shells howled overhead, 88s by the sound of them, and broke on the road.
The lieutenant halted and watched: “Dam’ unusual, shellin’ here this
time of night—must know it’s a relief—” It was the conviction of all
that the Boche knew everything, down to the movements of the lowest
corporal.—“I think we’ll cut a corner, and take a chance of gettin’
through the line over yonder—” He led away from the road, through the
trampled wheat to his right, away from the shelling. This was really No
Man’s Land, for the line curved back from the wood, and thrust out again
along the line of another crest, also wooded. Such intervals were
watched by day and patrolled by night, and ration parties, carrying
details, and other wretches who had to traverse them always sweated
mightily and anticipated exciting incidents. It was full of smells and
mysterious horrors in the starlight, that wheat. Once the platoon came
upon a pig, feeding unspeakably.... The woods ahead grew plain; the men
walked gingerly, straining their eyes at the shadows.... “Eighth
machine-gun in there—take it easy, you—risky business, this—wish to God
I’d—” The platoon stopped, frozen, as they heard the charging handle of
a Hotchkiss snick back. A small, sharp voice barked: “Halt—who’
there?”—“Platoon of the 49th—can we get through here?” “My God, I dam’
near gave you a clip! What the hell, comin’ up here—don’t you know you
ain’t supposed to come bustin’ around a machine-gun position you—” “All
right—all right!—shellin’ the road down there”—and the platoon scuttled
past the Hotchkiss gun, while its crew reviled them. Machine-gunners are
a touchy lot, prone to shoot first and inquire afterward; the platoon
gave thanks for a man who didn’t scare.
They turned left now, and went swiftly through the woods northwest of
Lucy. They passed a place where the midnight harassing fire had caught a
ration party; a shell had hit a pushcart loaded with loaves of the round
French war bread which was the main item of the ration on this front;
bread was scattered over an acre or so, and a frenzied sergeant was
routing his ration party out of several holes and trying to collect it
again. Otherwise, an outfit up in the Bois de Belleau wouldn’t eat for
another twenty-four hours. The platoon was amused. They took the road to
La Voie du Chatelle, stepping out. They’d be well behind the usual
shelling, if the Boche was on schedule. Far enough back to talk now, and
relax their hunched shoulders.
Down the road they heard a trampling, and the wind brought a smell of
unwashed men. “Hi! Relief of Frogs comin’ in—!” “Yeh—Frogs. They smell
like camels. We smell like goats.” “Hope this relief carries a bath wit’
it! Me, I’ve got blue mould all up my back.” “Well, next time we come
in, we’ll put showers in that goddam place. Been there long enough to,
already—” “How long we been there?—Le’s see—this is the 5th of July,
ain’t it?—” “Je’s, I don’t keep count of no days! I can’t remember when
we was anywhere else—” This was in a tone so mournful that the file’s
neighbors laughed. “What you doin’ in this war, anyway? Dam’
replacement, jus’ joined up after Hill 142—” “Man,” said the file very
earnestly, “I’ll tell you. So help me Gawd, I wuz dodgin’ the draft!”
The French column came up and passed. Its horizon-blue uniform was
invisible in the dark, but the stars glinted a little on its helmets and
bayonets. “V’la! Yanquis! B’soir, Americains!” “Dam’ right, Frenchie!
Bon chance, huh?” They went on without lagging, well closed up. A man’s
feet dragged going in; there are no such things on a battle-field as
fresh troops, for you always approach by forced marches, infinitely
weary—“but comin’ out—boy, we make knots!—” They reached La Voie du
Chatelle, where Regimental was, and there the old Boche always shelled.
It was a little farm, pretty well knocked to pieces now, but Regimental
was reported to prefer it to a change; they had the Boche’s system down
so that they could count on him. His shelling always fell into method
when he had long enough, and the superior man could, by watching him a
few days, avoid unpleasantness. La Voie du Chatelle, as the world knew,
received his attention from 11.45 to 12.10 every night. Then he laid off
until 3, when his day-shift came on. You could set your watch by it. The
platoon went cheerfully past.
A full kilometre farther they hiked, at a furious pace. Then the
lieutenant considered that they might catch a rest; they had come a long
way and were in a safe spot. Ten minutes’ rest out of every hour was the
rule when possible. He passed the word: “Fall out to the right of the
road,” and sat down himself, a little way off, feeling for his
chewing-tobacco. You didn’t smoke on the front at night—lights were not
safe. And chewin’ was next best. Then he observed that the platoon was
not falling out. They stood in groups on the road, and an angry mutter
reached him. “What th’ell?—Goin’ out, an’ then he wants to rest!” “Yeh,
‘fall out on the right of the road,’ he says, the goddam fool—” The
lieutenant knew his men, as you know men you live in hell with. He got
up, chuckling.—“Well, if that’s the way you feel about it—come on, you
birds!” and he set them a killing step, at which no man complained.
The dawn was coming when they rendezvoused with the battalion in Bois
Gros-Jean—beans for breakfast, and hot coffee, and tins of jam! That
afternoon they had off their clothes for the first time in three weeks
or so, and swam in the Marne at a place called Croutte. And at formation
they heard this order published:
VI Armée
État-Major
6930/2
Au QGA le 30 Juin, 1918.
In view of the brilliant conduct of the 4th Brigade of the 2nd U. S.
Division, which in a spirited fight took Bouresches and the important
strong point of Bois de Belleau, stubbornly defended by a large enemy
force, the General commanding the VIth Army orders that, henceforth,
in all official papers, the Bois de Belleau shall be named “Bois de la
Brigade de Marine.”
The General of Division Degoutte
Commanding VIth Army
(Signed) DEGOUTTE.
“Yeh,” said the battalion. “Now, about this liberty in Paris—” But they
didn’t go to Paris. They took a road that led through Soissons, and St.
Mihiel, and Blanc Mont, and the Argonne-Meuse, to Nieuwied, on the far
side of the Rhine.
SONGS
ONE
“BANG AWAY, LULU”
The Marines have a very noble song: the Marine Corps Hymn. It is taught,
along with close order drill and things like that, to recruits at Parris
Island and on the West Coast. It begins:
“_From the Halls of Montezuma
To the shores of Tripoli,
We have fought our country’s battles
On the land and on the sea_....”
and it closes, gloriously:
“_If the Army and the Navy
Ever look on heaven’s scenes,
They will find the streets are guarded
By United States Marines_....”
This platoon, however, led by a brazen-throated gunnery sergeant, is
roaring out:
“_Bang away, Lulu_....”
[Illustration: [Soldiers]]
II
[Illustration: [Soldiers]]
In the town of Villers-Nancy, where the battalion billeted, they
published this order to the troops:
No. 862’3
Ordre Général No. 318
Xe Armée
État-Major
3e Bureau
AuQG_A_ 30 July 18
_Officers, Non-Commissioned Officers and Soldiers of the Third United
States Army Corps_:
Shoulder to shoulder with your French comrades you were thrown into
the counter-offensive battle which commenced on the 18th of July. You
rushed to the attack as to a festival. Your magnificent courage
completely routed a surprised enemy and your indomitable tenacity
checked the counter-attacks of his fresh divisions. You have shown
yourselves worthy sons of your great country, and you were admired by
your comrades-in-arms.
Ninety-one guns, 7,200 prisoners, immense booty, 10 kilomètres of
country liberated; this is your portion of the spoil of this victory.
Furthermore, you have demonstrated your superiority over the barbarian
enemy of all mankind. To attack him is to vanquish him.
American comrades! I am grateful to you for the blood so generously
spilled on the soil of my country. I am proud to have commanded you
during such days, and to have fought with you for the deliverance of
the world.
(Signed) MANGIN.
II
THE CHARGE AT SOISSONS
The 1st Battalion lay in Croutte-sur-Marne. It drank deep of the golden
July weather, and swam noisily in the Marne, which swung a blue and
shining loop below the town. The battalion took but little interest in
the war, which could be heard growling and muttering intermittently to
the north and east. Indeed, the unpleasant Bois-de-Belleau-Bouresches
area was only a few hours’ march distant, and Château-Thierry was just
up the river. The guns were loud and continuous in that direction.
But the 2d American Division—Marines and troops of the Regular Army—had
just finished a hitch of some thirty-eight days attacking and holding
and attacking again, from Hill 142, on the left, through that ghastly
wood which the French now called the “Bois de la Brigade de Marine,” to
Vaux, on the right; and in this battalion, as in the other units of the
division, such men as had survived were quite willing to think about
something else.
Division Headquarters were over Montreuil way, and thither certain
distinguished individuals were ordered, to return with crosses on their
faded blouses. This furnished pleasant food for gossip and speculation.
Then, vin rouge and vin blanc were to be had, as well as fresh milk for
the less carnally minded, and such supplements to the ration were always
matters of interest. Also, there were certain buxom mademoiselles among
the few civilian families who lingered here in the teeth of the war, and
although every girl was watched by lynx-eyed elders early and late,
their very presence was stimulating and they were all inclined to be
friendly.
The most delightful diversion of all was discussion of the rumor that
rose up and ran through the companies: “Got it hot from a bird that was
talkin’ to a dog-robber at Brigade H. Q.—the division is gonna be sent
back to St. Denis for a month’s rest, an’ leaves, an’ everything!” “Yeh!
we gonna parade in Paris, too.” It was ascertained that St. Denis was
right near Paris. Platoon commanders were respectfully approached:
“Beggin’ the lootenant’s pardon, but does the lootenant think that we—”
The lieutenants looked wise and answered vaguely and asked the captains.
All ranks hung upon the idea.
July 14 came. “Sort o’ Frog Fourth o’ July,” explained a learned
corporal, standing in line for morning chow.
“In Paris, they’s parades, an’ music, an’ fireworks, an’ all that kinder
thing. Speakin’ an’ barbecues, like back home. Celebratin’ the time the
Frogs rose agin ’em an’ tore down some noted brig or other they had.
Now, if I wuz in Paree now, sittin’ in front of the Caffey de Pay——!”
“Don’t try to go there, Corp. J’seen the cellar they’s got fer a brig
here?— If you——”
“Don’t see no flag-wavin’ or such celebrations here. Seen one little
Frog kid with his gas-mask an’ a Frog flag down the street—no more. Why
back home, even in tank towns like this, on the Fourth——”
As a matter of fact, Croutte took on this day no especial joy in the
far-off fall of the Bastille. Croutte was in range of the Boche heavy
artillery; one could perceive, at the end of this street where, in
effect, the house of M’sieu’ le Maire had been! An obus of two hundred
and twenty centimètres. And others, regard you, near the bridge. Some
descended into the river, the naughty ones, and killed many fish. Also,
the avions——
Did it not appear to Messieurs les Officiers that the cannon were louder
this day, especially toward Rheims? And as the day went on, it did
appear so. In the afternoon a Boche came out of a cloud and shot down in
flames the fat observation balloon that lived just up the river from
Croutte. The rumor of St. Denis and fourteen-day leaves waned somewhat.
Certainly there grew to be a feeling in the air....
About one o’clock the morning of the 15th the Boche dropped nine-inch
shells into the town. The battalion was turned out, and stood under arms
in the dark while the battalion gas officer sniffed around busily to see
if the shells were the gas variety. They were not, but the battalion,
after the shelling stopped and the casualties were attended to, observed
that in the east a light not of the dawn was putting out the stars. The
eastern sky was all aflame with gun-flashes, and a growing thunder shook
the still air.
The files remarked that they were glad not to be where all that stuff
was lightin’, and after breakfast projected the usual swimming parties.
Aquatic sports were then vetoed by regretful platoon commanders, since
it appeared that Battalion H. Q. had directed the companies to hold
themselves in readiness for instant movement to an unspecified place.
Thereupon the guns eastward took on a more than professional interest.
The civilians looked and listened also. Their faces were anxious. They
had heard that noise before. The hot July hours passed; the battalion
continued to be held in readiness, and got practically no sleep in
consequence. There was further shelling, and the guns were undoubtedly
louder—and nearer.
Breakfast on the 16th was scant, and the cooks held out little
encouragement for lunch. Lunch was an hour early, and consisted of
beans. “Boys, we’re goin’ somewhere. We always gets beans to make a hike
on.” “Yeh! an’ you always gets more than two-men rates—standin’ in line
for fourths, now!”—“What’s that sergeant yellin’ about—fill yo’
canteens? Gonna get ving blonk in mine!”
At noon, the rolling kitchens packed up and moved off, nobody knew
where. The battalion regarded their departure soberly. “Wish I hadn’t et
my reserve rations....” The shadows were lengthening when the bugles
blew “assembly” and the companies fell in, taking the broad white road
that led down the river. At the next town—towns were thick along the
Marne from Château-Thierry to Meaux—they passed through the other
battalions of the 5th Marines, jeeringly at ease beside the road.
Greetings were tossed about, and the files gibed at each other. “Where
you bums goin’?” “Dunno—don’ care— But you see the ole 1st Battalion is
leadin’, as usual!” “Aw—.... Close up! close up!”
Beyond them was the 6th Regiment of Marines, arms stacked in the fields
by the river. Each battalion took the road in turn, and presently the
whole Marine Brigade was swinging down the Marne in the slanting
sunlight. Very solid and businesslike the brigade was, keen-faced and
gaunt and hard from the great fight behind them, and fit and competent
for greater battles yet to come. The companies were under strength, but
they had the quality of veterans. They had met the Boche and broken him,
and they knew they could do it again. The rumble of the guns was behind
them, and the rumor of the leave area still ran strong enough to
maintain a slow volubility among the squads. They talked and laughed,
but they did not sing. Veterans do not sing a great deal.
It was getting dusk when the 1st Battalion of the 5th, leading, rounded
a turn in the road and came upon an endless column of camions, drawn up
along the river road as far as one could see. The companies became
silent.
“Camions! They rode us to Chatto-Terry in them busses—” “Yeh! an’ it was
a one-way trip for a hell of a lot of us, too!” “Close up! Close up an’
keep to the right of the road.”
“Camions! That’s a sign they want us bad, somewhere on the line,”
commented the lean first lieutenant who hiked at the head of the 49th
Company. “Walter”—to the officer beside him—“I wonder what happened
yesterday an’ to-day, with all that shooting.” “Don’t know—but this
Château-Thierry salient is mighty deep an’ narrow, unless the Boche
spread himself yesterday.... If we were to break into it, up near one of
the corners....” “Yes! Well, we’re right on the tip of it here—can jump
either way—Lord there’s a lot of these conveyances.”
Later the battalion knew what had happened on July 15, when the Boche
made his final cast across the Champagne country toward Rheims and
Épernay; and his storm divisions surged to the Marne, and stayed, and
lapped around the foot of the gray Mountain of Rheims, and stayed. Just
now the battalion cared for none of these things. It had no supper; it
faced a crowded trip of uncertain duration, and was assured of various
discomforts after that.
Well accustomed to the ways of war, the men growled horribly as they
crammed into their appointed chariots, while the officers inexorably
loaded the best part of a platoon into each camion, the dusk hiding
their grins of sympathy. “Get aboard! get aboard! Where’ll you put yo’
pack? Now what the hell do I know about yo’ pack—want a special
stateroom an’ a coon vallay, do yuh, yuh—!” The sergeants didn’t grin.
They swore, and the men swore, and they raged altogether. But, in much
less time than it took to tell about it afterward, the men were loaded
on. The officers were skilled and prompt in such matters.
Wizened Annamites from the colonies of France drove the camions.
Presently, with clangor and much dust, they started their engines, and
the camion train jolted off down the river road. A red moon shone wanly
through the haze. The Marne was a silver thread through the valley of a
dream, infinitely aloof from the gasoline-smelling tumult.... “Valley of
the Marne! ... the Marne ... some of us will not see you again....”
[Illustration:
The automatic-rifle men.
]
A camion, as understood by the French, is a motor-vehicle with small
wheels and no springs to speak of. It finds every hole in the road, and
makes an unholy racket; but it covers ground, the roadbed being of no
consequence, as the suffering files bore witness. To the lieutenant of
the 49th, nursing his cane on the driver’s seat of a lurching camion,
beside two Annamitish heathen who smelt like camels and chattered like
monkeys, came scraps of conversation from the compressed platoon behind
him. “Sardines is comfortable to what we is!...” “Chevawz forty—hommes
eight! Lord forgive me, I uster kick about them noble box cars. They say
it wuz taxicabs an’ motor-trucks that won the first battle of the
Marne—yeh! If they rushed them Frogs up packed like this, you know they
felt like fightin’ when they got out!”... “I feel like fightin’
now!—take yo’ laigs outer my shortribs, you big embus-kay.”
“Night before last they shelled us, an’ we stood by last night—when do
we sleep?—that’s what I wanna know—” But sleeping isn’t done in camions.
The dust on the road rose thick and white around the train, and rode
with it through the night. The face of the moon, very old and wise,
peered down through the dust. They left the river, and by the testimony
of the stars it seemed to the lieutenant that they were hurrying north.
Always, on the right, the far horizon glowed with the fires of
war—flares, signal-lights, gun-flashes from hidden batteries; the route
paralleled the line. The lieutenant visualized his map: “Followin’ the
salient around—to the north—the north—Soissons way, or Montdidier....
The Boche took Soissons....”
Quiet French villages along the road, stone houses like gray ghosts
under the pale moon, and all lights hooded against Boche planes. Long,
empty stretches of road. Shadowy columns of French infantry, overtaken
and passed. Horse-drawn batteries of 75s on the move. Swift staff cars
that dashed by, hooting. Then, long files of horsemen, cloaked and
helmeted, with a ghostly glint of lanceheads over them—French cavalry.
Presently, dawn, with low clouds piling up in the rosy sky. And along
the road, wherever there were groves, more cavalry was seen, at ease
under the trees. Horses were picketed, lances and sabres stuck into the
ground, and cooking-fires alight.
The Marines had not met the French horse before. They now looked
approvingly upon them. Men and horses were alike big and
well-conditioned. All morning the camions passed through a country
packed with troops and guns, wherever there was cover from the sky.
Something big was in the air.
It was mid-forenoon when the train stopped, and the battalion climbed
out on cramped legs. “Fall in on the right of the road.... Platoon
commanders, report.... Keep fifty yards’ distance between platoons....
Squads right.... March!” and the companies moved off stiffly, on empty
stomachs. The little dark Annamites watched the files pass with
incurious eyes. They had taken many men up to battle.
II
Company by company, the 1st Battalion passed on, and behind them the
other battalions of the 5th Marines took the road and, after them, the
6th. “None of the wagons, or the galleys—don’t see the machine-gun
outfits, either,” observed the lieutenant of the 49th Company, looking
back from the crest of the first low hill. Here the battalion was
halted, having marched for half an hour, to tighten slings and settle
equipment for the real business of hiking. “They may get up to-night,
chow an’ all—wonder how far we came, an’ where we’re goin’. No,
sergeant—can’t send for water here—my canteen’s empty, too. All I know
about it is that we seem to be in a hurry.”
[Illustration:
Prussians from Von Boehn’s divisions in and around the Bois de
Belleau.
A page from Captain Thomason’s sketch-book.
]
The dust of the ride had settled thick, like fine gray masks, on the
men’s faces, and one knew that it was just as thick in their throats! Of
course the canteens, filled at Croutte, were finished. The files swore
through cracked lips.
The battalion moved off again, and the major up forward set a pace all
disproportionate to his short legs. When the first halt came, the usual
ten-minute rest out of the hour was cut to five. “Aw hell! forced
march!” “An’ the lootenant has forgot everything but ‘close up! close
up!’— Listen at him——”
The camions had set them down in a gently rolling country, unwooded, and
fat with ripening wheat. Far across it, to the north, blue with
distance, stood a great forest, and toward this forest the battalion
marched, talkative, as men are in the first hour of the hike, before the
slings of the pack begin to cut into your shoulders.... “Look at them
poppies in the wheat.”—“They ain’t as red as the poppies were the
mornin’ of the 6th of June, when we went up to Hill 142—” “Yep!
Beginnin’ to fade some. It’s gettin’ late in the season.” “Hi—I’m
beginnin’ to fade some myself—this guerre is wearin’ on a man ...
remember how they looked in the wheat that mornin’, just before we hit
the Maxim guns?—red as blood—” “Pore old Jerry Finnegan picked one and
stuck it in the buckle of his helmet—I seen it in his tin hat after he
was killed, there behin’ the Hill.... I’ll always think about poppies
an’ blood together, as long as I live—” This last from little Tritt, the
lieutenant’s orderly.
“Long as you live—that’s good!” gibed Corporal Snair, of the Company
Headquarters group. “Don’t you know by now how expendable you bucks
are?”—The lieutenant heard, and remembered it, oddly enough, in a
crowded moment the next day, when he lost the two of them to a
hard-fought Maxim gun.
No wind moved across the lonely wheatland; the bearded stalks waved not
at all, and the sun-drenched air was hot and dead. Sweat made muddy
runnels through the thick white dust that masked the faces of the men.
Conversation languished; what was said was in profane monosyllables.
Clouds came up, and there were showers of rain, with hot sunshine
between. Uniforms steamed after each shower, and thirst became a
torture. The man who had the vin blanc in his canteen fell out and was
quite ill. “Hikin’—in—a dam’—Turkish bath——”
After interminable hours, the column came to the forest and passed from
streaming sunshine into sultry shades. It was a noble wood of great
high-branching trees, clean of underbrush as a park. Something was doing
in the forest. Small-arms ammunition was stacked beside the road, and
there were dumps of shells and bombs under the trees. And French
soldiers everywhere. This road presently led into a great paved highway,
and along it were more of the properties of war—row upon row of every
caliber of shell, orderly stacks of winged aerial bombs, pile after pile
of rifle and machine-gun ammunition, and cases of hand-grenades and
pyrotechnics. There were picket-lines of cavalry, and park after park of
artillery, light and heavy. There were infantrymen with stacked rifles.