Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1917-12-07
Observation-Disclosures MOL
Machine Gunner Empey Gives Good Advice to Am
erican Soldiers = "War Not Nearly So Bad
as It's Cracked Up to Be-"

THIS war, for the man in the
trenches" remarked Machine
Gunner Empey, American vol
unteer in the British Army, sis not
nearly so bad as 1T is cracked up to
be-"
Arthur Guy Empey, author of
over the Top served for year
and a half with the British Army in
France, and at the end of that time
he was so badly wounded that he
was incapacitated for further SER
vice. In addition to less sensational
but more actually manning wounds,
he has a piece of another humans
rib in his cheek, where the bone was
smashed by an exploding bullet. He
has seen war as 1t is," if ever man
did. And although his conversation,
on returning to this country, could
scarcely be said to be- confined to
what some one has bcalled 1.-The
lighter side of trench life," his word
| to the American soldiers is full of
practical, and indeed of cheerful en-
co1ragement.
Also he has some bits of advice,
| culled from his own experience, for
the American soldier in England, in
France, making friends with the
French and British soldiers and at
last on the firing line. And ne
traces step by step the probable eX-
perlence OF the young American.
When you've been looking out of
the trench through the periscope,"
he said, don't stick your head over
the top to see what you saw"
And he has word of forecast, not
cheerful this time unless we look
! beyond it, as to the sort of time the
American soldiers are likely to have
when they first go under fire.
Il am afraid that the American
soldier is going to get it rough at
| first" he said, for the same reason
that the British colonials got it
| rough at first. We have heard n
great deal about the Canadians and
their splendid fighting, and 1 take
off my hat to Canada every time.
! But we have also heard all sorts of
! German-propaganda talk to the eff
/ feet that the Canadians did all the
! fighting while England sat back,
that the English put the Canadians
| on the hottest part of the line, and
that sort of thing. Well, it's true
that it was the hottest part of the
line, but it isn't true that the English
put them in it. What is true is that
wherever the Canadians were would
| be the hottest part of the line, be-
cause that was a definite German
plan. To discourage recruiting and
| to spread the report that England
! let her colonies do her fighting for
| her, the Germans specifically con-
centrated on the colonial lines. II
didn't discourage recruiting. But ]
think it is quite likely that the Ger
/ mans will do the same thing with
/ the first American forces on the
battle front-they will concentrate
! against them, to make people nj
home believe that the Americans are
/ being sent to the worst parts of the
I line, filing in gaps, as they say. So
think that at the beginning it will
be rough"
Then the gunner went back to his
original word of cheer.
! "The trouble with the American
J public" he went on, "is that they
have heard and read so much of the
great war and its horrors that they
think their boys are going to be con-
tinually in the midst of bloodshed
and CONSTANTLY in discomfort, ano
they concentrate on the terrible side
!, of it and ask, How long will it bt
before he is killed? They don't see
that that is not all there is to it.
] "It is natural enough, of course
/ A man writes a book about tine war
takes one incident, and another, and
another, makes chapters of them
! with the result that the man anC
woman who read his book read G
4 succession of horrors. and they think
4 it is all like that They don't real
ize, or they forget, the weeks be-
4 ,