The herald-advance. (Milbank, S.D.) 1890-1922, 1918-03-15
Correspondent Gives Thrilling
Description of First Ex-
perience at Front.
LIGHTED BY STARRY BALLOON
Might Watchers Trust Nobody But
ThemseIves-Both Sides Watching
the Flarino Bombing and Ma.
chine Cunning at Intervals.

With the French Armies in the Field.
Night life in a first-line trench has
ats little bag Of thrills for the begin
ncr.
Poilus say night trenches are monot-
onous, but all Poilus have seen llvelier
things than trench life.
To an American correspondent,
spending a first night on the fringe
of No Mans land precisely rs no
doubt hundreds Of thousands Of Ameri-
cans will before the end Of the war, a
nocturnal trench has all the melodra-
matte elements to keep up interest and
drive monotony away.
Darkness seems to settle down
quickly over the frowsy, weedy. gray
strip In front, which nobody owns and
nobody treads IN daylight.
A battery Of French guns bark
sharply in the rear. FREELY flashes
wink q mile behind the enemy's wire.
The French gunners are saying Good
night to q BOche battery, and the dull
"boom," ''boom," "boom"-then the
squeal Of enemy steel above tells you
the Boche Is answering. Unless un-
foreseen things happen tonight. the
gunners will rest on their arms un-
til daybreak. On "quiet" sectors like
this 1t often happens.
With darkness down, the night shift
is eating supper in their dugouts and
rigging out in %sheepskin jackets to
begin the silent night watch over the
parapets. The dugouts-corrugated
steel and sand-bag construction at In
tervals n few yards back of the first
1ine-are smelly and dark, but filled
with life. It's human life and insect
life. the latter making little difference
so lone as steel and sandbags shed va
grant shells. Men say they can get
accustomed to insects. but the bite OF
a shell is different.
Signs Of America.
The correspondent found the inevi-
table American sign in these dugouts
tonight. Penciled names on the wood
EN- hunks suggested New York's East
side. st. Louis, Cincinnati, Milwaukee
and other purer American names sug-
gested early settlers OF the prairies
OF the middle West. In fact, 1t was In
the trench just outside that a small
body of American "Sammies' on No
,vember 3 fought desperately against
overwhelming German odds In Ameri-
cas- first battle of the big European
war.
The night Poilus have taken their
places q few yards apart along the
parapet. The day Poilus have filed
into the dugouts for food and rest.
A machine gun Is "rat-tat-tating' its
evening tryout. All machine guns are
frequently tested at night. A fainter
.rat-tat-tat.tat" shows that the Boche
Is doing It, too. A bright, fiery streak
roars up nearby and a small white
parachute floats gently down with an
fncandescent flare lighting up No
Mans Land for a hundred yards
around. Somebody saw a suspicious
move beyond the wire, an officer ex-
plained. The officer orders a few rifle
Qrenndes fired as a warning to prowl-
Ing Boches, perhaps trying to learn
something or to cut the wire. The
Poilu heads, silhouetting over the para
net at intervals against the blackness
hevond. "duck down" for an instant
while the grenades explode with cav
ernous roars. These missiles fly into
a hundred pieces each and wipe ont
llfe for rods around.
More machine guns are tapping their
warnings or having their "tryouts"
here and there along the line. The
Boche again, as II nervous. Is doing i.
too.
Nobody 10 Trusted.
A half-hour follows without q single
spark OF fireworks. But 1t breaks ont
again-both sides watching. fiaring.
bombing, machine-gunning. suspicious
things IN that uncanny black stfetck