Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1919-03-18
FOUGHT like DEMONS
Not One Man Of the Famous 369th
Ever Taken Alive
Loved TO CUT RATHER Than SHOOT

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LOVED TO CUT RATHER Than SHOOT
Sent to Hold Abandoned Trenches
With but Little Chance for Their
Lives They Came Back safe-Were
j Sure from the First That They
Would Go Into Germany.
Literary Digest.
Like most good officers, COL William
Haywood, of the famous 369th negro
regiment, thoroughly believes in his
men and Is eager to testify to their
soldierly qualities. In the course Of his
first public address since his recent
return from France, he told a vivid
story Of real fighting by his "boys,"
who never wanted any weapon but
something with good cutting edge
on it." Declaring his opinion that bit
of strategy brought into play by Gen.
eral Gouraud in July Is, 1918, turned
the tide of the war, the colonel said,
as reported in the New York papers:
We were at one end Of the line held
by General Gouraud and were a part
of his army. At the other end Of the
line was that famous fighting Irish
outfit, the 165th (69th, New York; and
other units Of the great Rainbow divi-
sion.
The first thing I knew all there was
between the German army and Paris
on a stretch Of front little more than
four miles long was my regiment OF
negroes. But it was fair enough at
that; all there was between us and
Berlin was the German army. They
tried pretty hard to set by, but they
never did. No German ever got into a
trench with my regiment who did not
stay there or go back with the brand
of my boys on him.
In 1s1 days Of battle we never had
one Of our men captured-alive. When
those Germans would come into our
trenches after what our boys called
million dollar artillery preparation. the
thing Just got down to regular he
man, street-corner fight. They fought
with knives, bayonets, and the butts OF
guns. All those boys Of mine ever
wanted to fight with was something
with a good cutting edge on it.
On July IA the Germans, reinforced
by prisoners released by Russia, were
at their maximum strength. The Allies
were at the lowest ebb they had reach
ed during the war. That night we cap
tured some German prisoners in raid
and they told us that at a certain time
the Germans were to launch great
attack that was to last for five hours
and twenty-five minutes.
General Gouraud started counter
attack on a great scale five minutes
before the German attack was to start.
las we zafterward learned from pris-
oners, this attack greatly upset the
Germans and hampered their own at
tack disastrously.
General Gouraud, knowing the hour
when the German attack was to begin
took what was probably the longest
chance that a general ever took. Be-
fore the attack began he ordered his
whole army to abandon the first
trenches on a front of fifty kilometers.
These trenches had lost thousands Of
lives and men had toiled months and
months to gain those positions. II
Gouraud's plan failed he was ruined.
When the troops were withdrawn,
only sixteen of the 1000 men in my re-
giment remained in the front-line
trenches. Those sixteen, all volunteers,
who fully expected to lose their lives,
took refuge in shell holes, specially
constructed dugouts, armed with Hg-
nal-rockets, mustard-gas shells, and a
few machine guns Of an old type, which
could be started and then abandoned,
as they would keep on firing without
manipulation until their ammunition
belts were exhausted or they got jam
med.
When the handful Of men In the
trenches saw the German infantry
coming, after terrific artillery show
er had rained down on the irst-line
trenches, they set off the signal-rock-
cts to notify us, set of the mustard
gas shells in the dugouts, started the
machine guns going, and then ran for
1t, with the German barrage IN front
of them and the advancing German
infantry behind them. Strange to say
most of them got back.
When the Germans poured Into our
trenches they failed to find single
man alive. Those Germans who went
into the dugouts stayed there, because
they were filled with the deadliest gas
Behind the easily taken trenches the
French had massed the most incon-
ceivabIe amount Of artillery. OF course,
they had to a mathematical eXactneos
the range Of the trenches they had
abandoned. Immediately they poured
terrible fire down into those trench
es, and you can imagine the result.
NV boys afterward found enough
Mauser rifles to equip the whole reg
iment. The Mausers looked like the
old Spr!ngfields, and my boys liked
them. So they threw away their own
rifles. When the Mauser ammunition
we had captured gave out, OF course
they were in bad way.
The most wonderful thing saw
over there was the great faith OF the
American soldier in himself. Last
April a lot of my boys were discovered
buying German marks from Moroc-
cans, who had taken them from
the bodies of dead Germans. A mark
was no good in France, Of course but