But it was war, and it had to be. 139
On and on they rushed. Now they were at the first line of the German barbed wire. Some of it had been cut by the swift firing of shrapnel before the troops came from their trenches. But enough remained to be a hindrance, and quickly the men with cutters surged forward to open the way.
It was while the Americans were held up here that the Germans took fearful and heavy toll of them with their machine guns, which were now sputtering with terrific firing. Scores of brave men went down, some never to rise again. Others, only slightly wounded, staggered for a minute, paused behind some dead comrade’s body to adjust a bandage, and then went on.
Forward they rushed. Through the barbed wire now, trampling down the cruel strands, never heeding the bleeding wounds it tore in them, never heeding the storm of bullets, minding not the burst of shrapnel or high explosive.
On and on they went, yelling and shouting; maddened with righteous anger against a ruthless foe. Forward once more. Somehow, though how they did it they never knew, Ned, Bob, and Jerry stuck close to one another. Since the death of the Southerner the three chums were in line together, and stormed on. Their rifles were hot in their hands, but still they fired.
“The first-line trenches!” yelled Ned, as he pointed through the smoke. 140
And there, indeed, they were. They had passed over No Man’s Land through a storm of death which held many back. They had mastered the barrier of the wire, and now were at the first line of the German defense. And so fierce and terrible had been the rush of the Americans the Germans had fallen back, so that, save for lifeless gray bodies, the trenches were unoccupied.
“Forward! Forward! Don’t stop! Go on!” yelled the officers.
A certain objective had been set, and the commanders were fearful lest the troops, thinking that to capture the first German trenches was enough, would stop there.
But they need not have been apprehensive. The boys of Uncle Sam were not of that sort. They wanted to come in closer contact with the Boches. And they did.