The Knoxville independent. [volume] (Knoxville, Tenn.) 1894-current, 1918-10-19
CHAPTER Ill.

This time I was determined to en-
Hist. So, when we landed at st. Ma
zaire, drew my pay from the Vir
gilman and. after spending week
with my grandmother, went out and
asked the first gendarme j met where
the enlistment station was. I had to
argue with him some time before he
would even direct me to it. OF course
I had no passport and this made him
suspicious Of me. III
The officer in charge of the station
was no warmer IN his welcome than
the gendarme, and this surprised me,
because Murray and Brown had no
trouble at all in Joining. The French.
Of course, often speak of the Foreign
Legion as "the convicts," because so
many legionaries are wanted by the
police of their respective countries,
but criminal record never had been
a bar to service with the legion, and I
did not see why 1t should be now-if
they suspected me of having one. /
had heard there were not a few Ger
mans in the legion-later on became
acquainted with some and believe
me, no Alsatian ever fought harder
against the Huns than these former
Deutschlanders did. 1t occurred to
me then that il they thought was
German, because had no passport,
l might have to prove had been in
trouble with the kaiser's crew before
they would accept me. do not knew
what the real trouble was, but Lssolved
the problem by showing thdqn my dis
charge papers from the American
navy. Even then, they were suspicious
because they thought / was ltoo young
to have been G. P. o. When they
challenged me on this poinA ] said /
would prove it to them by taking an
examination.
They examined me very carefully,
in English although / know enough
French to get by on a subject like
gunnery. But foreign officers are very
proud of their knowledge of English
and most of them can speak it-and l
think this one wanted to show off, as
you might say. Anyway, / passed my
examination without any trouble,
was accepted for service in the For
eign Legion and received my commits
sion as gunner, dated Friday, January
i. 1915.
There is no use in my describing the
Foreign Legion. 1t is one Of the most
famous fighting organizations in the
world, and has made wonderful rec
ord during the war. When / Joined La
Legion, it numbered about 10000 men.
Today it has less than 5000. They
say that since August, 1914, the legion
has been wiped out three times, and
that there are only a few men still in
service who belonged to the original
legion. / believe 1t to be true. In
January of this year the French gov
eminent decided to let the legion die.
i was sorry to hear it. The legion
naires were a fine body Of men, and
wonderful fighters. But the whole
civilized world is now fighting the
Huns, and Americans do not have to
enlist with the French or the Limeys
any longer.
But one thing about the legion, that
/ find many people do not know. is that
the legionnaires are used for either
land or sea service. They are sent wher-
ever they can be used. do not know
whether this was the case before the
present war--I think not-but in my
time, many of the men were put on
ships. Most people, however. have the
idea that they are only used in the in
fantry.
With my commission as gunner, !
received orders to go to Brest and join
the dreadnaught Cassard. This as
signment tickled me, for my pal Muir
ray was aboard, and l had expected
trouble in transferring to his ship in
case I was assigned elsewhere. We
had framed it up to stick together as
long as we could. We did, too.
Murray was as glad as / was when
i came aboard, and he told me he had
heard Brown, our other pal, had been
made a sergeant In another regiment
of the legion.
We were both surprised at some of
the differences between the French
navy and ours. but after we got used
to it, we thought many Of their Gus
toms improvements over ours. But we
could not get used to it, at first. For
instance, on an American ship, when
you are pounding your ear in nice
warm hammock and 1t Is time to re-
lieve the watch on deck, like as not
you will be awakened gently by burly
garby armed with a fairy wand about
the size Of n bed slat, whereas in
French ships, when they call. the
watch, you would think you were in a
swell hotel and had left word at the
desk. 1t was hard to turn out at first,
without the aid Of club, and harder
Stili to break ourselves OF the habit
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