WITHIN SOUND OF THE GUNS
The men had traveled to Paris in passenger coaches, but when it came
time to move the first division to its training area in the Vosges our
soldiers rode like all the other allied armies in the famous cars upon
which are painted "Hommes 36; chevaux en long, 8." And, of course,
anybody who knows French understands the caption to mean that the horses
must be put in lengthwise and not folded. No restrictions are mentioned
as to the method of packing the "hommes."
The journey lay through gorgeous rolling country which was all a sparkle
at this season of the year. Presently the vineyards were left behind and
the hills became higher. Now and again there were fringes of pine trees.
At one point it was possible to see a French captive balloon floating
just beyond the hilltops, but we could not hear the guns yet. French
soldiers in troop trains and camps near the track cheered the Americans
and even a few of the Germans inside a big stockade waved at the men who
were moving forward to study war. The trains stopped at a little town
which lay at the foot of a hill. It was a mean little town, but on the
hill was the fine old tower of a castle which had once dominated the
surrounding country.
From this town, which was chosen as divisional headquarters, regiments
were sent northeast and northwest into tiny villages which were no more
than a single line of houses along the roadway. A few one-story wooden
barracks had been built for the Americans, but ninety per cent. of the
men went into billets. They were quartered in the lofts of barns of the
better sort. The billeting officers would not consider sheds where
cattle had been kept. Few troops had been quartered in this part of the
country previously and so the barns were moderately clean.
The effort to make cleanliness and sanitation something more than
relative terms was the first thing which really threatened
Franco-American amity. The decision of American officers that all manure
piles must be removed from in front of dwelling houses met a startled
and universal protest. Elderly Frenchwomen explained with great feeling
that the manure piles had been there as long as they could remember and
that no one had ever come to any harm from them. The American officers
insisted, and at last a grudging consent was forced. I saw one old lady
almost on the point of tears as she watched the invaders demolish her
manure pile. At last she could stand no more. "They make a lot of dust,"
she said critically, and went into the house.
A few days after the Americans arrived in camp came their instructors. A
crack division of Alpine Chasseurs was chosen to teach the Americans.
Nobody called these men froggies. They called them "chassers." It was
enough to see them march to know that they were fighting men. Their
stride was short and quick. Each step was taken as if the marcher was
eager to have it over and done with so that he could take another. Even
their buglers won admiration, for they had a trick of throwing their
instruments in the air and catching them again that brought envy to the
heart of every American band. Indeed, a good deal of friendly rivalry
developed from the beginning and in the early days, at least, the French
had all the better of it. They could lift heavier weights than our men,
who averaged much younger. Little Frenchmen standing five feet three or
four would seize a rifle close to the end of the bayonet and slowly
raise it with stiff arm to horizontal and down again. American farmer
boys tried and failed. Of course, this was a crack French division which
drew its men from various organizations, while our division was just the
average lot and perhaps not quite that since there was a larger
percentage of recruits than is usually found in the regular army.
Although our men were somewhat outclassed by their instructors in these
early days, they were game in their effort to keep up competition.
Almost the first work to which the troops were set was trench digging.
This is one of the most important arts of war and also the most
tiresome. Somebody has said of the Canadians: "They will die in the last
ditch, but they won't dig it." The Americans have a similar aversion for
work with pick and shovel, but trench digging came to them as a
competition. I saw a battalion of the chasseurs and a battalion of
marines set to work in a field where every other blow of the pick hit a
rock. There was no chance to loaf, for when a marine looked over his
shoulder he could see the French picks going for dear life down at the
other end of the trench. At four-thirty the men were told to call it a
day. The chasseurs leaped out of their trench; threw down their tools,
and began to sing at top voice a popular Parisian love ditty entitled
"Il faut de l'amour." One of the French officers told me afterwards that
it was the invariable custom of his men to sing at the end of work, but
the marines thought the "chassers" were merely showing off the excellent
nature of their wind. More slowly the Americans clambered out of their
trench, but they were ready when the last French note died away and
piped up somewhat breathlessly: "Hail! Hail! the gang's all here!"
American company commanders were quick to appreciate the value of
organized singing in the training of troops, and for the next few days
the doughboys were drilled to lift their voices as well as their picks.
Most of all, music was appreciated in the long hikes of the early
training period. A good song did much to make a marching man forget that
he had a fifty-pound pack on his back.
"I know I'm beginning to get a real company now," one captain told me,
"because whenever they're beginning to feel tired they start to sing and
freshen up." "No," he said, in reply to a question, "they didn't just
start. It needed a little fixing. I noticed that when the Frenchmen
stopped work they always started back to camp singing. 'We can do that,'
I told my men when we started back. 'Let's hear a little noise.' Nothing
happened. Nobody wanted to begin. They were scared the others would
laugh at them. I can't carry a tune two feet, but I just struck up
'We'll hang the damned old Kaiser to a sour apple tree' to the tune of
'John Brown's Body.' A few joined in, but most of them wouldn't open
their mouths. I told 'em, 'I'm just going to keep on marching this
company until everybody's in on the song. I don't care if we have to
march all night.' That got 'em going. Now they like it. They're thinking
up new songs every day. I can save my voice now."
One of the reasons for sending the men into the Vosges for training was
to get them within sound of the guns, but it was almost a week before we
heard any of the doings at the front. It was at night time that we first
heard the guns. It was a still, windless night and along about eight
o'clock they began. You couldn't be quite sure whether you heard them or
felt them, but something was stirring. It felt or sounded a good deal as
if some giant across the hills had slammed the door of his castle as he
left home to take the morning train for business. Up at the northern end
of the training area the sound of the guns was much more distinct. In
fact, they were loud enough some nights to become identified in the mind
as events and not mere rumblings. A Sammy up in that village stopped
our car one morning and asked if we couldn't give him a newspaper.
"I suppose you want to know how the baseball games are coming out,"
somebody suggested.
"To hell with baseball, I want to know about the war," said the soldier.
"I'm with these mules," he said, pointing to half a dozen animals
tethered on the bank of a canal. "I've been with them right from the
beginning. I came over on the same steamer with 'em. I rode up with 'em
in the train from ---- and here we are again. I don't hear nothing. They
could capture Berlin and nobody'd tell me about it. All I do is feed
these damned mules. 'Big Bill,' that one on the end, is sick, and I've
got to hang around and give him a pill every six hours. I wish he'd
choke. I don't like him as well as the rest of the mules and I hate 'em
all.
"It'll be fine, won't it, when somebody asks me: 'Daddy, what did you do
in the great war?' and I say: 'Oh, I sat up with a sick mule.'"
Back of the hills from some indefinite distance came the sound of big
guns. They raged persistently for ten minutes and then quit. "Big Bill"
began to rear around and kick. The soldier cursed him.
"Those guns were going like that all night, but mostly around two
o'clock," he said. "Nobody around here knows anything about it. I wish I
could get hold of an American paper and find out something about that
fight. I've sent to Memphis for _The News Scimitar_, but somehow it
don't seem to get here. I wish those guns was near enough to drop
something over here on the mules, especially 'Big Bill,' but I'm out of
luck."
The nearest approach of the war was in the air. It wasn't long before
German planes began to scout over the territory occupied by the
Americans. One battalion almost saw an air fight. It would have seen it
if the Major hadn't said "Attention!" just then. The battalion was
drilling in a big open meadow when there came from the East first a
whirr and then a machine. The machine, flying high, circled the field.
The soldiers who were standing at ease stared up at the visitor, but it
was too high to see the identifying marks. Soon there was no doubt that
the machine was German, for little white splotches appeared in the sky.
It looked as if Charlie Chaplin had thrown a cream pie at heaven and it
had splattered. An anti-aircraft gun concealed in a woods several miles
away was firing at the Boche. Presently the firing ceased and there was
a whirr from the West. A French plane flew straight in the direction of
the German, who climbed higher and higher. As the planes drew nearer it
was possible to see machine gun flashes, but just then the Major called
his men to attention. Regulations provide that eyes must look straight
ahead, but it was a hard test for recruits and there may have been one
or two who stole a glance up there where the planes were fighting. In
each case an officer was on the culprit like a flash.
"Keep your head still," shouted a lieutenant. "That's a private fight.
It's got nothing to do with you."
Soon the German turned and flew back in the direction of his own lines
and when the necks of the doughboys were unfettered and they could look
up again the sky was clear. Even the cream puff splotches were gone.
On another afternoon a Boche plane flew over the entire American area.
It circled a field in divisional headquarters where a baseball game was
in progress and flew home.
"I know why that German flew home after he reached ----," an officer
explained. "Don't you see? He was trying to find out if we were
Americans and that baseball game proved it to him."
The greatest aerial display occurred on a morning when a French officer
was instructing an American company in the art of trench digging. He
spoke no English, but an interpreter of a sort was making what shift he
could. The doughboys tried to look interested and didn't succeed. It was
harder when out from behind a cloud came one aeroplane, then another and
another. When half a dozen had appeared from behind the cloud one
doughboy could stand the strain no longer.
"Look," he shouted, "they're hatching them up there."
The French instructor finally granted a recess of ten minutes but
before the time was up the planes had maneuvered out of sight. In spite
of all the German activity in the air only one attempt was made to bomb
the Americans during the summer. A single bomb was dropped on a village
where the marines were stationed, but it did no damage.
The second week in the training area found the doughboys increasing
their curriculum to include bombs and machine guns. It had not been
possible to do much in the finer arts of war previously because of the
absence of interpreters. A number of these had been mobilized now but
they varied in quality. As one American officer put it, "Interpreters
may be divided into three classes: those who know no English; those who
know no French; and those who know neither."
However, the Americans managed to get their instruction in some way or
other. No interpreters were needed with the machine guns. Instead each
American company was divided up into little groups and a chasseur placed
at the head of each group. I watched the instruction and found that
little language was needed. The Frenchman would take a machine gun or
automatic rifle apart and holding up each part give its French name. The
Americans paid no particular attention to the outlandish terms which the
French used for their machine gun parts, but they were alert to notice
the manner in which the gun was put together and in the group in which I
was standing two Americans were able to put the gun together without
having any parts left over after a single demonstration.
Of course, a little language was used. Some of the marines had picked up
a little very villainous French in Hayti and they made what shift they
could with that. A few French Canadians and an occasional man from New
Orleans could converse with the chasseurs and one or two phrases had
been acquired by men hitherto entirely ignorant of French.
"Qu'est-ce-que c'est?" was used by the purists as their form of
interrogation, but there were others who tried to make "combien" do the
work. "Combien," which we pronounced "come bean," was stretched for many
purposes. I have heard it used and accepted as an equivalent for
"whereabouts," "what did you say," "why," "which one" and "will you
please show us once more how to put that machine gun together."
Not only did the Americans show an aptitude for getting the hang of the
mechanism of the machine gun and the automatic rifle, but they shot well
with them after a little bit of practice.
The first man I watched at work with the automatic rifle was green. He
had taken the gun apart and put it together again with an occasional
"regardez" and bit of demonstration from one of the Frenchmen, but the
weapon was not yet his pal. He picked the gun up somewhat gingerly and
aimed at the line of targets a couple of hundred yards away. Then he
pulled the trigger and the bucking thing, which seemed to be intent on
wriggling out of his arms, sprayed the top of the hill with bullets. The
French instructor made a laughing comment and an American who spoke the
language explained, "He says you ought to be in the anti-aircraft
service."
The next man to try his luck was a non-commissioned officer long in the
army. He patted the gun and wooed it a little in whispers before he
shot. It was a French gun, to be sure, but the language of firearms is
international. "Behave, Betsy," he said and she did. He sprayed shots
along the line of targets at the bottom of the hill as the gun clattered
away with all the clamor of a riveting machine at seven in the morning.
When they looked at the targets they found he had scored thirty hits out
of thirty-four and some were bull's-eyes. The French instructor was so
pleased that he stepped forward as if to hug the ancient sergeant but
the veteran's look of horror dissuaded him.
Bombing proved the most popular part of training and particularly as
soon as it was possible to work with the live article. First of all
dummy bombs were issued. A French officer carefully explained that the
bomb should be thrown after four moves, counting one, two, three, four,
as he posed something like a shot putter before he let the bomb go with
an overhand, stiff, armed fling. He illustrated the method several
times, but the first American to throw sent the bomb spinning out on a
line just as if he were hurrying a throw to first from deep short. The
Frenchman reproved him and explained carefully that, although it might
be possible to throw a bomb a long way in the manner in which a baseball
is thrown, it was necessary for a bomber to hurl many missiles and that
he must preserve his arm. He also pointed out that the bomb would never
land in the trenches of the enemy unless it was thrown with a
considerable arc.
The men then kept to the exercises laid down by the instructor, but just
before they stopped one or two could not resist the temptation of again
"putting something on to it" and letting the bomb sail out fast. One
lefthander who had pitched for a season in the Southern League was
anxious to make some experiments to see if he couldn't throw a bomb with
an out curve but he was informed that such an accomplishment would have
no military utility.
The first American wounded in France was the victim of a bombing
accident. A soldier threw a live bomb more than thirty meters from a
trench. When the bomb burst a fragment came whirling back in some
curious manner and fell into a box of grenades upon which a lieutenant
was sitting. The fragment cut the pin of one of the bombs and the whole
box went off with a bang. The lieutenant received only a slight cut on
his forehead, but a French interpreter thirty yards away was knocked
unconscious and lost the sight of his right eye. This Frenchman had
spent two years under fire at Verdun without being scratched and here
was his first wound come upon him on a quiet afternoon in a meadow miles
from the lines.
The men threw bombs from deep trenches and they were instructed to keep
cover closely after hurling a grenade just as if there was a German
trench across the way. But curiosity was too strong for them. Each
wanted to see where his particular bomb hit and how much earth it would
tear up. The bombs made only small scars in the earth, but they sent
fragments of steel casing flying in all directions and several men were
cut about the face by splinters.
The seeming inability of the American to visualize battle conditions in
training retards his progress in spite of his aptitude in other
directions. A French officer was directing a platoon of Americans one
day in skirmishing. They were to fire a round, run forward twenty paces,
throw themselves flat and run forward again. One doughboy would raise
himself up on his elbows and look about. The Frenchman, very much
excited, ran over to him and said, "You must keep your head down or you
will get shot. You must remember that bullets are flying all about you."
As soon as the instructor's back was turned the soldier was up on his
elbows again. "Hell," he said, "there ain't any bullets."
In later phases of training the inferiority of the American to the
French in imagination showed clearly. French veterans or recruits for
that matter could work themselves up to a frenzy in sham battles and
dash into an empty trench with a shout as if it were filled with
Germans. Americans could not do that. They found it difficult to forget
that practice was just practice.