One of the organizers of the Lafayette Escadrille, who was killed in
action in France.]
“He was not mistaken; at that spot, between two companies, our line
showed a slight opening, a ‘break’ which the Germans were trying to
enter. Lemordant sent one of his men to alarm the nearest company, and
was making a half-circle toward his own company when a huge Boche
ruffian appeared in the darkness and fired at him pointblank. The
bullet shaved his cheek; other bullets whistled about. The little troop
had been winded, and there was only one way to get out of it, that
was to reply by a general fire that would give the impression of an
attack in force. The enemy would perhaps be impressed by it, and in
any event this volley would put companies out on the alert. In fact,
on both sides the firing became general, even the artillery took part
in it; a seventy-seven burst near Lemordant, wounded him in his right
side and threw him into the air with his full equipment. The wound
was not serious, but Lemordant fell in such a way as to dislocate his
hip-bones and to tear his muscles. Fainting, he was carried away to a
field-hospital, where he remained until the ninth. The enemy was now
in full retreat. On the eighth we had crossed Le Petit Morin, on the
ninth we lay at Montmirail and at Champaubert, on the battlefields of
the Napoleonic epic, and the birth of victory came to the armies of the
Republic in the same cradle where the Imperial star had shed its last
rays.
“Lemordant refused to be sent to a base hospital. He was not yet
strong. He could scarcely walk, the two wooden splints which they had
placed over his pelvis came out of position at each sudden movement;
but the splendid conscience of a leader of men had awakened in this
idealist, this dreamer who but yesterday was so highly prejudiced
against the military profession. He knew that in war-time an officer
only holds his men by his own example and moral authority.”