CHAPTER IV
“INTO THE JAWS OF DEATH”
ON the platoons went, gaining the top of the low hill that crowned thevalley slope and then--suddenly the terrors of real war descended withone swift stroke and bit and tore and gnashed with even more than theirusual fury.
Captain Lowden had been walking with a French guide up the slope andnot far from where Herbert preceded his men. A moment before the formerhad gained the top and come within sight of the enemy’s front-linedefenses, hardly a second before the outburst of machine-gun fire fromthe entrenched foe, the captain had turned to his second lieutenant.
“He says,” meaning the guide, “that right over the hill is the edge ofthe famous Argonne Forest. It is a wild place; the Huns have chosen tomake a stand in it and they have boasted that nothing will be able todislodge them. But we shall see, my boy; we shall see!”
How false was this boast of the Germans has been well and repeatedlyset forth in the history of the Great War. Among America’s mostglorious deeds on the fields of battle; among the most heroic annals ofall warfare the bitter fight for the possession of the Argonne Forestmay be ranked with the highest. Perhaps nowhere on earth has the gritand bravery of men at war been so sorely put to the test as in thisstruggle of exposed attacking troops against thoroughly trained andefficient soldiers with the skill of expert snipers behind well maskedmachine guns.
The French, long practiced in the art of war, asserted that this widetract which had been held by the Germans since 1914 had been madedefensively impregnable. According to all previously held standards itwas a place to avoid, but the Yanks took a different view of it; theHuns must be dislodged and the former were the lads who could, in theirexpressive slang, “make a stab at it,” and this in the early morning ofthe 26th of September, 1918, they were beginning to do.
Every soldier engaged in this stupendous undertaking had his work cutout for him and everyone knew this for a man’s size job. Therefore,each Yank went at the task as it deserved, do or die being virtuallyevery fighter’s motto. Throughout the long, bent line made up of thefour combat divisions of infantry and their machine-gun battalion thatnow advanced toward the densely wooded hills, backed by brigades ofartillery, there was one simultaneous forward movement with the twoother army corps stretching eastward between the Aire and the MeuseRivers. And there was one common purpose: to rout the Huns, destroythem or drive them back the way they had come. Never before in thehistory of wars had there been a clearer understanding among all ranksas to what was expected of the army at large and just what this forwardmovement was meant to accomplish.
For the glory of America, for the honor of the corps, the division,the regiment, the battalion, the company, the platoon; for the sakeof justice and humanity and for the joy of smashing a foe that hadnot played fair according to the accepted rules of warfare, thedetermination that led this force ahead could not have been excelled.And therein individual bravery and heroism enacted a very large andnotable part in the victory over foes numerically almost as strong andhaving the great advantage of position.
As the line swept up the hill, Lieutenant Whitcomb noted the variousexpressions on the faces of those about him. Many of the boys werevery serious and quiet, some positively grim because fully aware ofwhat they must shortly encounter and were for the moment only shieldedfrom by the terrain. Others seemed unchanged from their habitualcheerfulness, even bantering their fellows, and a little bunch ofevident cronies started up a rollicking song, but in subdued voices.
Herbert heard one man near him call to another:
“A Frog who talked United States told me that the Heinies are a badbunch up here!”
“These here Frogs know mostly what’s what!” was the reply. Herbertknew that “Frog” meant Frenchman; it was the common term used amongthe Americans, inspired, no doubt, by the idea that batrachians are afavorite dish with the French, though they cannot be blamed for theirchoice.
“A sky-shooter gave me the dope that the Jerries are just inside thewoods,” another man said. “Reckon we’re goin’ to get it right suddenwhen we top the rise.”
“There’s goin’ to be some Limburgers short if I kin see ’em first!”said another, laughing.
One prediction proved true, in part at least; the line topped therise--and got it. The barrage and preliminary artillery fire had donelittle in this case; bullets, or even high-powered shells could notpenetrate far nor do much damage within the dense forest. But it wasvery different with the enemy among the trees and rocks; they could seeout from these natural shelters well enough to choose clear spaces forshooting.
And shoot they did. As the Americans went over the first little hilltopacross the nearly level ground towards the woods beyond, the streaksof flame in the misty atmosphere and the rat-tat-tat-tr-r-r of machineguns became incessant. The enemy also was on to his job, had his workwell planned and it was now being well executed.
Did an order to charge on the double-quick come along the Americanline? Or was it rather a common understanding born of the impulse toget at an enemy that was capable of doing so much damage unless quicklyovercome? At any rate, the men broke into a run, with no attempt atdrill about it; every one for himself and yet with the common notion towork with his fellows, to support and be supported by them.
Herbert’s men, being still a little in advance, seemed to draw more ofthe enemy’s fire than they otherwise might have done. At one momentthere was the full complement of men, a little separated from theircompany comrades, charging toward the enemy positions; in the nextsixty seconds there was not two-thirds of this number dashing on, andin another minute, by which time they had gained the wood, less thanhalf of their original number were in action.
It will be remembered that Lieutenant Herbert Whitcomb had been inseveral charges when serving in the trenches; a half dozen times he had“gone over the top.” In one desperate and successful effort to regainlost ground and then to forge ahead over a hotly contested field he hadseen his men go down; in holding a shell hole gun pit, in springing amine, in finally victoriously sweeping back the Germans when they weredriven from Montdidier where he had been gassed, he had witnessed manybloody encounters, missed many a brave comrade. But here was a new andmore terrible experience. The Americans had forced the fighting intothe open, and yet again and again they were compelled to meet the foewithin well prepared and hidden defenses; therefore, the offensiveYanks must suffer terribly before the Huns could be dislodged.
The boys in khaki knew only that before them, somewhere from amongthe trees, the enemy was pouring a deadly machine-gun and rifle fire,sweeping the open ground with a hail of bullets in which it seemedimpossible for even a blade of grass or a grasshopper to exist. Themiracle was that some of the boys got through untouched, or were butslightly hurt. Those who had nicked rifle stocks, cut clothing, hatsknocked off, accouterments punctured and even skin scratches wereperhaps more common than those entirely unscathed.
Yet through they did go; and in the midst of the sheltering trees atlast, where now the Yanks, too, were in a measure protected and wherealmost immediately a form of Indian fighting began, the Americans stilladvancing and stalking the enemy from ambush, in like manner to theGerman defense.
The Yanks took no time to consider the toll of their number out therein the open and to the very edge of the forest, where men lay dead andwounded by the score, the ground half covered, except that the desirewas to avenge them, to destroy the cause of the loss among theircomrades. And this was a very palpable desire, serving to increase thefury of the offensive.
More than ever among the trees it was every man for himself; yet everyman knew that his surviving comrades were fighting with him, and whilethis sort of thing strengthens the morale it was hardly needed here,for each man depended also on his own prowess, and there were many who,had they known that every one of their companions had been shot down,would alone have gone right ahead with the task of cleaning up theArgonne Forest of Huns. Numerous cases of this individuality were shownand
will be forever recorded in history to the glory of the Americanfighting spirit, being all the more notable on account of the Germanboast that the Americans would not and could not fight, and they couldexpect nothing else than overwhelming defeat if they should attempt tocombat the trained soldiers of the Central Empire.
In the advance across the open the singing and striking of small armbullets accompanied by the roar of many running feet was the principalimpression which Lieutenant Whitcomb received; the purpose of chargingthe enemy and overcoming him was so fixed in Herbert’s mind as to bealtogether instinctive. Several times he glanced aside to see a comradetumble forward or, going limp, pitch to the ground with his face evertoward the enemy. Several times the lieutenant but just observed thebeginning of struggles in agony or the desire to rise and go on again.Once, after a particularly savage burst of fire concentrated from theforest upon his men, when several fellows in a bunch went down andout of the fight and the line for a moment wavered a little, the boyofficer called out sharply:
“Steady, fellows, steady! Keep right on! We’re going to get those chapsin there in a minute and make them sorry we came!”
Then a moment later, when they were among the trees, he turned againto call to his platoon, within hearing at least of the nearest, thoughhe could not have told how many of his men were with him, how many hadsurvived the terrible ordeal of the charge in the open:
“Now, men, go for ’em in our own way! Trees and rocks--you know how tomake use of them! Give them a taste of their own medicine, only make itten times worse! Forward!”
The Brighton Boys in the Argonne Forest Page 5
