Across the narrow river was the village of Fismette, destined to be the scene of the writing of a truly glorious page of Pennsylvania's military history. The past tense is used with regard to the existence of both places, as they virtually were wiped out in the process of forcing the Hun from the Vesle River barrier and sending him flying northward to the Aisne.
The railroad through Fismes and in its vicinity runs along the top of an embankment, raising it above the surrounding territory. There was a time, before the Americans were able to cross the railroad, that the embankment became virtually the barrier dividing redeemed France from darkest Hunland along that front. At night patrols from both sides would move forward to the railroad, and, burrowed in holes—the Germans in the north side and the Americans in the south—would watch and wait and listen for signs of an attack.
Each knew the other was only a few feet away; at times, in fact, they could hear each other talking, and once in a while defiant badinage would be exchanged in weird German from the south and in ragtime, vaudeville English from the north. Appearance of a head above the embankment on either side was a signal for a storm of lead and steel.
The Americans had this advantage over the Germans: They knew the Huns were doomed to continue their retreat, and that the hold-up along the railroad was very temporary, and the Germans now realized the same thing. Therefore, the Americans fought triumphantly, with vigor and dash; the Germans, sullenly and in desperation.
One man of the 110th went to sleep in a hole in the night and did not hear the withdrawal just before dawn. Obviously his name could not be made public. When he woke it was broad daylight, and he was only partly concealed by a little hole in the railroad bank. There was nothing he could do. If he had tried to run for his regimental lines he would have been drilled like a sieve before he had gone fifty yards. Soon the German batteries would begin shelling, so he simply dug deeper into the embankment.
"I just drove myself into that bank like a nail," he told his comrades later. He got away the next night.
Richard Morse, of the 110th, whose home is in Harrisburg, went out with a raiding party. The Germans discovered the advance of the group and opened a concentrated fire, forcing them back. Morse was struck in the leg and fell. He was able to crawl, however, and crawling was all he could have done anyway, because the only line of retreat open to him was being swept by a hail of machine gun bullets. As he crawled he was hit by a second bullet. Then a third one creased the muscles of his back. A few feet farther, and two more struck him, making five in all.
Then he tumbled into a shell hole. He waited until the threshing fire veered from his vicinity and he had regained a little strength, then crawled to another hole and flopped himself into that. Incredible as it may seem, he regained his own lines the fourth day by crawling from shell hole to shell hole, and started back to the hospital with every prospect of a quick recovery. He had been given up for dead, and the men of his own and neighboring companies gave him a rousing welcome. He had nothing to eat during those four days, but had found an empty tin can, and when it rained caught enough water in that to assuage his thirst.
Corporal George D. Hyde, of Mt. Pleasant, Company E, 110th, hid in a hole in the side of the railroad embankment for thirty-six hours on the chance of obtaining valuable information. When returning, a piece of shrapnel struck the pouch in which he carried his grenades. Examining them, he found the cap of one driven well in. It was a miracle it had not exploded and torn a hole through him.
"You ought to have seen me throw that grenade away," he said.