In the closing days of the great war a striking contrast was drawn by the Los Angeles Times between William Hohenzollern and Marshal Foch, from the religious standpoint. The former German monarch coupled Gott with himself as an equal, while Ferdinand Foch was called, with apparent reason, "the gray man of Christ."
"This has been Christ's war," said the Times. "Christ on one side, and all that stood opposed to Christ on the other side. And the generalissimo, in supreme command of all the armies that fought on the side of Christ, is Christ's man. * * * It seems to be beyond all shadow of doubt that when the hour came in which all that Christ stood for was to either stand or fall, Christ raised up a man to lead the hosts that battled for him." And the Times continues:
"If you will look for Foch in some quiet church, it is there that he will be found, humbly giving God the glory and absolutely declining to attribute it to himself. Can that kind of a man win a war? Can a man who is a practical soldier be also a practical Christian? And is Foch that kind of a man? Let us see.
"A California boy, serving as a soldier in the American Expeditionary Forces in France, wrote a letter to his parents in San Bernardino recently, in which he gives, as well as anyone else could give, the answer to the question we ask. This American boy, Evans by name, tells of meeting Marshal Foch at close range in France.
"Evans had gone into an old church to have a look at it, and as he stood there with bared head satisfying his respectful curiosity, a gray man with the eagles of a general on the collar of his shabby uniform entered the church. Only one orderly accompanied the quiet, gray man. No glittering staff of officers, no entourage of gold-laced aides were with him; nobody but just the orderly.
"Evans paid small attention at first to the gray man, but was curious to see him kneel in the church, praying. The minutes passed until full three-quarters of an hour had gone by before the gray man arose from his knees.
"Then Evans followed him down the street and was surprised to see soldiers salute this man in great excitement, and women and children stopping in their tracks with awe-struck faces as he passed.
"It was Foch! And now Evans, of San Bernardino, counts the experience as the greatest in his life. During that three-quarters of an hour that the generalissimo of all the Allied armies was on his knees in humble supplication in that quiet church, 10,000 guns were roaring at his word on a hundred hills that rocked with death.
"Moreover, it is not a new thing with him. He has done it his whole life long."