"Pontoon" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... bridge and two pontoon bridges constructed below that village the Germans poured their troops before dawn of September 1, and as the morning fog of that day slowly lifted, their columns were seen working round the north of the deep loop of the Meuse, thus cutting off escape on the west and north-west. Meanwhile, on ...
— The Development of the European Nations, 1870-1914 (5th ed.) • John Holland Rose
... same time the engineers were building pontoon bridges and smaller foot bridges. After the first wave of men had crossed the river and the mud and were climbing up the further side of the canal, the engineers were not so greatly delayed by rifle ...
— Winning a Cause - World War Stories • John Gilbert Thompson and Inez Bigwood
... and grape: all these may be needed by each piece in a battle, as the shot used depends upon the distance of the foe. A full regiment of infantry may fire in one battle sixty thousand rounds of ammunition, weighing nearly three tons. The pontoon trains, the baggage of the staff, the forage for the horses of the artillery and of the generals, field officers, and their staffs, the food of the army, and the food and forage for this further army of camp followers—all have to be ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 3 No 2, February 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... army in the most effective condition. His chief engineer must have informed himself of all the routes and the general topography of the country to be traversed; he must know at what points rivers can be best crossed, and where positions for battle can be best obtained; his pontoon trains and intrenching implements must be complete and ready for service; his maps prepared for distribution to subordinate commanders. His inspector must have seen that the orders for discipline and equipment ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 5, No. 6, June, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... point some eight miles above the present railway (A. & P.) bridge, where they crossed. Their experience was interesting. Lieutenant Ives directed the operations, using for a ferry-boat a singular combination: an old rubber pontoon, with the box from a spring waggon attached to the top of it for a receptacle for the goods. This was arranged at night. In the morning the pontoon was found in a state of collapse and the waggon-box filled with water, but the concern was resuscitated by the skill of Ives, ...
— The Romance of the Colorado River • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh
... million of rubles! There is a constant fight going on here between water and the efforts of man. To look at the fine buildings around us, you would say that man had secured the victory. He has thrown over the river a variety of bridges, stone, suspension, and pontoon, that can be taken to pieces at pleasure, to connect the numerous islands together, and has raised the most stately edifices on a trembling bog! But the water is not conquered after all! I have known ...
— The Rambles of a Rat • A. L. O. E.
... we were met by the exciting news that the Rebels were bringing up pontoon-bridges, and were expected to attempt crossing over near the Ferry, which was only two or three miles from us. Couriers came in every few moments with various reports. A superintendent whose plantation was very near the Ferry had been watching through his glass the movements on the opposite side, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 80, June, 1864 • Various
... the well-known ship designer, suggests the construction of a pontoon to be carried on the after end of the vessel and to be made of sectional air-tight compartments. One compartment would accommodate the wireless outfit. Another compartment would hold drinking water, and still another would ...
— Sinking of the Titanic - and Great Sea Disasters • Various
... witnessed the bloody and disastrous battle of Fredericksburg, and can never forget the experiences of that useless tragedy. I was conscious of a sensation which struck me as too profound to be merely awe. Early in the morning we crossed the Rappahannock on a pontoon bridge and marched up the hill to an open plain. The roar of the battle was simply terrific, shading off from the sharp continuous thunder immediately about us to dull, heavy mutterings far to the right and left. A few hundred yards before us, where ...
— Taken Alive • E. P. Roe
... km note: the Danube River, central Europe's connection to the Black Sea, runs through Serbia; since early 2000, a pontoon bridge, replacing a destroyed conventional bridge, has obstructed river traffic at Novi Sad; the obstruction is bypassed by a canal system, but the inadequate lock size limits the size of vessels which may ...
— The 2003 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... foundation of both is of the 14th century or earlier. There are also an ancient hospital and a museum of art and antiquities. On the north side of the fjord is Norre Sundby, connected with Aalborg by a pontoon and also by an iron railway bridge, one of the finest engineering works in the kingdom. Aabborgt received town privileges in 1342 and the ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... Prince Bagration had marched with his army from the hills on the other side of the river to take post on the main Moscow road so as to prevent the position being turned by the advance of a portion of the French army by that route. During the night Barclay had thrown two pontoon bridges across the river in addition to the permanent bridge. At daybreak a dropping fire broke out, for both Davoust and Ney had sent bodies of troops into the suburbs, which they had entered without opposition, and these now opened ...
— Through Russian Snows - A Story of Napoleon's Retreat from Moscow • G. A Henty
... trains which move with the army are those which carry the pontoons. Of these there are various kinds, made of wood, of corrugated iron, and of india rubber stretched over frames. But the wooden pontoon boats are most in use. They can be placed in a river and the flooring laid upon them with great rapidity. Several very fine bridges have been thus constructed—among them may be mentioned the one at the mouth of the Chickahominy, across which General McClellan's army marched in retreating ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 2, August, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... arrival at an out-port, and as you are crossing the pontoon which leads from the steamer to the bund, a most beaming celestial meets you and presents an open letter, which ...
— Life and sport in China - Second Edition • Oliver G. Ready
... was so far right. The entrance to unimportant creeks, indeed, had not been guarded, but the Russians had already laid down many torpedoes in the river to protect them from Turkish ironclads while engaged in constructing their pontoon bridges. He had scarcely made the remark, when I was half stunned by a shock under my feet, which seemed to rend the yacht asunder. There followed a terrific report, and the deck was instantly deluged with water. There could be ...
— In the Track of the Troops • R.M. Ballantyne
... close under the guns of the double redoubt of Gravelle and La Faisanderie, eight pontoon-bridges were thrown over the Marne; and at daybreak the first column of the third army under Blanchard and Renoult crossed with all their artillery, and, covered by the fire of the double redoubts, of ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... there was no time for repairs, and if left in the path, it interrupted the passage of the flying army. At last, in order to facilitate the flight, the provision-wagons were burned, and the bread divided amongst the soldiers; the equipages and pontoon-wagons were also burned. Exhausted by their unusual exertions, beside themselves from pain and unheard-of suffering the whole army was seized ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... enemy, and, held in its position by the Spanish vessel, completely dismasted. Already the flag-officer and two lieutenants had been wounded by the side of Admiral Villeneuve, who courted death in vain. The Bucentaure was cut down close like a pontoon. The admiral wished to pass on to another vessel. Not a single boat was left him. When he at last pulled down his flag he could not reply with a single cannon-shot to the English vessels that ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt
... all that we could swallow, those of us who could walk were ordered to fall in and march over to Wilmington. We crossed the branch of the river on a pontoon bridge, and took the road that led across the narrow sandy island between the two branches, Wilmington being situated on the opposite bank of ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy
... the 'Times' correspondent says: 'Hearing the firing apparently more fierce and continuous to the right than anywhere else, I hurried in that direction, past the sugar house of Colonel Chambers, where I had slept, and advanced to near the pontoon bridge across the Big Sandy Bayou, which the negro regiments had erected, and where they were fighting most desperately. I had seen these brave and hitherto despised fellows the day before as I rode along the lines, and I had seen General Banks acknowledge ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams
... strong wooden bridge had been thrown. Had it not been for this bridge the passage of the river would have cost us great delay, as we should have had to descend by narrow pathways to the bottom of the cliffs, then to throw a pontoon across, and ascend on the other side. In the face of an enemy this would have ...
— In New Granada - Heroes and Patriots • W.H.G. Kingston
... German artillery from each flank as well as the front. If the infantry line was broken at any point the whole would be compromised. There was the danger also of the canal in the rear with only a few pontoon bridges. The canal would be filled with our guns and dead. Very few of our men could escape. There were no troops but ours and the French on the left between us and Calais. Two weeks after the Battle of St. ...
— The Red Watch - With the First Canadian Division in Flanders • J. A. Currie
... royalist enthusiasm which anticipated by a few weeks only the abdication of Napoleon at Fontainebleau. The defection of Bordeaux forced Soult to fall back rapidly on a very formidable position in front of Toulouse. The British army followed in pursuit, encumbered with a great artillery and pontoon train. After a lively action at Tarbes, it arrived in front of Toulouse on March 27, to find the Garonne in flood, and the French army strongly entrenched around the town, with a prospect of being joined by 20,000 or 30,000 veterans, under ...
— The Political History of England - Vol XI - From Addington's Administration to the close of William - IV.'s Reign (1801-1837) • George Brodrick
... Backhouse and Brereton—the commanding officers at Manila and Cavite,—stating that he was ready to take over the city in due form, and he thereupon took up his residence in Santa Cruz, placed a Spanish guard with sentinels from that ward as far as the Pontoon Bridge (Puente de Barcas, which then occupied the site of the present Puente de Espana), where the British advance-guard was, and friendly communication took place. Governor Drake was indignant at ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman
... at half a mile's distance, was eloquent of tipsy reproach. In short, when the procession had filed past the edge of my tent-flap, I crawled out to watch: and then it occurred to me as worth a lazy man's while to cross the Zapardiel by the pontoon bridge below and head these comedians off upon the highroad. They promised ...
— The White Wolf and Other Fireside Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... flight of granite steps, leading down from a lawn laid along the whole of the house-front, within containing walls, access was had to a pier to the end of which was attached a floating pontoon affording an easy means of boarding the yacht's boats or the launches which were kept at Chatwold for use when the ...
— An Adventure With A Genius • Alleyne Ireland
... imagines her to have been a Parisienne,—a person of no importance, you understand,—who had come to spend the holiday with poor Dupre. But he quite realizes that the fact must never be revealed." He spoke in a dry, matter-of-fact tone. "There will not be room on the pontoon for more than five or six, including ourselves and Dr. Tarnier. Doubtless some of our newspaper friends will be disappointed—if one can speak of disappointment in such a connection—but they will have plenty of opportunities of being present to-morrow and the following nights. I have arranged ...
— Studies in love and in terror • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... him to be on the Mississippi by the first of May. For ten days he had been waiting at Grand Ecore, only to see the last of the fleet pass down in safety. Meanwhile he had entrenched his position, thrown a pontoon bridge across the river, placed a strong detachment from Smith's command on the north bank, and sent urgent orders to Alexandria, to New Orleans, and to Texas for reinforcements. Birge, with his own brigade and the 38th Massachusetts and 128th New York of Sharpe's ...
— History of the Nineteenth Army Corps • Richard Biddle Irwin
... come along for an extra monsoon, 'Twas Noah constructed the first pontoon To the plans of Her ...
— The Seven Seas • Rudyard Kipling
... Now, for instance, suppose an army comes to a wide river and wants to get across. They can't send anybody over to stretch a line; there may be enemy sharp-shooters that would get them and it is too wide, anyway. But they must know how many pontoon boats and how much flooring plank they must have to bridge it and so they sight a tree or a rock on the other shore and take the distance ...
— Radio Boys Cronies • Wayne Whipple and S. F. Aaron
... the French lost in killed and wounded 7000 men, and 6000 were taken prisoners. They lost 52 guns, their whole baggage and pontoon train, and 80 standards. Among the prisoners were the Princes de Soubise and Rohan, while among the killed were many nobles of ...
— The Cornet of Horse - A Tale of Marlborough's Wars • G. A. Henty
... is a floating pontoon bridge over the Duna. It consists of fourteen rafts, 105 ft. in length, each supported by two pontoons placed 64 ft. apart. The pairs of rafts are joined by three baulks 15 ft. long laid in parallel grooves in the framing. Two spans ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various
... later Rick called for instructions and was told to beach at Ramp Three. He located it without difficulty. Scotty climbed out on the pontoon and caught the rope thrown by a seaman. In a few ...
— The Electronic Mind Reader • John Blaine
... settled five seconds after he was seated at table. The way in which the butter was passed was one test; the manner of the eating of the famous omelette was another. If the tourist were a Frenchman, the neat glass butter-dish was turned into a visiting-card—a letter of introduction, a pontoon-bridge, in a word, hastily improvised to throw across the stream of conversation. "Madame" (this to the lady at the tourist's left), "me permet-elle de lui offrir le beurre?" Whereat madame bowed, smiled, accepted ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd
... following day, the enemy's futile efforts were resumed along the river east of Chateau-Thierry. The Germans suffered appalling losses in their efforts to place pontoon bridges at Gland and at Mareuil-le-Port. St. Agnan and La Chapelle Monthodon fell into the hands of Americans on ...
— "And they thought we wouldn't fight" • Floyd Gibbons
... It was obvious that bridges would be required, and it was decided to force the passage of the river in the dark hours by putting covering troops across to the northern bank, and by capturing the enemy's positions to form a bridgehead while pontoon bridges were being constructed for the use of guns and ...
— How Jerusalem Was Won - Being the Record of Allenby's Campaign in Palestine • W.T. Massey
... crossing it, and you must keep those means intact. The bridges running from left to right of our line were at Venizel, Missy, Sermoise, and Conde. The first three were blown up. Venizel bridge was repaired sufficiently to allow of light traffic to cross, and fifty yards farther down a pontoon-bridge was built fit for heavy traffic. Missy was too hot: we managed an occasional ferry. I do not think we ever had a bridge at Sermoise. Once when in search of the C.R.E. I watched a company of the K.O.S.B. being ferried across under heavy ...
— Adventures of a Despatch Rider • W. H. L. Watson
... single house in 1868. So far as I can recollect, Tapson's Hotel was the only building between Cambridge and the sea. This building was still in existence a few years ago. The Buffalo River had to be crossed by means of a pontoon; the road to this was cut through dense jungle. Judging by the spoors crossing the road this jungle must have been ...
— Reminiscences of a South African Pioneer • W. C. Scully
... dismount and stake out our animals, and then examine the spot at our leisure. If that is the place, we will find means for reaching it, even if we have to build a bridge, or buy a pontoon of India rubber." ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes
... The only church was the great church of the monastery. The town was not fortified, but the houses made a sort of hedge around it; and there were but two entrances—the one from the forest, by which Drake's party entered; the other leading over a pontoon bridge towards the hilly woods beyond the Chagres. Attached to the monastery, and tended by the monks and their servants, was a sort of sanatorium and lying-in hospital. Nombre de Dios was so unhealthy, so full of malaria and yellow fever, "that no Spaniard ...
— On the Spanish Main - Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. • John Masefield
... N. vehicle, conveyance, carriage, caravan, van; common carrier; wagon, waggon^, wain, dray, cart, lorry. truck, tram; cariole, carriole^; limber, tumbrel, pontoon; barrow; wheel barrow, hand barrow; perambulator; Bath chair, wheel chair, sedan chair; chaise; palankeen^, palanquin; litter, brancard^, crate, hurdle, stretcher, ambulance; black Maria; conestoga wagon, conestoga wain; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... here, as I said before, about a month, and then again moved on after our enemy, our cavalry, pontoon bridges, and artillery coming on by the most convenient passes of the mountains. While on the march we often had slight skirmishes with the enemy, but no regular pitched battle until we came to the Nivelle, where Soult had taken up a strong position. There our army halted in line, ...
— The Autobiography of Sergeant William Lawrence - A Hero of the Peninsular and Waterloo Campaigns • William Lawrence
... longer existed the useful and honored Puente de Barcas, the good Filipino pontoon bridge that had done its best to be of service in spite of its natural imperfections and its rising and falling at the caprice of the Pasig, which had more than once abused it and finally destroyed it. The almond ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... two pontoon bridges across, one above and one below the old railway bridge. The Mississippians have driven them back once, but they are pushing on the work and will soon get it finished; but General Barksdale bids me report that with the force at his command ...
— With Lee in Virginia - A Story of the American Civil War • G. A. Henty
... mud we came to the Judrio, which marked the line of the old frontier. We crossed the river by a pontoon bridge, for the Austrians had destroyed ...
— Italy at War and the Allies in the West • E. Alexander Powell
... Virginia to the Southwestern states. In their retreat from Loudon, the enemy had burned the bridge across the Tennessee at that point. It was several days before we were able to place across the river a pontoon bridge. From the south, in the direction of Chattanooga, Gen. N. B. Forrest often threatened us. From the north, a General Jones was daily reported to be advancing down the valley of the Holston upon Knoxville. About the time that our battery arrived at Loudon, Gen. ...
— Campaign of Battery D, First Rhode Island light artillery. • Ezra Knight Parker
... door to prevent interruption, opened and read two despatches from McClellan, who had gone personally to superintend the crossing. The first despatch from the general described the fine spirits of the troops, and the splendid throwing of the pontoon bridge by Captain Duane and his three lieutenants, for whom he at once recommended brevets, and the immediate crossing of eighty-five hundred infantry. This despatch was dated at ten o'clock the previous night. ...
— A Short Life of Abraham Lincoln - Condensed from Nicolay & Hay's Abraham Lincoln: A History • John G. Nicolay
... and beautiful one—the brigade of Colonel P. Sidney Post was thrown out, up the river four or five miles, to see what it could see. What it saw was Hood's head-of-column coming over on a pontoon bridge, and a right pretty spectacle it would have been to one whom it did not concern. It concerned us ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce • Ambrose Bierce
... heavy, and this not only tired the men, who were heavily laden, but also proved difficult for the limbers, several of which stuck and had to be man-handled. At Beaulieu we had dinners and rested while parties reconnoitred the Canal crossings and discovered various pontoon bridges built by the Engineers soon after the attack. As no orders came, we waited here until soon after 3-0 p.m., when we were sent forward to support the 2nd Brigade on the right flank of ...
— The Fifth Leicestershire - A Record Of The 1/5th Battalion The Leicestershire Regiment, - T.F., During The War, 1914-1919. • J.D. Hills
... time, and turned him face downward, so that the thundering recommenced in his ears; there was the sense of strangulation; and then he was steadily swimming on once more, past moored barge with its lights, past steamboat pontoon; and then with a rush he was driven against a stone pier; his hands grasped at the slimy stones without avail, he was turned in an eddy around and around, sucked under, and rose again, to swim on and on, till at last, ...
— The Bag of Diamonds • George Manville Fenn
... on 20th February. General Buller had captured Hlangwane Hill, the real key of the enemy's position, and on the following day the whole of Warren's Division crossed the Tugela by a pontoon bridge thrown across by the Royal Engineers. The significance of the fact was at once recognised at Ladysmith, and that day saw the last of the hated horse-flesh ration. Events were now moving fast. The ...
— Four Months Besieged - The Story of Ladysmith • H. H. S. Pearse
... had caved away into the sea, leaving a gap of open water about thirty-five feet in width, out of which rose the black perpendicular wall of the coast. There was no possibility of getting across without the assistance of a pontoon bridge. Tired and disheartened, we were compelled to camp on the slope of the escarpment for the night, with no prospect of being able to do anything in the morning except return with all possible speed to the Viliga, and abandon the idea ...
— Tent Life in Siberia • George Kennan
... with every known thing therein—first thousands of soldiers, then wagons of provisions, cannon, boats for pontoon bridges mounted on wheels ready for unloading, material for building, trucks of hay, portable houses and in one car were hundreds of tiny wheels sticking up which we discovered belonged to wheelbarrows. It is a droll procession, that never ceases before one's eyes. To offset ...
— Lige on the Line of March - An American Girl's Experiences When the Germans Came Through Belgium • Glenna Lindsley Bigelow
... which a violent sand storm put a sudden end about 3 o'clock in the afternoon. The main attacking force pushed forward toward its destination after nightfall. From twenty-five to thirty galvanized iron pontoon boats, seven and a half meters in length, which had been dragged in carts across the desert, were hauled by hand toward the water, with one or two rafts made of kerosene tins in a wooden frame. All ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... in the pavilion, all standing with bared heads, the Metropolitan dips the great gold cross in the rushing waters of the Neva, through a hole prepared in the thick, opalescent, green ice, and the guns on the opposite shore thunder out a salute. The pontoon Palace Bridge, the quays on both sides of the river, all the streets and squares for a long distance round about, are densely thronged; and, as the guns announce the consecration, every head is bared, every right hand in the mass, thousands strong, is raised ...
— Russian Rambles • Isabel F. Hapgood
... work on "Military Bridges" exhibits this power of resource in a remarkable degree; it is full of expedients, novel, practical, and useful, among which may be mentioned expedients for crossing streams in front of the enemy by means of blanket-boats,—ingenious substitutes for pontoon-bridges, floats, and floating-bridges,—plans for the complete destruction of railroad bridges and track, and for reconstructing track,—modes of defence for lines of road, etc.: for the book, be it observed, is not limited in its contents to the single subject indicated ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 86, December, 1864 • Various
... eastern division, of one thousand men under Arnold, crossing the country by the Kennebeck and Chaudiere, through difficulties and suffering almost unparalleled, arrived opposite Quebec on the 9th of November. The place was at this time almost without defence, and, had Arnold possessed a suitable pontoon equipage, it might easily have been taken by surprise. But by the time that the means for effecting a passage could be prepared, and a junction could be effected between the two American armies, Quebec was prepared to sustain their attack. The result of that attack is too well known ...
— Elements of Military Art and Science • Henry Wager Halleck
... his right flank required the moving of pontoon trains and artillery over the worst of roads for at least twenty miles, through a country cut up by a multitude of streams running across the route to be taken, and emptying into either the Potomac or Rappahannock; all requiring more or ...
— The Campaign of Chancellorsville • Theodore A. Dodge
... love of him by such shouting, but the shouting which accompanied him everywhere disturbed him and distracted him from the military cares that had occupied him from the time he joined the army. He rode across one of the swaying pontoon bridges to the farther side, turned sharply to the left, and galloped in the direction of Kovno, preceded by enraptured, mounted chasseurs of the Guard who, breathless with delight, galloped ahead to clear a path for him ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... of Mr. Jagn is on a totally different principle. Its essential features consist, as shown, of an endless rope made of hemp or aloe fiber, which takes a turn or two round a pair of drums mounted on a barge or pontoon, and then passes down the channel to return over a pulley hung from a floating punt, at such a depth that the whole of the rope is immersed in the water. Along this rope are suspended at equal intervals a number of parachutes made of sail cloth. ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 455, September 20, 1884 • Various
... miles to the left of the bridge, called Bridle Drift. Waggon Drift is about as much farther on. There is a drift just this side of where the Little Tugela runs into it, and one just farther on; there is Skeete Drift and Molen Drift, with a pontoon ferry; there is an important one called Potgieter's Drift, where the road from Springfield to Ladysmith crosses; and another, Trichardt's, where a road goes to Acton Homes. I know there are some to the right, but I ...
— With Buller in Natal - A Born Leader • G. A. Henty
... siege of Stockholm. But the Swedish fleet met him outside the harbor, captured or burnt his vessels, and took him prisoner. In October, seeing that the garrison was losing strength, Gustavus advanced his camps nearer to the town. His southern camp he moved to Soedermalm, from which he built a pontoon bridge to connect it with the west camp now on an island some three or four hundred yards from Stockholm. Another bridge he threw across the channel east of the city, and built upon it a turret which he armed with heavy guns. The ...
— The Swedish Revolution Under Gustavus Vasa • Paul Barron Watson
... gallery are far above those mentioned in the Tito gallery. In fact there are so many other good pictures that a mere mention of names must suffice. From the Ciardi group on toward the right, Guido Marussig's "Walled City", Italico Brass' "Pontoon Bridge", and particularly Scattola's "Venice" are all worthy of comment. Scattola's picture is very sensitively studied, discreetly painted and full of the poetry of a summer night. Before leaving ...
— The Galleries of the Exposition • Eugen Neuhaus
... battle developed itself before making his dispositions. But while the imposing array of cavalry was attracting the king's attention, Parma moved off with the main body of his army, threw a division across the river on a pontoon bridge, and attacked ...
— By England's Aid or The Freeing of the Netherlands (1585-1604) • G.A. Henty
... a further humiliation upon Prussia was inflicted by the military occupation of Schleswig-Holstein by Austria. The Austrian troops, who came to put a definite stop to hostilities in those provinces, marched into Schleswig-Holstein over a pontoon bridge laid by the retreating columns of the Prussians. As a concession to outraged German feeling, representatives from Schleswig-Holstein were to be readmitted to the Diet of the Germanic Confederation. This superannuated Diet met again ...
— A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year - Volume Two (of Three) • Edwin Emerson
... would succeed the field telegraph corps; the field post-office corps; the Red Cross corps; the brass band of, say, forty pieces; and all the rest of it, to the extent of a thousand and one circus parades rolled together. There were boats for making pontoon bridges, mounted side by side on wagons, with the dried mud of the River Meuse still on their flat bottoms; there were baggage trains miles in length, wherein the supply of regular army wagons was eked ...
— Paths of Glory - Impressions of War Written At and Near the Front • Irvin S. Cobb
... placed in charge of a pioneer corps, and you will go four miles south, on the road, where a bridge has been destroyed across a small bayou, build a new bridge strong enough to cross artillery, then move on two miles to a river you will find, and look out a good place to throw a pontoon bridge across. The first bridge you will build under an artillery fire from the rebels, and when it is done let a squad of cavalry cross, then the pontoon train, and a regiment of infantry. Then light out for the river ahead of the pontoon train, with the cavalry. ...
— How Private George W. Peck Put Down The Rebellion - or, The Funny Experiences of a Raw Recruit - 1887 • George W. Peck
... of water and a biscuit. They also asked me what those headquarters were, and a number of other questions. However, no suspicion of there being anything wrong entered my mind, as they spoke perfect English. They left and had just turned the corner to cross a pontoon bridge over Yser Canal, going toward the front-line trenches, when three French guards came running like mad. They asked me some questions excitedly, but it was some time before I could ...
— S.O.S. Stand to! • Reginald Grant
... rake of trucks and was hauled down to Ismailia—a journey of some 30 odd miles. Detraining at Moascar, on the west side of the town, a march of some four miles, along a first-class road, brought the 28th to the bank of the Suez Canal. A crossing was effected by means of a pontoon bridge constructed by the Engineers. As the east bank was reached, Signaller Yeldon was heard to exclaim in tones of great satisfaction, "Well, this is another bally country I can say I've been in." The march continued for another mile to a camp (Staging ...
— The 28th: A Record of War Service in the Australian Imperial Force, 1915-19, Vol. I • Herbert Brayley Collett
... of the infantry was posted in the east loop, so as to appear ready to cross the river and support the feint attack between the loops. As soon as the guns had driven the enemy into their trenches on Brakfontein, a pontoon bridge was to be thrown across the river south of Hunger's Drift, and the guns on Zwart Kop were to open on Vaalkrantz, and when this had been sufficiently bombarded, it would be carried by the infantry, and guns would be ...
— A Handbook of the Boer War • Gale and Polden, Limited
... occasion, adopted the cause of the besieged; for we had scarcely taken up our ground, when a heavy rain commenced, and continued, almost without intermission, for a fortnight; in consequence thereof, the pontoon-bridge, connecting us with our supplies from Elvas, was carried away, by the rapid increase of the river, and the duties of the trenches were otherwise rendered extremely harassing. We had a smaller force employed than at Rodrigo; and the scale of operations was so much greater, that it ...
— Adventures in the Rifle Brigade, in the Peninsula, France, and the Netherlands - from 1809 to 1815 • Captain J. Kincaid
... the Venetian Gulf, where the Austrians, having filtered into the Piave Delta, sought to cross both the Sile and the Piave, the enemy each night hooked up pontoons. At daybreak every morning one end of a huge pontoon structure was anchored to the east bank of the Piave and the other flung out to the strong current, which soon stretched the makeshift ...
— History of the World War - An Authentic Narrative of the World's Greatest War • Francis A. March and Richard J. Beamish
... his shout to the boys to be taken aboard after the fog closed down. Then came the sudden appearance above his head of what seemed a mountainous black steamer bow, a terrific crash, that hurled him from the pontoon raft into the water, and then a frenzied grip for a ...
— The Boy Aviators' Treasure Quest • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... arrive under the chestnuts of the Tuileries, cross the bridge, then down the river-bank, over the shaky gangway, and so on to the steamer pontoon. ...
— The Aspirations of Jean Servien • Anatole France
... Kazemain, on the western side of the river northward, opposite which on the eastern side lies Muazzam. The former of these is connected with western Bagdad by a very primitive horse-tramway, also a relic of Midhat Pasha's reforms. The two parts of the city are joined by pontoon bridges, one in the suburbs and one in the main city. The Tigris is at this point some 275 yds. wide and very deep. Its banks are of mud, with no other retaining walls than those formed by the foundations of the houses, which ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 2 - "Baconthorpe" to "Bankruptcy" • Various
... and never had they food suitable for a fever-stricken invalid. The vexations he encountered were of no common kind: at starting, the greater part of his medicines was stolen, much though he needed them; in the course of the journey, his pontoon was left behind; at one time, while he was under the influence of fever, his riding-ox threw him, and he fell heavily on his head; at another, while crossing a river, the ox tossed him into the water; the heavy rains, and the necessity ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie
... unsuccessful sally, with heavy loss; on the 10th, a breach, forty yards wide, was made in the wall overhanging the river; on the night of the 15th, through the treachery or negligence of Brigadier Clifford, on guard at the Clare side of the river, a pontoon bridge was laid, and a strong English division crossed over in utter silence. The Irish horse, which had hitherto kept open communications with the country on that side, fell back to Six Mile Bridge. On the 24th, a truce of three ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... the Polish troops had been occupied building a pontoon bridge, upon which, on the 8th day of September, the allied forces began to cross ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach
... Here is the story as told by Ensign E. A. Stone, United States Naval Reserve, after he was rescued from the Channel, where with a companion he had clung for eighty hours without food and drink to the under-side of a capsized seaplane pontoon. "I left our station in a British seaplane as pilot, with Sublieutenant Moore of the Royal Naval Air Service as observer, at 9 o'clock in the morning. Our duty was to convoy patrols. When two hours out, having met our ships coming from the westward, we thought we sighted a periscope ...
— Our Navy in the War • Lawrence Perry
... No. 1. In 1453 by order of Sultan Mohamed II. the Golden Horn was crossed by a pontoon bridge laid on barrels (see Joh. Dukas' History of the Byzantine Empire XXXVIII p. 279). —The biographers of Michelangelo, Vasari as well as Condivi, relate that at the time when Michelangelo suddenly left Rome, in 1506, he entertained some intention of going to Constantinople, there ...
— The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci, Complete • Leonardo Da Vinci
... horse had been quartered on the Clare side of the Shannon; but, through the treachery or indifference of Brigadier Clifford, who had been posted, with a strong body of dragoons, to prevent such an attempt, Ginkell threw across a pontoon-bridge, and sent over a large detachment of horse and foot, on the morning of the 16th, which effectually cut off communication between the citizens and their camp. On the 22nd he made a feint of raising the siege, but his real object was to lull suspicion, while he attacked ...
— An Illustrated History of Ireland from AD 400 to 1800 • Mary Frances Cusack
... not followed the tracks for more than fifty yards when they turned straight towards the water. The next minute I barely stifled a yell of delight, for there, staring me in the face, was a sort of pontoon bridge, stretching away into the darkness. On closer inspection, I found it to be composed of bundles of brushwood which were held together in some mysterious manner, and appeared to lie on the water. The surface of the bridge was in very bad repair and, as some of the top ...
— 'Brother Bosch', an Airman's Escape from Germany • Gerald Featherstone Knight
... the little river, nor were there boats enough to carry the army across. But under the direction of skillful engineers, the best in the world, pontoon bridges sprang up as if by magic. Before the Germans were fully aware of what was going on, several thousand men had been hurled across ...
— The Boy Allies On the Firing Line - Or, Twelve Days Battle Along the Marne • Clair W. Hayes
... sent General Bagby, with a brigade of horse and a battery, from Mansfield to Grand Bayou Landing. Before reaching the ferry at Bayou Pierre, he ascertained that the fleet had turned back on the afternoon of the 10th. There was a pontoon train at Shreveport that I had in vain asked for, and Bagby experienced great delay in crossing Bayou Pierre by means of one small flat. The fleet, descending, passed Grand Bayou Landing at 10 o'clock ...
— Destruction and Reconstruction: - Personal Experiences of the Late War • Richard Taylor
... while crossing with his regiment a pontoon bridge, Stephen Brice heard a shout raised on the farther shore. Sitting together on a log under a torch, two men in slouch hats were silhouetted. That one talking with rapid gestures was General Sherman. The impassive profile of the other, the close-cropped beard and the firmly held cigar ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... keeping the Boers holding the horseshoe in expectation of a frontal attack, and masking their main position; Sir Charles Warren to march by night from Springfield with the brigades of Hart, Woodgate, and Hildyard, the Royal Dragoons, six batteries of artillery, and the pontoon train to a point about five miles west of Spearman's Hill, and opposite Trichardt's Drift on the Tugela. Here he was to meet the mounted forces from Spearman's Hill, and with these troops he was next ...
— London to Ladysmith via Pretoria • Winston Spencer Churchill
... were ordered to pack their knapsacks; but the men of the Sixth corps remained in camp until the sun's rays became scorching; then the column moved rapidly eastward. A hard day's march on the 16th and another on the 17th, brought the corps in sight of the Chickahominy. It crossed a pontoon bridge of enormous extent, in the construction of which ninety boats were used, and the length of which was over two thousand feet. Thoroughly exhausted the men bivouacked on the eastern ...
— Three Years in the Sixth Corps • George T. Stevens
... 587 km note: Danube River traffic delayed by pontoon bridge at Novi Sad; plan to replace ...
— The 2004 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... closed I took her to the American Consulate to find a house where she could stay. That night and the next loads of English Red Cross busses with their households of pain and ether rumbled over the pontoon bridge across the Scheldt, went past Fort Tete de Flandre, and disappeared in the swampy meadows on the road to Ghent. I never saw her again, but I have always hoped that Mrs. Richardson was among the nurses who went ...
— The Log of a Noncombatant • Horace Green
... object of taking in reverse the first and second lines of the enemy's defences.[7] A division was accordingly sent across the Gumti for this purpose, and the movement, being entirely successful, materially aided in the capture of the city. The passage of the river was effected by means of two pontoon bridges made of empty barrels, and thrown across the stream a little below the Dilkusha. They were completed by midnight on the 5th March, and before day broke the troops detailed for this service had ...
— Forty-one years in India - From Subaltern To Commander-In-Chief • Frederick Sleigh Roberts
... opportunity of stretching my legs. Peter had come ashore for a smoke, and we wandered among the battered riverside streets, and looked at the broken arches of the great railway bridge which the Germans were working at like beavers. There was a big temporary pontoon affair to take the railway across, but I calculated that the main bridge would be ready inside a month. It was a clear, cold, blue day, and as one looked south one saw ridge after ridge of snowy hills. The upper streets ...
— Greenmantle • John Buchan
... and nobody but the guides knew our destination, and we followed them in silence up the shell-pitted road and across the pontoon bridge that spanned the Yser Canal. Various dark forms hobbled past, their baggy trousers showing them to be Algerians. A French outpost challenged us, and a party of Ghurkas passed us leading pack horses with the bodies of their fallen officers lashed ...
— From the St. Lawrence to the Yser with the 1st Canadian brigade • Frederic C. Curry
... service was the pontoniers, whose duty it was to bridge non-fordable rivers. They were armed and drilled as infantry, but only for their own protection. Their specialty was laying and removing pontoon bridges. A pontoon train consisted of forty to fifty wagons, each carrying pontoon boats, with plank and stringers for flooring and oars and anchors for placing. In laying a bridge these boats were anchored side by side across the stream, stringers made fast across them, and plank ...
— War from the Inside • Frederick L. (Frederick Lyman) Hitchcock
... January, 1865, the Confederate vessels in the James made an attempt to descend the river, destroy the pontoon bridges of the United States armies, and cut off both the Army of the James and that of the Potomac from their base of supplies at City Point. Rear-Admiral David D. Porter, who then commanded the North Atlantic Squadron, was fully occupied at the time with the bombardment of Fort Fisher and ...
— Admiral Farragut • A. T. Mahan
... Kershaw was stationed and that of Mayree's. Daylight was yet some hours off when we took position, but we could hear the rattle of the guns of Barksdale's Mississippians, whose turn it was to be on picket in the city, driving off the enemy's pontoon corps ...
— History of Kershaw's Brigade • D. Augustus Dickert
... to cross to the western side of the Canal. On the outward journey there was never any difficulty about this, but on the homeward some such scene as the following was almost certain to occur. As the fatigue party—thirty men under an officer—reach the end of the pontoon bridge, after a hot afternoon in the ordnance depot, a cloud of natives hurl themselves upon it from either end and proceed to haul it in two halves under the whip-cracking of their own headman and the fatherly advice of an R.E. corporal. Looking up the Canal the fatigue ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison
... Mulrady set to work; the rigging was cut clear, and the mainmast, chopped away at the base, fell over the starboard rail, which crashed under its weight. The MACQUARIE was thus razed like a pontoon. ...
— In Search of the Castaways • Jules Verne
... proved Burke's power to follow an idea to its lair, and its launching also launched the author upon the full tide of polite society. Goldsmith said, "We will lose him now," but Burke still stuck by his coffeehouse companions and used them as a pontoon to bridge the ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 7 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Orators • Elbert Hubbard
... fortified town of Peterwardein, opposite which, just across a pontoon bridge spanning the Danube, is the larger city of Neusatz. At Hamenitz we met Professor Zaubaur, the editor of the Uj Videk, who came down the Danube ahead of us by steamboat; and now, after housing our machines at our gasthaus ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens |
