WITH GENERAL PERSHING'S FORCE IN FRANCE
We are in the midst of an American army encampment in a French village.
For miles away over the rolling country the golden harvests of France
are ripening in the sun, broken by patches of green field, forest, and
stream. The reapers are gathering in the grain. Only old men, women,
and children are left to do the work, for the sons of France are away
at the battle front. The countryside is more beautiful than the finest
parts of New York or Pennsylvania. In almost every valley sleeps a
little French hamlet, with its red tiled roofs and its neat stone
cottages, clustered about the village church tower. It is a picture of
calm and peace and plenty under the summer sun. But the sound of
distant guns on the neighboring drill grounds, a bugle call down the
village street, the sight of the broad cowboy hats and the khaki
uniforms of the American soldiers, arouse us to the realization of a
world at war and the fact that our boys are here, fighting for the soil
of France and the world's freedom.
We are in a typical French farming village of a thousand people, and
here a thousand American soldiers are quartered. A sergeant and a
score of men are in each shed or stable or barn loft. The Americans
are stationed in a long string of villages down this railway line.
Indeed it is hard to tell for the moment whether we are in France or in
the States. Here are Uncle Sam's uniforms, brown army tents, and new
wooden barracks. The roads are filled with American trucks, wagons,
motors, and whizzing motorcycles, American mules, ammunition wagons,
machine guns, provisions, and supplies, and American sentinels down
every street.
These are the men of the First Division, scattered along behind the
French lines, being drilled as rapidly as possible to take their place
in the trenches for the relief of the hard-pressed French. The nucleus
is made up of the men of the old army, who have seen service in Cuba,
Porto Rico, the Philippines, Texas, or along the Mexican border. And
with them are young boys of nineteen, twenty, or twenty-one, with clear
faces, fresh from their homes, chiefly from the Middle West--from
Illinois to Texas.
The first thing that strikes us as we look at these men is their superb
kit and outfit. From the broad cowboy hat, the neat uniform close
fitting at the waist, down to their American shoes; from the saddles,
bits, and bridles to the nose bags of the horses; from the guns,
motors, and trucks down to the last shoe lace, the equipment is
incomparably the best and most expensive of all that we have seen at
the front. The boys themselves are live, clean, strong, and
intelligent fellows, probably the best raw material of any of the
fighting forces in Europe. The officers tell us that the American
troops are natural marksmen and there are no better riflemen in the war
zone. The frequency of the sharpshooters' medals, among both the
officers and the men, shows that many of them already excel in musketry.
The second impression that strikes us is the crudeness of the new men,
and the lack of finish in their drill, as compared with the veteran
troops of Britain and France. The progress they have made, however, in
the past few weeks under their experienced American officers of the
regular army has been truly remarkable.
The next impression we receive is the enormous moral danger to which
these men are exposed in this far-away foreign land. During the whole
war it is the Overseas Forces, the men farthest from home influences,
who have no hope of leave or furlough, who are far removed from all
good women and the steadying influence of their own reputations, that
have fared the worst in the war. The Americans not only share this
danger with the Colonials and other Overseas Forces, but they have an
additional danger in their high pay. Here are enlisted men who tell us
that they are paid from $35 to $90 a month, from the lowest private to
the best paid sergeants. When you remember that the Russian private is
allowed only one cent a day, that the Belgian soldier receives only
four cents a day, the French private five cents, the German six cents,
and the English soldier twenty-five cents a day, most of which has to
go for supplementary food to make up for the scantiness of the rations
supplied, you realize what it means for the American soldier to be paid
from one to three dollars a day, in addition to clothing, expenses, and
the best rations of any army in Europe.[1]
Some of these men tell us that they have just received from two to
three months' back pay in cash. Here they are with several hundred
francs in their hands, buried in a French village, with absolutely no
attraction or amusement save drink and immorality. In this little
village the only prosperous trade in evidence is that in wines and
liquors. The only large wholesale house is the center of the liquor
trade and the only freight piled up on the platform of the station
consists of wines and champagnes, pouring in to meet the demand of the
American soldiers. There are a score of drinking places in this little
hamlet. Our boys are unaccustomed to the simple and moderate drinking
of the French peasants, and they are plunged into these _estaminets_
with their pockets full of money. Others under the influence of drink
have torn up the money or tossed it recklessly away. Prices have
doubled and trebled in the village in a few weeks, and the peasants
have come to the conclusion that every American soldier must be a
millionaire; as the boys have sometimes told them that the pile of
notes, which represents several mouths' pay, is the amount they receive
every month. Compare this with the $1.80 a month, in addition to a
small allowance for his family, which the French private gets, and you
will readily see how this false impression is formed.
Temptation and solicitation in Europe have been in almost exact
proportion to the pay that the soldier receives. The harpies flock
around the men who have the most money. As our American boys are the
best paid, and perhaps the most generous and open-hearted and reckless
of all the troops, they have proved an easy mark in Paris and the port
cities. As soon as they were paid several months' back salary, some of
them took "French leave," went on a spree, and did not come back until
they were penniless. The officers, fully alive to the danger, are now
doing their utmost to cope with the situation; they are seeking to
reduce the cash payments to the men and are endeavoring to persuade
them to send more of their money home. Court martial and strict
punishment have been imposed for drunkenness, in the effort to grapple
with this evil.
Will the friends of our American boys away in France try to realize
just the situation that confronts them? Imagine a thousand healthy,
happy, reckless, irrepressible American youths put down in a French
village, without a single place of amusement but a drinking hall, and
no social life save such as they can find with the French girls
standing in the doorways and on the street corners. Think of all these
men shut up, month after month, through the long winter, with nothing
to do to occupy their evenings. Then you will begin to realize the
seriousness of the situation which the Young Men's Christian
Association is trying to meet.
Here on the village green stands a big tent, with the sign "The
American Y M C A," and the red triangle, which is already placed upon
more than seven hundred British, French, and American Association
centers in France. Inside the tent, as the evening falls, scores of
boys are sitting at the tables, writing their letters home on note
paper provided for them. Here are men playing checkers, dominoes, and
other games. Other groups are standing around the folding billiard
tables. A hundred men have taken out books from the circulating
library, while others are scanning the home papers and the latest news
from the front.
Our secretaries have been on the ground for a week, working daily from
five o'clock in the morning until midnight. They have unpacked their
goods and are doing a driving trade over the counter, to the value of
some $200 a day. In certain cases goods are sold at a loss, as it is
very hard indeed to get supplies under present war conditions. The
steamer "Kansan" was torpedoed, and sank with the whole first shipment
of supplies and equipment for the Y M C A huts in France.
Outside a baseball game is exciting rivalry between two companies;
while near the door of the tent a ring is formed and the men are
cheering pair after pair as they put on the boxing gloves and with good
humor are learning to take some rather heavy slugging. Poor boys, they
will have to stand much worse punishment than this before the winter is
over. Just beside the present tent there is being rushed into position
a big Y M C A hut which will accommodate temporarily a thousand men,
before it is taken to pieces and shipped to some new center. The
Association has ordered from Paris a number of permanent pine huts, 60
by 120 feet, which will accommodate 2,000 soldiers each, and keep them
warm and well occupied during the long cold winter evenings that are to
come. On the railway siding at the moment are nine temporary huts,
packed in sections for immediate construction, and a score of permanent
buildings have been ordered to be erected as fast as the locations for
the camps are selected by the military authorities. Indeed, the aim is
to have them on the ground and ready before the boys arrive and take
the first plunge in the wrong direction.
What is the life that our boys are living here at the front? Let us go
through a day with the battalion quartered in this village. At five
o'clock in the morning the first bugle sounds. The boys are quickly on
their feet, dressing, washing, getting ready for the day's drill. In
half an hour they are tucking away a generous breakfast provided by
Uncle Sam, of hot bacon, fried potatoes and coffee, good home made
bread, and as much of it as a man can eat. They get meat twice a day,
and we have found no soldiers in Europe who receive rations that
compare with the food that our boys receive.
By 6:40 a. m. the men have reached the drill ground on the open fields
above the village and are ready to begin the eight or nine hours of
hard work and exercise that is before them. Half of each day is spent
with the French troops, learning more quickly with an object lesson
before them, and the remaining half day is spent in training by
themselves. The French squad goes through the drill or movement; then
the American battalion, after watching them, is put through the same
practice. They are trained in bayonet work and charges, in musketry
and machine gun practice, in the handling of grenades, and the throwing
of bombs. There is evidence of speeding up and an apparent pressure to
get them quickly into shape, in order to take their place in the
trenches before the winter sets in. A few weeks at the front with the
French troops will soon give them experience, and after a winter in the
trenches, the men of these first divisions will doubtless form the
nucleus for a large American army, and provide the drill masters
quickly to train the men for the spring offensive.
On the day we were there, after a hard morning's drill, the Colonel
assembled three battalions and put them through the first regimental
formation and the first regimental review since landing in France. The
men of the First, Second, and Third battalions marched by, and one
could quickly contrast the disciplined movements of the veterans or old
soldiers with the crude drill of the new recruits, some of whom could
not keep step or smoothly execute the movements.
At the noon hour, after the men had taken their midday meal and had
rested for a few minutes, the Colonel asked us if we would address the
troops. Some two thousand men were marched in close formation around
the large military wagon on which we were to stand. The mules were
unhitched and the men seated themselves on the grass, while the band
played several pieces. A great hunger of heart possesses any man with
half a soul as he looks into the faces of these boys, beset by fierce
temptations and facing a terrible winter in the trenches. At the
beginning we reminded them of the words of Lord Kitchener to his troops
before they left for France: "You are ordered abroad as a soldier. . .
Remember that the honor of the Army depends upon your individual
conduct. . . Your duty cannot be done unless your health is sound. So
keep constantly on your guard against any excesses. In this new
experience you may find temptations both in wine and women. You must
entirely resist both temptations, . . . treating all women with perfect
courtesy." [2] Kitchener's words furnish a text for the two-fold
danger which confronts these men. Here for an unhurried hour, with the
generous backing of the officers, we plead with the men on military,
medical, and moral grounds, for the sake of their own homes and
families, for the sake of conscience and country, on the grounds of
duty both to God and to man, to hold to the high ideals and the best
traditions of the homeland. Here, with no church save the great dome
of God's blue heaven above us, seated on the green grass, under the
warm summer sun, we have the priceless privilege of trying to safeguard
the life of these men in the grave danger of wartime.
We were encouraged alike by the splendid support of the officers and
the warm-hearted and eager response of the men as they broke into
prolonged applause. The General in command attended one meeting and
pledged us his support for our whole program for the men. He had
already cooperated with us most generously on the Canal Zone, in the
Philippines, and in Mexico. Three colonels presided at three
successive meetings, and gave the work their strong moral support.
Three bands were furnished in two days. The official backing of the
authorities placed the stamp of approval on the whole moral effort for
the welfare of the men. In no other army in Europe that we have seen
have the officers taken such a keen interest in the highest welfare of
the troops, or offered such constant and efficient cooperation with
every effort to surround the men with the best moral influences.
After the meeting, the regimental parade and the strenuous physical
drill of the morning, the Colonel called for a short break, and the men
gathered to learn some popular songs. Major Roosevelt assembled his
battalion, and Archie Roosevelt enthusiastically led the men in singing
Julia Ward Howe's "Battle Hymn of the Republic" and the modern soldier
songs of the war.
After nine hours of hard drill, the men swung cheerfully down the
hillside into the village street. Now they have lined up, and with
ravenous appetites are waiting for the evening meal. We are almost as
hungry as they, and are glad to share the meal with them. Here on the
table are huge piles of good home-made bread. It is almost the first
white bread we have seen after months of brown war bread in England and
France. Here are heaping plates of good pork and beans, tinned salmon,
plenty of fried potatoes, and piping hot coffee. This is followed by a
delicious pudding, as good as the men would have had in their own
homes. Well fed, well clothed, well equipped, sleeping under Uncle
Sam's warm blankets, on comfortable "Gold Medal" cots, our boys are
well cared for.
In another village, at the close of the day, the Colonel commanding two
battalions of the infantry called the men together in the open square
of the market place, and after a band concert invited us to address the
troops on the moral issues of the war. The next day almost the same
program was repeated, and at noon in an open field on a grassy hillside
the Major of another battalion marched out his men for a similar
lecture. Every commanding officer seemed eager to arrange for
meetings, to summon the men, and to back up the messages given to them.
Not only have General Pershing, General Sibert, and the Colonels
commanding the various regiments, met us half way in every plan for the
welfare of the troops; but they have taken the initiative in insisting
that every provision should be made for the physical, mental, and moral
occupation and safeguarding of the men.
Probably more men are led astray in the war zone when they go on leave
than at any other time, in reaction from the deadly monotony of camp
life, or the inferno of the trenches. London and Paris are the chief
centers of danger. In London, just before sailing for the States, we
visited the finely equipped American "Eagle" Hut in the Strand. It
would be difficult to devise a more homelike or attractive place for
soldiers. In addition to sleeping accommodations for several hundred
men, the lounge and recreation rooms, the big fireplaces and
comfortable chairs suggested the equipment of an up-to-date club, in
marked contrast to the surroundings of a cheerless soldiers' barracks.
[Illustration: The "Eagle Hut" in London.]
In Paris, in addition to the permanent headquarters at 31 Avenue
Montaigne, we are hoping to provide hotels and hostels and guides for
supervised parties to see the chief points of interest, and to plan
such healthy occupation for the soldiers that the evils of the city may
be counteracted. Better still we are planning resorts in the French
Alps, where summer and winter sports, athletics, mountain climbing, and
physical and mental recreation will obviate altogether the necessity of
leave to Paris for many of the soldiers of the United States and
Canada. In the first resort we are arranging for special rates and
moderate charges at the hotels and have the pledge of the civil
authorities to keep the place wholesome and absolutely to prevent the
incoming of camp followers. The Association is planning to take over
the best hotel, which can be made into an attractive social center for
the entire camp. A score of American and as many Canadian ladies will
help to provide social recreation and amusement for the men, which will
prove a greater attraction than the dangerous leave in Paris.
A glance at one or two typical meetings held in various camps will show
how we are trying to help our boys face the pressing problems of a
soldier's life.
We enter a large hut filled with a thousand soldiers. Here are many
men who have been driven toward God and who are face to face with the
great realities of life, death, and the future as never before in their
lives, eager for any message which may help them. But here are several
hundred others who have fallen victims to evil habits and who are
determined you shall not force religion down their throats. How are we
to capture the attention of this mass of men and hold them? Will they
bolt or stand fire? The time has come to begin the meeting and we
plunge in. "Come on, boys, let's have a sing-song; gather round the
piano and let's sing some of the old camp songs." Out come the little
camp song books, and we start in on a few favorite choruses. A dozen
voices call for "John Brown's Body," "Tennessee," "Kentucky Home," "A
Long, Long Trail," etc. Soon we have several hundred men seated around
the piano and the chorus gathers in volume. Now we call for local
talent. A boy with blue eyes and a clear tenor voice sings of home. A
red-headed humorist climbs on the table; and at his impersonations, his
acting, and comic songs, the crowd shouts with glee.
Our heart sinks within us as we look over this sea of faces and wonder
how we are going to hold this crowd that this man seems to have in the
hollow of his hand. Somehow these men must be gripped and held to the
last. "Boys, what was the greatest battle of the war?" we ask. "Was
it the brave stand of little Belgium at Liege? Was it the splendid
retreat of the little British army from Mons? Was it the battle of the
Marne, when the French and British struck their first offensive blow?
Was it the great stand at Ypres, or the defense of Verdun, or the drive
on the Somme? What is _your_ hardest battle? Is it not within, in the
fight with passion? Now is the time to challenge every sin that
weakens a man or the nation. How about drink? Is it a friend or foe?
How about gambling? How about impurity?" Here we mass our guns on the
greatest danger of the war. In five minutes the room is quiet, in ten
minutes we have the ear of every man in the hut, the last man has
stopped talking, and now the battle is on. They are gripped on the
moral question; how can we get them to the religious issue? These men
have the root of religion in their souls, but they do not know it.
They believe in strength, in purity, in generosity. We show that they
are often falling before temptation, but the very things that they most
admire are all found in their fulness in Jesus Christ.
Now we make use of a simple illustration. We hold up a gold coin
hidden in our hand and offer it as a gift. "Who will take me at my
word and ask for this gift?" At last a man rises in the back of the
hall, there is a little scene, and then a burst of applause as he
receives it and goes to his seat. "Now why didn't _you_ come? Some of
you didn't believe me, some were ashamed to come up before everybody
and ask for it, some were just waiting; and so all lost your chance.
Once again I offer a gift. Here is something more valuable than all
the gold on earth--heaven to be had for the asking; the free gift of
God is eternal life. Why don't you come? For the same three reasons.
Some of you don't believe, some are afraid to show their colors, some
are just waiting. You will soon start for the front to take your place
in the trenches. Are you ready for life or death? What will you do
with Jesus Christ?"
We have had them forty minutes now and many a man is listening as for
his life. We hold up the pledge card of the war roll. "How many of
you are willing to take your stand against drink, gambling, and
impurity, to break away from sin, and to sign the war roll, which says:
'I pledge my allegiance to the Lord Jesus Christ as my Saviour and
King, by God's help to fight His battles and bring victory to His
Kingdom'? Who will take his stand for Christ and sign tonight?" Here
and there all over the house men begin to rise. A hundred come forward
to get cards and sign them. Then every head is bowed and in the
stillness we pray for these boys; for they are mere lads, with ruddy
checks, fresh from the farm or the city.
Now the meeting breaks up and we move down into the crowd. Men come up
and ask for private talks, some to confess their sins and others to
request prayer. Here is a boy who is friendless and homeless and in
need; the next man has just lost his wife, his home, and his money, but
here in the war he has been driven to prayer and has found God. He has
lost everything, but he tells us with a brave smile that he has gained
all, and now wishes to prepare for the ministry to preach the Gospel.
Next is a young atheist, an illegitimate child, a circus actor, who has
now found God and wants to know how to relate his life to Christ. The
next man is a jockey, who in the midst of his sins enlisted in order
that he might die for others and try to atone for his past life.
Later, we were holding evangelistic meetings among the boys of another
regiment. One Sunday evening we were in a big hut where the meeting
was about to begin. Many of the men were writing to the old folks at
home. Captain "Peg" of Canada, who was with us to lead the singing,
stepped on the platform and announced a hymn. Immediately several
hundred men flocked to the seats and began singing the Christian hymns
they knew at home. Eyes lit up and faces were aglow as they sang
"Nearer, My God, to Thee," "Lead, Kindly Light," and "Fight the Good
Fight." Gradually the numbers increased until a thousand men were
singing. Then we began the address. Here were open-hearted boys some
of whom had gone down before the temptations of the port cities and who
now have to face the dangers of a camp in France. We began on moral
themes. Within half an hour it seemed as if the better nature of every
man was with us. The Christian ideals of home, of the Church, and of
their own best selves surged up again, until we had seated and standing
nearly twelve hundred men, many of whom were ready to make the fight
for purity with the help of Jesus Christ. One can never forget that
closing hymn as the men rose to sing "God Be With You Till We Meet
Again." We saw tear-stained faces before us as nearly the whole
company joined in the song "Tell Mother I'll Be There."
Here was one poor fellow who felt he could not sign the decision card.
He sent up this little note: "I am the worst man in the tent--a man who
robbed his old father of his life's savings. How can I hope to be any
good again without any prospect of ever being able to repay this
money?" But before he left he had accepted God's forgiveness, and the
dawn of a new eternity breaks upon his happy face. There was another
man, the worst character in the regiment. Finally, touched by the
secretary's kindness, he had read his little pocket Testament in
prison, had yielded his life to Christ, and was now witnessing among
the soldiers in the camp. Another, broken down, came up to say he had
wronged a girl at home, and to ask if there was any hope for him. The
last man, Bob A----, serving at present with a British regiment, tells
us he was a Christian in Cleveland, Ohio, before the war. He lay all
last night drunk in the fields, but, convicted of his profligate life,
he repented and turned back again to God. There was another boy who
stopped to tell us that ever since a previous meeting he had knelt in
prayer every night before all the men.
At the close of the meeting another man stepped up and handed in a
letter, saying: "Thank you for that message tonight, sir. I will be
true to the little girl I left at home. Here is a letter I had just
written to a bad woman. God helping me I will not go. I have signed
the War Roll tonight and I am going to be true to it." Hundreds of men
filed past and shook hands in gratitude.
We were facing an average of some five hundred men every night in the
week and a thousand or more on Sunday. One humble private who had been
a pilot out at sea, handed us a poem which he had just written, the
last lines of which are typical of the verses many of the men are
writing these days:
"And if I fall, Lord, take an erring mortal
Into those realms of peace and joy above;
And, by-and-by, at Thy fair mansion's portal,
Let me find there the little girl I love."
In all our meetings our aim has been to enable men to find themselves
by coming into a personal and vital relation with God as Father,
through Jesus Christ. Our purpose is to evangelize, but not to
proselytize. We aim to make each man more loyal to his own church.
During the three years of the war, we have never known of a man
changing his church or being asked to do so. Our aim is not to change
any man's ecclesiastical position, but to make him a truer and stronger
man in the church where he is. The great outstanding issue in war time
is not between creed and creed, between sect and sect, but between God
and mammon, between right and wrong, purity and impurity. We have no
contention concerning the questions that divide us; we are fighting for
the great fundamentals upon which we are all united, for God and moral
manhood.
[1] According to the War Bulletin of the National Geographic Society,
issued in Washington in September 1917, a first class American private
drawing $26.60 a month receives more than a Russian colonel or a German
or Austrian lieutenant. An American lieutenant receives more than a
British lieutenant colonel, a French colonel, or a Russian general.
[2] See Appendix IV.