We now received our first taste of winter, and my first experience made me put more faith in the rumors of large falls of snow than an American likes to concede to any country but his own. I was sent to our regular station at the poste de secours at Mittlach. It was the farthest away, up the mountain to Treh, along the bare crest for five kilometres and then twelve more on a winding, narrow road to the valley of Metzeral. There was little work then, and the car that I was to relieve got a trip late that night in what was, even at Mittlach, a terrific rainstorm. The next morning it continued raining, but I could see the peaks of the mountains covered with snow; still no wounded, so I waited, a little anxious, as no relieving car had arrived. Late in the afternoon, just after dark, the familiar sound of a Ford brought me out of the poste de secours, and I found Rice, with his car covered with snow which even the rain hadn't yet melted. His story was of helping the car I had relieved, all morning, in their efforts to pull it on to the road from which a heavy ammunition wagon had pushed it, neither vehicle being able to stick to the icy road. Farther on he had met continual snow-drifts. His eagerness to bring me chains, my only chance of getting up, persuaded him to keep on, and he eventually got through with everybody's help on the road. We decided to wait until the storm was over, our only alternative, and proceeded to make ourselves as comfortable as we could, which means a stove, somewhere to sleep, and plenty to read and smoke. It was four days before the snow let up and we had visions of a long and lonely winter, but as soon as the storm broke we started up, and, as it proved, in the nick of time, as the five kilometres along the crest were again swept by snow and sleet and drifts were beginning to form. The Mittlach service had to be abandoned after this, although in late November and early December a car could go through, but it was impossible to assure the service and it was found better to have sleighs and wagons do the work.
Stephen Galatti
The cold has been intense during the last few days and breaking the ice to wash is a usual morning performance. A temperature of 5° below zero Fahrenheit does not facilitate starting a Ford ambulance that has been standing out all night; in fact, almost every morning it takes about fifteen minutes to start each car with the aid of hot water, hot potiers, and other appliances that the inventive genius of our various drivers supplies.
On either side of you a wilderness of snow. Take your eyes off the road and you seem to be in the great forests of a new country. Look back on the road and turn sharply to avoid the first of a convoy of brand-new American tractors, or a maze of telephone wires with their red-and-white labels which have been pulled from their supports by the snow. The great rocks and banks resplendent with their coating of ice, the trees, the snow, the occasional deer, fox, or rabbit contrast strangely with the road—the narrow, winding, mountain road serving for almost all forms of traffic, save the railroad, known to man. Mules, mules, mules, always mules, with their drivers hanging on to the beasts' tails.
H. Dudley Hale
