Every evening, Wilmington daily commercial., 1918-12-05

sent in again after only a few days of rest.
| The First, Fifth, Twcnty-sixth, Forty
| second, Seventv-scventh, Eightieth,
! EJghty-ninth and Nincteth were in the
! line twice. Although some Of the divisions
| were fighting their first battle, they soon
| became equal to the best
The Commander-in-Ch Chief does not ioee
sight oi the divisions operating with
! French or British armies during this time
| He tells Of the work Of the Second Corps.
comprising the Twenty-scventh and Thir-
tieth Divisions IN the British assault on
The Hndenburg line, where the St Qucn-
tin canal passes through q tunnel: Of how
the Second and Thirty Divisions got
their chance in October, by being assigned
TO aid the French in the drive from Rheims
and of the splendid fighting of the 37th
and 9ist Divisions, sent In join the
French Army in Belgium
TOTAL FORCES IN wAR
OF the total strength Of the Expedition
airy Force General Porshing reports.
There arr in FIr0pc, altogether, IN
Guiding q regiment and some sanitary
units with inc Italian Army and the
organizations ut Murmansk. also incIud-
ing these cnroute from the States, ap-
proximatrly 2.0SS, ,3i7 men lcss mir inss,s
Of this total there are III France, ! ,53S, t6g
comhatant troops For;v divisions have
arrived Of which the infantry personnel Of
10 have been used ~ rcplaccncn.s, Ieav-
ing so divisions now IN France organized
into three armies Of three corpz each"
OF their equipment he SAYS
t,ur entry into the war found us with
lew Of the auxiliarIes necessary for its
conduct IN the modern sense Among our
most Important Deficiencies IN material.
were artillery. aviation ard tanks In
order to meet our requirements IA rapid
ly MS possible, We accepted the offer uf the
French Government to provide us with
the necessary artillery equipment Of
seventy-hves, one ffty-hvc rnilllmeter
howitzers, and one fiftv-five G. T. f. guns.
from their own factories for 30 divisions
The wisdom of this course is fully demon
strated by the fact that, although We
Soon began the manufacture Of these elias
@cs Of guns AZ home. there were no guns Of
the calibrcs mentioned manufactured IN
America on our front ut the date tho
was signed. The only guns Of
these types produced at home thus far re-
ccived IN France arc 100 scventy-fvc
mlllimeter guns.
FRANCE AGAIN 10 RESCUE.
In aviation we were IN the same situa
Tncnt came 10 our and until our own ava
ton program should be under way We
obtained from the French the necessary
planes for training our personnel. and
they have provided ue with . total Of
676 pursuit. observation and bombing
planes. The first planes received from
home. arrived in May and altogether We
have received t.379 Tho first American I
squadron. completely equipped by Amcri
-an production. including aIrplanes, eros
ed the German lines on August z, 1918
t~ IL tanks, VIC were also compelled to
RELY upon tho French Here however We
Hcrr less fortunate for the reason that the
French production could barely meet the
at their own armies
1T would hc fully realized that the
rcnch Government has always taken
most liberal attitude and has been most
,nNious to give rs every possible asslst-
incc IN meeting orr dcfriencics IN these.
IS well rs in other respects Otlr lie
upon France for artillery,
ivIation and tanks, waS, ot course. due
0 the fact that orr industries had not
'ecn exclusively devoted q military pro-
luction
All credit i due our own manufacturers
or their efforts ~ meet oar requirements.
: ST hr time the armistice was signed.
SC were able 70 Iooi forward to the carlv
uppIv ~ practically all our necessities
rom our own factories