TRENCH WARFARE IN LORRAINE
Unloading at Gerberviller was far different from the easy job of loading
at Guer. The night was black. On account of the proximity of the front,
no lights could be used. Not a match's flare, not a cigarette's glow,
was allowed, lest it serve as a target for some bombing aeroplane. There
was no loading platform, and the carriages and wagons which had been
rolled across ramps directly onto the flat cars had to be coaxed and
guided down planks steeply inclined from the car's side to the ground.
Handling the horses packed closely in box-cars was a difficult task in
utter darkness.
Dawn was just breaking when the battery pulled out. A grey light showed
us the ruins of the town of Gerberviller as we passed through. The
houses stood like spectres, stripped of the life and semblance of home
which they had held before the German wave had swept this far in August,
1914, and then, after a few days, had receded, leaving them ruins. Four
walls, perhaps not so many, were all that remained of building after
building; windows were gone, roofs fallen, and inside were piles of
brick and stone, in which, here and there, grass had found root.
At the village of Moyen the battery stopped long enough to water the
horses. At 10:30 we arrived in Vathimenil, where the battery halted till
1 o'clock, and mess was served. In the afternoon in the dust and heat of
a sunshiny day such as Lorraine can produce after a cold spring night,
the battery hiked through St. Clermont to Luneville, the cannoneers
following the carriages on foot.
There we were quartered in an old barrack of French lancers, whose
former stables housed our horses. Big, clean rooms, on the third floor,
were assigned to Battery E. With bed ticks filled with straw, we made
this a comfortable home.
A practice review the following morning and another, the real thing, in
the afternoon, before a French general and his staff, formally
introduced us to Lorraine. In our free hours during the day and in the
evening, we added to this acquaintance by pretty thorough familiarity
with the city of Luneville.
Though its nearness to the battle front restricted trade and industry a
great deal, yet its shops, restaurants and cafes proved a paradise for
the men who remained there at the horse-line, as the battery's song,
"When We Were Down in Luneville," attests. Though the streets were
absolutely dark, behind the shuttered windows and the darkened doors
business was brisk enough. At 8 o'clock, however, all shops were closed,
and soldiers must be off the streets by 8:30.
These restrictions were, in fact, precautions against enemy aeroplanes.
Of these we had close enough experience on our third night in the city,
when a bomb fell in the fields that lay back of the barracks, shaking
the windows by its explosion.
The cannoneers did not stay long in Luneville. February 25 they marched
out of the city with their packs on their backs, up near Marainviller.
There were between forty and fifty men altogether, including the four
gun crews and the engineers' detail. When we marched along a road
screened from the enemy by a mat of boughs stretched by wires between
high poles along one side of the way, we knew we were not far from the
front. The big thrill came, however, when, turning off the high road, we
went forward one squad at a time at intervals of about 200 yards. The
chief object was to avoid attracting the notice of some chance enemy
aeroplane by the movement of a considerable body of men. To our minds
the precaution seemed for the purpose of limiting casualties, in case a
shell burst on the road, to the men of only one squad.
But we took our way in peace up the hill in front of us, and carried up
supplies and tools that followed on the ration cart. We put all in a big
abri--a marvelous piece of work, of long passages, spacious rooms,
wooden floors and stairways, electric lights, and flues for stove
chimneys. Then we discovered that this was not for us, but for some
brigadier-general and his staff when he directed an operation at the
front. So we moved ourselves and baggage to another big abri not far
away and not much less comfortable, except that it lacked the wooden
floors, the electric lights, and the spaciousness of the rooms which the
first abri possessed.
The next four days were spent in preparations for building a battery
position. The spot chosen was in a hollow, back of a gently rising
slope. The woods near by and the tall thickets made good concealment,
but the ground was rather marshy in the wet weather we were then having.
Part of the men began to dig, and part wove twigs through chicken wire
to stretch over the excavations as camouflage. From 7 a. m. to 5 p. m.
was a long arduous day, particularly since it was begun and ended by a
hike of two miles from the dug-out to the position. Rain fell most of
the time, soaking through slickers and blouses to one's very skin.
Two of the days the gunners, No. 1 and No. 2 men of each section spent
at a French battery near by, to gain experience in actual firing. Little
firing was done--only 24 rounds per gun one day and 15 rounds the
second, for in this quiet sector there was little ordinarily but
reprisal fire--but the men learned quickly the actual working of a
battery. To the Frenchmen the quickness and the constant good-humor of
the American boys, much younger than the average among them, were
matters of comment. "Toujours chantant, toujours riant" (Always singing,
always laughing), were the words of the lieutenant who fired the
battery. The warm-hearted hospitality of these Frenchmen--resting in
this sector from the fearful work, night and day, at Verdun and
pardonable, one would say, if somewhat uneven-tempered and unmindful of
others in their fatigue from that strain--impressed the Americans in
turn. Every comfort that the dug-outs afforded was offered to the
visitors, and when the Americans had, in an impromptu quartette,
entertained the Frenchmen with harmonized popular songs, the latter
summoned a young "chanteur" who sang the latest songs from Paris till
his voice was weary.
Orders came to cease work on this position, and none too soon. For when
the men were returning from work there for the last time, about 5 p. m.,
March 2, the woods in the vicinity were deluged with gas shells.
The following day the gun squads and engineers hiked to the town of
Laneuveville-aux-Bois, about two kilometres away. There they had for
billet a big room, formerly the police magistrate's office. The town
contained only French soldiers billeted there en route to the trenches
or return. So close to the lines was it, that shells fell there
frequently.
Back of the town and to the left was the site of Battery E's first gun
position. On the far side (from the enemy lines) of a gently sloping
hill, covered by tall yellow grass, was staked out the four gun pits,
with abris between. The first work was to construct the camouflage. This
was composed of strips of chicken wire, in which long yellow grass was
thinly woven so as to blend with that growing around the position. These
strips were supported by wires stretched from tall stakes, forming the
ridge, to short stakes, scarcely two feet above the ground, at either
side. In shape, the result was something like a greenhouse. The angles
were so graduated that no shadow was cast by the sun, and the color
blended so well with the surroundings that no human trace was visible on
the hillside from a distance.
As fast as the camouflage could be "woven" and put in place to shield
them from observance by the enemy planes that whirred overhead in the
bright afternoons, the gun pits were dug. Platforms and "circulaires"
were installed as each pit was dug. The guns of the second platoon were
brought from Luneville on the evening of March 7, and caissons of
ammunitions followed during the night. The rapidity and excellence of
the work on the position were partly due to the French officer, Captain
Frey, whose battery was near, who gave his advice and counsel, and to
the little sergeant, nicknamed "La Soupe" (the words with which he
always signified his intention to depart for mess, for he acquired no
English), who constantly supervised the work.
At 9:50 a. m., March 8, Battery E fired its first shot at the front, the
Third Section piece having the honor. The gun crew was composed of
Sergeant Newell, Corporal Monroe, and Privates Sexauer, Ekberg, Farrell
and Kilner. The crew working on the Fourth Section piece, which
registered the same morning, included Sergeant Suter, Corporal Holton,
and Privates O'Reilly, O'Brien, Ladd, Colvin and Kulicek.
Until the first platoon's guns came up, the gun crews of that platoon
alternated on the pieces with the crews of the second platoon, who could
sleep in the billet in town on their nights off. The men on the guns had
two watches to keep, one at the guns, and one at the "rocket post" on
top the hill, to notify the battery if a red rocket, the signal for a
barrage, appeared at points laid out on a chart. At first there were two
barrages, Embermenil and Jalindet, the names of two towns in whose
direction the different fires lay. If the sentinel on the hill-top
shouted either of these names, the sentinel at the position was to fire
the guns and awake the crews. The names, unusual and difficult to ears
unfamiliar with French, were not easy to remember. From that difficulty
developed the "Allabala" barrage which made Mosier famous.
Seeing a rocket rise in the vicinity of Embermenil (whether white or red
is a mystery), he started to shout the name, but in his excitement could
not pronounce the French word, and stuttered forth a succession of
syllables like some Arabian Nights' incantation. Whatever it was,
"Allabala" or something else, it worked. The guns were fired--until an
order from the O. P. called a halt, declaring the alarm false.
The First and Second Section pieces were brought from Luneville on the
evening of March 15, and registered the next day. The First Section gun
crew was composed of Sergeant Bolte, Corporal Fred Howe and Privates
Nickoden, Freeburg, Mosier, Wallace and Hodgins; the Second Section crew
of Sergeant McElhone, Corporal Clark, Privates Donald Brigham, Meacham,
Nixon and Herrod.
March 17, 1918, was remarkable not because it was Sunday or St.
Patrick's day so much as because on that day Battery E's camouflage
burnt. In the course of a 10-round reprisal fire, about 4 p. m., the
flame from the muzzle of the Second Section gun set ablaze the grass
woven in the wire netting overhead. In a second the covering was in
flames. The dry grass burnt like tinder. The men beat the blaze with
sand bags, but could check it but little in the face of the intense heat
and thick smoke. By tearing off several strips of netting, they
succeeded in preventing the fire's spreading to the other end of the
position. Within a short space of time the first platoon's camouflage
was changed from yellow grass to black ashes. The work of seven or
eight days was undone in as many minutes.
On so clear and bright a day there was grave danger that the position
would be betrayed to enemy observation by the flames, or by the black
scar they had left, or even by the men's activity in repairing it. A few
bursts of shrapnel gave warning of the danger. Immediately as much of
the burnt surface as could be was covered with rolls of painted canvas
on wire netting, such as the French artillery used. Then all the men
were set to gathering grass in the fields back of the position. Not long
after, about fifty men from D and F batteries came over to help, and all
the available men were brought out in the chariot du parc from the
battery's horse-line at Luneville. So eagerly and rapidly did all of
them work that the old netting was restretched and woven full of grass
by midnight.
During the next two days the firing was small, only a few rounds
occasionally. The chief work was digging the abris and carrying up beams
and concrete blocks from the road for their construction.
On March 20 the battery was engaged in tearing down enemy barbed wire,
firing 216 rounds per gun during the day, in preparation for an attack
that night. At 7:40 p. m. commenced the actual bombardment. A few
minutes before that time 75's began to bark from the woods to our left
and in the rear of us. The reports gradually grew in number. At the
appointed moment, our guns began to bang away. For the next two hours
and forty-five minutes, the noise was deafening. Batteries of whose
existence we had not the slightest suspicion were firing near us. Every
hillock and clump of trees seemed to blaze with gun flashes. Joined with
the constant bark and bang of the 75's near by was the deep thunderous
roar of heavier cannon in the distance.
At 10 o'clock the firing began to die away. Half an hour later only a
few shots at long intervals could be heard. Fatigued with their
strenuous and racking work, the men eagerly attacked the mess just then
brought up to them. Nearly all were a little deaf from their guns'
racket. A few, on the gun crews, were totally oblivious to all sound
whatsoever, and could comprehend only signs.
[Illustration: B. C. Detail at Observation Post near Ancerviller]
[Illustration: Cook Boisacq Hears Thrilling Tales at the O. P.]
[Illustration: Horseshoers' Shop at the Merviller Horse-lines]
[Illustration: Aeroplane Scouts Wouldn't See this Pup-Tent]
The first published account of an engagement of the 42d Division was
brief and anonymous. In the Paris edition of the "New York Herald" of
March 22, 1918, at the end of a column on the first page telling of the
decoration of Corporal Alexander Burns and other members of the regiment
appeared this paragraph, under date of March 21:
"Members of the American force made a raid last night. Following a long
barrage, the boys went over in good shape, but the German trenches were
deserted, the long heavy Allied barrage having driven every one out. No
American was hurt or killed."
The enemy's reply to us did not come till the next morning. Roused at 4
to stand by the guns, the cannoneers had scarcely occupied their posts
when shells began to drop dangerously near. Captain Robbins ordered
everyone into the abris till the shelling ceased. Half an hour later we
went out to find that a gas shell had made the officers' abri and
vicinity untenable, all our telephone wires were cut, and shell
fragments had torn up things here and there. How Nickoden fared, who had
been out at the rocket post on the hill-top during it all, we learned
when he was relieved shortly after. Hearing not a sound, he was aware
that shells were falling near only when he saw them plow up the ground
within a few hundred feet of him. Corporal Buckley was wounded by a
shell fragment and Private McCarthy was badly gassed that morning, in
the machine-gun post at the top of the hill.
Private (later Corporal) Mangan was recommended for the D. S. C. by the
regimental commander "for volunteering to and aiding the French in
keeping open a telephone line running from a forward observation station
across the open to the rear. This on March 19 and again on March 20,
when the telephone line was repeatedly cut by an intense enemy
bombardment of heavy caliber shells from both guns and trench mortars."
The French cited Mangan for the Croix de Guerre for his conduct on this
occasion also.
Orders to move came that day. A few more shells landed within a few
yards of the position in the afternoon, and one end of
Laneuveville-aux-Bois received considerable shrapnel. But we pulled out
safely that evening, reaching Luneville at midnight.
Two days later the regiment left Luneville on a 120-kilometre hike to
the divisional area, in the vicinity of Langres, where the division was
to spend some time in manoeuvres. But the orders were countermanded
before the regiment had gone more than its first day's hike, on account
of the Germans' success in their first big offensive of the spring on
the northern front.
So the battery remained for a week at Remenoville, in readiness to
return to the front upon the receipt of orders. During those seven days
of sunshiny weather, in the bright warmth of early spring, the men
basked in ease and comfort. Gun drill for the cannoneers and grooming
for the drivers occupied the mornings. The afternoons the men had to
themselves, for games of horseshoes, writing letters to make up for lost
time at the front, baths in the cold brook, and washing clothes in the
village fountain. Eggs and potatoes and milk were abundant in the
town--until the battery's consumption depleted the supply--and the men
ate as often in some French kitchen as in their battery mess line. Some
boys "slipped one over on the army," too, by sleeping between white
sheets in soft big beds, renting a room for the munificent sum of one
franc a day, instead of rolling up in their blankets in the haymow where
they were billeted.
The following Saturday, the battery hiked to Fontenoy-la-Joute, on its
way back to the front. Easter Sunday, March 31, was spent there, the
band playing in front of the "mairie," on the steps of which the
chaplain held the church services. Rain fell intermittently in a
depressing drizzle. Pulling out in the afternoon, the battery reached
the spot they since call "Easter Hill," where some French batteries had
their horse-lines. There the battery had its evening mess--stew--and
while waiting for orders to move on, the men slept wherever there was
shelter and dryness--on sacks full of harness, in caisson boxes, under
tarpaulins stretched over the pieces. At 1 a. m. the guns pulled out,
arriving in position as day was breaking.
Sergeant Bolte had gone to officers' school at Saumur from Remenoville,
and Sergeant Landrus took charge of the First Section in his place. At
Fontenoy, Sergeant Newell was sent to the hospital with acute
bronchitis; so Sergeant Wright went to the front in charge of the Third
Section. Sergeant Newell did not return to the battery, but went from
the hospital to Saumur, returning later to the regiment as a second
lieutenant in Battery F, after serving a while in the 32d Division.
The new positions were near Montigny, the first platoon to the left of
the town, the second platoon just in back of it. Both were abandoned
French positions, but much different in construction; 163, the first
platoon's position, was constructed well underground. Only the
embrasures through which the guns fired were exposed to the enemy's
fire. On the other hand, 162, the position of the second platoon, was
covered only by camouflage, with the exception of the abris, of course.
An 8-foot trench, instead of a tunnel, connected the abris and gun
emplacements, and the position was much lighter and dryer than 163. But
the solid construction of the latter was of fortunate advantage when the
enemy directed its fire on it for several hours continuously on two
occasions.
After one night on "Easter Hill," the horse-lines moved, with a stop
next night at Azerailles, to the Ferme de Grammont, between Merviller
and Baccarat. The Second Battalion occupied old French stables, which
long use had made veritable mudholes. Piles of ooze and "gumbo" had been
dug out and these were constantly added to, but still the mire was so
bad that it was fatal to loose rubber boots. Grooming seemed a hopeless
task, so far as looks were concerned.
This was the first time a divisional sector was taken over completely by
American forces. The French were sending all their available troops to
the northern part of the front, where one big enemy offensive followed
another. So, as a matter of fact, this section of the front was very
lightly defended. But the spirit of the American soldiers, who took this
light task as seriously and as determinedly as they did far heavier and
more vital ones later on, made up for lack of numbers, and the enemy was
worsted in every encounter. The discipline and care that was the rule in
this comparatively easy work during the three and a half months in
Lorraine formed the basis of the division's splendid record in the big
battles of later months, and was the chief reason why the division,
though engaged in all the major operations of the American army, and, in
addition, at the vital point of General Gouraud's army in Champagne, in
the biggest battle of the war, spending a greater number of days at the
front than any other division, has not so big a casualty list as some
other divisions.
Since both positions occupied by the platoons were known to the enemy,
and our only safety lay in maintaining his belief that they were
abandoned, no one was allowed to enter or leave them during the daytime.
At first so rigid was this rule that we could not even go to Montigny
for meals. Instead, the raw rations were divided among the sections, and
the men cooked them as best they could in their mess kits over the
little stoves that were in each abri. But cooking could only be done at
night, lest the smoke betray us. So seven or eight hungry men, having
eaten hard-tack and a little cold food during the day, crowded around
the little stove from nightfall till early morning, doing their
unskilled best to make something edible out of hard-tack, canned corned
beef, canned tomatoes, potatoes, a slab of bacon, coffee, some sugar,
and occasionally some beef cut up into small slices or cubes. The result
was that the men got neither much sleep nor much nourishment, and after
about ten days of this sort of living, the meals were cooked in the
kitchen at Montigny and then carried in heat-containing cans to the
positions.
Even when conditions were thus bettered, there were still heavy inroads
on sleep by the large amount of sentry duty required. In a clump of
bushes at the top of the mound in which was dug the position, was placed
an indicator board, similar to that at Laneuveville-aux-Bois, on which
were marked several barrages. From 6 p. m. to 6 a. m., a sentry stood at
this post watching the horizon for red rockets signaling for a barrage.
In addition, one man, and sometimes two men, had to be on watch in each
gun pit, ready to fire a barrage the instant it was called for. For a
time this required four hours' watch every night for each man. Later
this was reduced to two, or at most three hours a night.
April 6 Battery E commenced work on a new position halfway on the road
from Montigny to Reherrey. Under the direction of a camouflage non-com.
from the engineers, wires were stretched on top of stakes, forming a
frame not unlike that of a greenhouse roof, which was covered by slashed
burlap on a backing of chicken netting, a species of camouflage
manufactured by the French by the millions of square yards. It hid
whatever was beneath it, and cast no shadows, and blended in tone with
the grassy fields around. When the camouflage was up, a trench eight
feet deep was dug the length of the position. From it saps were started
downward and forward from the trench. These carried the work into solid
rock, necessitating drilling and blasting every foot of the way. At the
same time the gun pits and ammunition shelters were begun. Work was slow
because of the hardness of the rock, and the available men were few.
After staying a few days in Reherrey, the squad of engineers had moved
to Montigny. There, in billet No. 19, they and the extra cannoneers,
sent up later from the horse-lines, lodged. To speed the work, some of
the gun crews came from the positions each day. After several weeks,
drivers were sent from the horse-lines to exchange places with some of
the cannoneers. A well designed wooden tablet, the work of Nixon, was
placed at the entrance to the position, reading:
CONSTRUCTED
BY
BATTERY E, 149th F. A.
IN ACTION
A. D. 1918
The gun pits were rushed to completion in the last days of April, so
that they might be occupied by the guns of Battery D in an attack that
came May 3. In the preceding days the French had moved up heavy
artillery in support, and several batteries of 75's, of the same 232d
French regiment which had been our neighbors in the Luneville sector,
occupied the meadows to the left of our new position.
Our firing had been only occasional and limited to brief reprisals up to
this time. The first platoon, at 163, had suffered most in reply,
receiving over 400 shells one day. Now a heavy bombardment was planned,
to push back the enemy lines a short way and safeguard our own
occupation of "No Man's Land." On May 2, some of the batteries kept
pounding away all day, cutting barbed wire entanglements and clearing
away obstacles in the infantry's advance.
The following morning we were aroused at 3, and stood by the guns. At
3:50 we added our fire to the din around us, sending over a barrage in
front of the troops going over the top. It lasted only two hours, and
expended about 175 rounds per gun. So thorough and heavy had been the
preliminary bombardment that the enemy had been forced to withdraw all
his troops from the shelled area, and the infantry met with next to no
resistance in reaching the objective set for them.
May 13 the officers and sergeants went to Azerailles to inspect Battery
B equipped and packed in the manner of a battery on the road prepared
for open field warfare. Rumors had been plentiful for weeks (1) that the
42d Division was going home to become instructors of the millions of
drafted men in the great camps in the United States, (2) that the 42d
Division was going to the Somme to aid in checking the rapid drive of
the enemy in the north, (3) that the division was to go to a rest camp
in the south of France, (4) that the regiment was to turn in its horses
and be motorized, etc., etc. The review at Azerailles strengthened some
of these rumors and stirred up still others. But, for the present, all
these reports came to naught.
May 21 the battery moved four kilometres back to a reserve position just
in front of Merviller, which had formerly been occupied by Battery B.
The latter moved up to relieve us. After the seven weeks of close
confinement in damp abris, the change to the life at the Merviller
position was like a trip to a summer resort. Being so far back of the
lines, the men were permitted to move about with perfect freedom. The
stream just back of the position invited cool swims on the hot dusty
afternoons. Ball games passed the time of waiting for mess. Battery E
won a close game and keg of Baccarat beer from Headquarters Company by
the score of 12 to 11. Just across the road was stationed a bathhouse
and laundry unit, and before long the battery had replaced their
uniforms, torn and dirty from digging, with more presentable ones.
Merviller's cafes and "epiceries" furnished food to make up for the lean
weeks at Montigny. Being only a few minutes' walk from the position, the
town was a frequent evening's resort. Baccarat, about eight kilometres
farther, was visited when Sunday passes permitted. This city was not so
large as Luneville and held by no means the same attractions as that
early favorite of the 149th men. But the shops, cafes, large hospitals,
the celebrated Baccarat Glass Works, and the fact that it was a city
drew the men there often. Across the Meurthe River, between the
cathedral and the heights at the western edge of town lay the ruins of a
large section of the city, shelled in those days of August, 1914, that
marked the limits of the Germans' first onrush.
Work had been dropped, after a couple of days, on the position begun by
Battery B some distance in front of the one we occupied. Gun drill and
instruction in various phases of the battery's work was the sole
occupation of the men. Only once did the battery fire. At 1:30 a. m.,
June 5, the gun crews were hurriedly aroused, and fired for about an
hour, in response to a heavy enemy barrage, to which all guns in the
sector replied.
Gas alarms woke the battery many times at night, but by this time the
men had reached that stage where their own judgment told them when they
should sit up with their gas masks, and when they might turn over and go
to sleep. In brief, the alarms, though frequent, bothered them little.
June 9 the first two sections took two Battery D guns up in front of our
forward positions, to demonstrate for the officers of the regiment the
methods of open field warfare. All of the men learned to put up the
"flat-tops" that were always, after we left Lorraine, used as camouflage
over the guns. From four corner poles, held firmly by ropes and stakes,
heavy ropes were stretched as taut as possible. On this framework was
spread a cord netting, about thirty feet square, whose corners slanted
out equidistant from the corner poles. On the netting were fastened
wisps of green burlap thick enough to conceal what lay beneath it, but
not so thick as to cast a heavy shadow which might be distinguished in
an aerial photograph. This form of camouflage could be set up and taken
down quickly, and used repeatedly.
During the latter part of our stay near Merviller, the peculiar sickness
called "trench fever" ran through the regiment, thinning the ranks of
the men fit for active duty and sending many to the hospital for a few
days. After a few days of fever, languidness and weakness, the illness
passed away.
June 19 the first platoon pulled out, and the second platoon followed
on the next night, hiking 37 kilometres to Damas-aux-Bois. After two
days there, the regiment marched to Charmes, where we entrained for a
short train ride to Chalons-sur-Marne. By noon next day the battery was
in comfortable billets in Chepy, which, to us, is the cleanest village
in France, for no manure piles decorate its main street and no dirty
gutters line its roads.
Swimming in the canal near by, French "movies" at the Foyer du Soldat,
plenty of food--vegetables were abundant, and so were cheese, butter and
milk till the hungry soldiers bought out the creamery completely--made
this a delightful place, in spite of the boredom of "trigger squeeze
exercise" and overlong "stables" in the heat of the day.
On the night of June 28 the regiment marched up through Chalons to Camp
de la Carriere, a large concentration camp in the midst of woods, away
from any towns, the nearest of which was the little village of Cuperly.
We were in the great area known as the Camp de Chalons, where MacMahon
had mobilized his army of 50,000 men in 1870, which ended so unhappily
at Sedan.
Sunday, June 30, one year since the regiment had been called out, there
was a rigid inspection in the morning, and in the afternoon Colonel
Reilly and Major Redden spoke on the work of the regiment in that time,
and announced that the 42d was now to go into a new sector as a combat
division.