The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1918-05-15
FIRST into FIGHT
The March of Marches Was
That to Picardy.
Americans Made History in
Movement Into Battle.
VANGUARD OF YANKEE FORCE
General Pershing Addressed
Men With Feeling.
Bands Played and Flowers
Nodded to Fighters.
VANGUARD OF YANKEE FORCE
BY FRED s. FERGUSON.

Will the american ARMY III It leu,
April IT (by maiD The march of
marches in so far as America is con-
cerned, was under way today.
There have been other marches in
France and there will be more. But
today the first Americans to throw
their weight into the line of battle
where the fate of free nations is at
stake were tran1ping over the winding
roads of Picardy.
The march began at daybreak.
There were no bands. There were no
wives or sweethearts to wave good
bye.
AS the men swung away toward the
battle line to the music of their own
songs they were putting their hands
to the turning of a new page in Amer
lean history A movie camera filmed
them here and there on the road.
But French peasants and laughing
children, who turned from their play
to wave them goodbye, were the
principal witnesses.
Bound for Picardy.
This was the march from the mo-
b1lization area in Picardy into the line
OF battle. After the journey from
Lorraine by train and on foot, there
was a period of rest for the soldiers
in the villages. They drilled now and
then, but for the most part strai
u.
They made new friends among the
villagers, picked up new French words
from the children and staged a crap
game or a poker session. After more
than a month in the trenches it was
| big picnic.
Meantime. however. the officers
were busy. There were field prob
lens French liaison officers took part
in demonstrations of open field work
and signals were studied. Then. one
day, word came that General Pershing
was coming. That meant real bust
ness was not far off.
General Pershing on Hand.
| Standing on a knoll in the rear of
| an old chateau that served as head
quarters, the commander-in-chie ad-
dressed the officers of this first fight
ing unit The officers stood in
great semi-circle about him. They
were young men, the best America
| had to offer. The general talked to
them earnestly. He was proud of
them. He said SO. He told them the
eyes of America and of the world
were on them as they went into the
lAmerica had always had in her fight
ing men and the traditions of the
armies of the past
That night there were movie shows
IAmerican boys hung from the win
dows of little French shops, crowded
the court yard of the Hotel de Vile,
chung precariously to the stone pillars
and were amused by pictures and mu-
sic. They cheered the band when it
played over There and shuffled
their feet 1ongingly to the tune of a
familiar waltz.
Bands Here and There.
! p The regimental bands moved from
| place to place in numbering army
/ wagons, drawn by six and eight Amer
| lean horses. With the departure of
| the bands and last flicker on the big
| sheet stretched across the front of
the town hall, which served a movie
screen, every one started for his bill
| let. A half hour later only the scrape
| of the sentries' feet on the cobblee
stones broke the stiffness of the night.
This was Tuesday, April 16.
| Then came today.
In every village over a radius of
many miles, in old chateaux dctting
the country between, i'll every stable
and shed of the valley, all was activ-
ity a daybreak.
on in full swing.
horses mules, wagons wound across
the valley. Great clouds of dus: rolled
across freshly Flowed fields along the
roadside. French peasants stood by
their plows to watch the Americans
pass Fruit trees were in full bloom.
| Wild flowers nodded by the roadside.
The air was heavy with the first real
| breath of spring. 1t was an ideal day
| of April-America' first war month.
America was sending her first men
to the greatest battle II history.