It was in following up the German retreat from their "farthest south" back to the Marne, that our men learned the truth of what they had heard and read so often, that the German is as good a fighter as any in the world when he is in masses, but degenerates into a sickening coward when left alone or in small groups.
It was during this time, too, that they learned the truth of the oft-repeated charge that Germans were left behind, chained to machine guns so they could not escape, to hinder an advancing enemy and make his losses as heavy as possible.
Repeatedly groups of our men advanced on machine gun nests in the face of vicious fire until they were in a position to make a sudden rush and, on reaching the guns, were greeted by uplifted hands and bleats of "Americans, kamerads! kamerads!"
On the nature of the individualAmericans depended what happened. Sometimes the Germans were released from their chains and sent to the rear as prisoners. Sometimes the bayonet was used as the only answer to such tactics. And who shall blame either action?
When, as frequently happened, it was a case of man to man, the Pennsylvanians found that it was a rare German who would stand up and fight. Long afterward they told gleefully of finding, here and there, a Hun who bravely gave battle, for our men frankly preferred to kill their men fighting rather than to slaughter them or take them prisoner.
Some of the Americans were so eager to keep close on the heels of the retreating Huns that they did not stop long enough thoroughly to clean up machine gun nests and other strong points. Groups of the Boche hid until the main body of the Americans had passed on, then raked them from the rear with machine gun and rifle fire, snipers concealed in trees being particularly annoying in this way.
In scores of instances our men found machine guns and their gunners both tied fast in trees, so that neither could fall,even when the operator was shot. It was reported reliably but unofficially that machine gun nests had been found where the Germans, in the short time they had been on the ground, had arranged aerial tramways of rope from tree to tree, so that if a machine gun nest were discovered in one tree and the gunners shot, the guns could be slid over to another tree on the ropes and another group of men could set them going again.
Many of the Huns "played dead" until the American rush was past, then opened fire on the rear. This is an old trick, but Allied soldiers who tried it early in the war discovered that the Germans countered it by having men come along after a charging body of troops, bayoneting everybody on the field to make sure all were dead. The Germans, however, knew they were safe in trying it with our men, for they were well aware Americans did not bayonet wounded men or dead bodies.
Sergeant McFadden, who has been mentioned before, was making his way through the woods with a single companion when he noticed an apparently dead Boche in a rifle pit. He got a glimpse of the face,however, and noticed the eyes were closed so tightly the man was "squinting" from the effort. McFadden jabbed his bayonet in the German's leg, whereupon he leaped to his feet and seized the rifle from the astonished American's hand. He threw it up to fire, but before he could pull the trigger, McFadden's companion shot him.
At one point, below Fossoy, the Germans not only went back to the river, but actually crossed it in the face of the 110th Infantry's advance. Reaching the banks of the river, however, the enemy was within the protection of his big guns, which immediately laid down such fire that it was utterly impossible for the Americans and French to remain. Having had a real taste of triumph, the Pennsylvanians were loath to let go, but fell back slowly, unpressed by the Germans, to their former positions.
It was on this forward surge back to the Marne that Pennsylvania's soldiers began to get real first-hand evidence of Hun methods of fighting—the kind of thing that turned three-fourths of the world into active enemies of them and their ways, and sickened the very souls of allwho learned what creatures in the image of man can do.
They came on machine gun nests, in the advance between Mezy, Moulins and Courtemont-Varennes, to find their comrades who had been taken prisoner in the earlier fighting tied out in front in such a way as to fall first victims to their friends' fire should an attack be made on the gunners. Men told, with tears rolling down their cheeks, how these brave lads, seeing the advancing Americans, shouted to them:
"Shoot! Shoot! Don't stop for us!"
They saw eight airplanes, painted with the French colors, swoop over the lines, soar low near a barn where a battery had been planted and drop tons of bombs, shaking the earth and demolishing everything about as if an earthquake had occurred. Fortunately in this instance, the battery had been moved to another location, but the same planes poured streams of machine gun bullets into the ranks of our men until driven off by machine gun and anti-aircraft fire.
Not the least of the difficulties of our men was the fact that the Germans mingleda certain quantity of gas shells with their high explosives and shrapnel. Ordinarily, soldiers learn to distinguish gas shells from others by the difference in the sound of the explosion, but in such a bombardment as this the sounds are so commingled that even that protection is denied.
Therefore, it was necessary for the men to wear their gas masks almost continuously. While these are a protection against the poisonous fumes, they are far from being pleasant. Not only is it more difficult to see and breathe, but what air is inhaled is impregnated with chemicals used to neutralize the gas. Yet for hours at a time, the men had to go through the inferno of fighting under the handicap of the masks.
Men returned to the rear with great burns upon their faces, hands and bodies. From some the clothes were burned away almost entirely, and others reeled along like drunken men, nearly blinded. They reported that they had seen Germans in the woods with what looked like large tanks on their backs. As the Americans approached to give battle, these Huns turned short nozzles toward the oncomingsoldiers, and from the nozzles leaped great streams of flame, extending as much as thirty feet.
A part of the 111th Infantry confronted, at one time, a small wood, which the French believed masked a strong machine gun nest. A patrol was organized to reconnoiter the position, composed partly of volunteers and partly of men chosen by officers. One of the volunteers was Private Joseph Bennett, of Gulph Mills, Pa., near Norristown, a member of the headquarters company of the 111th. The party consisted of twelve enlisted men under command of a French lieutenant.
They advanced with the greatest care, their line extended to more than the normal skirmish distance. There was not a sign of life about the wood. Coming closer, they saw the body of an American soldier propped against a tree. The French officer signaled for the men to close in toward this point. As they did so, four machine guns, concealed by the Hun ghouls behind the American body, raked the thin line of approaching men with a terrific fire. Every man in the party except Bennett was killed instantly. Bennett fired one shot andsaw one of the Boche plunge forward from his hiding place and lie still. Then a stream of machine gun bullets struck his rifle and destroyed it.
Bennett flung himself to the ground and dragged himself to the body of the French lieutenant. He took a supply of smoke bombs with which the lieutenant had intended to signal the result of his expedition. Setting these in operation, Bennett heaved them over in front of the machine gun position. They promptly threw up such a dense cloud that the Gulph Mills man was able to stand up. Under cover of the smoke he advanced and threw hand grenades into the position, killing the remaining three Germans. Then he returned to his regiment, the sole survivor of the scouting party of thirteen men. The Distinguished Service Cross was awarded to him for that act.
Bennett had another remarkable experience. He is one of the biggest men in his regiment, standing a little more than six feet, and weighing about 200 pounds. He was with Private Joseph Wolf, of Pottstown, in the advance when they saw a sniper in a tree just drawing a bead onan American lieutenant. Bennett was almost directly under the tree, and coolly picked off the sniper. In falling, the body dislodged a second badly frightened German. Bennett, watching the grim little tableau, had not lowered his gun, and the live German fell directly on his gun, impaling himself on the bayonet. The force of the blow almost dropped the big American.
The men of the 111th were no whit behind their comrades of the other regiments in the intensity of their fighting spirit nor in their accomplishments. Individuals performed the same kind of heroic feats, whatever regiment they called their own. In other words, all were true Americans.
Corporal William Loveland, of Chester, with Company B, 111th, single-handed, captured seventeen of the enemy, and was decorated for his bravery. He was so badly wounded in the last campaign of the war that he died November 5th.
It was a little later, after they had driven the Germans back to the Marne and had retired again to their original positions, that there came to the Pennsylvanians a highly pleasing estimate of theirprowess as viewed by the British. A runner from division headquarters brought up a copy of a great London daily newspaper in which appeared the following comment:
"The feature of the battle on which the eyes of all the world are fixed, and those of the enemy with particular intentness, is the conduct of the American troops. The magnificent counter-attack in which the Americans flung back the Germans on the Marne after they had crossed was much more than the outstanding event of the fighting. It was one of the historical incidents of the whole war in its moral significance."
One other bit of cheering news came to them, passing down through the various ranks from headquarters. It told something of what the intelligence officers had gleaned from the study of documents taken from enemy prisoners and dead. One of these latter had been an intelligence officer. He was killed after writing a report on the quality of the American troops and before he had a chance to send it along on its way to German great headquarters. Our men learned that in this report he had written that their morale was not yetbroken, that they were young and vigorous soldiers and nearly, if not quite, of the caliber of shock troops, needing only more experience to make them so.
With his troops back at the Marne and balked from moving southward, the enemy now tried to move eastward along the banks of the river toward Epernay. The checking of this move fell to other troops, chiefly French, while our men lay in their trenches, the victims of a continuous, vindictive bombardment, without apparent purpose other than the breaking of that morale of which the dead intelligence officer had written.
The men did not know what had happened. They knew only they wanted either to get away from that sullen bombardment or get out and do something. They were not aware that Foch had unleashed his armies between Château-Thierry and Soissons and that the enemy already was in flight from the Marne, the bombardment being designed to keep those terrible Americans in their trenches until the last Huns had recrossed the river to begin the long retreat northward.
Until July 21st, the Pennsylvaniaregiments hugged their trenches, nursed their minor hurts and their deadly fatigue, and wondered what was going on out yonder where the fate of Paris and possibly of the war was being decided. The roar of artillery had gradually died down and the men realized that the front was moving away from them. This could mean only one thing—a German retreat: and our soldiers were gladdened, despite the sad gaps in their ranks, with the knowledge that they had played the parts of real men and splendid soldiers in making that retreat compulsory.
Uppermost in the mind of more than one old national guardsman, as evidenced by scores of letters received since that time, was the thought that the despised "tin soldiers" of other days had "come through" with flying colors, and had put their fine old organization well beyond the touch of the finger of scorn.
So, on July 21st, the regiments were ordered back out of the ruck of battle and away from the scene of their hard six days for a rest. They went only a few miles back, but it was a blessed relief for the men—too much and too sudden for some.Men who had come through the battle apparently unscathed, now collapsed utterly as their nerves gave way with the release of the tension, like the snapping of a tight-coiled spring, and more than one went under the physicians' care from that rest camp, miles away from German fire.
Not all were allowed to rest, however. Details were sent to the scene of the recent fighting to clear up and salvage the wreckage of war, to hunt for wounded and to bury the dead. This was not the least trying of their experiences for the men engaged. The bodies of well-liked officers were dragged out from tangles of dead Huns and buried tenderly, each grave being marked by a little wooden cross on which was placed one of the identification disks taken from the dead man, the second being turned over to statistical officers for record purposes.
A week had passed since the first engagement, and the burying squads had no pleasant task, from the physical standpoint, entirely aside from the sadness and depression it entailed. The men got little touches of spiritual uplift from things they found on the battlefield. Such as, forinstance, the body of little Alexander Myers, of Green Lane, Montgomery County, a private in Company M, 109th, who had been known in boxing circles about Philadelphia as "Chick" Myers. He was found with five dead Boche about him. And the body of Sergeant Coburn, of the same company, who had been married two days before he sailed for France, was found prone on an automatic rifle, with the ground before him literally covered with dead Huns.
In the burial detail of the 111th was Harry Lewis McFarland, of Fallston, Pa., near New Brighton, a private in Company B. He had been grieving bitterly over the fact that his brother, Verner, had been missing since the company was cut up so badly in the first German advance. Moving about among the dead, he turned one over, face up. It was his brother. In his hands was his rifle, still clenched tightly. In front of him, in such position that it was plain he had done the execution himself, lay seven dead Germans.
Such was the spirit with which our men fought and died, and such was the price they charged for their lives.
Back in the rest camp, the companies were mustered and the rolls checked off with the known statistics regarding those not present. Figures on the casualties of the 109th in those six days of action have reached this country. They show four officers and 75 enlisted men killed; ten officers and 397 enlisted men wounded; six officers and 311 enlisted men missing, a total of twenty officers and 783 men, or 803 casualties for the regiment, out of something more than 3,000 men—approximately twenty-five per cent of losses. The 110th suffered about as heavily, and the 111th scarcely less. The 103d Engineers had been more fortunate. Their hard time was yet to come.
It was in this period that the weather changed. The fine, hot, sunshiny days gave way to pouring rains, which turned the roads into quagmires and added immeasurably to the miseries of the men. However, officers commented on the fact that there was little complaining. Men who had grumbled in the training camps back in America when the beans were cold for lunch, or when they had an extra hour's work to do, or when the wind blewchill while they were "on sentry go," now faced actual hardship with dauntless spirit and smiles. In some places the men marched through mud up to their knees. At night they slept in the open with the rain pouring on them. When the hot sun shone once more, their clothing steamed.
More cheering news came to the men while they rested. The companies that had been in the front line with the French when the Germans drove across the river and had suffered the heaviest, were mentioned in special orders for their gallantry, and the report went down the line that several of the officers and men were to receive decorations.
With indomitable good humor, which served to cover their hurts to some extent—as many a small boy laughs to keep from weeping—officers and men made the most of things that struck a funny vein. In this connection, there was much "kidding" of Captain George M. Orf, of Philadelphia, statistical officer of the 109th.
Sunday, July 14th, Captain Orf received his discharge from the army because he had been found to be suffering from an ailment that unfitted him for military duty.He wrote a request at once for a re-examination and revocation of the order of discharge. Pending action on his request, he was, technically and to all intents and purposes, a civilian. Actually, he went right on with his duties, "carried on" throughout the German drive and the counter-attack, came through without a scratch, and stayed right with the regiment through further hard fighting and campaigning to August 9th. Then he received final word, a rejection of his appeal and orders to proceed home at once. During this period, his fellow officers declined to address him by his military title, but went out of their way to speak to him and of him as "Mister Orf."
After only a few days and nights of rest, the regiments were moved off to the southward a few miles, then turned sharply to the west, thus passing around a district that still was being shelled heavily by the Germans in an effort to hold the Allied force back until they could get their own materials out of the Château-Thierry salient.
Thus they came again to the Marne, which turns sharply south at Château-Thierry, and here they made camp again and received contingents of "casuals"—that is, men unattached to any regiments—who had been sent to fill up the depleted ranks. The shattered companies were refilled, Companies L and M, of the 109th, and B and C, of the 110th, becoming almost new organizations. The newcomers were made welcome and proved to be good soldier material, but few of them were Pennsylvanians.
The march was resumed July 24th over a road paralleling the railroad line from Paris to Château-Thierry, which followed the course of the river rather closely, except for its numerous bends. The doughboys were anxious to see Château-Thierry, which already, even among these lads who were out of touch with events in other parts of the war area, had loomed large in their talk. They had heard much of it and of the achievements there and in the vicinity of other American troops, notably the marines, and they were eager to see it.
They saw it, however, only in glimpses from the far side of the river, for they kept on up the road and did not cross the river there.
That night they bivouacked in woods along the Marne. Here the 109th had its first taste of night air raiding. The regiment halted at the little town of Chierry, just east of Château-Thierry, but on the south bank. One battalion remained there, another crossed the river on pontoon bridges, left behind by the French and Americans now in pursuit of the fleeing Germans, and remained in the hamlet of Brasles for the night, andthe third was ordered out to guard the bridges.
About three o'clock in the morning sentries heard the whir of airplane motors, and fired their rifles. The sharpshooters of the regiment rushed to the edge of the woods with rifles and supplies of ammunition, and the anti-aircraft guns around Château-Thierry set up their baying. The 109th's marksmen tried a few shots, but the range was too great for effective shooting, and the flyers turned tail and disappeared in the face of the air barrage from the big guns before they got within good rifle range of our men.
Next day the regiments remained in camp, and that night another battalion of the 109th stood guard on the bridges. This time the flyers apparently had crossed the river to the east or the west, for they came up from the south, directly over the bridges at Chierry, probably returning from an attempt to raid Paris.
They rained bombs. There was no possible chance for the marksmen this time. Rather it was a question of keeping out of the way of the death-dealing missiles hurtling earthward. Again theanti-aircraft guns gave tongue, and after ten minutes or so of this explosive outburst the airplanes disappeared. Then the 109th learned something of the difficulties airmen experience in trying to hit a particular mark. Although the river had been churned to foam by the hail of bombs, only one bridge was hit and the damage to it was so slight as to be repaired easily.
Early next morning, July 26th, the period of inaction came to an end. The regiments were ordered out on a route to the northeast, which would carry them somewhat east of Fere-en-Tardenois, in the middle of the Soissons-Rheims "pocket," which fell some days later.
Orders were for the Pennsylvanians to press along that route with all speed until they effected contact with the retreating enemy, and to exert all possible pressure to harass him and push him as far and as rapidly as possible.
Gradually, as the regiments moved forward, the sound of the firing became louder, and they realized they were overtaking the ebbing tide of Germans. Officers, having learned by bitter experience at the Marne the value of the British suggestionto do away in battle with marks distinguishing them as of commissioned rank, stripped their uniforms of insignia and camouflaged themselves to look like enlisted men. The officer casualties in those first few days of fighting could not be maintained without working irreparable harm to the organizations.
Orders were issued to beware of every spot that might shelter a sniper or a machine gun. The regiments deployed into lines of skirmishers, greatly extending the front covered and reducing the casualties from shell fire. Patrols were out in advance, and every precaution was taken against surprise by parties of Germans that might have been left behind in the retreat.
The Germans still were using gas shells, and again the masks were inspected carefully and donned. Overhead, enemy aircraft circled, but Allied airman and anti-aircraft guns were active enough to keep them at a respectful distance. They were unable to harry the Americans with machine gun fire. Occasionally, a bombing flyer, protected by a covey of fighters, would get into what he believed to be a favorable position for unloosing a bomb, but thesedid no damage to the thin lines of our troops.
At night they made their way into the forests and lay there. There was little sleeping, but the men were grateful for the rest. They evaded the vigilance of the airplane observers, so they were not molested by a concentrated artillery fire, against which the forest would have been poor shelter, but the continual roar of the artillery and the occasional shell that came with a rending crash into the woods effectually disposed of any chance to sleep. The men crept close to the trunks of the larger trees. Some dug themselves little shelters close to the trees, but the night was a terrible one, and the day, when it came, was almost a relief.
The regiments now were in a region where the Germans had been long enough to establish themselves, where they had expected to stay, but had been driven out sullenly and reluctantly, fighting bitter rear-guard actions the whole way. Our men had their first opportunity to learn what it means to a peaceful countryside to face a German invasion.
The wonderful roads for which Franceso long had been noted were totally effaced in places, sometimes by shell fire, often with every evidence of having been mined. Here and there were tumbled heaps of masonry, representing what had once been happy little villages, many of the houses centuries old. Trees and grape vines had been hacked off close to the ground, and often the trunks of trees were split and chopped as if in maniacal fury. Where the Huns had not had time to chop trees down, they had cut rings deep into the trunks to kill them.
They saw the finest homes of the wealthiest landowners and the humblest cottages of the peasants absolutely laid in ruins—furniture, tapestries, clothing, all scattered broadcast. Handsome rugs were tramped into the mud of the fields and roads. It was as if a titanic hurricane had swept the entire country.
There had been no time to bury the dead, and the men actually suffered, mentally and physically, from the sights and the stench. At one place they came on a machine gun emplacement, with dead Boche lying about in heaps. Close beside one of the guns, almost in a sitting posture, withone arm thrown over the weapon as if with pride of possession, was an American lad, his fine, clean-cut face fixed by death in a glorified smile of triumph.
Scores of officers and men almost unconsciously clicked their hands up to the salute in silent tribute to this fair-haired young gladiator who had not lived to enjoy his well-won laurels.
It was about this time that the Pennsylvanians saw one of the few really picturesque sights in modern warfare—a touch of the war of olden times, which had been seen seldom since Germany went mad in 1914. Troop after troop of cavalry, some French, some American, passed them, the gallant horsemen sitting their steeds with conscious pride, their jingling accoutrements playing an accompaniment to their sharp canter, and round after round of cheers from the Americans sped them on their way to harry the retreating foe.
During a brief halt along a road for rest a part of the 110th Infantry took shelter under an overhanging bank while a sudden spurt of heavy enemy fire drenched the vicinity. There were few casualties and the officers were just beginning tocongratulate themselves on having chosen a fortunate position for their rest when a large high-explosive shell landed on the edge of the bank directly above Company A. Two men were killed outright and several were wounded. Lieutenant George W. R. Martin, of Narberth, rushed to the wounded to apply first-aid treatment.
The first man he reached was Private Allanson R. Day, Jr., nineteen years old, of Monongahela City, Pa., whom the men called "Deacon," because of a mildness of manner and a religious turn of mind.
"Well, Deacon, are you hard hit?" asked Lieutenant Martin, as he prepared his first-aid application.
"There's Paul Marshall, Lieutenant; he's hit worse than I am. Dress him first, please, sir. I can wait," replied the Deacon, who died later of his wounds.
The Pennsylvanians had thought they hated the Hun when they left America. They had learned more of him and his ways below the Marne, and they found their loudly-voiced threats and objurgations turning to a steely, silent, implacable wrath that was ten times more terrible and more ominous for the enemy.The farther they penetrated in the wake of the Boche the more deep-seated and lasting became this feeling of utter detestation. Not for worlds would they have turned back then. Had word come that peace was declared it is doubtful if the officers could have held them back. The iron had entered their souls.
During the progress of all these events east of Château-Thierry, the 112th Infantry had come up and had been in the desperate fighting in the vicinity of that town, so that when the Franco-American attack from Soissons to Bussiares, on the western side of the pocket, began to compel a German retirement from the Marne, that regiment was right on their heels.
The 110th and the 111th were close behind and all three soon came into contact with the fleeing enemy.
In all their engagements the greatest difficulty the officers had to contend with was the eagerness of the men to come to grips with the enemy. Repeatedly they overran their immediate objectives and several times walked into their own barrage so determinedly that officers, unable to halt the troops so hungry for revenge, had tocall off the barrage to save them from being destroyed by our own guns.
The Pennsylvanians pressed on relentlessly. The 109th Infantry now was rushing up from the Marne to resume its meteorlike career as a fighting unit beside its fellow regiments of the old National Guard, and word was received that the 53d Field Artillery Brigade, commanded by Brigadier-General W. G. Price, Jr., of Chester, was hurrying up to participate in its first action.
Still other organizations of the Twenty-eighth Division hastening to the front were the ammunition train and the supply train. The division was being reassembled, for the first time after leaving Camp Hancock, as rapidly as the exigencies of hard campaigning would permit.
With the 112th and 111th in the van, the Pennsylvanians pushed northeastward after the Germans. It was at times when the Huns had stopped, apparently determined to make a stand at last, only to be blasted out of their holding positions by the Americans and continue their flight that, as so many officers wrote home, they "could not run fast enough to keep up withFritz," and the artillery was outdistanced hopelessly.
Repeatedly our doughboys had to be held up in their headlong rush to permit the artillery to catch up. It being useless to waste life by sending infantry against the formidable German positions without artillery support, our lines were held back until the struggling field guns could come up to silence the German guns by expert counter battery work.
The Pennsylvanians were wild with eagerness and excitement. None but the officers had access to maps, and hundreds of the men, having only hazy ideas as to the geography of France or the distances they had traveled, believed they were pushing straight for Germany and had not far to go.
One and all realized fully that, when they began their fighting, the Germans for months had been moving forward triumphantly. They realized just as well that the Germans now were in flight before them. Each man felt that to his particular company belonged the glory of that reversal of conditions. Thus, scores wrote home: "Our company was all that stood between the Boche and Paris, and we licked him andhave him on the run"—or words to that effect.
They were like a set of rabbit hounds, almost whining in their anxiety to get at the foe. Deluged by high explosives, shrapnel and gas shells, seeing their comrades mowed down by machine gun fire, bombed from the sky, alternately in pouring rain and burning sun, hungry half the time, their eyes burning from want of sleep, half suffocated from long intervals in gas masks, undergoing all the hardships of a bitter campaign against a determined, vigorous and unscrupulous enemy, yet their only thought was to push on—and on—and on.
The likeness to rabbit hounds is not uncomplimentary or far-fetched. One soldier wrote home: "We have had the Boche on the run in open country, and it has been like shooting rabbits—and I am regarded as a good shot in the army."
Captain W. R. Dunlap, of Pittsburgh, commander of Company E, 111th Infantry, and Captain Lucius M. Phelps, Oil City, of Company G, 112th Infantry, with their troops, led the advance beyond Epieds.
They came to the western edge of the forest of Fere, and into that magnificent wooded tract the Germans fled. The occasional small woods, dotting open country, through which they had been fighting, now gave way to heavily timbered land, with here and there an open spot of varying extent.
An American brigadier-general, who has the reputation of being something of a Haroun-al-Raschid among the men, left his dugout in the rear at night and went forward to the front lines to get personal knowledge of the dangers his men were facing. Scouts having reported that the Germans were preparing to launch anattack in hope of delaying our troops, the general started for a position from which he would be able to see the attack and watch our men meet it. He became confused in the forest and arrived at the designated observation post later than he had intended. He found it had been destroyed by a shell just a few moments before he reached it. Had he been on time he certainly would have lost his life.
He took up another position and Lieutenant William Robinson, Uniontown, Pa., started to lead forward the first line of Americans to break up the German formations. Standing on a little ridge, the general saw the young officer, whom he had known for years, going among his men, cheering and encouraging them, when a huge shell burst almost at the lieutenant's feet. A party of his men rushed to the spot, but there was not even a trace of the officer.
"I'll sleep alone on this spot with my thoughts tonight," said the saddened general, and he did, spending the night in a shell hole.
The Americans battled their way in little groups into the edge of the forest, likebushmen. This was the situation when night fell, with a fringe of Americans in hiding along the southern edge of the woods. The forest seemed to present an almost impenetrable barrier, through which it was utterly hopeless to continue an effort to advance in the darkness.
So scattered were the groups that had forced their way into the shelter of the wood that it was imperative headquarters should know their approximate positions in order to dispose the forces for a renewal of the assault in the morning. In this emergency Lieutenant William Allen, Jr., Pittsburgh, of Company B, 111th Infantry, volunteered to find the advanced detachments of our men.
Throughout the night he threaded his way through the woods, not knowing what instant he would stumble on Germans or be fired on or thrust through by his own men. It was a hair-raising, daredevil feat of such a nature that he won the unstinted admiration of the men and the warm praise of his superiors. When he found himself near other men he remained silent until a muttered word or even such inconsequent things as the tinkle of a distinctly Americanpiece of equipment or the smell of American tobacco—entirely different from that in the European armies—let him know his neighbors were friends. Then a soft call "in good United States" established his own identity and made it safe for him to approach.
As the first streamers of dawn were appearing in the sky off in the direction of Hunland, he crawled back to the main American lines, and the report he made enabled his superiors to plan their attack, which worked with clock-like precision and pushed the Boche on through the woods.
Corporal Alfred W. Davis, Uniontown, Pa., of Company D, 110th Infantry, was moving forward through the woods in this fighting, close to a lieutenant of his company, when a bullet from a sniper hidden in a tree struck the corporal's gun, was deflected and pierced the lieutenant's brain, killing him instantly. Crawling up a ravine like an Indian stalking game, Davis set off with blood in his eye in quest of revenge.
When he picked off his eighteenth German in succession it was nearly dark, so he "called it a day," as he remarked, andslept better that night for thought of the toll he had taken from the Germans to avenge his officer.
In the woods the Germans fought desperately, despite that they were dazed by the terrific artillery fire. Hidden in tree tops and under rocks, with even their steel helmets camouflaged in red, green and yellow, it was difficult for the attackers to pick them out in the flicker of the shadows on the dense foliage.
While the attacking waves were advancing it was discovered that touch had been lost with the forces on the right flank of the 110th, and Sergeant Blake Lightner, Altoona, Pa., a liaison scout from Company G, 110th, started out alone to re-establish the connection.
He ran into an enemy machine gun nest, killed the crew and captured the guns single-handed. Then he went back, brought up a machine gun crew, established a snipers' post, re-established the communications, returned to his own command and gave the co-ordinates for laying down a barrage on a line of enemy machine gun nests he had discovered.
Toward nightfall of one of these days ofdesperate fighting it was discovered that the ammunition supply of the first battalion of the 110th was running low, and Corporal Harold F. Wickerham, Washington, Pa., and Private Boynton David Marchand, Monongahela City, Pa., were sent back with a message for brigade headquarters. When they reached the spot where the headquarters had been they found it had been moved. They walked for miles through the woods in the darkness and finally came to a town where another regiment was stationed, and they sent their message over the military telephone.
They were invited to remain the rest of the night and sleep; fearing the message might not get through properly, however, and knowing the grave need of more ammunition, they set out again, and toward morning reached their own ammunition dump and confirmed the message orally. Again they refused a chance to rest, and set out to rejoin their command, which they reached just in time to take part in a battle in the afternoon. Such are the characteristics of the American soldier.
Somewhat the same fate as befell Epieds, which had been completely leveled byartillery fire, came to the village of Le Charmel. After violent fighting lasting two hours, during which the village changed hands twice, it was blown to pieces by the artillery, and our men took possession, driving the Germans on northeastward.
The Pennsylvanians now began to feel the change in the German resistance as the Boche retreat reached its second line of defense, based on the Ourcq River, and the fighting became hourly more bitter and determined. This, as well as the dense forests, where the Germans had strung a maze of barbed wire from tree to tree, slowed up the retreat and pursuit. Also the density of the woods hampered observation of the enemy from the air and therefore slowed up our artillery fire.
The process of taking enemy positions by frontal assault, always a costly operation, gave way, wherever possible, to infiltration, by which villages and other posts were pinched off, exactly as Cambrai, St. Quentin, Lille and other places were taken later by the British farther north.
The process of infiltration from a military standpoint means exactly the same thing as the word means in any otherconnection. A few men at a time filter into protected positions close to the enemy until enough have assembled to offer battle, the enemy meanwhile being kept down by strong, concentrated fire from the main body and the artillery. Although much slower than an assault, this is extremely economical of men.
During this progress from the Marne northward, the various headquarters had found some difficulty in keeping in touch with the advancing columns. A headquarters, even of a regiment, is not so mobile as the regiment itself. There is a vast amount of paraphernalia and supplies to be moved, yet it is necessary that a reasonably close touch be maintained with the fighting front.
The German method of retreat necessarily resulted in the Americans' going forward by leaps and bounds. Strong points, such as well-organized villages, manned by snipers and machine guns in some force, held the troops up until the German rear-guards were disposed of. Once they were cleaned up, however, the American advance, hampered only by hidden sharpshooters and machine guns in smallstrength, moved forward rapidly. It was reported, for instance, that one regimental headquarters was moved three times in one day to keep up with the lines.
Most of the time, regimental, and even brigade, headquarters were under artillery fire from the German big guns, and it was from this cause that the first Pennsylvania officer of the rank of lieutenant-colonel was killed, July 28th. He was Wallace W. Fetzer, of Milton, Pa., second in command of the 110th.
Regimental headquarters had been moved far forward and established in a brick house in a good state of preservation. The office machinery just was getting well into the swing again when a high explosive shell fell in the front yard and threw a geyser of earth over Colonel Kemp, who was at the door, and Lieutenant-Colonel Fetzer, who was sitting on the steps.
A moment later a second shell struck the building and killed three orderlies. This was good enough evidence for Colonel Kemp that his headquarters had been spotted by Boche airmen, for the artillery was registering too accurately to be done by chance, so he ordered a move.
Officers and men of the staff were packing up to move and Lieutenant Stewart M. Alexander, Altoona, Pa., the regimental intelligence officer, was finishing questioning two captured Hun captains when a big high-explosive shell scored a direct hit on the building. Seventeen men in the house, including the two German captains, were killed outright. Colonel Kemp and Lieutenant-Colonel Fetzer had left the building and were standing side by side in the yard. A piece of shell casing struck Colonel Fetzer, killing him, and a small piece struck Colonel Kemp a blow on the jaw, which left him speechless and suffering from shell-shock for some time.
Lieutenant Alexander, face to face with the two German officer prisoners, was blown clear out of the building into the middle of the roadway, but was uninjured, except for shock.
It was this almost uncanny facility of artillery fire for taking one man and leaving another of two close together, that led to the fancy on the part of soldiers that it was useless to try to evade the big shells, because if "your number" was on one it would get you, no matter what youdid, and if your number was not on it, it would pass harmlessly by. Thousands of the men became absolute fatalists in this regard.
Major Edward Martin, of Waynesburg, Pa., took temporary command of the regiment and won high commendation by his work in the next few days.
It now became necessary to straighten the American line. The 109th had come up and was just behind the 110th. It had taken shelter for the night of July 28th in a wood just south of Fresne, and early on the morning of July 29th received orders to be on the south side of the Ourcq, two miles away, by noon of that day.
The men knew they were closely in touch with the enemy once more, but this time there was none of the nervousness before action that had marked their first entrance into battle. They had beaten back the Prussian Guard, the flower of the Crown Prince's army, once, and knew they could do it again.
Furthermore, there were many scores to settle. Every man felt he wanted to avenge the officers and comrades who had fallen in the earlier fighting, and it was agrimly-determined and relentless body of men that emerged from that wood in skirmish formation before dawn of July 29th.
Almost immediately parts of the line came into action, but it was about an hour after the beginning of "the day's work" that the first serious fighting took place. Company M, near the center of the 109th's long line, ran into a strong machine gun nest. The new men who had been brought into the company to fill the gaps that were left after the fighting on the Marne had been assimilated quickly and inoculated with the 109th's fighting spirit and desire for revenge.
Although the company had gone into its first action as the only one in the regiment with the full complement of six commissioned officers, it now was sadly short, for those bitter days below the Marne had worked havoc with the commissioned personnel as well as with the enlisted men.
Officers were becoming scarce all through the regiment. Lieutenant Fales was the only one of the original officers of the company left in service, so Lieutenant Edward B. Goward, of Philadelphia, had been sent by Colonel Brown from headquartersto take command of the company, with Lieutenant Fales second in command.
The company had to advance down a long hill, cross a small tributary of the Ourcq, which here was near its source, and go up another hill—all in the open. The Boche were intrenched along the edge of a wood at the top of this second hill, and they poured in a terrible fire as the company advanced.
Lieutenants Goward and Fales were leading the first platoons. The company was wild with eagerness and there was no holding them. Here was the first chance they had had since the Marne to square accounts with the unspeakable Hun, and they were in no humor to employ subtle tactics or use even ordinary care.
With queer gurgling sounds behind their gas masks—they would have been yells of fury without the masks in place—they swept forward. Lieutenant Goward ran straight into a stream of machine gun bullets. One struck him in the right shoulder and whirled him around. A second struck him in the left shoulder and twisted him further. As he crumpled up a stream of bullets struck him in the stomach. He fell dying.
Seeing him topple, Lieutenant Fales rushed toward him to see if he could be of service. He walked directly into the same fire and was mortally wounded. Goward managed to roll into a shell hole, where he died in a short time.
The men did not stop. Led only by their non-commissioned officers, they plunged straight into and over the machine gun nest directly in the face of its murderous fire which had torn gaps in their ranks, but could not stop them. They stamped out the German occupants with as little compunction as one steps on a spider. The men came out of the woods breathing hard and trembling from the reaction to their fury and exertions, but they turned over no prisoners.
The machine gun crews were dead to a man.
Goward and Fales had been especially popular with the men of the company, and their loss was felt keenly. Goward was distinctly of the student type, quiet, thoughtful, scholarly, doing his own thinking at all times. He had been noted for this characteristic when a student at the University of Pennsylvania. Fales, on theother hand, was of the dashing, athletic type, and the two, with their directly opposed natures, had worked together perfectly and quite captured the hearts of their men.
Both Goward and Fales are buried on the side of a little hill near Courmont, in the Commune of Cierges, Department of the Aisne, their graves marked by the customary wooden crosses, to which are attached their identification disks.
From then on, the rest of the day was a continuous, forward-moving battle for the regiment. Every mile was contested hotly by Hun rear-guard machine gunners, left behind to harass the advancing Americans and make their pursuit as costly as possible.
Lieutenant Herbert P. Hunt, of Philadelphia, son of a former lieutenant-colonel of the old First, leading Company A of the 109th in a charge, was struck in the left shoulder by a piece of shell and still was in hospital when the armistice ended hostilities.
The 109th reached Courmont and found it well organized by a small force of Germans, with snipers and machine guns in what remained of the houses, firing from windows and doors and housetops. Theycleaned up the town in a workmanlike manner, and only a handful of prisoners went back to the cages in the rear.
It was in this fighting that Sergeant John H. Winthrop, of Bryn Mawr, performed the service for which he was cited officially by General Pershing, winning the Distinguished Service Cross. The sergeant was killed in action a few weeks later.
He was a member of Company G, 109th Infantry. All its officers became incapacitated when the company was in action. Sergeant Winthrop took command. The official citation in his case read:
"For extraordinary heroism in action near the River Ourcq, northeast of Château-Thierry, France, July 30, 1918. Sergeant Winthrop took command of his company when all his officers were killed or wounded, and handled it with extreme courage, coolness and skill, under an intense artillery bombardment and machine gun fire, during an exceptionally difficult attack."