No greater measure of self-satisfaction was ever reflected in his pompous announcements than this. But on this same fourth day at Chateau-Thierry the German troops found a small American fighting unit, the 7th Machine Gun Battalion of the 3rd U.S. Division, which had come a distance of 110 miles in thirty hours by motor transport, and the Boche failed to cross the Marne. As a dough-boy, it appears to me that the marines have received glory at our expense. The whole Marne campaign has by many writers been credited to them. Unquestionably, the marines did exceptional work in France, and we dough-boys are proud of them.
Marines is a word to conjure with, and the conjuring has gone far.
That night began a fatiguing march to the front. About midnight we camped in a grove of a chateau at Conde Brie. Near by our own batteries were thundering, and now and then we would hear the whine and the roar of a position-searching Boche shell. Although this was our first introduction to enemy fire of any kind we were too dead tired and worn out to be even nervous. He had just come from near Chateau-Thierry.