NORTH OF VERDUN
Stopping for a day in Ancemont west of the Meuse River for improvised
baths and haircuts by the Company barbers refreshed the men, although
clean clothes were not to be had. The night of October 9 the Battalion
took up quarters in the Caserne de Bevaux, a large cavalry barracks
just a kilometer east of the famous fortress of Verdun. Paris had
its charms for the American soldier, but he looked with more favor
upon the arts of war, worshipped more at that time before the shrines
of military greatness than the creations of great architects and
sculptors, so the world-famed ruins of Verdun were attacked with a
full-hearted avidity which carried the men to its most remote passages.
From the parapets of its outer defenses to the recesses of its great
tunnels they walked and marvelled that a city could withstand artillery
bombardment of such intensity for so long without being crumbled
to a heap of dust. Verdun was the point of a terrific attack which
lasted for months, in the defense of which tens of thousands of French
soldiers had made their last stand and before which Huns in far greater
numbers had given their lives blindly for a hopeless cause.
For six days the Company stayed in the barracks, repairing equipment
and getting into shape for the coming period of activity, the severity
of which was foretold by units which had been relieved. Austrian
prisoners sent back from the line spoke only of peace, giving as their
belief that the war was fast coming to a close, but the many varieties
of rumors were put aside on the night of the 15th, when the Company
moved north through the outer defenses of Verdun, through Belleville
and Bras to the Ravin d'Andremont, not far from Samogneaux, a little
village about twelve kilometers north of Verdun east of the Meuse River.
All signs of shelter had been demolished here and the men slept in the
open while the inevitable rain of a hiking day soaked their clothes and
blankets. The following morning brought visions of what shell fire had
done to much of the artillery and wagon trains which had started for
the line. Although the latest advances had made it practically safe
for troops and it was now used for a camping place for all branches of
line troops, at one time not far passed Hun artillery had accounted
for large numbers of American horses and mules, whose dead bodies were
lying all around the area.
Ordered to relieve machine gunners of the 29th American Division
and certain French troops, the Company began its march to the new
positions that night, only locating the sector assigned to it after a
six hour hike during which colorful compliments were paid the guides
who had been assigned from the relieved units to lead the way. Loaded
with packs, guns and ammunition and further handicapped by the hilly
character of the country, the men struggled through shell holes,
occasional bits of barbed wire, underbrush and fallen trees and mud,
always mud, to the positions in the Bois d'Ormont which they reached
just before dawn.
The Bois d'Ormont is a small elliptical-shaped woodland on the crest of
one of the many hills in that region and the American and German lines
were within a few yards of each other, near the center of the woods.
Members of the Company with ability to converse with the Huns, made
several trips to the German lines and tried to induce them to return as
prisoners, but the minions of Prussianism were strong in their belief
that the war was shortly coming to an early end and decided they could
better afford to take the chance for the rest of the time than enter
a prison camp for an indefinite period. They told of changes in the
government of the Fatherland, the abdication of the Kaiser and other
rumors afterward fulfilled.
October 20 a short American barrage brought an immediate response from
the nervous Teutons and they laid a box barrage around the sector
occupied by the Division, evidently believing an attack was coming.
Until the 23d the lines were at a standstill. On several occasions
it was rumored that an attack was to be made by the enemy or Allied
troops, but all that broke the monotony of the days was the Hun
practice of shelling ration parties.
With the infantry battalions, especially those of the 102d Regiment,
depleted by the enormous losses they had incurred in previous action,
the Division was holding a rather narrow sector. Officers were lacking
in most of the companies and the men were holding on through sheer
nerve, short of rations, clothing, blankets and all the creature
comforts obtainable in parts of the line they had formerly occupied. It
was in this condition they were ordered to take the aggressive October
23. On the left of the Company's positions parts of the 102d and 101st
Infantry regiments succeeded in straightening out a section of the line
which threatened to prove a favorable position for a flanking attack by
the enemy. This manœuver was completed with the aid of the artillery
and machine guns.
The following day after preparation to resist an attack in the morning,
orders were issued in the afternoon to clear the woods of Germans, and
this task was attempted by L and M Companies of the 102d Infantry with
D Company furnishing the machine guns. Without artillery preparation
the men went forward, fighting through the tangled woods against an
enemy entrenched, armed with innumerable machine guns and numerically
superior, but lack of leaders and proper liaison with the units on
their flanks forced them to return after they had almost gained their
objective. Again on the morning of October 25 orders were issued to
attempt the advance, but it again proved too much for the men.
With entire battalions formed into units, but slightly greater in size
than a full infantry company and the men suffering from the exertion of
the past few days and lack of sleep, a final attempt was made Sunday,
October 27, to force the enemy from his positions in the woods which
had a certain strategical importance in the military situation. As the
barrage was scheduled to start at 10 o'clock that morning, all men were
withdrawn from the front lines and held in readiness to attack when the
curtain of fire thrown over by the artillery should lift enough at 11
o'clock to allow them to go forward.
Summoned to Battalion Headquarters, Lieutenant Paton left his post
of command after the barrage was well under way and started down a
communicating trench accompanied by Nutting. German artillery had
started its reply and was doing all it could to prevent the attack
which the Huns knew to be in preparation, and a life which had seemed
charmed was taken as toll when Lieutenant Paton was killed by a
fragment from a bursting shell. Wilfore and Lieutenant Pickett of the
Infantry were mortal victims of the same messenger of death and Nutting
suffered dozens of wounds from the small bits of steel which fill the
air close to an exploding projectile.
Time after time under the leadership of non-commissioned officers from
their own companies and several of the D Company sergeants the infantry
went out onto that short stretch of ground separating them from the
coveted German trenches, but each time they fell back, hundreds of
casualties resulting from the perfect hail of machine gun bullets which
the Germans sprayed across that section of "No Man's Land." In the
command of a second lieutenant the third battalion of the 102d Infantry
mustered one hundred and eighty men that night, practically one fifth
of its authorized strength, while D Company had lost seventeen during
the day from its already depleted personnel. A reorganization of the
defenses of the sector was effected the next day, and three surplus
guns were sent to the rear, the strength of the Company being too low
to provide crews for them.
A little to the rear of the lines the bodies of Lieutenant Paton,
Wilfore and Rosenkind were buried by the men and services at the graves
were conducted at three o'clock on the afternoon of October 29 by
Chaplain Creighton of the 101st Field Signal Battalion. Disheartened,
as the men were, by the loss of their comrades and officer, this sorrow
came at a time when their spirits were at a very low ebb. All about
them in the line were the bodies of French, American and German dead,
rude cemeteries were filled on every side and the fever of battle
against overwhelming odds had begun to dull their senses to the finer
emotions they would have experienced under different conditions.
Where such a large proportion of the men have the qualities of heroes a
life is risked or given as a matter of completing the task in hand, so
it is not strange that in spite of all the Company went through during
this unequalled campaign but two were especially rewarded. George Eddy
received the Croix de Guerre for work in destroying a machine gun crew
which threatened the flank of the advancing infantry, and Mike Yuczszik
was awarded both the Belgian and French war crosses for presence of
mind in dropping the tripod he carried onto a Hun "potato-masher"
grenade thrown into a shell hole occupied by his squad during an attack.
While carrying messages from Battalion Headquarters Bill Meickle was
reported missing during the action of October 25. His name was added to
the list of honored dead when it was found later that he had died in
the hospital from wounds received in the performance of his duty.
Cited for gallantry during the Chateau Thierry drive, Sergeant C. Lyon
Rogers had been recommended for a commission as second lieutenant and
he was sworn in as an officer on October 28 after performing the duties
of one for more than a month.
Relief by D Company, 103d Machine Gun Battalion was completed early
on the morning of October 30, and the Company withdrew to a hillside
south of Ormont Farm where it spent the day, and the following night
moved to the place at the crossroads it had occupied before entering
the line. Long range shelling of this position made rest impossible.
Twelve mules were killed and seven wounded when a Hun projectile landed
in the picket line, but Geer was the only man to suffer injury from the
succeeding shells as the Company sought places nearer the top of the
hill for safety.
Under way again, the Company relieved a group of French machine gunners
on November 1 in the Bois des Caures, a kilometer northwest of Beaumont
and slightly to the right of the positions occupied by it in the Ormont
Woods. This was reputed to be a quiet sector and so it proved with the
exception of occasional shelling when ration parties were due. One of
these salvoes delivered against Lieutenant Nelson's post of command
resulted in the wounding of Oscar Johnson and Bill Kennedy, the latter
mortally. Kennedy had volunteered to aid in the distribution of rations
and was struck at a time when his ordinary duties would have kept him
out of danger.
Armistice rumors were numerous and convincing, but the invitation sent
over by the Huns to become prisoners and end the fighting found no
sympathy in the American lines. Many of the men were being sent to the
hospital, suffering from gas, shell-shock and illness, but the largest
percentage of these came from the replacements, who, although they had
come to the Company fresh from training, failed to stand the rigors of
the campaign as well as the men who had fought through nine months
without rest.
Infantry raiding parties sent out to identify the German units in the
line met with small success, but three prisoners they brought back
were confident that the war would end within a few days as were all
the French with whom the men came in contact. More reliance was placed
in the reports from the latter, for the French soldier was always well
informed as to probable events.
Meeting but weak resistance the infantry cleared the woods of Germans
November 8, and it was during this operation that Lieutenant Rogers was
killed by a machine gun bullet. He was in charge of two machine guns
in the advance but had been asked to lead a party of infantry over the
top and while organizing the men he met his death. His fearlessness
had placed him as high in the esteem of neighboring units as it had in
that of his own men. It was one of the doughboys who remarked that "he
shouldn't have been a second lieutenant, but an infantry captain."
Advancing down the road in the direction of Ville devant Chaumont with
the third battalion of the 102d Infantry, it was found that units on
the right and left flanks had failed to keep up with the movement, so
after consolidating the position, the men remained there during the
night of the 8th and were withdrawn a half kilometer in the morning.
The advance was taken up later in the day and continued through to the
eastern edge of Champneuville woods, in the conquest of which Corporal
Arthur Parmalee was wounded so severely he died that day.
The entire Battalion took up the march eastward on the 10th in support
of the infantry. That night the doughboys were sent into Wavrille
Woods to protect the flank of the advance. They were shelled heavily,
but German dugouts and shell-proofs were as effective against Hun
shell-fire as they had been against American bombardments, so the men
rested comfortably until the next morning, when they were marched back
to Beaumont, from which place, with the remnants of the third battalion
of the 102d Infantry, they were ordered into the line to relieve the
101st Infantry. Reports had gained circulation that hostilities were to
cease at 11 o'clock, but little credence was given them.
Orders were given out to begin the attack at 10:39 ceasing the advance
at 11:00, but it was 11:03 before the formations were perfected and
the men ready to start after the enemy. Three minutes before this the
artillery fire which had been practically continuous for days and had
reached its greatest intensity in this region not long before the final
hour suddenly ceased and an almost uncanny silence prevailed. Far
from being hailed by the men as the hour for which they had struggled
through seemingly endless days, it was greeted silently. Neither
American nor enemy soldiers exhibited joy when they knew hostilities
were at an end, but, under the spell of a war, which had been the most
exciting, most terrible thing within the span of their lives, they
awaited the realization of peace.
Keeping well out of sight during the daylight hours the Huns gave an
indication of their feelings at night by providing a pyrotechnical
display which vied with a July 4 celebration in brilliance. Rockets,
verrey lights and flares were used in profusion, but there was
no intercourse between D Company and its enemies, for early that
night heavy, unbroken sleep was the portion of all except a few
infantrymen who were used in establishing an outpost as a guard against
possibilities and the last night on the line was spent in that prosaic
but profitable manner.