Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1917-07-27
Regiment Is Made Up of Pick
of Engineers and Fighting
Men From All Quarters of
United States

On railroad siding at the end of
Whitehall street a string of Pullman
cars stand empty in the hot July sun
shine. The tracks they cover lead to
;he north and east. They lead to a
harbor where a transport waits with
empty cabins, and beyond they lead TO
to the broad Atlantic, and beyond--;o
the fields of France and the red lines
where legions fight for the world S
freedom.
Beside the railroad track is a high
board fence surrounding a clump of
rusty buildings and a parade ground
white with dust. A sentry pacing back
and forth outside the gate has orders
to admit no man. On the gate is a
gn-"Seventeenth Regiment of Engi-
neers"
Thus for the last two months has
the picture been-the high board fence,
the tops of rusty buildings peering
above It, the sentry pacing back and
forth outside. only the Pullman cars
are setting OF the last few days.
Occasionally a man in olive drab has
issued from the gate and caught a
street car TO town. Save for the cord
around his hat-white and red stripes
hundreds of other olive drab figures
by with a glance. He was a soldier and
that was all. The significance of the
hat cord was lost. Ana as for the high
board fence, the rusty buildings and the
sign-few knew of their existance.
1t is different now Atlanta has seen
one thousand, one hundred and eighty
four of those men in olive drab at a
quick step while the band played Mary
land, My Maryland" And Atlanta
go to France.
WILL GO SOON.
In few days the Pullmans will be
gone from the Whitehall street siding.
the gate i'm the high board fence will
be open. the buildings will he empty
shells and the parade grounds just a
vacant lot. The Seventeenth regiment
of engineers will be somewhere on the
Atlantic and Atlanta will not know
them any more. But Atlanta will not
forget; she has seen the engineers
Shortly after $50 o'clock Wednes-
day morning the gate in the high board
fence swung back and a dull drab col
umn swung out toward the city.
A little group of people had collected
to watch them, forerunners of the
In an automobile were three ladies'
and they stopped their knitting-was it
surgical dressings or fancy scarfs?-
10 lean out with parted lips.
Upon she bank beside the tracks
section rand wiped the sweat from his
face and looked with longing eyes.
In the first field was an old darby
with a COW. He came to the edge of
the fence and took his hat from his
Il In, air u
the column passed
GO git 'em. white folks" he shouted.
The engineers swung on-into White
hall street and north toward the city.
Ahead of them came Chief Mayo and
his squad of mounted bluecoats. Next
rode Colonel John s. Sewell and Lieu
tenant Colonel Charles G. Dawes and
other staff officers. And then came the
band, wedemeyer's band, playing Amer
lea, l Love You"
The regiment that followed was in
light marching order-one thousand, one
hundred and eighty-four men coatless
beneath the hot July sun. hats pulled
down across their eyes, rifles at their
shoulders. their light leggings making
"A centipede of swinging pendulums as
they tramped on leg for leg as regular
as the surge of surf toward shore
MEN OF ALL CLASSES.
Here were men OF All CTeeuS anu ali
classes, from all quarters and corners
of the country.
The first man who enlisted on March
IA was a brakeman from Seattle, the
second was football star from Prince
ton \ moonshiner left his still de-
serted in the Blue Ridge and tramped
into camp with a successful business
man from the east.
If a census of the regiment were tax
en-, il would show the states OF the
union and the upper and under crusts
of society Men who have punched
COWS i'm Wyoming, marched with conduc-
tors who have punched transfers In
Gotham and prize fighters who have
punched heads on the Pacific. Rlch
mems sons marched with the sons of
Kansas farmers. and section hands from
every railroad in the union obeyed the
orders of engineers who have putt
| bridges and dams from the Canadian
Pacific and the Florida Coast Line.
| As cosmopolitan as the Rough Kid
| ers of '9S. they are democratic as the
| DAYS of Thomas jefferson, for the brush
| of patriotism has painted them one and
| all with the same color, olive drab, and
| they are alike under one banner. old
Glory. and one commander. Uncle Sam
Short but suappy was the parade
Along Whitehall street the regiment
| swung across the viaduct, crossed Five
Points marched ont Peachtre past the