Battle of 100 Hours

The vicious little Gran Chaco war between Bolivia & Paraguay last week reached its Gettysburg. Under French-trained General Estigarribia the Paraguayans, born short-end fighters, had harried the Bolivians northwestward across the jungle to the Pilcomayo River, backed them up against their last Chaco stronghold, Fort Ballivian. The Paraguayans planned to take Ballivian and stop. They found the Bolivians entrenched in open hayfields, for the first time in the war. General Estigarribia's artillery bombarded the trenches for two days. On the second the first wave of Paraguayans stumbled out into the hayfields in a close formation bayonet charge. The Bolivians had their first fun in months. With machine guns they mowed down the lines of little brown men, left not one standing. Another wave came over and another. Here and there an officer and a few men gained the Bolivian trenches, leaped down and died fighting.

That night the Paraguayans came over again, four times, but the darkness was not cover enough from the machine guns. Slow learners, they kept it up next day, trotting in solid lines across the plain, across the bodies of their day-old dead. On the fourth day as dusk drew in, the Paraguayan officers led their men in two last desperate charges, as futile as all the others. Thus ended the "Battle of 100 Hours'' at Las Conchitas. The dead: 1,000.

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