The Birmingham age-herald., 1919-01-05
Capt. Zac Sn1ith, T.,
 Tells Of Fighting Of
 Fanaous3O Ofh DiUision

l ANNNN' i to his parents tells of the fighting in 1 which the famous Thirtieth division en. gagged at Bellicourt and vicinity. Thif ! division, composed chiefly of North anc 1 South Carolina and Tennessee men was l with the British in the tremendous of | fensive opened by General Haig to break 1 the Hindenburg line. Captain Smith 1 writes
 Our division, the Thirtieth, composed
 nessee troops, and the Twenty -seconc division from New York were assigned upon arrival in France the first part of June to the British.
 The first three weeks in June were devoted to training and learnng the English system. And it was a complete change. Our division had instructors from famous English and, Scotch regi- ments, the Black Watch Argyle, Gordon Highlanders, etc. Our regiment, the 105th engineers, had six officers and 40 men, all that remained of the famous Glou-
 testers. We had two bonnie Scotchmen
 to teach us about transports. We formed
 the first and second battalion trans
 port and supply section. We learned that
 harness soap was Dubbin and a curry
 comb was a dandy-brush and put in
 indents instead of acquisitions, every
 name was different and it was like learn
 ing a new language. In order to be sure and see the R. E. (Royal Engineers we
 found that the best time was around tea
 time or mess. The English officers
 are sure to indulge in tea and spend two
 to three hours at their mess in theseven- ing and they do not get up early, habits
 ishized, although at that time tea was
 indulged in in an effort to imbibe some
 information for we were eager to learn.
 No criticism or censure is meant here
 for the English, for before we got though all admired the British army and think of it as one of the most disciplined, highly organized and strong est of any But we found out that the British officers let the noncoms run the army. The American officer makes an effort to do it all by himself. It was a fact, however that the English were fled up' to use their own expression, and were very tired of the in June and it is doubtful if the war would ever have been won if the Americans had not come over. It is a fact that the Thirtieth and Twenty seventh American divisions put new life and ginger into the British armies that it came in contact with.
 IN BELGIUM
 During the first of July the British placed us in the reserve near Ypres. We did our first work building rear line trenches and wiring them. It was ta1 that tla oh to make a big push towards Hazebroucl< that would take them to the sea and cap- ture us all. It was also rumored that only about 10000 British separated us from the Germans and that they were holding a very thin line. Our men worked wonderfully and the English off cers praised our troops for the amount of work accomplished and the zeal and always expressed constant admiration of their excellent physique, our troops being larger and stronger than the English. During August to September 8, the Thir- tieth and Twenty seventh divisions occu- pied front line trenches from Ypres to the other side of Mt. Kemmel. While in this sector the Germans had every advantage. From Mt Kemmel they could spot ev- cry move and they shelied us by day and night and big bombing planes were over our heads every night. Two nights they dropped SOttl6 lfOil IdllOuS IiSu III our company doing considerable dam age Bombing planes would get our wind up quicker than any of Jerry's H. 's or gas shells and even his whizz- bangs didn't bother us as much as hlS bombing. One night we were rejoicing that an allied plane was overhead when a couple of bombs dropped nearby. The Hun had come over in an allied plane; the whirring is materially different Notwithstanding the fact that our divi- sion had orders not to make a push nor advance Voormezeele was captured with some German prisoners and the division tasted the first fruits of success. The 1O5th engineers put over some deadly gas attacks and a big one August 2l, that did material damage as we after ward learned from German prisoners Our regiment built rods, light railways machine gun emplacements and received a very congratulatory letter from Gem eral Sir Scott of the Second British army for the work done, stating that the 1O5th engineers was a very efficient or and officered by highly trained and efficient officers. The Germans re- tired from Mt. Kemmel the latter part of August, a sector that possibly cost the British more lives than any other part of the entire line to hold. It was near hear that the Germans put over the first gas attack, kAlHS -V,o"u Saho dians Our division was relieved Septem- ber 3 by a Scotch division and we came south to be assaulting troops for the biggest attack the British ever put over.
 THE HINDENBURG LINE
 "The attack September 29 Sunday, 1t Bellicourt on the Hindenburg line be- tween St. Quentin and Cambrai the strongest fortified line ever known, will ever live in the memory of the Thrtieth division, for it was the Thirtieth divi-