"The Algerians came up at midnight and we pushed out. They went over at daybreak and got all shot up. We made the relief under German flares and the light from a burning town.
"We went out as we came, through the gully and town, the latter by now all in ruins. The place was full of gas. We pushed on to the forest and fell down in our tracks and slept all day.
A FUNERAL, AT THE FRONT
"That night the Germans sh.e.l.led us and got three killed and seventeen wounded. We move a bit farther back to the cross road and after burying a few Germans, some of whom showed signs of having been wounded before, we settled down to a short stay.
"It looked like rain, and so Wilmer and I went to an old dressing station to salvage some cover. We were about to go when we stopped to look at a new grave. A rude cross made of two slats from a box had written on it:
"Lester S. Wa.s.s, Captain U. S. Marines. July 18, 1918."
"The old crowd at St. Nazaire and Bordeaux--Wa.s.s and Sumner killed, Baston and Capt. LeRoy T. Hunt wounded. We then moved further to the rear and camped for the night. Dunlap came to look us over. A carrier pigeon perched on a tree with a message. We decided to shoot him. It was then quite dark, so the shot missed. I then heard the following remarks as I tried to sleep: "h.e.l.l! he only turned around!" "Send up a flare!"
"Call for a barrage!" etc.
"The next day we were back in a town for some rest and to lick our wounds."
IMPRESSION OF A FRENCH LIEUTENANT
A French lieutenant thus describes the American fighting quality:
"The finest thing in the combat was the dash of the Americans. It was splendid to see those grand fellows, with their tunics thrown off and their shirt sleeves rolled up above their elbows, wading the rivers with the water to their shoulders and throwing themselves on the Boche like bulldogs.
"Any one who has seen such a sight knows what the American army is good for henceforth and to the end of the war. At the sight of these men, magnificent in their youth, physical force, good temper and dash, the Germans fled "with every leg" or surrendered without awaiting the order to throw away their arms and take off their suspenders, which is the first thing a prisoner is told to do, in order that he may be compelled to keep his hands employed and out of mischief.
"The Germans hurried toward our lines gripping their trousers, haggard and mad with terror.
"Would that every mother in France who has lost a son in the war could have seen that epic sight. They would have seen themselves revenged, and it would have been some consolation to them in their sorrow."
KEEPING THE GERMANS ON THE RUN
The trench deadlock in northern France and Belgium was broken by Ludendorff"s fatuous drive in March, 1918. After the allies had stopped it and inaugurated their counter-offensive all Europe made a startling discovery. The Germans were tenacious enough in trench warfare; in open fighting, known as war of maneouvre, they could not stand before American and the allied troops. Incessant attacks, rapidly delivered at the same time at many points on the long line between the North Sea and the Swiss border, were more than they could withstand. The mechanically trained troops of the central empires were futile before armies of men who did their own thinking and delighted in fighting an enemy they could see from the feet up. German armies had twice been almost at the gates of Paris. The first time they were driven back they dug themselves in.
That was in 1915. The second time, in the spring of 1918, they were allowed no time for digging in. From the July days of 1918, when American soldiers at Chateau Thierry beat the best troops that ever were trained in Prussia, they were kept going. How industriously may be inferred from the story of the young corporal who was sitting on the roadside trying to tie the soles of his shoes to the uppers, in a hurry.
Somebody asked him what was the matter.
"O, nothing much," said he. "Only I came over here to kill Germans, but they never told me I"d have to run "em to death."
A STRANGER TO HIS OWN CHILD
There never was a war so prolific of personal incident in every shade of experience possible to human life. The devastated provinces of France offer perhaps more of these happenings than any other part of the steel-swept, sh.e.l.l-wrecked fronts of all Europe. An a.s.sociated Press correspondent tells one that is especially touching.
He was motoring toward Denaen, one of the cities the Germans had occupied through four hard years, when a French officer going in the same direction asked him for a lift, explaining that he had lived there but had neither seen nor heard from his wife during all that time.
Entering the city and turning into his street the officer saw the first house was in ruins. He gave a nervous start. A few doors farther on was his home. The officer climbed out with an effort, his eyes fixed on the place.
There was no sign of life. The windows were shuttered and on the door was a sign showing German officers had been living there. The officer pulled the bell with shaking hand. No one answered. He backed away like a man in a trance and leaned against the car, trembling.
Suddenly the door opened and an aged servant appeared, leading a beautiful baby girl with a wealth of golden curls. The officer took one step toward the child and halted. He was a stranger to his own flesh and blood. The child hid behind the nurse, peering out in fright.
The half blind eyes of the old nurse had recognized her master and she held out her hands, repeating, "Monsieur! Monsieur!" in ecstasy. He crossed the road and grasped her hands, but the baby drew back.
A door opened end a comely young matron came to see what was going on.
She caught sight of her husband, then stopped. Her hands flew to her breast. She swayed for a second. With a sob of joy she hurled herself into his arms.
The correspondent moved away. And thus they were left, the nurse beaming on the happy couple and the curly headed youngster looking with troubled eyes at this strong man who had appropriated her mother so completely without a word.
WHAT PERSHING THOUGHT OF HIS YANKS
An American newspaper man who returned from Europe about the time hostilities ceased was informed that General Pershing suggested to Marshal Foch in June 1918, that he thought it bad policy to stick around waiting for the boche and that he felt the time had come to jump in and attack--"But" he was told, "we have not got the troops."
"Whats the matter with the Americans?" Pershing asked.
"They are not yet trained" was Foch"s reply.
"Try them and see" said General Pershing. "They will go, anywhere you send them, and I will bet my life on it."
Pershing took the initiative in urging the offensive, supplied the troops that gave Foch his mobile reserve enabling him to strike his blow, and those American troops "delivered the goods."
HEALTH OF ARMY SURPRISING
Official reports to the war department show that the general health of the American army during the war had been surprisingly good. The death rate for all forces at home and abroad up to August 30th, 1918, was 5.
per 1,000 men per year, or little more than the civilian death rate for men of the same age groups.
There were 316,000 cases of influenza among the troops in the United States during the late summer and fall of 1918 and of 20,500 deaths, between September 14th and November 8th, 19,800 were ascribed to the epidemic.
ARMY REACHED TOTAL OF 3,664
An official report shows that on the day the Armistice was signed more than twenty-five per cent of the male population of the United States between the ages of 19 and 31 years, were in military service, the army having reached a total of 3,664,000, with more than 2,000,000 of this number in Europe. As compared with an army strength of 189,674 in March 1917, one week before war was declared by the United States.
CHAPTER IV.
AMERICAN VICTORY AT ST. MIHIEL
_First Major Action by All American Army--Stories to Folks at Home--Huns Carry Off Captive Women--h.e.l.l Has Cut Loose-- Major Tells His Story--Enormous Numbers of Guns and Tanks-- Over the Top at 5:30 A. M.--Texas and Oklahoma Troops Fight in True Ranger Style--Our Colored Boys Win Credit._
The first major action by an all American army was that which began before the St. Mihiel salient September 11, 1918. The Germans had occupied that salient almost four years, and had built it into what they believed to be an impregnable position. The Americans, under direct command of General Pershing, reduced it in a three days" advance.
The salient was a huge bulge, almost twenty miles in depth, turning southwest from Combres at the north base and Hattonville at the south and looping down around the towns of St. Mihiel and Ailly. It was powerfully held by ma.s.ses of enemy troops.
General Pershing"s army attacked from the west, south and east all the way from Bouzee to Norroy, and by September 13th had pushed it back to a straight line drawn from Combres to Hattonville. The French attacked at Ailly, the apex of the salient as it was on September 11.
The entire operation was conducted with rapidity and with irresistible energy. The dash and enthusiasm of the American soldiers astonished and delighted the French and British as completely as it staggered the Germans.
By September 13th the Americans had taken forty-seven towns and villages, reduced the German front from forty miles to twenty, captured the railway that connects Verdun with Commercy, opened the cities of Nancy and Toul to the allies, and with the French and British on the east, created a new battle front on a line running from Hattonville on the west to Pagny on the east--Pagny being a town on the Moselle river, at the German border.
The importance of this victory could hardly be overestimated. It opened the way to and was followed up by the demolition of the whole German line from the Swiss border to the North Sea, and hastened the great German retreat. In the action itself, September 11 to 13, about 15, Germans were taken prisoner by the Americans.