The Press., 1919-04-03

0mpeu dnedu or my story Dlt, but
 You see I can't miss any chance to
 aive the Hun the discredit that is due l him. We were fortunate enough not
 to encounter any subs" on our trip across, though when we were in the danger zone off the Irish coast, we Ean through the wreckage of a ship that had been torpedoed but few
 hours ahead of us, and I understand that one of the destroyers with us picked up about fifty survivors from the life boats. We remained in Eng land but few days, but during that time I had pass for an evening at { Romsey, a very pretty English village | of the type you read about. The truth is though, that the thing I shall |sTsmember about Romsey, in the years to come, is the feed" I had there of ham and eggs, served by the pleasant ladies of one of the village churches. When do we eat?" is one question the soldier never forgets how to ask, wherever he may be. From South hampton we shipped across Channel one dark night, to Cherbourg, France. A day of rest there and we piled into hox cars for the trip to our training camp near Bordeaux. After a period Eof stiff training there I spent a solid 5week of travelling in the French Side
 door Pullman" better known as box fro 1,,norod at mid
 night, with the rest of the train-load, in a meadow, on the bank of a canal. l
 I didn't say it was raining, but it was, l real hard rain, the kind that is wet. l There were just two things to do; sit
 in the rain till morning, or pick out a l
 damp place between the puddles, |
 spread out our blankets and go to |
 sleep. My roommate" and I chose |
 the latter course, and after our long 1
 box car trip, where you had to sleep
 sitting up or not at all, believe we
 could have slept with ease in the canal. In a few days I was assigned tp an artillery outfit, just in time to
 let in the big fight in the Argonne. Being with the light artillery at the front is something like being with travelling circus in the States, move every night and work all day, eat and sleep the rest of the time. At that time it was raining almost day and night, and handling the guns and daissons in the mud was about like d,rr in O sge spring. The conditions were bad, insurmountable at times, but A||| aasroekrcope, by hook or crook, a ms WSy> driven back to cah put behind us, but the victory we have won is lasting one, one that has broken the power of the greatest system in history. Living in Germany as I am now, I've a chance tb get some little idea of the effect of this system on the German people, and on the children. There is a caste system here in Germany just as surely as there is in India. Even the small school children carry packs on their backs, so that later when they are forced to enter the army, they will be better able to march with packs. in the American army have often found it very difficult to con- vince the German people that they entered the service of their own free will Since we have been here in Rhineland the people have treated us very we'll. Why? Because that's the only thing they can do. They figure position to help them, so the thing for them to do is to make friends with America. Many speak of coming to America to live. In that way they can escape the consequences of their de- feat and avoid paying the debt they owe the world. They are undesirable
 people, a brutal race, and I hope that America will close her doors to them absolutely, until they have buried Kultur and established in it's place
 real and humane civilization, and that
 will be the work of years of gener- ations. After about month with the artillery I was transferred to the ammunition train where I had
 chance to see the great work Ameri |
 can trucks were doing in the tran
 sportation of troops and supplies. Day and night, up to within a few miles of | the lines, there was steady stream
 of trucks going in both directions.
 These trucks were capable of making twenty or twenty-five miles per hour,
 and were usually run to the limit, and
 so close together that if the front one
 stopped those in the rear bumped into
 each other like train of freight cars.
 All night driving was done without
 lights of any kind, and in the ammu-
 hilton train all trips were at night as l
 it was too dangerous to take ammuni-
 at night the roads to the batteries
 were always being shelled and the
 lowlands covered with cloud of gas,
 but at night the German batteries had
 no chance for aerial observation and
 were obliged to fire by map alone.
 Stand by the old City Hall in Hart ford on busy Saturday night and
 watch the traffic there, that's the kind of traffic we had in the Argonne, but with no lights. This doesn't begin to tell tue tale, but perhaps it will tell you little of what your boys have been doing over here. Those who were at Chateau Thierry, at Soissons, St. Mihiel and at Verdun can tell you much more than I, who was only in at the finish. Yet in the two months I was at the front, 1 found what war