The artillery bombardment continued for two days, continuing up to noon of March 9th, when the enemy again launched another attack. This time we were better prepared and, having gotten wind of the plan of attack, we again caught a great body of the infantry in a ravine waist deep in snow. We could plainly see and hear the Bolo commissars urging and driving their men forward to the attack, but there is a limit to all endurance and once again one or two men bolted and ran, and it was but a matter of minutes until all were fleeing in wild disorder.
Space does not permit the enumeration of the splendid individual feats of valor performed by such men as Lieuts. McPhail of Company “A”, and Burns of the Engineers, with their handful of men—nor the grim tenacity and devotion to duty of Sgts. Yarger, Rapp, Garbinski, Moore and Kenny, the last two of whom gave up their lives during the last days of their attacks. Even the cooks were called upon to do double duty and, led by “Red” Swadener, they would work all night long trying to prepare at least one warm meal for the exhausted men, the next day taking their places in the snow trenches with their rifles on their shoulders fighting bravely to the end. Then, too, there were the countless numbers of such men as Richey, Hutchinson, Kurowski, Retherford, Peyton, Russel, De Amicis, Cheney, and others who laid down their lives in this hopeless cause.
The attack was not alone directed against the position of Vistavka, for on the opposite bank of the river the garrison at Maximovskaya was subjected to an attack of almost equal ferocity. The position there was surrounded by forests and the enemy could advance within several hundred yards without being observed. The defenders here, comprising Companies “F” and “A”, bravely held on and inflicted terrific losses upon the enemy.
It was during these terrible days that Lt. Dan Steel of Company “F” executed a daring and important patrol maneuver. This officer, who had long held the staff position of battalion adjutant, feeling that he could render more effective service to his comrades by being at the front, demanded a transfer from his staff position to duty with a line company, which transfer was finally reluctantly given—reluctantly because of the fact that he had virtually been the power behind the throne, or colonel’s chair, of the Vaga River column. A few days later found him in the thick of the fighting at Maximovskaya, and when a volunteer was needed for the above mentioned patrol he was the first to respond. The day in question he set forth in the direction of Yeveevskaya with a handful of men. The forests were fairly alive with enemy patrols, but in the face of all these odds he pushed steadily forward and all but reached the outskirts of the village itself where he obtained highly valuable information, mapped the road and trails through the forests, thus enabling the artillery to cover the same during the violent attacks of these first ten days of March.
By five o’clock of that day the attack was finally repulsed and we still held our positions at Vistavka and Maximovskaya—but in Vistavka we were holding a mere shell of what had once been a prosperous and contented little village. The constant shelling coupled with attacks and counter attacks for months over the same ground had razed the village to the ground, leaving nothing but a shell-torn field and a few blackened ruins. It was useless to hold the place longer and consequently that night it was decided to abandon the position here and withdraw to a new line about three versts in advance of Kitsa.
Under cover of darkness on the night of March 9th we abandoned the position at Vistavka, and as stated in the previous chapter, established a new line of defense along a trail and in the forests about three versts in advance of Kitsa. While our position at Vistavka was practically without protection, this position here was even worse. We were bivouacked in the open snow and woods where we could only dig down into the snow and pray that the Bolo artillery observers would be unable to locate us. Our prayers in this respect were answered, for this position was not squarely in the open as Vistavka was, and therefore not under the direct fire of his artillery. The platoons of “F” Company at Maximovskaya were brought up here to join the balance of their company in holding this position, “A” Company being relieved by “D” Company and sent across the river to Ignatovskaya. “F” Company alternated with platoons of the Royal Scots in this position in the woods for the balance of the month, during which there was constant shelling and sniping but with few casualties among our ranks. The latter part of March “F” Company was relieved for a short time, but the first week in April were again sent back to the Kitsa position. By this time the spring thaws were setting in and the snow began disappearing. Our plans now were to hold these positions at Kitsa and Maximovskaya until the river ice began to move out and then burn all behind us and make a speedy getaway, but how to do this and not reveal our plans to the enemy a few hundred yards across No Man’s Land was the problem.
XVIII
DEFENSE OF PINEGA
Kulikoff And Smelkoff Lead Heavy Force Against Pinega—Reinforcements Hastened Up To Pinega—Reds Win Early Victories Against Small Force Of Defenders—Value Of Pinega Area—Desperate Game Of Bluffing—Captain Akutin Reorganizes White Guards—Russians Fought Well In Many Engagements—Defensive Positions Hold Against Heavy Red Attack—Voluntary Draft Of Russians Of Pinega Area—American Troops “G” And “M” Made Shining Page—Military-Political Relations Eminently Successful.
The flying column of Americans up the Pinega River in late fall we remember retired to Pinega in face of a surprisingly large force. The commander of the Bolshevik Northern Army had determined to make use of the winter roads across the forests to send guns and ammunition and food and supplies to the area in the upper valley of the Pinega. He would jolt the Allies in January with five pieces of artillery, two 75’s and three pom poms, brought up from Kotlas where their stores had been taken in the fall retreat before the Allies. One of his prominent commanders, Smelkoff, who had fought on the railroad in the fall, went over to the distant Pinega front to assist a rising young local commander, Kulikoff. These two ambitious soldiers of fortune had both been natives and bad actors of the Pinega Valley, one being a noted horse thief of the old Czar’s day.
With food, new uniforms and rifles and common and lots of nice crisp Bolshevik money and with boastful stories of how they had whipped the invading foreigners on other fields in the fall and with invective against the invaders these leaders soon excited quite a large following of fighting men from the numerous villages. With growing power they rounded up unwilling men and drafted them into the Red Army just as they had done so often before in other parts of Russia if we may believe the statements of wounded men and prisoners and deserters. Down the valley with the handful of Americans and Russian White Guards there came an ever increasing tide of anti-Bolshevists looking to Pinega for safety.