American Falls press. [volume] (American Falls, Idaho) 1907-1937, 1918-09-17
Interesting Stories From the Bat
tlefronts in France
They Never Let Go.

August z.
They Never Let Go.
1t has been said that Sergy chang
ed hands nine times in as many hours.
The Yankee regiment that took it will
tell you that it grabbed Sergy on the
hrst day and never let go again.
What happened was that American
regiments rushed and held positions
on either side Of the gun-bristling viii
lage, that the village itself thereupon
becaume a No Mans Land, in which,
through five days and nights, venture
some patrols did battle from time to
time.
Neither town was important in it.
self, and both stood u in the com
muniques and dispatches because, Wis
ible on all maps, they were easier to
identify, if not easier to capture. than
the nameless, bloOd-drenched crests
between.
The first rush across the Ourcq
which preceded the battle on the
heights where these two towns were
was made in the early hours of Sun
day morning, July %. 1t was made
by troops that had been pursuing the
Germans from the Marine, pursuing
a retreating enemy who paused from
time to time to resist violently. All
the way. the Yankees had been ham
pred by clusters of machine guns and
the backward play Of the German
heavies tearing up the fields. The
pursuit was made along narrow,
twisting roads, cut by shells and made
muddier and muddier by the intermit-
! font ~D.,,11~ sc 1890 -ofn
Already Across River.
The pursuit was hot, the scheme to
keep the enemy on the jump. The
plan and order was to advance from
the heights below the Ourcq to the
heights beyond at 4:30 Sunday morn
ing. AS the time approached it be-
came apparent that all the elements
could not be ready, nor all the artil-
lery need yet in position.
An order to delay the advance was
rushed down the line, but it is part o.
the price paid for such a hot and har'
RAISING pursuit that communications
are. naturally, not always perfect, ant
when the countermanding ordel
reached one regiment, its first batta
lion was already across the river, anC
when it reached another the advance
battalion was already in the flush o
its first exultant rush down the Stop
to the stream.
Recall was blown, but the boy Wh'
made the bugle sing from his post Il
the golden wheatfeld was ealing U
deaf ears. There was no stopplni
he triumphant rush of the doughboys
who with Heaven, He'll or HoboKel
before Cbristmas!" as their battle cry
waded the Ourcq and, through a RAJ
Of machine u bullets, rushed up Tn
s1ono on the other side. 1t woui
have been as easy to stop an avalahcn
with a protesting hano'
Beating HOyle to It
Such advance battalions, stormlh
I the Hill without the advantage OF an
. artillery whatever and obliged to mol
. tha crest for an hour or so DeIor
they could have fellow DalIallon
shoulder to shoulder with them, wei
: not exactly playing according 10 Hoyi
. hut some who shared in 1t Dehe'
: that if they had waited for a mol
! orthodox and perfectly prepared az
vance. the Germans, too, would nav
heen better prepared, the low lyln
r mists in the valley of the Our6
would have lifted their sheltering Gu
4 tain. and the Yanks might never ha'
crossed at all.
$ once across, the leading battalion
dronned back to hide behind the ere
v of the first slope and there dl
+ themselves in feverishly, dug Their
r selves in with their bayonets, WI
V their mess-tin covers, with their n
e gers-anything for a little hole IN q
ground. Then, as never before IN
learned to cherish the shovel, al
n those who had brought them alol