Not all our operations were necessarily as successful as the ones I have mentioned above. Raids were organized and drew blanks. At times orders would reach us so late that it was exceedingly difficult to attempt their execution with much chance of success. For example, one night a message reached me that a prisoner was wanted for identification purposes by morning.
As I recall, it happened as follows: The telephone buzzed; I answered, and the message came over the wire somewhat in this fashion: "Hello, hello, is this Hannibal? Hannibal, there is a friend we have back in the country [the brigadier general] who is very fond of radishes [prisoners]. He wants one for breakfast to-morrow morning without fail." This reached me at about ten or eleven o'clock. The raid had to be executed before daylight. In the meantime the plans had to be made, the company commander notified, the raiding party chosen, and all ranks instructed. Add to this that everything had to be done during the dark and you will see what a difficult proposition it was.
I got hold of the company commander, got the men organized, telephoned to the artillery, and asked for five minutes' preparation fire on a certain point, joined the raiding party and went forward with it. Then the first of a string of misfortunes happened. On account of the hurry and the difficulty of transmission, the artillery mistook the coördinate and fired three hundred meters too short, with the result that an effective bit of preparation fire was wasted on my own raiding party. By the time this preparatory firing upon our own raiding party was over, the Germans naturally understood that something was happening, for why would we strafe our own front-line trenches to no purpose? The result was that when the raid went over, every machine gun in the area was watching for them. They got to the opposing wire, ran into cross-fire, and, after various casualties, found it entirely impossible to get by the enemy wire, and worked their way back.
As they were working back a senior sergeant, Yarborough by name, was sitting in a shell hole, machine-gun bullets singing by him, checking his party as it came in. Lieutenant Ridgely, who had been with the party, came up to him. As he crawled along, Yarborough said to him: "Lieutenant, this reminds me of a story. There was once a guy who decided to commit suicide by hanging himself. Just about the time he done a good job of it the rope broke. He was sitting up on the floor afterward when I came in, a-rubbing his neck, and when he saw me, all he said was, 'Gee, but that was dangerous.'"
During this period the German Château-Thierry drive was made, again scoring a clean break-through. The Second Division, which was coming up to our rear to relieve us, was switched and thrown in front of the enemy. Shortly after the Huns attacked toward the town of Compiègne, in an endeavor to straighten out the reëntrant in their lines with its apex at Soissons. This latter attack passed by on our right flank.
We, of course, got little but rumor. In the trenches you are only vitally concerned with what happens on your immediate right and left. What goes on ten kilometers away you know little about, and generally are so busy that you care less. "Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof," is a proverb that holds good in the line. In this last instance we were more interested because we believed that as a result of this attack the next point to stand a hammering would be where we were holding. Our policy, which held good through the war, was developed and put into action at this time. The orders were, all troops should resist to the last on the ground on which they stood. All movement should be from the rear forward and not to the rear. Whenever an element in the front line got in trouble, the elements immediately in the rear would counter-attack. This extended in depth back until it reached the division reserve, which, as our general put it, "would move up with him in command, and after that, replacements would be necessary."
During the time when the Huns were making their Château-Thierry drive, Blalock, afterward sergeant of D Company, distinguished himself by a rather remarkable piece of marksmanship. Noticing a pigeon fluttering over the trench, he drew his automatic pistol and killed it on the wing. Thebird turned out to be a carrier pigeon loosed by one of the attacking regiments the Germans were using in their drive toward the Marne, and carried a message giving its position as twelve kilometers deeper in France than our higher command realized. At the same time it identified a division that we had not heard of for three months, and indicated by the fact that it was signed by a captain who was commanding the regiment that the Germans were finding it difficult to replace the losses among their officers.
Instances occurred constantly which showed the spirit of both officers and men. A recruit, arriving one night as a replacement, got there just in time for a heavy strafing that the Germans were delivering. A dud—that is a shell that does not go off—went through the side of the dugout and took both of his legs off above the knees. These duds are very hot, and this one cauterized the wounds and the man did not bleed to death at once. The platoon leader, seeing that something had gone wrong on the right, went over to look and found the man propped up against the side of the trench. When he arrived, Kraakmo, the private, looked up at him and said, "Lieutenant, you have lost a hell of a good soldier."
Another time, when we were moving forward to reënforce a threatened part of the line, a sergeant called O'Rourke was hit and badly wounded. As he fell I turned around and said: "Well, O'Rourke, they've got you." "They have sir," he answered, "but we have had a damned good time."
Sergeant Steidel of A Company was a fine up-standing soldier and won the D. S. C. and the Médaille Militaire. He used to stay with me as my own personal bodyguard when I was away for any reason from headquarters. Steidel was afraid of nothing. He was always willing and always clear-headed. When I wanted a report of an exact situation, Steidel was the man whom I could send to get it. We used to have daylight patrols. One day a patrol of green men went out to obtain certain information. They were stampeded by something and came back into the part of the trench where Steidel was. He went out alone as an example to them, and came back with the information.