Evening star., 1922-05-12
CANT|GNY TO GET
AMERICAN SCHOOL
Geographic Society Selects
Village as Site for A. IF.
Memorial.

The National Geographic Society
will erect at Cantigny. France.
schoolhouse as memorial to the
American soldiers who wrote that
tiny village into the history of their
country as the scene where A. E. F.
troops first fought as a unit.
This action, taken by the society's
board of trustees at Its meeting on
Wednesday, was announced today by
Gilbert Grosvenor. president of the
selection of the town as fitting
place for such memorial was de-
termined by the recommendation OF
Gen. Pershing. ,
During the war members of the
National Geographic Society con-
the establishment and equipment OF
wards at American Military Hospital,
No. /. at Neuilly, France. When the
armistice was signed only $4,000
of this fund had been expended. A
committee of the SOCIETY constdesed ona ere,
full expenditure of the remaining
$4,000 of the fund, and after con-
sultation with Gen. PeTshing. 1t was
determined to build a memorial
schoolhouse for the children of the
devastated town of Cantigny.
Down SIX COunter Att0cRe.
At Cantigny the 1st American Di-
vision first went over the top and be-
gan to share in Foch's sturdy resist
ance which held the Germans back.
then defeated them. and won the war.
1t will be recalled that the German
general staff had ordered that the
heart be taken out of the Americans
at any cost when they first showed
kup as a unit along the fighting front.
Therefore, when orders came for the
Americans to iron out the salient at
Cantigny what might have been a
skirmish turned into terrific strug-
gle, during which the Germans rallied
thousands of men and threw $4,000
shells into the town. Even after the
Americans took the town they had to
hold it against six counter-attacks by
the exasperated Germans.
Gen. Pershing, in his official report
of the engagement at Cantigny, called
it "a brilliant action" and said that
lit demonstrated our fighting quail
ties under extreme battle conditions"
The French communicate gave high
praise to American courage, valor and
soldierly qualities. The German war
office merely referred to the Amer
leans as "the enemy
English Version Of Feat.
The London Times History of the
War" has this to say of the Ameri-
cans at Cantigny:
THE 1st Division, fresh from the
Toul training sector, had relieved the
45th French African Division from
north of Mesnil ST.. Georges to just
north of Cantigny in that sector, fac
ing Montdidier and south of Amiens,
where the undulating country, broken
here and there with sparse woods, af-
forded the opportunity for fierce de-
fense after the open vastness of the
Somme valley. They had, after. the
Amients drive, settled down into the
game of exchanging shells across the
green and stood up to a daily lombard
ment Of every kind Of cannon. At
last. the chance, welcome after much
sitting in trenches. Cahtigny, small
but proud. on it's green emihence,
overlooking with a mouth of fire the
whole countryside, was to be taken.
Never did men rise SO eagerly out Of
trenches to go forward than those
Americans. through gas. through a
cloud of machine-gun bullets, follow
ing close behind their barrage, they
steadily assembled the slopes of the
village and sheltered themselves in
the cemetery when the village was
theirs. Cantigny was a small, isolat-
ed action, with little immediate sig
nificance. But the village was the
first ever captured by American
troops in Europe, and the lesson that
the Germans learned was the first
they had received from the youth Of
America"
Cantigny sets on a bill near Mont
didier, and is twenty miles southeast
of Amiens. Even before the Ameri-
cans took 1t the village had been dew
astated during a heroic French resist
anCe,