Sequachee Valley news. (Sequachee [Sequatchie], Tenn.) 1896-1952, 1919-06-12
WHERE BULLETS
FLEW THICK
Harry F. Holmes, Former,
a Former Whitwel Boy,
Vividly Describes His
Experiences

Editor News:
As am now in the good old U,
$. again / will enlesvor to write a
few lines of my experiences IN the
Worlds War.
enlisted in Camp Lewis, Wash
ington, and after ten days training
entrained at. Camp Kearney, Cal,
and was there the short period of
nine days until we Unframed for
Camp Mills, N. Y, from where we
embarked for oversee duty. After
thirteen days of ocean life we de.
barked in Liverpool, Eng. On ar
rivlng we stopped at rest camp at
Winchester, Eng. In this camp we
gave our stomachs a rest for six
days. On the Goth of August we
debarked at La Harve, France,
where we we're placed again lin the
28th division. 1t was on its way to
the Verdun Front from st. Mehiel.
We arrived there about September
IL. and were about three kilometers
from the firing line. We waited un-
til the Million Dollar Barrage start
ed. 1t began on the night Of Sept
ember 25th at eleven o'clock. We
commenced our march out under the
barrage toward the Hindenburg line
and we were there three days follow
ing the Germans in their retreat.
The third day the Germans turned
on us with their machine guns, kill
ing many of our men. We advanc-
ed about one kilemetre on the fol-
lowing afternoon in which we cap
tured II German prisoners and got
from them some valuable informa-
ton. Tn the same evening we had
one lieutenant killed and one SER
.iously wounded. Several enlisted
men were also wounded. Lieut. Ea.
gan was killed outright and Lieut..
Flynn was seriously wounded and
died in a short while.
-
The goth of September we ad.
vanced under heavy machine gun
fire, and this is where l experienced
my first real warfare. The first
man to get wounded that day was in
my squad. He was lying in about
ten feet in front of me. | crawled
up to him and cut !his pack off and
tried to. carry him back behind the
bushes out of observation of the
Germans, but could not handle him
alone. Tscalled another Yank to
help me back with him, and just as
this boy started to crawl TO my aid |
two machine gun bullets caught him
in the neck, and when / saw that he
was more seriously wounded than
this boy crawled over to assist him
first. Cutting his pack from his
back there were three more boys
there to help me and starting to car
ry him out of observation | saw
there was no use. He was dying.
He died in my arms. Then going
back 10 pursuit of the other boy we
met him crawling to us. We took
him back to the first aid station
from where he was sent to the hos
pital. Going back to our company
we found that three were killed out
right and two wounded.
We were on the lines four days
without anything to eat and on the
fourth day we were relieved by the
One Hundred and Eleventh Infan-
try from which we dropped back in
TO support, where we found Ger
man garden and we ate cabbage
leaves and salt. The following af-
ternoon our mess wagon made its
way up to US with something to eat.
We were five days in taking Hill
223 which was very important posi-
lion for the Germans and on taking
this Hill we went one kilometer to
The right fiank. The next orders we
had were to take the little village of
Chateau Thierry and Hill ga,
which was located near the village.
The night before this advance was
made our officers Informed us of
what we had to do on the following
morning.. We had the remainder of
hat night to study about the great
.aak hafora ma. Ii