I

Fifth Avenue held a memorable crowd on the afternoon of the ninth of March, 1917. There were old women there in whose eyes was the eager light that only the thought of a son can cause to glow; there were proud old men—some of them with battered blue garrison-caps, and badges that told of service in the War between the States—there were wives, mothers, children—all waiting, in jubilant and affectionate expectation, the sound of a band playing “Garryowen” and the sight of a flag fluttering from a pole so covered with battle-furls as to glisten in the sunlight like a bar of silver.

The Sixty-ninth Regiment was back from the border. Escorted by its old friend, the Seventh New York, the Regiment marched nearly eight hundred strong, down the Avenue and east to the Armory. The crowd—or a large part of it—followed, and soon families separated for months were reunited. When the Sixty-ninth was mustered out of service that March day, after months of arduous service on the Mexican Border, it numbered 783 men. Almost immediately it lost some three hundred officers and men. This was in accordance with War Department orders and the National Defense Act of June 3rd, 1916, which provided that men with dependant relatives should be discharged from the service. Men were lost also because of the system, now discontinued, by which a soldier in the National Guard was furloughed to the reserve after three years of active service.

So in the early Spring of 1917, with participation in the European War a certainty, the Sixty-ninth Regiment found itself far below war strength, having lost a great number of men whom experience and training had made ideal soldiers. At once a recruiting campaign was instituted, but a recruiting campaign of a special kind. The Sixty-ninth has never found it at all difficult to fill its ranks—when it was under Southern fire in the Sixties it was brought up to war strength nine times. But the purpose in view now was to bring into the regiment men who would, in every purpose and way—physically, mentally and morally—keep up its ancient and honorable standards. It was easy enough to enlist hundreds of strong men who could be developed into good soldiers. But this was not the object of the recruiting of the Spring of 1917. It was desired to enlist strong, intelligent, decent-living men, men whose sturdy Americanism was strengthened and vivified by their Celtic blood, men who would be worthy successors of those unforgotten patriots who at Bloody Ford and on Marye’s Heights earned the title of “The Fighting Irish.”

The Regiment set its own standards in selecting recruits. In weight, for example, one hundred and twenty-eight pounds was established as the minimum. And if some honest man with broad shoulders and a knockout in each fist was unable to read ACXUROKY on a card hung thirty feet away—why, the examining physicians were instructed not to be overly meticulous in their work. But if the candidate, having every physical perfection, seemed to be the kind of man who would be out of harmony with the things for which the Sixty-ninth stands and has always stood, then the rigorous application of some of the qualifying tests invariably resulted in his rejection.

When, on April 6th, 1917, President Wilson declared that a state of war existed between the United States and Germany, his words found the Sixty-ninth Regiment ready, its ranks filled to war strength with soldiers of whom the men who fought at Gettysburg and Chancellorsville would not be ashamed. There was new intensity in the nightly drills; there was new fervor in the resolve of every man, veteran of the Border and recruit alike, to make the Regiment as nearly perfect a fighting unit as possible.

The 6th of April is a date which no American soldier will forget. And almost equally memorable is the 15th day of July of the same year—the day on which the National Guard was called into Federal Service. The Sixty-ninth regiment, 2002 strong, scarcely felt the heat of that torrid midsummer, so intent were all the men on preparing themselves for the great adventure, and so passionately eager were they for the call to service over-seas.

On the 5th of August the Regiment, still retaining the numerical designation which is permanently engraved upon the tablets of our nation’s history, was drafted into the Regular Army of the United States. This was a step nearer to the firing line—made, accordingly, with enthusiasm. And on the 25th day of August came the electrifying news that the Sixty-ninth Regiment had been selected as the first New York National Guard organization to be sent to the war in vanguard of the American Expeditionary Force.

The circumstances in which the announcement was made to the regiment were striking. It was a boiling Saturday afternoon and officers and men were exhausted from the exercises of the morning—a Divisional inspection in Central Park. The regiment marched through the dusty streets and ascended the steps into the Armory to learn that they were not to be immediately dismissed, but were to stay on the drill floor or in the Company rooms. Lieutenant Colonel Latham R. Reed had gone to Governor’s Island to attend an important conference, and officers and men were ordered to await his return. Everyone hopefully awaited the arrival of splendid tidings, and the weariness seemed to pass away.

When Lieutenant Colonel Reed returned, he called a meeting of his staff and the Battalion and Company Commanders, and told them such details as were then obtainable of the great honor which had come to the regiment they loved. There were present Major William J. Donovan, Major William B. Stacom, Major Timothy J. Moynahan, Captain George McAdie, Captain Thomas T. Reilley, Captain William Kennelly, Captain James A. McKenna, Jr., Captain Alexander E. Anderson, Captain Michael A. Kelly, Captain James J. Archer, Captain James G. Finn, Captain Van S. Merle-Smith, Captain John P. Hurley, and Captain William T. Doyle. They heard the good news with undisguised delight and at once proceeded to prepare for the necessary intensive training.

But as great as was their delight, it was clouded with one regret. And that regret was felt also by every enlisted man. They all knew that the Regiment had been the first selected to go abroad not because of what it had done in the Civil War, nor because it was representative of what was best in the citizenship of our nation’s greatest city. It had been selected, after a long and searching examination of the military resources of the country, because its record in the most recent important test—the Mexican Border Campaign—showed it to be the best trained and equipped fighting unit that America possessed. And the man who had done more than all others to bring the Regiment to this point, the man who during the long strenuous months on the Border had moulded it after his own ideal pattern of soldierly efficiency—that man was absent from the conference at which was announced the momentous news. There was not an officer in the conference room, there was not an enlisted man on the drill floor that day, who did not think of Colonel William N. Haskell—of the joy with which he would lead his beloved Regiment into the Great War, of the joy with which that Regiment would follow him across the ocean and over the parapet and through the German lines to the Kaiser’s palace. There was not an officer or man who did not recall his last words when he was ordered to another duty “I want to lead the 69th Regiment into a fight.”

Colonel Haskell was absent from this historic conference. He had been lent, not given to the Regiment, and now the Government claimed his valuable services to solve some of the problems of the new National Army. But he was present in spirit—in the thoughts of everyone in the building and in the fitness he had given to the Regiment’s personnel.

Soon after the announcement that the Sixty-ninth Regiment was to be one of the very first into battle it was learned that the Regiment was to be brought up to a strength of 3500, according to the scheme which the French military experts had developed from their hard-bought experience with the conditions of modern warfare. It would have been a task gratifying to the whole Regiment, including Colonel Charles Hine, who now was placed in command, to build up the Regiment to this size by means of the recruiting methods which already had proved so successful. But it had been decided by higher authorities that the Regiment’s numbers should be augmented by additions from other New York National Guard organizations. Accordingly, one day in August, 1917, there arrived at the armory the first of the new increments—332 men from the 7th New York Infantry.

The ties that bind the 7th and the 69th are ancient and strong. The friendship between the two organizations has often been strikingly manifested. It was much in evidence when the New York National Guard was stationed on the Border. But it has never been displayed more convincingly than on the day that the men from the 7th joined the 69th. Escorted to the doors of the armory by the rest of the 7th, led by Colonel Willard C. Fisk, the men found the entire 69th Regiment assembled to welcome them. They were made at home; they found it no difficult task to orient themselves to their new surroundings. Without any disloyalty to the venerable regiment they had left, they accepted as their own the traditions and standards of the 69th and became not a distinct group added to the Regiment but a vital part of it.

On the 20th of August the 69th Regiment, now 2,500 strong, again marched through New York, and again an enormous crowd witnessed and followed the march. But this crowd, unlike that of the 9th of March previous, was not composed of people rejoicing over a long-sought reunion. The same men, women and children who had been present on the 9th of March to welcome the soldiers returning from the Rio Grande were present and they were as proud as, or prouder than before. But faces that had been happy were fearful now and the gestures were of farewell. Wives and mothers looked at the bright ranks with smiling anguish. The 69th was marching to the ferry to cross the East River and entrain for Camp Albert L. Mills, near Mineola, New York. It was the first move toward the front, to win new battle-rings for the pole that saw Cold Harbor and Bloody Ford.

There were many new and strange experiences in store for the officers and men during the period of intensive training on Hempstead Plains. A carefully planned schedule provided for drill and instruction enough to fill nearly every minute of the day. Much of the work was repetition for those of the men who had seen service on the Border, but they entered into it in a way that showed they thoroughly appreciated its value. There was also training in those phases of offensive and defensive warfare which have been developed since August, 1914. This work came in for an especially large share of attention. It was no longer a mere drill; it was active preparation for the use of what is, in spite of trench mortar, cannon, bomb and machine, the most effective weapon of modern warfare. The Regiment was instructed in the use of the bayonet by reserve officers who had acquired their knowledge from men with actual experience at the front. Cold steel propelled by Irishmen was said to be what the Germans chiefly feared and every effort was made to make sure that the 69th should not, through lack of practice, be less skillful with the bayonet than were the Dublin Fusileers and the Connaught Rangers. Visitors to the camp who were so fortunate as to be present at the bayonet drill were greatly impressed by the dexterity which the soldiers had gained in a few weeks, and by the intense realism which pervaded the exercise.

And now the Regiment gained, from day to day, the increments necessary to bring it up to the prescribed war strength of 3500. The men from the 7th had already been assimilated as privates and non-commissioned officers; they had become an integral part of the 69th (for only on paper was the name 165th in use). The 23rd, 14th, 71st and 12th now sent their delegations.

In most cases, the selection of the men in the various armories was made with perfect fairness, the prescribed number of sergeants, corporals and privates being arbitrarily taken from the ranks. But in certain companies it was soon evident that the officers had yielded to the natural temptation to endeavor to retain in their commands their best trained non-coms. Here was, for instance, a corporal to be taken from Blank Company of the Dash Regiment. By strict adherence to the letter of the law, Corporal Smith, a soldier of stainless record, with three month’s Border service to his credit, should be the man to entrain for Camp Mills. But here was Private Jones, a recent recruit, not especially happy in the Dash Regiment and probably not likely to be homesick for it if sent away. Why not let him sew a couple of stripes on the sleeves of his new blouse, and go on his way rejoicing.

This is the way some Company Commanders reasoned. And as a result, the 69th Regiment found that among its new members were some Sergeants and Corporals whose military knowledge included little more than the manual of arms, and privates who were physically, morally, and mentally unfit for the service. It was not to be expected that these men would be received with overwhelming enthusiasm.

Many of the soldiers received from other regiments—most of them in fact, were valuable additions to the 69th and at once proved their usefulness by merging with the rest of the outfit and working for the soldierly perfection of the whole body. Of the others—well, some of them were reformed by thorough disciplinary action, and others were allowed to drift back into civilian life by means of liberal use of dependency and surgeon’s certificate of disability.

So many soldiers were lost of those acquired from other regiments that although the time for sailing was almost at hand it was considered advisable to institute another recruiting campaign. There was no difficulty in gaining the desired number of recruits; the prospect of immediate service in France with the most famous regiment in America brought to the Armory doors three times as many candidates as could be accepted.

Now the wives and mothers who thronged the dusty Company streets on Saturday and Sunday afternoons began to show stronger anxiety, to look with new intensity into the eyes of their soldiers as they bade them farewell and returned to the city. For the time for sailing was at hand—no one knew just when or just where the Regiment was going, but all felt it was a question only of days or hours.

Twice secret orders to sail were received at Regimental Headquarters, and twice these orders were hastily countermanded. The suspense began to tell on officers and men, to tell even more, perhaps on those to whom they had again and again to say good bye. At last, on the night of October 25th, Major Donovan led the first battalion through the dark camp and down the silent lanes to the long train that was to take them to Montreal.

And now there were no crowds, there was no music. It was a journey more momentous, greater in historical importance, than the Regiment’s triumphant return from the Border, than its flower and flag decked setting forth for Camp Mills. But it was not, like those memorable events, a time for music and pomp. The feeling of the officers and men was one of stern delight, of that strange religious exaltation with which men of Celtic race and faith go into battle, whether the arena be Vinegar Hill, Fontenoy, or Rouge Boquet. As the trainful of happy warriors steamed through the first leagues of the journey to the Front, Father Duffy, the Regiment’s beloved Chaplain, passed from car to car hearing confessions and giving absolution. Rosaries—the last dear gift of mothers and sweethearts—were taken out and by squads, platoons and companies the soldiers told their beads. There was little sleep on the 69th special for Montreal that night—officers and men were too excited, too exalted for that. They had entered at last on the adventure of their lives.

General O’Ryan had said that a soldier is a man who always wants to be elsewhere than where he is. This is not true of soldiers of the race to which General O’Ryan’s name indicates that he belongs. They want to be elsewhere—only when they are in some peaceful place. If the Regiment had been restless before, the second and third Battalions were doubly so after they had seen four companies of their comrades go away.

But they had not long to wait. On the night of October 29th, the America (formerly the Amerika of the Hamburg-American line) pulled out of New York Harbor. There was no khaki on her decks; the only figures to be seen were sailors and deck-hands. But as soon as the vessel was out of range of spying Teutonic eyes, soldiers poured out of every hatchway. And as they thronged the deck-space available and looked their last for a long time at the lights along the fast receding shore, they showed a contentment, a mirth that amazed the crew, long accustomed to transporting troops.

“What’s the matter with you fellows?” asked one sailor. “Ain’t you sorry to be leaving your homes? Didn’t you ever hear there was such things as submarines?” He had helped carry over all sort of soldiers, he said, Regulars, Marines and Guardsmen, but he had never before seen passengers so seemingly indifferent to the grief of leavetaking and the perils of the wartime sea. He couldn’t understand it.

He might have been able to understand it if he had read Chesteron’s “Ballad of the White Horse.” For in that wise poem is an explanation of the psychology of the 69th New York, an explanation of the singular phenomenon of soldiers leaving their dear ones and setting out over menacing seas to desperate battle in a strange land as merrily as if they were planning merely an evening at Coney Island. Chesterton wrote:

“For the great Gaels of Ireland

Are the men that God made mad

For all their wars are merry

And all their songs are sad.”