It was the season of the year when the orchards were covered with blossoms and the fields with flowers, but the horrors of war destroyed the beauty of the spring. In these battles men fought until they were completely exhausted and one could see troops staggering as they walked and leaning on each other from pure exhaustion.
These were days when wonders were performed by the Medical Departments of the Allied armies, and the work of the Red Cross was almost as important as the work of the soldiers. Relief for the wounded had to be undertaken and carried on a mammoth scale. Many of the doctors, nurses, orderlies and ambulance men lost their lives while making efforts to rescue the wounded.
These were days when the German leaders were filled with the pride of victory. They were talking now about a hard German peace. On June 17th the German Kaiser celebrated the thirtieth anniversary of his accession to the throne. He talked no more of a war of self-defense, but declared the war to be the struggle of two world views wrestling with each other. "Either German principles of right, freedom, honor and morality must be upheld, or Anglo-Saxon principles with their idolatry of Mammon must be victorious." He sent congratulations to Field Marshal von Hindenburg, to General Ludendorf and to the Crown Prince. Von Hindenburg assured the Kaiser of the unswerving loyalty until death of Germany's sons at the front, and concluded "May our old motto 'Forward with God for King and Fatherland, for Kaiser and Empire' result in many years of peace being granted to your Majesty after our victorious return home."
But the terrific attacks which the German commanders directed upon the Americans at Chateau-Thierry and at other points upon the southern lines show well that they knew that there was another danger rising to confront them; that during their great drives a million and a half American soldiers had been learning the art of war, and that every moment of delay meant a new danger. By the end of this period the Americans had arrived.
CHAPTER XLII
CHATEAU-THIERRY, FIELD OF GLORY
Nowhere in American history may be found a more glorious record than that which crowned with laurel the American arms at Chateau-Thierry. Here the American Marines and divisions comprising both volunteers and selected soldiers, were thrown before the German tide of invasion like a huge khaki-colored breakwater. Germany knew that a test of its empire had come. To break the wall of American might it threw into the van of the attack the Prussian Guard backed by the most formidable troops of the German and Austrian empires. The object was to put the fear of the Hun into the hearts of the Yankees, to overwhelm them, to drive straight through them as the prow of a battleship shears through a heavy sea. If America could be defeated, Germany's way to a speedy victory was at hand. If America held—well, that way lay disaster.
And the Americans held. Not only did they hold but they counter-attacked with such bloody consequences to the German army that Marshal Foch, seizing the psychological moment for his carefully prepared counter-offensive, gave the word for a general attack.
With Chateau-Thierry and the Marne as a hinge, the clamp of the Allies closed upon the defeated Germans. From Switzerland to the North Sea the drive went forward, operating as huge pincers cutting like chilled steel through the Hindenburg and the Kriemhild lines. It was the beginning of autocracy's end, the end of Der Tag of which Germany had dreamed.
The matchless Marines and the other American troops suffered a loss that staggered America. It was a loss, however, that was well worth while. The heroic young Americans who held the might of Germany helpless and finally rolled them back defeated from the field of battle, and who paid for that victory with their lives, made certain the speedy end of the world's bloodiest war.