The Washington times., 1934-01-24
TwO Talking Boys and In the TOuDn of Meaux
a Telegram GiUe Us On July Fourth, Is,
An Idea for q Column But the ShOID Went On
By BILL C0RUM

Imorning. Just the twisted form
of what had been a movie camera,
some trinkets and pots and pans,
stove split in half, a picture of
papa" in his uniform. what was
left Of the little things that make
home.
don't guess the German boy
who pulled that lever would have
felt very proud Of blowing things
all to pieces if he could have seen
it, do you, sonny?
So It's Been Is Years?
When you stop to think about
it, there isn't much sense in shoot
ing at people you can't see and
have never seen. Nor any hint
of SportSmanShip, either. Like
that morning the Armistice was
signed and the Germans came
bubbling up out of their trenches
and funk holes, yelling and shout
ing and waving those funny
round caps.
The ones across from us were
the Gandswehr, or practically that.
The "landlubberS" some Of us
used to call them, knowing no
German. They were the old 'uns,
anyhow. Men around so, hauling
guns and grenadeS around through
the mud, long past their time for
such foolishness.
Why, son, you never saw o
more pleasant or comical gang
of old geezers. They were "ya,
wohling" and "sehr quoting" and
what not all over the place and
patting you on the back and
pumping your hand just for one
lousy little American cigarette,
and offering to share the schnappS
in their battered, dirty old can
teens in return.
Couldn't Hurt EN-
If they had started the war all
over then, you wouldn't have had
the heart to punch one Of 'em
in the jaw, much less shoot him.
No doubt they felt the same. Yet
there were plenty. Of cold, shape
less still bodies lying about there,
both in khaki and field gray, for
whom the pardon had come too
late.
You see, the worst thing about
war is that it's so silly. And
anybody who has been in one
must feel a little silly when it is
over. Somebody may have won
the last one and somebody may
have felt mighty proud Of himself
about it, but 1t wasn't the guys
who were up there swapping
cigarettes for Rhine wine and bad
German for worse English on that
first Arrnistice Day.
But I am neither a preacher
nor a pacltist, though I may have
sounded somewhat like both to-
day, and 1 would not be telling
you the truth if I told you that
there was no thrill in war at all.
In the beginning at least there is,
and though the telegram says it
will have been Is years in a few
days now, remember like they
were yesterday those days and
nights in early February, 1918,
when the Twenty-sixth went
swinging up toward the Cham
payne and the Road OF Our
Lady"
Thunder Across Aisne
If there was a threat in that
growing roll of thunder in the
North. there was also a promise.
The promise of adventure and ex-
citement and of playing some
small part in the greatest show Of
all.
No gang of kids, because that's
all they were really, ever went up
with lighter hearts and heavier
packs than those lads from New
England, predominantly from Bos-
ton and predomonantly Irish. But
there was a catch in it. And for
all the gallant French and Eng
lish lads who had gone before
them. Too many Of them failed
to come back from those ghostly
chalk fields along the Aisne. At
best, it wasn't worth the candle.
So you want to go to war,
Sonny?
Forget it. Baseball and football
and ice hockey and tennis and
golf and basketball are better
games.