HISTORY
OF THE 304th FIELD ARTILLERY
by
James M. Howard
1920
CHAPTER
VI
HEADED FOR THE UNKNOWN
Toward the end of July came the word that we were
presently to be shifted to a more active sector. There
were rumors that our destination was to be Italy, where
some American troops were already being sent, but every
one hoped with all his heart that it might be our lot to
go into the thick of the fighting in France or Flanders.
On the night of Thursday, August 1st, our positions were
taken over by a French battalion which, worn out with
terrific battles in the north, had been sent to Baccarat
for a rest. The infantry was relieved by the 37th
American Division, and we were glad to know that we were
not again to be separated from them. The 77th Division
bad begun to feel its unity, and although the different
branches of the service had by no means perfected the art
of cooperation, a certain esprit de corps was beginning
to make itself felt, and we had no desire to have it
interrupted.
On this occasion we had our first experience of taking
the regiment on the road at night. Most of the batteries
got out of their position without any mishap, but Battery
A, just as the drivers were hitching the horses to the
guns, was startled by the sudden grinding of a Klaxon:
the gas alarm!
"Gas!" shouted the officers.
"Gas! gas!" yelled the men, as they struggled
to get their masks on in the dark. Soon every one was
masked. Then, "Put the masks on the horses!"
ordered the Captain, and a wild scramble took place to
get those queer smelling bags out of the cases which hung
under the horses muzzles, and -to slip them over the
animals' noses and fasten the straps. It was Bedlam let
loose. Nobody could see in the dark through his mask, and
they all stumbled over each other and over the guns and
barked their shins and fell into the gun pits, until
Captain Lyman, lifting his nose clip and sniffing the
air, discovered that there was no gas at all!
"Gas masks may be removed," he cried, taking
off his own, and presently order was restored and the
guns were moved out in peace.
Battery A's little farce, however, was mild compared to the circus
parade of that first night march. To begin with, the French artillery
was moving in on the same road on which we were moving out. Our drivers
had not yet learned to keep well to the right of the road, and the
French are notorious for spreading themselves. One of our organizations
would be held tip for a moment, causing a break in the line, and instantly a French column would
butt in and get us all tangled up. Wagons, piled high
with boxes and bundles, got pushed off the road into the
ditch. Horses stepped over their traces. The seventy-five
new stallions, which had been delivered to us two days
before, squealed and pranced and backed all over the
road, while the Frenchmen jabbered in their unknown
tongue and our own drivers exhausted their vocabularies
of profanity.
Colonel Briggs, as usual, was everywhere at once. Riding along the
column he would see a traffic congestion, and would at once leap from
his horse and dive into the midst of the turmoil. His quick eye would
soon diagnose the cause of the trouble, and his mind and hand never
lacked for a remedy, and presently the mess would untangle itself and
the column would proceed. Once he had just straightened out one driver's
difficulty and was about to mount his horse when another, a few paces
farther back, not knowing who he was but only seeing that he was a
friend in need, called out, "Hey, Buddie, come over
and give me a hand, will you?"
At length, after two or three hours of unutterable
confusion, we got through the town of Baccarat and
started on our way. The men who had to travel on foot
soon showed their lack of training in the gentle art of
hiking. Tender feet began to blister, and unused leg
muscles became tied up with cramps. All along the
roadside men began to fall out and sit down. There was a
ten minute rest after every fifty minutes of marching,
and it was, of course, against orders to drop out without
permission, but in the intense darkness it was impossible
to keep track of everybody. The men, who believed that as
members of a regiment of horse artillery they should
either be mounted on wagons or on horseback, were
shameless about it. They were tired, they were blistered,
they were sore, and they didn't care who knew it!
Eventually those who sat down joined in with other
batteries as they came along, and some of them managed to
beg rides on trucks or wagons, so that by the end of the
hike the whole regiment was present.
But it was a weary night. Shortly after sunrise a very
tired and discouraged crowd of soldiers dragged
themselves into a wood, and, after putting the horses on
picket lines, sank down to the ground without stopping to
get out their blankets. By seven-thirty it had begun to
rain, but few men had the energy to rouse themselves and
put up shelter tents. They lay where they were, in the
open, and let it rain.
There was another night of marching, in which the order
and discipline were much better; but the hike was very
exhausting and the hours dragged on interminably before
there were any signs of the journey's end. Morning came
at last, however as we passed through Bayon and pulled
into a splendid wood whose clean open fields seemed just
meant for tents. Moreover, there was a river nearby for
watering the horses and f or bathing. The news that we
were to stay for several days was received with
gratitude, and from Saturday, August 3rd, until Tuesday,
the men really enjoyed themselves. There was work to be
done, of course, but there were also leisure hours,
especially on Sunday, and we basked in the sun and bathed
in the river, and lay around taking it easy. Sunday
morning many of the men walked to a nearby village to
attend church, while others went to the Chaplain's
service in the woods; and on Sunday afternoon, to our
astonishment, a truck drove in and deposited a load of
American mail.
On Tuesday, August 6th, Colonel Briggs received orders to
take his regiment to a place called Einvaux, where trains
would be waiting to move the troops to their next
destination. What that destination was he did not know:
he was to start under sealed orders.
That night we marched some twelve kilometers to Einvaux
and entrained. This was a very different operation from
what it had been at Bonneau, for the men knew now how to
put their horses and wagons into the cars. There was
little or no confusion, in spite of the fact that the
work had to be done in the dark. Quietly and steadily
they went about their business, and train after train was
loaded and sent forth on its mysterious way.
Where were we bound ? No one knew. One thing only was
sure: with the present state of affairs at the front it
was un-thinkable that our division, now fairly well
schooled in the principles of warfare, should not be sent
where fighting troops were needed.
As the first train bowled along through the country, one
man got out his compass and set it on the seat beside him
to discover what general direction we were taking. All
day long the train rumbled toward the west-toward
Chateau- Thierry and the region where the fighting was
thickest-and soon after dark we came to a station called
La Ferte Gaucher, situated on one of the tributaries of
the Marne River. There we detrained, and, marching
northwest, reached a group of villages in the
neighborhood of Rebais. Some in billets and some in the
fields, the batteries found their stopping places, and
inasmuch as Colonel Brigs instructions did not carry him
any farther, the regiment, with headquarters established
at St. Leger, settled down and awaited developments.
While we were in that region a new officer came to take command of the 152nd Brigade. General Rees, who had
commanded us for more than six months, had been relieved
just before we left Baccarat, and in his place came
Colonel Manus McCloskey. The latter had just led the 12th
Field Artillery through the terrific fighting of the
Allied counterattack at Chateau-Thierry, where, as part
of the 2nd Division, it had done splendid work, and it
was in recognition of his able services that he had now
been given a brigade and was to be made a
brigadier-general.
On Saturday, the 10th, there was a bustle of preparation
throughout the regiment. The wagons were carefully
repacked, the rolling stock was all examined and put into
good shape, such horses as needed it were shod, and
finally the tents were struck, and the packs rolled.
About sundown the various units came out on the roads and
the long column started on its momentous march
toward-toward what? -
We were headed north, but just what that meant no one
could fully grasp. We were coming to a jumping-off place
where we must take a leap in the dark into something
utterly unknown. There was a general feeling of curiosity
and of sup-pressed elation. Big things lay ahead of us,
and they loomed large in our imagination as we tried to
compass with our minds the significance of this strange
new venture.
By this time the men had learned how to march. The column
moved evenly along the right-hand side of the road, and
the gaps which had been so evident on the first night
hike were far less frequent. The feet of the unmounted
men had become toughened, and their packs were better
rolled and better adjusted. The whole regiment was able
now to be content with the ten minute halts for rest, and
to travel a considerable distance without too great
fatigue. It would hardly be true, however, to say that
the men did not get tired. To start after one has been
working all day, and ride a rough-gaited horse or drive a
four-line team, or walk with a fifty-pound pack on one's
back throughout the night, is quite enough to tire any
normal man. The long waits which so often occur on the
roads, when no one knows the reason for the delay nor how
long it is to last, add an element of irritation which
inevitably increases the drain on physical and nervous
energy. It would seem as though the mounted men and
drivers had by far the best of it, but when the end of
the journey comes and the guns are parked and the wagons
rolled into place, these men have to look after their
horses and mules and put away the harness before ever
they can think of attending to their own needs and
comforts. As a matter of fact, though each man is tempted
at times to envy some one else's lot, there is no one who
does not have his full share of drudgery and labor, and
there is no one who is not tired out when the night's
work is done.
The first stage of our journey toward the great unknown
brought us in the intense dark of a cloudy night to a
forest road on which, shut in by overhanging trees, the
blackness could almost be felt. Groping their way about,
the men finally got their horses tied up, and without
waiting to put up tents, threw their blankets on the
ground and fell asleep.
Morning revealed the fact that we were in the grounds of
a beautiful chateau on a hill overlooking the Marne
River. Some of the officers had discovered the chateau
the night before and had crept in and slept on sofas or
on the soft carpets; but most people were lying in the
tall wet grass which grew in abundance all about the
place. It was Sunday, and aside from the necessary work,
which must always be done, the day was spent as a day of
rest. A warm August sun lured many to the river, where
they took off their clothes and bathed and swam about.
The 305th and 306th regiments were encamped near by, and
the stream was fairly alive with men. One can imagine the
relief it brought to tired and dirty bodies to plunge
into the cool water and then come out and sit in the sun.
A great many lay down under the trees that afternoon and
slept until word was passed around, "Everybody up!
Roll your packs; we start right after supper."
The march of the night of August 11th was one that we
shall never forget. Pulling out of the chateau grounds,
we moved along parallel to the river for a while, and
then turned to the left and went straight for the
historic town of Chateau -Thierry. As we made our way
along a wide avenue flanked with handsome dwellings and
beautiful shade trees, it was hard to realize that we
were actually in the place where the French and Americans
had hurled their first terrific counterattack across the
-Marne. But as we got farther into the city itself we
could begin to see, in the darkness, the scars of battle.
There were houses which had been wrecked by shellfire;
there was a general atmosphere of disorder; and there was
a certain indefinable odor which we noticed there for the
first time, and which came afterward to be associated in
our minds with destruction and death.
Arrived at the center of the town, we found ourselves on
the famous bank of the Marne. The old bridges had been
destroyed, but a pontoon bridge had been constructed, and
on this we crossed. Our progress through the city had
been delayed by a freight train which cut in between
batteries as the column was passing the railroad and
stood for a half hour directly in the way. The result was
that we were holding up the entire brigade on the road
behind us, and Colonel Briggs was anxious to get over as
fast as he could. He sat on his horse by the bridge head
and urged every organization as it came along to make as
great speed as possible. Some of the horses were
frightened and balked, and one mule fell into the water,
whence it took considerable time and trouble to extricate
him. But at last the regiment had passed over, and
leaving the town we started tip the hill on the northern
bank.
As we reached the crest of the hill we looked to the
north, and there, on the far horizon, was a continual
play of what looked like heat lightning. We watched the
flashes come and go, and gradually the significance of it
dawned on us: we were looking toward the battle front,
and the flashes were the flashes of guns and flares and
rockets where at that very moment good American troops
were struggling with the Boche for mastery of the hills
beyond the Vesle !
Fascinated as we were by the sight, it was necessary to
look sharp about us, for we were passing now over roads
where recently the fighting had been intense, and there
yawned beneath our feet shell holes and mine craters
which must be coimpassed with great care by the guns and
vehicles. Slowly we plodded on our way, through shattered
villages and wasted fields which brought us from time to
time that unmistakable odor of death. After toiling tip a
long and difficult hill over the roughest of country
roads, we came at last to a clump of woods where the
order was given to park our guns and pitch camp for the
rest of the night.
On waking up in the morning we found that we had been
sleeping on a veritable battle field. In the thick
underbrush about us were innumerable little pits, half
covered with branches, where Boche machine guns had been
planted to pour their deadly fire on the French and
American troops as they advanced up the hill. One man
found that the little mound of earth he had used for a
pillow was a grave. Nearby was another grave with no
mound whatever over it, and the feet of the corpse were
sticking out of the ground. Everywhere scattered over the
hillside were the things which the Germans in their
retreat and the Americans in their pursuit had thrown
away to lighten their burdens in the furious running
fight, rifles and ammunition, blankets by the score,
helmets, canteens, cartridge belts, and every conceivable
object the riddance of which might make for freer, faster
movements. It was a dismal place, and yet it had a morbid
fascination for the men, and they spent hours rummaging
through the woods ;and looking f or traces of the battle.
As we took the road about dusk that night we realized
that we were coming close to the front, for in the
gathering darkness the lightning in the sky to the north
became more and more vivid, and we could from time to
time hear the rumble of guns. Red flares blazed up and
threw a lurid glow halfway across the heavens, and then
died down again, leaving the sky black save for where
that constant flicker of light showed where the battle
was raging.
Late in the evening we began to pass a stream of troops
coming back from the front. They were a part of the 4th
Division, which was being relieved by the 77th after
several weeks of terrific fighting through the
Chateau-Thierry drive. First came a regiment of
engineers, stumbling along over the shell-torn road,
grumbling as they went. "I don't know what ailed
them," writes an officer in his diary, "but I
never heard such a lot of growlers. We all remarked it.
Doubtless they were tired out. One man stopped right
alongside my horse at a halt, leaned over and vomited.
Then, in a matter-of-fact, disgusted way, he exclaimed,
God-damned gas!' and went on his way."
After the engineers came the infantry. They cursed us
softly from time to time for being in the way, and for
being mounted while they had to travel on foot. They
overlooked the fact that at least half of our men were
plodding along with packs like themselves. Especially
were they irritated by presence of a band.
"Look!" they cried, one after another, as they
passed. "These guys have got their band with 'em.
You won't need any bands up there, Buddie-you'll get all
the music you want!"
But at our halts they stopped and chatted with the
artillery, told them wondrous stories of their adventures
with the Hun, and wished us joy. "Give 'em
hell!" was the slogan all along the line. "Go
to it! They'll need all the guns you've got to blast
those damned Boches out of the hills across the river
Some time after midnight we passed through the skeleton
-like runs of Sergy near Fere-en-Tardenois, which, as an
important road center, had been one of the main
objectives in the Allied drive. The streets were deserted
save for an occasional M. P. on a corner, and the rattle
of our wheels and the clatter of horses' hoofs on the
pavement resounded with a mostly racket which contrasted
sharply with the deep rumble of the distant cannon.
Bearing off to the east for a short distance, we turned
sharply to the left and began a long, steady climb up
into the Nesle Woods. Arrived at the top of the hill, the
regiment halted while the foremost battery turned in from
the road, bumped along under the trees for a while, and
then unhitched their horses and prepared to camp. The
other organizations followed in turn, and after
considerable maneuvering- among the stumps and ditches
and holes, we were all settled for a sleep.
We had hardly begun to doze when suddenly there was a
terrific report, which sounded very close, and at the
same time an enormous white flare burst over the edge of
the woods and floated down among the trees. A dozen
Klaxons screamed the ,gas alarm. Every one was up in an
instant, and the cry of "Gas! gas!" could be
heard on all sides. Fumbling in the dark we pulled out
our masks and put them on, and then there was a rush for
the picket lines to get the horses protected. Hardly had
this been done when Major Sanders's voice was heard above
the din, "Gas masks may be removed!" Some of
the battery commanders, before repeating the order to
their men, dispatched their gas sergeants to the Major's
tent to find out what was up. "False alarm!"
was the report. So we took off our masks and lay down
again.
Within a few minutes there came again the rasping of a
Klaxon, and immediately every guard in the camp began to
sound the alarm once more. This too was found to be
false. Major Sanders, who was in command that night in
the absence of the Colonel, gave orders to the officer of
the guard that no alarm was to be sounded without an
express command from the gas officer, Lieutenant Keller.
But fear of this dreaded device of the Hun overcame even
the Major's orders, and within an hour one of the
guards,, hearing a gas alarm way down in the valley,
thought it his duty to warn the camp first and get his
authority afterward, and turning to the tree where his
Klaxon was mounted, he seized the handle and ground away
for dear life. By this time every one was exasperated,
and yet no one was quite sure that it might not be a real
alarm, so for the third time the whole camp was roused.
"Put that man under arrest!" shouted the Major.
"Officer of the guard, arrest that man! There is no
gas whatever in these woods!"
Then at length the alarms were at an end. The men lay
down again, and this time they slept soundly until the
sun was well up in the heaven.
When we looked about us in the morning, we found that we
were near the edge of the woods on the crest of a hill.
Be-low us in the valley lay the little village of
Mareuil-en-Dole, through which ran the main road from
Fere-en-Tardenois to Fismes. All about us among the trees
were shallow trenches, which had been used by the
infantry when the battle passed that way. Machine gun
emplacements were also numerous, and there were a few
rude shacks which had once been used by the Germans for
officers quarters and as stables for their horses. The
smell which we had noticed all along the way from the
Marne was here overpowering. We had been nauseated by it
the previous night when we moved in, and when day came
the cause was not far to seek: within a few yards of us
were a number of dead horses. Indeed, the whole
countryside was littered with them, and although our men
were immediately started on the happy task of giving them
decent burial, the stench they made had permeated the
ground and the air, and during our whole stay in the
sector it was part and parcel of the atmosphere we
breathed.
Along with the dead horses must be mentioned the flies.
France is not noted f or its good sanitation even in
peace times; and during the war towns and villages
abounded in filth where flies throve and multiplied.
Added to the swarms which came from such places were
myriads breeding wherever troops had lived or battles had
been fought, and in the Vesle sector they were so thick
as to be almost unbearable. Even with the best of food,
eating was never a pleasure. The worst little railroad
restaurant in America is a paradise of cleanliness, so
far as flies are concerned, compared with mess time in
those woods. Not until night fell was there any peace;
and even in the dark the slightest touch on the under
side of the shelter tent brought down a buzzing shower of
flies,
After our experience with the flare on the previous
night, and with the sound of aerial bombs which had
seemed so close at hand, we wondered whether we were not
by this time nearly to the front. At first we were told
that we should probably make one more move forward, but
the following day the Colonel brought us word that, for
the present, the Nesle Woods was to be our echelon, and
that the batteries would go into position immediately. On
August 15th, shortly after supper, 13 Battery's guns were
on their way, and before the night was over, all the
firing batteries had taken over the positions of their
predecessors. The long expected day had arrived: at last
we were on the real firing line!