BOMBED FROM THE AIR
After only a few days and nights of rest, the regiments were moved off
to the southward a few miles, then turned sharply to the west, thus
passing around a district that still was being shelled heavily by the
Germans in an effort to hold the Allied force back until they could get
their own materials out of the Chateau-Thierry salient.
Thus they came again to the Marne, which turns sharply south at
Chateau-Thierry, and here they made camp again and received contingents
of "casuals"--that is, men unattached to any regiments--who had been
sent to fill up the depleted ranks. The shattered companies were
refilled, Companies L and M, of the 109th, and B and C, of the 110th,
becoming almost new organizations. The newcomers were made welcome and
proved to be good soldier material, but few of them were
Pennsylvanians.
The march was resumed July 24th over a road paralleling the railroad
line from Paris to Chateau-Thierry, which followed the course of the
river rather closely, except for its numerous bends. The doughboys were
anxious to see Chateau-Thierry, which already, even among these lads who
were out of touch with events in other parts of the war area, had loomed
large in their talk. They had heard much of it and of the achievements
there and in the vicinity of other American troops, notably the marines,
and they were eager to see it.
They saw it, however, only in glimpses from the far side of the river,
for they kept on up the road and did not cross the river there.
That night they bivouacked in woods along the Marne. Here the 109th had
its first taste of night air raiding. The regiment halted at the little
town of Chierry, just east of Chateau-Thierry, but on the south bank.
One battalion remained there, another crossed the river on pontoon
bridges, left behind by the French and Americans now in pursuit of the
fleeing Germans, and remained in the hamlet of Brasles for the night,
and the third was ordered out to guard the bridges.
About three o'clock in the morning sentries heard the whir of airplane
motors, and fired their rifles. The sharpshooters of the regiment rushed
to the edge of the woods with rifles and supplies of ammunition, and the
anti-aircraft guns around Chateau-Thierry set up their baying. The
109th's marksmen tried a few shots, but the range was too great for
effective shooting, and the flyers turned tail and disappeared in the
face of the air barrage from the big guns before they got within good
rifle range of our men.
Next day the regiments remained in camp, and that night another
battalion of the 109th stood guard on the bridges. This time the flyers
apparently had crossed the river to the east or the west, for they came
up from the south, directly over the bridges at Chierry, probably
returning from an attempt to raid Paris.
They rained bombs. There was no possible chance for the marksmen this
time. Rather it was a question of keeping out of the way of the
death-dealing missiles hurtling earthward. Again the anti-aircraft guns
gave tongue, and after ten minutes or so of this explosive outburst the
airplanes disappeared. Then the 109th learned something of the
difficulties airmen experience in trying to hit a particular mark.
Although the river had been churned to foam by the hail of bombs, only
one bridge was hit and the damage to it was so slight as to be repaired
easily.
Early next morning, July 26th, the period of inaction came to an end.
The regiments were ordered out on a route to the northeast, which would
carry them somewhat east of Fere-en-Tardenois, in the middle of the
Soissons-Rheims "pocket," which fell some days later.
Orders were for the Pennsylvanians to press along that route with all
speed until they effected contact with the retreating enemy, and to
exert all possible pressure to harass him and push him as far and as
rapidly as possible.
Gradually, as the regiments moved forward, the sound of the firing
became louder, and they realized they were overtaking the ebbing tide of
Germans. Officers, having learned by bitter experience at the Marne the
value of the British suggestion to do away in battle with marks
distinguishing them as of commissioned rank, stripped their uniforms of
insignia and camouflaged themselves to look like enlisted men. The
officer casualties in those first few days of fighting could not be
maintained without working irreparable harm to the organizations.
Orders were issued to beware of every spot that might shelter a sniper
or a machine gun. The regiments deployed into lines of skirmishers,
greatly extending the front covered and reducing the casualties from
shell fire. Patrols were out in advance, and every precaution was taken
against surprise by parties of Germans that might have been left behind
in the retreat.
The Germans still were using gas shells, and again the masks were
inspected carefully and donned. Overhead, enemy aircraft circled, but
Allied airman and anti-aircraft guns were active enough to keep them at
a respectful distance. They were unable to harry the Americans with
machine gun fire. Occasionally, a bombing flyer, protected by a covey of
fighters, would get into what he believed to be a favorable position for
unloosing a bomb, but these did no damage to the thin lines of our
troops.
At night they made their way into the forests and lay there. There was
little sleeping, but the men were grateful for the rest. They evaded the
vigilance of the airplane observers, so they were not molested by a
concentrated artillery fire, against which the forest would have been
poor shelter, but the continual roar of the artillery and the occasional
shell that came with a rending crash into the woods effectually disposed
of any chance to sleep. The men crept close to the trunks of the larger
trees. Some dug themselves little shelters close to the trees, but the
night was a terrible one, and the day, when it came, was almost a
relief.
The regiments now were in a region where the Germans had been long
enough to establish themselves, where they had expected to stay, but had
been driven out sullenly and reluctantly, fighting bitter rear-guard
actions the whole way. Our men had their first opportunity to learn what
it means to a peaceful countryside to face a German invasion.
The wonderful roads for which France so long had been noted were
totally effaced in places, sometimes by shell fire, often with every
evidence of having been mined. Here and there were tumbled heaps of
masonry, representing what had once been happy little villages, many of
the houses centuries old. Trees and grape vines had been hacked off
close to the ground, and often the trunks of trees were split and
chopped as if in maniacal fury. Where the Huns had not had time to chop
trees down, they had cut rings deep into the trunks to kill them.
They saw the finest homes of the wealthiest landowners and the humblest
cottages of the peasants absolutely laid in ruins--furniture,
tapestries, clothing, all scattered broadcast. Handsome rugs were
tramped into the mud of the fields and roads. It was as if a titanic
hurricane had swept the entire country.
There had been no time to bury the dead, and the men actually suffered,
mentally and physically, from the sights and the stench. At one place
they came on a machine gun emplacement, with dead Boche lying about in
heaps. Close beside one of the guns, almost in a sitting posture, with
one arm thrown over the weapon as if with pride of possession, was an
American lad, his fine, clean-cut face fixed by death in a glorified
smile of triumph.
Scores of officers and men almost unconsciously clicked their hands up
to the salute in silent tribute to this fair-haired young gladiator who
had not lived to enjoy his well-won laurels.
It was about this time that the Pennsylvanians saw one of the few really
picturesque sights in modern warfare--a touch of the war of olden times,
which had been seen seldom since Germany went mad in 1914. Troop after
troop of cavalry, some French, some American, passed them, the gallant
horsemen sitting their steeds with conscious pride, their jingling
accoutrements playing an accompaniment to their sharp canter, and round
after round of cheers from the Americans sped them on their way to harry
the retreating foe.
During a brief halt along a road for rest a part of the 110th Infantry
took shelter under an overhanging bank while a sudden spurt of heavy
enemy fire drenched the vicinity. There were few casualties and the
officers were just beginning to congratulate themselves on having
chosen a fortunate position for their rest when a large high-explosive
shell landed on the edge of the bank directly above Company A. Two men
were killed outright and several were wounded. Lieutenant George W. R.
Martin, of Narberth, rushed to the wounded to apply first-aid treatment.
The first man he reached was Private Allanson R. Day, Jr., nineteen
years old, of Monongahela City, Pa., whom the men called "Deacon,"
because of a mildness of manner and a religious turn of mind.
"Well, Deacon, are you hard hit?" asked Lieutenant Martin, as he
prepared his first-aid application.
"There's Paul Marshall, Lieutenant; he's hit worse than I am. Dress him
first, please, sir. I can wait," replied the Deacon, who died later of
his wounds.
The Pennsylvanians had thought they hated the Hun when they left
America. They had learned more of him and his ways below the Marne, and
they found their loudly-voiced threats and objurgations turning to a
steely, silent, implacable wrath that was ten times more terrible and
more ominous for the enemy. The farther they penetrated in the wake of
the Boche the more deep-seated and lasting became this feeling of utter
detestation. Not for worlds would they have turned back then. Had word
come that peace was declared it is doubtful if the officers could have
held them back. The iron had entered their souls.
During the progress of all these events east of Chateau-Thierry, the
112th Infantry had come up and had been in the desperate fighting in the
vicinity of that town, so that when the Franco-American attack from
Soissons to Bussiares, on the western side of the pocket, began to
compel a German retirement from the Marne, that regiment was right on
their heels.
The 110th and the 111th were close behind and all three soon came into
contact with the fleeing enemy.
In all their engagements the greatest difficulty the officers had to
contend with was the eagerness of the men to come to grips with the
enemy. Repeatedly they overran their immediate objectives and several
times walked into their own barrage so determinedly that officers,
unable to halt the troops so hungry for revenge, had to call off the
barrage to save them from being destroyed by our own guns.
The Pennsylvanians pressed on relentlessly. The 109th Infantry now was
rushing up from the Marne to resume its meteorlike career as a fighting
unit beside its fellow regiments of the old National Guard, and word was
received that the 53d Field Artillery Brigade, commanded by
Brigadier-General W. G. Price, Jr., of Chester, was hurrying up to
participate in its first action.
Still other organizations of the Twenty-eighth Division hastening to the
front were the ammunition train and the supply train. The division was
being reassembled, for the first time after leaving Camp Hancock, as
rapidly as the exigencies of hard campaigning would permit.
With the 112th and 111th in the van, the Pennsylvanians pushed
northeastward after the Germans. It was at times when the Huns had
stopped, apparently determined to make a stand at last, only to be
blasted out of their holding positions by the Americans and continue
their flight that, as so many officers wrote home, they "could not run
fast enough to keep up with Fritz," and the artillery was outdistanced
hopelessly.
Repeatedly our doughboys had to be held up in their headlong rush to
permit the artillery to catch up. It being useless to waste life by
sending infantry against the formidable German positions without
artillery support, our lines were held back until the struggling field
guns could come up to silence the German guns by expert counter battery
work.
The Pennsylvanians were wild with eagerness and excitement. None but the
officers had access to maps, and hundreds of the men, having only hazy
ideas as to the geography of France or the distances they had traveled,
believed they were pushing straight for Germany and had not far to go.
One and all realized fully that, when they began their fighting, the
Germans for months had been moving forward triumphantly. They realized
just as well that the Germans now were in flight before them. Each man
felt that to his particular company belonged the glory of that reversal
of conditions. Thus, scores wrote home: "Our company was all that stood
between the Boche and Paris, and we licked him and have him on the
run"--or words to that effect.
They were like a set of rabbit hounds, almost whining in their anxiety
to get at the foe. Deluged by high explosives, shrapnel and gas shells,
seeing their comrades mowed down by machine gun fire, bombed from the
sky, alternately in pouring rain and burning sun, hungry half the time,
their eyes burning from want of sleep, half suffocated from long
intervals in gas masks, undergoing all the hardships of a bitter
campaign against a determined, vigorous and unscrupulous enemy, yet
their only thought was to push on--and on--and on.
The likeness to rabbit hounds is not uncomplimentary or far-fetched. One
soldier wrote home: "We have had the Boche on the run in open country,
and it has been like shooting rabbits--and I am regarded as a good shot
in the army."