On the evening of October 26, the Second Battalion moved up through Fléville and to the right, near Sommerance. This spot is historically known by the battery as “Gassy Gulch”. Our guns were located behind a line of bushes along a sharp embankment ten to fifteen feet high that descended to a dirt road. Along this road were lined American 155mm. rifles. In front of them, on the gentle slope to a low crest ahead, were several French batteries. To our right were 75’s, 155mm. howitzers, and 155mm. rifles indiscriminately mixed. The whole 67th Brigade, some batteries of heavy corps artillery, and several French batteries were concentrated in this little valley.
The dirt road in front and the high road, which ran at an angle behind, drew much fire, making the drivers’ task in bringing up caissons of ammunition a dangerous one. On the day the battery moved up, a shell bursting close wounded Cook and killed the horse under him. But Sergeant Lucius Brigham’s coolness in cutting out the dead horse and leading the hitch safely through prevented greater damage from the resulting confusion; for this work he was highly commended by the regimental commander.
Several days later this road was heavily gassed. All traffic was held back till shelling should let up. On this account no rations had gone up from the horse-lines the day before. When, on the second attempt, Rosse insisted on making the trip, an M. P. stopped him:
“You can’t go up that road. You’ll never get through the gas and shelling.”
An officer argued, too, “Don’t take that road. It’s too dangerous.”
“The boys gotta hava the rash,” insisted Jerry imperturbably. And he lashed up his horse, and galloped past with the ration cart. When he arrived at the position, his eyes and nose were streaming from the effect of the gas, and he could scarcely see. But the boys, “they gotta the rash!” For this act the regimental commander highly commended Rosse, remarking on his “high sense of duty and exceptional courage.”
Gas alarms were frequent at night. The itching in one’s throat left no doubt of there being actual danger present. The favorable wind carried away the noxious fumes of several shells that burst at the edge of the flat-tops. The boys dug their bunks deep to escape the fragments. Near the machine gunners, the shells burst thick, and both Donahue and Harry Overstreet were sent to the hospital with bad poison burns. Practically everyone at the position suffered a little from gas, some in one way and some in another, but, since they were afflicted in no violent way, they stuck to their work, disregarding minor discomforts.
Friday morning, November 1, was the big barrage in which Battery E fired its last shot of the war. At 3:30 a. m. began the preliminary fire, at 100 rounds per hour. Then followed the barrage, with first reduced charge shell, then smoke shell and normal charge shell, and finally high velocity shell, reaching a range of nearly 12,000 metres when the firing ceased, at 1:30 p. m. The total for each gun was over 1,000 rounds.
This barrage was fired in support of the infantry of the 2nd Division, which had relieved our own infantry. After the marine brigade had broken through the Freya Stellung in the morning, capturing the villages of St. Georges and Landres-et-St. Georges, the brigade of regulars kept on going, driving the enemy out of range of our guns.
By Sunday the enemy was so far away that even the heavy guns about us had to cease firing. The Frenchmen in the neighboring batteries were gloriously drunk in the prospect of a speedy victory and early peace. That night the battery pulled out, not to rest, as we had been expectantly hoping in the midst of fatigue and discomfort from gas, etc., but to go ahead in pursuit. Our infantry had relieved the 78th Division and were to march to Sedan. To make matters worse for the dismounted men, an order was issued that each man must carry his full pack upon his back, to lighten the load for the worn out horses. So we staggered up the mud roads to Thenorgues, where we spent a sleepless day Monday moving carriages here and there to accommodate the throng of traffic. In the afternoon we moved on, through Buzancy to Harricourt, where we made camp at dark, just as enemy planes dropped a succession of bombs on the road over which we had just passed.