“BUT FOR EVERY ONE THE BOCHES SENT WE PUT OVER TWO OR THREE”
The registering of the batteries was guessed at so that the enemy would be taken by surprise and he was. The command to fire was given and we let go a howling hurricane of shells that deluged the enemy. The German guns rallied to meet our attack and from that time on a royal artillery duel was on. Once under cover of a heavy barrage their shock troops came on only to be mowed down by us at point blank range.
Talk about fire and brimstone of the infernal regions, it is a feeble place of punishment as against the hades let loose in our sector that morning. Shells were screaming through the air and bursting all around us but for every one the boches sent we put over two or three. Our men were dropping but we kept the guns going as if they were fed and fired by machinery.
A shell had put our wireless equipment out of action, killed a couple of our men, wounded a couple more and stunned me for a few minutes. When I came to I went over to the battery and was giving the gunners a hand. Planes were darting back and forth over us and every little while terrific battles took place between our fliers and the boches for the supremacy of the air. Suddenly I saw the airplane attached to our battery fighting half a dozen enemy planes, which was often the case for the Germans had four or five times as many airplanes as we had at that time.
Our airplane had caught on fire and she fell within 300 yards of our lines. I saw one of our airmen crawl from her and then fall over on the ground. I crept out in a rain of bursting shells to where our machine lay and managed to extricate Flight Lieutenant Ross from the débris and as good luck would have it he was not much hurt. Then I lifted Observer Gilfillan onto my back and we started for our line. When we were within a hundred feet of it a sliver from an exploding shell struck me in the leg and shivered it. I crawled back and another man brought Gilfillan the rest of the way. After being treated at the field hospital we were removed to the base hospital where I was decorated. Soon after I was sent to Paris and since it was clear I could no longer be of service I was returned home and discharged, and—here I am. That’s the thumb-nail sketch of how I did my bit for Uncle Sam.
CHAPTER XII—MUSTERED OUT
Jack Heaton and I had just finished our goulash at Moquin’s on Sixth Avenue (New York), and the waiter, under the stimulus of a piece of money, graciously removed the table cloth as he had been asked to do on twelve previous occasions.
I took a couple of quires of blank paper out of my brief case and laid them in front of me; then I produced a pair of fountain pens, one filled with black ink and the other with red ink, the latter for writing on chapter headings and putting in such corrections as might be necessary, and all of which showed without any deduction that I was in for a writing spell.
“Well, Jack, we’ve got down to the last chapter and this sitting will finish it,” I started off encouragingly.
“I’ve told you all my experiences and if there’s any more to be said I guess you’ll have to say it, Mr. Collins,” remarked the bored young soldier.