| Show s w c FIX V VF BAYONETS X A A 0 A V tl ae war at clem ramos ja I 1 ss nur talili anki hi osar brimi it 9 afi t aa capt JOHN W T jr tr tessi on the Ac xai WD 0 by the th bell inc ina here re morgan lie said ill po poke emy cay tin hat around this side and you watch and see if you can get the chaut chaut on them ile he stuck the helmet on his bayonet and thrust it out something struck it violently fro from M the point and the rifle made ills his fingers tingle the chaut cliant went off once in the same breath there was an odd noise above him the machone gon lie he looked tip P morgans body was slumping clumping slum ping down to its knees it leaned forward against the wood the chaut chaut still grasped in a clenched hand coming to the ground butt first the mans head was gone from the eyes up big helmet slid back over his combat pack and lay on the ground sly my mother reflected the lieutenant wilt will never find ray my grave in this place ile he picked up the chaut chaut and examined it professionally noting a spatter of little red drops on the breech and the fact that the clip showed one ona round expended the charging handle was back he got to his fits feet with deliberation laid the gun across the woodpile and a nd sighted three koche with very red faces their eyes looked pale under their deep helmets he gave them the whole clip and they appeared to wilt then lie came away from there ther e late gatei he was in the little run at tho the foot of the hill with three men all wounded lie ha never know how he be got there it just happened later in the day the lieutenant Mu tenant was back on the pine crested hill now identified as I jill hill captain hamilton was there one or two other officers and a handful of the forty ninth and sixty seventh compan companies tea a semblance of a line was organized from the direction of torcy dorcy a count er attack developed the doche boche was filtering cleverly and forming somewhere on the torcy dorcy road in cover the marines were prone slings adjusted killing him its a quarter point right nawl not a breath of airl air use zero A file of sweating soldiers burdened with picks and shovels in adan engineer of the sec second ond to bandoleers and combat gear came trotting from the right A second lieutenant a reddish rough look in ing 9 youngster slumped up and ed you in charge here he be said bald to the marine Of fleer im lieutenant wythe of the second engineers with a detachment im to report to you for orders well captains right up yonder how hov many men you got twenty two sir fine I 1 that makes thirty six of us Inc including ludin ule me just flop right here and well hold this line orders are to dig in here but that can wait see yonder those engineers their packs pacha went one way and their tools another and they cast themselves down happily what range buddy asial any A hairy noncom non com got into his ht ling and laid out a little pile of clips there was always good feeling between the marines of the second division and the regular army units that formed it but the marines and the second engineers say it if I 1 ever got a drink a second engineer can have half of it 1 boy they dig t trenches enches r and mend roads all night and they fight fill all day I 1 an when us guys get all killed off they just come up tip an take over the warl war I 1 theys no better folks anywhere than the engineers gi 91 ginders CHAPTER II 11 the boche wanted hill he be came and the rifles broke him and he came again all his bat batteries were in action and always ill hla 9 machine annb ad th the ellace pi abc acc bu but he caul d bearns athe rine rides guns ns he could understand he know knew all about bombs and auto rifles and ma chine guns and trench mortals but aimed sustained rifle ride fire that comes from nowhere in particular and picks ot off men it brought the war home to the individual and demoralized him toward midday mid day this sixth of june 1918 the condition around mil hill stabilized A small action fought by battalions over a limited area of no special importance it gave the boche something new to think out and it may be that people who write histories will date an era from it between attacks the stretcher bearers and the red cross cress men on both sides did their utmost for the wounded w who he were scattered through the wheat around the hill and who now under the torture of stiffening wounds and the hot sun be te ganto cry out As the afternoon advanced yen heard pitiful voices little and thin across the fields ach bimmel hilf hildi liebe gott brandl brandI ghe glie first tild ald this way first ald aid for the love of god late in the afternoon a great uproar arose to the right there was more artillery up now more machine guns more of everything the third battalion of the sixth marines and the third battalion of the fifth attacked the town called bouresches Boure Boures clies and the wood known as bols bois de belleau they attacked across the open losing hideously platoons were shot down entire lieutenant robinson got into bouresches Boure with twenty men out of some hundred who started threw the doche boche out and held it they gained a footing in the rocky ledges at the edge of the bols bois de belleau suffering much from what was believed to be a machine gun nest at this point they tried to leave it and go on with a containing force to watch it they found that the whole wood was a machine gun nest night descended over a tortured area of wheat and woodland lit by lares flares and gun flashes flailed by ma chine guns and in two many places pitiful with crying of wounded who had lain all the day untended nn tended in a merciless sun stretcher bearers and combat patrols roamed over it in the dark water parties and ration parties groped back from forward positions over unknown trails there were ere dog fights all over the place wild al alarms arins and hysterical outbreaks of rifle fire it was the same with the boehe beebe he knew the ground better and he was determined to repossess it his people filtered back through the american stron aprong g points for the marines did not hold a continuous line isolated positions were connected by patrols and machine guns laid for interlocking fire at the southern angle of hill the forty ninth company put out a listening post poet one man down don the slope a little way to watch for visitors in the night there was a trampling a grant and one scream boche 1 at once the hill bill blazed into action weary men overspent overspend over spent they tired fired into the dark until their pieces were hot and alter after they found the listening post follow fellow bayoneted and down the hill a little huddle of now dead not all the rifle tire had gone astray back in brigade officers bent over maps and framed orders for a stronger attack on the bols bois de belleau at dawn brigade was writing also to division casualties severe figures on which to base call for replacements will be submitted as soon as possible 11 at the crossroads beyond la vote vole du da chatelle the replacements met the war behind them crammed sorbe somehow how into weeks were quantico the transport brest a french troop train then there was the golden country around st dignan aignan the saint onion of americans the war was represented by demoniac non coms instructors in this and that bayonet drills come on now lemme hear you what do we wash our bay barnets nets in german blood P 1 aw sing out like you meant it you dam replacements replacement si ill swear its a shame to feed animals like you to the germans P gas mask drill 1 take more than five seconds an your maw gets a gold star now the gas alert post position 0 tor for dawds sake you guy you wit the two left feet but sergeant I 1 find that I 1 have a certain difficulty P sergeants also swear terribly there was every kind of drill eight hours a day ot of it and police work rumors of great battles in the north glum and sad civilians they were glum and sad everywhere in france that spring of 1018 talking in anxious groups after the town crier with his drum passed another troop train maybe the same train that was carelessly left alongside a train containing the wine ration for some french division the papers in which case are probably still accumulating mu lating camione camions after that the replacements de bussed late of a juno june afternoon and went up a great white road between exactly spaced poplars they marched first in column of squads then in column of flies files platoons on opposite sides of the empty road at the crest of a slope the column stopped you could see hanging above the skyline to the north and east curious bhame look like a elephants head bows on wit his ears out dont t they bey sergeant the tall noncom non rion com replacement officer in charge well stop here sir boche beebe sausages yonder observation hal balloons loons see ibee the whole country kofl well wait till tili dark 11 the detachment w was as glad to fall out off the road the sun sull set after a while and the d day ay drowsed into the long twilight presently the sergeant said we can move now sir 11 the replacements moved making no conversation A little country road led them off the highway they passed a shattered fa farmhouse where a few soldiers lounged in the dusk regimental sir gets shelled a lot no sir they dont expect you to report somebody on the road to meet you A little group of officers rose out of the ditch yawning they looked slack and tired replacement column you in charge yes assignments made back in brigade go too henry your battalion gets a hundred and seventy with five officers take em off the head of the column tell major turrill P the detachment followed the officer called henry who set what they considered an immoderate pace ile he passed the word dont bunch up it if a plane comes over low dont look up at it lie he can see your faces no an dont talk P they went through a gap in a hedge and were at another crossroads fall out here an form combat packs leave your stuff under the hedge take one blanket come on quickly bowl now an dont bunch up the replacements formed combat packs expertly remembering parris panis pan Is island and quantico smartly now w come by here nil fill your packo pockets ts each man take two boxes hard bread cherell Wh erell you yon carry them how in hell do I 1 know there I 1 1 two goods boxes sat close together and the men filed between them one box had dried prunes in it the other bread dont stop I 1 dont stop I 1 right down that road an keep movIn 1 out over the woods a sound started a new sound it was a rumbling whine it grew to a roar and a 77 crashed down just beyond the crossroads A cloud blacker than the night leaped up shot with red fire lie down all hands another landed at once the air was full of singing particles the men flat on their faces in the dark waited numbly for the next order there were a dozen or so shells all around the place the last one hit between the two goods boxes where a man was lying the boxes and the man vanished in a ruddy cloud better than if hed gotten it in the belly and rolled around screaming there were no more shells say you know I 1 saw a arm an I 1 a rifle goin up wit that burst I 1 who was he anyway neep keep quiet therel there all right on your feet right down that road the officer ordered and added to himself dam lit it should have remembered they shell la vote vole du da chatelle every night this time but they acted one fine A voice spoke up excited amused say I 1 sergeant mcgee anything like that in vera cruz pipe down you doot boot they went down a wood road black as a pocket just ahead came a bright flash and a roar and fragments ripped through the woods and they heard a lamentable crying getting weaker first aid first aid 11 the column came to a dead m mule ule and the wreck of a cart lying athwart the road and a smoking liole hole an and d a smell of high explosive and the sharp reek of blood there was a struggling group somebody working swiftly in the dark a whiteness ot of bandages and the white blur of a mans torso lie still damn youl 0 0 go easy you yon v nell hell I 1 know it hurts guy but I 1 got to get this bandage on I 1 come on quit 11 passing around the mule a man stepped on something neither hard nor soft nothing else on earth feels that way and he floundered to one side cursing hysterically quiet back there pass the word no talking the flies files obediently passed the word the column groped on in the dark it came out of the woods into a pale stone town Cham champillon pillon there were no lights in the houses the place had an air of death about it there was a phd from harvard in that sweating file a big pale unhandy handy private be hounded U tided habitually by sergeants and troubled with indigestion an and d patriotism for all his training a pack was not at home on his shoulders or a rifle easy in his hands bands ile he thought of the pleasant study back cambridge way of the gold and blue sergeant under the first to FI fight gh t I 1 11 recruiting poster your job too fella I 1 come on an help lick the hun I 1 you dont wanta wait to be drafted a big guy like you I 1 we can use you in the marines A hearty red necked ruffian extremely competent in his vocation no doubt good enough chaps yes but tea by a seal coal fire in the new england twilight and clever talk of art and philosophic anarchism one wrote fastidious essays on such things for the more discriminating reviews scholarly abstractions of all the stupid ignorant lg noran uncivilized things a war I 1 who coined that phase civilized warfare there was no such thing I 1 here in the most civilized country on earth the neighborhood of chateau thierry Monta ignes town it the kings of 0 france had a chateau near it once and yet it was always a cockpit since adtlus rolled back bach attila in the battle of the nations at chalons napoleon fought champ aubert and Mont around here alwil always y 4 war T L r READ BEAD THE WANT ADS H I 1 yh the e co ilan was through chalm pillon dipping into a black hollow more shell sheil holes in the road here all at once there was a new shell hole bole and the doctor of philosophy sometime private of 0 marines lay beside it very neatly be headed with the rifle that had been such a bore to keep clean across hla his knee and dried prunes spilling out of the pock ets that he never had learned to button the column went on at dawn a naval medico attached to the marine brigade with a staff officer passed that way odd the wounds you see observed the naval man professionally interested he looked curiously 1 I t am sketches from captain Thorna notebook have done a neater decapitation than that myself wonder who took his identification tags with IL it JL I 1 see replacement by his uniform for the fifth and sixth regiments had long since worn out their forest er green marine uniforms and were wearing army khaki while the replacements came in new green clothing in g the stall staff officer picked up the rifle snapped back tho the bolt and squinted expertly down the bore he said sure he be was a replacement you never catch ali an old timer with a bore like that filthy I 1 bet there been a rag through it in a week you know surgeon I 1 was looking at some of the rifles of that bunch of machine gun ners lying in the brush just across from battalion they were beautiful never saw better kept pieces fine soldiers in a lot of ways these boche I 1 meantime the column had passed into heavier woods and halted where the rifles ahead sounded very near they saw dugouts dug outs betra betrayed by the thread of candlelight around the edges of the blankets that cloaked their entrances one was a dressing station by the sound and the smell of it the officer named henry due ducked ked into the other there a stocky major sat up on the floor and rolled a cigarette which he lighted at a guttering candle candie replacements in well they look like same men I 1 saw in the t training |
