Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1919-03-05
BATTLE OF ST. MIHIEL:
HOW YANKS WON 1T.

WILDER G. Barry, Richland Democrat
of the battle of st. Mihiel, in which
all-American troops first showed the
French and British how to do the i'm
possible. Capt. Losche volunteered
for service from Richland Center,
and from the first has proved q most
efficient surgeon. He had charge of
surgical team and a mobile hospi-
tai, right up at the front. A part of
the letter, the part that refers to the
battle, reads as follows:
Will we ever forget those first three
days at st. Mihiel? Not while we live
and remain rational At one O'Clock
in the morning of the 18th of Septem-
the most intensive barrages Of the
war and this continued until five
O'Clock, the ~" hour set for going ov-
er the top. At that moment the bar
rage was lifted and made a rolling
barrage to which was added the ma
chine gun and infantry fire. Now,
our troops had been doing trench du-
ty for month or more in this sector,
but being a quiet one, there was no.
IAA11A5 IAOlC llIdI IlOQ1Sd1
change of artillery and rifle fire, with
now and then some one or two more
adventurous soldiers taken prisoners.
So you may imagine the keen inter-
est and tense excitement which pre-
vailed among us, when on the night
Of Sept. 18th our orders reached us
to go over the top at daylight next
morning Outside the fact that this
was to be our initial baptism of fire,
it carried with it the glory of knowing
that to us had been assigned diff
cult task. Difficult for more reasons
than one. The terrain over which we
had to fight was made up of many
thickly wooded hills. The French
and British had both as separate and
combined armies attempted to route
the Hun from his Businesses, and their
efforts had been repulsed, not only
with heavy losses, but in one instance
with almost complete humiliation.
Further than that the French had re-
peatedly warned against our invasion,
quoting their own and British eXper-
fence and adding that the BOche had
occupied the area for three years and
had spent most of that time in forti
flying himself and making his position
impregnable. Well, what happened
when the Yankees cut loose is now
glorious history, but I'll relate a few
of the events briefly. The kaiser's
idea had at all times to make war as
horrible and gruesome as possible,
so our leaders decided to fight the
devil with fire. And that's just what
our four hours preparatory barrage
amounted to. Our artillery from the
light field pieces to the heavy marine
guns were on the hills back of us,
hub to hub, and when they opened up
the Germans thought land so did WEI
that hell had broken loose. That ar
tillery fire was so intense that it
simply paralyzed the enemy for a
time. But you ask, "How could any
one live through such a barrage?"
Well, there were many who didn't,
but also too many who did. You see
the Boche had built concrete re-en-
forced machine gun emplacements
with a slight part of them above
ground and in these emplacements
were men entirely free from harm,
except in case of a direct hit by our
heavy artillery. Now lots of them got
direct hits and were put out of bus
mess, but the enemy had so many of
these that it wasn't possible to 81
lence a large percentage of them.
Then after night of anxious wait
ing with some casualties from the en-
emy's return fire we finally cane face
to face with the most glorious, the
most eventful and most hazardous
moment of our young lives. Every
mothers son knew, and knew we'll
n Of hi To cd 1oo f11od
and adopted the slogan Garry on"
he realized fully that many would
fall before the enemy's fire and he had
no assurance that he would not be
one of the many. AS the momentOus
hour approached everything was dead
ly silent so far as conversation is
concerned. Watches had been prev
iously synchronized, no command was
given, no orders shouted. Company
commander, platoon and squad lead
ers had their eyes, riveted on their
watches. 4:55-another five minutes
of breathless waiting; 4:59-the sec
ond hand moved all too slowly. Five
O'clock-ye gods, what a scene to be-
hold. One tumultuous crash of ma
chine guns added to the deafening
din, one concerted leap out of the
trench, and your immortal American
army had gone lover the top" and was
locked in deadly combat with the
Hun.
| had previously told my little band
that they were not obliged to go ov-
er on the first jump-off; that they
might, if they chose, follow me with
the second wave, but none voiced his
desire. So you may imagine how my
heart swelled with just pride when
looked about me in mo Mans Land"
and saw them all at my side with
grim, determined faces. Boys, just
boys, l call them, they had been with
me under my care and guidance for
an entire year and / knew them in a
way which cannot be described by
mere words. Thus they started and
thus they completed their task-al-
ways up among the real doings, TAX
ing equal chances with combatant
troops. Out of our original 48 medi-
cal corps men, we have 10 with us
now. We lost four killed in action;
two died of wounds, the remainder
wounded or gassed. Of the original
seven medical officers we have but
two remaining. None were killed in
+Iic roUipoont h11t tbOco Wn lost xuorn