CAMP MERRITT--LEVIATHAN--AT SEA
The gallant Seventh Division, destined to render a service well worthy of
Old Glory, was then commanded by Brigadier General Baarth with Col. W. W.
Taylor, Jr., Chief of Staff, and Col. John Alton Degan, Adjutant.
It comprised the 34th, 55th, 56th and 64th Regiments of Infantry; the
6th and 7th Regiments of Field Artillery; 19th, 20th and 21st Machine
Gun Battalions, 10th Field Signal Battalion and Divisional Sanitary and
Supply Trains, with a complete field equipment of 32,000 men.
The Chaplain's Corps of the Seventh comprised Rev. Fathers Martin and
Trainor, and Rev. Messrs. Cohee, Rixey, Hockman and Evans. Fathers Gwyer
and LeMay joined in France. All these Chaplains rendered a brave and
excellent service, meriting the respect and confidence of officers and
men alike.
Departure of that mighty fighting force from Camp Merritt was deeply
impressive. At the midnight hour of the First Friday in August, Mass was
said for the last time, and hundreds of the boys received Holy
Communion. Within an hour all were on the march, under full pack, along
the country road, leading to the Palisades of the Hudson.
The night was densely dark, and grimly each soldier trudged along,
guided only by the bobbing pack of the comrade in front of him. Chill
gray dawn saw the head of the column emerge from the hills at a secluded
point on the Jersey shore, where waiting ferry boats were boarded, which
conveyed us to the wharf of the Leviathan at Hoboken.
How thrilled we were to find this giant of all the seven assigned to
carry us "Over There!" Nine hundred feet long, one hundred feet wide,
thirty-six feet draft and nine stories deep! Like some fabled monster of
the sea, which well her weird camouflaged sides suggested, she opened
her cavernous jaws and received as but a morsel thirteen thousand men.
Here was our first contact with the gallant Navy--here did the mighty
tide of khaki gold merge with the deep sea blue of heroes.
"Columbia loves to name
Whose deeds shall live in story
And everlasting fame."
Leaning nonchalantly on the rail of their mighty ship, the Jackies, all
perfect specimens of young American manhood, quietly watched us march
aboard. We were as novel to them as they to us, yet what confidence they
inspired! Curiously yet kindly they looked us over, approvingly observed
the long orderly lines of our glittering rifles stretching away through
the dim sheds, and seemed to say, "You are worth while fellows!--we'll
take you over all right, all right, for our little old Uncle Sam!"
To quarter, feed, and sleep 32,000 men; to carry them across 3,000 miles
of angry pathless sea, where lurked the deadly mine, and prowled, as
panthers of the deep, the submarines--this was the task assigned to the
Leviathan and our convoy ships, the Northern Pacific and the Northland.
How well our superb Navy "carried on" not only for us but for seventy
times our number, let the most brilliant pages of seafaring annals
tell!
With perfect co-ordination between our Army and the ship authorities,
all troops, equipment, and provisions were aboard within ten hours; and
promptly at three o'clock the following afternoon the Leviathan swung
out from her pier on the North River and headed seaward.
In serried ranks, silent and still as at attention, the troops lined
both sides of the upper and lower decks. As at the funeral of Sir John
Moore "not a drum was heard," for who can cheer at the thought of dear
ones left behind, with the kiss of fond farewell still lingering in
loving memory on the lip, with the soldier's requiem echoing through
lonely hearts:
"Farewell, mother, you may never
Press me to your heart again;
When upon the field of battle
I'll be numbered with the slain."
As we passed down the city front, every building, on both the New York
and Jersey sides, burst into color; handkerchiefs signaled a last
farewell; and out of the mists of our tears seemed to rise a mighty
rainbow, spanning ship and receding shores, and spelling in letters of
heavenly hue, "God be with you till we meet again."
With destroyers ahead, astern, and on the beam, two hydroplanes circling
and paralleling above, and a solitary observing balloon hovering over
the Long Island shore, our ship and convoys stood boldly out to sea.
We were now in the war zone, easily within range of hidden mines and
torpedoes, and, like the charger who scents the battle from afar, we
thrilled and were glad with the thought of daring deeds before us.
The ship Chaplain was good Father McDonald, Captain United States Navy,
one of the most beloved and notable figures of the war. Every evening at
the sunset hour he would go to the bridge. The Commander of the
Leviathan, Captain Bryan, together with his staff, would be there
assembled; and, as the last rays of the sun sank beneath the waves,
every soldier and sailor on board would stand rigidly at attention and
offer prayer as Father McDonald would raise his hand in absolution and
benediction.
How near God seemed in that vast, horizon-wide cathedral of the sea! Its
vaulting dome more radiant than St. Peter's sculptured prayer; its
altar, clothed with the lace of ocean foam; its pavement strewn with
silvery sheen; its sanctuary light the candelabra of the stars. "I will
lead thee into solitude and there I will speak to thy soul." God,
Eternity, and Things Divine were here made real; and to each lonely boy
wrapped in blanket on the dark cold deck, there came the message that:
"Far on the deep there are billows
That never shall break on the beach;
And I have had thoughts in the silence
That never shall float into speech."
A town of 13,000 population, ashore, is one thing--at sea, it is
something else! First of all the question of clothing, most young men
back home are fastidious--here all must wear the life preserver style
trimmed a la canteen, which means our canteen, filled with water ration,
must be our inseparable companion--very much attached to us, as it were.
On shore, juvenile America spends his evenings downtown; here, he must
remain at home--indoors, if you please, not even deck promenades being
permitted. Again, to the average young man, the disposition of cigarette
butts is of little concern--m'lady's best parlor centerpiece, polished
floor or cherished urn usually preferred; woe betide the luckless Buddie
who denies his poor dead fag decent burial in the ubiquitous spit kit!
To throw butts, gum wrappers, matches or anything but glances overboard,
clew to the vulture eye of the lurking submarine, was a positive court
martial offense. It was beginning to be evident that Sherman was right!
Yet all went well; and that indomitable humor which ever characterized
our boys, which rose superior to all hardship and danger, and smiled in
the very face of Death, made tolerable, if not happy, those seven
thrilling days at sea. "Some swell place" would be Buddie's comment on
the tossing waves of mid-Atlantic; and usually having been well, and not
used to see sickness, he was easily prone to seasickness!
[Illustration: IN RUE DE BELGRADE--LULL BEFORE BATTLE.]
One day private Barry, 64th Infantry, came to me. "Chaplain, I am in
great trouble! Before leaving Camp Merritt my best girl and her
mother called to see me off, came from away back home to say good-bye.
Now I am not satisfied with the details of that parting; I am just crazy
about the girl, and what worries me is the thought that, in the
excitement of leaving, I may not have made it perfectly clear to her how
much I really love her. Now, Chaplain, I want you to write her a letter,
make it good and strong, and tell her how much I love her. Will you do
that?"
What else was I to do? I was his Chaplain, his big brother, friend and
pal. His comrade in arms, climbing with him even then the road to
Calvary's hill! "Sure thing--leave it to me, old man--but say, tell me,
just how did you act and what did you say to her in parting?"
He told me. "Well, that looks pretty convincing; I think she saw you
loved her all right--however, I will write the letter provided you help
me."
We sat down on a coil of rope and together wrote the letter,
collaborating in the most unique, most compelling, missive ever written
on board the Leviathan!
How he treasured that letter! How carefully he guarded it, how
prayerfully, in due time he followed its journey from Ponteneuson
Barracks, Brest, back to Chicago. Was it successful? Here's to you,
Barry, old top, now happily married, in your snug little home in old
Chi--and my best regards to Mrs. Barry.
One day in mid-ocean, with a fresh gale blowing abeam, and the three
troopships rolling and throwing spray high in the air from a heavy
white-capped sea, the cry rang out "man overboard from the Northern
Pacific!" A soldier had slipped on the watery deck; and, before his
mates could reach him, was overboard.
Alarm was at once sounded, lifebuoys thrown toward him, the vessels came
about and circled diligently around, but no sign was seen of him. His
untimely and tragic death deeply affected us all; and though the ocean
was his grave and the spume of the sea his shroud, his memory abides
with us in the sanctuary of our prayers.
On the morning of the sixth day, a flotilla of destroyers bore down on
us. So apparently from nowhere did they come, we were tempted to believe
they rose from the depths of the sea. How thrilled we were to see those
six greyhound terrors of the submarine take position around us--one
ahead, one astern, and two on each beam.
It was now full speed ahead on a zigzag course. We were in the most
deadly submarine infested zone of the ocean. Only yesterday the
Susquehanna had been torpedoed in these very waters, and, no doubt, the
same evil periscopes were watching us now from beyond yonder kopje of a
wave! Our temples throbbed poundingly; our throats grew dry, our eyes
stared straight ahead--the same psychic phenomena we were to note in
ourselves, even more accentuated, later in the trenches. What a prize we
would be--to sink the largest ship afloat, with the greatest human
cargo, 13,000 souls, that ever put to sea!
It was, as it were, an old-time, nerve-racking ninth inning at the White
Sox grounds! A clean single will tie, a double will beat us. Uncle Sam's
Navy is in the box; Von Tirpitz's best sticker is at the bat. Two
strikes have been called. What will the next be?
A sudden hush grips the watching thousands. Here it comes--the batter
swings with terrific force--"Strike three, you're out!" and proudly our
gallant Armada sweeps into the welcoming and sheltering harbor of
Brest!