There was more than co-operation from the army itself. There was the deepest gratitude, openly expressed, from every member of the army, whether general or private, because it was a recognized fact that, though an army cannot do these things itself, it owes them more than it can ever repay.
CHAPTER XVI
INTO THE TRENCHES
AFTER months of training behind the lines the doughboys began to long for commencement. It came late in October. The point selected for the trench test of the Americans was in a quiet sector. The position lay about twelve miles due east from Nancy and five miles north of Lunéville. It extended roughly from Parroy to Saint-Die. Even after the entry of the Americans the sector remained under French command. In fact, the four battalions of our troops which made up the first American contingent on the fighting-line were backed up by French reserves. No better training sector could have been selected, for this was a quiet front. American officers who acted as observers along this line for several days before the doughboys went in found that shelling was restricted and raids few. Many villages close behind the lines on either side were respected because of a tacit agreement between the contending armies. French and Germans sent war-weary troops to the Lunéville sector to rest up. It also served to break in new troops without subjecting them to an oversevere ordeal, so that they might learn the tricks of modern warfare gradually.
Of course, even quiet sectors may become suddenly active, and care was taken to screen the movements of the soldiers carefully. It proved impossible, however, to keep the move a complete mystery, for when camion after camion of tin-hatted Americans moved away from the training area the villagers could not fail to suspect that something was about to happen. Perhaps these suspicions grew stronger when each group of fighting men sang loudly and cheerfully that they were "going to hang the Kaiser to a sour apple-tree."
The weather was distinctly favorable for the movement of troops. One of the blackest nights of the month awaited the Americans at the front. Rain fell, but not hard enough to impede transportation. Still, such weather was something of a moral handicap. Many of the newcomers would have been glad to take a little shelling if they could have had a bit of a moon or a few stars to light their way to the trenches. Instead they groped their way along roads which were soft enough to deaden every sound. A wind moaned lightly overhead and the strict command of silence made it impossible to seek the proper antidote of song. One or two men struck up "Tramp, Tramp, Tramp, the Boys Are Marching," as they headed for the front, but they were quickly silenced.
The march began about nine o'clock, after the soldiers had eaten heartily in a little village close to the lines. At the very edge of this village stood a cheerful inn and a moving-picture theatre. The doughboys looked a little longingly at both houses of diversion before they swung round the bend and followed the black road which led to the trench-line. The people of the village did not seem to be much excited by the fact that history was being made before their eyes. They had seen so many troops go by up that road that they could achieve no more than a friendly interest. They did not crowd close about the marchers as the people had done in Paris.
Seemingly the Germans had not been able to ascertain the time set for the coming of the Americans. The roads were not shelled at all. In fact, the German batteries were even more indolent than usual at this point. The relief was effected without incident, although a few stories drifted back about enthusiastic poilus who had greeted their new comrades with kisses.
The artillery beat the infantry into action. They had to have a start in order to get their guns into place, and some fifteen hours before the doughboys went into the trenches America had fired the first shot of the war against Germany. Alexander Arch, a sergeant from South Bend, Indiana, was the man who pulled the lanyard. The shot was a shrapnel shell and was directed at a German working-party who were presuming on the immunity offered by a misty dawn. They scattered at the first shot, but it was impossible to tell whether it caused any casualties. When the working-party took cover there were no targets which demanded immediate attention, and the various members of the gun crew were allowed the privilege of firing the second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, and ninth shots of the war. After that, shooting at the Germans ceased to become a historical occasion, but was a mere incident in the routine of duty, and was treated as such.
The only unusual incident which seriously threatened the peace of mind of the infantrymen in their first night in the trenches was the flash of a green rocket which occurred some fifteen or twenty minutes after they arrived. They had been taught that a green rocket would be the alarm for a gas attack, but this particular signal came from the German trenches and had no message for the Americans. The Germans may have suspected the presence of new troops, for the men were just a bit jumpy, as all newcomers to the trenches are, and a few took pot-shots at objects out in No Man's Land which proved to be only stakes in the barbed wire or tufts of waving grass.
Although the Germans made the first successful raid, the Americans took the first prisoner. He was captured only a few nights after the coming of the doughboys. A patrol picked him up close to the American wire. He was a mail-carrier, and in cutting across lots to reach some of his comrades he lost his way and wandered over to the American lines. Although he was surprised, he was not willing to surrender, but made an attempt to escape after he had been ordered to halt. One of the doughboys fired at him as he ran and he was carried into the American trenches badly wounded. He died the next day.