GRAND
December 25th, 1917
If there is one day in all the year that wanderers from home cannot afford to forget it is Christmas. The Company Commanders have had their Mess Sergeants scouring the countryside for eatables.
It was my business to give them a religious celebration that they would remember for many a year and that they would write about enthusiastically to the folks at home, who would be worrying about the lonesome existence of their boys in France. The French military authorities and the Bishop of the diocese had united in prohibiting Midnight Masses on account of the lights. But General Lenihan, the Mayor, and the Curé decided that we were too far from the front to worry about that, and it was arranged tout de suite. I knew that confessions and communions would be literally by the thousands, so with the aid of Joyce Kilmer and Frank Driscoll, ex-Jesuit-novice, I got up a scheme for confessions of simple sins in English and French, and set my French confrères to work; the Curé, a priest-sergeant in charge of a wood cutting detail, a brancardier, and another priest who was an officer of the artillery—all on the qui vive about the task. Christmas Eve found us all busy until midnight. I asked one of the men how he liked the idea of going to confession to a priest who cannot speak English. “Fine, Father,” he said with a grin, “All he could do was give me a penance, but you’d have given me hell.” Luckily the church was vastly larger than the present needs of the town, for everybody, soldiers and civilians, came. General Lenihan and Colonel Hine and the Brigade and the Regimental Staffs occupied seats in the sanctuary which was also crowded with soldiers. The local choir sang the Mass and I preached. Our lads sang the old hymns, “The Snow Lay on the Ground,” “The Little Town of Bethlehem,” and all, French and Americans, joined in the ancient and hallowed strains of the Adeste Fideles until the vaults resounded with Venite Adoremus Dominum. It took four priests a long time to give Communion to the throng of pious soldiers and I went to bed at 2:00 A. M. happy with the thought that, exiles though we are, we celebrated the old feast in high and holy fashion.
Christmas afternoon we had general services in the big market shed. The band played the old Christmas airs and everybody joined in, until the square was ringing with our pious songs.
Everybody had a big Christmas dinner. The Quartermaster had sent the substantial basis for it and for extra trimmings the Captains bought up everything the country afforded. They had ample funds to do it, thanks to our Board of Trustees, who had supplied us lavishly with funds. The boxes sent through the Women’s Auxiliary have not yet reached us. It is just as well, for we depart tomorrow on a four-day hike over snowy roads and the less we have to carry the better.