AFTER THE BATTLE
FORET DE FERE
_August, 1918_
This is a dirty, dank, unwholesome spot and the daily rains make it
daily more intolerable. But they are keeping us here in reserve till
some division—they say our old townies of the 77th—has time to come
up. The forest has been occupied by the Germans and its sanitary
conditions are no credit to their boasted efficiency. Sixty per cent
of our men are sick with diarrhœa and everybody is crawling with
cooties. The men are sleeping in shelter tents or in holes in the
ground in the woods and they are a sorry looking lot.
A number of them have been busy with me in the heart-breaking task
of burying the dead, which is hard for everybody, but particularly I
think, for myself, because I knew these men so well and loved them as
if they were my younger brothers. It has been the saddest day in my
life. Well, it is the last act of love I can do for them and for the
folks at home. God comfort them in their sorrow. I must not think of
the tragedy of it too much; the main thing is to keep up the spirits
of the living, for battles must still be fought and the awful price
paid if the war is to be won. Many of us who have come through this
will be dead after the next battle; and if the war lasts another year
or so there will be few, very few left of the infantry in our First
Hundred Thousand. It is a soldier’s fate and we must be ready for it.
In this one battle nearly half our strength is gone. We have lost
fifty-nine officers and thirteen hundred men and of these thirteen
officers and about two hundred men have been killed outright. Many
of our wounded have been badly hurt and we shall have other details
to grieve over.[5] But in spite of losses and sorrow and sickness I
find the men surprisingly cheerful and willing to carry on. They have
what soldiers most wish for, Victory. And they know now that the men
who opposed their path and had to give way to their persistence were
the famous Prussian Guards, of the very flower of the German Military
Machine. The old 69th had again lived up to its reputation of the
past; there were no German troops, no troops in the world that could
withstand its stubborn bravery.
I went amongst the survivors to gather items for my chronicle of the
war. I may say here as I rewrite these chapters that I have had to
obtain many of the incidents months afterwards from men that have
been wounded, for many of those who could best tell the story were
then lying suffering from agonizing wounds on hospital cots, and
still burning with the courage and devotion of their race for the day
when they could once more return to the post of danger with their
beloved regiment. These are the real heroes of the war. It is easy
under the stress of emotional enthusiasm to volunteer for service,
but the true test of a man comes when, after he has faced the danger
of sudden death and has passed through days of racking pain, he
once more insists, in spite of offers of easier service from kindly
officers, on taking his place again in the battle line with his old
comrades. And now that the war is over, there is nothing that stirs
my blood like the petty arrogance of some officials in hospitals and
casual camps who rebuke the requests of men (many of whom have been
wounded and gone back into line and got wounded again) to rejoin
their former outfits. My malison on their tribe.
I shall present first the lists of names mentioned for good work (a
soldier’s meed) and afterwards incidents of more general interest.
Company A gives credit to three snipers for working out to the
front ahead of them and making the Fritzies keep their heads down
during the attack on July 29th: Corporal Charles Hallberg, Edwin
Stubbs, and John McDonald. They also spoke highly of their Sergeants
or Acting Sergeants on whom leadership devolved during the fight:
Joseph Higginson, Joseph Pettit, John R. Scully, Hugh McFadden,
Harry Blaustein, Will Mehl, Don Matthews, Michael Walsh, Frederick
Garretson, Sidney Clark, and John Dennelly. With Dennelly in the
occupation of Meurcy Farm were John Sheehy, Maurice Cotter, Pilger,
Newton, Thorn, Iverson and Frechales. Besides Henderson, those who
distinguished themselves by liaison work were Corporal Lester Hanley,
Joseph M. McKinney, Michael Polychrom, Louis Tiffany, John Gannon and
Edwin Dean. Litter Bearers: Matt Kane, Howard Hamm and in a volunteer
capacity Cook Edward Mooney, Albert Cooper, August Trussi. Others
mentioned with high praise are Patrick Thynne, Patrick J. Doolin,
Fred Stenson, John J. Morrissey, James Partridge, Paul Smith, John
Barrett, Richard Campion, Louis Cornibert, Brady and Buckley.
If Company B ever loses its big Captain they have already a
candidate of their own to succeed him in his senior lieutenant,
John J. Clifford, a cool and capable officer, as all his men say.
The greatest loss the Company has suffered is from the death of
the First Sergeant, John O’Neill, a remarkable old soldier with
regular army experience, who was frightfully wounded by shell fire
while getting up supplies, and died in hospital. Al Dunn, a game
youth, was hit by the same shell, but refused to allow anybody to
touch him until O’Neill was looked after. Among other good men who
received wounds were John Mooney, William Judge, Al Whalen, Harry
Guenther, Dan Finnegan, Thomas Fitzpatrick, Vincent Farrell, Francis
X. Goodwin, and William O’Sullivan. The platoon under Lieutenant
Wheatley that joined the attack with Company A, had for its non-coms
Edward Kelly, Langan, Cullinan, Travis, Patrick Kelly, Foster,
Tinker, McClymont and Mearns. Lieutenant Clifford had high praise
for Sergeant Thomas, who had gone out on the night of July 28th
to repulse a counter-attack of the Germans and, of those in the
detachment, Connie Reuss, Corporal Michael Tierney, a Clare man, who
was killed; and also amongst the killed Charles Chambers, a patriotic
volunteer who leaves a wife to mourn him in the city of Dublin. James
Dwyer, Joseph McCarthy, Joseph Maher and John A. Lane were also badly
wounded. As John A. Lane was lying out in a very exposed position
his namesake, John B. Lane, a lad of eighteen, and the pride of the
Company as a clever little boxer, declared that he was going out to
carry the other in. He did so without scath, but was killed three
days later in front of Meurcy Farm. Private Frank McGovern received
praise for a similar action on the 29th; also Harold Kyte, Thomas
Walsh, John O’Connor, James Lannon, James Austin and John Matthews,
litter bearers. John Mahoney especially distinguished himself in
this line, carrying the wounded to the rear and then lugging up food
for the surviving fighters. Good liaison work was done by Charles
Weick, James Murray, James Brennan, Ed. Powers, Jim Brundage, Arthur
LaSalle, and John Kane, a youngster of seventeen. Thomas Herlihy and
Charles Kavanagh were also commended.
Inquiry at Company C gave me the name of John Teevan, who on the
31st left cover to save a wounded comrade and was himself wounded
while doing it; Sergeant Herman Hillig, always a good man, who led
the advance patrol on the 29th; Corporal Frank Drivdahl, who took
charge of a half platoon when his seniors were wounded and led it
into handgrips with the enemy. All of the non-coms distinguished
themselves. First Sergeant Gene Halpin, always a steady leader;
Tom O’Hagan, the _beau ideal_ of an Irish soldier; Sergeants Joe
Hennessey, John Knight, John McAuliffe, Peter Keller, Frank Colyer,
Corporals Frank Duffy, James Barry, Charles Quinn, Edward Gordon,
Edward Brown, and amongst those wounded Arthur Totten, Arthur
Slicklen, Peter Gammel, the Peisel brothers, and Denis Cahill,
sturdiest of old-timers. This Company claims that it has the most
heroic and devoted lot of litter bearers that ever deliberately took
their lives in their hands. By the stories I hear it is hard to
choose between them. They are Thomas P. McPherson, Edmond McCarthy,
James and Joseph Burns (twins in birth and twins in courage) and
Edward F. Brown. They were always at the front, day and night, and
they should all have the Distinguished Service Cross. Liaison men
mentioned are Clarence Smith and Vivian Commons. Others that received
praise were Frederick Craven, Corporal Childress, who came over on
the torpedoed _Tuscania_ and joined us at Baccarat; Corporal Pat
Moran, Thomas Leddy, James Heaney; and Mess Sergeant Grace with cooks
Duffy and Wilson, who won the eternal gratitude of the Company by
carrying food to them in line.
William Hisle was one of the first names I got from Company D, a
man who did extraordinarily fine work as a litter bearer. John J.
Kolodgy also, and Edward Coxe (wounded at the same task and sticking
on the job until killed) are in the same class. Liaison men: Louis
Murphy, William P. White, John Conway, John Dale, Frank DeMuth; while
others mentioned are Mess Sergeant Edward McIntee, Pat Crowley, “the
wild Irishman,” Pat Grogan (wounded again), John L. Burke, Peter
Carberry, Charles Edgerton, Richard Dwyer (who said “Tend to me last”
when wounded), Thomas Keyes, Sergeant Denis Murphy, badly wounded;
Denis O’Connor, Charles Lynch, Everett Smith, John Cahill, Andrew
O’Rourke, Peter O’Sullivan, Martin Hurst, Arthur Comer, John L.
Thompson, John Cox, Joseph P. Tracy and Patrick Finn (both ’98 men)
and Fred Urban, a new man and a great shot with the rifle, with Chief
Powless and Tony Zaliski.
Company E told me of Michael Breen, who received his death wound,
covering the advance of his Company by the use of smoke grenades;
William Foley and James Fitzpatrick, going out under fire to rescue
two companions; George M. Failing, who did noble work as a litter
bearer; John Costello, Thomas Cullen (both killed), with Bechtold and
William Goldenburg, four privates who saved their Company by putting
a machine gun out of action. Sergeant Augustus T. Morgan, also
Sergeant Frank Johnston and Corporal John Cronin did heroic work.
Company F, Bernard Corcoran got a bullet across both his eyeballs
which will render him blind for life. John Fitzgibbon, Michael
Douglas, Frank Dunn, Charles Dougherty, William Garry, Leo Hanifin,
Owen Carney, George D. Lannon, Frank Kelly, Gottfried Kern, Edward
Chabot, James McCormack, John McAuliffe, Daniel McGrath, Peter
McGuiness, William McQuade, John P. Mahon, Herbert Doyle, Peter
Malloy, shot through the lung, William Mulligan, Charles O’Leary and
William Moran, Sergeant Pat Wynne, John Smith, Peter Rogers, Frank
Sweeney and William Walsh are on the honor roll.
Company G had the greatest praise for Edmund Reardon and Charles
McGeary, who did remarkable work saving others until finally death
came to themselves. Others mentioned with praise are Corporal Edward
Fitzgerald and Sergeant Edward McNamara, who had to be ordered out
of the line when wounded. Also Corporal David Fitzgibbons, Thomas
Meade, Michael Shea, Michael O’Brien, Patrick Donohue, Frank Cahill,
Thomas Bohan, First Sergeant John Meaney, Corporal Frank Garland,
Thomas McGowan, James Brennan, Sergeant James Coffey; Robert Monohan
and Patrick McNamara, liaison men; and Maurice Dwyer, mechanic, who
always dropped his tools and picked up a rifle when a battle was on.
Company H thinks that it is about time that Sergeant Dudley Winthrop
got a citation. His latest feat was to go wandering out in the open
where everybody that went had been hit, searching out his wounded
comrades. Martin Higgins has also been recommended for citation for
the same kind of heroic activity. Patrick Reynolds went out alone
and, by expert sniping at close range, put out of action a machine
gun that was holding up the advance. Later on, he was killed.
Sergeant John J. Walker kept his platoon going when his seniors
were wounded. Callahan, Dunseith, Ernst, Conway, Bealin, McDonald,
O’Brien, McKenna, Sweeney, White, Frieburger, Crose and Bushey are
also recommended for excellent work.
I have already gone through the list of Company I, so I shall just
add an additional list of non-coms who were wounded: Sergeants
Harold J. Murphy and William Lyle, Corporals Wilton Wharton, Charles
Beckwith, L. Vessell, James Brady, William Burke, William Crossin,
Patrick Farrell, Alfred Georgi, Hugh Kelly, Michael Learnahan, John
Maddock, H. R. Morton, Patrick O’Brien, Francis O’Neill, Edward
Powers, William Reutlinger, and James Sullivan.
The men from Company I whose names were selected at the time for a
Regimental Citation were First Sergeant Patrick McMeniman, who was
really in command of the Company during most of the trying time on
the hill; Dexter, Dynan, Howard, Coen, Farley, Coppinger, Battersby,
and Lesser as stretcher bearers; Cook Michael J. O’Brien, who carried
food to the front line no matter how dangerous it was, and carried
wounded on the return trip; and Thomas A. Boyle, who seeing an
abandoned automatic rifle ran forward under vicious fire, loaded it
and started it working against the enemy; and finally, William B.
Lyons, prominent as liaison man and stretcher bearer.
Company K recommends Nicholas E. Grant, a liaison man, along with its
heroic Captain, Sergeant Joe Farrell, Victor Van Yorx, John Doyle,
stretcher bearer, and the self-sacrificing William Bergen, Francis
I. Kelly, also a martyr to loyalty, as he was killed while rendering
first aid to Lieutenant Stott. Burr Finkle and John J. McLaughlin are
recommended for a display of extraordinary heroism.
In Company L the valiant Captain and Lieutenant Spencer have been
recommended for the D. S. C. For rescue work, Thomas Deignan, Joseph
Coogan, John Ahern, Joseph Grace, Charles Oakes, William Hughes,
Michael Fallon (twice wounded) and James Santori, the latter being
killed while placing a wounded man on a stretcher. Lieutenant
Wellbourne, with the Sergeants already mentioned, and also Corporals
Edward McDonough, Harry McDermott, Eugene McCue, and Wild Bill Ryan
distinguished themselves by their work in the line. So, too, did
James Judge, Thomas Boyle, Eddie Bloom, Arthur Campbell, John Burke,
Will Coleman, John Murphy, Matt Devlin, Hugh Fagan, Fred Meyers,
Leslie Quackenbush, John Mulvey, Peter O’Connor, Maurice Powers, Val
Roesel, John B. McHugh, Sam Ross, Peter Deary, James Streffler, Harry
Baldwin, expert sniper, and Eddie Morrissey, liaison man.
Captain Meaney of Company M gave the highest recommendation to
Lieutenant Collier and also to Corporals Thomas J. Courtney and
Patrick Ames, both of them soldiers of remarkable coolness and
resolution. The men of this Company were kept busy throughout the
week as food and ammunition carriers and stretcher bearers. Amongst
those who distinguished themselves in these tasks were Corporals
James Duffy and Jack Manson, with Edward Mendes, Daniel Leahy,
William Lynch, John Feeley, Thomas Ferrier, William O’Neill, Frank
Sisco, James Shanahan, Edward Flanagan, Patrick Bryne, Frank Cullum,
James Igo, James A. Watts, the Rodriguez brothers and Herbert Dunlay.
Captain Walsh of Headquarters Company recommended Sergeant Arthur
Jaeger, Sergeant John J. Ryan, Corporal Charles Leister of the
one-pounders, with Corporal Leslie Reynolds and Privates Robert
Callaghan, Clarence Cumpston, Maurice Small, Charles Goecking,
Spencer Sully, John C. McLaughlin and William Hearn (who also did
heroic work rescuing the wounded), Corporal A. A. Brochon and
Privates James P. McCabe and Arthur Olsen and Kirwin of the Signal
Platoon. In the Stokes Mortars Sergeant Thomas Fitzsimmons, Jeremiah
J. Casey, Thomas J. Kelly and Malcolm Robertson, Thomas J. Taylor,
Herbert Clarke with Moore, Wisner, Hayes, Nugent, Robb, Levins, Orr,
Shannon, Dugdale, and my old friend, John Mahon, who always has
some special reason why he should be selected as a member of every
gun crew sent to the front line; George Utermehle, Stable Sergeant;
Jerome Goldstein, Mess Sergeant; with Cooks John A. Wilker, Maher
McAvoy and Wagoner James Collintine; and Jim Turner, wounded while
doing courageous work as a liaison man.
The Machine Gun Company cites their runners, John L. B. Sullivan,
William Murphy, Hantschke, Charles Smith, and James Ledwith. Also
Lieutenant Billings, who had the dangerous task of keeping up the
supply of ammunition, which he accomplished with the aid of two
excellent non-coms, Sid Ryan and Joe McCourt (one of the most
efficient men in the whole regiment). Every man in the company sang
the praises of Bill Sheppard, Paul Fay and Pete Gillespie; also
of Leon Baily and Frank Gardella, who spent their leisure moments
carrying in Company C’s wounded.
The Supply Company wagoners Peter J. Seagriff, Albert Richford, A.
Brown, Philip Smith and Thomas J. Ferris, won praise for difficult
and dangerous tasks courageously performed by night and day.
The Sanitary Detachment, in addition to those mentioned, gave me
Milledge Whitlock, Louis Bidwell, John McKeough, John P. Murphy,
Patrick Fawcett, Thomas V. Boland, Walter Clark and Sergeant Arthur
Firman. Whitlock, Wright and Walker were at an advance aid-post under
the river bank all week long.
The most striking incident I heard described took place in Company D
as they were waiting in the street of Villers sur Fere about three
o’clock in the morning of the 28th. The Germans were raking the
streets with high explosives and shrapnel, and men were falling,
hit by the flying pieces. The most trying moment in battle is going
into action under shell fire, especially at night. The shells come
wh-e-e-e-zing over. One goes Whannng! up the road—another in a field
to the right! Then one falls on a house and the tiles, plaster,
fragments of stone are scattered over the men who are lying in the
lee of it. Then another comes, more menacing in its approaching
whistle. Men run, drop on the ground, stand petrified. And it lands
in the midst of them. There are cries, ceasing suddenly as if cut off
with a knife, curses, sobs of “Oh, God!” “They got me!” “For God’s
sake, pick me up, Jim.” The survivors rush back, ripping open their
First Aid packages, the non-coms bawling orders, everybody working in
a frenzy to save the wounded. And then perhaps another shell landing
in the same place will send them all away from the troubles of this
awful world.
Company D was going through all this, and for the time being, without
officers. Buck was gassed the day before; Connelly and Daly had gone
off to execute their difficult operation to the right, First Sergeant
Geaney being with them; Burke was away on his mission of danger and
glory. The remaining Lieutenant had been called to receive orders.
Two corporals, Patrick McDonough and John Gribbon, had been working
hard, giving first aid to the wounded, and they began to worry about
the possible effect of the shelling on the men. So they went up the
line to look for some person in higher authority.
They found no officer but they did find Sergeant Tom O’Malley
sitting against a stone wall, sucking philosophically at his pipe, as
if the wall were the side of a stone fence in his native Connemara.
Now the sight of Tom O’Malley breeds confidence in the heart of every
soldier in Company D.
“Where’s the officers, Tom?”
“Oi don’t know where th’ hell they are,” says Tom, between puffs of
his pipe, and in the slow, soft speech of the West Coast Irish, “If
ye were in camp and ye didn’t want to see thim, ye’d be thrippin’
over thim. But now whin ye want t’ know what ye got to do in a foight
ye can’t find wan of thim.”
“Well, Tom, we’ll elect you Captain and you take charge of the men
until some of the officers get back, or they may be getting out of
hand.”
“No, lads, Oi don’t fancy meself in a Sam Brown belt. Dick O’Neill
here is a noice young fellah, so we’ll elect Dick Captain, and O’ll
make ye fellahs do what he tells ye.” So Sergeant O’Neill, a youth
of twenty-one, took charge of the situation, got the men together
in small groups under their non-coms, and in places of comparative
safety, and had them all ready when Lieutenant Cook came back from
the conference to issue their orders to cross the Ourcq.
It is something that we call typically American that a number of men
under a stress and in an emergency like this, should get together,
choose their own leaders and obey them implicitly for the common
good. These four men are Americans of the type we are proudest
of. Yet it is worth noting that three out of the four were born
in an island whose inhabitants, we are often told, are unfit for
self-government. As for Dick O’Neill, he is one hundred per cent
American, but it would take a braver man than I can claim to be to
tell Dick O’Neill that he is not Irish, too.
One of the members of D Company who was wounded in this spot was Matt
Sullivan, an old-timer, and a kindly pleasant man who always took
an interest in the younger lads, so that he was known as “Pop.” His
two special protégés were Barney Friedman and George Johnson. When
he was hit he was ordered to the rear, but he said, “I’ll not stir
out o’ this till I see if the children are safe, God bless them.”
He hobbled around in the gray dawn until he found the boys and then
started for the rear.
Company I had a number of little battle pictures to give me besides
those I have already written. One was of Barney Farley, who was busy
all morning dressing wounds, and after he had stopped the flow of
blood, before picking up his man, he would roll a cigarette, stick it
in the wounded man’s mouth with a cheery “Here, take a pull out of
this, avic. It’ll do ye good.”
Mike Lenihan, wounded while on the hill and told to go back, said,
“No, I’ve waited so long to get at them I won’t lave this hill.”
Another shot got him, and he was carried off.
Tom Shannon, being carried in, got off his stretcher and wanted to
give his place to another man who, he said, was worse wounded than
himself. An officer ordered him back on the stretcher and he was
carried in, and since then I have heard he has died of his wounds.
William Cleary, wounded in the shoulder, refused to leave without
orders, so they led him to where Captain Ryan was lying in a shell
hole, himself wounded. The Captain looked up at him. “You’ve got a
bad wound. No use around here. You’re young—got good color in your
face—live long. Got good legs yet—run like hell.”
The Captain saw a German near the top of the hill who was using an
automatic, and he wanted to try a shot at him, so he borrowed Pat
Flynn’s rifle, fired and missed, the pain of the recoil disconcerting
his aim. He tried again; then he said: “I’m going to pull the last
bit of Irish in me together and get that fellow.” With the last shot
in the clip he got him.
Two men from Company L had a laugh about Fortgang, who, one of them
said, is the champion moocher of the Company, and can always get
something to eat no matter how short the rations are. They were
lying out on that shot-swept hill on the morning of the 28th when
Fortgang produced from somewhere a can of solidified alcohol and
three strips of bacon. He calmly proceeded to start his little fire,
and fried his bacon, which he shared with the men on each side of
him; and thus fortified, picked up his rifle once more and began to
blaze away at the Germans.
While the topic is food I may add that the whole company is devoted
to Mess Sergeant McDonald and Cook Connelly, whose kitchen was hit
but who swore they would “stick to it while there’s a spoke left in
it.” Hugh Fagan was one of the men who had to be driven off the hill
after being badly wounded.
I saw several men who were hit through the helmet, the bullet
entering in front and going out at the back without inflicting a
wound. One of them was Edward McDonough, who seemed to consider it a
great joke, though another man who had the same thing happen to him,
a man whom I did not know, was walking in wide circles, unable to
pursue a steady course unless he had a wall or a fence to guide on.
Captain Hurley of Company K got four or five wounds at once in leg,
arm and back, but refused to allow himself to be carried, saying
impatiently, “Now, don’t be bothering with me. I’d like to see myself
on a litter while there’s men much worse off than myself still lying
on the ground.”
I was in the dressing station one evening when a sturdy young
lieutenant walked in with one hand almost blown away. He announced
himself to be Lieutenant Wolf of the 150th Machine Gun Battalion,
and settled down on the table for his operation with more coolness
than most people display when getting their photograph taken. He had
just one thing on his mind, and that did not concern himself. He had
come in with an ammunition detail, which was ready to start back when
a shell got him just outside the hospital door. That detail had to
go back. He was much relieved, one would say perfectly contented,
when I assured him that I would convey his orders to the sergeant in
charge. Through such men battles are won, and nations made famous
for bravery.
On one of the days of the battle I was coming up the street of
Villers sur Fere with Jack Percy when an enemy gun began to land
shells just across the narrow street from us. We dropped alongside a
wall when the shriek of the first one told us it was coming across
the home plate, and as we lay there I saw a ration wagon coming down
the road with George Utermehle, Sergeant of mounted section, H. Q.
Company, on the box. George had no whip and was urging his team by
throwing cherries at their heads. I shouted at him, “This is a bad
corner just now, they’re shelling it.” “Oh, this old team of mine can
beat out any shell,” said George, as he hit the ear of his off animal
with a cherry; and he went tearing by in time to miss the next, and,
I was happy to find out, the last one that came over.
I overheard a conversation in the woods which gave me a good story
on Major Donovan. The majority of his battalion have always looked
on him as the greatest man in the world. But a certain number were
resentful and complaining on account of the hard physical drilling
he has continually given them to keep them in condition for just
the sort of thing they had to go through last week. As a result of
watching him through six days of battle—his coolness, cheerfulness,
resourcefulness—there is now no limit to their admiration for him.
What I overheard was the partial conversion of the last dissenter.
He still had a grouch about what he had been put through during the
past year, and three other fellows were pounding him with arguments
to prove Donovan’s greatness. Finally he said grudgingly, “Well, I’ll
say this: Wild Bill is a son of a ——, but he’s a game one.” When I
told it to Donovan, he laughed and said, “Well, Father, when I’m gone
write that as my epitaph.”
I shall always think that the finest compliment paid to Major
Donovan was the devotion of John Patrick Kayes, an Irishman, very
tall, very thin, somewhat stoop-shouldered, not at all young, and
a servant of the rich in civil life. The Irish in him had made him
a volunteer. He was put in charge of the Battalion H. Q. mess, and
I used to tell Donovan that I came to visit him, not on account of
his own attractions, but because of what John Kayes had to offer me.
He refused to remain behind in action. He wanted to be where the
Major was, though he knew that anybody who kept near Donovan stood
an excellent chance of being killed. On July 31st he went forward
with him on his restless rounds, which led them out of the shelter of
Bois Colas into the open country. A German machine gun began firing
at them and Kayes was struck in the ankle. He fell forward into the
path of the bullets and as different portions of his long body neared
the ground he was hit successively in the thigh, arm and face. He
still had strength enough to protest that the Major should not risk
himself by carrying him in. He died in hospital weeks later, his
last thoughts being that Major Donovan would be neglected with him
gone. The terms “hero” and “butler” are not generally associated in
fiction, but they met in the person of John Patrick Kayes.
Major Lawrence tells me that he met Captain P. P. Rafferty, a doctor
in our Divisional Sanitary Train, who told him,
“We had an original character from your outfit through here last
week—a Lieutenant Connelly. He was lying on a cot and in a good deal
of pain, I knew, when I was surprised to hear him laugh a hearty
laugh. I thought he was going out of his head and I went over to him
and said, ‘What’s happened to you that’s funny, Lieutenant?’”
“‘Oh,’ he said, ‘I was just thinking about something.’
“‘Let me in on it,’ I said. ‘There is not much to amuse a man
happening around here.’
“‘Well,’ said he, ‘it’s just an incident of battle. I was in command
of a Company that had just about forty men left, and Major Donovan
gave me orders to send some of them one way and some another and take
the rest and capture a woods and Meurcy Farm. Just after I started I
got into a mix-up and was put out of action and my first thought was
‘Thank God! Now I don’t have to take that damn farm.’”
One of my own prayers of Thanksgiving is “Praise be! Major Lawrence
is back.” When I told him so he thanked me for the compliment, but
I said, “George, don’t take it as coming from me. It is only for my
own peace of mind. Since the day you left I have been pestered by
everybody, officers and men, who have the right to wear your red
cross armlet, with the plaintive petition, ‘Father Duffy, can’t you
do something to get our Major back?’”
We joke Rerat about the size of the French rivers. I told him that
one of our soldiers lay badly wounded near the river, and I offered
him a pull at my canteen. Raising himself on one elbow and throwing
out his arm in a Sir Philip Sydney fashion, he exclaimed, “Give it to
the Ourcq, it needs it more than I do.”
The Germans nearly had a grim joke on me during the action. We picked
up our dead in the town, and I had the Pioneers dig me a long trench
on the south side of the cemetery wall, which screened them from
observation while their own trench would give protection. I said
“This spot is the safest place in France.” We finished our sad task
and went away. A few hours later I passed that way again and found
that the wall against which I was sitting was smashed to the ground;
a tree eight inches in diameter which had shaded me was blown in
two, and two other missiles had exploded five feet from the line of
graves. Evidently a German aviator, seeing the freshly turned earth,
thought that it was a gun emplacement and dropped three of his nasty
eggs. I smiled grimly as my words came back, “The safest place in
France.”
Going through the woods I heard John McMorrow discussing a date with
Monzert of Headquarters Company, and he was saying, “It happened the
first day we went over. I tell you it was. It was on the mornin’
that we crossed the O’Rourke River and captured Murphy’s Farm.”
Colonel McCoy felt deeply grieved at the news of Quentin Roosevelt’s
heroic death in an air battle some time before, as he knew him from
boyhood, having been military aide at the White House during part
of President Roosevelt’s term of office. We knew that Lieutenant
Roosevelt had met his death in this sector, and our Colonel had
instituted inquiries to find if any person had discovered his grave.
Word was brought to him that the grave had been found in the sector
to our right, which was occupied by the 32nd Division, and Colonel
McCoy determined to have it suitably marked. I had a cross made
and inscribed by Julius Horvath, and the Colonel with Lieutenant
Preston and myself went by automobile to the place to erect it over
the grave. We found the roughly made cross formed from pieces of
his broken plane that the Germans had set to mark the place where
they buried him. The plot had already been ornamented with a rustic
fence by the soldiers of the 32nd Division. We erected our own little
monument without molesting the one that had been left by the Germans.
It is fitting that enemy and friend alike should pay tribute to
heroism.
The Germans had not retreated ten miles before the advance guard of
the French civilian population began coming in to take possession of
their shattered homes. I was coming down today from the battlefield
whither I had gone with Emmet Watson and Bill Fernie to make a map
of the graves when I met the incoming civilians in Villers sur Fere.
Most of them were men who had been sent ahead by the family to see
what was left. But occasionally we met a stout old peasant woman
pulling a small cart behind her on which rested all her earthly
substance, or a hay-cart drawn by oxen with the family possessions
in it and two or three chubby youngsters with their mother perched
on top. I followed a middle aged farmer and his son into one of
the houses near the church and we made our inspection together.
All the plaster had been knocked off the walls and the glass from
the windows, and there was a big hole in the roof, and altogether
it looked anything but a home, but after looking it all over the
young man said to his father, with a satisfied grunt, “Pas trop
demoli” (not too badly banged up). I certainly admired the optimism
and courage of people who could take up their lives once more with
cheerfulness under such desperate conditions.
The Germans had made their most of the time in which they had
possession of this salient. They had harvested a great deal of the
grain and anything else that was already ripe and in some places they
had ransacked the houses of any goods that were worth while. There
were many evidences, though, that they had no idea that they were
so soon to be dislodged. At Seringes they had installed an electric
light plant, and the French road signs had been supplemented with the
large legible German signs. Their sense of security was the cause of
their largest losses in material, as they had made of the Forest of
Fere a great ammunition dump, and the large shells, gas, shrapnel,
high explosives, were left behind by thousands.
I got back to Château Thierry looking for hospitals which might
contain our wounded but found none of them, as they had all been
transferred to other places, no one knew exactly where. In the
burying ground I hit upon the graves of Sergeant John O’Neill of
B and Sergeants Peter Crotty and Bernard McElroy of K and Walter
Wandless of H. The city already presented a lively appearance with
a great deal of traffic, not all of it military, over the bridge of
boats which replaced the bridge that had been destroyed during the
German drive.
Our men are getting more and more restless in these dirty woods and
the first question that anybody asks is, “When do we get relieved.”
I stepped into the woods on the other side of the road to visit
my Alabama friends and one of their fine lads voiced the common
mind by asking whether the govament hadn’t othah soldiehs than the
Fohty-Second Division. I answered, “Well, if they’re using you so
much, it is your own fault.” “How is it ouah fault?” demanded my
friend, and twenty pairs of eyes asked the same question. “It’s your
fault all right; the trouble with you fellows is that you’re too
blamed good.”
I have become a specialist on what they call the morale of troops and
as I go around I find that the morale of the men in this division is
still very high. They have had a tough week of it and nearly half the
infantry are gone while of those remaining more than half are sick.
But they know that they have whipped the enemy on his chosen ground
and they feel confident that if they only get rested up a little bit
they can do it again and do it cheerfully.
The Quartermaster’s Department has helped considerably by fitting us
all out with new clothes, underwear, shoes, everything we need, and
the food supply is steady. And Miss Elsie Janis has done her part,
too, as a joy producer by coming up to us in our mud and desolation
and giving a Broadway performance for an audience which was more
wildly appreciative than ever acclaimed her on the street of a
million lights.
The long desired orders for relief finally arrived. We marched out on
Sunday morning, August 11th. I had planned with Colonel McCoy to have
my Sunday Service a memorial one for the brave lads we were leaving
behind. He had me set up my altar in an open field just south of the
forest on our line of march to the rear. The men, fully equipped
for the march, came down the road, turned into the field, stripped
their packs and formed a hollow square around the altar. After Mass I
preached on the text, “Greater love than this no man hath than that
he lay down his life for his friends.” When the service was over the
regiment took the road again and began its march, with the band in
advance and the regimental wagon train in the rear.
As we passed through Beuvardes General Menoher and officers of his
staff were in front of Division Headquarters. Colonel McCoy passed
the order down the ranks, the band struck up the regimental air of
“Garry Owen” and the regiment passed in review, heads up and chests
out and stepping out with a martial gait as if they were parading
at Camp Mills and not returning from a battlefield where half their
numbers had been lost.
Two days later they marched through Château Thierry in similar
fashion. Colonel McCoy came to mess with a smile of pride on his face
telling us he had encountered an old friend, a regular army officer
who had said to him, “What is that outfit that passed here a little
while ago? It’s the finest looking lot of infantry I have seen in
France.” “That is the 165th Infantry, more widely known to fame as
the 69th New York, and I am proud to say that I command it.”
I have been playing truant for a few days. I had been suffering with
a great sense of fatigue. Nothing particular the matter, but I felt
as if I were running on four flat tires and one cylinder. Two of
the War Correspondents, Herbert Corey and Lincoln Eyre, came along
and insisted on bringing me down to their place in Château Thierry;
and General Lenihan brought me in in his car. Corey cooked supper—a
regular _cordon bleu_ affair—and Lincoln Eyre gave me a hot bath and,
like Kipling’s soldier, “God, I needed it so.” Then they bundled me
into Tom Johnson’s bed, and as I dropped asleep I thought, and will
continue to think, that they are the finest fellows in the world.
They were ordered out next morning and I went with them for a couple
of days to Bossuet’s old episcopal city of Meaux, where I had a fine
time gossiping with Major Morgan, Bozeman Bulger and Arthur Delaney
of the Censor’s Bureau and Ray Callahan, Arthur Ruhl and Herbert
Bailey, a delightful young Englishman who writes for the _Daily Mail_.
I rejoined the regiment at Saulchery—somebody says that sounds like a
name for a decadent cocktail—and found myself housed in a large and
pleasant villa, the garden of which looked out upon vineyards and
fields down to the banks of the Marne. It was one of the pleasantest
places we had been in in France. The weather was perfect, and the men
enjoyed the camping out in their shelter tents, especially since the
river was handy for a swim. The whole thing made us feel more like
campers than soldiers. And by the time we had gotten well rested up
and most of the cooties washed off, we had forgotten the hard days
that were past and saw only the bright side of life once more.
We were there from August 12th to 17th, on which latter date we
entrained at Château Thierry to go to our new training area. This was
down in the Neufchateau district, and to get to it by the railroad
we were using we went south until we got to the vicinity of Langres,
where we had spent our last two months before going into the trench
sector. Regimental headquarters was at Goncourt and the regiment was
accommodated in barracks and billets in that and two close lying
villages. The towns had been used for some time by American troops
and had unusual facilities for bathing, etc. The warm reception
given to us by the townspeople was a tribute to the good conduct of
the 23rd Infantry which had been billetted there for a considerable
period before occupying the front lines.
After a couple of days’ rest the men were started on a schedule
of training which was laid out for four weeks. Target ranges were
prepared by the engineers and everything looked like a long stay.
The training was necessary not so much for the old-timers as for
the replacements who had been sent in to take the places of the men
we had lost. We received five hundred from the 81st Division. We
had known cases where our replacements had to go into line without
anything like proper training. The night we left Epieds to advance
into action at the Ourcq we received new men, some of whom knew very
little about a rifle and had never once put on a gas mask; and the
Captains took them out by night and drilled them for an hour with the
gas masks in order to give the poor fellows some sort of a chance
for their lives if exposed to danger of gas.
The second day that I was in Goncourt Colonel McCoy came to see me
with Major Lawrence and Major Donovan to lay down the law. They had
decided that I was to go to the hospital at Vittel, where Major
Donovan’s brother was one of the doctors, “for alterations and
repairs.” General Menoher, with his usual kindness, sent over his car
to take me there, and Father George Carpentier was brought over from
the Sanitary Train to fill my place. I told him “Your name is French
but it has the advantage of being the one French name that is best
known and most admired by our bunch of pugilists.”
I have had a nice lazy week of it at Vittel, which was a French
watering place before the war, the hotels and parks now being given
over to American soldiers. I hear a great deal of talk about a
coming offensive in which the American Army is to take the leading
part. I had gotten an inkling of it before from a French source,
with strictest injunctions to secrecy. But here in Vittel I find it
discussed by private soldiers on the park benches and by the old
lady who sells newspapers. If it is a secret, all the world seems to
know it. We have taken every step to make the Germans aware of it
except that of putting paid advertisements in the Berlin newspapers.
The fact is, these things cannot be kept secret. Here in Vittel they
are cleaning out all the hospitals of wounded and that means that
a big battle is expected somewhere in this vicinity within a short
time. Then up along the line ammunition and supply trains are busy
establishing dumps, and the drivers are naturally talking about it in
the cafés, so that everybody knows that the Americans are planning
something big and the place where it is going to happen.
VITTEL
_August_ 24th, 1918
Major Donovan is over every few days to have his wound attended to
and incidentally to see his brother Tim, who is a surgeon with the
Buffalo Unit. Today he gave me a piece of news that came as a shock
though hardly as a surprise—the orders are out to make Colonel McCoy
a Brigadier General and he is to leave us. He has been with us less
than four months yet I feel as if I had known him for forty years,
and this war is going to be a different sort of thing for me lacking
his presence. But the staying thing about life is that institutions
go on even though men may pass. My thoughts turned to the regiment.
“Who is likely to be Colonel?” I asked.
“We are all united on Mitchell,” said the Major, “and I think General
McCoy will be able to arrange it for us.”
“I have always thought that General McCoy can do anything he sets
out to do. As for Mitchell, with the possible exception of yourself,
Major, there is no man I had rather see have it.”
“Oh, Hell, Father, I don’t want to be Colonel. As Lieutenant Colonel
I can get into the fight and that’s what I’m here for. We all want
Mitchell.”
“You are a selfish creature, Bill. Did you ever see anybody more
contented in action than the man you want to tie up to a telephone?”
“Well, somebody has to be tied up to the telephone, McCoy didn’t like
it, nor MacArthur. And then, as you know, they can always find some
reason to get away from it and have a little excitement.”
VITTEL
_August_ 29th, 1918
The orders have come already to move up to the next battle area.
Instead of having a month for rest and training the Division has
had but ten days in its new area. Orders came in on the 28th and
the regiments moved out on the 29th, our headquarters being at
Gendreville. On the next day they moved to Viocourt, the 2nd and 3rd
battalions being at Courcelles. Major Lawrence came to see me at
the hospital to tell me about the new move and I obtained permission
to leave and rejoin my regiment. I shall always have a warm place in
my heart for the doctors and nurses of the Buffalo and Westchester
County Units.
VIOCOURT
_September_ 1st, 1918
I walked into Division Headquarters at Chatenois today on my business
as Senior Chaplain. I sent off a couple of telegrams to the G. H. Q.
Chaplains about a Protestant chaplain that I want them to send for
the Alabamas and also stirring them up about a Protestant chaplain
that I had been asking them for a long time for my own regiment.
Another telegram went to the K. of C. at Paris to send a priest to
look after Catholics in the Illinois and Indiana artillery regiments,
as the chaplains there are anxious to have one. My final inquiry was
about transportation to Toul for Jewish members of the Division in
order to have them celebrate their approaching feast. Sergeant Marcus
looked up at me and grinned: “Say, Father Duffy, aren’t you glad you
have no Buddhists to look after?” He added that the adjutant had a
surprise in store for me.
He had—two official announcements, one, that the corps commander had
made me a major and the other that I had been cited for the D. S. C.
Being a Major has no particular thrills to it, except no doubt when
I come to sign my pay vouchers; but there is no man living who can
truthfully say that it means nothing to him to receive the bronze
cross and red, white and blue bar of our Army. To everybody, I think,
the greatest satisfaction comes not from what it means to himself
but from the gratification it will give his friends. Another feeling
uppermost in my mind was one of grateful affection for Colonel McCoy
because I knew that it was he who had recommended me both for the
rank and the distinction. I wrote to him “The British reward their
military heroes with a peerage, a pension, and a tomb in Westminster
Abbey. You have gotten for me the American equivalent for two of
them—the distinction and the emoluments—and it only remains for you
to fix it up so that I can have a tomb in St. Patrick’s Cathedral.
All that is necessary to give me a right to that is to make me
Archbishop of New York; Cardinal, if you insist. I never knew you to
fail in anything you went after so I shall consider this matter as
settled.”
We remained in Viocourt six days and then began our journey north by
night marches. The 4th of September was spent in the Bois de Raidon.
On the 5th of September the whole regiment was together at Bulligny.
On the 6th, still marching by night, we were at Foug, and September
7th found us at Boucq, where we spent two days.
Here we had the honor of a visit from the Commander in Chief. General
Pershing had come on for the ceremony of presenting Distinguished
Service Crosses to those who had been cited in our Division,
and the ceremony took place in a field to the northeast of our
village of Boucq. The recipients from our Regiment were Lieutenant
Colonel Donovan, Major Reilley, who quite overshadowed me, Captain
Merle-Smith, Lieutenant William Spencer, Lieutenant John J. Williams,
Sergeant Frank Gardella, Corporal John McLaughlin, Corporal Martin
Higgins, and Burr Finkle. Captain Ryan and others who had been
cited were still in the hospital, while others were of those who
had perished on the field. A complete list will be given in another
place.
FOOTNOTES:
[5] Final figures.
Killed Wounded Missing
Officers 14 45 0
Enlisted Men 224 1,135 153
——— ————— ————
Total Losses 238 1,180 153
Grand Total 1,571
Practically all of those marked “missing” were wounded men of whom no
record was sent back to us from the hospitals.
In the Lunéville Sector our battle losses had been 1 officer and 29
enlisted men killed; 19 officers and 408 enlisted men wounded.
In the Baccarat Sector, 3 men killed and 8 wounded.
In Champagne 1 officer and 43 men killed; 7 officers and 245 men
wounded. Our missing on all three of these fronts was 9 men.
Between March 1st and August 1st the Regiment lost 315 killed, 1,867
wounded, 162 missing, making a grand total of 2,344.