There was no continuing against such a shower of projectiles and hissing of bullets. A halt was called. A battalion of reserves was brought up while the artillery was told where to concentrate its fire; separated units were brought together, re-formed on a new line; tanks came up on the left to assist in the second charge at 5.30 P.M.; but the enemy had only held his fire, waiting for the second charge to start. It came nearer the Ogons, but when darkness fell the Blue Ridge men were still lying in the open, south of the wood, the enemy's guns still keeping up an intermittent galling fire, which was falling alike on the dead and the wounded and the survivors. Patrols filtered into the woods during the night—and the Blue Ridge men had a gift for such work—only to learn that a few enterprising scouts, in their stealthy crawling, if they wished to escape massacre or being taken prisoner, had to avoid drawing fire.
Attack again! Keep on trying! The next morning all the machine-guns were ordered up to send a barrage of bullets over the heads of the charge into the edge of the woods. This had been efficacious on other occasions, but it was not this time, as the infantry knew instantly they rose to advance, when the deadly refrain from the edge of the woods showed no more diminution than the wrath of the guns from the heights. Ground was gained in places between the swaths of the machine-guns' mowing; but no part of the line penetrated the woods, though it was close to the woods when it was stopped. Attack again! Keep on trying! The enemy will break if you try hard enough! The wedge must be driven, whether through woods, over slopes, or through trenches. Again reorganization; again the line re-formed to make the most of gains; again the artillery ordered to concentrate on the woods for an attack at 6 P.M. This time the jumping-off place was so near the woods, that the Germans, when the barrage descended upon them, were as a rule disinclined to wait for the charge. Many who remained held up their hands. The men felt relief at being at last no longer a target in the open as they made swift work of mopping up the whole of the Ogons.
The next day, the 6th, the divisional artillery assisted the 3rd in its efforts for the Mamelle trench. Patrols trying to reach the trenches north of the Ogons—which incidentally was being gassed—ran into an array of machine-gun nests, and brought back information about what was in store for the next attack; for the German, as we know, was much in earnest on the east flank of the whale-back. On the night of the 6th the brigade which had been in front during these two days was relieved by the brigade in reserve. On the 7th and 8th, while there was more or less of a lull in the battle everywhere except in the Aire valley and the Argonne, the 80th was busy with patrols, locating enemy pill-boxes for the information of the artillery, and preparing for its part in the general attack of the 9th all along the line—the attack that brought us up to the main line of defenses at many points—the third great attack of the battle. September 26th, October 4th, and October 9th are the three dates.
The 80th did not start at daylight, the same hour as the 3rd on its left. Its thrust waited on the advance of the 3rd to a certain point. At 3.15 the word came for the 80th to attack. After fifteen minutes of furious artillery, the first wave rose and moved forward in face of the machine-guns, while the enemy brought down a curtain of shell-fire in front of the second wave when it rose, in order to keep it from supporting the first, whose ranks were being rapidly thinned; but all the powers of destruction which the enemy could bring to bear could not stay the men of the fresh brigade in their hard-won stages of progress, now that the slopes and the Ogons were at their back. They took the strong point of the Ville-aux-Bois farm, and still going after dark they reached the Cunel-Brieulles road.
There was a familiar sound to that word Brieulles. The 80th on September 28th had attacked the hills in front of this town at the bend in the river. Brieulles was still in the enemy's hands, but the village of Cunel was ahead in the dark night. There must be numerous Germans in Cunel. In stealthy audacity two companies of the Blue Ridge men now turned a trick that would have rejoiced the heart of Jeb Stuart or Colonel Mosby. They slipped into Cunel very quietly, and returned with two crestfallen German battalion staffs—thirty officers and sixty men—whom they had caught completely by surprise.
The next morning the enemy had his revenge of the kind which his hidden long-range artillery in its lofty positions out of reach of our guns might take. An attack was ordered for 7 A.M. As it was forming, and the morning light dissipated the mist, the watchful German observers were taking notes and passing the word to the gunners in Brieulles and in the Rappes and Pultière woods. The minute-hands were near the "H" hour on wrist watches, and the line ready, when a concentration of screams came from three directions, and geysers of earth and shell fragments and gusts of shrapnel had something of the effect of a volcanic fissure opened at the men's feet. Officers were killed or thrown down by the concussion in the midst of their hasty directions. Two companies were decimated, two others scattered in confusion, by this sudden and infernal visitation; but this did not mean that the Blue Ridge men were to give up making the attack. They reorganized and charged according to orders. The enemy guns which had caused such havoc in their ranks disputed their advance. Against this whirlwind they managed to go beyond the Brieulles-Cunel road, but could not hold their positions. The Germans made the road a dead line, and for days to come its ribbon was to be the clear gray background upon which human targets were clearly visible to their watchful gunners. The "pinch-hitting" 80th was the only division thus far that had been twice in the battle line of the Meuse-Argonne. Before it went in again, its infantry was to have a real rest, though its artillery, engineers, and ammunition train remained to support the 5th Division which took its place.
XX
IN THE MEUSE TROUGH
The bull-dog 4th—Enfilade shell-fire from a gallery of heights—Driving and holding a salient—A second try—As far as it could reasonably go—Reversing Falkenhayn's offensive—The 33rd builds bridges—To cross and join the Blue and Grey Division in a surprise attack—A bowl of hills—The Borne de Cornouiller holds out.