Vernon County censor. [volume] (Viroqua, Wis.) 1865-1955, 1919-12-03

out the county. His experiences have
| been written out for a Lacrosse pa
per and the Censor herewith repro
duces the same:
When Major "Go-to-Hell" White
sey of the now famous Lost Battal-
ion' chose to die rather than surren-
der to the Germans who had sur
rounded him on all sides, Viola had a
representative there.
He is Private Arthur Ray LOCKER,
who few days ago, for the first time
since his return home, consented to
| tell the story of his experiences
which are recounted here in his own
words.
Private LOCKER suffered untold
hardships like all the rest of the bat
talon which refused to give up to the
| Germans, During the intense cold, in
the blackness of night, while stand
ing embraced with his buddy" in an
effort TO keep warm, machine gun
bullet caused his buddy" to ego
west" as the soldiers say; it was an
experience which LOCKER will never
forget
LOCKER was a member of Co. B. of
| the first battalion of the 30Sth in
fantry regiment and was severely
gassed On October 5th he was
struck on the head with the butt of
rifle in the hands of a German sol
der and put out of commission He
spent ten and one half months in a
hospital after being rescued October
| 3, and few months at Fort Smelling,
Mimi, from where he recently went
to his home at Viola
He is the only man from this vi
entity who was "A member of the Lost
| Battalion"
Lockers story follows:
Con the morning of October the
| second" Mr. LOCKER began, 1--WE were
stationed back Of high hill in the
Argonne Forest, my own company to-
gether with three others, under the
command of Major Charles NJ. Whit
telsey, two platOons of machine gun
ners under Captain Strongly of Com
pany c. TO our right with four 9th
err companies of our regiment under
Major Budd to their right again. The
next morning we were ordered to ad-
vance-that is, the machine gunners
with four companies under the com
mand of Major Whittelsey; Major
| Budd remaining behind with the 9TH
er four companies. Our objective was
some German barracks to our left, AS
/ far as / could judge, to the north
east of Us Upon reaching the crest
of the hill before US, we came upon
La German trench, which however, was
deserted, so we simply crossed it
and continued on down the very steep
hillside In the valley below, we
| found a fine spring, where we filled
f,F l. va
| clay from our faces and hands.
"But we had no sooner crossed the
stream and began to advance up the
wooded hillside to the east, than we
were met by q furious machine gun
fire The trees and underbrush af-
| forded but poor shelters, so we were
ordered to dig ourselves in. That
doesn't mean trench digging but the
so-called funk holes" which man
| digs while lying on the ground You
! see, machine gunuers aim for the
| legs, the purpose being to get a man =
| body TO sink down, after which the
| rapid firing gums can easily send
plenty Of bullets into more vital parts.
| The only chance Of escape is to hug
| the ground so closely, that one is be-
! low the range, which is not very far
above the ground at best The ma
jor then sent Lieutenant McKeough
10 report our position to regimental
| headquarters Some time later one Of
the runners, who had been stationed
at intervals as we advanced, came IN
and reported that he BY mere luck
had escaped from q surprise attack
during which the other men at his
post had been killed and he knew
that the post behind his had also been
attacked
This proved that the Germans
from our left had come in behind US.