ON THE CHEMIN-DES-DAMES
As early as February, 1918, American batteries were heard on the French
lines east of Rheims, where American gunners were apparently under
training by the French before going into action on their own front. An
opportunity came to them to show their quality when the French
determined to suppress a German salient which dipped into the French
position between Tahure and Butte du Mesnil, in the Champagne. It was a
difficult operation owing to the nature of the ground, which formed a
basinlike depression, into which the Germans could pour the fire of
their concentrated guns from the surrounding heights.
Artillery did the main work. American gunners took part in a six-hour
bombardment of the salient on a front of a mile, and so thoroughly were
the German defenses demolished that it took the French assaulting troops
only an hour to gain all the objectives in view. Afterward the American
gunners, with their French comrades, extended their range, developing an
effective barrage to prevent counterattacks on the newly won ground.
"American batteries gave very effective support," said the French
communiqué in reporting this successful raid.
About the same time American units appeared on the Aisne fighting front
in the vicinity of the famous Chemin-des-Dames. They had been detailed
there for training purposes; but their location was not revealed by
General Pershing until the Germans themselves knew of their presence.
They had been there weeks before their presence became known. Suddenly
ordered from their billets, they entrained to the railhead, and passed
through mile after mile of shell-scarred, desolate ground and through
several great piles of stones and débris which once were villages but
now had not a single house standing. They took up their positions
without a hitch to the music of roaring guns, both friendly and hostile,
their flashes stabbing the blackness of the night, first here and then
there, as far as the eye could see.
Many of them were quartered in quarries twenty feet underground, one
quarry having room for sheltering 3,000 men. Other recesses beneath the
surface occupied by them were partly natural in formation and improved
through blasting operations by the Germans, who occupied them for three
years. But most of the American troops were above ground, having
established themselves in trenches and dugouts which they had cleaned,
strengthened, and improved and protected by barbed-wire entanglements.
The cave dwellers' chief barracks was seventy-two feet underground. This
cave ran in long galleries with cement ceilings, and was lighted by
electricity, acetylene lamps, and oil lanterns. The troops slept on low,
double-tiered wooden bunks provided with straw. Here the troops usually
remained from four to six days each, a company being assigned to a
certain portion of the cavern. Being new to active field service, they
were not permitted to roam about at will, lest they be lost, nor to
leave the cavern at all except on duty, lest they be detected by enemy
airmen.
The appearance of Americans on this sector was greeted by the Germans
with a sign reading: "Welcome, Yankees." It was promptly riddled with
bullets till it looked like a sieve.
The French and Americans responded to this little pleasantry by an
attack on the German lines at Chevregny on February 23, 1918. The French
organized a little raid on the German lines, aided by twenty-six picked
Americans, and rehearsed the operation the day before. An hour's barrage
at dawn brought the Americans moving forward eagerly with their French
comrades. They moved so fast, indeed, that they came within thirty
yards of the dropping shells on reaching the enemy lines. It was the
first time American troops had essayed an attack under such a curtain of
fire, and their ardor actually took them beyond their objectives.
In the German trenches officers were making the rounds after morning
relief when the Americans and French burst in. The Germans rushed to
shelter in a dugout roofed with rails and sandbags; but this refuge was
immediately shattered by a French shell.
Deprived of this cover, the Germans scattered about the trench. The
entire party at this point was captured after some hand-to-hand
fighting. Other shelters and communicating trenches were cleared without
yielding any prisoners. A German counterbarrage caught the raiders and
their captives on returning across no-man's-land, wounding five Germans
and six Frenchmen, but no Americans.
[Illustration: American soldiers starting out to storm Cantigny, on the
Picardy front. They were aided by French tanks. The attack, which took
place on May 21, 1918, was entirely successful.]
The Germans directed a strong retaliatory assault against this sector a
few days later. Its repulse revealed that the Americans were in
sufficient force to hold a considerable portion of the front line. Three
companies of trained shock troops were sent to take the American
trenches under a heavy German barrage. American artillery responded
with a like curtain of fire as soon as the German barrage was raised,
and American machine guns sent streams of bullets into the advancing
enemy. The fighting was brisk for about an hour; but the accurate
machine-gun and rifle fire from the American front lines, coupled with
the perfect American barrage, which prevented reenforcements from coming
up, forced the Germans to withdraw after sustaining heavy casualties and
without having set foot in the American trenches.
After the attack a patrol was found to be missing. A platoon set out
into no-man's-land to find them in a rain of machine-gun bullets. The
German fire was too heavy, and they returned without finding any trace
of the missing men. It was assumed that the latter had been too
venturesome and were captured.