A Rifleman Went to War

During our first month or so in the trenches there was no time or occasion to do much with the rifle on my part. We were too busy with our machine gun work and it was not until along in October when we moved up into the Ypres Salient that the opportunity came to test my skill with both rifle and machine gun.

That first month was taken up almost entirely with our becoming acquainted with “strafing” work with our two Colt guns. The Machine Gun Officer of the Surreys, whom we had relieved, had established two strafing positions, well behind the front lines, and it was my fortune to be assigned to this position. I say this position because, although there were two different emplacements for the guns, they were used alternately — one at night and the other during the daytime. This latter position — which I afterwards changed — was for aircraft strafing. At that time the enemy planes came over at an elevation of fifteen hundred feet or less and they made fine targets. We finally got one and then they kept up so high we could no longer reach them.

The other, the real, permanent gun position, was so situated that we could fire over our own front lines and harass the enemy ration parties as they came up at night. We certainly made life miserable for Heinie from that place. One morning, after one of our strafing parties, we could see, through our glasses, at least a dozen men and as many horses piled up at a place called The Barricade — the end of the road down to the German trenches across the valley. That was as far as they could come with their field kitchens which were hauled by horses. After that they only came as far as the top of the ridge, at a place right behind the Hospice. We named this place “Cookers Halt.” That was about twenty-two hundred yards from our position but, by bringing up our reserve guns and giving them the whole dose, we were able to convince them that they better stay back behind the hill. I’ll bet a lot of Fritzes cursed us aplenty when they had to pack all their stuff for a mile or two. That’s where the fun comes in — just to know that you have stung the other fellow.

One of our strafing positions was about a hundred and fifty yards to the front of a group of wrecked buildings and from this position on two occasions we caught large working parties in broad daylight and cut them up badly. Our fire coming from the line of buildings naturally led the Germans to believe we were using the buildings for cover, and they shelled those buildings steadily but never put anything close enough to our real hideout to do us any damage. This taught me a good lesson which I put into operation later on in my sniping, as will be duly told.

Up to this time, we had no instruments of our own for working up the firing data other than what we had borrowed from our artillery. Just for the edification of some of our mathematical sharks (in the United States Army, I mean — they are all my friends), I will tell how we sometimes found our targets without the aid of a mil scale.

We had a lot of little playthings, just like the “string and gadget with a hole in it.” Hell, yes: we had all that and the “graticules” on our binoculars — and range finders! Say, folks; I have seen more of those expensive instruments lying alongside the road than you could carry in a two-ton truck. We tried our best to make some practical use of all these things, but it was out of the question — so we ditched them and went back to the old system of figuring things by degrees and minutes of angle. We had, of course, good maps of the whole terrain over which we were fighting. The only thing necessary to know was exactly where we were located on that map. Having ascertained this, we were in position to deliver fire on any other area shown on the same map or any other which joined up with it.

Were we? Well; yes — maybe. Here we are at “B-4-6-21” — the enemy we want to straff is at “A-2-6.” “Un- ha; now how we going to catch him? Got a good compass and the map says that the magnetic deviation (or declination) is 24 degrees. Well; that’s all right, so far; what do we do from here? What to do — what to do? That’s what I thought. Here we are and there he is but how in hell am I to lay these guns so they will drop their bullets in the right spot?

At that time we had no clinometers (quadrants) for proving the angle of elevation — but we did have carpenters; in our Pioneer Section; and these carpenters had squares and levels and at least one of them knew the ratio of angles on his square. Perhaps I have not expressed this in the proper mathematical way, but neither have I put in the technical language of the textbooks that come from Ft. Sill or Benning. I’m just telling you how we worked it out. To make a short story out of what might drag out into an all- night discussion, we figured the thing out and got results.

The Battle of Loos opened on the 25th of September and lasted about a week. We were outside the immediate sphere of the action but were called upon to stage a demonstration to prevent the taking of reinforcements from our front to the scene of the big battle. The Nineteenth Battalion of our Brigade (the 4th) carried out the feint, the others simply standing by to take care of any counter-attacks. All the machine guns of the Brigade took active part in the show and we were kept busy for some twenty minutes or so, laying a barrage along the line of the enemy parapet to cover the advance of the infantry who only went far enough to throw a few grenades into Heinie’s trench and then retired.

The casualties on our side were light and I suppose the same was true of the enemy but the performance accomplished the desired result; keeping our enemy on the qui vive and preventing the dispatch of reinforcements to the embattled troops to the south where the combined British and French attack was gaining headway every hour. Unfortunately, at that time, as in several subsequent attacks, our High Command had evidently underestimated the strength of the enemy artillery and our batteries ran out of ammunition, necessitating a retirement to the original lines. Had the supply of shells for our guns been adequate, I think it quite probable that the battle would have resulted in a decisive victory for the allied cause. However, it was to be long, weary months later before the allies did catch up with the Germans in the number of guns and the supply of fodder for them and by that time they had suffered such enormous losses of men that the advent of the United States, with its fresh divisions was most welcome. No, I do not think the United States won the war but they certainly did a good job of shortening it. If, in a major battle, a commanding officer holds back a substantial reserve until the critical point of the action and then hurls them in to overcome the weakened and tired enemy, thus winning the battle, it could hardly be said that these reserves won it. Those who took the shock of the earlier stages of the struggle are, in my opinion, entitled to something more than half the credit.

Those of us who were operating the machine guns during the little show above mentioned, simply took them back of our front line to slightly higher ground in the rear, to insure safe clearance over the heads of our advancing infantry and just set them up, right up in the open. It was at night and we were safe from observation but fully exposed to the rifle and machine gun fire. It was our first experience of the kind. The bullets were cracking all around us, exactly as it sounds in the pits at Camp Perry during a stage of rapid fire during the National Matches — the only difference being that we were right up on top of the parapet instead of down behind a concrete wall. Neither I nor my No. 2 man, who was feeding in the belts, were hit. He was just a kid, about seventeen, and the little rascal kept shouting and laughing in high glee so, of course, I could not do less, even had I wanted to. As a matter of fact, I did rather enjoy the performance. The fact that I might be hit never occurred to me. The whole show was over within about a half hour, but in that short time we had learned a thing which can be learned in no other manner — that it is possible for thousands of bullets to pass by or come close to you without doing any harm.

During those last few days in September, we had beautiful Indian Summer weather. I remember one afternoon when, things being quiet, Bouchard and I sneaked away for a look around to see what we could find in the way of souvenirs. At that stage of the game, we were all souvenir hounds. We never gave a thought to the matter of disposing of our finds or how we could get them out of there. It was only the men of the other services who had any chance to take anything home. The infantryman and the machine gunner had enough to do to carry their own equipment, but that did not prevent us picking up this and that and gloating over it until the time came to make a move, when we regretfully turned it over to some artilleryman, transport man or medico.

We had worked our way around to where we were on a hillside, well behind our lines and a mile or more from the Ridge (Messines) when we suddenly came upon a great patch of blackberries, growing along a hedge, and there we spent the rest of the afternoon.

The warm glow of the westering sun beat gently upon us as we sat there behind the hedge. It was late September, but the autumn was tardy that year and the gentle breeze carried the warmth of summer. I was idly sketching the landscape across the wide valley, the boy busily picking and eating the luscious big berries.

After a while, the youngster ransacked the haversack which he was carrying and dug up a piece of bread and the remnant of a can of jam. Prying loose the top of the can with a big knife, he proceeded to scrape out the contents and spread it on the bread. As if by magic, dozens, hundreds, yes thousands of “yellow-jackets” appeared and fastened themselves on to the sweet-tasting stuff. He would spread some jam on the bread and, before he