DEADLY MACHINE GUNS
The enemy's position thus made the north bank untenable and orders were given to retire to the south bank under cover of the darkness. At 9:30 P. M. the French, in accordance with these plans, retired to the south bank and blew up a stone bridge. The American machine gun companies during the retirement poured a galling fire from the flanks into the areas evacuated by the retiring troops.
The enemy was now shelling the south bank more heavily and the enemy machine-gun fire was multiplied. The commander of Company A was forced to change the position of his guns in order to secure a better field of fire. With the light Hotchkiss pieces on their shoulders he led his men into a wood further down the river. Here they were spotted by enemy observers and thirty high explosive shells crashed into the wood. The shelling ceased and the guns went into their positions.
The French were still retiring at 10:30 P. M. It was pitch dark, except for shell bursts and the streaky flame stabs from the machine guns on both sides—the Americans were in the wood and along the south bank of the river, the Germans on the crest of the hill on the other side.
Suddenly there was an immense detonation. It was the big bridge blowing up. Then there came out of the darkness across the river, as the firing lulled, the ghostly chant of the advancing enemy. It was one of those German mass attacks, where men, shoulder to shoulder, singing inguttural tones the praise of Germany and the Kaiser, blindly walk into death like fanatics.
The sort of creaky, shuffling sound their boots made as they trotted into the open road came across the river like the wailing of lost souls, converged toward the bridge and was heard by these young Americans, who strained their eyes across the river to get what machine-gun men call "the target." But it was in pitch darkness, and there was only the sound to tell them there were plenty of "targets." Every little black devil of a machine gun tore loose with hellfire. The Americans behind them, who saw their first glimpse of war about thirty hours before, fed in bullets as fast as human hands could work. And the bullets caught their "targets" on the opposite side.
The "target" came on again and again, but nothing could live in that leaden hail. The enemy waves melted in the darkness.
Now come the even more thrilling experiences of the little band of Americans under Lieutenant Bissell who had been cut off and surrounded by the enemy across the river. Even experienced soldiers could not be blamed if they had surrendered there.
At the beginning of the German mass attack a few French colonial soldiers, also cut off by the blown-up bridge, made the Lieutenant understand that then it was every man for himself. The north bank was becoming a seething mass of Germans. All other forces had retired across the river. Bullets were registering on every foot of the space approaching the bridges.
The Germans chant to keep up the courage of the advancing masses. They sometimes yell to disconcert their enemies. With this ghostly chanting drawing nearer to the Lieutenant and his men and the weird yells of the Germans occasionally splitting the night, there was no thought of surrender. Their orders were to retreat by the main bridge, and orders were orders.