The Sauk Centre herald. (Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn.) 1886-current, 1918-07-18
A. E. F.'S BIRTHDAY
Was JUNE EIGHTH
STORY OF FIRST AMERICAN
FORCES DEPARTURE AND
ARRIVAL OVER THERE.
TOLD FOR THE FIRST TINE
VANGUARD CROSSING OCEAN ON
THE BALTIC SAW NO TRACE (
OF SUBMARINE.

"Stars and Stripes" paper publish.
ed by the American Forces in France
tells for the first time the story Oh
the First American Expeditionary
forces departure and arrival over
seas. Every parent who has boy in
France will read this article in full:
Agar ago June 1 the vanguard of
the A. E. F. landed at Liverpool.
On June 8, 1917, General Pershing
and his staff set foot on English soil.
Late in the afternoon of June Is they
were welcomed at the gates of Paris
by such a moving, spontaneous, tum-
ultuous greeting from the people of
the city as they will remember all
the days of their lives, such well
come, probably, as they cannot know
again till the war is done and the A.
E. F. goes home.
Even as the crowd were cheering
in the streets of Paris, the piers of
the North River on the other side Of
the Atlantic were astir with the 81
lent, hurrying preparations of the
first contingent for departure, for it
was the next day that the first con-
voy set sail for France.
On Tuesday of last week, General
Pershing was entitled to sew on his
second service chevron.
It was on May %, 1917, that the
General and his staff, with as little
fuss and feather and as much Sec
recy as an excited and immensely
curious country would permit, set
sail from the harbor of New York.
They were crossing the sea to pre-
pare the way, the ports, the camps,
the bases, the system for the hum
dreds of thousands Of troops that
were to follow them within year.
The anniversary of that sailing was
celebrated by the Battle of Cantigny
for it was just year to the day later
that the A. E. F. made its first att
tack in force.
The voyage of the vanguard was
hedged with secrecy and many of the
facts and figures from the log of that
voyage are given here for the first
time to mark the anniversary. The
time has come when we may turn
back and read the first chapter in
history of the A. E. F.
For several days the lucky officers
and men, picked for the party that
was to accompany General Pershing,
converged on New York, so that the
morning of May 20 saw them all as
sembled on Governors Island. The
orders for secrecy had been strict.
The General himself and most of his
staff were uncomfortable, but unrec-
ognizable, in civilian clothes, and the
enlisted men had been airily telling
all inquiring friends that the were
bound on recruiting duty.
It is true that faint suspicion
must have dawned on those who may
have been watching the Battles pier
when several pieces of baggage ar
rived there artlessly addressed to va
rious officers with the American
Expeditionary Forces Care of Gem
eral Pershing." It is true that some
knew, and many guessed, but it is al
so true that the great majority OF the
American people never knew that
the Commander-in-C Chief had sailed
until the cables brought back from
England the news of his safe arrival
on the other side.
The vanguard was composed Oh
General Pershing, "a field officers, 80
line officers, Sc clerks, interpreters
and ST enlisted men, 1872 in all. Pres
emit, too, were Major II. b. Young and
three other members Of a special
medical commission, and some news
paper correspondents were OF the
party.
At noon they assembled at one OF
the little island piers, boarded the
tug "Thomas Patton" and steamed
off down the harbor to Gravesend
Bay, where, on nasty, storm-rough-
ened sea and in the pouring rain, the
White Star liner Baltic was waiting
for them.
The enlisted men, numbering few
for once compared with the officers,
were a bit low in their minds at the
prospect Of having to sling all the
baggage for the party, SO they were
greatly cheered when the General
sent word along that each man was
to carry his own, and he set the ex-
ample by siezing his own bags when
the time came to transfer from the
tug to the waiting liner.
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