[8] All numerals relate to stories herein told--not to chapters in the
original sources.
"DIXMUDE"-AN EPIC OF THE FRENCH MARINES
_Story of the Murder of Commander Jeanniot_
_Told by Charles Le Goffic of the Fusiliers Marins--Translated by
Florence Simmonds_
The story of the French Marines is one of the epics of the World's
Wars. Such is the story of the Bretons. At Dixmude, under command
of their own officers, retaining not only the costume, but the soul
and language of their profession they were still sailors. Grouped
with them were seamen from all the naval stations. The heroism of
these sailors is told in the volume entitled "Dixmude," published
by _J. B. Lippincott Company_. From these interesting stories, we
here relate "The Murder of Captain Jeanniot."
[9] I-GREAT HEARTS OF THE FRENCH MARINES
I had opportunities of talking to several of these "Parigots," and I
should not advise anyone to speak slightingly of their officers before
them, though, indeed, so few of these have survived that nine times
out of ten the quip could be aimed only at a ghost. The deepest and
tenderest words I heard uttered concerning Naval Lieutenant Martin
des Pallières were spoken by a Marine of the Rue des Martyrs, George
Delaballe, who was one of his gunners in front of the cemetery the
night when his machine-guns were jammed, and five hundred Germans, led
by a major wearing the Red Cross armlet, threw themselves suddenly into
our trenches.
"But why did you love him so?" I asked.
"I don't know.... We loved him because he was brave, and was always
saying things that made us laugh, ... but above all because he loved
us."
Here we have the secret of this extraordinary empire of the officers
over their men, the explanation of that miracle of a four weeks'
resistance, one against six, under the most formidable tempest of
shells of every caliber that ever fell upon a position, in a shattered
town where all the buildings were ablaze, and where, to quote the words
of a _Daily Telegraph_ correspondent, it was no longer light or dark,
"but only red." When the Boches murdered Commander Jeanniot, his men
were half crazy. They would not have felt the death of a father more
deeply. I have recently had a letter sent me written by a Breton lad,
Jules Cavan, who was wounded at Dixmude. While he was in hospital at
Bordeaux he was visited by relatives of Second-Lieutenant Gautier, who
was killed on October 27 in the cemetery trenches.
"Dear Sir," he wrote to M. Dalché de Desplanels the following day,
"you cannot imagine how your visit went to my heart.... On October 19,
when my battalion took the offensive at Lannes, three kilometers from
Dixmude, I was wounded by a bullet in the thigh. I dragged myself along
as best I could on the battlefield, bullets falling thickly all around
me. I got over about five hundred meters on the battlefield and reached
the road. Just at that moment Lieutenant Gautier, who was coming
towards me with a section, seeing me in the ditch, asked: 'Well, my
lad, what is the matter with you?' 'Oh, Lieutenant, I am wounded in the
leg, and I cannot drag myself further.' 'Here then, get on my back.'
And he carried me to a house at Lannes, and said these words, which I
shall never forget: 'Stay there, my lad, till they come and fetch you.
I will let the motor ambulance men know.' Then he went off under the
fire. Oh, the splendid fellow!"