MOROCCO: At Jacob’s Hummock

In blinding heat, a French army patrol wound deep into the Atlas Mountains last week. Ambling, loose-jointed came a detachment of the Camel Corps, then a sweltering khaki-clad detachment of the Foreign Legion, finally a black-skinned, red-fezzed detachment of stalwart Senegalese. The column entered the pass called El Bordj. Nothing is there but blistering rocks, flat, cracked stretches of baked mud. The French column, losing contact with their flank outposts, pushed forward intent on reaching the evening’s camp.

Suddenly from the rocks behind and above came the smash of rifle fire. Soldiers fell. Hastily the French commander flung out a skirmish line, halted the advance. His little patrol was completely ambushed by 3,000 ragged, bearded, fierce-fighting Moors. Firing every inch of the way the French patrol retreated through the pass to the cement blockhouse of Ait Yacoub (Jacob’s Hummock). For 48 hours the garrison of 360 French and Senegalese stood off 3,000 yelling bloodthirsty tribesmen owing allegiance to no recognized Sheikh, who had sworn to die rather than submit to French rule. In the ambush and retreat to Ait Yacoub, 13 French were killed, 93 wounded, captured or missing. It was the bloodiest fight since red-bearded Abd-el-Krim surrendered in 1926.

French army headquarters at Rabat, 100 miles away, moved quickly to rescue the beleaguered garrison. Three squadrons of bombing planes zoomed into the air. Eight thousand troops of the Foreign Legion soaped their horny feet, filled their canteens with good red pinard in preparation for the long march to Ait Yacoub.

While airplanes strafed the Moroccan tribesmen with bombs and machine guns, the Foreign Legion’s district commander, dashing General Freydenberg, went forward with the relief column himself.

The Foreign Legion contains no more romantic figure than General Freydenberg, swagger, redhaired, theatrically handsome. For 20 years he was a cloistered monk. Wearying of the religious life he broke his vows and joined the army. It is often said that none but a Frenchman can hope to rise above the rank of Captain in the Foreign Legion. But it is also true that one need not explain all one’s antecedents to the Legion. Anything but French in appearance, red-thatched Freydenberg nevertheless had such Gallic dash that he became Major, Colonel, and after the Moroccan campaign of 1926 against Abd-El-Krim, General of Brigade.

Ex-Monk Freydenberg wired the French War Ministry last week: WITHIN THREE DAYS I WILL KILL CAPTURE OR DISPERSE EVERY ONE OF THE BESIEGERS.

Quite as brave as ex-Monk Freyden-berg was Pierre Pigeaire, a correspondent for the United Press. Alone, he traveled by motor, horse and foot 300 miles from the railhead at Marrakesh to the scene of the ambush, sent the first direct word of the battle. At Meknes base hospital Lieut. Briard. wounded in the first skirmish, told how he had lain behind a desert bush and watched his wounded comrades being stabbed to death by Moors.