The Arizona copper camp., 1918-09-21

Just staying there in that awful noise
with nothing to do, and no water.
our sergeant said he would not ask
any man to attempt to carry the mes
sage, because he said it was not only
certain death, but absolutely useless.
And he began to show that he was
near shell shock himself.
Then I began to shiver again, and 1
thought to myself that anything would
be better than sitting in this hole wait
ing to go ''cafard," so l decided to vol
unteer. 1 did not think there was any
chance to get through, but it seemed
as if l just had to do something, no
matter what. / had never felt that
way before, and had never been
anxious to Ego west" with shell for
company, but 1 have felt that way
since then several times, l can tell
you.
The man was telling US that some
time before they had seen the Turks
bringing up ammunition from some
storehouses, but they did not come
anywhere near. He said their sergeant
wanted our messenger to tell them
that, too. He would say a few words
very fast, then he would shiver again,
and his jaws would clip together and
he would try to raise his hand, but
could not.
Then our sergeant asked the name
of the other sergeant, and when the
man told him he said the man was
senior to himself and therefore in
command and would have to be obeyed.
He seemed to cheer up a lot after
he said this and did not shiver any
more, so l thought l would volunteer
then, so I said to him, swell, mon
vieux, do you think we are seeing real
Ehelling now?" And then 1 was going
to say 1 would go, but he looked at
me in funny way for a second and
then said, "Well, my son, suppose you
go and find OUT
I thought he was kidding me at first,
but then l saw he meant it. / thought
two things about it-One was that any,
thing was better than staying there,
and the other was that the old dugout
was a pretty fair place after all. But
I did not say anything to the SER
geant or the other men-just went
out of the dugout. The sergeant and
another man went with me and boost
ed me over the back wall of the hole.
lay fiat on the ground for minute to
get my bearings, and then started off.
set my course for where I thought
the communication trenches were, to
the right, and just stood up and ran,
for l figured that as the shells were
falling so thick and it was open
ground | would not have any better
chance if l crawled.
tripped several times and went
down, and each time thought / was
hit, because when I got it in the thigh
at Dixmude it felt a good deal as
though 1 had tripped over rope.
And one time when l fell shell ex-
ploded near me and began to shiver
again, and could not go on for
long time. All this time l did not
think would get through, but finally,
when I reached what had been the
communication trench / felt I had
done the worst part of it, and began
to wish very hard that I would get
through was not at all crazy about
going west.
The mouth of the communication
trench had been battered in and the
trenches it Joined with were all filed
up. There were rifles sticking out
of them in several places, and /
thought probably the men had been
buried alive in them. But it was too
late then, if they had been caught, so
climbed over the blocked entrance to
the communication trench and started
back along it. 1t led up through sort
of gully, and 1 thought it was bad
place to dig communication trench
in, because it gave the Turks some
thing like the side of hill to shoot at.
Every once in a while / would have
to climb in and out of shell hole,
and parts of them were blocked where
a shell had caved in the walls. In one
place l saw cOrpses all torn to pieces,
so l knew the Turks had found the
range and had got to this trench in
great shape. AT another place 1 found
lots of blood and equipment but no
bodies, and l figured that reinforce
ments had been caught at this spot
and that they had retired, taking their
casualties with them.
The Turks still had the range, and
they were sending a shell into the
trench every once in a while, and
was knocked down again, though the
shell was so far away that it knocked
me down with force of habit more
than anything else. I felt dizzy and
shivered lot, and kept trying to think
of Murray or anything else but myself.
So finally 1 got to the top of the
little hill over which the gully ran,
and on the other side 1 felt almost
safe. Just down from the crest of the
hill was one of our artillery positions,
with the good old "75s" giving it to the
Tr1rI<c oc facf &c thov oo11Id told