“With best wishes to your paper and a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all the boys, I’ll close with the consoling assurance in my heart that we’ll meet you back on Broadway, anyway.
C. B. KNIGHT, Corp. “Hq” Co., 339th Inf.,
American E. F., Archangel, Russia.”
XXII
WINTER ON THE RAILROAD
We Come Under French Flag—Thanksgiving Day At Verst 455—Exploration And Blockhouse Building—First Occupation Of Bolsheozerki—Airplane Bombs Our Own Front Line Troops—Year’s End Push On Plesetskaya Fiasco—Nichols Makes Railroad Sector Impregnable—Bolo Patrol Blows Up Our Big Six—Heavy Drive By Reds At Winter’s End—“I” Company Relieves French-Russian Force—Valorous Conduct Of Men Gives Lie To Charges Of Loss Of Morale.
In the narrative telling of the fighting on the Vaga and Dvina, we have already seen that the Red Guards had disillusioned us in regard to the quiet winter campaign we hoped and expected. Now we shall resume the story of the Railroad, or Vologda Force, as it had become known, and tell of the attempted Allied push on Plesetskaya to relieve the pressure on the River Fronts.
After our digging in at Verst 445 in early November, a Company of Liverpools came from Economia to aid the French infantry and American and French machine gunners, supported by French artillery, to hold that winter front. The American units who had fought on the railroad in the fall were all given ten days rest in Archangel. Soon the Americans were once more back on the front. And it started off uneventful. A French officer, Colonel Lucas, had come into command of the Vologda Force. American units were generously supplied with the French Chauchat automatic rifles, and ammunition for them, and with French rifles and tromblons to throw the rifle grenades. Earnest business of learning to use them.
Those who were stationed at field headquarters of the Front Sector of the Vologda Force, which was at Verst 455, will recollect with great pleasure the Thanksgiving Day half-holiday and program arranged by Major Nichols, commanding the American forces. He gave us Miss Ogden, the Y. W. C. A. woman from d. o. U. S. A. to read President Wilson’s proclamation. How strange it seemed to us soldiers standing there under arms. And Major Moodie the old veteran of many a British campaign, and friend of Kitchener, the good old story teller praised the boys and prayed with them. Major Nichols and Major Alabernarde spoke cheering and bracing words to the assembled American and French soldiers. It was an occasion that raised fighting morale.
The President’s Thanksgiving proclamation was transmitted to the American troops in Russia through the office of the American Embassy. The soldiers listened intently to the words of Mr. De Witt C. Poole, Jr., the American Charge d’Affaires who since the departure of Ambassador Francis, was the American diplomatic representative in European Russia. His message was as follows:
“The military Command has been asked to make this day a holiday for the troops, so far as military requirements permit, and to communicate to them upon an occasion fraught with tradition and historical memories, the hearty greetings of all Americans who are working with them in Northern Russia.
“The American Embassy desires the troops to know that both here and at Washington there is a full understanding of the difficulties of the work which they are being called upon to do and a desire no less ardent than their own that they should realize as soon as possible the blessings of the peace which is foreshadowed by the armistice on the Western Front.”