Shenandoah herald. [volume] (Woodstock, Va.) 1865-1974, 1918-12-27
Letters From France.
Nov. 29, 1918.

ling l WISH, dS tue Hidi - uot
censored now. Everything goes
through as we write it.
We have been Oh a hike for
nine DAYS, and have walked some +
thing like one hundred and TWEEN
ty miles. Camp rumor has it
that we have several hundred
miles more to walk. Another
rnnor is that we are 10 be att
home Christmas, but You cannot
tell about these reports. How
ever, shall feel that we are
very lucky if we are not sent in
to Germany as an army of occu-
patton. If we are not sent into
Germany we shall be on the road
home before very long, and from
what | can hear we are not
scheduled to go to Berlin. The
fellows who go to Germany will
see a good long service before
getting home.
l have seen all of the war that
l want TO see, and | am hoping
that | shall be home soon. Of
course if l am sent into Ger
many, l shall have to do as the
|rest of the boys-wait as pa
ltiently as possible till we are
sent home.
l was in the last bit of the
war. We were making a drive,
and we went over the top at nine
ten o'clock Saturday morning.
We stayed there till the fight
iing was stopped by the arms
Itice on the following Monday.
We were shelled time after time
and gassed several times. All of
Jour crowd got their gas masks
en- in time aud none of them suf-
fered any i'll effects fro m the gas,
| This last spell of fighting was
lour second time on the front.
| The first time we were up on the
lSwiss border. That was very
Iqu1et place, and we had very few
casualties, but we got hit heavi-
lily on the last front betw cen Yer.
Iduu and Metz.
II l wrote you just before we
lstarted on this hike, and as our
Ioutfit was not sending out any
1 mail l got an officer from another
company to censor and mail the
letter for me. l hope you. got
the letter and are not worrying
labout me.
| You have been askin e III your
letters what my duties are, and
Iwhile the letters were being CEN
Isored | could not tell you any
thing at all about the many
Things that we did here. | viii
tell you all about this later, for
II have not the necessary time
lnow to go into the various duties
which we had while III the drive.
| In making the last drive we
|came in for quite little shower
lof shrapnel, some gas, and a
perfect storm Of machine gun
Head. They placed machine guns
Ito retard car advance. and they
Iwere very earnest in their effort
to hold us back. This stiff ma
lclline gun defense was largely
Responsible for our severe losses.
| We had one rather funny and
at the time real uncanny ex-
lperience which was splendid
|example of German trickery aud
skill. Every tiYe we passed
over a certain road, night or day,
German shells fell among our
troops. We were puzzled by the
fact that they seemed to know
just when we. were passing that
particular part Of the road, and
| to be able without any trouble
to drop shells accurately in our
midst. This continued until the
fighting ceased, when two Ger
mans came out of a concealed
dug-out under the road. They
had been left there by the re-
treating Germans and had tele-
phone communication with their
batteries some miles away, the
lines being concealed in the bot.
tom of an abandoned trench.
When they beard us passing oyer
their dug-out they telephoned
their batteries to give us hi,
and they did it in good measure.
l saw Ralph Snyder come off
the battle field after the arms
|tice. He did not get scratch.
Landon Drifting also got by |
without wound.
About all l can say about GO
lug oyer the top is that if you
come back alive the Lord is Ger
tain1v with you. 1t looked fair. !