,000 horses. At this strength the fortress was pro- visioned, not for four and a-half, but for three months.

The actual garrison of the fortress at the beginning of mobiliza- tion consisted of the Austrian uith and the Hungarian 9 7th Landsturm Inf. Bdes., one reserve squadron, one reserve bat- tery, 40 companies of garrison artillery, 44 Landsturm artillery brigades, 7 companies of sappers, and the essential sanitary and labour detachments. When the Austro-Hungarian armies retreated behind the San, after the breaking-off of the battle of Lemberg-Nawa Ruska, there were added to the fortress command (under Field-Marshal-Lt. Kusmanek von Burgneu- stadten) the Austro-Hungarian 93rd and loSth Landsturm Inf. Bdes. and the 23rd Honved Inf. Division. Earlier additions had been: two Hungarian march regiments, of which, however, one was handed over to Jaroslau and Radymno, one Hungarian Landsturm hussar unit, and lastly a group consisting of four battalions formed out of various Landsturm formations, auxil- iary police and others, cut off from the main body. All in all, the fortress establishment, when the last man of the mobile armies had left the zone, consisted of: 6i| infantry battalions (of which 40! were Landsturm), 7 squadrons, 4 field-gun bat- teries, 43 fortress-artillery companies, 48 Landsturm artillery brigades, and 8 sapper companies; also sanitary corps, military and Landsturm labour detachments, fortress and tramway formations, balloon detachments, telegraph, telephone and radio formations, and so forth. The value of the troops shut up in the fortress may best be judged by the facts that two-thirds of them were Landsturm, including therefore older and less trained men, and that the formations which had been fighting on the open field were reduced to nearly half their strength. There had been, since the beginning of the World War, only two brigades to take duty in the fortress, and one of these even was sent temporarily to the IV. Army Command. The rest of the troops in the fortress were therefore not over-familiar with the duty of the fortress.

The Russian siege army, commanded by Gen. Radko Dimi- triev, consisted originally of the whole of the III. Army, with the IX., X., XI. and XXI. Corps and parts of the IV. and VIII. Armies. When the Austro-Hungarian forces resumed the offen- sive in the beginning of Oct. 1914, the Grand Duke Nicholas withdrew three divisions of the III. Army from the circle of

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' These figures indicate the volume and page number of the previous article.