Five Mile Beach weekly journal., 1916-06-23
The Degeneracy
Of Modem War
By Captain F. A. Mitchell

make stories ABOUT tn1S Dig war IN Eu-
rope,'' said the G.. A. r. veteran, when
it's all over. What kind of a war is
it, anyway? A hundred thousand men
march up against a line of trenches de-
Tended by rapid fire guns, electric
wires and grenades; 10000 or 10000
of them are either killed or wounded,
while the rest capture a few yards of
territory or are driven back without
having accomplished anything. You
might as well extract from
the Chicago stockyards ON killing day"
The remark was made to a party of
men sitting on chairs tilted against the
outside of a country store.
where's the a in the war
you fit mr. asked an old farmer, TAX
ing his pipe out of his mouth and look
ing at the G. A. r. mar doubtfully.
"Whar is it? Why, that war was
brimful of it. 1t was spread over q
big country; there were comparatively
few battles; a small amount of takin'
Notifications and all the rest was ro-
nance. 1 don't mean girl romance,
though there was plenty of that. I
mean adventure romance. I was con-
cerned in one of EN- myself. We was
layin' quiet In camp, down In Tennes-
see, one summers evening, singin',
When this cruel war Is over or 10
rena' or some other of the romantic
war songs of that time, when my cap
tain came along in q hurry, shoutin',
ANY locomotive engineer among you
boysY I said I'd been a fireman IN a
locomotive and could run a machine
tolable well. He yanked me off to the
general, who asked me a few questions,
then told me that the bridge guard
across the Tennessee river, twenty
miles above us, had been attacked and
unless he could get re-enforcements
there right off the bridge would be
taken and burned. This would break
our line of communications and we
might have to give up a big stretch of
country we occupied. He wanted an
engineer to take a regiment through to
the rescue. The officer commanding
the guard had telegraphed that he
couldn't hold out much longer, when
the wire was cut.
"The train was made up and 400
men were hurrying into the cars. A
locomotive was being fired up, and I
jumped aboard and took the throttle.
"Well, now, mebbe there was nothin'
adventurous in that ride! The colonel
commanding the regiment and the ad-
jutant were in the cab with me, and
1t wasn't long before they were made
aware of the fact that we were run-
ming a gantlet. 1t was the people
along the road who were trying to
wreck us that made it amusing.
Rounding a curve, 1 saw about half
the length of the train ahead a tie
wedged in under the rail. 1t was too
late to stop, but l reversed and wait
ed. There was a thump, but the en-
CINE stuck to the track. There were
seven out of ten chances that we would
have been ditched and most of us in
the cab killed or MANNED.
1.-THE next amusing occurrence was
the rattle of bullets against the cab.
Nobody was hurt, but you'd better be-
lieve every man ducked, moi excepting
the colonel.
But they didn't get the excitement
out of it that 1 did. l was straining
my eyes into the darkness ahead with
my hand on the throttle, expecting
every minute to run up against an OBJ
struction. The shadow of a tree was
a log felled across the track; the shad-
ow of a stump was a tie on the rails.
And sometimes the Instructions were
real. Once l pulled up within a few
feet of a log that had been rolled
square across the rails. Another time
l slowed up before reaching a switch
and found that it had been left open
to run us up against a brick house.
You see, if they hadn't really been
tryin' to wreck us there wouldn't "a
been any excitement.
"And if there hadn't been any neces-
sity of goin' at a rapid gait there
wouldn't "a been any fun neither. If
we didn't get there in time to save the
bridge it meant the retreat of the
whole army. So you see 1 was obliged
to let her out, danger or no danger,
for if l didn't we wouldn't be in time,
and we might as well be wrecked as
too late. Besides, if I'd wanted to go
slow the colonel, who was at my ell
bow, wouldn't have allowed it.
1.-THE last obstruction vas a post put
up on end as a cattle guard only a
few miles from the bridge. Seeing
that I couldn't stop In time, 1 put on
steam and snapped it off like a twig.
"After passing this we heard firing
and knew that the bridge was not yet
lost. 1 blew a long blast on the whis-
tie and heard a distant cheer. When
we came near the bridge the colonel
ordered me to stop the train in a cut.
The men got out and, forming on one
side Of the cut on high ground, charg-
ed down on the attacking force and
drove them off.
"Now, that's what l call the romance
e H. ol-o-k1,.