History of Company G314th Infantry

By Joseph T. Labrum Philadelphia, Pa. (1925) Formerly SergeantCo. G, 314th Infantry, U. S. A.

CHAPTER IThe Birth of a Fighting Outfit

From the date of its birth, August 29, 1917,Company "G" was a big success. Rising from thedepths of an infancy in the sandy wilderness ofCamp Meade, Maryland, it became one of thebest fighting companies in this man's army. Thatisn't boasting either, it is an established fact borneout by the reputation earned by the boys of thecompany, during their time on the front. AlsoCompany "G," we must add, is part of the SecondBattalion, Three Hundred and Fourteenth infantry, One Hundred and Fifty-seventh Brigade,Seventy-ninth Division.

As was stated before, Camp Meade was a sandywilderness when the company was born. At thattime it had accommodations for approximatelyfive hundred men, exclusive of workmen, manyof whom did not live on the newly established cantonment. The nearest railroad station was morethan a mile from where the camp was at that timelocated, while the other accommodations were akinto the rail facilities. The word accommodation isnot used advisedly, for there wasn't any such thingwhen the camp opened. However, it wasn't longbefore the land boomed and Uncle Sam made it

- look more like a camp where future fighters wereto do their training than a home for sand lizards.

At the inception of the company the followingwere its officers: Captain Harry J. Lawrence,First Lieutenant James W. Acklin, Second Lieutenants Robert H. Brigham, John H. Hollinger,Joseph R. A. Cushing and Daniel K. Chase. Tothese officers was given the task of welding together a fighting machine from a mass of men whohad little or no knowledge of what the wordsoldier meant, and who did not know whether"squads" was a command or army slang. In addition, the officers had but few men with any trainingat all to assist them. But the first men showed awillingness and desire to learn that made the taskof the officers easier, and gave them a nucleus fromwhich to pick their non-commissioned officers andestablish the company.

The officers received their first taste of workwith the new army men when on the twentieth(lay of September fifty-three men from BradfordCounty came into Camp Meade all ready for thefirst act of their part in the big drama. - Theywere a happy bunch, too, many of them beinghappier than usual as a result of free imbibing onthe way down. They can't be blamed for that,for were they not giving up everything to servetheir uncle? And they had to do something tolessen the pain of the giving. Those fifty-threemen were the vanguard of some nine hundred andfifty that came to the company to be trained inthe rudiments of a soldier's career. Of that number, seven hundred and fifty were from time totime transferred to some other division or outfitdestined for overseas.

Of the fifty-three men who came to camp thatday, twenty-one went over to France and participated actively in the fighting, the remainderof the men were either transferred to other divisions, sent home because of physical disabilityof some sort, or volunteered for the tank service.It is as advisable to give the names of these firstmembers of the old company as it would be toplace the name of the builder in the cornerstoneof a new building, for it was these men whoreally started the company on its successful career,drilling many of us who went over and many whodid not.

The list follows: George Fairchild, BernardMcCabe, Sherman Vanderpool Vincent A. Vineski,Wilfred Brewer, Harry L. Hawkins, Harry May.nard, Albert Hemenway, Daniel O'Sullivan, LeeBrooks, Grant Cole, Charles G. Kapp, ElwynFoster, Harland Van Loon, Charles Boland, HarryWest, Brewster Dibble, Harry Estelle, Charles L.Spencer, Charles De Voe, Harold L. Peters, thetwenty-one who came across with us; Ernest Vanderpool, Ernest Williams, Leonard Sullivan, JohnScott, Walter Scott, Edward Stanton, Floyd Ellsbrey, Leonard Campbell, Charles Seebich, Lawrence O'Donnell, Paul Freeman, George Neuber(transferred and died in France), James Mason,Clyde Tebo, Daniel Carman, Patrick Morrisey,Claire Secor, Ross Weyman, Cameron Campbell,Leo Mills, Howard McCutcheon, Lloyd Eddy,Harry B. Ackley, Raymond White, Orin Bennett,Harry J; Fletcher and Samuel Cook, who receiveda commission as a second lieutenant in the infantryafter attending the training school at Camp Meade.

John W. E. Phillips was the top sergeant inthese early days of the company and was the only

member of the company to become a member ofthe regimental football team, which gained an enviable reputation for the Three Fourteenth. InNovember Phillips was succeeded by W. W. Lambert, a former training school man.

Those who were present with the company onOctober thirty-first, Hallowe'en night, cannot for.get the wonderful time we had that night, andthose who were present the same night one yearlater cannot forget the time we had that night,either. The contrast between the two nights~ isinteresting. But in 1917 every one enjoyed him-self, some of the boys getting dressed up inpeculiar looking garbs that caused considerablemirth, while others sang and told stories and jokesduring the big feed. Cider was served to theboys, which no doubt shocked some of them. Thislittle party gave us the opinion that the army wasnot so cold-hearted after all. The officers of thecompany were all present, as was the commandingofficer of the battalion, Maj or Allen.

Then again on Thanksgiving Day we hadanother party that will long be remembered bythe boys who were left behind when the passeswere given out. About two hundred men composed the company at that time, and almost theentire number were present to enjoy a real homefeed of turkey, pie, fruit and all the accessorydishes that go to make up a real Thanksgiving Daydinner. Nothing was too good for the boys thatnight, and joy was unconfined on all sides.

From Thanksgiving Day on we began lookingforward to Christmas and the five-day passes thatwere to be given out, according to the rumorsthat were current. Drilling was more or less

a pleasure during those days, for was there not anopportunity to get home for five days staring usin the face? The cold and the sand had no terrors.And then came the time for the selection of thefortunate ones. With the exception of the equivalent of a platoon, the whole company enjoyed theholidays at home.

The day after the boys started on their passesthe company was quarantined for the measles, andthe men left in the barracks were forced to doguard duty continuously for five days. Few of themen were able even to take their shoes off duringthat time. The cold and the snow gave us ourfirst taste of real hardship in the army as wewalked our posts.

Thanks to Lieutenant Cushing, Christmas Dayfor those who did. not go on pass was a mostpleasant one. The mess hall was covered withholly and evergreen, while a big Christmas tree,gaily decorated and containing a gift for eachman present, stood in the center of the hall.Speeches were made by the officers and the boys.Judging by the comments made to those fortunateenough to get away on pass when they returned,a great time was had by all.

Those who returned flushed with the good timeat home were more than surprised to find thecompany under rigid quarantine restrictions forthe first time. The quarantine was placed onthe company for seven days, but before the seventhday had passed one of our number returning from

pass contracted the measles and an additional sevendays was levied.

On the fourteenth of January the entire regiment was quarantined because of an epidemic ofall sorts of diseases, and from that day until theseventh of February, at one in the morning,when the quarantine was lifted, a guard walkedin the front and rear of the building. Duringthe period of the quarantine all bunks were takenoutside in the morning and remained there untilthe afternoon for airing, while the most rigidrestrictions imaginable made those days anythingbut joyous ones. You could not get away from thebarracks at all during the quarantine except todo detail work or drill, had guards on at all times,were permitted no passes and could receive novisitors. They were the darkest days in our soldier life at that time.

On the fifth of January, during the quarantine,First Sergeant Lambert and Sergeants Kapp,Phillips and Cook were sent to the officers training school in the camp. I. H. Boyer was selectedas the new first sergeant of the company.

The twentieth of January saw the departure ofCaptain Lawrence, who had been with the company since its infancy. The Captain had alwaysleaned toward aviation as his favorite branch ofthe fighting game, but it was with considerablesurprise that we received the announcement ofhis transferring to naval aviation. So it was withmingled feelings that we bade good-by to the Captain when he left the company, feelings of regretthat he was leaving us, and feelings of pleasure

that he had succeeded in securing what hecherished most.

Captain Frederick M. Muhlenberg, for twelvedays after the twentieth, was our company commander,

Captain Henry M. Smith, formerly FirstLieutenant Company F, who had been an "instructor at the officers. training school, succeededCaptain Muhlenberg as our company commander,which post he has held ever since, with theexception of three months, during which time hewas in a hospital recovering from wounds. Inthe interim Lieutenant Brigham acted as company commander. The company was under thelatter's command from the twenty-sixth of September during the remainder of the first drive andall of the second drive, when the company sawits hardest fighting.

In the meantime several of the officers of thecompany had been elevated in rank. LieutenantsCushing and Brigham were advanced from SecondLieutenants to Firsts, so that the line-up of ourcompany officers about the first of February wasas follows: Captain, Henry M. Smith; First Lieu.tenants, James-W. Acklin, Joseph R. A. Cushing,Robert H. Brigham; Second Lieutenants, John H.Hollinger and Joseph A. Haney. LieutenantChase in the meantime had become a member ofthe First Battalion.

On the eighteenth of February, the first opportunity to shoot our rifles since becoming soldiersarrived. It was quite a sensation on the firstshot to receive a little kick in the shoulder andfind that there really wasn't anything to shootinga rifle after all. Just hold it good and tight, get

a good aim, and squeeze the trigger. The shootingwas done on the obstacle course, as the big rangehad not been completed. That same obstaclecourse took a good deal of our time, for we built

it, getting a taste of making bosches, facines anddoing police work galore, in addition to once anda while getting into a few snowball fights.

In March a call was sent out through the divisionfor men who desired to volunteer for the tankservice. Company "G," not to be outdone by anyof the other companies, sent a strong representationto the tankers, including First Sergeant Boyerand several other non-coms of no mean ability.

Sergeant Vincent A. Vineski was chosen forthe place vacated by reason of Boyer's change ofallegiance. Sergeant Joseph Barnett, supply sergeant, also left for the tankers, and our old friendBill' Brewer was promoted from company clerkto supply sergeant, while Harry Seitzer, a memberof the old third platoon, was given the rank ofcorporal and made company clerk. Private IshamA. Gillette, in Dibble's twenty-eighth squad, wasmade mess sergeant, succeeding Doyle Clarke.

On St. Patrick's Day the company received anoverseas examination and rumors flew thick andfast that the division would sail for overseas. Wehad heard the first step in making preparationsfor overseas duty was a physical examination.The company at that time, however, was exceedingly small, due to the large number of transfersthat occurred almost daily. In the meantime thevarious divisional and regimental schools had beentaking many of the men during the day. Therewere all sorts of schools, gas, automatic arms, fieldfortifications, French, topography and variousothers, all of which proved interesting to thosewho attended them.

CHAPTER II.The Baltimore Hike

In April came the never-to-be-forgotten Balti-more hike, when the division displayed its waresbefore the President, other official dignitariesand more than two hundred thousand people. Itwas on the morning of April Fourth that with fullpacks we started on the first leg of our hike toBaltimore. The first day, fourteen miles, to thetown of Shipley was our objective. Pup tentswere put up and preparations made for the night.Tired from the hike on the macadamized road, itwasn't long before we crawled into our tents tosleep. However, few slept, for the night wasbitter cold, so cold that it was warmer to dancearound on the outside of the tent than to attemptto sleep on the inside.

Few were sorry the next morning when westruck tents, rolled our packs and started out forBaltimore. Shortly after ten the morning of thefifth we landed in Druid Hill Park, Baltimore,pitched tents and established the camp. Passeswere given for the night to town to many of theboys, while the remainder contented themselveswith meeting their many friends who had journeyed out to the park to see Uncle Sam's newsoldiers.

At eleven forty-five the following day, Saturday, we fell in and fifteen minutes later moved outon a nine-and-one-half-mile march at attentionwith bayonets fixed. That Enfield never feltheavier than it did that day. It seemed to weigh

a ton. It had to be carried at the right shoulder

and could not be moved even for a minute's reliefto the left. And that right elbow had to be againstthe hip and the forearm had to be straight. Thespirit of the occasion and the fact that we werebeing reviewed by the Commander-in-Chief ofthe Army and Navy made us forget our troublesand the leg and arm weariness we were suffering.As we passed the reviewing stand and "EyesRight" was given, a more perfect line could hardlybe seen.

When route step was given, the relief of beingable to transfer that gun from one shoulder tothe other tasted sweeter than all the sweets inexistence. After a good night's sleep in the old puptent, we packed up at seven in the morning, andat eight five started on our journey back to camp.We carried light packs on the way back, and asa result did some excellent hiking, arriving incamp at three thirty-five without the loss of asingle man by falling out. A great record whencompared with what other companies suffered.

It wouldn't be a complete history if we did notmake mention of Ken Clarke and his song rehearsals at camp. Who can forget the familiar "Alltogether, let's go," in that baritone voice of Ken's?Rehearsals were held in the "Y," and when theweather was good, on the drill field. In betweenacts at the theatre we used to sing with Ken. Hehad more to do with the development of our vocalpowers than any one we ever met, but he ruinedmany a good evening in the barracks, for menwho never sang before in their lives took to singingwith sad results.

And did you ever get your name taken for a.

dirty gun from October till May, or were youone of the fortunate ones never to accumulate duston that old piece? There were a few, we willadmit. Or were you ever late for reveille andhad to do extra detail for the same? Or did youenjoy a Sunday in the kitchen because it wasn'tyour fault? Or did you do- a half dozen otherthings that made you do considerable swearing orgnashing of teeth? But it was all in a soldier'slife, and when all was said and done, we took our,dose with a smile.

The dawn of morning on the thirteenth of Maysaw the first day of the battalion war strengthproblems, and they were problems, too, in everysense of the word. From that day on for twoweeks, with the exception of Sunday, we were upevery morning at four-thirty or five making upour full pack. Then a hasty breakfast and off atsix. The first week we were under command ofthe first battalion officers, while the third battalionofficers were our commanders the succeeding week.

That was when we had our first real taste ofhard work and at that time we thought we wouldnever have any harder work to do as long as wewere soldiers. The hours were long, the packsheavy, the drill stiff, the problems many and the.downs. frequent. The constant drilling in thenew French combat formations was a source ofconsiderable annoyance to the then small company, but like everything else we did before andafter, we went to it with a will that made good.It was with little regret that we received the newsof the calling off of the contemplated third week

of the problems, for we had had enough.

Shortly after the battalion problems had concluded the company started filling up. On Maytwenty-eighth a big batch of men came in fromPennsylvania, were drilled for about two weeks,and part of the number transferred to Camp Leeto fill up the Thirty-seventh Division, which wasabout ready to go overseas. Previous to the coming of these men, the company had about eightymen for all purposes. The new men were rawand had to be drilled more intensively than wasanticipated. The drills were even continued onthe range between shots so necessary was it toget the men into condition.

It was on the tenth day of June that with fullequipment the company left the barracks for aten-day stay on the range. Living in pup tentswith little water available for washing and witha thousand and one discomforts, or, rather, whatseemed like discomforts at that time, made life atthe range seem almost unbearable.

The weather was extremely hot during thosedays and that, along with the sand and mosquitoesand others of the annoyance family, added considerable to the apparent hardships of the place.The company as a whole made excellent scores onthe range, many of the new men after shooting thecourse over after their first use of the rifle makingscores that were fifty per cent. better than on theirfirst attempt. Many of the boys were given theprivilege of going to camp on Sunday to feel theluxury of a good bath and a change of clothing,and also to greet their friends of the opposite sexwho had journeyed into the camp to see them,for passes were ex-communicado out at the rangethat particular week-end.

The hardships of those ten days on the rangewere often spoken of at that time as being theworst ever, but it was paradise there in a goodpup tent, with sufficient covering to make onecomfortable at night, with three regular mealsevery day, with the canteen nearby and manyother conveniences unseen, to what we experienceda few short months later.

Three days after our return from the range itbegan to appear as though the company were goingto be filled up and equipped for a long journey.On June twenty-third one hundred and three mencame into the company from Camp Upton, NewYork. The boys were all from New England,principally from Rhode Island and Massachusetts,and had practically no training at all. They didprincipally detail work in the camp they camefrom. Shortly after the arrival of these men, thecompany was brought up to war strength by theaddition of a few from the divisional artillery.

It was not long before we began to realize thatwe were slated for a long journey in the nearfuture, for on every side was more activity thanwe had ever witnessed in the camp. Then thenew equipment began coming in and all we didfor ten days Was line up to receive two pairs ofthis, two pairs of that and two pairs of the otherthing. Finally our names were sewed on ourbarracks bags, and as far as equipment went wewere ready. As is usual during such times, rumorswere rife and rampant day and night about wherewe were going, when and on What boat, and whateverything. Inspections of our new equipmentwere held daily, sometimes on our bunks carriedoutside the barracks.

At last one hot, July afternoon, the third, wewere inspected by the Inspector General's Department, and from then on we knew that it was onlythe matter of a very few days until we would beon our way somewhere. The Sunday previousmany of us had an opportunity to visit our homesfor the last time before going over. The following day we turned in our old clothes and paradedaround in blue denims from that day until theday we departed.

The fourth was a quiet day in camp, for therewere many partings to be made by the boys withmothers, wives and sweethearts. The camp wascrowded from early morning until after taps, andmany were the tears shed at the old W. B. and A.Station that night.

When the order was given Friday morningshortly after reveille to empty our bedsacks inthe rear of the canteen and a little later to fill upour barracks bags and tie them tight and placethem outside the barracks, we knew then that itwas only the matter of a few hours until we wouldbe started on our great adventure.

CHAPTER III.We Are Ready

And so the following day, July sixth, shortlyafter four o'clock, We fell in a column of squads,and reported all present with the exception of aheadquarters squad corporal, who reported CookKehoe absent. Old Carl came into place a fewminutes later with the explanation that he had togo back to the kitchen for something or another.

It Was but a few minutes later that Captain Smithcommanded "Forward, March," and two hundredand fifty men of Company "G" passed down theback road to the waiting train.

At five twenty that afternoon with a cheer anda fleeting glance at Camp Meade, where some ofus had spent ten months in training, and which.we had seen grow from a population of five hundred to a veritable city of forty-.ve thousand withunexpected conveniences, with representationsfrom each of the four major war activities societies, each with one or several huts and with atheatre that was unexcelled in its accommodationsand in its quality of plays, the train moved off.

Until dark we were greeted enthusiastically bypeople all along the railroad. At Philadelphia afifteen-minute stop was made and there the RedCross gave us cigarettes, fruit and matches, in addition to wishing us well. The old B. and O. Station, at Twenty-fourth and Chestnut streets,was thronged with friends of boys in the division,and many of us saw old friends there.

After leaving Philadelphia the train moved veryslowly, making numerous stops along the way,with the result that it was almost five o'clock thefollowing morning before we reached Jersey City.It was almost seven when we detrained and in acolumn of squads marched to the ferry, which weboarded shortly before 8 o'clock. For almost twohours while the ferry lay in her slip we had theprivilege of seeing the harbor of New York andthe spires of lofty skyscrapers, and the merrypicnickers on their way up the river on a Sundayexcursion boat. However, we were not going on

any picnic and could only look off in the distanceand envy the carefree pleasure-seekers.

At ten the ferry churned the waters and startedup the river to the pier of the American Trans-port Service. An hour later we were marchingup the gangplank of the Leviathan, answering toour names as the embarkation officer called themout, after which we dropped our arrived safe cardsin the mail bag and started downstairs.

We were assigned to "E" deck, the first onwhich troops were quartered, with the result thatwe had much better accommodations than did theother troops on board. We had no sooner unslungour packs on our bunks than we started out to seewhat the ship contained, and from then on untilafter dark we examined with the usual landlubber'scuriosity everything we were permitted to see andmuch that we were not.

Contrary to expectations, the ship did not leavethat night, so that we had all the next day in theharbor getting better acquainted with the big ship.Also we had our first opportunity to see what abig proposition it was to feed thirteen thousandmen twice daily with good, wholesome food andplenty of it. For two hours our company wasusually in line before we were fed, but when wedid get our feed it was well worth the waiting.

CHAPTER IV. Goodbye Broadway

.Abandon ship drill call was sounded for the firsttime on the evening of the eighth at six-thirty,and in accordance with the advice given to us

previously we donned our life belts and startedfor the deck. A few minutes after our arrival ondeck the huge steamer slowly started moving outof her dock amid the screeches of the whistlesand sirens of the river craft, which seemed to beall wishing us "Bon Voyage."

As we reached midstream the regimental bandstruck up "Good-by Broadway, Hello France,"'but strange to say there was no singing. Weweren't exactly sad, nor were we happy, but some.how or another the gravity of the mission onwhich we were then starting held us silent. Westeamed slowly downstream past the Battery, andin the golden sunset saw the Statue of Liberty,many of us with a peculiar feeling of sadness. Asthe dusk was rapidly turning into the night wecould faintly make out the lines of Coney Island..

That was the last time we saw land for sevendays.

The first and second days of our trip acrossfound us on a course that seemed to be southeastand in the Gulf Stream. It was excessively warmon the boat those days, especially below decks.The first day out we enjoyed the luxury of a blockof ice cream and the next day a big piece of mincepie, and those luxuries, along with the excellentfood that was being served, made us forget thetwo-hour wait in the line. The first and Seconddays found what appeared to be little attentionpaid to the subs, but on the third day every manhad to be out of his bunk and dressed at four-thirty, ready for any emergency. This continuedfor the remainder of the journey, as from thethird day on we Were in the so-called danger zone,liable to attack at any time.

From the second day out to the last we sawwhales, porpoises, sharks and flying fish sportingaround in the deep blue. On the morning of thethirteenth the gigantic ship entered the real danger,zone, and from that day until our arrival in portthe strictest watch was kept at all times by thecrew, especially in the matter of any lights on4board showing.

At dawn the morning of the fourteenth wemet our convoy, six American destroyers, plowingtheir way through the deep, alongside of andcompletely around the ship with its human cargo.The arrival of the destroyers was a most welcome sight to all of us, for it gave, in addition tothe speed of the vessel, more convincing feelingof our safety on the seas. All the way over wetook our much-needed salt water baths, whichseemed to make fun of soap.

At two-thirty the afternoon of the fifteenth theLeviathan steamed into the harbor of Brest anddropped anchor with its sixth load of fighters.The voyage had been made without a single mishap,not one incident marring the pleasure ofthe trip on a sea as tranquil as a lake. With the'exception of our battalion, which remained on boardas the unloading detail, the troops disembarked.

The second battalion remained on board fromthe fifteenth to the eighteenth, assisting in the un.loading of what was not human cargo. Duringthose three days rumors had been flying thickand fast that when we landed we would be takento a rest camp where for about a week we wouldhave the privilege of doing nothing; However, therumor proved to be as mythical as all rumors

eventually are, for instead of having a rest wehad just the reverse.

Conversations with men who went over on otherships make us believe that we were particularlyfavored in being selected to go over on the Leviathanbecause of the excellent food and accommodations we enjoyed that they were unfortunateenough to be unable to secure.

CHAPTER V.Brest and the Rest Camp

On the morning of the eighteenth, with \ fullpacks strapped to our backs, we touched foot onFrench soil. Then we started out on a five-milehike that just about tried the patience and gritof every one of us, for we had become sort ofsoft on board ship with hardly any walking orexercise.

We had just finished mess after pitching our'tents when the call came to get ready with lightpacks for a parade that we were to participatein that afternoon. Now there are times whenparades fire a soldier with enthusiasm and makehim do his best in spite of himself, but herewas a time when a parade brought down onwhoever suggested it a newer and warmer home,and in addition to the well-wishing of the boys itdid anything but fire them with enthusiasm. At,any rate, we started out, and after a five-mile hiketo the city, passed in review before General Nicholson, of our brigade, and a French dignitary.We passed in platoon front and then on outthrough the city streets, getting our first glimpseof life in a French city. However, there was

really nothing impressive about the scenery excepttheir trolley car, which was no larger than a flivver.

So along the streets we tramped and out of thecity to the "rest" camp along a dusty road that madethe hot, sultry day all the more trying. Many ofthe boys had blisters when they removed theirshoes and socks after our arrival in the pup tentvillage. But why worry, for were we not in a restcamp where there would be lots of time to getrested up and get wearied feet into some sort ofshape? Alas! the word rest was not used withdiscretion,/ for we had hardly pulled the blanketsover our heads that night when the call came tostrike tents and roll packs.

It was 2 o'clock and raining in torrents. Forthe life of us we could not understand why it wasso necessary to have packs rolled when it wasraining so hard. It had never been done before, yso why now? War gave us its first cruel blowthen and there. Apparently time was exceedinglyvaluable that morning, for the usual time allottedto make a pack in the dark without a light waslacking. However, most of us got our packs intosome sort of shape for the march down to therailroad, but others in their haste had to throwtheir belongings into their shelter halves and carrytheir load much after the way of a plunderer.

There was many a good laugh on the boxcarsabout that famous hike to the train, as they calledit. However, we failed to find a waiting train, butsome boxcars along the siding. Being Americanthrough and through, we certainly expected tosee the boxcars roll out and if not a goodstring of coaches, at least some sort of present-able cars roll in to take us on. But those

boxcars were obstinate and accordingly, a la' horse,we entrained. The first sight that greeted oureyes when we got to the station had forebodings,for we saw on the palatial cars on the siding thefollowing legend, "40 hommes, 8 chevaux." Thefew that knew. the meaning even then did not expect

that the side-door Pullmans were the bestthat could be provided for us in the line of travelaccommodations.

At 8 o'clock we were packed in tight in our Pull-mans, and a few minutes later the train pulledout with an eager bunch of Yanks looking forshell holes right away, but it was quite some timebefore we did see those shell holes we were soeager to see on that first day's journey. What wedid see during our three days on the boxcars wasthe part of France that remained undevastated bythe Huns.

In all, according to the village expert of thecompany, George Hentschel, we passed througheighty-two villages in the course of our ride fromBrest to Laignes. The most important of thetowns we passed through follow: Morlaix, Rennes,Vitre, Laval, LeMans, Tours, Nevers, Allerey and VDijon. It was 2 o'clock in the morning of thetwenty-third that we detrained at Laignes andbivouacked there for the night. Shortly after 5 wewere out again getting mess and rolling packs forthe journey to what was expected to be our homefor a long time, but for some unknown reasonwas not.

A little after 8 we started out on a fifteen-milehike from Laignes to Puits, a very small village.

It was a good long hike over hilly roads, coveredwith dust; that along with the heat of the daymade the march an almost unbearable one. Itwas the first long hike most of the men had everexperienced, but every man was game to the core,and those who unfortunately had to drop out onlydid so through sheer exhaustion. It was a hike

that tested the sand of every man and showed thatthe old company had the stuff. It was almost 4o'clock when we arrived in the village of Puits toreceive a touching welcome from the natives, whowere seeing American soldiers for the first time.

It was in Puits that the first Vin Rouge and VinBlane gave the boys a start. It was also in Puitsthat we received our first lessons in spendingFrench money and how valueless it was, and ourfirst time to know that the arrival of Americansoldiers in any place presaged an immediate increase in the price of everything.

It was in Puits that many of the boys learnedto their sorrow that they would have to be morethan soldiers in name only and that their personalappearance must be in keeping with what theword soldier meant. Many of the boys had thehard task of taking three-hour disciplinary hikesfor having a button unbuttoned, or failing to salute,or doing anything that tended to make them appearas poor soldiers in the eyes of any one who chancedto pass by. Our stay in Puits lasted for threedays, although we all felt that we were fairlycomfortable with straw in our ticks and a place towash and shave. But many of us wished morethan once that we were back in our old bunks inCamp Meade, which we had tired of so often.

At the end of three days we packed up every.thing we owned, and with barracks bags slungover our shoulders started for the outskirts of thetown to. wait there for an automobile train thatwas to take us to our training area. For three.days and the same number of nights we remainedbivouacked along the side of the road waiting for

the trucks. All seemed to have one desire inmind while we were waiting along that road, withnothing at all to do but keep ourselves out oftrouble, a desire to celebrate the first day of freedom, and we did. The first day on the road theold man of Puits invited to dinner, in addition toa host of the officers of the battalion, SergeantsCole, Fairchild, Kapp and Labrum, and Vaguenerand Forcier. Probably every one in the companyheard of the dinner the old man served that dayto the boys, for it sure was some dinner, with itsfour courses.

Celebrating was all finished the night of thetwenty-sixth. At five-thirty the trucks arrived,and an hour later we were on our way to Fretts,where we disembarked at five-thirty in the after.noon. That day was a characteristic French day,for it rained constantly from the night beforeuntil we were billeted, when, to our surprise, itstopped. Many of the boys rode the entire dayin trucks that had no covering, with the resultthat they were drenched through when we hoppedoff the camions in Fretts. Before nightfall wewere all comfortably billeted and prepared for along stay and hard work.

CHAPTER VI.Fretts and the Cognac Barrage

It only took us until the next morning to discoverthat there were beaucoup eggs, milk, chicken andpommes des terres frite in the village, while it issaid that McMillion knew the night we arrivedthat chickens could be secured for a rip in one'sleggings or trousers. McMillion did take the prizefor the copious amount of the feathered flock thathe could secure at any time he wanted. He andHomer Hayes, both representative West Virginians, were there when it came to food.

Then one sergeant, if you will all remember,made considerable love to a telephone girl, which,however serious it seemed at the time, didn't reallyamount to much. Then there was Bill Brewerbonjouring the fair ones day in and day out, andproving to the other member of the telephone outfitthat saucerhead snakes were far more presentableto the eye than were rattlers. And you all remember Joe Petkus and his mademoiselle who livedleft oblique of the kitchen. It wasn't long afterPetkus made his home there that Harry West wasinveigled into going across the street to help Petkusmake love. And the peculiarity of the wholething was that the fellows all discovered thesethings the first day in the village, whereas it isgenerally understood that more time is necessaryto secure such results.

It only took us a couple of days to police up thevillage and get it into shape fit for men to live in.But the place was sure a mean mess at first, odors

and the yellow bees to add to the discomfort of us

all. However, once established, we were a happylot. After the police work out came the ordersfor intensive drilling, and from then on until thetime of our departure we were busy as bees everyday learning the newest wrinkles in warfare, andmany of us learning over again the bayonet andgrenade drills. It was mighty hot those days onthe drill field, but there was an absolute lack ofshirkers.

Our battalion commanding officer in Fretts wasLieutenant-Colonel Meyers. He was filling theplace of Major Caldwell, who had been attendingschool. The old colonel was a prince most ofthe boys thought after they had learned to likehim, and the popularity of every man in the armyis measured by what he does for the men underhim. The afternoons were almost as hot as theywere in the sand back at Camp Meade, but thatdidn't bother us much, for we had our Vin Rougeand Vin Blane in the evening just the same. Wecould never account for the reason why the enterprising cafe keepers of the village could not getbeer in, as an excessive use of the Vin causedmany an upset stomach, and many an unhappymorning after, but what is that to a happy eveningalready spent? We weren't in Fretts long beforeLieutenant Hollinger returned from school, thefirst time we had seen him since the week beforewe left Meade. Lieutenant Brigham and PopVineski left for the same school, the infantry schoolat Chattillon Sur Seine.

It was in Fretts that we discovered the simplicities of our old friend and barber, Tick Van

Loon. When Tick was wealthy, haircutting was

one of his pastimes, but when the Vin wasn't.owing at just the proper rate for want of cash,that was the time when haircutting became anapplied art for Tick, one of Towanda's best boosters. If there is one place on the map of thegood old States we all want to visit, it is thatvillage in Bradford County, Pennsylvania, calledTowanda. I understand the name is an Indianone and means the city of two battles, in thatone time when Van Loon was a boy two very famous Indian battles were fought there. NeitherVan Loon nor Squash Fairchild could rememberthe winner of the battle or the exact details ofthe famous episode, but without questioning theveracity of their statements, we shall have tovisit the famous City.

Of course it is different With Pop Vineski. Heis such a learned philosopher that he has thehistory of Troy on his lips ever ready for aquestioner. When Brookes was with us back atFretts, Troy, Pa., and the original Troy, whichmade the name Helen ever famous, were practically synonymous, for deeds were daily takingplace in Troy, Pa., that outshone any the Greeksever performed. Harold Peters, who learned thatprofanity was born in a man and not learnedover night, was one of Troy's most famous citizens.

It was in Fretts that we all learned to appreciateHarold and his many kindnesses to every one.There was nothing in the game too hard for Haroldto do if it would help one of his soldier buddies.He did more sewing on of buttons-and patchesthan any man in the outfit, and always for someone else. There are many of us who will everrecall to memory when we are reminiscing overour first days in France what an excellent and

upstanding man and soldier Harold was. Unselfish in his motives, big-hearted and a friend ofall, he was a real pal.

At Fretts the sergeants had a table in thekitchen, and it was there that Nipple receivedthe nom de guerre of "Candy" because of hisexcessive use of molasses at every meal. Thefirst thing that Nipple asked for at every mealwas the candy. Phillips ran a close second toNipple there. Many the heated arguments wereheld every meal, especially after Labrum, Jacobs,Nipple and Mapes, new-made sergeants, took theirplaces with the wise sages of soldierdom. Butthrough it all Charlie Kapp and Pop Vineski neverlost their smiles or good nature.

It was voted more than once that the one-armedgenius of Fretts, otherwise known as the cowgirl,was the most popular. At least it was said thatshe had a greater following than any one else inthe town, especially in the evenings. Fairchild'sgirl down the hill was popular with the Towandaboys, especially Charlie Boland.

In Fretts we had the famous guard duty thattook all the privates in the company every fourthnight. Many of the men did guard duty for thefirst time in their life in Fretts, and it was a hardproposition to get them used to the formalitiesto be used on guard. As a result, many were thepeculiar answers to the "Halt! Who goes there ?"and to the officers when questioning the guard,but none was funnier than the time Lieutenant

Brigham tried to get Mutch Lukuc to salute himas he came up to speak to him one dark night.

Lukuc halted the officer of the day correctly, buthe failed to salute, and Lieutenant Brigham triedwith all sorts of persuasive acts to get Mutchto salute him, but somehow or another he couldn'tget him to compree. As a last resort, LieutenantBrigham whistled "The Star-Spangled Banner,"and Lukuc, recognizing the national anthem,promptly came down to present arms.

One night when Sergeant Labrum was sergeant-of the guard Cacciconte was on the third relief.The corporals were in the habit of going aroundto awaken the men a half hour previous to theirtime to go on duty. The corporal of the reliefCacciconte was a member of reported to the guardhouse that all efforts to find the sentinel had beenin vain, so it was up to the sergeant of the guardto provide a substitute, or find the missing man.Sure enough, Cacciconte was not in his regularplace in the billet when the sergeant went thereto look for him, but upon issuing from the billetpeculiar noises were heard coming from the direction of the pig pen just outside the billet, andupon investigation it was found that the lostsentinel, in his efforts to escape walking guard,had carried. his bedsack, blankets and everythinghe owned to the pig pen, where he expected topass the night in comfort. He was promptlypulled out of 'his hiding place 'and told to makehimself ready for duty in ten minutes.

About twenty minutes later Sergeant Hemenway, then corporal of the old relief, came intothe guard house with Cacciconte and the informationthat he had been halted and told to followhim to the guard house under arrest. Caccicontewas in a remarkable state of soldierly appearance

when he came into the guard house that time, forhe was without socks or leggings, had his shoesuntied, wore nothing but his undershirt, no beltor sidearms, nor overseas cap to cover his head,but his helmet as a top piece. A more humorousspectacle could hardly be found anywhere in theA. E. F. It was impossible to put him on guard,so he was carted, off to the billet to sleep o.' hishappiness.

We wouldn't be saying much about Frettes ifwe left out the cooks and the parties they hadthere, especially little Carl Kehoe and Maynard,whose happiness often overflowed the kitchen area.

But it wasn't all joy unconfined in Fretts, forthe drilling was harder and more intensive thanwe had ever had, especially the new men who hadhad practically no drilling at all in the States.The humor and the fun, however, helped to passaway the moments of idleness and helped sootheour tired bodies after the daily grind. We learnedto look upon Fretts as one of our homes, and itwas with considerable dismay that we received therumors of our probable moving from there.

At last one rainy Saturday the word came thatwe would leave the following morning at 8 o'clock.According to orders, we packed up and madeready. On Sunday morning, September eighth,we left Fretts with the fullest of packs strappedto our backs. Along the way we had much tosay of our late home, where we had learned ourfirst ideas of French life and customs and theintricacies of the language.

Few will forget that twelve-mile hike along thewhite road that day with those packs, the heat of

the middle of the day and the rain as it camedown several times along the way. Our objectivewas Laferte, a railhead, which we reached late inthe afternoon, only to be met by a downpour ofrain that lasted for hours, drenching us throughand wetting our packs so that they seemed toweigh a ton.

After the cars had been loaded we entrainedin our side-door Pullmans for an overnight ride. Inthe morning we detrained at Mussey, and with fullpacks once more started out hiking, arriving inthe village of Fains some time in the afternoon,where we were billetted comfortably if a littlecrowded. From the ninth to the thirteenth weenjoyed the chicken, omelettes, rabbit and Frenchfried potatoes that could be secured in abundanceat the private homes in the. town. We also enjoyed French beer for the first time, while somefew enjoyed the sights of Bar le Duc, the firstlarge-sized town we were near since coming toFrance. Then the name of Murphy became famous in the outfit.

CHAPTER VII.So This is the Front

It was the night of Friday, the thirteenth, agreat day for the superstitious, that we left Fainsin trucks driven by Chinese coolies, whose adaptability as drivers was criticized more than once,for they led us a crazy existence while they werewith us. It was 2 in the morning of the fourteenthwhen we hopped out of the trucks and started ona three-hour hike that was almost entirely uphilland that brought us to, the Brocourt woods. During the hike that night we had our first idea ofwhat war at night was with the varicolored flares

that made the heavens seem daylike, and the roarof the guns in the not-too-far distance.

We remained in dirty, rat-infested billets untilthe night of the fifteenth, when shortly after night.fall we set out on a hike that brought us to theRecicourt woods and the famous bomb-proof dug.outs where George Druding nightly went on rathunts. The' following night Jerry did some of hisfamous night stra.ng with the aid of a bombingplane that did considerable damage to the alreadywrecked town of Recicourt just below us, but whichdid absolutely no damage in our immediate area.All the time the bombs were dropping in thebeautiful moonlight, some of the boys in the company were having a poker game undisturbed byeven the hum of the motor of the avion overhead.

From the sixteenth to the twentieth we receivedfirst sight intimation of what a gigantic thing warwas when we saw the big guns being brought upthe road by the tractors during the night to beplaced for the big offensive about which we knewlittle or, nothing, though the rumors were flyingthick and fast that the American Army was going"to strike for the first time without being aidedby the Allies. We all knew that something verybig was brewing, but how big or how small apartwe were to play in the big offensive did not giveus any immediate concern. ,

At 8 on the night of the twentieth we left ona four hours. hike that brought us much closerto the front. The twentieth of September willalways be inscribed indelibly on the mind of BillBrewer. Bill died that particular night, giving uphis life like the heroes in romance. Out of thestill of the night when we went over the top in

our first gas alarm the voice of bill could be heardheard above the klaxons, the guns and the sirens.

"Good-by, boys, I'm going to die," said Bill,and he meant it. "Good-by Seitz and George..I'm resigned to die," continued Bill in awe-inspiring tones. Then the shrill voice of a lieutenantout of the night, "Climb a tree, the gas alwayshangs on the ground." And the last we saw of Billbefore our sides split from laughter brings tomind the picture of our supply sergeant double.timing gamely for a thirty-five foot tree. Thefunny part of it all is the fact that there wasabsolutely no gas at all.

From the following day until the night of thetwenty-fifth we remained in pup tents in the Hessewoods, doing absolutely nothing but keeping outof sight and receiving a copious amount of mail.It was then that we saw the gigantic preparationsthat were being made for the offensive, the placingof the big guns along the road just in front of us,the amount of ammunition of all calibres that wasbeing brought up and placed alongside the guns,the 180 tanks that wended their way laboriouslyalong the road on the way to take up their positions, the large number of trucks with suppliesand what-not going up and down the road, and theprevalence of so many cars of the staff officersand generals, and every conceivable thing beingconcentrated for the avowed purpose of pushingthe Hun back.

The afternoon of the twenty-fifth the officersand company and platoon scouts and platoon sergeants went up on the lines to see where we wouldbe placed that night preparatory to our going overin the morning. The party received its baptism

of shell fire that afternoon, though the shellsdropped some distance from them. When theyreturned we all knew that the stage had been setfor our first act in the big drama, "War." Thesergeants were called together, the maps gone overand the situation in general explained. With thereturn of the officers our, preparations started forduty. Light packs with reserve rations were madeup, while the remainder of our equipment wasplaced in a roll with our names inscribed on itand placed on a salvage pile that had been selectedfor the outfit.

At 8 o'clock the night of the twenty-fifth, andthe night will long live in our memory, we startedout to take our position preparatory to jumpingoff. We were cautioned that all talking was tobe done at a whisper, and that all care was tobe taken in everything we did. Shortly aftermidnight we were in our places in support of "E"Company, ready for the word that would send usover. In the meantime the greatest barrage inthe history of the world started. To our untrainedears it seemed that all the noises in the universehad been collected together and released simultaneously. The sky was lighted up as far as theeye could see from the flares of the big guns, whileoff to the front the Germans were sending up theirsignal flares in copious amounts. The first actsurely had a wonderful setting.

CHAPTER VIII.Up and Over at Sunrise

At five-forty, the zero hour, just as the sunwas rising in the East and spreading its rays overa troubled world, we went over the top. Hardly

ten minutes had elapsed before we were engulfedin the deepest kind of a gloom, made more denseby the smoke barrage that was sent over to veilour early movements from enemy observers. Thefog Was so dense that a man ten feet away wasbarely distinguishable. The result of the fog wasthe disconnection of the company, two platoonsbearing OH to the left under Captain Smith andLieutenants Cushing and Haney, while the othertwo, under Lieutenants Brigham and Hollinger,went off to the right.

The leaders of the two sections of the companyin the meantime were making all sorts of effortsto get in connection with each other, but no matterhow many runners and scouts went out, they in.variably returned, if they weren't lost, with theinformation that they could see no one. The section under Lieutenants Brigham and Hollingercontinued going forward, while that under Captain Smith and Lieutenant Cushing had to fightfor every inch of their advance. This part of thecompany saw its first prisoners going back when"E" company was met.

From that point on resistance was met on allsides. Part of the first platoon under LieutenantCushing split from the remainder of the sectionand started out to a clear a trench that seemed

to be causing trouble. They met with resistanceall around, the machine gun bullets whistling overthe trench for almost half an hour. After makinga personal reconnaisance, Lieutenant Cushingbeckoned for the remainder of the platoon to followhim.

In the meantime Sergeant Kapp, with part ofthe first platoon had gone off to the right to seewhat was holding up the other part of the company. Seeing a sniper working with deadly ac-curacy on a body of troops lying in shallow shellholes, Kapp crept up behind the Hun and shot himdead, thereby permitting the advance to continueonce again. The moppers-up attended to an avenue of dugouts over which we had passed beforegoing up a slight elevation at about 9 o'clock.We hadn't reached the top of this elevation beforewe were fired upon by several machine guns. Whenthey were located Captain Smith, leading aboutten men in the face of heavy fire, with grenadeand rifle fire finished the obstacle.

In the meantime Lieutenant Cushing veered offto the left along with Platoon Sergeant Brookesand several men to flank a nest of five guns that.red on us from all directions simultaneously. Upto this time We had suffered no casualties, but itwas but a short time after that we lost heavily.

Captain Smith, discovering the position of theguns, disdaining all danger, led the companythrough some thick brush, then to a trench and outto the top of a knoll from which the guns appearedto be firing. Here the Hun snipers got in somedeadly work while their brethren were sufferingthe loss of their machine guns through the intuition

and quick action of the captain.

Sergeant Brookes, platoon sergeant of the firstplatoon since the company was formed for over.seas duty, was killed instantly by a sniper. Corporals Peters, Shinko and Sipler and Privates Calveresse

and Castro were all mortally wounded inthis vicinity.

Off to the left Lieutenant Cushing was shotthrough the left lung by a machine gunner andwas severely wounded. He was carried off thefield by a group of Hun prisoners that CorporalMarquis and Private Paterson had captured. Corporal Tom Dunbar, while leading his squad, wasshot through the hand, while Private Faust waswounded in the left side during the attack on thenest.

The nest was finally cleared out and severalprisoners sent to the rear. Once more collectinghis scattered forces, the captain started forward,not to be daunted by the heavy resistancewe were meeting. Hardly a few minutes had.elapsed before once more we met resistance, theHuns this time waiting until we were almost ontop of them before opening up their fire. Fortunately they were bad shots and no casualtieswere suffered by our company, though a companyfrom the three fifteenth lost a first lieutenant andseveral men at this spot.

However, a little later the company lost itsleader, Captain Smith, and also one private, LouisIzzi, who was wounded by an exploding handgrenade. The Captain received his injury whichput him out of action while leading a handful ofmen in an effort to dislodge a machine gun. It

all happened this way: After the machine gunshad opened up on us, the section was compelledto take cover because of the excessive fire. TheCaptain here took inventory of his surroundings,

finally locating one of the guns. While goingforward along with Sergeant Kapp and PrivateHayes, the Captain received his wound. He immediately sought cover in a shell hole, where hewas forced to lay until the Huns left the district,"when the captain, though he wanted to go forward,was forced to the rear when the Colonel came up.Up until the time of his wound the Captain hadled two platoons fearlessly in the face of severemachine gun fire and fire from snipers. His leadership, disdaining all personal danger, inspired themen to renewed activity when the situation seemeddarkest. Before he left for the rear the Captainexhorted us to continue forward, which we did inspite of severe resistance.

The path was once more cleared of opposition,and without an officer this part of the companycontinued forward under the leadership of FirstSergeant Cole and Sergeant Kapp. The sectionunder Sergeant Cole remained for the night in atrench, after continuing forward until darkness,while that under Sergeant Kapp attached itselfto the third battalion for the night.

When daylight broke Sergeant Kapp's sectionstarted out and met that commanded by SergeantCole, and together the two sections started forwardin the cold and heavy rain. However, they wereunable to advance far, for the part of the companyunder Lieutenants Brigham and Hollinger, seenfor the first time since the previous day, had met

severe machine gun resistance up ahead._ Severalof the members of the second and fourth platoonswere wounded here and could be seen walking downthe road toward the first aid station. Corporal

Harry Estelle and Dietrich, walking side by sidedown the road, made light of their wounds, Estellebeing shot through both arms, while Dietrich received a bullet through his heel and anotherthrough his arm.

From Estelle and Dietrich the first and thirdplatoons learned what had happened to the othertwo platoons on the previous day. It appears asthough the second and fourth platoons got off alittle to the right of their sector, getting their firsttaste of machine gun fire about two hours aftergoing over the top. This obstacle was overcomewithout the loss of a single man. Heavy machinegun fire from a wood directly in front a little

later kept the two platoons in a trench most ofthe day and part of the afternoon. The positionwas such an untenable one that it was well nighimpossible to even attempt to clear the obstacle,for the cover was poor and the Huns had a directfire on the position held by the platoons! "E"company off to the left managed to clear out theobstacle by flanking the guns.

The way cleared, the two platoons joined upwith the rest of the battalion, which reorganizedand started forward. Resistance was met a littlefurther on and though it was easily overcome, thebattalion a few minutes later on was forced toWithdraw to a better position a little to the rear,because of darkness and a desire to have a goodposition in case of a counter-attack. Long before

daylight the battalion started forward again andcontinued their advance for about two and a halfkilos before they met resistance along the main

road that runs through Montfaucon. Cover wasquickly taken and because of the darkness noeffort was made to overcome the obstacle. Thecompany on the left flank cleaned out two nestsof guns and, supported in the rear, the secondand fourth platoons cleared their resistance.

The impeded advance was once more renewedand continued for a short distance when theywere fired on from all sides. The two platoonshad been marching up the road in platoon columnswhen fired upon. They immediately dropped tothe shell holes and narrow trenches on the rightside of the road. It was late in the morning beforethis obstacle was overcome, and then it was necessary to do mopping-up work, one-half of Lieutenant Hollinger's platoon going through a woods andbombing dugouts. When they returned the platoons once more re-formed and started forward.It was during the heavy machine gun fire fromall directions that Estelle and Dietrich werewounded. A sniper hiding in a camouflaged trenchinstantly killed Harry D. Miller, the bulletpassing through his helmet and skull. Pete DiPrinzio received a wound in the thigh and anotherin the calf of the leg by a sniper as he liftedhis automatic rifle to his shoulder on discoveringthe position of the sniper.

It was on this day, the twenty-seventh, that,George Druding was so badly wounded that shortlyafterwards he died, while Demetrius Dionne, orderly to Captain Brieux, and attached to

regimental headquarters, was also wounded so severelyby shrapnel that he too died of wounds. Aftermeeting up with the second and fourth platoons,

the first and third platoons were told of the lossOf Jeffries Higgins on the previous day by asniper, while Reds Kelly had his left arm shattered by shrapnel, and Feick was wounded bymachine gun bullets. Higgins loss was a severeone to his family for the day before we wentOver the top he received word that his brother, adoughboy in the twenty-eighth division, had beenkilled. Privates Hogberg, Imondi, Zampino andSjoblam were all wounded on the twenty-seventhin front of Montfaucon.

CHAPTER IX.Montfaucon and Resistance

The resistance was finally overcome and thecompany started forward toward the woods tothe right of the city of Montfaucon. Here weexpected to find hard fighting, for the wood waspowerfully fortified with trenches and dugouts,formidable enough to hold us off for a long time.But fortunately the wood was not as infestedwith machine guns and snipers as was anticipated,though there was a sprinkling of the latter whomade considerable trouble for us. The companieshad hardly reached the outer edge of the woodsbefore they were met by a terrific barrage of over-head shrapnel which made things unbearable inthat Vicinity for some time, with the result thatthe entire battalion was forced to withdraw andtake up a position in the field just before the city.Lieutenant Brigham's leadership and coolnessbrought us safely out of the woods without theloss of a single man.

Corporal Hawkins dropped unconscious at theedge of the woods, making most of us think that

he had been seriously wounded, but upon going tohis aid it was found that he was suffering froma severe hernia. At the dressing station Bud wasticketed for the hospital but he returned to thecompany and said that he would not go, as therewas nothing the matter with him. It took anorder to get Hawkins to the hospital that day.Back in the field we had so recently taken wedug in and made preparations to repel acounter-attack that was expected that night, but whichnever materialized. Late that night an order camein that we would have to move forward to take upa more advantageous position to repel the expectedcounter-attack.

We remained in position until almost daylight,when we withdrew and returned to the trenchesto the right of the woods at Montfaucon, wherewe rested for some time that morning until MajorCaldwell came up and told us that there wassomething to eat for us about half a kilometerback. That meant a short respite and that thebattalion was placed in support for the morning.The half kilometer vanished toot sweet, for wehad had nothing but hard tack and corn bill fortwo days, and that had been exhausted the firstday out. To say that the meal was appreciatedwould be putting it mildly, though the quantitywas anything but sufficient to satisfy our appetites.That was one time the mess sergeants were givena good word, for they had braved the heavyshelling of the back area to get up and feed us.

After the meal, the battalion was reorganizedunder command of Major Shoge, then captain,while Lieutenant Brigham reorganized our company. A short time later we started forward untilwe had reached a position on the left and in front

of Nantillois, where, because of excessive enemyshell fire, we remained on the reverse slope of ahill comparatively safe in our funk holes. It wasat this juncture that the Huns fired minnies andthree-inch shells almost point blank at us. Theshelling was the worst we had ever been under,Fritzie most of the night keeping us in a boxbarrage that for its intensity of fire could hardlybe equalled. The right and left and our front andrear was a ,halo of steel from four o'clock in theafternoon until the next morning, but fortunatelyour position was almost impregnable for artilleryfire.

It rained consistently all night, with the resultthat our holes became pools of water that we wereforced to lay in, for it was almost suicidal to standup. The next morning we started forward andhad hardly gotten over the top of the hill beforewe received a terrific shelling that added furtherto our growing casualty list. Clarence Surprisewas killed by a shell that killed two other menfrom another company and wounded severelyPrivate Sloat of our company: Harry S. Millerand Anthony Mitsko were wounded during thisshelling, along with Privates Murphy, Pickeringand Swanson. This, however, did not deter ouradvance at first, but the shelling became so severethat we were forced to hold up for some considerable time. Corporal Charles L. Guthrie was killedjust in front of Nantillois by a fragment of a shellthat went through his skull. Elmer Krausereceived a severe shrapnel wound a few feet fromGuthrie. Corporals Reutter and Marshall wereboth wounded by machine gun bullets in front ofthe woods, while a little later Private Weyrickwas wounded by shrapnel.

CHAPTER X.Relief and Back for a Rest

In the meantime there had been all sorts ofrumors about relief, but we began to think thatwe never would be relieved. At last, however, attwo-thirty on the afternoon of, the thirtieth, wecould see the infantry of another division comingup across the rises in the ground. A little laterthe Third Division relieved us and we started forthe rear, having proved that the National Armyman was as good a fighter as anyone of the otherarmies, and after accomplishing all that we hadset out to do the morning of the twenty-sixth, anda little more.

On the way to the rear we were shelled incessantly by the Hun, but fortunately suffered nocasualties. We were also told on our way out ofthe bombing of the Red Cross hospital by the Hun,an aeroplane directing the artillery that did thefiring. Major Allen, Lieutenant Lynch, our battalion medical officer, and a large number of menwere killed when the hospital was blown up. 'Ateight that night in the rain we arrived on thereverse» slope of a hill, where we bivouacked forthe night. Tired and hungry, we were denied thepleasure of eating a good meal that SergeantGillette had prepared for us by the inability ofthe kitchen to get up to us because of the congestion on the road. The meal that was prepared forus was commandeered by the major of anotherbattalion for his men, and we went hungry. A fewloaves of bread and the same number of cans ofbeans were distributed in the morning, but thatwas like a drop of water to a thirsty man.

At nine in the morning we started hiking tothe rear, and at four-thirty arrived back in thesame woods we left the night of the twenty-fifth.Here we received our second meal in seven days.The menu consisted of corn willie, tomatoes, gold-fish, bread, coffee and molasses, and we all ateravenously. After eating and securing our salvaged rolls, the company re-formed and startedout on a half hours' hike that carried us to an openfield, where we pitched tents for the night.

It seemed like the first night of quiet sleep, un-disturbed by the bursting of shells all around, thatwe had enjoyed in months, though in reality itwas only eight days. Shoes Were removed for thefirst time in what seemed like ages and our bodiesgiven an opportunity to relax, that was sorely?needed. Taps were not needed that night to callthe men to bed, for long before the usual hour oftaps the camp was silent. All slept the sleep ofthe weary.

The next morning we all started out for water toget a nine days' beard off our mud-encrusted faces,and that, by the way, was one of the toughest jobswe had for a long time. Many of the men wouldhave much rather remained on the front a fewhours longer to have the pleasure of feeling a goodsharp razor in the hands of their hometown barberon their beard that morning. Before the morningwas out we moved from the open field into thewoods to screen ourselves from enemy aeroplanes

that hovered around a good portion of the morning.Shortly after pitching our tents in the woods,Nowell, who had done excellent work on the front,teamed with Yelle, stretcher bearing, was forced

to leave for the hospital because of an infectedhand, the result of a barbed wire cut. That nightthe mail came in and we were a happy lot, for wewere getting letters from home for the first time intwo weeks.

The following afternoon at five-thirty we strucktents and packed up for the longest and hardesthike we had ever taken. It was eight o'clockwhen we started out on the first leg of the journey.At three-thirty the following morning we pitchedtents in the Sonnecourt woods. We passed throughthe villages of Dombasle and Ancremont on theway. It was a hard night's hike, but more wasto come, for that afternoon at four o'clock Weleft the woods for a five hours. hike that broughtup to a field just outside the village of Recicourt,Where we bivouacked for the night. In the courseof our hike we passed through Souilly, which manymonths later was to be our division headquarters.Coming through the village and on its outskirtswe saw American aeroplanes on land in hangarsfor the first time.

Meals had been exceedingly scarce in the courseof the hike and considering the fact that we hadhad but two meals in eight days previous to thestart, the boys were in anything but good shape.We never thought that seven-thirty the next morning would find us starting out on the longest hikeof the series on empty stomachs, but it did. We

hiked until well on past noon, when the kitchencame up and gave each man a half cup of un.sweetened coffee, and, with a couple of hardtackbiscuits that could be borrowed from some onefortunate enough to have them, we made a meal.

And all the time we were hiking with full packsthat seemed to weigh a ton more each step we took.That was the hike that tried the sand in every manand it is no disgrace to say that quite a few of ourmen fell out from fatigue and sickness, for thedeadly dysentery had taken hold soon after coming off the front. It was about six-thirty as thesun was sinking behind the distant hills that wearrived at the village of Rupt, after going out;the wrong road a kilometer or so. We were thenfairly comfortably billeted.

From the fifth until the eleventh of October weremained in the village of Rupt, paying an exhorbitant price for everything we bought, fromnuts and onions to preserves and champagne, butthat mattered but the least to us, for we hadn'tbeen able to spend any money for such a long timethat we wouldn't have been satisfied if theprofiteers hadn't burned us a little. Many of theboys suffered from dysentery, With the result thatthe company was very fortunate to have six skeleton squads to drill in the morning. But there waslittle drill, fortunately, most of the day beingspent in resting and scrubbing up equipment andclothes. It was in Rupt that Sergeant Fairchildleft the company for the officers. training school,and it was also in Rupt that guides and scoutswere started for the St. Mihiel front one fine dayto see the positions the battalion was to take onthat front. Sergeants Vineski and Labrum andLieutenant Haney, the company representatives,had hardly reached the town above Rupt, whenthey were overtaken by the colonel's car and toldthat they were to return to their companies, as theorders had been changed. Bien!

It was in Rupt that the losses of the company in

the first drive were summed up and it was foundthat we had lost in killed, one sergeant, four corporals and twelve privates, while the captain, firstlieutenant, three corporals and thirty-four privateshad been wounded and three privates missing inaction. Privates Hayes and McMillon, at firstreported missing in action, were afterwards foundto have been wounded and in base hospitals, whileAchille Angelucia, also reported missing in action,was so severely wounded that he was evacuatedto a base hospital and shortly afterwards to theStates. Corporal Steve Dolan was gassed andsent to a base hospital along with Privates Gharity,Lukuc and Lastowsky. Chester Riley and JerryShultz, of the first platoon, and Fred Schucker, ofthe fourth, were the mystery men of the firstdrive. We had fifty-nine casualties in the company or losses of approximately twenty-five percent. for our first time in action.

Tilly and the Troyon FrontCHAPTER XI.

The company really seemed small when on thenight of October 11th we started another seriesof hikes, the first of which carried us to a thickwoods in the morning at six-thirty. Pup tentswere immediately pitched and the boys, after getting a good breakfast, spent the remainder of theday wrapped in their blankets. That night was spent in the woods while billeting officers wereout searching for suitable quarters for us. Theevening of the twelfth at five o'clock tents weretorn down and an hour later the company startedout for Tilly, where at eight-thirty we were housedin the best billets we had had since coming toFrance, with big open fireplaces in every room of

every billet the company made the chilly fall daysmore than comfortable and wet shoes and sockscould be dried nightly by the blazing fire. Goodbunks of straw aplenty made our beds almosthomelike after the way we had been used to sleeping for a month. The Meuse River ran throughthe village and gave us an opportunity to do somewashing and cleaning up after the long hikes andlack of water everywhere.

It was in Tilly that the boys returned to someof their civilized methods of washing and combingtheir hair every morning, something that hadbeen more Or less neglected during the past month.Tilly boasted of a flour mill, and as a result, weenjoyed good old-fashioned homemade flap jackswith every meal, and twice after evening mess.Ofttimes baking powder was especially scarce,but What the cakes lacked of that ingredient theymore than made up with the others. Three goodmeals a day and seconds and thirds for those whodesired them helped to build us all up to our oldphysical state again, with the result that we leftTilly feeling fit to go through another campaignof hikes and fighting.

Bob Maddox, who had been made a sergeantin Rupt and assigned to the first platoon, received papers in Tilly telling him that he was asecond lieutenant in the Philippine Scouts as aresult of successfully passing examinations backin Camp Meade previous to our going over. Itseemed funny to the boys to see Bob promenading-around with gold bars on his shoulder straps.However, it made little difference to Bob, Who wasthe same old man to all of us.

Sergeant Cole in Tilly also received notification

that he was to receive the coveted gold bars forconspicuous bravery in action. He took the physical examinations and then awaited his commission.Corporal Rice was taken very seriously sick in.Tilly and had to be evacuated to a base hospital.

At six o'clock on the night of the twenty-firstwe packed up hurriedly and an hour later startedon a forced Hike to the front as the result of anemergency call sent to the. regiment to re-enforcea line on the Troyon front which the Three-Sixteenth Regiment of our division was holding. Itwas two-fifteen the following morning when wereached the appointed place in rear of the linethere to wait for the orders to take our places onthe line.

It was a hard uphill hike all the way that taxedthe strength of every one, for we had everythingwe owned on our backs. The officers and theplatoon sergeants shortly after our arrival wereguided up to the lines and shown the positions totake up should the Hun begin his attack in themorning. However, the expected attack failed tomaterialize, as was expected, as the battalion ofHuns that did come over were slaughtered in thepass by machine gun fire.

That afternoon the company packed up andstarted back for Tilly, arriving shortly after sevenfrom a hike that will never be forgotten by thosewho took it. The warmth of the fireplaces neverfelt better than they' did on that night. Comingin tired, hungry and wet with perspiration, something was needed to do some cheer giving and thefireplaces provided the solace for sore feet andwet bodies. Our stay in Tilly this time was short-lived. Two days later we packed up again and

started for we knew not where at that time, thoughit was rumored that we were going on the Verdunfront.

Rumors had also been flying around that Austria-Hungary, Turkey and Bulgaria had capitulatedand that armistices would shortly be signed by allthree countries, thereby weakening the power ofthe Huns. This was the best news we had heardsince coming into the army with the possible exception of the successes of the allied armies on allfronts in pushing back the enemy. It was at Tillythe day before we left for the front that we received our first replacements, Tittle and Tally.

We left Tilly at six-thirty in the evening, and,after a long, hard hike, arrived in Sommedieu,being billeted in the woods on the outskirts of thetown in old French barracks. It was at Sommedieu that we were paid and also at the sameplace that we received fourteen replacements fromthe casual camps. The company did nothing atSommedieu but rest, while a few played wildpoker with the money that it was impossible tospend.

At nine-thirty the night of the twenty-seventhwe left Sommedieu for the front, making our firststop in the village of Lempire, where we all received quite a bundle of mail. It was early in themorning when we arrived in the village and earlythe same evening when we left, hiking for fivehours until we reached the deep, rat-infested, coldand uncomfortable dugouts outside the village ofFromerville. That was one of the most uncomfortable and cheerless nights the most of us hadever spent. There was no sleeping, for warmthcould come only by walking up and down the

road. It was on the next day, October twenty-ninth, that Bob Maddox bade farewell to the boysand started on his long journey to the Philippines.

At five-thirty that evening, just at nightfall, weleft the dugouts and hiked until two-thirty in themorning along a road that was the worst we hadever traveled on. Many of the boys badly sprainedtheir legs and ankles on the march, but none asseriously as Ray Crompton, who had to be evacuated.

We bivouacked for the night in the DesForges Woods, just in rear of the line. Duringthe day guides were sent out to secure our positions on the lines and guide us in when we arrivedthe following night. It was in these woods thatPete DiPrinzio and Corporal Egolf, who returnedfrom hospitals, joined us.

CHAPTER XIIA Glorious Hallowe'en in Death Valley

At five-thirty the evening of the thirty-first,Hallow'een, we started for the front along anotherbadly torn and twisted road, which, along withthe almost running speed made by the head ofthe column, made our full packs feel like tons ofmetal. We passed through the Village of Somagneux, of old stones, so badly ruined was it. We couldhardly have recognized the place for a town butfor a Sign that stood in its center which simplystated that the pile of stones was Somagneux.

Every one remembers the pontoon bridge overthe Meuse on which we rested just before goingon the last leg of our journey, They say the bridgewas constructed faster than any bridge ever made

by the Americans under fire. When we reachedthe narrow road toward the front line, some of the

Twenty-sixth and the Twenty-Ninth Divisionswere already coming out, and, as usual, we triedto elicit information from them as to the conditionsof things up there, but either through fright orthat we might prove to be boche, they would tellus nothing. Once in a while a whispered "It ishell," could be heard.

All along the road cut in the valley gas in large quantities that had been lying stagnant as a resultof the rain, making the air almost unbearable.We had our first casualty of our second trip on thefront going in that night, when George Robinson,our blond-haired bugler, was struck down byshrapnel from the only shell that dropped near thecompany. Most of the men at the head of thesingle file column heard the shell whistle, butfigured that it would pass on out of danger. How-ever, it dropped about five feet from the movingcolumn, killing Robinson almost instantly, whileBorden received a fragment in his neck and Sergeant George Stolz a minute piece in his ear. Sergeant Joseph Labrum had the muzzle of his gunshot off clean while he was walking along Withthe weapon slung on his left shoulder.

At midnight we arrived on the lines in the Belleau Woods and started to relieve Company C ofthe Hundred and Fourth Regiment of the Twenty-Sixth Division, holding the front line of our sector.It was the matter of but a few minutes to displacethe wornout New England boys, the first andsecond platoons doing the relieving and the othertwo remaining in support in the dugouts just inrear of the lines. This was our first opportunity

to see what holding the lines was like, and wefound it to be quite 'a different task than we hadduring the first drive.

While fairly safe from artillery fire, our funkholes being dug in the bushes that formed a naturalcover from enemy observation, on the reverse slopeof the hill, we were nevertheless constantly subjected to a harassing artillery fire that came fromseveral directions and which did some damage tothe men on the lines, killing on the morning ofthe first John McKenna and wounding PrivatesBlanchette and Cericola. On the morning of thesecond, about daylight, Dowd Crawford was instantly killed by shrapnel as he was standing inthe funk hole so lately vacated by Sergeant Labrum, of the first platoon, whom Dowd had relieved.Dowd had been an acting sergeant previous to hiscoming up on the lines, he having asked to returnto his company from battalion headquarters. Twodays later one of the machine gun crew from theThree-Eleventh had his scalp torn off by shrapnel.Privates Shillock and Rush were wounded byshrapnel on the left flank the same day and by thesame shell that killed Crawford. Private Favreaua little later was wounded in the arm on the rightflank of the line. Crawford and McKenna weredecently buried but a few feet from where theywere killed by Sergeants Clark and Vineski.

It was while holding the lines that First Sergeant Cole received his commission as second lieu-tenant in infantry. Cole's commission was theresult of his excellent work throughout the firstdrive, especially on the first day of the drive whenhe aided Captain Smith in all the attacks the company made on machine guns. Cole disdained allpersonal risk, leading the men on to several enemy

positions which he took after a hard fight. Afterthe captain had been wounded, Cole re-formed thesection and started forward once again. His leadership and bravery under fire drew warm commendation from Colonel Oury. Sergeant Jacobssucceeded Cole as first sergeant of the company.

A change was made by Lieutenant Brigham inthe method of relieving platoons on 'the line, withthe result that the fourth platoon was chosen asthe detail platoon to bring up the rations, andlook after the feeding on the line. Were it not forthe excellent work of Sergeant Clark and his menduring those trying days, going through gas andshell fire constantly to accomplish their mission,we would have gone hungry more than once. JohnO'Connell, one of the old men of the company andone of the lightest, did yeoman work feeding thelines, often working during heavy shelling withoutregard for the personal danger involved.

We almost forgot to inscribe in this little historythat Lieutenant Hollinger, because of his excellentwork on the front in the first drive, received a firstlieutenancy. The coveted silver bar came to"Holly" at Sommedieu and we were all more thanhappy at his increase in rank. He was up thereall the time ready for anything and proved to usall that he was a real leader.

On the afternoon of the seventh an order camefrom regimental headquarters to send out a day.light patrol to ascertain the front line of the enemyand their possible strength. Under LieutenantsBrigham and Cole the patrol crept cautiouslyaround and down through the narrow path betweentwo hills and started out in the open. They hadhardly been out a half hour before Jerry opened

tip along the whole line, sending over the worstbarrage we had ever been under, considering thetime it lasted. It seemed that everything but theguns themselves were being hurled our way.

The men on the patrol were fired on from allangles by machine guns, trench mortars and handand rifle grenades, with the result that the patrolwas forced to withdraw hurriedly, but not withoutsevere losses. Private Jones was the last man toWithdraw, and only after emptying his automaticrifle; Privates Mike O'Connell, who but a fewdays before had received a letter telling him of thedeath of his mother; Fred McLaughlin, ChristosStavris and Orbie Ore were killed' outright, whileArthur Sortet brought in wounded in several places,died shortly after in a hospital. Privates JosephGibbs and Sidney Tuttle were wounded and evacuated to the hospital as was Wesley Williams as theresult of a badly torn knee..

The first members of the patrol to return statedthat the boche was coming over in large numbers.The order was immediately sent by runner to theplatoons resting in the dugouts to reinforce the lineand they did without the loss of a single man,though they passed up through terrific halo of leadand steel. The miracle of every man arriving onthe line that afternoon has been a topic of conversation at more than one sitting around the stove.When we arrived on the line it was thought by allthat Jerry Was coming over, and the expectancywas that we would get our first chance to use ourin, out, on guard, that we had been practicing forsuch a long time. But the Hun did not come over.

Sergeant Nipple, returning from gas school,joined the company in the heighth of the excitement.

In addition to those already mentioned, thefollowing men were members of the patrol: Corporals Foose and Cunningham, Privates Yeager,Nehf, Wilson, Rompolski and Simmons, andStretcherbearer Yelle. The following day, theeighth, we received word that Austria-Hungary,Turkey and Bulgaria had capitulated completelyand had accepted very rigid armistice terms. How.ever, we received no word at all that the allieshad proposed terms to the Germans for their consideration or that such plans were even being considered by the allies.

Shortly after noon firing ceased altogether allalong the line, making what seemed before likehell let loose a deathly still place. We could notunderstand the reason, for we had been shelledso constantly during the time on the lines thatmany thought something radical was wrong. Atfive-thirty that evening, as we were eating our dailymeal, the order came that an hour later we were togo over the top. We finished our meal and madepreparations to start. The company assembled onthe line with the first platoon on the left flankshortly after six o'clock. A half hour later wemoved up and over. Corporal Bostwick, of thefirst-platoon, had suffered severely from the gasof the previous night and had to be evacuated.

There was absolutely no connection at all on theleft with the First Battalion, with the result thatpatrols were sent out by each platoon in an effortto locate them, but they all returned without havinggained any information at all. In the inky, rainydarkness of the night we went slowly forward with our shoes caked with mud and with a fall hereand there into imperceptible shell holes. At mid-night the advance was halted and the order given

to dig in for the night. It was raining in volumesthen and it continued the same during theremainder of the night; making the cold all the moreuncomfortable.

CHAPTER XIII,The Beginning of the End

At five-thirty in the morning the advance wascontinued, but still no resistance was met. Thevillage of Moirey wholly destroyed, was takenwithout any fighting. Moving by the left flankalong the road leading out of Moirey, the battalioncontinued for about two hundred yards into anopen field, where a rest was taken. In the mean.time the Hun opened up for the first time withlight field pieces, which, fortunately, fell ten totwenty-.ve yards from their target. The orderwas then given to go forward, and, bearing off tothe right and under machine gun and artillery fire,the battalion started up Hill 328. Before reachingthe base of the hill, the enemy machine guns openedup savagely While we were crossing the swampthat wetted every man to his waist and added considerable to the misery of a heavy pack, the rainand the cold.

Corporal Charles Leon Spencer, the old sleuth,was the first to fall with a flesh wound in his rightside. At the base of the hill Private Kirby Burkertwas wounded by a machine gun bullet, but wouldnot leave the field until he received permission fromhis sergeant, despite the fact that he was sufferingintensely. When we reached the trench aboutthree-quarters way up the hill, safe from artilleryfire, reconnoitering patrols were sent out by eachcompany. All came back with the report that the

hill was infested with machine guns. It wasshortly after the return of the patrols that wereceived our first aeroplane strafing. A Hun aviatorcircled over our heads not over two hundredyards, dropped a few signals and scurried off.Hardly fifteen minutes elapsed before once moreoff in the distance we could see the Maltese crosson the boche plane as it sailed directly toward usnot more than a hundred feet in the air.

The battalion at that time was withdrawingfrom the hill, preparatory to an artillery barrageon the hill in an effort to dislodge the enemy ma.chine guns as the Hun came over. When directlyover the battalion, the avion opened up with hismachine gun, sweeping the open spaces devoid ofcover, unmercifully, doing considerable damage tothe entire battalion. We suffered one casualty,Billy Yelle, one of the finest and bravest boys inthe company, living but five minutes after thebullet entered his lung. Yelle, as a stretcherbearer in the first drive, worked day and nightbringing in the wounded, going for two days inthe rain without his overcoat and slicker, both having been turned into improvised stretchers.

As soon as the aeroplane was out of range, thebattalion continued its interrupted move down thehill to the dugouts in rear of Moirey, so recentlyoccupied by the Huns that the fresh cut kindlingwood lay beside the stoves. We remained in thedugouts until after the artillery sent over its barrage, when we were re-formed and once morestarted up the hill through the swamp. In rearof the town Privates Joseph Dionne and WilliamPriddy, while bearing an empty stretcher, wereinstantly killed by shrapnel, the shell bursting buta few feet from them. The Dionne family suffered

the loss of two of its boys in the company, Demetrius in the first and Joseph in the second drive. Privates Yeager and Astol. were wounded by thesame shell that killed Dionne and Priddy.

The object in going up the hill was to forestallany possible counter-attack that might have beencontemplated by the Hun that night, rather thanto attack, for the resistance we would have metwould have made it impossible to advance as wasevidenced the next day. The line was establishedalmost on the crest of the hill and outposts sent outto warn of any possible attacks. The Hun wasactive most of the night with trench mortar shells,which, however fell further down the hill fromour positions.

At five o'clock the next morning the order cameto once more withdraw from the hill in anothereffort to see whether our artillery could break downthe machine gun resistance ahead of us. We re.turned to the road to the left of the town, fairly

» safe from enemy artillery which pounded awayall around us. After an hour's barrage of seventy:fives, we started forward again, this time in combatgroups. While going through the swamp previousto forming in combat groups from the end of thefirst platoon to the end of the fourth, heavy casual.ties were suffered from shrapnel, the Hun openingup a terrific barrage of six-inch shells which didmore than the usual damage due to the length ofour line.

Ovilla Robidaux, John Dowling and WilliamKleshinsky on the end of the first platoon fellwounded first when a shell burst not far fromthem. A few seconds later Sergeant Claude

Mapes, one of Laquin's famous boosters, fell witha wound in the leg, followed by Stanny Kraukakas,the latter, one of the oldest men of the company.A gas shell incapacitated Oleshefsky and SamJohnson a few minutes later, while Harold Shippeefell wounded. Ray Rowan, one of the best likedmen in the company, a gentleman and a goodsoldier, who, despite his size, went through everyday of our gruelling fighting and hiking, lost oneof his arms the night of the ninth near Crepions,from which the following day he died.. CorporalFrank Annand, who vied with Henry Borden asthe tallest man in the company, was also severelywounded at the same time as Rowan.

The part of the company ahead did not realizethat so many men had been lost until later in theday when a check was taken. It was shortly aftersix o'clock when we started moving, but hardlyan hour had elapsed before we were met by averitable machine gun barrage that forced us toseek cover in a trench, at one time a strong pointof resistance for the enemy. The fourth platoon,however, was not as fortunate as the other threeplatoons of the company, for, under the leadershipof Lieutenant Hollinger, it had gone to the aid ofH Company which was suffering heavy casualtiesfrom machine gun and snipers' fire. There waslittle or no cover where the platoon stopped, soit was decided by Lieutenant Hollinger that themen would have to go back one at a time to the

safety of a trench, where the remainder of thecompany was under cover.

Sergeant Adams, of H Company, lay wounded Iand calling for first aid near where the fourthplatoon was under cover. Corporal Charlie De-

Voe volunteered to assist in carrying the stretcherto the rear, and he had hardly taken three stepsbefore he fell seriously wounded from a sniper's.bullet, dying a short time later in the field hospital:DeVoe was one of the old men of the company, atCamp Meade gracing the kitchen as an instructorcook. Corporal McBride was the first to leave forthe trench and he arrived safely. Private Tallythen followed McBride, but he had barely gonefive yards before he was shot in the stomach.Private McGee; the third to start out, had hardlygone ten yards before he fell mortally wounded bythe sniper's fire. Several others followed, makingthe safety of the trench by quick dashes and halts.

One of the last to leave for the trench, SergeantJ. Delbert Nipple, raising his body for a quickdash to cover, was killed instantly by a bulletfrom the same sniper. The death of Nipple wasa keen shock to all of us that day while we lay inthe trench with death so near. It was Nipple'sdesire to get back to the fighting front withhis company that really resulted in his death.He had been attending gas school and had on the. completion of his course, an opportunity to visitParis. This, however, did not appeal to Nipple,who was anxious to get back with his outfit. Thenight of November 7th found him on duty onthe front lines ready for action. His unwavering

good habits in spite of good-natured criticismearned for Nipple the admiration of all his fellowsoldiers, while his ability made him a valued assetto the company.

Sergeant Clarke, Hemenway and LieutenantHollinger, the, last three to leave the precarious

position, made their way safely back to the trench,but not before Sergeant Clarke had first left thesafety of cover and, crawling along the ground,had dragged the wounded Tally to the rear of adugout where he was safe from the snipers' fire.Costello and Vandruff, acting in a pinch asstretcher bearers, did good work bringing back thewounded during heavy machine gun fire.

The company was forced to remain in the trenchuntil after four-thirty in the evening because ofthe harassing machine gun fire the Huns playedon the trench and surrounding territory. A headbobbing up above the parapet of the trench woulddraw immediate fire, so that it was finally decidedto hold our positions and await the coming of one-pounders and trench mortars from the rear.

In the meantime it had been found extremelydifficult to get messages from one company to an-other or to locate the positions of the other companies of the battalion due to excessive machinegun fire. Wesley Meeks distinguished himself byoffering to carry messages to H Company, off toour right, though the carrying meant that the runner had to cross machine gun-swept ground. Thisdid not deter Meeks, who went to the task, gettingthe messages to and from the other companies asthough there was no such thing as danger in

bullets. As a result of this extraordinary work,Meeks was recommended for a D. S. C.

Shortly before four o'clock the trench mortarsand one-pounders came up and did considerabledamage to the Hun emplacements, after which areputed half hour's barrage of eight minutes of

seventy-fives was sent over, many of the shells,however, dropping short of their target and narrowly missing our trench. After the seventy-fiveshad finished their work, the order came to go over,and the company started forward from the left sideof the trench, only to be met by a hail of lead fromthe machine guns. Cover was taken in the trenchfor about five minutes, where it was found that wehad suffered but a single casualty, Mechanic Bor. ,den, the tallest man in the company, having beenshot through the back. A few minutes later thecompany was up and over again, this time on theright side of the trench.

Veering off to the right with but a trifling resistance, we crashed through the bushes and barbedwire, climbing over the later without, any effortbeing made to cut a path through it. Downthrough the valley we swept and up the hill atalmost a double time gait without the slightestsemblance of resistance from the Huns, who hadapparently made a hasty getaway. It was morelike the charges we had read of in history in theold method of fighting, where everything was sweptaside by the victorious chargers, than modern war.fare.

It was decided to dig in for the night in a lateraltrench that afforded but little shelter.

Good work with shovels, bayonets and anythingthat was handy made it fairly safe from artilleryfire. Outposts were sent out and the men keptconstantly on the alert for counter-attacks, forthere seemed to be something wrong in the mannerin which the Huns had made such; a quick rearmovement. All night long shells of all calibreswhistled and whined over our heads to fall in the,

valley in our rear. Evidently we had fooled theHuns in taking the position on the crest of the hill,for not once during the night did a shell drop nearour trench.

At eight-thirty in the morning, with a dense fogoverhanging the earth, the order was received thatat an hour later we would start over once more.All sorts of rumors had come to us that we were tobe relieved that morning, but at the zero hour westarted forward with our mythical relief out ofsight. The companies of the battalion had just'formed in combat groups when the enemy openedup with terrific fire from small calibre guns. Coverwas sought for a few minutes and once more were-formed and started forward in the height of theenemy shell fire.

The company had hardly gone three hundredyards when the third and the fourth platoons onthe right flank of the company received the worstof the shell fire that had been harrassing us forover an hour. One shell dropped in a group ofthird platoon men, killing instantly SergeantDibble and Austin O'Hare, wounding CorporalCharles Boland, Anthony Fauer, Raleigh Osborneslightly, and Francis J. Oakes, severely. A littlefurther on Sergeant Red Clarke was severelywounded by shrapnel and carried from the field bycomrades to the dressing station. Clark lost aleg, but smiled through it all. That is the kind ofspirit Clark showed all through the action of thecompany on the front. Always ready to do anymission, no matter how hazardous, he proved him.self a born leader under fire.

The company continued moving forward untilmet by severe machine gun fire, when a short halt

was made in the advance to clean out several enemymachine gun emplacements. These obstacles over.come, the company and battalion continued for-ward until they had reached a patch of brush tothe right of a deep cut in the valley, where theywere met by such a halo of 'machine gun fire thatthey were forced to withdraw a short distance tothe cover of a trench.

CHAPTER XIVGoing Strong at the Armistice

At the ten-forty-five Lieutenant Brigham received the order that at eleven o'clock all firing onthe battle front would cease, as an armistice hadbeen agreed upon by the Allies and the Huns.That was the first intimation we had received thatsuch a thing as an armistice was even being considered, for we had been without any news what.ever of what was going on in the outside worldfor almost two weeks, with the exception of oneor two papers brought up on the lines.

At eleven o'clock Lieutenant Brigham gave theorder that we were to cease firing, and what beforehad been a hell let loose now seemed like a quietSunday in the country. For several minutes aftereleven we could hear the distant boom of cannon,but it only lasted those few minutes and theneverything was deathly still. It did not seemnatural to our ears used to the crack of machinegun bullets and the bursting of shrapnel for elevenconsecutive days, but it was true, for a few minuteslater the Germans started celebrating and continued to do so for two days.

While inwardly we were happy mortals that the

fighting was over, outwardly we made nodemonstration whatever, simply going around shakinghands with one another as a congratulation on ourmutual good luck to be there at the finish. But notso with the Huns. They came down from theirmachine gun and snipers. nests to talk with usabout the end and offering us anything they had,cigarettes, tobacco, buttons off their coats, theirhats, helmets and, in fact, everything.

Many were the stories told by the Huns of whatthey intended to do if the war had lasted anotherday, that they were going to desert in a body andturn themselves over to the Americans, howstrongly fortified was the hill we were scheduledto take that day, of the fabulous number of ma-chine guns that were on the hill, of the amount ofartillery that was posted behind it and of the largebody of fresh infantry that would have met us hadwe taken the hill.

As proof that we were completely surrounded byHuns, we had only to see the places from whichthey emerged when the armistice ceased all firing.They came from our right and left and from infront of us. This was due to the inabilityof our flanks to keep up with us, with the resultthat we pushed forward without practically anysupport at all, giving us the right to say that wewere the farthest advanced of the division, a division hastily thrown together and welded into afighting machine second to none in sacrifice andability to fight. We made a huge sacrifice forevery strip of ground we had taken from the firstday out in September to the final hour of the war.A case of individual sacrifice, several of Whichcould be noted, was that of Private Arthur Gang.were, who, though suffering badly from trench

feet, continued forward with the company and re.fused to be evacuated to a hospital until after thearmistice.

The chumming of the Yanks and the Huns wasshort-lived, however, for an order came out statingthat there was to be no fraternizing with theenemy.

Quite a few of our Pennsylvania Dutch boys lostthe opportunity to practice up a bit with the Germans. Bob Wetzler even had some schnapps ordered from a German officer, but unfortunately,because of the order, the schnapps had to go begging as far as Bob went.

A little later our front line was established andguards posted to prevent the crossing of the line byeither Americans or Germans. Up went our puptents and a little later, for the first time since wehad started on our fighting career, we could buildfires on the front line. If anything felt comfortable that day, it was those fires, as our feetwere soaking wet and our clothes, too.

Some time in the afternoon Sergeant Stolz tooka detail down to the town in our rear to bring upfood for us and about two hours later we wereenjoying our first hot meal in three days; It wasthen that the cooks had their first glimpse of thefront line, but they could see nothing out of theordinary about it though.

The night of the eleventh will be one that everyone of us on that line will remember till his dyingday. Darkness had hardly descended over the war.ridden land until the Germans started sending outtheir signal lights, and what a beautiful display it

was. A Fourth of July celebration in a big citywould seem tame as compared with the display thatnight which came from every conceivable corner.

The vari-colored lights and signal flares that oncetold us to beware now brought us right back homeon a Fourth of July. It Was the most beautifulpyrotechnic display we had ever seen, the heavenslooking as though another sun had suddenly startedwhirling around the universe as a rival to Old Sol.

Up on the big hill, our objective that morning,the Huns celebrated at length, singing, playing ontheir musical instruments and otherwise makingmerry. One quartet of Germans far up on the hillsang "Holy Night," and sang it so well and loudthat we could plainly hear it down in the valley.In spite of the fact that it was our enemies doingthe singing, we could not help but say that it wasthe finest we had heard for a long time. On theother hand, we did very little celebrating, as a matter of fact, none at all, for we were tired out bythe long grind with full packs, were cold andsleepy and contented ourselves with building fires,drying our shoes and socks and making our beds ascomfortable as it was possible under the circum.stances, An abundance of straw discovered in adugout added something to our comfort.

The next day was spent doing little, most of usexploring some and resting more, in addition togetting our two squares brought up from thekitchen. The following morning, the thirteenth, werolled packs and started to move back to the old'German' camp huts between Wavrille and Moirey.Here Bill Brewer helped to make the cold nightsmore comfortable by giving us additional blankets.

The billets were fairly comfortable, for therewas an abundance of stoves and wood around tomake fires; It was in this camp that we stoodreveille and retreat again and doing a little squadsright and left, just enough to keep in some sort ofcondition. There we remained until the eighteenth,when we packed up and hiked to the dugouts justoutside the village of Ville, where we relieved acompany in the Sixth Division, the famous "SeeingFrance" division, which did more hiking to getinto battle and yet didn't get into the fuss, thanany division in France.

The work at Ville consisted in doing outpostduty where the lines had been established. Thefirst platoon was given the job with the option ofrelief the following day, if desired. However,Sergeant Kapp decided that the outpost duty wasmuch better than detail work in the valley belowWhere the remainder of the company was situatedand the dugouts were warm and comfortable.

As a rule, all the dugouts were warm and comfortable and with no drill schedule until the lasttwo days, all that a man had to do was to keephimself clean and rest. Bun McCabe, with hisbunch of orderlies, had quite a time in Ville makingflap jacks and washing clothes with the tireless Ed McElroy on the job.

Incidentally, it has almost been overlooked thatMcElroy was one of the hardest worked men onthe lines those last eleven days. He was companyrunner, platoon runner and in fact a runner forany one who needed him. He went after water forthe men on the lines more than once during heavyshell fire and always returned with his can filled.

The outpost lasted for a week, during which timeit was the duty of the first platoon to receive allallied prisoners of war, take them to the battalionP. C. from where they were sent to Verdun. Ger.mans and Americans were forbidden to cross theline at any time without written orders until thethird army started on its march to the Rhineland.At Ville the famous order came that the battalionwould start on a hike of a hundred and twentymiles in short time. The order continued thatall men unable to make the hike were to report tothe infirmary for examination. About~ thirty menof our company left to be examined at that time,and all Were sent to the rear for treatment.

At Ville the second and final check on the total'losses of the company in the last drive and the firstalso was taken. In the last eleven days of the warthe company suffered the loss of two sergeants,two corporals, one bugler and fourteen privateskilled and two sergeants, two corporals, twenty-four privates and one mechanic wounded. Fourmen were first reported missing in action, but itwas found later that "Talk in His Sleep" JimmieCunningham, one of Bun McCabe's best corporals,had been wounded in the leg with shrapnel. Ourtotal losses in killed, wounded and missing in thetwo drives were thirty-six killed, sixty-six woundedand six missing, a total of 108, which added tothirty men sent to hospitals as a result of sickness,gives the company a casualty list of 138, or aboutsixty per cent.

The night of the twenty-fifth of November six-teen men of the company were selected to be thefirst to go on pass as a result of four months’service in France. Such celebrities as the

following enjoyed the great privilege: Sergeants Charlie Kapp, Bun McCabe, Bob Wetzler,Bill Brewer, Pop Vineski and George Fitzgerald;Corporals Meeks and McBride; Private PerryVandruff and Cook Harry Maynard. At four thenext morning they started on a hike to Verdun,under the guiding wing of Lieutenant Hollinger,there to entrain for Aix Les Bains and numerohuit.

CHAPTER XVIThe Battle of Mud

That same morning the battalion started out ina downpour of rain from Ville on a four-hour hikethat carried it to Cote de Morimont Hill, a sea ofmud just outside the village of Romagne. It wasa sea of mud from the time we arrived there until'we left. About two of the thirty days we spentthere were clear, it either raining or snowing mostof the time. The problems were almost as thickas the rain, two or three weekly, no matter whatthe weather conditions.

The billets were as good as could be Secured atthat time and wood was plentiful, even if therewas an Order to the effect that no more of the oldbillets could be broken down and the wood usedas fuel. Once every week practice hikes wereheld out through that part of the country overwhich there had been no infantry fighting, butwhere shell holes and demolished buildings werecommon.

On one of our hikes we ran across a huge Hunammunition dump that contained shells varyingfrom three-inch to big sixteen-inch ones. The

woods in which the dump was situated was fullof dugouts and buildings loaded, down to capacitywith shells, powder and high explosives. On anotherday the company was taken out on a scoutingtrip, by Lieutenant Brigham, and hardware of all»kinds ranging from nails down to railroad equipment was scattered over a wide area in buildingsmade for the purpose.

It was here that Mechanic Dan O'Sullivan filledup his carpenter's chest with all sorts of tools,While the billets were strengthened by the additionof several axes and hammers and new additions totheir stoves.

For over two weeks at Morimont Corporal Harvey Egolf, one of the best known of Philadelphia'snickle boosters, was sergeant in charge of thesecond platoon. The responsibilities that Harveyhad during those days were enormous, but in truePhiladelphia style, Egolf surmounted all difficultiesand came through an acknowledged platoon leader.

Every one remembers the famous inspection heldby the brigade commander on the muddy, rain-soaked field one morning and how the rain becoming more or less unbearable forced the inspectionfor our company to be held indoors. It was themorning after the boys had arrived back from passand they were certainly initiated into "the orderof mud" in fitting style.

In the meantime the divisional headquartershad moved to; Souilly and rumor had it that wewould shortly move to that vicinity. The rumorof moving to Souilly was not the only one we hadon that hill during the month we spent there.Almost daily we heard that we would shortly start

for the rear and thence to the States, or else weheard that the division was placed in the Army ofOccupation, or that such and such and such asoldier had heard from such and such anothersoldier that we would be in the States at such andsuch a time. They were all rumors, but at timesthey sounded good to all of us, although at othertimes they made us feel sort of numb in thestomach.

It was in Morimont that Labrum ran his famousbattalion shows and where we met Slim and Kenneth Clarke for the first time since coming overseas. The same old Ken of Camp Meade dayswith his "All Together, Let's Go!" in his strongbass voice. Once in a while we did have a smile inMorimont, especially when old Doc Lawrencewould bring in some supplies and spend three-fourths of the day trying to figure out how he couldbest sell them to the boys. Then he would figureout how many each man could have so that every _man in the battalion received an equal share. Allvery well for the good old doctor, but lots of theboys never did receive their share.

Christmas Day on "Mud Hill" was a happy onein spite of the weather. Sergeant Gillette spentthree days previously in search of food for the outfit, and came back loaded down with pork andother goodies, along with cigars, candy, cigarettesand nuts. The meal itself was a treat to our famished stomachs, after so much corn bill during theprevious four weeks. The dessert was tres bon.Nearly every one made a speech that day, evenJimmie Patterson and Tick VanLoon, the formerhaving lots to say, while Tick, with his truereticence, just thanked the gang.

Barney Cinco sang along with the company's oldWarbler, Steve Dolan, who pulled his "Doughboy'sDream" on us for the first time. All in all we hadthe time of our life in France that day. The nextmorning sixteen men left for Aix Les Bains and aseven-day pass, while the remainder of the company packed up and started off on the first leg of athree-day hike with an almost full pack.

The first night was spent in Verdun, after seeing the trucks of the boys on pass whizz by, andthe second. just outside of Souilly. The hike onthe third day was started in the rain and ended inthe rain at Rosnes, about forty-.ve kilos fromVerdun, There were no stoves in the billets whenwe landed in the village, and wet throughfrom the heavy rain, the most of us spent a weirdcold night. The next day stoves were secured foras many billets as they could be found for, withthe result that our homes for the most part in haylofts were made more tenable.

Shortly after our arrival in Rosnes, the boyswounded in the first drive started wending theirway back to the company, and by the end of themonth, with the addition of twenty-eight men as-signed to the company from headquarters company,the outfit had a strength of well over one hundredand seventy. The first of January. the companyhad one hundred and four men. In addition tothe return of the wounded men, Lieutenant Cushing came back to the company and was immediatelyplaced in charge. He brought word that CaptainSmith was on his way. A few days later the captain returned and once more took charge of hiscompany, that he had been absent from for fourmonths.

When First Sergeant Jacobs, Sergeants Stolz,Seitzer, Seifred, Hemenway and Labrum, and Corporals Lubusky, Spencer, Foster and Marquis, Mechanic Hentschel, the famous souvenir hunter andthe hardest worked man in the outfit; Cooks Westand Petkus and Privates Costello, Callahan andCavanaugh, returned from pass they were placed ina mock quarantine which lasted for three days andgave them that many days of rest.

Shortly before the return of Sergeant Jacobsand his party, Steve Dolan took quite a numberof the boys to Lavabo. It was some twenty-fivedays before they returned with tales of what awonderful trip they had, but still they did nothave much on the former party who were the firstof the outfit to set foot on the sacred soil of Paris

and Lyons. Sam Reutter took the next joy party.out that included Tick Van Loon and Dan O'Sullivan, of Overshot. Apparently they had the worsttime of all the pass men, for they had little to sayabout their trip, the place they were in or the timethey had while there.

Detail work and problems were the specialtyWhile at Rosnes. The road was scraped whenmuddy and chopped up when icy, while a newrifle range was built about two kilos outside thetown. The pick and shovel men were numerousat Rosnes. Bob Wetzler was the engineer incharge of operations on the rifle range.

While out on a problem one day we had a miniature blizzard that gave us our first taste of winterand presaged a cold spell that lasted for over tendays and made the billets colder than the ice cheston a cold winter's day back home. The warmest

place in town was around the stove, if you werefortunate enough to have one and skillful enoughto get a place near it. Most of us had to get inbed or freeze.

CHAPTER XVI.The Night of the Big Feed

In an effort to spend some of the mess fund andto provide a little entertainment for the boys,the company banquet was held on the night ofFebruary first. Twenty-three officers and the company were present and all had a fairly good time,considering that the oysters in the oyster soupcould not be found.

The menu was quite a lavish one, and in addition to our mess kits being filled up, wealso had the peculiar sensation *of eating from aclean china plate. Roast pork, mashed potatoes,brown gravy, celery, jelly, candy, nuts and cheese,hot chocolate, cigars, cigarettes appearing on themenu card. About twelve acts of vaudeville werestaged by the entertainment securer, Labrum.

About this time the sergeants began makingtheir weekly pilgrimages to Bar le Duc, Vineski,Brewer, Kapp and Labrum starting the ball a-rolling and later on all the sergeant going down toenjoy the sights of the city. One time Labrumand Vineski had to walk all the way back, aboutfifteen kilometers, but that did not dampen thespirits of the excursionists any.

A few days later, before leaving Rosnes, Kapp,Wetzler, Marquis Krause, Minehan and three privates left the company and joined the military police.

It was in Rosnes that word came to us that threeof our boys had been wounded in the accident thatoccurred in the divisional educational school atSouilly When a trench mortar shell exploded."Happy" Charleston, gassed in the first drive, wasthe most seriously wounded. It was found necessary to amputate one of Happy's legs to save hislife. He was also wounded in two other parts ofhis body by shrapnel.

Ray Crompton, who had spent almost eightweeks in a hospital as a result of badly spraininghis ankle on his way up to the front in the latterpart of October, was wounded in the arm, butnot seriously, while Adelard Bergeron received apiece of shrapnel in one of his toes.

On the morning of the seventh, after biddinggood-by to Kapp's old man, and with everythingwe owned strapped to our backs, giving us theappearance of Christmas trees, we left Rosnes,where rumors were thicker than flies around amolasses can and where the problems made thedoughboy hearts in us weary, we started for Seigneulles, about three and one-half kilos away.

Though the town was extremely dirty one whenwe entered it, the billets more than compensatedfor this, for they were fifty per cent. better thanthe ones we had just left, with a stove for eachone and much better bunks. The sergeants weregiven a billet to themselves at the end of town.

After two or three days. of road scraping andpicking up cans and rubbish and carting it awaythe town began to take on the appearance ofcleanliness, with the result that by the middle of

March it was almost fit to live in. Two days afterour arrival we were paid. It was such a long timebetween pays that the boys knew no restraint.That was one wild night. However, no one landedin the guard house.

On the twenty-first the famous brigade reviewwas held. We had to hike some kilometers thereand back to make our showing, which proved tobe a good straight line when we passed the reviewing stand. On the twenty-fourth we had a regimental review which just about taxed the strengthof us all. We had to pass in review no less thanthan five times with its attendant double times.

The next day Lieutenant Connors became part,of the company and his first day among us provedhim to be an excellent officer, with an uncannyability to ask questions about guard duty and infantry drill. On the twenty-seventh we receivedour first holiday since joining the army in France.. Of course it rained, but still it gave us a day ofrest. The holiday was decreed to honor our greatassistant in the fighting game, the horse, whounbeknownst to himself was on parade that day.

It was in Seigneulles that we learned of ordersto the effect that our division was the last to leavein June, and we resigned ourselves to making thebest of the four remaining months until we sailedfor the good old States. It was thought that thisorder would stop all rumors, but it did not, fora few days later rumors came out to the effectthat our division had gained some eighteen dayson the schedule due to additional shipping and thefact that it was due to a non-desire to be too optimistic that the schedule was made out with but acertain number of divisions to go home at a time.

At Seigneulles we received our second anti-typhoid inoculation, or "shot in the arm," as knownto the boys, an intimation that at no terribly distant time we were scheduled for a journey acrossthe seas.

The last week in March came the welcome newsthat the 79th Division would leave the shell-tornand battle-scarred Souilly area, with its villagesof mud and manure, and move down Chaumontway, where billets and conditions were much better.Finally the definite order came, and sure enoughwe were scheduled to leave on Friday, our favoritemoving day, for a five-day hike of approximately104 kilometers. Even though the distance wasconsiderable, the news of this hike was not receivedwith the accustomed gloom of former long hikes,and for once the motor end of the A. E. F. escapedits wonted criticism, for were we not started onour way home, even ready to hike to Brest andswim the Atlantic if necessary?

Friday morning, March 28th, found the company lined up with full packs ready to start onthe long hike, and as usual the 79th Division hikingweather prevailed, but this time it snowed andrained both. Our objective that day was Louisy,which we reached at 12.30, resting the balanceof the day. Next morning we started out and hadgone but a short distance before it began to pour.We continued marching in the drenching rain untilwe reached Ligny, a small city. Here tired and'wet we tried to dry ourselves as well as possible,hoping that we would have Sunday, the next day,to complete the process, but we were disappointedin this, and Sunday morning, at 7 o'clock, startedon the longest and most wearisome hike of the

series, covering some thirty-two kilometers, arrivingat Eschaney at 2.30 in the afternoon, tired andweary, and as the day was cold 'the hot cocoaserved by our Y. M. C. A. during our hike wasmore than appreciated.

CHAPTER XVII.The Battle of Francs

After rather a cold and uncomfortable night westarted out at 7.30 in the morning, reaching Chambroncourt at noon, and it being April Fools. Day,we were fooled in the usual French weather.Strange to say, the sun shone and it did not rain.After a comfortable night in good billets we leftfor St. Blin, our final objective, which we reachedabout noon. Here we found good billets awaitingus and this together with an easy drill schedulemade our twenty-one days' stay in the town apleasant one.

It was in St. Blin that the nervy wild boar,letting his curiosity get the better of him, tried toinspect the company while at platoon drill andreceived two shots for his pains which sent himscurrying up the hill.

Almost the entire regiment was quartered here,giving us. a chance to renew old acquaintancesand spend many a happy hour in the evenings inthe numerous cafes, and if our tastes didn't runthat way, could attend a show at the "Y" eachevening, provided you went early enough to geta seat. We can also carry recollections of St. Blinas being a place where beaucoup francs were necessary, as the shopkeepers, of a mild, Jesse Jamestype, believed in making hay while the sun shines,

though the hay in this case was francs.

Detail work and athletics took up most of ourhours there, and nothing of unusual interest markedour stay except the divisional review by GeneralPershing. Great preparations were made for thisboth in drill and dress, and every one took a keeninterest in the proceedings for all wanted to appearat their best before their commander-in-chief.Shoes were cleaned as never before, and the townscoured for irons to press the clothes. Many werethe sighs when a particularly obstinate wrinkledcoat or trousers failed to yield to the persuasionsof the light French flatirons heated mildly warmat the hands of an inexperienced doughboy.Finally Saturday, April 12th, the morning ofthe review came and with it the usual 79th weather,rain} Reveille that morning was at 4.15, and after- a hurried breakfast we started out for the paradegrounds at 5.50, which we reached at 8.30. Aftergetting into position there was nothing to do but1 wait for the General, who was to commence theinspection at 10 o'clock. Hardly had the inspection started before it began to pour and continueduntil after the review. The men presented aninspiring sight as they passed the reviewing standwith fixed bayonets and wearing helmets and instraight platoon lines.

A matter of special interest and pleasure to thecompany was the awarding of the DistinguishedService Cross to our company commander, CaptainSmith, for exceptional bravery in the battle ofMontfaucon. The whole company felt a keenpride in having its commander decorated.

The entire division was lined up in a column ofplatoons and in so compact a form that its nineteen

thousand-odd men occupied a comparatively smallspace, and the commands of the divisional commander, General Kuhn, could easily be heard.

After passing the reviewing stand and double-timing for a considerable distance, a half-hour'shalt was made and then we started through themuch-cursed French mud back to our billets, tiredand wet, but happy, as the general was more thanpleased with the appearance and condition of ourdivision, and was not slow in letting it be knownto the men. This was also the first time the divisionhad been assembled since our arrival inFrance, and while the units fought side by side,the billeting area was always so large we neverhad an opportunity to assemble for parade.

After our review our interesting army creation,rumor, began to work again, this time regardingour probable moving date and seaport, as a reviewwas generally a forerunner of an early move homeward bound. Finally we began to turn in variousarticles of equipment, and then we knew that thetime was only a little ways off.

CHAPTER XVIII.Getting Nearer

Finally the definite date and area for our battalion to leave was given and preparations forthis made. The Nantes area was to be our finalbilleting area and Saint Nazaire our sailing port.

Accordingly on Tuesday, April 22, a perfectsunshiny day, which must be noted, as we wereaccustomed to sunshine only in homeopathic doses,at one o'clock in the afternoon we lined up with

full packs. The villagers were all out, the bandwas playing and with joyful hearts and the bestof spirits we started out, leaving St. Blin a pleasantmemory. The hike was a short one, taking usto Remaucourt, where we entrained.

At Remaucourt we found American boxcarsawaiting us, sixty hommes and no chevaux, andplenty of straw to lie on, an unaccustomed luxuryto the doughboy in his side-door Pullman travels,also plenty of space, as we were allowed four carsto the company or about forty men to the car, awelcome contrast to the forty hommes capacity nostraw French car with forty-two or forty-threetired doughboys packed in. One car also wasassigned as cook car, from which hot coffee wasserved to us.

The main items on our bill of fare for this tripwere our famous iron rations (hard tack and cornWillie) with a microscopical amount of jam, whichwe thought our friends in the S. O. S., throughmistake, had let slip by. Just before we startedan unguarded bread truck was raided and the waythe battalion of doughboys carried it away reminded one all the world of a colony of disturbedants carrying away their eggs to a secure place,though the secure place in this case was under thestraw in the boxcar, safe from the prying eyes ofour time-sworn enemies, the military police.

Our trip took us through some beautiful partsof France, also through the freshly inundated LoireRiver section, where we were made acquainted withthe fact that a French river can get ambitionenough to travel over its banks. The weather wasideal, every one was happy and seemingly at peacewith the whole world, for we were leaving the

extreme boundaries of the battle-scarred Franceand lessening time to our final objective, home.

While we expected to reach our destination at8 A. M. April 24, the usual railway delays pre-vented. Consequently it was 9 P. M. before wedetrained at Cholet, where we found trucks awaiting us, and for once thought that motorized infantry had at last become a reality and our hikingdays were over (we were partially mistaken in this,however). After a considerable delay we were takento our new home for the next fourteen days, Andreze, arriving there about one in the morning ofApril 25th.

The following day was spent in cleaning up andgetting acquainted with our new French neighbors,and being the first troops that had been quarteredthere since the war, we were objects of great curiosity and any drill or formation would soonattract a crowd. Our company only was quarteredin this town, and we soon were acquainted withall the inhabitants and found the people here contrary to all types that we had met before, andmany ideas were changed in regard to our fightingpartners. The people here were a kindly benevolent lot, and seemed as though they could not doenough to make our stay more pleasant. A francthere went much farther in purchasing luxuriesthan any other place we had been, and ampletime for recreation made our days seem short.

Changing and boiling clothes was one of ourmain occupations there, for we were thoroughlydetermined to get rid of the great pest of ourarmy existence, the cootie, nothing more or lessthan the civilian greyback with a thorough military training. Each platoon had its boiling pot,

and it was kept busy day and night, and manywere the good-natured scraps caused by a carelesssoldier thrusting in his 0. D. shirt with a colorthat would run, giving the whole batch a coffee.colored appearance and a sight to behold.

This place will recall memories of the greattobacco shortage where a cigarette was worth itsweight in gold and as scarce as the proverbialhen's teeth, and where one cigarette would passthe rounds of a dozen men and the remnants hoarded and made into its successor and then pass therounds again. Even the strong and at all othertimes unpopular French tobacco was a most welcomeaddition to our almost exhausted supply, andLady Nicotine's worshippers welcomed her,Whether she came from Camels, Bull Durham, orthe strong ill-smelling French variety.

Cootie and physical inspections were very numerous there, but the great inspection was theone held to determine our fitness to go on divisional priority list for early overseas sailing,and many were the individual misgivings of thesoldier when the inspection day drew near andhe found that he was short small but necessaryarticles, the shortage of which would bring censure from the inspecting officer and a black markagainst his company, too many of which mighthinder the bright prospects for an early departure.Nothing floored him now, though with his knowledgeof camouflage, and many a box of shavingpowder contained nothing more or less than kitchenbaking powder, and what passed for tooth pastenothing more than the anti-dim compound for useonly on the eye piece of a gas mask.

Finally the day came and passed and when

the returns were in it was found that the 314thRegiment had taken the honor and would be thefirst to leave for our seaport, St. Nazaire. Passenger lists which had been gotten out some timeprevious were brought out and practice in goingup the gangplank was given and never were instructions more thoroughly obeyed or more interestshown in drill.

Definite instructions were received the ninth forus to prepare to move the following day, and soour last day in Andreze was an exceedingly busyone. Reville was scheduled for 4 o'clock themorning of the tenth, and at the first sound ofthe bugle the tired doughboys rolled over, yawned,rubbed their eyes and hopped out of their none toocomfortable bunks, and after a hurried breakfastrolled packs, policed the area, and at 7 A. M.started on the hike to Cholet, meeting the differentunits of the regiment on the way (motorized infantry dreams were again shattered).

We arrived there at 10.30, and at 2.30 entrainedfor St. Nazaire, which was reached at 9 P. M.Detraining, we hiked to Camp No. 1, although ashort hour and a half hike, was one of the mostexhausting ones we had had for many a day onaccount of the speed with which it was conducted.However, after a rest and a feed of corn willieand trimmings, our friend and acquaintance formany a day, we felt refreshed and ready for ourhike to Camp No. 2, which we reached shortlyafter midnight.

The next morning orders came that all Frenchmoney was to be changed into the only currencythat was ever worth anything. It was then thatsome of us learned what wealthy fellow-soldiers

we had. Francs of paper, of silver and evenmoney of higher denominations of gold came forthfrom pockets jealously guarded during our longstay in the land of the poilus.

The day was a cloudy one, but our spirits werenot to be dampened by any fitful display of Frenchweather. The stage was set, We were going home,date unknown, but going, that was certain. Thatday we were taken to a building where the keenestmedical inspection imaginable was held. Some ofthe boys had little ills that were soon dissipated,and the. company Was ready as soon as the authorities decided to send us.

We moved up to the section known as theready to leave area, where we were treated to oneof those famous cootie inspections, and where wediscarded all our clothing that had been used as ahiding place for the vermin and were given cleangarments. Weyrick, it will be remembered, wasdecked out in a new suit of Uncle Sam's when hefelt a sudden gnaw at his knee. Hasty examination revealed the fact that the cootie was not tobe downed so easily. And another casualty wasadded to the millions credited to the doughboyson the sacred soil of France.

After eating three squares a day and enjoyingthe bunk fatigue that made our waiting hours alittle easier, we were ordered on the afternoonof the sixteenth to get ready. Packs which hadbeen rolled every morning for three days wererolled again. As the sun ~was slowly sinking inthe West, and a beautiful sun it was, bidding usfarewell to the land we had learned to honor andrespect, we started for the drill grounds, wherewe met up with the remainder of the regiment.

CHAPTER XIX.When a Feller Needed a Friend

"Forward march," the sweetest command wehad ever heard, and we were off for the dock. Thehike through the town was a most enjoyable one.The packs, heavy as they were, seemed as lightas the proverbial feather. There was joy in ourhearts and with some of us just a trifle of sorrow.It was not long before we were standing at thefoot of the gangplank getting ready to mount toAmerican soil, for the old Princess Matoika, withthe Stars and Stripes flying aft, meant everythingAmerican to us, and why not the soil?

Final orders were given about answering to ournames and the column moved forward and up thegangplank. Down we went a couple of decks andwith the terse orders of the gobs found the bunksthat were to be our resting places for ten days. Itwas hot, frightfully so, down in that hold, but itmattered little. Smiles played all over the featuresof each and every one of us. We were technicallyhome. We were denied the privilege of going ondeck and hence gained our last View of France, theland of beaucoup madamoiselles, cooties, francs,vin rouge and vin blanc, cognac, manure, stables,the home of Paris, the great city, and of the sweet-hearts and good friends some of us left behindgoing up the gangplank.

Some time after midnight the old sea wagonbestirred its engines and started down the bay tothe stormy, weather-beaten and wind-tossed Bay ofBiscay. To the landlubbers there was little sleeping that night. A funny feeling akin to a ride on

a roller coaster on a full stomach seemed to makesome of us a little timid. No, we weren't seasick --not yet -- but what was it, anyhow?

We found out in the morning. "All up on thedecks. Come on, soldier, you can't stay here, placemust be cleaned; get up" How easy to giveorders and how difficult some times to carry themout. Most of the boys, be it said, had strongstomachs and mounted the stairs with the agilityand grace of a ship-trained man. Not so withothers. The walk up the stairs with the ship tossingand rolling like a rubber ball in a lake duringa storm was a perilous one and fraught with dangerevery minute; Once on deck, faces white, therewas nothing else to do but get rid of it. Andthey did. That feeling of emptiness in one's lowerregion, with a peculiar tossing of the head, provedthe necessary impetus, and up it came.

There wasn't much to laugh about for thoseaffected, but for those who retained the productsof Mother Earth there was many a good smile. Itwas a bad day at sea for hundreds, the ship tossingand swaying and apparently hitting the bottom ofthe ocean every time it got into a trough of water.

The food was anything but like what we hadenjoyed coming over on the Leviathan, and hadit not been for the canteen and its goodies, happiness would have been at a low ebb. Many nevervisited the mess hall, but it wasn't because theydisliked it, they simply were unable to hold anyof its products in the receptacle for man's food.

There was little to mar the perfect tranquilityOf our passage home. Boxing contests betweenthe members of the regiment and the sailors

provided entertainment one day. Any one fortunateenough to get up on the officers' deck could seetheir many forms of enjoyment with cards. Thiswas denied the enlisted men, who had to becontented with a surreptitious crap game or a littlestud here and there.

Boats were sighted, all kinds of fish misnamed,and storms added a little excitement on the wayacross, but not much. The old liner plungedalong in the sea making its way to the land ofthe free and the home of the brave. One nightthe poor tired ship stopped dead for about tenminutes to rest, affording considerable amusementto those on guard.

CHAPTER XX.There is no Place Like------

Early on the morning of the twenty-sixth, landwas sighted, with the accompaniment of thousandsof voices. Up the harbor we steamed, past theBattery, up to quarantine, where we were met bythe police boat, every man now on deck perchedin some perilous place anxious to see and cheereverything that was sighted. The Statue of Libertywe had passed on our way across seemed to havea much more radiant smile for her returning sons.The world seemed cleaner, happier and better aswe each and every one of us realized that we wereat last at home, that place we had talked incessantly of from the first day in Brest.

Tugs, small in comparison to the ship, Soonmaneuvred us alongside the dock. We were ready.Packs were placed- in readiness for the word todisembark. It came and we went in single file to

step on real American soil and to breathe the airwe had missed for eleven months.

Great! We'll all say so. Nothing like it.Smile! I'll say we did. Happy, say quit yer kiddin'. Oh, boy, what a grand and glorious feelin'.

The Red Cross was on the job and just to showus that we were still in the army gave us a mealthat included corn willie. It was good and itwent down with a relish. Reformed, we startedoff for the ferries that were to carry us to JerseyCity and the trains.

Ever forget that sort of feelin' like nervousnessthat came over you as you marched along throughthat lane of Americans who greeted us in the trainshed? And the smiles! Say, we were as happyas kids on a picnic. It wasn't long before wewere on the trains ready for the last leg of thejourney that was to send us out into the world,better and finer men. The Red Cross, K. of C.,Y. M. C. A., Salvation Army and Y. M.. H. A.were on hand with oranges, apples, candy, chewinggum and what not.

With a cheer that could be heard back in Frettswe were off for Camp Dix. How the folks didcheer us on the way, every village and hamlet having its committee of honor out to greet us with awelcome that was genuine.

The sun was beginning to set in the West whenwe arrived in Camp Dix on the afternoon of thetwenty-sixth. In short order we were billeted andready for the last days of our soldier life. Detailwork of cleaning up kept us busy for two days,and then we moved down close to the last point of

contact of our army careers. The entire companysuccessfully passed the final medical examinationand now all that was necessary was to get ourpapers in order to get paid.

On Memorial Day the company started. in forits tour of the "Mad House." By 6 o'clock inthe evening most of the company had been paid infull, with the old discharge tucked securely away.Hands of buddies who were closer than brothersduring the great experience were clasped in fondfarewell as eyes dimmed with tears looked away.

Our work was finished. We were soldiers nomore. The great experience faded into memoryand was no longer a living thing. We were backin the world again where we had to continue thefight to exist. We all felt that we were the betterfor our experience and could meet any emergencyin the life of a citizen that we met when in thekhaki we learned to love so much.

All we have left is the memory of terrible daysand the memory of others that were happy. Wewill never forget our experiences. They will everremain vivid on our memories and remind us thatwe were the fortunate ones, and that back in thehallowed ground of France we left our sacrificethat democracy might live and tyranny be foreversuppressed.

(THE END)