“THE FRONT”
The average person in this country has a different idea of what the
term “Front” means to those who have been “Over there.” “The Front”
from this point of view consists of a series of long trenches, filled
with infantry, and their personal equipment, such as barbed-wire, for
they know that exists, and back of the trenches some cannon; but little
does the layman know about the component parts necessary to make up
a “front” and all the branches of service that are utilized, each an
individual cog in an efficient fighting machine. I shall enumerate some
of the departments that are not only necessary but vitally essential.
In addition to the countless thousands who labor in the mills,
factories, foundries and machine shops, there must be supply depots,
where all this equipment goes for storage when it is completed.
These are not unlike our warehouses. From the warehouses, supplies
are requisitioned for the different portions or sectors of the front
where they may be needed. There are what we might term sub-warehouse
stations, generally located back of the front near a railroad siding,
where supplies remain until needed by the army. Here a great number
of men are required for the clerical work, stock-keeping, loading and
unloading. After this the material and equipment must be delivered
to different parts of the battle front. This constitutes another big
branch of service in which countless auto trucks and men are used,
known in the French Army as the Camion Service, and most of the success
of an army in either offensive or defensive operations depends largely
on this organization and its ability to “deliver the goods.”
Then there are the supply departments for food; for the army has to
have meals regularly. It is difficult to realize what it means in the
way of supplies to feed an army. Each section of the front has its base
of supplies from which the transportation department obtains them.
This is where the meat is prepared and weighed out to the different
departments of the army.
Other supplies in food stuff are measured out the same way. After this
is done, the supplies are transported to the front, or near the front,
where the field kitchens are located. Here it is again apportioned and
distributed, for the cooks have just so much with which to feed so
many. The cooking and serving requires still more men.
Next comes the bakery department. The raw materials are delivered to
the bakery and the finished product taken away. One can appreciate
the size of some of these army bakeries when you know that their
capacity is 180,000 loaves of bread a day. This was the capacity of
the one from which our bread came, which I visited. When you consider
the output of such a bakery you realize that a great number of men
are necessary who don’t fire a shot and yet are a vital factor in a
military organization.
The telegraphic and telephone departments constitute still another
important element in the system. They employ a great many men, who are
continually putting up new equipment and repairing the old, for the
lines of communication must be ready at any instant, as they control
the movements of the troops and the fire of the artillery.
Then there are the Dressing Stations with their corps, who attend
the injured; the brancardiers (stretcher-bearers) and, somewhat
removed from the first lines are the _Post du Succors_, with
their attendants and doctors. Still farther to the rear are the base
hospitals, and after that the Army hospitals, each with its corp of
doctors, nurses and attendants, to say nothing of the ambulances,
drivers, laboratories and attendants.
[Illustration: A “Load-up and Getaway”—Wounded for the Hospital]
There are the auto parks along different sections of the front, where
there are hundreds of mechanics busy on cars of every description
undergoing repairs of all sorts, for without these what would become of
the camion service when new parts were needed for the auto truck? What
would become of the supplies that they convey, and what of the army
that needed the supplies?
Think of the number of men necessary for the ground work only around
the hangars to serve, say, 3,000 planes (between 30 and 40 thousand
men). What a part, for instance, of our soldiers concentrated at
the Mexican border two years ago would be used up for just this one
seemingly small branch of the army of to-day.
There are other departments, such as Observation, Dispatch Riders,
Blacksmiths, Mechanical, Camouflage, Road Gangs, Clerical Forces for
each division, Horseshoers, Artillery Supply Caissons, which must be
utilized; for many times guns are located off the roads and the auto
trucks cannot get through the fields and mud, and so the caissons have
to be used, as they are horse-drawn.
Last but not least is the very large and important department—that
of the engineers who make and repair the bridges, railroads, gun
placements, roadways, and new buildings.
All are most necessary for the success of the army for each has just as
an important part as the other, and without the thousand upon thousand
of non-combatant men behind the lines the ones at the front would count
for naught.