Gelett Burgess

“ Georges, I think, must have begun to realize that he had grown up when he, a veteran now, marched into Suippes, carrying a big basket for a lad of fifteen who looked up to his soldier protector admiringly, and called him “M’sieu.”
No Frenchman will ever forget that dreadful first week of September, 1914. Every day the Germans grew nearer Paris, every day their cowardly aeroplanes sailed over the capital and dropped their futile threats. What was the French army doing? We hoped they were merely luring the enemy toward the forts of Paris where the big guns could smash them. ”

“ You should hear Coco tell how, on that long march, François took care of him, carrying his rifle when Coco was tired, carrying even Coco’s knapsack for him, helping him grease his boots at15 night when Coco’s feet began to blister. François was like a big brother.
At the nightly bivouacs along the road the two boys always slept side by side; that is, when they slept at all. The excitement (and the hard ground) for the first few nights kept them wide awake, in spite of their fatigue. ”

“ And so through the bursting shells, across the wide field to rising ground.
It was there, on that hillside, they got a sight of what had happened during those deadly days along the Marne. First, rows and rows of twisted, limp-lying Frenchmen, dead for long, thrown by the shells into horribly fantastic groups; and sickening heads and limbs lying scattered alone. Bodies everywhere, mostly resting face up to the sky, eyes open, staring. ”

“ All over the field the wet men jumped up, slung on their belts, grabbed their rifles and formed dismally in the rain. As they stood waiting, word ran down the column—François passed it to Coco—“The enemy!” An ammunition wagon drove up—boxes of cartridges were distributed. “Load!” ordered the captains. The ranks were fairly buzzing now, everyone asking questions, nobody answering. A whistle blew. “Forward, march!” Coco had no thought of the rain now! The guns grew louder, but still no enemy was visible. ”

“ Forward at sunset, past wrecked automobiles,84 burned to masses of curly iron; past caissons smashed by shells, and bicycles without number abandoned along the road. Forward, in the moonlight across battle fields where the dead lay in windrows in shocking confusion, mutilated abominably, dead in the long fresh trenches, filling every gallery and compartment, dead in the woods, dead on green meadows where in the cool night air wisps of trailing mist hovered near the ground and the stench was in their nostrils till they sickened and hurried on, rinsing their mouths with water! ”

“ Yes, monsieur; it was a ticklish job; I felt rather queer, I confess. I knew that I would be the very first one to be shot at. That was about the longest fifteen minutes I ever spent.
“Well, we let them crawl up, crawl up, to within a hundred meters and then just as they all jumped to their feet, the lieutenant shouted: ‘Fire at will!’ I was ready for the foremost man, and I let him have it right through the forehead. Here is his helmet, monsieur; see that hole?”
In the hospital at Toulouse, while I listened to his story, he held up a black helmet, trimmed with brass—with a spiked top. ”

“ The men were fretful and restless with excitement, nervous, exclamatory. With a high, snoring drone, a German shell came driving through the air—a boom from the woods—then a sudden,29 terrifying crash as of thunder let loose as it burst in the rear. Coco turned to see a volcano of black smoke and earth behind him. “Lie down!” shouted the officers, and the men only too willingly dropped flat in the road. “At first,” said Coco, “the men lay looking up into the air trying to see the shells—imagining that they really could! ”

“ The Twentieth was smarting with the shame of its defeat; it was savage for revenge; but, held in reserve behind the battle line, it had to wait listening to the booming cannon and the crackle of machine guns for an impatient hour—then they were ordered back to Mouzon.
At Mouzon, news of a fresh defeat awaited them. The town was now distraught, terror-stricken by the ever-nearing, ever-increasing thunder of the German cannonade. When Georges arrived at midnight, almost every house was lighted. The frenzied in45habitants were packing up or hiding their belongings, ready to fly. ”

“ More and more German dead were passed, leaped over, even trod on where the way was narrow, and still the thundering of cannon came from every side. It seemed as if the whole world were fighting—as if all the old quiet ways of life had ceased to exist, even in memory. Still they pushed forward, marched to the west of Vitry-le-François, crossed the Marne on a pontoon bridge at76 Blacy under a rain of rifle fire, and hurried through a beet field for a crest above the long, white, poplar-lined national road at Couvrol. ”

“ If the column halted for a minute, half the men fell instantly asleep as they stood.
The minute the trenches were dug they had to prepare to receive the enemy. Mighty little food these days, and no fresh meat. Even water was scarce, as the men were forbidden to drink of springs till they had been inspected. Georges’s regiment was, for the most part of the retreat, held in the second line of the rear guard, and he was, therefore, in but one actual engagement. ”

“ Every man was tense with excitement—battle was in the air—surely something was going to happen, must happen! But further and further south they marched; and along the roads, now, the automobiles were flying like mad, night and day, some with officers, some flying the Red Cross flag. Over their heads there were French aeroplanes, every67 day the sky was never quite free of them. Georges caught his first sight of a British soldier—a khaki-clad dispatch rider on a motorcycle flying past, and another. ”

“ With the artillery still hammering all about—but mostly the French batteries of “75’s” now, pounding away in fours—the Twentieth stayed till night, and sent its wounded to the rear—for the stretcher bearers and ambulances were right up behind these days, with plenty to do. Here the regiment received with yells and tears the news of the victory of this five days’ battle of the Marne. It was too good to be true.
The captain of Georges’s company, with his arm in a sling, was a Frenchman, and now it was time for more rhetoric. He had an appreciative audience, this time. “You are men!” ”

“ It was high time; for, at the sight of this destruction all over the field, men had already begun to jump up and run toward the39 rear. Now they all ran—everybody ran—with the shells and shrapnel chasing them. They threw away their knapsacks, they threw away their guns, they ran screaming and crying like children.
Coco threw away his knapsack and musette, too, but kept his rifle as he ran, making for a shelter in the woods on the other side of the road. “You’ve no idea how much worse they were, those shells; when I had turned my back I expected to be hit every moment. ”

“ Coco says that their chief worry was lest they shouldn’t find enough straw to sleep on, or at least enough to tie up their feet in bundles to keep them warm.
At Mouzon they crossed the Meuse, and here Coco slept more comfortably than he had for a week, on a sack full of straw at a farm. After a day’s wait for orders—and no meat even here—they set out again, passed through Carignan, and soon reached the last village in France—Florenville.18 “Don’t send me any more French money,” Coco here wrote to his mother. “It won’t be any use to me now!” Poor Coco! ”

“ Lift up your hearts! If you wish your Country everlasting honor, let every man die at his post, if necessary, rather than surrender another inch of ground, and the victory will be ours.
It was not Gallic sentimentality now. It was the voice of a leader who wasted no words. ”

“ Georges, staggering back, taken by surprise with the others, as men dropped all about him, caught sight on a low hillside beyond78 of a deep gray mass of men extended in battle front only a hundred meters away. There, waiting to hold back the advance, was at least a full regiment of infantry—one of those hundreds of little rear guards that were left absolutely unsupported, to cover the German retreat, and to fight to the death without hope of success. ”

“ Emotion swept the ranks and men wept without shame. The tremendous suggestion put into those thousands of minds had a terrible potency. Georges said that71 morning he felt as if he were intoxicated; he grew suddenly like a giant. It seemed as if nothing on earth could possibly resist them, now.
Bread and biscuits were handed out and the Twentieth Regiment was hurried to a wood two miles away. Already they had begun to move northward. But again it was their fate to be held in reserve, while the brunt of the attack was given to other troops. ”

“ It seemed like some hideous mistake.10 But already Coco, pink-cheeked, laughing, shy, his mother’s only boy, was well on his way toward the German shells and machine guns!
III
The French do nothing without a flavoring of sentiment. Rhetoric flowers in the official proclamations; it makes one laugh even to read the textbooks for soldiers, they are so strewn with fine, resounding phrases; and so, of course, it was quite impossible for Coco’s regiment to get away without one of those stirring, gesticulative speeches by the colonel. ”

“ A wagon flew past, with men inside feeding out telephone wire, hooking it with long poles into the ditch, or over bushes, out of the way, as they galloped on. Best of all, he began to get fresh meat for dinner, from the portable kitchens that hurried from company to company along the road. But always, never stopping, night or68 day, more exciting than all the rest, never forgotten, no matter what happened, in the north, growing ever nearer—the steady rumbling thunder of the German guns. ”

“ His narrative is concerned with only the first six weeks of the fighting, and mostly with that terrible retreat from Belgium, so bitter in its disappointments, so trying to the flamboyant courage of the French. Hardly had they rallied along the Marne and begun to pursue the enemy when Georges was wounded and invalided home. It was there in the hospital that I got his history; and from those talks, and his notebook, and his letters to his aunt, I have reconstructed the trials and emotions of this lad of twenty. ”

“ Coming to a halt, they bivouacked in a wide field. It thundered and it lightened. Soaked and cheerless, the regiment tried19 to sleep. The fires wouldn’t burn. One couldn’t even smoke a cigarette. As Coco turned on his side the water oozed under him sloshily.
He dozed off, however, after a while, only to be awakened by a punch in the ribs. “Listen!” François was saying. “What’s that?”
“Thunder, of course!” Coco, irritated, rolled over again, opened his eyes after a while, and saw François still sitting up, alert.
“That’s not thunder!” he exclaimed. “Listen! it’s cannonading!” ”

“ Coco was already a hero—and, after eight days without meat, that bacon was certainly good! How they all laughed and chattered! But the old men stood apart and listened anxiously; for, through all that rejoicing there came steadily the distant sound of guns. Surely the Germans were coming nearer! If they ever got to Bertrix—The old men shook their heads with foreboding.
Again the whistle blew—Forward! The22 enemy was only a few miles away now; it was getting exciting. The boys, proud, patriotic, confident, started “La Marseillaise” and the song was taken up by the whole column—“Marchons! ”

“ The men, exhausted with the digging and the marching and the watching, with their few hours’ sleep constantly interrupted by alarms, trudged hopelessly southward, too glum to talk. Constantly the officers encouraged them—“Just to that hill there, men! Come on!” but it took more than their optimism to restore the courage of the troops. Man after man stopped, absolutely incapable of going further, and slumped down by the side59 of the road only to be forced on, kicked on again by the corps of gendarmes which followed the march. ”

“ Marchons!” they sang—but Coco was singing, he admits, to keep up his courage, as he tramped on through the mud to be shot at. He tried to keep in mind that he was marching on gloriously to fight for his country; but he couldn’t help thinking of what he had heard of those terrible machine guns at Liége and Namur.
Halt! The captain whipped out his field glasses—everybody gazed eagerly ahead. There it was, there! coming steadily nearer, flying low—a German aeroplane—a “Taube” reconnoitering. There was a quick order. As the whir of the motor grew nearer the lieutenant of Coco’s platoon pointed. ”

“ Georges went on, when I forced him. “Then, I must have almost fainted, I think; I don’t know what happened till I found myself wiping my face, and something was holding me. It was the bayonet of that German’s that was caught in the wing of my overcoat, somehow—and he was lying on the ground with the blood still coming out of his stomach. There were lots of our men81 on the ground, but lots more of Germans. The rest of them were running; they were two hundred meters away by this time, and our men were after them, sticking them like pigs.... ”

“ Mon Dieu! could it be that they were to retreat no longer? That, at last, they were to make a stand? A hope like a gaining fire sprang up and swept from man to man.
It was early in the morning of Sunday, September 6, that on the heights south of Mailly the regiment was assembled for re70view. To the accompaniment of an incessant, raging bombardment from the German cannon, the colonel read aloud this message from General Joffre, Commander in Chief of the Allied Forces:
Children of France, the hour of the great battle has arrived! ”