The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-02-19
BY ROBIN ]. FLYNN
Written exclusively for this newspaper.
(Bv The International News Bureau, Inc.


While we were working in the Somme
sector we had one front line dressing
station to which were attached two
auxiliary posts, nearer the lines, and
which could not be reached by auto
mobile.
Wounded Carried on Stretchers
The wounded at these posts were
generally carried down through
bitches by French stretcher bearers
and put into our cars at the main
dressing station. One day while L
was at this post telephone order
came through for 1.-The American" to
run up to the other station at the
lines and assist down soldier with
a bad leg wound, 1t was a day of
pelting rain, with a blowing wind,
and as I stumbled along the watery
ditch I was soon wet through to the
skin. Half way up the ditch the
Bochess tarted to shell the deuce out
of the place and then 1 was in for
it. The ditch was lined with a long
line of slender trees, and as the shells
came screaming and bursting into the
wet earth, trees and mud end steel
l lay flat against one side of the
ditch for quite a while, as the pieces
of shell fell kissing all about me:
reached out and picked up several
shell fragments but quickly dropped
them again. They were red hot. And
as 1 lay there, shell after shell burst
! ing about me, I thought of fellow
| I'd once seen on a stage back in the
states, who stood up against wall
while a confederate threw knives and
marked the outline of his body sill
houetted against the wall. That's
what the shell pieces seemed to be
doing with me-trying to see how
close they could hiss by me and PUNK
into the mud without touching me
Close Call with Death
And it really is very strange how
close one can come to death over
there and never know it till it's all
| overland often never know it at all
When we were turning on first line
trench work near the Fort de Douau-
mont we were often called upon tC
rescue badly wounded among the bat
teries of field artillery. Some one
would phone in saying that a shell
had fallen upon the gun crew of one
of the guns of the Three Hundred
and SiXtieth Battery of Field Artil
lery located near the road to C.
and it was up to US to find the bat
terry position and bring in the wound
ed. Such an order came in one day
and I was sent out to get four badly
wounded artillerymen near the road
to D..
At point in the road where
thought the battery might be located
I got out of the car and started max
ing inquiries among the jewellers o
some roadside dugouts
The Germans then started to shell
some battery positions and threw ;
, lot of shrapnels over the road. 1 ad
vanced the car five hundred yard
farther down the road to some NOR
artillery dugouts, and, after duckin;
and crawling about and asking ques
) tons for half an hour, learned tn
location of the battery for which
was searching. 1t was half a mil
back on the road, they told me, so
turned the ambulance and ran bacl
to the proper distance.
Shells were crashing and smashin
about the place, and the air was fill
ed with the sound of kissing shrap
mel hail; great clouds of shell smok
whirled across the fields.
Far back in the distance I coul
see, through the rolling smoke, piece
of camouflage screens, which, Judged
had once given a hiding place to som
battery of light guns. I got down O.
r my hands and knees and starte
crawling across the open fields.
Year Old Bodies Found on Field
This great place a year before ha
been a battlefield, with thousands dy
ing daily, and now the unburied bod
/, les, months and even a year old, la
about the field in great numbers.
There were a great many shell era
tiers about, all filled with muddy pol
luted water.
AS I craw1ed along on my hand
and knees, often dropping flat as
great scream filled my ears and tn
exploding shell with a hot, blindin
flash threw mud and dirt over me,
cursed the custom that makes a
ambulance driver take it all and neve
get a crack back.
Half way across the field the dea
bodies were very numerous, and tn
stencil was overpowering.
l didn't have time to notice muc
of the, scenery, as the Boches bega
to throw in more shrapnel shells an
the bullets sang and whlstled an
sputtered and splashed in the mut
but right near the edge OF a she
j crater 1 saw a sight that made m
- turn for a second look. 1t was
u whole skeleton of a German lyin
- prone; his clothes had long since ro
! ted away, but his little gray cap wit
y the red band around it and the tW
y buttons in front still perched raklst
III ly on his skull
J. And in and out of the bones of II
81 skeleton, red peoples sprouted-bloe
II red peoples.
/ When I got to the gun position
'e found one gun overturned and broke
H. and two men dead, and IN dugo'
~ 1 found the wounded, tended IN
c. rough way by their companions WI
Is helped me carry the stretchers oaf
ct through the shened field to the an
re bulance.
nd oil 51nt6in0 hit m