After the attack a patrol was found to be missing. A platoon set out into no-man's-land to find them in a rain of machine-gun bullets. The German fire was too heavy, and they returned without finding any trace of the missing men. It was assumed that the latter had been too venturesome and were captured.
CHAPTER XLVII
BEFORE AMIENS
The Allies' resistance to Germany's spring offensive of 1918, which aimed to reach the Channel ports and Paris, at first revealed no indication that American forces were taking part in the defense. The sweep of her first advance, begun on March 21, 1918, extended from the vicinity of Arras, on the north, to La Fère, on the south. The latter town was near a great bend then in the western line around the wood of St. Gobain, a short distance northwest of the Chemin-des-Dames, where, as shown in the previous chapter, Americans were stationed. Hence the German attack swept within fighting distance of American arms.
The United States was in sufficient strength along the western front to make it certain that General Pershing would not let Great Britain and France bear the sole burden of meeting the German advance. But for some days the share of the American forces in the fighting was veiled in mystery. Berlin finally shed a little daylight on the subject. In its official communiqués of March 24 and 25, 1918, it alluded to American reserves having been thrown back on Chauny, which is eight miles west of La Fère. These bulletins contained the following passages:
"The British Third and Fourth Armies and portions of Franco-American reserves who had been brought up were beaten, and on the line of Bapaume-Bouchavesnes and behind the Somme, between Péronne and Ham, as well as at Chauny, were repulsed with the heaviest of losses.
"The corps of Generals von Webern and von Conte and the troops of General von Geyl, after a fierce battle, crossed the Crozat Canal.
"French, English, and American regiments which had been brought up from the southwest for a counterattack were thrown back on Chauny in a southwesterly direction."
The next day General Pershing threw further light on the mystery in a message to the War Department:
"Reference to the German communiques of the 24th and 25th regarding American troops: Two regiments of railway engineers are with the British armies involved in this battle. Three companies of engineers were working in the areas mentioned in the communique in the vicinity of the Crozat Canal."