The wooded front of the Fifth Corps--Where the Germans discounted
the chance of an attack--Particularly by a division that had never
been under fire--The Pacific Coast men through the woods for a
five-mile gain--And, its artillery up, keeps on for nearly as much
more--Into a dangerous position which cannot be held--The "hand-made"
attack of the Ohioans--Surprise carries them in a rush through
the pathless woods--Three days of unsupported advance against
counter-attacks--Open country for the advance of the 79th up the
valley to Montfaucon--And open country beyond toward Nantillois and
the whale-back--The 79th "expended."
Cameron's Fifth Corps, which made the central drive head on to the
whale-back, relied, in mastering the distance it had to cover on the
first day as the "bulge" of the Army movement, upon the freshness of
its troops, whose inexperience would be only another incentive to hold
up their end. No aspect of the plan of our command was more audacious
or more thrilling than the decision to expend in one prodigious
ruthless effort the energy of the 37th, 79th, and 91st Divisions
and their impatience for action accumulated in their long period in
training camps.
[Illustration: MAP NO. 5
DIVISIONS IN THE SECOND STAGE OF THE MEUSE-ARGONNE BATTLE, OCTOBER
1ST-31ST.]
It was in this that we defied accepted standards; in this that we
carried to the seemingly quixotic limit our confidence in our ability
to transform on short notice citizens into soldiers who would go bolt
from the drill-ground into a charge that was to take an elaborate
trench system as the prelude of from five to six miles of advance
in the days of mobile interlocking machine-gun fire. Anyone who was
surprised that they did not go as far as they were told to go on the
first day had forgotten the power of modern weapons in defense, and was
oblivious of the military significance of the ground which the Corps
had to traverse.
The right division, the 79th, had before it a comparatively woodless
stretch following the Esnes-Montfaucon road among the hills to
Montfaucon, but the other two divisions faced the German trenches at
the edge of a deep belt, or rather mass, of woods as dense as the
Argonne, which, though broken by only one open space of a breadth
more marked than a roadway, had sectional names--Montfaucon, Véry,
Béthincourt, Cheppy, Malancourt,--each taken from the name of the
nearest neighboring town. The store which the Germans set by these
woods had been shown by their stubborn resistance to the attacks of the
French for their possession in 1915.
When the Germans detected--as they did despite our care--unusual
activity on our roads in this sector during the later stages of our
preparations, they made the raid of September 22nd, already mentioned,
which took a man of the 79th prisoner; but evidently they did not learn
from him of the presence of the other two divisions. German prisoners
said that an Allied attack was expected along the whole front from
Metz to Champagne, but that it would be limited to the front-line
positions--a feint, to cover the offensive from Soissons to the
Channel. Certainly the enemy had no thought that we would try to storm
the woods on the first day. On September 18th a memorandum of the 1st
German Guard Division, in occupation of this sector, said:
It is unlikely that the enemy will direct his attack against the
wooded territory in Sector K (Cheppy Wood) or against the neighboring
sectors on our left. He would have to meet an unknown situation,
and to advance through the heavy underbrush of the woods, which are
totally secured from observation, would be very difficult....
It is only in the case of a deliberate offensive against the whole
front of the Group or Army that there should be any retirement to the
main line of resistance (the Lai Fuon ravine).
The main line of resistance must be held in any event.
The Lai Fuon ravine really bisected the woods transversally into two
masses or belts. In describing the action of the Corps, which had the
mission of taking the ravine and both sections of the woods, I shall
begin with the 91st Division, National Army from the Pacific Slope,
on the left. The 91st had never been in any except a practice trench,
or heard a bullet or shell fired in battle, when it went into position
for the attack. On its left was the 35th of the First Corps, and on
its right the 37th of its own Fifth Corps. For artillery the 91st had
that of the 33rd, and a battalion from the 82nd. The fact that the 33rd
was also using borrowed artillery in its own attack is sufficiently
indicative of the character of the hasty and heterogeneous mobilization
of our unprepared army for the battle.
The Pacific Coast men had traveled far, clear across the Continent
and across the Atlantic. Traveling was in their line. If distance
had kept them from reaching the front as soon as some of the eastern
divisions, noticeably those praised New Yorkers of the 77th, they would
show that they could move fast and stick in the war to the end. The
pioneer heritage was theirs; they were neighbors to Alaska, who looked
toward Asia across the Pacific: big men who thought big and were used
to doing big things. Their people depended upon them for great deeds
worthy of their homes beyond the Great Divide. As the National Guard
divisions from the Pacific Coast had had the misfortune, through sudden
necessities when they were the only available men in depot, to be cut
up for replacement, the men of the 91st had as an intact division a
special responsibility in upholding the honor of the Coast.
They had the stamina which their climate breeds. They were under no
apprehension that their inexperience in battle would not enable them to
take care of the Germans they met, once they were through the trenches
and in the open. As men of the distances, they had imagination which
applied all their training to the situations which they would have
to encounter. No veterans ever went into action with more confidence
than these draft men. The roar of the surf on Pacific beaches, of the
car-wheels from the Coast to New York, of the steamship propellers
across the Atlantic, was the song of their gathered energy suddenly
released in a charge.
The wire on their front had not been well cut; but what might have
been a justifiable cause for delay they overcame in an intrepidity
of purpose supported by a team-play which prevented confusion of
their units. Happily the prompt taking by the stalwart Kansans and
Missourians of the Vauquois hill positions commanding the 91st's field
of advance, which had been the object of the French attacks in 1915,
removed a formidable threat on their left. The Germans, who had been
told that a division which had never been under fire was on their
front, had no thought that it would attempt a serious attack. They
were accordingly the more unprepared for the avalanche of man-power
which came rushing at them. Relatively few in numbers, waiting on the
5th Guard Division to come up in reserve, they had a painfully urgent
desire to start to the rear and meet it on its way forward.
If the uncut wire had made progress slow for the men of the 91st at the
start, once these fast travelers were past the fortifications, they
stretched their legs in earnest as they rushed through the thickets
of the first belt, which in their sector was the Cheppy Wood, in a
practically unbroken advance. When they came out in front of the Lai
Fuon ravine, they had the "jump" on the enemy on their front. He had
not the numbers to form up for a determined defense on that main line
of resistance which he was supposed to hold in any event. The best
he could do was a skilful rearguard action. Speedy as they were,
the Pacific Coast men could not force the enemy, who surrendered or
withdrew after bursts of machine-gun fire, to close with the bayonet,
as they desired.
Having fought their way through the Véry Wood, the narrowing spur of
the second belt, which extended only part way across their front,
they had now open hilly country, for the most part, before them. The
men were warmed up for their afternoon's work. As they continued to
gather in prisoners, as they pressed steadily ahead against rearguard
resistance, they maintained the _liaison_ of their units admirably. By
nightfall they had advanced nearly five miles. The Coast might well be
proud of its sons in their first day's battle.
They had been fortunate in preventing congestion of their transport,
and their artillery was fast coming up in support when they attacked
with unbroken vigor the next morning. They were to find, as all other
divisions found, that the second day was a different kind of day from
the first. As all their power was needed on the 27th to support the
37th Division in its attack for the ridges protecting Montfaucon, all
four regiments were put into line, with orders to go as far as they
could, regardless of whether or not their ardor carried them ahead of
the other divisions into a salient. They drove the enemy out of the
positions which he had taken up overnight, and continued their advance
in repeated charges against his increasing resistance. Parties charged
into the village of Epinonville several times, to receive a blistering
cross-fire from positions in flank and rear, and from the Cierges Wood,
where the German machine-gunners looked down upon all the streets and
approaches of the village.
Though its flanks were still exposed, the 91st was told to go ahead
the next day, the plan of the Army command, as we have seen, being to
use all the fight there was in every division on the 28th, when our
ambition still dared an immediate conquest of the whale-back after the
taking of Montfaucon. Switching now to a two-regiment front, after
fifteen minutes of preparation by the artillery, which was all in
position, the Pacific Coast men again attacked on the third day, which,
in turn, they were to find different from the second. While the guns
kept moving forward and striving to lay down protecting barrages and to
smash machine-gun nests, they made a mile and a half against resistance
hourly becoming more vicious and determined, taking Epinonville and
entering the Cierges Wood, which was to earn such a sinister reputation.
Despite the general results of September 28th, which had somewhat
dampened its ambition for a prompt decision, the Army command, now
seeking to drive a wedge into the heights between the Aire and
whale-back in order to break the chain of its covering defenses,
ordered the 91st to continue attacking on the 29th. The two regiments
in the rear, which had had a little rest, passed through the two
that had been exhausted by the hard work in front on the 28th. Two
battalions of the engineers, whose indefatigability had kept the roads
in shape, were sent into line. As we know, the engineers were never
allowed to be idle. If they had nothing else to do, they could fight.
The morning advance drove its point beyond the Cierges Wood, but was
checked by merciless fire from Cierges village on the right. Though
the front was in a salient, still the orders were "at all costs" to
"push ahead." At 3.40 that afternoon, after forty minutes' preparation
by the artillery, which was keeping faithfully up to the infantry
despite the weariness of horses and men, the right once more moved
forward with a vigor that was amazing after the four days' strain,
and succeeded in passing through Gesnes and in gaining a footing in
Morine and Chêne Sec Woods on its left. Every rod farther meant an
increase of overwhelming cross-fire. Either there must be support on
the flanks from the adjoining divisions, or this tongue of men thrust
into furious cross-fire must be withdrawn. Support could not be given.
The 35th Division on the left was stopped in the shambles of the
Exermont ravine, the 37th on the right was facing counter-attacks.
Accordingly on the night of the 29th the 91st fell back to the front
of the morning's gains. The 32nd, which was to have such hard fighting
in re-taking the positions which the 91st had temporarily held, was
to relieve it on October 4th. During the 30th the 91st organized
defensive positions, and until October 4th held its ground under
continuous artillery and machine-gun fire as well as harassing blasts
of machine-gun bullets from low-flying enemy aeroplanes. Though the
men were suffering from exposure and diarrhea, the whole division was
not to be relieved. The 181st Brigade, under Brigadier-General John B.
MacDonald, was assigned to the 1st and 32nd Divisions to take part in
the greater effort of fresh troops to break the heights between the
crest of the whale-back and the Aire, which was to be such a brilliant
and costly exploit. The 91st had advanced for a depth of nearly eight
miles, and held its gains for a depth of nearly seven miles.
It might be said that the 37th Division had had, as National Guardsmen,
a longer military experience than the other two divisions of the Corps,
and some trench experience in a tranquil sector, which, however, was
slight technical preparation for the offensive action which it was now
to make. If ever there was a "hand-made" battle, it was that of the
Ohio men. For artillery they had the brigade of the 30th Division,
which, after five days' hard marching when it should have been brought
by train, arrived with its men exhausted and its horses utterly so.
There were no French guns to assist this tired artillery brigade,
operating with a division with which it was associated for the first
time.
Ohio's predilection for politics is well-known; and it has even been
said that her National Guardsmen took some interest in politics.
The politics of September 26th was Republican-Democrat-Socialist
politics,--all the political genius of Ohio, town and country, from the
river to the lake, armed, trained, and resolute. I have no idea what
part these soldiers will play in the future of Ohio elections; but I do
know how they fought in the Meuse-Argonne. It is something that Ohio
should not forget.
Their rush through the trench system was soon over. Ahead was the
full depth of nearly four miles of the Montfaucon woods which I have
already described. The old trench system was partly in the midst of
woodland wreckage, caused by long sieges of artillery fire, of the
same character as that facing the 77th in the Argonne Forest. In its
attack through the thickets the 37th was to have the assistance of no
scalloping movement in forcing the enemy's withdrawal from its front.
I have already referred to the enemy's conviction that our "untrained"
troops would not have the temerity to attempt an attack which comprised
the taking of this deep belt of woods; and do not forget that half
way through the belt, which it really divided into two sections,
was the Lai Fuon ravine. Here, as our troops emerged to descend the
hither and ascend the opposite slope, they would be in full view; and
here, in the edge of the woods on the far slope, the Germans had long
ago organized the positions for that main line of resistance which
the enemy memorandum of September 18th had said must be held in any
event,--which did not include, however, the event of a drive by the
Ohio men of the same swiftness as that of the Pacific Coast men on
their left.
Had the 5th German Guard Division come up a little earlier, had the
Germans had time to mass reserves for the defense of the ravine, it
seems impossible that it could have been conquered without a siege
operation. The value of taking an enemy by surprise and audaciously
following up the surprise was singularly illustrated by the rushing
tactics of the Ohio infantry, who cleared the whole depth of the
woods on the first day. When they were halted, it was not for long.
Theirs was no cautious policy. Their reserves, keeping close to the
front line, were ready instantly to add their weight in the balance in
charging any refractory machine-gun nests. The Germans never had time
to form up for prolonged or effective resistance. Their familiarity
with the woods made retreat behind the screen of underbrush the more
inviting in face of the numerous figures in khaki which they saw
swarming forward through the openings in the foliage. Instead of a
determined stand on the Lai Fuon line, there was only a rearguard
action, fitfully though never clumsily carried out by the veteran
Prussians, in their injured pride at having to yield to the American
novices.
With no thought except to keep on going, when the Ohioans emerged
from the woods into the open, they pressed on toward the commanding
positions of Montfaucon on their right. The fact that there was nothing
like a practicable road for their transport through the woods behind
them now developed a handicap which they appreciated keenly in their
eager appetites and the thought of shields for the next days' attacks.
Though tanks and artillery were of no service in the woods, they were
needed now. The tanks assigned to assist the Ohioans as they came into
the open did not arrive until the evening, when they were short of
gasoline. The artillery, by the use of snatch ropes, managed to bring
up one battalion of guns to the south of the ravine.
When rain began to fall, it made the woodland earth soft, hampering
the efforts of the engineers, who themselves labored without food all
the day and all through the night and all the next day without pause,
as they dug and chopped away roots and cut saplings for corduroys in
making a passage through that four-mile stretch of forest---and _forêt_
it was though called a _bois_--which separated the fighters from their
beleaguered supplies. Signal corps carts, so necessary to lay the wire
for the communications which would enable the infantry to send in
reports and receive orders promptly, and the small arms ammunition
carts, which would keep soldiers who were without their shields from
being without cartridges as well, were forced through by dint of an
arduous persistence in answer to the urgency of the call. Rolling
kitchens with warm meals could do no more rolling than if they were
hotel kitchens. Ambulances had to wait at the edge of the forest for
wounded brought three and four miles on stretchers or plodding on foot
or hobbling on canes and crutches made from tree limbs.
Was this division, with its artillery, its ammunition trucks, and all
its supplies waiting upon a road through four miles of the forest
whose time of completion was uncertain, to attack the next day after
all the exertion of working its way through the forest? Of course.
The Fifth Corps was supposed to take Montfaucon on the night of the
26th. Montfaucon must be taken on the 27th, and early, too, or the
pencilings on the maps would be fatally behind ambitious objectives
in the center. To the west of Montfaucon in small patches of woods
and on crests were the positions of the Völker Stellung, which the
Germans had plotted, though they had done no digging, for the defense
of Montfaucon; but the lines where trenches were to be dug and the
points machine-guns were to occupy had been carefully assigned.
Therefore units of reserves as they arrived would know exactly where
to go without loss of time. Naturally, we wanted to attack this
position while it was still weakly held. For all the Ohio men knew,
the enemy might have already concentrated there in force, when without
their artillery, machine-guns, or trench mortars, uncertain even of a
constant supply of small arms ammunition, they began their second day's
action at the break of dawn. In swift charges the right overran the
ridges, overwhelming German reserves, who were arriving too late, on
their way forward. By 11 it had patrols in Montfaucon, and by 1.30 in
the afternoon it had cleared the enemy from the cellars as well as from
the steep and winding streets of the town, which were littered with the
débris of buildings that had crumbled under shell-fire.
Against the left brigade the Germans did not depend upon defensive
tactics alone. Their reserves, more prompt in arriving than on the
right, counter-attacked at 9 A.M. to stem the brigade's advance. There
was a pitched battle, a conflict of charges, for a fierce half-hour;
but the brigade, putting in the last of its reserves, won the mastery,
and at 9.30 was in pursuit of the enemy. An hour later its advance
elements, running a gamut of artillery and machine-gun fire, were in
the village of Ivoiry. Now turning their attention to the conquest
of Hill 256 beyond the town, which was lashing them with plunging
machine-gun fire, storming parties finally swept over the crest; but
their exposure to the blasts which the enemy promptly concentrated made
their position untenable. With the left holding its gains after this
slight withdrawal, the center advanced at 5.45 and took a strong and
threatening position which made the victory of the day more secure. The
line at dark was along the Ivoiry-Montfaucon road.
After the exhaustion of fighting its way through the forest on the
first day, the 37th had used every available man on the second day.
The engineers had now made a road through the forest. This, being
unequal to caring for all the transport in a steady flow, was the more
inadequate owing to the delays due to the repair of sloughs, which
were always appearing at some point in its four-mile length. Hungry
infantrymen lying on the moist ground were wondering if they would
ever have the strength to rise again. The prodigal, hasty crowding in
of reserves which necessity required had exposed all the troops to the
widespread artillery fire and the long-range sweep of bullets, which
caused many casualties.
On the next day, the 28th, the Army command, as we know, was to call
for a supreme effort all along the line. Despite the tireless labor of
the gunners with their snatch ropes, most of the 37th's artillery was
still stalled where it could be of no service. Without their shields
the Ohio men again rose to the attack at seven on the morning of the
28th. In half an hour they had entered the Emont Wood on their left and
the Beuge Wood on their right. They continued on toward the village
of Cierges until the blasts of fire from the heights and woods of the
whale-back, not only upon the elements in advance but upon those in
support, forced them to take cover. They were now within a quarter of
a mile of the Cierges-Nantillois road. Meanwhile the Germans had been
filling Emont Wood with phosgene gas to such an extent that it became
untenable. In another attack at 5.45 P.M. the Ohio men encircled the
wood. By dark their outposts were just south of Cierges.
Gettysburg did not last three full days, but any veterans who fought
throughout that battle will have some idea of what the 37th Division
as a whole had endured on September 26th, 27th, and 28th. The division
commander reported lack of food and a "condition of almost collapse"
among his men, which did not weaken the determination of Corps or
Army to expend any energy remaining in the 37th in another effort on
the next day to "crack" the chain of heights between the Aire and the
whale-back. How fruitless this proved only makes the final effort of
the 37th the more appealing. The Ohio men were willing; they were
willing, after shivering on wet earth all night without blankets, as
long as they had strength enough to stagger to their feet,--and they
might have had more strength if they had had more food. There was only
one relieving feature of their situation, so unfavorable from the
first. A German water-point equal to supplying the whole division had
been captured. There was enough to drink, if not enough to eat: that
is, for such units as the water-carts could reach.
Yet Corps and Army thought the 37th ought to be very cheerful. Hadn't
they been assigned, on the morning of the 28th, ten small tanks to
assist them in taking Cierges? The tanks were moving gallantly along
the western edge of Emont Wood until the German artillery, from the
heights which had them in plain view, concluded that they had gone far
enough, and put them out of action. Then the German artillery turned
its undivided attention to assisting the German infantry, concentrating
its volume upon any attempt of the Ohioans, whose brains and legs
were numb from fatigue, to storm particularly murderous flanking
machine-gun nests. Patrols, creeping up ravines and dodging bursts of
shells, succeeded in entering Cierges. They could not be supported
by the artillery, which was now up, as it had run out of ammunition.
Thus our guns were silent when the enemy started a counter-attack
beyond Cierges; but the vengeful and accurate fire of the infantry soon
sent the survivors of the advancing German wave to cover. Later the
artillery, having received some ammunition, when it had an aeroplane
signal of the Germans massing for another counter-attack, scotched it
promptly. If the Germans could not budge us, we could not budge them.
Every time we showed our heads in any effort for another gain, we
stirred up a hornet's nest of bullets and offered a fresh target for a
storm of shell-bursts.
Late in the afternoon word came from the 91st, asking coöperation
from the 37th in a further advance to relieve pressure on the wedge
it had driven past the fronts of its neighbors. The fact that the
message was two hours in transit was sufficient comment on the state
of communication between divisions which had extended themselves to
the limit of their power. The Ohio men who were already intrenching
might still be willing to charge, but it was the willingness of the
spirit rather than of the flesh. Had every gun and machine-gun on their
front there on the threshold of the whale-back been silenced, and had
they been ordered to march another two miles over that rough ground, a
majority would have dropped in their tracks from exhaustion. There was
nothing to do but stick where they were. This was as easy as for logs
of wood to lie in their places. They fell asleep over their spades, and
the bursts of high-explosive shells which shook the earth did not waken
them. All they asked of the world was rest and food.
Remaining in a stationary line all the next day, they had recovered
enough strength to march back when the 32nd Division relieved them on
the night of the 30th. At the cost of 3,460 casualties their rushing
tactics, keeping the jump on the enemy, had taken 1,120 prisoners and
23 guns. Fatigue and sickness from exposure, as well as casualties, had
worn them down. If they had fought with less abandon of energy, with
less resolute and vivid spirit, their casualties would have been much
larger. From the first they had thrown in all their reserves; and to
the end they had fought with all their numbers in order to overcome the
handicaps of their mission.
On the right of the Fifth Corps the 79th Division, National Army
from the Atlantic Coast--Pennsylvania, Maryland, and the District
of Columbia--was to have its baptism of fire at the same time as
the Pacific Coast men on the Corps left,--a baptism preparing it
for its memorable service later in taking Hill 378, or the Borne
de Cornouiller, on the east bank of the Meuse. In place of its own
artillery brigade, which had not yet received its guns, it had three
regiments, less six batteries, of the veteran artillery of the 32nd
Division, and one regiment of that of the 41st Division, National Guard
from the Pacific Coast.
As one of the two divisions which had never been under fire before,
the 79th had been given the farthest objective of any division. The
German trenches on its front were everywhere in the open, crowning
a gentle ridge. The wire had been badly cut, but the Eastern Coast
men made no more fuss over that handicap than their neighbors. When
they came to the top of the ridge, they might see the field of their
action, in its relation to the Army plan, spread before them. There
was the route of their advance, following a valley with the ribbon
of the Esnes-Montfaucon road at its bottom, and the distant ruins of
Montfaucon on their high hill as distinct a goal as the stone column of
a lighthouse on a shore. They were not only to take this on the first
day, but to pass on down the slopes beyond, and, conquering patches of
woods and ravines, carry their flying wedge to the foot of the heights
of the whale-back. On the second day Army ambition designed to assail
the whale-back itself, as we know. Well might these inexperienced
troops have asked in irony: "Is that all you expect of us? Don't you
think we can do it in the forenoon, and take the whale-back in the
afternoon, so that we can get on to the Lille-Metz railway tomorrow?"
As the 79th had open country to traverse, it ought to go fast. With
adjoining divisions clearing the walls of the valley leading up to
Montfaucon, it was supposed to be marching over a boulevard compared
to the route which the 37th had in the Montfaucon forest. Indeed
every division was given the idea that all it had to do was to keep
deployed and moving according to schedule. As for the distance itself
which the 79th had to travel, any golfer may measure it as two and
a half times that of an eighteen-hole round, with a quarter of the
distance through traps and bunkers, and the rest altogether in the
rough of a surpassingly hilly course, while he carries a rifle and
a soldier's pack and ammunition. In the immediate foreground was a
belt of weed-grown shell-craters, their edges joining, the passage
being further complicated by the ruins of two villages--Haucourt and
Malancourt--within the area of the trench system. On the left, over the
moist slippery weeds of the shell-craters, the men could not keep pace
in the mist with the barrage, which had been made specially rapid in
order to urge them to the rapid movement required; but this delay did
not prove important.
From Montfaucon the German observers could see the wave of khaki
figures distinctly as they came down the slope toward the valley. It
was a sight to thrill any veteran with professional admiration of the
drill-ground precision of these young soldiers in dipping and rising
with the folds of the ground. There seemed not enough superfluous fat
among the division's privates to have given a single war profiteer
that rotundity with which we associate the corpulency of a parvenu's
fortune. They were pantherishly lean, trained down to elastic sinews
and supple muscles. In every eye there was a direct and eager glance,
quick in response to any order. Looking at these thousands of athletes,
with their clean-cut and intelligent faces, one was not surprised that
the Army command thought that to such men nothing was impossible.
For the first three hours they made a parade of their daring mission as
a flying wedge. They had only to continue to march, each man guiding
by the man on his right and left, while the sun shone genially, and
war, once they were through the trench system, was little more than a
stroll across country in excellent company. The observers on Montfaucon
might not gratify the appetite of their eyes by sending over barrages
of shell-fire into such a distinct target. All the Germans' available
artillery force, which was slight at that time, must be concentrated
elsewhere. Let those American amateurs come on! There was trouble in
store for them.
When the 79th came down into the valley, a hill in front of Montfaucon
was now on the sky-line, instead of the ruins of the town. There were
hills all around them, while they were exposed in the valley bottom.
To the right in the 4th Division's sector was the hill and village of
Cuisy, high points in a series of irregular commanding slopes. On the
left was the Cuisy Wood, as the eastern end of the Montfaucon woods was
called. So they were between the two Cuisys. The Cuisy Wood was in the
79th's sector. The machine-gun nests there served notice of one of the
disadvantages of open country when they began firing from the cover
on the visible foe. Checked by this fire, and forced to take cover in
shell-craters and any dead spaces available, the Eastern Coast men
found that whenever they showed themselves the air cracked and sung
with bullets. This was the trouble that the Germans had in pickle for
them; this was war in earnest. They were now without barrages. They
could not close with the enemy in an abandoned rush through a screen of
woodland: the enemy had all the woodland to himself. Moreover, they had
to advance uphill over very treacherous ground.
With the help of tanks and of the 37th exerting its pressure on the
left, Cuisy Wood was taken after three hours' fighting; but valuable
time had been lost. The center, striving to pass over the crest of
Hill 294 in front of Montfaucon, was blown back by converging blasts
from machine-guns. Cuisy and the ridges on the right, as threatening
as those on the left, were not yet taken. The 79th was in an open area
of interlocking fire, though in a lesser degree than the 28th in the
valley of the Aire. There was confusion owing to errors which were not
always those of the young officers and the men, only waiting in their
willingness to go where they were told against any kind of resistance.
One of the young officers, finding himself alone, as the morning mist
lifted, in the midst of machine-gun nests, forced the gunners to
surrender and to point out the location of sixteen other nests.
In ratio to the importance of the thrust of the 79th was the
responsibility of its senior officers, regimental and brigade. They had
come to test in the field their ability as professional soldiers; when
the amount of fat they had accumulated on their bodies and in their
minds would have its influence on their endurance and judgment. There
was contradiction in commands; uncertainty in decisions; higher orders
were not carried out. In one case the natural military initiative of
a tank commander gave the word to advance, which was all that the men
wanted. Instead of reserves being sent in to keep the jump on the enemy
by swift taking of positions, he was allowed time to recover his morale
and bring reinforcements and machine-guns into position.
Corps was displeased with this hesitation; Army equally so. They still
had their eyes on the distant goal that they had set for the day's end.
The 79th was told to press on at dusk and that it was expected to reach
Nantillois and its full objective during the night. This, of course,
required only the writing of a message. Without artillery support
a regiment made a brave and fruitless attempt against a deluge of
hand-grenades and interlocking machine-gun fire. During the night the
division commander relieved a senior officer who had failed to carry
out his orders, read lessons to others, and reorganized his command.
The road across the two miles of trench system and of shell-craters,
being used by two divisions, despite the work of the engineers was
wholly unequal to demands. As it passed over a ridge the trucks,
sinking into sloughs which seemed to have no bottom, were frequently
blocked in the ascent.
The 79th had two battalions of artillery up when it attacked the
next morning. Now it had its "second wind." The men were given rein.
Practically without shields, neither shells nor hand-grenades nor
bullets could stay their progress. On the right they began driving
ahead under the flanking machine-guns of Cuisy before dawn at 4 A.M. On
the left they started at 7 A.M. Their only _liaison_ with their flanks
was by mounted messenger, as their motorcycles were of no service
until Montfaucon was reached. Their units intermingled with those of
adjoining divisions, and advanced with them in that determined rush to
"get there." By 11 A.M. the 79th had men in Montfaucon with those of
the 37th. A regiment was re-formed and ordered to flank Nantillois on
the right, but now, going down the north slopes, it was in full view of
the artillery from the whale-back. The left was stopped in the Beuge
Wood. It had been a day of incessant and wearing effort of the same
kind that the 37th had suffered. The road was in better condition, the
troops received some though not sufficient food. A hundred burros were
invaluable in bringing up ammunition.
The next day being the critical 28th, the orders were for the 79th to
exert itself to the utmost. It was still advancing in country perfectly
open to view from the whale-back and its covering positions. In the
morning the regiments which had been in reserve, now being in front,
proved that woods fighting was no monopoly by cleaning up all the
machine-gun nests in the Beuge Wood and storming the ridge beyond Hill
268, and taking Nantillois before noon. Then they were re-formed and
given a little time for rest,--if rest was the word for hugging cover
under incessant shell-fire. With the aid of tanks two attacks were
made on the Ogons Wood beyond Nantillois under the German artillery
fire from the whale-back, which was at close quarters and as accurate
as the plunging machine-gun fire which accompanied it.
The two tanks, so inadequate for their task, did not go far before both
were hit. The infantry came near enough to the Ogons to realize that
at the ratio of the increasing resistance our survivors who reached
it would be hopelessly unequal to taking the machine-guns firing from
its edge. Withdrawal was necessary to the south slopes of the crest in
the rear, Hill 274, if the troops in their present position were not
to be offered as sacrifice to the nests of artillery the enemy now had
in position. Undaunted by the shell-fire on the road, the transport
was able that night to reach Montfaucon, which was kept under such a
heavy bombardment that there was no going farther without blocking the
road with wreckage. Though in a trance of weariness, carrying parties
brought the food and other supplies three miles through the zone of
shell-fire to the front.
A willing horse was still to be driven for another day. The 79th was
to be sent against the slopes of the whale-back. Morning revealed
the enemy's artillery in still greater force; and there was mockery
for the men as they breasted it in the sight of a German observation
balloon, lazily floating above the whale-back and directing the guns
in firing on any parties who might have found ravines or slopes out
of sight of observers from the heights. All day the left strove for
gains in fitful attacks, and gained some three hundred yards. The
right, in a determination that shell-fire could not balk, reached the
edge of the Ogons Wood. That was something; courage's final defiance
in its exhaustion, before the thin line, which had looked into the
recesses where the hidden machine-guns opened upon them, withdrew to
their former position. The 79th was "expended," to use the military
phrase; and the meaning of that was in the hollow eyes of pasty faces
and in dragging footsteps. On the 30th its part was that of the other
divisions from the Meuse to the Forest, hugging the pits it had dug
under shell-fire. In the afternoon it was relieved by the veteran 3rd
Division.
Having brought the account of the battle down to the standstill which
closed the first stage, we may now turn our attention to the American
divisions which were engaged with Allied armies in other decisive
attacks of this crucial period.