But it was a most kind Providence that sent us away from the scenes
of devastation and death for our first service, and placed us where
we could come into a comprehensive knowledge and appreciation of
our non-combatant forces. Seven months of continuous service and
daily contact in the camp with these men warrant our writing with
assurance certain definite impressions left upon our minds by them. We
take it that the 20,000 soldiers whom we served, those visited at Brest
and other S. O. S. points and those who rested with us in the Leave
Area from Bordeaux, Marseilles, and other camps were typical of the one
hundred thousand or so men who formed the non-combatant group.
These men were known chiefly as stevedores and labor battalions.
Somehow a widely circulated report gained credence that they had been
gathered indiscriminately, and had been landed on foreign soil, a mere
group of servants for the white soldiers. We do not know who first
sought to thus humiliate these soldiers by such unjust and undeserved
rating. One might easily believe, of course, because of the constantly
unfair attitude of some of their officers toward them, that there was
some such assumption to that effect. But the world has learned now,
that in spite of all handicaps, there could be found nowhere in the
army stouter and braver hearts, or more loyal and self-sacrificing
spirits. Subjected to a stern discipline; with discriminations, cruel
in their intent and execution; long hours of toil; scant recognition
for service or hope of promotion, they still kept their faith.
Throughout the war they wrought as weavers who are given to see only
the wrong side of the glorious pattern they are weaving. Indeed,
through these men we came into an abiding belief that the colored man
was in the war to justify his plea for democracy. The first day we
entered that busy military port of St. Nazaire, we saw a colored lad
standing under the ancient clock in the center of the square. He had
M. P. (military police) on his arm band in large red letters, and in
his hand a stick with which he quietly directed the tremendous traffic
of that town. Auto-trucks, auto-cars of officers from the highest to
the lowest rank, auto-busses for welfare workers, sidecars, bicycles,
used so constantly by French women as well as men, and the typical
French _voiture_ made a constant noisy stream. And this colored lad,
who had come from a rural district of the far South, stood there calmly
pointing his stick, now left, now right, or holding it up in demand for
a pause. Surely he was there by Divine Thought.
The very first group of colored soldiers to leave for France in the
autumn of 1917 were stevedores and labor battalions. Another group
reached St. Nazaire, by way of Brest, Christmas eve of the same year.
Time and time again in camp they told us the story of that first winter
of hardship. Christmas day found them cold and cheerless, with hard
tacks and beans for their rations. All that winter they worked, poorly
equipped for their severe task. In the dark hours of the night and
the morning, they plunged through the deep mud of the camp and city,
without boots. On the dock they handled the cold steel and iron without
gloves. But they _were soldiers_, and so they worked without complaint.
When the first American Forces reached the Continent, the French were
calling loudly for help. All seemed chaos for a little, as thousands
of troops began to reconstruct the ports of France. These quiet ports,
many of them centuries gray, became centers of throbbing activity.
Hundreds of warehouses, most modern in their construction, rose as
if by magic. From the south where Marseilles looks out on the blue
Mediterranean, to Brest at the entrance to the English Channel, our
own stevedores, labor battalions and engineers, have rebuilt much of
the water front of France, thus making a real epoch in the history of
French navigation. During the last year of the war, these thousands of
men were at work in the S. O. S., connecting it with the great battle
front. System and efficiency, with the greatest possible haste, were
required in speeding the supplies to combatant troops. All of this
these soldiers comprehended and ever they responded with a decisive and
soldier-like spirit. The incessant tramp of many feet through the city
street, the constant rush and rumble of auto-trucks kept the camps of
these ports closely linked with the docks.
All who were at work in France well remember that “Race to Berlin”
contest, upon which the last great forward move of our troops so
largely depended. The world looked out only toward Metz, where our
great combat army was centering, but just as often, anxious eyes were
upon the rear where our men were toiling like mad that peace should
not be delayed through any failure of theirs. With feverish haste and
anxiety they battled with great bulks of ammunition and supplies. For
weeks at Marseilles, Bordeaux, St. Nazaire, Brest and other ports they
worked with almost superhuman strength. Those serving these men during
this contest labored with the same feverish spirit that possessed the
men themselves. How they tried to cheer, encourage, and entertain our
determined heroes as they contested for the honors! If by chance you
see somewhere a soldier wearing the emblem of the S. O. S., with an
arrow running through it and pointing skyward, you will know that he
belongs to those service battalions at Brest who by their inexhaustible
reserves of energy and endurance, won in the “Race to Berlin.”
Although these men were not called upon to face the shot and shell
at the front, they paid their toll in death from accident, cold and
exposure. No more at the rear than at the front did they pause to
consider personal danger. They were truly heroes, carrying not bayonet
and gun, but connecting the wonderful resources of their own country,
three thousand miles away, with the greatest battlefields the world has
ever known.
There went to rest in the land of light and peace a short time ago,
one of the world’s poets whose divinest gift was her great human
understanding and sympathy. Long and well did Ella Wheeler Wilcox
write to lift the souls of men from the sordid things of earth to the
purer realms of sympathetic knowledge and co-operation. She was given
_entrée_ to the heart of the war, and saw the grim conflict in all its
various settings. Riding along the coast one day, looking out upon the
long lines of warehouses, hearing the hum of the thousands of men at
work, she said: “I have gained with the years a growing appreciation
and love for the colored people, and I have seen nothing in France
finer than the work of the stevedores. I have written and dedicated a
poem to them.” That afternoon, after she had spoken for a few minutes
to the thousands of swarthy soldiers, assembled to pay her homage, her
companion read the poem as follows:
We are the army stevedores, lusty and virile and strong.
We are given the hardest work of the war and the hours are long.
We handle the heavy boxes and shovel the dirty coal;
While soldiers and sailors work in the light, we burrow below in the hole.
But somebody has to do this work, or the soldiers could not fight
And whatever work is given a man, is good if he does it right.
We are the army stevedores, and we are volunteers.
We did not wait for the draft to come, to put aside our fears.
We flung them away on the wings of fate, at the very first call of our land,
And each of us offered a willing heart, and the strength of a brawny hand.
We are the army stevedores and work as we must and may.
The cross of honor will never be ours to proudly wear away.
But the men at the Front could not be there,
And the battles could not be won
If the stevedores stopped in their dull routine,
And left their work undone.
Somebody has to do this work, be glad that it isn’t you,
We are the army stevedores—give us our due!
[Illustration: MEN OF THE TWENTY-FIRST DEPOT COMPANY]
But this wonderfully revealing poem goes hardly far enough to give full
appreciation of the whole life of the colored stevedore in France.
So often in addition to this “hardest work of the war,” was added
treatment accorded no other soldier. While white American soldiers
were permitted to go freely about the towns, the great mass of colored
American soldiers saw them for the most part, as they marched in line
to and from the docks. Passes for them were oftener than otherwise as
hard to secure as American gold. Always they were aware of some case of
cruel injustice for which there seemed absolutely no redress. We found
in our camp a young college student, who, believing that war spelled
opportunity, was among the first to enlist. His education placed him at
once in the office of his company, and he went to France a sergeant.
He did not find that war meant for him what he had dreamed it would,
but he kept loyal; his work commanded respect, and, for a time, all
went well. But a company commander came who resented the pride of the
colored boy, and then began a series of humiliations that took away
rank, sent him to the guard-house and dock. Retribution is rather swift
at times, and so this officer’s downfall came soon. He never knew,
however, that the fond mother back home was the only thing that
stood between him and death. The young man has since told us how happy
he was to return home with his honor maintained, rank restored. But in
camp his face hurt us as often as we looked upon it, so full it was of
the endurance of an outraged manhood.
Even a short outing might be robbed of its pleasure. For how well
we remember a company that had been granted a week-end leave as a
reward for exceptional work. They were going to a neighboring summer
resort—a miniature Coney Island. It had been arranged for them to
tent on the beach. Just like children, they made us listen to all
their enthusiastic plans and dreams of this outing. They went, but
came back dumb in the despair of outraged truth and justice. A runner
had preceded them, and the French restaurants and places of amusement
had been warned not to receive them, since they were but servants of
the white soldiers. Later the French knew better, but at that time it
required more time and spirit than this company had, to convince the
French people of the injustice of it all.
Always there was the knowledge that for them, loyalty, devotion, and
energy, led to no higher rank, no possibility of promotion. True,
orders were often issued that for the moment, seemed to include the
colored soldier in their opportunity for advancement, but just as soon
as he attempted to make himself a part of these orders, some subterfuge
would be used to deny him the privilege of the army of which he was a
part. Well for the colored soldier in France, well for all, that he
possessed the far-visioned faith and the endurance of his fathers!
Another misleading idea relative to the non-combatant organizations was
to the effect that they were totally illiterate. While the percentage
of illiteracy was high, on the other hand hundreds of men were of fair
intelligence, while other hundreds had been given fine educational
advantages. Not only could there be found large numbers of students and
graduates of our colored schools, but there were many from the largest
and best known universities and colleges of the United States. It was
not unusual to have a man in fatigue uniform, as his working clothes
were called, volunteer for some needed educational work, modestly
announcing himself a graduate of Dartmouth, Iowa, Yale, or some other
large university or college. Two of the best-trained physical directors
of our race were discovered over there doing their “bit”—one as a
stevedore on the dock, the other busily cutting wood with an isolated
labor battalion. For every variety of profession or trade there was a
representative. One had but to require the service of a stenographer,
dentist, doctor, lawyer, electrician, plumber, draughtsman, pianist,
illustrator, or what not, to find him at hand. Once in the palmy days
of Camp One, St. Nazaire, an educational exhibit was held in the Y
Hut and it was far more interesting, varied, and unique, than any one
school could have possibly produced.
Labor battalions were to be found not only at the ports of France,
but more than any other class of soldiers, they were spread over all
France. Whether near the Belgian or Swiss border, or in “No Man’s
Land,” one would be sure to find these indispensable troops. Oftener
than otherwise these battalions would be split, and a company or two
would be at Verdun or some other important center, while another
company would be found in some woods cutting trees. The 608th Labor
Battalion was the only organization regularly stationed at St. Nazaire,
that had its own colored Sergeant-Major. So clean cut, intelligent and
forceful was Sergeant Major Thomas, that he might have been a Major
quite as well. His men were much like their leader, and we found it not
only a pleasure but comfort to count them among “our boys.”
At Romagne we worked side by side with the 332nd and 349th Labor
Battalions. There with the Pioneer Infantries, they were grimly
fighting through to the end. To the Leave Area came these men of the
labor units in large numbers, and we have many pictures of them and
with them. We have, better still, recollections of their faces, earnest
and often sad—their eyes aglow as they related the story of their
adventure in France. Always they had suffered but always they knew
“That Freedom’s battle once begun
Bequeathed from bleeding sire to son
Though baffled oft—is ever won.”
Hundreds of men among these non-combatant troops were so thoroughly
fine that to mention a few of them in a special way seems hardly worth
while, except as they represent types. We think of Charles Wright
from Ann Arbor, Michigan, who not only performed his office work with
thoroughness, but who, through all the long months, first at St.
Nazaire, and later at Camp Montoir, gave himself with deep earnestness
as a volunteer teacher for his less fortunate mates. Many others gave
help in much the same manner for the educational, religious, and
athletic activities, or for library or canteen service. There were
Charles Wilkinson of the Medical Corps, Sergeants Farrell, Dunn, Jones,
Ward, Armstrong and Tapscott, Corporal Henry Smith, Electrician Powell,
all so faithful as to seem a part of the regular staff of Y workers.
There was one special group within this group for whom we had great
sympathy and deep respect. They were the regular army men, who had
seen real fighting, who were still in their prime, and longing for the
opportunity to go “over the top.” There were men who had seen service
in Russia, the Philippines, Hawaii, heroes of the Spanish American War;
men who had known the hideousness of Carrizal, all kept in the S. O.
S. But they were soldiers and they knew how to hold their peace and
obey. One had to but look at men like Sergeants Blue, Banks, Clark and
Dogan, to know that even without the bars on shoulders, they were finer
soldiers than many who wore them.
[Illustration: 1. “A Canteen Man.” 2. An Old Soldier—Sergeant Banks,
10th U. S. C. 3. Playing Ball at Camp No. 1, St. Nazaire. 4. Our
Military Policeman. 5. An Electrician.]
These non-combatant troops challenged the very best in those welfare
workers who could appreciate the tremendous undercurrent of their lives
and their rigid determination to be loyal to the country they served.
Always during our days and nights with them, the urge and desire to
serve was so keen as to make us forget the loss and strain of physical
strength. Our greatest effort was centered in keeping constantly before
them this truth so beautifully expressed by James Weldon Johnson:
That banner which is now the type
Of victory on field and flood,
Remember its first crimson stripe
Was dyed by Attuck’s willing blood.
And never yet has come the cry,—
When this fair flag had been assailed
For men to do, for men to die,
That we have faltered or have failed.
We’ve helped to bear it rent and torn,
Through many a hot-breathed battle breeze;
Held in our hands, it has been borne
And planted far across the seas.
Then should we speak but servile words,
Or shall we hang our heads in shame?
Stand back of new-come foreign hordes,
And fear our heritage to claim?
No! stand erect and without fear,
And for our foes let this suffice,
We’ve brought a rightful sonship here,
And we have more than paid the price.