Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1919-08-19
No Wonder Germany Quit
By BRIGGS
NUMBER FORTY SEVEN.

One day shortly after we went
In the trenches L got report that
Boche sniper was making life mis-
cradle for one of my combat
groups" said Major Frank c.
Mahin, of the Army Recruiting Sta
ton, 325 Market St., Harrisburg.
Il promptly went down to see what
was happening. The entrance to
this particular combat group was
through tunnel which led into an
old mine crater. The mine crater
! had been consolidated and during
the day had garrison of three
men which was increased at night.
AS Snlping has a tendency to get
! mems goats l stopped in the mouth
of the tunnel for a minute to see
how my three men were taking
! things. l found one man sleeping
peacefully in the bottom of the
crater, a young kid barely eighteen
was sitting on the firing step smok-
ing a clgaret quite calmly. But
the third man was the character.
He was a big, lanky Tennessee
| mountaineer about six feet five
| inches tall. He was sitting on top
of the parapet with his back against
sand bag, intently studying the
Boche lines. Crack! went a bullet
right past him: he never moved
Half a minute passed and crack
went another bullet. About that
| time the young boy got up and
| peeped over the top of the parapet.
The big man looked down at the
! boy, squirted a stream of tobacco
! juice out of one cornersof his mouth
and remarked kid! you better git
down from thar or you'll git hurted
! IN a minute l then and there de-
| cided that it would take more than
Boche to get these mems goats, so
asked my friend on the parapet
If he had spotted the sniper yet.
| He answered that he had gotten
| him approximately located and felt
fairly sure he was in a certain spot
| and that as soon as he was certain
OF the spot he would up and drill
the blankety blank fool: and fur
! ther that he ought to be shot for
| trying to shoot an American with
| out first learning how to shoot a
| rifle properly. Eventually we got
+ the sniper, and that before any of
our men were hit. l made that big
| mountaineer, whose name l found
was Marry Smith, corporal, and
put him on the scout platoon.
Marry was well suited for patrol
ing as his legs were so long he could
step over quite a fair sized barb
wire ENHANCEMENT and if it were
too big to step over he was SO thin
he could crawl through. AS ex-
pected, Marry rapidly became one
of my crack scouts. He was utterly
devoid of nerves and his one am
bition in life was to get Boche.
! Week after week Marry led his pa
trols over into the Boche trenches
! every night, and the Boche suffered
| Pistols, grenades, buckshot from
! sawed-oH shotgunS, accounted for
many a Hun. Then Marry de-
veloped a new ambition and that
! was to see what one of the triangu-
lar bladed trench knives would ac-
complish when jabbed up to the
hilt in Boche body. And it was
then our valiant scout began to
have his troubles. 1t seemed as
though every Boche knew what he
was trying to do and had decided
that his was not the carcass upon
which the crazy American was to
be allowed to experiment. Marry
didn't want to shoot because it
would not be fair experiment on
a dead on wounded man, so he tore
uniform after uniform into an un-
recognizable mass of rags crawling
through the wire to get close
enough to stick a Boche. There was
a Boche listening post, in particu-
lar. that Marry tried to get into
night after night, but invariably the
Boche would hear him and beat il
before he got through the wire
Finally Marry explained his failure,
briefly but hopefully. He said,
you knew them damn Boches knew
every bend and turn in their
trenches. When I takes out after
one of them in his own trench he
knows the turns and gets around
them, but in the dark 1 rams head
on into every damn traverse. which
slows me down and them Boches
gets away. Some night I am going
to take out after fat one instead
of the skinny ones I have chased
before, and that fat fellow amt 60
ing to be able to turn so quick like
and then / can put in a report as
to how well the old knife really
works Do you wonder the Hun
disliked the Yanks?"
|