The Washington herald., 1919-02-27

have noticed that here and there, op-
'posite the American lines. Fritz has
been failing in his recent bombing at
tacks?' Ralston said. Noticed that in
recent official reports from other sec
tors?
Yes. but thought that was due
to some new machine gun
You give us this trench to hold ::
it's the apex of the situation here. If
We break the attack here it will die
Your information Is that it's to be
only a local attack, just what we
want
"Keniver grumbled; so did some of
his sergeans who overheard, St 1t
vas an order from Black Jack, so
those apparently fool boys with their
nice new automatic shotguns went
out into that front-line trench to face
lack Johnsons and machine guns and
what not. 1t looked. fair suicidal,
Paul admits.
1T was then about dawn, the usual
stack hour. The opposing trenches
were so close that an attack with
hand grenades was first to be expect
ed. Ralston. Martin, Taylor and 9TH
ers waited, guns cuddled up. A stray
shot or two came over, part of the
morning strafe.
suddenly from the German trench
a hand grenade came over, lobbing
twisting. like a low-hying jacksnipe.
Ralston's sweet little gun swung onto
1t. He pulled.
Dead bird joked Taylor as Raj
stOn's charge of BIS smashed the
bomb. exploding it in midair. so that
the fragments went back Hunward,
mostly. He had caught IT Just as il
came up. A yell from the German
trench and arguments told that the
thrower had been blamed for a bad
throw and the damage it had done.
The crack of the nitro in Ralston's
load was like a rifle shot and the
Huns didn't know what had hap
pened.
Another grenade came over. more
swiftly. right-quartering to. Taylor.
He snapped it like cutting down an
October woodcock in a creek edge
stubble. 1t. too, went up in smoke
! and flame.
Now came other bombs, by ones,
twos. threes, like clay birds from un-
known traps at unknown angles. Each
| bomb was cut down, either in mid
| flight or before After that first shot
/ Ralston had waited. He had the bal
ance of his magazines loaded with
shells carrying buckshot. Out of that
! early night of bombs, all thrown by
foes within cover of their trench, no,
one came into the American trench
Suddenly the hand grenades ceased
to come. Ralston tensed his muscles
waited. There was a muffled explo-
sion from the opposing trench, and
that told of the foes use of the trench
mortar to send over a large bomb in
a slow, lobbing flight, that they used
at such close ranges. The bomb made
a beautiful target for a quick man
Ralston swung onto it; his bucksho,
crashed into 1t before it was near, and
it. too. went up in a gust of smoke
and flame.
"At once a dozen heads popped
| out of the Boche trench, one OF tueu
an officers. Exclamation of wonder
in German came to our fellows. Tnen
a machine gun from our side sprayed
the Germans off the trench edge.
"Grenades began to come now
faster and faster. The shotguns
cracked. The bombs, smashed in
midflight, faded from vision. A few
got by, not many. Some damage was
done in our trench, not much, COM
pared with what had been done in
other closeup bombing operations.
Then there was a lull and our fer-
lows knew it meant the attack. sud
denly the trench opposite bristled
with men in spiked helmets, each
foe with his arms full of grenades
| ready to do or die.
"Our boys swarmed, as the Ger
mans started. ready TO cast their
bombs ahead of them. The line OF
|
them, the automatic pumps went into
action. The hail of pellets never
/ slackened. 1t was snap shooting
most of the time like at woodcock in
the brush, from the hip much of it.
Grenades that got into the air were
smashed there; then. as the Germans
charged to come to close grips, at a
! word from Ralston the guns were
| turned onto the now closeup foes
armfuls of bombs. There were severe
! explosions, at a safe distance for
our boys to escape-and there were
no more Huns in sight. Live ones
that is.
Then there was silence for a time
in that foe trench. At last the hum
of a plane was heard and our boys
knew that the German officers had
called for a birdman to fly over and
try to see what was opposing them
| there. Ralston chuckled at that sure
sign that we had Fritz's number and
had found it to be o.
Everybody down but me- he or
dered.
Erect, daring the bullets of snipers,
Ralston watched the plane appear in
the faraway mist, coming straight
toward our trench. She was travel
ing fast: 100 an hour, at least. The
American antiguns wove smoke pat
terms about her. machine gunner
of down our lines sprang his rattle
at it. but failed to connect. Then
the Venomous Fokker swooped, seem-
ingly ready to alight on the Ameri-
can trench, but really preparing to
rake 1t with machine-gun fire as well
as pick up useful information to carry
back Hunward.
shotgun Wrecked Plane.
THE German filer banked his ma
chine and it made perfect turn,
right over our line and hung OUT
there for moment. just about sew
enty-five yards away, beautiful
mark for Ralston. Just as the Teu-
ton machine gun in the plane began
to spit Ralston swung onto its pilot
as the Hun plane man gripped his
levens and glared down through his
| green goggles. The right barrel
crumpled the Teuton pilot; the lert