CHAPTER XIV
In my junior year in high school I started working at the YMCA as a night clerk. My compensation was my dormitory room rent. I manned the night desk, renting rooms, supervising the recreation rooms and transacting a great amount of business. I ate at a local greasy spoon, and really had a free and enjoyable year.
Doubtless, the most important event of my lifetime took place when I met and started dating Jessie Maud Shannon. She is the first and only girl I ever had. Our first date was New Year's Eve, and we attended a picture show which unknown to me was in violation of her parents wishes.
Our courtship became serious quite soon, for it seemed we were destined for each other. It seemed unwise for us to become serious with so many years of college ahead of me, but once you get stung by the love bug, there is no workable antidote for the disease which follows.
I graduated from high school with a very good scholastic record, except in Latin, which was only fair. I entered DePauw University along with Russ Lavengood, in the Fall. Russ and I had a pact that we would go through college and medical school together, which was broken when I enlisted at the beginning of World War I.
I did quite well scholastically at DePauw, except for the foreign language bug-a-boo, this time it was German.
April 6th, War was declared against Germany, and six days later I enlisted in Headquarters Company, 150th Field Artillery, after I was assured we would be a part of the Rainbow Division and slated for early overseas duty. Thinking we would be called soon, I went home for a visit before launching my military career. After a few days I was notified that it would be some time before I would be called to duty, so I returned to college to finish out the semester. Several classmates enlisted later.
The regimental band was recruited at Indiana University and Headquarters Company was largely-made up of boys from Butler and DePauw Universities. The regiment was mustered in service August 12th, at Fort Ben Harrison. We were drilled in close order marching, and had formal guard mount and retreat each evening.
Our officers were mounted, and the entire regiment was decked out in its best attire. Many people from Indianapolis drove out to the parade grounds to witness the pomp and pageantry.
When the time grew near for out departure from Ft. Harrison to proceed to the east coast prior to embarkation for overseas, we were told we could have leaves to go home for family visits and goodbyes. I had written Jess and my father of the likelihood of my visit, but for some reason all leaves were cancelled. I decided as did many others that I was going home, leave or no leave. A comrade answered my name at roll call so that it was possible for me to go home on the traction, and be back for morning roll call, without being reported absent.
My biggest problem was evading the sentry on my return to camp. I went home, said my goodbyes, and still had the problem of getting through the guard line without detection.
I can still see my old father leaning on his cane after we shook hands and repeated our goodbyes. I looked back through tear dimmed eyes to see him looking at me as I walked toward the
inter-urban station.
My guardian angel must have still been with me because I was able to pass through the rear
gate of the fort, and waited until the sentry was at the most distant point on his post, when I slipped out of his sight on my way undetected to my tent. The guard house was full and overflowing with soldiers who had been guilty of being absent without leave, on the same weekend I went home.
The time came for us to start our journey to the AEF. We entrained at Ft. Harrison and arrived at Camp Mills in Long Island. We again were quartered in a tent camp. The sod had been removed from the ground, and the dust stirred by so many walking feet was a colossal problem. We resumed our close order drill and formal guard mount was conducted to the last day of our stay at Camp Mills.
It may be of interest that I walked post in front of General MacArthur's tent. He was a Colonel then, and Brigade Adjutant.
We packed our gear along with extra clothes and toilet articles we were advised to take along, and marched off to the pier at Hoboken, where we embarked on the S.S. Lincoln, which would be our home for over two weeks.
We were part of an experiment to ascertain if the German freighters which had been interned at the beginning of the war in 1914 were seaworthy after they had been repaired. The German crews had sabotaged the ships by damaging them with sledge hammers to vital operating machinery, to render them useless to their enemies.
Electro-welding had just been developed and an enthusiastic young naval officer had convinced his superiors that the damaged machinery could be repaired by electro-welding. The ships were hurriedly repaired and fitted into troop transport ships, and had only a very brief shake down cruise before we embarked for overseas. Our regiment boarded the S.S. Lincoln which was sunk by a torpedo in the English Channel as it was returning home after delivering its second load of troops.
We were told repeatedly that the ship would stay afloat at least eighteen hours after being struck by a torpedo, but when it was torpedoed, it sank in fifteen minutes. Only a small fraction of the ships compliment would have been rescued in that little time. The German freighters
were certainly not designed for troop transports so that sanitary, dining and sleeping facilities were completely inadequate.
We were constantly reminded of the ever present danger of submarine attack and alarms calling us to antisubmarine drill were frequently sounded. When the alarm sounded we were never sure whether it was a practice call or an actual attack.
The third day out of New York we encountered stormy weather and rough seas. We had slum-gullion stew for breakfast and lunch. We only had two meals a day, so the first meal of the day was breakfast and lunch combined. The slum-gullion stew and rough seas combined to make the rails the most popular spots on the ship. The duty officer had difficulty finding enough able bodied men to furnish our complement of anti-submarine guards.
I was a corporal and was not subject to general duty, but I volunteered because it removed me from the sleeping quarters which were poorly ventilated and unpleasantly odorous. I stood guard with a young officer from Purdue. We discovered we were fraternity brothers, and we stood guard together the remainder of our voyage. We stood in a little compartment the size of a telephone booth, and looked out over the ocean thru a slit window at eye level. There was a shelf below the window on which there was a device, calibrated in degrees with a movable pointer in
the center of the quadrant. If we saw an object on the water we lined it up with the movable indicator, and read the degree to the officer on the bridge who by setting his indicator at the reading we reported he could quickly spot the object that had come into our view, and take appropriate action.
We reported every object we saw afloat regardless of its resemblance to a periscope. After fourteen days we reached St. Nazaire, our port of debarkation. We did not disembark immediately because of some confusion in orders; and remained aboard for another week, during which time our sanitary facilities malfunctioned, and the stench was almost intolerable.
We finally rolled our blanket rolls with all our equipment and entrained in the little old French forty eight boxcars and were on our way to Camp Coequidon which had been a Calvary camp in the time of Napoleon.
We were quartered in crudely constructed cantonments which allowed the cold wind and sometimes snow free ingress through the cracks in the siding boards. I was made mail corporal in charge of regimental mail. My Sgt. and I had a mild disagreement and he charged me with insubordination.
I was called to the Regimental Adjutants office and was informed of the charges. Capt. Klosbrenner,the Adjutant, told me he did not want a court marshal proceeding on my service record, so he reduced me to a private and gave me my choice of another duty. I chose telephone detail, and eventually became the regimental telephone operator. We took special training in all forms of communication, telephone, telegraph, semi phone, heliography, flashlight, Morse code, and others.
We spent our first Christmas in Coequidon and had our barracks gaily decorated. Holly and mistletoe grew in great profusion in the nearby woods, and we hauled wagon loads to be used in our holiday decorations.
Washington's Birthday marked the date of our departure for the front lines. We boarded the little old forty eight train, and detrained at Baccarat, which was on the Lorraine front. This was a quiet sector and we remained in position there for six months. We broke into battle experience gradually, and became prepared for more exacting and exciting duty. We then moved to the Champaign front, from there to Château Thierry, an to the Argonne, and St.
Milril. Our regiment participated in every battle which American troops were engaged and we were the only American division to fight in the Battle of Champaign.
We were billeted in the basement of a house at Mt. Faucon, which had been leveled by artillery fire. We were within range of enemy rifle fire and had to stay in the cellar during daylight hours to avoid enemy sharpshooter's bullets.
One morning before daylight, I was awakened by our Captain and told to hurriedly roll my blanket roll so we could leave for the rear before daylight. I naturally asked the meaning of his orders and he replied that the Colonel had appointed me to West Point. I inquired if I had to go and he replied only a fool would pass up an opportunity to get out of this hell hole. I told him I had no interest in West Point, and preferred not to go A substitute was named to replace me, but failed to pass the entrance examination and was immediately promoted to a 2nd Lt.
While on the Champaign front, our post of command was situated in a very deep dugout, which was camouflaged by a special netting supported on six foot poles to conceal the position of the dugout and provided protection for troops above the ground. The dugout was so poorly ventilated that frequent trips topside were needed for breathing fresh air to replace the carbon dioxide saturated air in the lungs.
I was relieved at the switch board to go topside to re-vitalize myself, and walked about under the safety of the camouflage netting. I noticed a puff of smoke some one half mile away. Shortly there was another shell burst a little closer. I was not alarmed because by that time we had grown accustomed to such sights.
I loitered at a poker game which was being played on a table of ammunition boxes by motorcycle couriers. After a time I continued on my way to the dugout entrance to return to my switchboard duty. I heard the warning scream of an oncoming shell, and I noticed several French soldiers who were standing nearby take a hurried belly flop and I did likewise just in time because the shell landed no more than twenty feet away where I had been standing, and killed all the men who were engaged in the card game.
I have often wondered in my guardian angel had a hand in moving me to safety.
We moved out of the battle front to bivouac in a grain field on November 10th. The morning of the 11th we saw a French Spad airplane engaging in daring acrobatics which made us speculate what the occasion might be for his unusual behavior. Our radio equipment was not operating, so we had no news from the outside world.
Our radio detail quickly activated their equipment, and were able to get a news broadcast from Arlington, Virginia which told us of the war's end. Of course we were jubilant but had nothing special with which to celebrate.
We gathered wood to make a bon-fire for the eve of Armistice Day, the first open fire we had seen since our arrival at the front eight months before. We marched thru northern France, Luxembourg, Belgium, Southern Germany, to reach Nuenahr, which was to be our home for the next three months as a part of the Army of Occupation.
We returned to dear old USA aboard the passenger ship Leviathan, then the largest ship afloat. We were carried by train on a triumphant journey back home to Indiana. After a regimental parade through the streets of Indianapolis, we moved on to Camp Taylor at Louisville, Ky., to be mustered out of the service.
I picked up the pieces of civil life by taking a position of Veterans Secretary at the Marion YMCA. I spent a very pleasant summer living in the YMCA Dormitory and assisting returning veterans in their efforts of returning to civil life.
To be continued
