The Nashville globe. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1906-193?, 1918-08-30
YOUNG BLACK JOE' IN FRANCE
SHOWING HIMSELF TRUE BLUE.
Their Slogan, "Let's Go" Music and Song
Keep Them Cheerful While Villagers
Make Rush to Catch Strains.
THE BOYS ARE JUBILANT "OVER
THERE AND HEADED FOR BIER. In

sibly because he wished to show the
Bush-Germans that he regarded the
whole thing as being in the nature of
a celebration, or maybe because he
just wanted to see what would hap
pen afterward, he touched off one
of them. And then a fellow down
the line seeing this srocket decided,
guess, that national holiday of
the French was being observed and
so he touched off two. But it never
will happen again.
The very next night we had a gas
alarm two miles back of here in the
next village, where one of my bat
talions is billeted 1t turned out to
be false alarm, but all Through the
camp the sentries were sounding
their automibile honrs as a warning
for gas masks. But Mai. Blanks or
derly didn't kno wthe meaning of the
signals, or If he did know he forgot
it in the excitement of the moment.
Still he didn't lose his head alto
gether. AS he heard the sound Of
the tootings coming nearer and near
er he dashed into the Majors billet
the Major is a very sound sleeper
and grabbed him by the shoulder and
shook him right out o his blankets.
Wake up Major!" he yelled, try
ing to keep on shaking with one
hand and to salute with the other.
Fur Gawd's sake, sub, wake up. The
Germans is coming'-in automobiles!
"Oh, yes, they were green at the
start: but they are as game as any
men in this mans army are. You
take 1t from me, because / know.
They weren't afraid of the cold and
the wet and the terrific labor when
they worked last winter down near
the coast of France on as mean job
OF work as anybody ever tackled.
They were up to their waists in cold
water part of the time-yes, most of
the time they were-but not a one
of them fiinched. And believe me
there's no fiinching among them now
that we are up against the Huns |!
You don't need the case of Johnson
and Roberts to prove it. 1t is proved
by the attitude of every single man
among them. 1t isn't hard to send
them into danger-the hard part is
to keep them from going into it on
their own accord. They say the dark
races can't tand the high explosives
that their nerves go to pieces under
the strain of the terrific concussion
If that be so the representatives OF
the dark races that come from
America are the exceptions to the
rule. My boys are getting fat ant
sassy on fare of bombing and bonn
bardments, and we have to watcf
them like hawks to keep them from
slipping off on little Independent
raiding parties without telling any
body about it in advance. Their rea
test hasn't come yet, but when i
does come you take tip from me ant
string your bets along with this min
strel troupe to win"
When the Boys Say Lets Co."
MY men have a catch phrase tina
has come to be their motto and thei
. slogan, Tell any one of them to d
certain thing and as he gets u
, to go about it he invariably says
, Let's go' Tell hundred of ther
; to do thing and they'll say tn
seaIne thing. | hear it thousan
times day. The mission may il
= volVe discomfort or the chance OF
/. sudden and exceedingly violent deaf
. No matter-'Let's go' That's tt
invariable answer. Personally | thin
, it makes a pretty good maxim fl
9 an otutit of fighting men, and L
Y stake my life on it that they'll liz
up to it when the real trial comes
e Two days we stayed on there, al
they were two days of superior v
k riety of continuous blackface vaud
n vile. There was the evening Whe
p for our benefit the men organized &
g mpromptu concert featuring a qua
n teI that would succeed on any man
d burlesque. circuit, and a troupe
h b-ck-and-wing dancers whose equa
r. ii would be hard to find on the b
Time. There was the next eyeniI
g when the band of forty pieces sc
3, enaded us. | think surely this mu
II LIE the best regimental band in o.
= army. Certainly it is the best one
II have heard in Europe during tn
v war. On parade when it played Il
i Memphis Blues the men did n
n march; the music poured in at the
r earse and ran down TO their hee
@ and instead of marching they lite
ally danced their way along. AS
q. the dwellers of the French towns
" which this regiment has from tin
a to time been quartered, they, | a
n told, fairly go mad when some alll
If ing, compelling, ragtime tune
<. played with that richness of synC
% pated melody in it which only t
r. black man can achieve; and as t
q regiment has moved on more tn
ID once it has been hard to keep t
il unattached inhabitants Of the villai
n. that the band was quitting frc
It moving on with it.
,e If | live to be a hundred and one
re shall never forget the second nigl
e. which was night of a splend
n lawless moon. We stood with t
a. regimental staff on the terraced lay
)r OF the chief house in a half-desert
10 town five miles back from the trent
At es, and down below us in the ma
street the band played plantation a.
and hundreds of Negro soldier
le joined in and sang the words Behi
3. the masses of upturned faces was
s. ring Of white ones where the