When they were off the Irish coast a half-dozen British destroyers steamed out of the fog and met them and, like greyhounds at full speed, chased one another in great circles around the more slowly moving convoy.
At Liverpool they marched ashore singing, "The Yanks are Coming" and never marched again. Then they traveled by train to London and a day or two later to Southampton, then by channel steamer to Havre, then by train to Paris, where most of the men were assigned to service in France.
Those going to Italy, some thirty-five, including Saylor and Cornwall, several days later traveled by train through Southwestern France to Modane, then by way of Turin to Bologna.
There they made settlement of their incidental expense accounts, which did not include transportation charges; and though they traveled together and stopped at the same hotels, Saylor rendered an account for two hundred and twenty-five dollars and Cornwall one for eighty-three dollars.
In Bologna they were lectured and cautioned, particularly against having anything to say about the Protestant religion in a Catholic country, or making themselves conspicuous by attending Protestant churches and gatherings. Then they were indiscriminately scattered from the Austrian boundary to Syracuse.
John Calhoun was given a high-powered car and stationed at Cento, a place within convenient distance of Florence, Venice, Verona, Brescia and Milan. He always left Cento on Saturday a. m. and returned Monday p. m. He saw these and more distant cities. The cafes on the shores of lakes Garda, Iseo, Como and Maggiore knew the resonant sound of his Klaxon horn.
But his weekly reports of work done, sent into Bologna, showed magnificent accomplishments. There were but seven thousand soldiers in his district, and only four huts or places of entertainment for the soldiers. At night some thirty or forty soldiers gathered in each place, their wants attended to by a sergeant of the Italian army, who called at his rooms when supplies were needed; yet this report recited that an average of three thousand visited the four places each night of the week, making a weekly attendance of more than twenty thousand. He made out his weekly report Friday night, with directions to his orderly to mail it to Bologna on Monday morning. The report came in promptly, though John Calhoun might be in Venice or Verona.
How he did enjoy these week-end outings. It was a break in the monotony of sitting quietly at ease in quarters furnished by the Italian Government, when the only recreation was lunch and dinner at the officers' mess, where he drank his share of the red and white wines and learned to eat macaroni seasoned with grated cheese and red tomato sauce, wrapping it around his fork and picking it up in great mouthfuls.
He was wonderfully kind to Colonel Rocca, the commanding officer, keeping him supplied with cigarettes and tobacco from the supply furnished for distribution among the privates. When the colonel expressed a desire to accompany him on one of his week-end outings or even to be carried to some neighboring city (the army only allowing a horse and cart for his personal service), the Y Fiat was always at his service. This courtesy resulted in John Calhoun being awarded the Croce di Guerra, for distinguished service at the front, though Cento was seventy-five miles from the front line and he never so much as heard the roar of a distant gun. He did visit the battlefields, the whole front line from the Adriatic Sea, along the Piave, Mt. Grappa and the Trentino, westward to Tonale Pass and northward to Innsbruck, but it was after the armistice. He made a choice collection of war relics and photographs, which he subsequently used in his lecture: "Personal Experiences at the Battle of Vittorio Veneto, or How I Won the War Cross."
He had spent his boyhood on the trails of Pine Mountain, often riding to mill straddle of a mule. When the family moved to Madison County he drove a speedy trotter to a side-bar buggy over the turnpike, then in his own Pierce-Arrow over excellent roads, then in Italy a Y Fiat. He was educated by gradation to speedy locomotion and was a most competent judge of good roads.