The Lakeland evening telegram. (Lakeland, Fla.) 1911-1922, 1918-08-17
AMERICANS LAUGH AT
WOUNDS AND WANT TO
GET BACK IN FIGHT
Whizzng Bullets "Just Made Me
Nader Than Ever" Says One,
Wounded Twice

With the British Army In France
Aug. 17.-"This way to the war"
some soldier wag had written with a
piece of charcoal on a battered house
beside a shelltorn road between the
Somme and the Ancre, just to the
rear Of the ground over which Amer
lean and British troops have been
| fighting so stubbornly to gain their
detectives in this battle in Picardy.
1t was up this road that the Am
erican soldiers pressed on their way
to the front, and it was in barn
nearby, neatly cleaned up for a
dressing station, that some Amer.
cans and Britons who had gone that
way and had been brought back over
it in ambulances, were having their
wounds attended to as the CORE
spondent visited them.
These men who had STEPPED blithe-
ly forward to the fight and had been
carried back not because they wanted
to come, but because thus it must be,
were in as high spirits on returning
as when they went and were show
ing it by both manner and words.
Not only Americans were here, but
wounded British and occasionally a
gray-clad wounded German prisoner
all of them, however, receiving at
tention from the American hospital
orderlies.
, Inside the dressing station one
American who spoke with pro
nounced Swedish accent, was sitting
on a stretcher having his foot
dressed. His head also was ban
daged, but in one hand he he,, 0
sandwich and in the other cup OF
hot chocolate, and it was evident he
was paying more attention to hi:
! food than to his wounds. He fin
ished eating looked up and smiled
and said:
"If | had Gig, now l would fee
tophole."
Picked Up British Slang
He, like all the Americans here
had been trained with the British
and had picked up much of the
slang of the British soldier.
The appearance of case of Am
erican cigarettes brought a reoues
for one from every slightly wounded
man in the room and the contents
of the case disappeared in less time
than 1t takes to tell it.
The soldier just mentioned after
giving his name, which cannot BIZ
repeated now, talked freely of hi.
experiences.
There wern't many of u.s." he
said, but we went up on the run anG
got in the thick of EN- quick. The
first thing knew the bullets begar
to sing around us from a rise in the
ground. We halted moment t.
let them have it, and then went on
my platoon leader led us to tn,
rise, where we came upon five boche.
hiding out in as hell-hole, and col
Jared the lot of them. All the tim,
the bullets were whizzing around u.
but We didn't mind them. They JUS
made me madden than ever. The
platoon leader told me to take somt
prisoners back to the rear. so
placed 'em in front me and W,
started across the rolling ground
| got on top of a little hill. when tn,
bullets began to rain around us. On,
prisoner was hit on the head anc
killed and another was wounded
while two bullets hit me, one in tn,
foot and one alongside the head
The four prisoners that were left anC
myself got away quick then an,
here ! am, all full of bullet hole.
and the fight still going on. Rottei
luck"
Stretcher-bearers came into tn,
room just then bearing a long
legged German sergeant, who ha(