All in a Life-time

by Henry Morgenthau; French Strother

Arrived at Gondrecourt, we saw a splendid sight. Here were American boys in American uniform, with American automobiles and other equipment. It gave us a keen sense of home. Captain Jaubert, whom I had by this time discovered to be not only a captain but a marquis, and a nephew of the Duke of Montebello, soon located the headquarters of General Sibert. We were here invited to dine with General Ponydreguin, the commander of the famous “Blue Devils,” a very charming gentleman. He commanded the French troops in this neighbourhood, as General Sibert commanded the Americans. After dinner, we adjourned to the camp headquarters, which I found these two gentlemen shared. As neither spoke the other’s language, it was amusing to see them, while using an interpreter to converse with each other, carry through the French politenesses of direct conversation, smiling at each other, and bowing and courtesying, General Sibert especially finding it difficult to accommodate his rather formal American manner to the livelier conventions of Continental usage.

After a tour of inspection, on the following morning, of the interesting activities of the camp, we proceeded on our way to Domremy, the birthplace of Joan of Arc, where I wished to visit the church, which is a shrine to her memory. By this time I had discovered not only that my escort was a marquis, but, more surprising, that our chauffeur had been in private life a member of the Paris Bourse. The car in which we were riding belonged to him, and he had volunteered to do his bit for his country by putting the car at the Government’s service, and offering himself as its chauffeur. Captain Jaubert, in accordance with military traditions of discipline, had treated him, a mere sergeant, as impersonally as if he were another piece of the car’s mechanism. When we drew up at Joan of Arc’s Chapel, and dismounted to enter, I saw by his expression that he was as eager as I to see the interior of this famous shrine. The yearning look on his face, as he stood before the portals, which an absurd military convention forbade him to enter in company with us, who were no better than he, was too much for me to withstand. I asked Captain Jaubert to relax the rigours of discipline for the moment, and allow him to accompany us. The Captain acquiesced with characteristic French politeness, though I suspected he did not especially relish it; but the chauffeur’s appreciation was sufficient recompense for whatever slight damage was done to military tradition. The Captain himself had a fair grievance against military fate: he was a graduate of St. Cyr and had resigned from the army during the Dreyfus episode, with the result that he had had to reënter the army as a captain, while most of his classmates at the Military School were at least colonels and many of them generals.

That night we reached Thann. We arrived about nightfall, and were met at the town boundary by the Mayor. He invited us to spend the night with him at his suburban home, as it was not safe for us to sleep in the town. I was ushered into the best room in his house, and found that the mirror in the bathroom, as well as the tub, was almost demolished. The Mayor explained that this damage had been done during the week, and that he had not had time to repair it. The next day was a great Catholic holiday, Assumption Day, and we were invited to attend the services at the church of St. Theobald. This spectacle was intensely interesting, because the parents of these people, though French by origin and sympathy, had been compelled by the Germans to rear their children in the German tongue, and consequently, though the first sermon of the celebration was delivered in French by a chaplain of the French army, a second sermon was then delivered in German by an old abbé. The French general explained to me that he saw no reason why he should deprive the inhabitants of the town of their religious comfort simply because they could not understand French.

At one o’clock we were entertained at the hotel by the two oldest inhabitants and most respected citizens of the town, Messieurs Weber and Groshents. At this luncheon they paid me one of the most touching compliments I have ever received in my life. They were men of about seventy. Both had been of age during the Franco-Prussian War, and both had continued throughout the forty-three years of the German occupation, since that war, to be unconquerably French in their patriotism. During the luncheon, while the conversation was lagging, owing to my insufficient knowledge of French, the two old men whispered to each other for a few minutes, and then one of them, Mr. Weber, turned to me, and said in German: “We have just released each other from the vows we made in 1871, that we would never again speak German in public. But we want to enjoy your company and we want so much to hear you talk to us, that we think we are justified in suspending our agreement.”

We then had a most delightful conversation. Mr. Weber told me how, in 1871, he had taken the French flag which had flown over the City Hall until the German occupation, and secreted it in the back of a sofa in his parlour, and how he had taken the flag staff and hidden it in his garret. Then, when the French entered the town in 1914, he ripped open the sofa, took out the flag, fastened it back on its staff, and at seventy years of age had proudly presented it to President Poincaré in celebration of the return of Alsace to France.

Leaving these delightful old gentlemen and their quaint city of Thann, we motored southward. At dinner next evening we were entertained by the Mayor of Mazevant, Count de Witt Guizot. After a very pleasant evening with him, and as we were about to take our leave, I inquired if he were related to Francis P. G. Guizot, the famous historian. He smiled, and replied: “Slightly; he was my grandfather.”

Another day of interesting travel took us through the Alsatian provinces to Belfort, and there we abandoned the automobile, and returned by train to Paris.

A few days later I had the pleasure of renewing my acquaintance with Marshal Joffre, which I had first made at the civic receptions in New York. I called upon him at his headquarters at the Military School in Paris. Marshal Foch had succeeded him as Commander-in-Chief of the French armies, and Joffre was now engaged chiefly in training staff officers, and in advising the High Command when his judgment was needed in council. The Marshal gave me, with great frankness, his ideas upon what America should do to make effective our military participation in the war.

Immediately after our interview I had a memorandum prepared by the gentleman who acted as my interpreter, from which I have made the following extracts:

In the present warfare there is a most vital need for artillery officers and for general staff officers. The American Department of War must realize this. It is not enough to have the men, the other officers, and even the equipment. The framework of the army is far from being complete or efficacious before you have a sufficient number of trained artillery and general staff officers. In order to train these officers for active field service, they should be sent to France. They can at once be sent to the front where for a week or two they can see the work done there. The general staff officers can then attend courses in the general staff school, and the artillery officers can be attached to French artillery regiments until they are thoroughly familiarized with the work.