The daily star-mirror. (Moscow, Idaho) 1911-1939, 1917-12-31
HOW ARMY STOOD
FIRST SHELL fire
Meets Roar and ShrapneI Whis-
ties Like Veterans.
MEN SHOWED GREAT NERVE
American Engineers Endure Ordeal Of
High Explosives With All the Cool
Nerve of Experienced Regulars
Correspondent TELLS of Goodness of
Sammies in Their First Trying Sit
uation Under Fire.

| PASSED by Censor, for Publication In
America Only.)
"HOw did they face it?" was the
question put to the commanding officer
of the first battalion of American
troops to come under shell fire.
How would Americans face it?" he
snapped back wrathfully.
Yet the question was fair one. Sea-
soned British officers say they still feel
nervous under shell fire.
young troops just out, when they
get their first taste of it, sometimes
feel pretty sick for a while, and show
it. It's quite natural" So spoke an
English officer who himself has lived
under German shell fire so terrific that
1T was heard clear across the channel.
Showed Great Nerve.
The fact, then, that these young
ordeal of high explosives with all the
cool nerve of experienced regulars is
worthy of mention.
A personal experience will indicate
In a very mild way the kind Of surprise
and strain which successive patches of
Sammies are now undergoing.
You are walking along a road cheer
fully joking about the weight of your
tin hat, or about the uncanny feeling
which comes from knowing that in
some observation post behind the twist
ing white lines on the ridge opposite
a German officer is watching you with
his telescope. Back Of you hidden
British guns are cracking methodically.
1t is "quiet day" along the front.
Your attitude is that Of an idle spec
tator watching some vast, slow-moving
natural phenomenon. That human
lives are involved in the spectacle
hardly occurs to you, much less that
your own is concerned in the drama.
Entire Party Stops.
Suddenly, with nerve-shattering I'M
expectedness, the menacing wall of an
approaching shell stops the whole party.
Every fiber in your body vibrates
harshly in the metallic key set by the
shell.
You feel like trapped animal. :,
THERE'S violent jar in the air and
earth, a roar, shell fragments whistle
about your ears, and the road behind
you is wrapped in a heavy pail Of
black smoke and dust.
Before you are conscious of safety
from that shell, another is shrieking
in the air toward you, and still third
is on its way.
damn it, they're after u.s. says the
officer in charge of the party. "Scat-
ter out In the field each side of the
road And if the shell is coming very
close, throw yourself fiat on the ground
quickl Take to shell hole only if
there's one near. You only have a
second or two!'
Every shell seems shrieking at YOU.
The sky seems hard the atmosphere
tense, the fields cradely shelterless,
and every shell hole a hooking omen
Of what's going to happen to you next.
To the tune of the first shell or two
you inwardly make a last will and
testament. Then you manage to adj
Just yourself mentally to the situation,
and move on again noting where the
shells explode and analysing your own
ceilings.
Do 1t All Mentally.
You do all that mentally. But nerv-
,usly you are high strung to the break
ng point.
The nerve strain comes out when the
'arty finally reaches the veritable
trench. Knees are univers-
lily weak. Everybody sits down awk-
vardly in the mud. Faces are flushed, |
oreheads perspiring, and you use two
r three matches to light one cigarette,
Which promptly you toss aside after
isinterested puff or two.
That is roughly what the first ex-
erience has been like to each individ-
al Sammy. The terrific nervous ten
ion is inevitable.
1t is under just such nervous tension
nat these young American engineers,
'esh from shop benches and office
esks, have been quietly keeping at
'ork day after day here with all the