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HEADQUARTERS 28TH DIVISION
AMERICAN EXPEDITIONARY FORCES
FRANCE
27th October 1918.
MEMORANDUM - RED KEYSTONES
A RED KEYSTONE has been designated as the distinctive insignia of this
Division.
Keystones are to be worn on all coats and overcoats, including the
trench and short coats worn by officers, and the Mackinaws issued to
Engineers motorcycle drivers, etc., but not on the slicker.
A standard size of Keystone of selected color and quality of cloth has
been adopted and contracted for by the Quartermaster's Department. These
will be issued at the rate of two per man and no others will be worn.
They are to be sewed on the left sleeve with red thread, the top to be
on the line of the seam.
The proportions of a Keystone are shown below:
[Illustration]
By command of Major General Hay:
OFFICIAL: W.C. Sweeney,
Richard W. Watson, Chief of Staff.
Major, Adjutant
[Illustration]
THE OFFICIAL ORDER DESIGNATING THE 28TH AS THE
KEYSTONE DIVISION (_Reduced_)
THE IRON DIVISION
NATIONAL GUARD OF PENNSYLVANIA
IN THE WORLD WAR
THE AUTHENTIC AND COMPREHENSIVE
NARRATIVE OF THE GALLANT
DEEDS AND GLORIOUS ACHIEVEMENTS
OF THE 28TH DIVISION IN
THE WORLD'S GREATEST WAR
BY
H. G. PROCTOR
[Illustration]
PHILADELPHIA
THE JOHN C. WINSTON COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
Copyright, 1919, by
THE JOHN C. WINSTON CO.
Copyright, 1918, by
THE EVENING BULLETIN
TO THE
MOTHERS OF PENNSYLVANIA,
AND ESPECIALLY THOSE WHO MOURN FOR
LADS WHO LIE IN THE SOIL
OF FRANCE,
THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED
FOREWORD
If love, admiration and respect, with a sense of personal gratification
at seeing the hopes and predictions of years fulfilled, may be pleaded
as justification for a self-appointed chronicler, then this book needs
no excuse. It is offered with a serene confidence that it does justice,
and nothing more than simple justice, to as fine and gallant a body of
soldiers as ever represented this great commonwealth in action.
There must be, for the loved ones of these modern crusaders, as well as
for the thousands of former members of the National Guard, who, like the
writer, whole-heartedly envied the opportunities for glorious service
that came to their successors in the organization, a sense of deep and
abiding pride in the priceless record of achievement. To all such, and
to those others to whom American valor is always a readable subject,
whatever the locale, the narrative is presented as not unworthy of its
cause.
H. G. P.
CONTENTS
PAGE
I. MEN OF IRON 11
II. OFF FOR THE FRONT 25
III. THE LAST HUN DRIVE 48
IV. "KILL OR BE KILLED" 60
V. THE GUARD STANDS FAST 77
VI. BOCHE IN FULL FLIGHT 91
VII. BOMBED FROM THE AIR 108
VIII. IN HEROIC MOLD 121
IX. THE CHURCH OF RONCHERES 137
X. AT GRIPS WITH DEATH 157
XI. DRIVE TO THE VESLE 168
XII. IN DEATH VALLEY 184
XIII. STARS OF GRIM DRAMA 199
XIV. AMBULANCIERS TO FRONT 213
XV. A MARTIAL PANORAMA 227
XVI. IN THE ARGONNE 241
XVII. MILLION DOLLAR BARRAGE 251
XVIII. "AN ENVIABLE REPUTATION" 262
XIX. ENSANGUINED APREMONT 278
XX. TOWARD HUNLAND 291
ILLUSTRATIONS
THE OFFICIAL ORDER DESIGNATING
THE 28TH AS THE KEYSTONE DIVISION _Frontispiece_
PAGE
FRANCE AT LAST! IRON DIVISION
DEBARKING 22
INTO THE MAW OF BATTLE 186
BRIEFLY AT REST IN THE ARGONNE
FOREST 248
CHAPTER I
MEN OF IRON
"You are not soldiers! You are men of iron!"
Such was the tribute of an idolized general to the men of the
Twenty-eighth Division, United States Army, after the division had won
its spurs in a glorious, breath-taking fashion at the second battle of
the Marne in July and August, 1918.
The grizzled officer, his shrewd, keen eyes softened to genuine
admiration for the deeds of the gallant men and with real sorrow for the
fallen, uttered his simple praise to a little group of officers at a
certain headquarters.
It was too good to keep. It was repeated with a glow of pride to junior
officers and swept through all ranks of the entire division in an
incredibly short time. The gratified and delighted soldiery, already
feeling the satisfaction of knowing their task had been well done,
seized upon the words and became, to themselves and all who knew them,
the "Iron Division."
The words of praise have been attributed to General Pershing. Whether
they actually emanated from him has not been clearly established. That
they did come from a source high enough to make them authoritative there
is no shadow of doubt.
Furthermore, to make the approval wholly official and of record, there
has come to the division from General Pershing a citation entitling
every officer and enlisted man to wear on his left sleeve, just under
the shoulder seam, a scarlet keystone, an unique distinction in the
American Army. The citation called the Twenty-eighth a "Famous Red
Fighting Division," but even this formal designation has not supplanted,
in the minds of the soldiers, the name of "The Iron Division," which
they regard as their especial pride.
And, to make the record complete, scores of the officers and men
throughout the division have been cited for gallantry and awarded the
Distinguished Service Cross by General Pershing, while others have won
the French decoration, the Croix de Guerre.
So it is that the former National Guard of Pennsylvania has carried on
the fame and glory which were the heritage of its fathers from the Civil
War and from every other war in the history of the nation. At the cost
of many precious young lives and infinite suffering, it is true, but
that is war, whose recompense is that the victory was America's and that
our men magnificently upheld all the traditions of their land.
Regiments and smaller units of the division which did not get into the
line in time for that first swift battle looked with envy upon their
comrades who did and pridefully appropriated the division's new-found
honors, announcing themselves "members of the Iron Division." And when
their own time came, they lived well up to the title and reputation.
Held up to scorn and contempt for years as "tin soldiers," made the
plaything of the pettiest politics, hampered and hindered at every
emergency and then thrown in a sector where it was believed they would
have a chance to become fire-hardened without too great responsibility
falling to their lot, they met the brunt of the last German advance
from the Marne, held it and sent the enemy back, reeling, broken and
defeated, saved Paris and won the grateful and admiring praise of their
veteran French comrades in arms.
Throughout all the years of upbuilding in full belief that the time
would come when they would have a chance to vindicate their faith in the
National Guard system, a devoted group of officers and enlisted men
remained faithful and unshaken. The personnel fell and rose, fell and
rose. Men constantly dropped out of the service as their enlistments
expired and the burden of recruiting and training new men was always to
be met. It was discouraging work, but carried forward steadily and
unfalteringly.
Persons who visited the National Guard of Pennsylvania in its training
camps, especially the last one in this country, Camp Hancock, at
Augusta, Ga., were impressed with the quiet confidence with which the
older officers and enlisted men viewed their handiwork. Many of the
newer men in the service, catching the spirit of confidence, voiced it
in boyish boastfulness.
"These men are ripe and ready," said the older, more thoughtful ones.
"They will give a good account of themselves when the time arrives. They
are trained to the minute, and Pennsylvania never will have need to be
ashamed of them."
"Just wait until this little old division gets to France," bragged the
younger ones. "The Hun won't have a chance. We'll show 'em something
they don't know. Go get 'em; that's us."
And today, Pennsylvania, mourning, grief-stricken, but aglow with pride
and love for that gallant force, agrees with both.
It is an odd coincidence that the Twenty-eighth Division of the German
army should have been one of the most frequently mentioned organizations
of the Kaiser's forces during the war and that it, too, should have
acquired, by its exploits, a title all its own. It was known as "the
Flying Shock Division," and on frequent occasions it was disclosed,
through the capture of prisoners, that the two Twenty-eighth Divisions
were opposing each other--a fact eloquent in itself of the esteem in
which the enemy held our Pennsylvania lads as foemen, for the "Flying
Shock Division" was shunted from one end of the Western Front to the
other, wherever a desperate situation for the Germans called for
desperate fighting.
In the heroic stand of the Pennsylvania Guardsmen may be traced one more
instance of the truth of the adage that "history repeats itself." On the
field of Gettysburg a handsome monument marks the crest of Pickett's
charge, the farthest point to which Confederate fighting men penetrated
in their efforts to break through the Union lines. Here they were met
and stopped by Pennsylvania troops (the Philadelphia Brigade). Had they
not been stopped, military authorities have agreed, the battle of
Gettysburg almost certainly would have been lost to the Union. The whole
course of the war probably would have been changed and the Confederacy
would have been within sight of ultimate victory.
But they were met and stopped by the Pennsylvania troops. From that time
the cause of the Confederacy was a losing one, and for that reason the
monument is inscribed as marking "The High Water Mark of the
Rebellion."
It is not inconceivable that, when the time comes to erect monuments on
the battlefields of the Great War, one will stand at or near the tiny
village of St. Agnan, in the Department of the Aisne, France, fixing the
"high-water mark" of the German bid for world domination.
Here it was, at this village and its vicinity, that Pennsylvania troops
met and defeated the flower of the German army, halted the drive and
sent the Huns staggering backward in what turned, within a few days, to
wild flight. The Germans, in their first rush through Belgium and France
in 1914, came closer than that to Paris, but with less chance of
success. Then virtually everything was against them except the
tremendous impetus of their forward movement. In July, 1918, everything
favored them, and the entire world awaited with bated breath and
agonized heart the news that Paris was invested.
When it seemed that nothing could prevent this crowning blow to our
beloved Ally, the advancing Germans struck a portion of the line held by
Pennsylvania's erstwhile despised National Guardsmen. Instead of news
that Paris lay under the invader's heel came the gloriously thrilling
tidings that the German was in retreat before our very own men, and that
it was again Pennsylvania troops which had turned the tide.
To get a proper perspective on the organizations comprising the Iron
Division, it is necessary to go back a few years in the history of the
National Guard, before the various reorganizations to which it was
subjected. The division was a product of gradual growth since the
Spanish-American War. After that brief conflict, the National Guard of
Pennsylvania set out upon a new course of development almost as a new
organization.
In 1916, it consisted of four infantry brigades of three regiments each;
one regiment of artillery; one battalion of engineers; one battalion of
signal troops; two field hospitals, three ambulance companies and one
regiment of cavalry.
The call for service in the threatened war with Mexico, resulting in a
tedious tour of duty at Camp Stewart, Texas, on the Mexican border,
caused lively recruiting and the upbuilding of the units. This was
nearly offset on the return home by the eagerness of officers and
enlisted men, disgusted with the fruitless task assigned them on the
border, to get out of the service. When America entered the war against
Germany, however, recruiting again livened up, but in the meantime the
tables of organization of the whole army had been so changed and the
regiments so enlarged that it was necessary to send quotas of selected
men to fill the ranks to the required strength.
During the service on the Mexican border, a brigade of artillery had
been formed and the number of infantry brigades was reduced to three.
Also, a start was made on the work of expanding the engineer battalion
into a regiment.
The division moved into camp at Augusta, Ga., from August 20 to
September 15, 1917. The post was known as Camp Hancock. Here the drafts
of selected men were received and the division was completely
reorganized to conform to the new army standards. New designations also
were awarded the units. It was necessary to reduce the number of
infantry brigades to two, of two regiments each. The First Infantry
Regiment, of Philadelphia; the Tenth, of Philippine fame, hailing from
counties in the southwestern part of the state; the Sixteenth, centering
in the oil country of the northwest, and the Eighteenth, of Pittsburgh,
were chosen as base regiments, to retain their regimental organizations
virtually intact.
The Thirteenth Infantry Regiment, of Scranton and vicinity, was broken
up and its officers and men turned into the First to bring the companies
up to the required strength. In the same manner, the Third, of
Philadelphia, was consolidated with the Tenth; the Eighth, from
Harrisburg and vicinity, with the Sixteenth, and the Sixth, from
Philadelphia and surrounding counties, with the Eighteenth.
The former First and Thirteenth became the 109th Infantry, in the new
designations; the former Third and Tenth, the 110th; the former Sixth
and Eighteenth, the 111th, and the former Eighth and Sixteenth, the
112th.
The former First Artillery, whose batteries were distributed through the
state from Pittsburgh to Phoenixville, became the 107th Field
Artillery; the historic old Second Infantry, transformed into the
Second Artillery during the border duty, whose home station is
Philadelphia, became the 108th Field Artillery. The Third Artillery,
which had been formed from the former Ninth Infantry, of Wilkes-Barre
and the surrounding anthracite towns, became the 109th Field Artillery.
The cavalry regiment disappeared. One troop, from Sunbury, remained
cavalry, being attached to division headquarters as Headquarters Troop.
The rest were scattered through different organizations. The 103d Trench
Mortar Battery was formed almost entirely from among the cavalrymen,
largely members of the famous old First City Troop of Philadelphia.
The engineer regiment became the 103d Engineers, the signal troops the
103d Field Signal Battalion, and the field hospitals and ambulance
companies became parts of the 103d Sanitary Train. In addition, there
were formed the 103d Military Police, the 103d Ammunition Train, the
103d Supply Train, and the 107th, 108th and 109th Machine Gun
battalions.
The 109th and 110th Infantry regiments were brigaded together under the
designation of the 55th Infantry Brigade. The 111th and 112th regiments
became the 56th Infantry Brigade and the three artillery regiments and
the trench mortar battery became the 53d Artillery Brigade.
There were other Pennsylvanians--many thousands of them--in the war, but
no other organization so represented every locality and every stratum of
society.
[Illustration: (C) _International Film Service._
FRANCE AT LAST! IRON DIVISION DEBARKING
After months of vexatious delays, the Pennsylvania Guardsmen
acknowledged their welcome on French soil with expansive smiles
which showed their pleasure at having come thus far on the
Great Adventure.]
And so the division went to France. The movement to a port of
embarkation began in April, 1918, and the convoy carrying the eager
soldiers arrived in a French port May 18th. The troops were separated by
organizations, brigaded with British troops in training areas and
entered upon the final phases of their instruction. The men were
discouraged by their exceptionally long period of preparation. They felt
within themselves that they were ready for the front line, and the
evident hesitation of the military authorities to put them there was
distressing. Many of them began to doubt that they would see actual
fighting. They had longed and waited for so many months that it is no
exaggeration, on the word of men who have returned, to say that their
very dreams were colored with the keen desire to try their mettle on
the enemy.
According to the system worked out by the high command for bringing new
troops up to front line caliber, they should then have gone into their
own camp within sound of the guns, but behind the actual "zone of
operations." There the division should have been reassembled and gotten
to functioning properly and smoothly as a division, and then have been
moved up by easy stages. It should have occupied one billet area after
another, each closer to the lines, until it should actually have been
under artillery fire behind the fighting line. Then, with its nerves
tautened and having learned, possibly through some losses, how best to
take care of and protect itself, it would at last have been sent into
the front line, but even then not without some misgivings and it would
have been carefully watched to see that it reacted properly to the new
conditions.
In the progress of this customary routine, the work of assembling the
division was begun a few miles northwest of Paris. Division headquarters
was established at Gonesse, a little over ten miles from the heart of
Paris. The infantry regiments and the engineers were scattered through a
myriad of villages in the vicinity, billeted in houses, stables,
buildings of any kind that could be turned to adequate shelters.
Established thus, the organizations extended over a considerable stretch
of territory. The 109th, for instance, was at Mitry and Mory, twin
villages, but a short distance apart and usually referred to, for
convenience, as one place, Mitry-Mory, eight miles by airline from
division headquarters.
The 53rd Artillery Brigade still was hard at its training work miles
away and the doughboys, surmising that they would not be withheld from
action to wait for the guns, gave thanks that it was the old Second, and
not one of their regiments, that had been turned into artillery. Men of
the old Third, particularly, recalled that it had been generally
expected, when there was talk of transforming an infantry regiment to
artillery, that theirs would be the regiment to be chosen, and that the
naming of the Second had come as something of a surprise.