Part 2
It would take all evening to tell about that one action, or Fontinelle Raid, alone. There is so much I could tell you about my Battalion, funny things, as well as serious, to say nothing of our Division or the French soldiers and people and what not, that I hardly know what to tell.
But I do know we haven’t much time so I think we’ll make a long jump, skipping things equally interesting, the bombardments, the patrols, the raids, the experiences and trials at Fontinelle, then the hard marches, the sleepless, shelterless nights in cold rain and mud, the hardships of the Argonne and our part during the early days of that famous American drive, our tiresome movement from that front and our taking over from the French on the night of October 6th and 7th of C. R. Musson, an important section of the Marbache sector’s front, on the east bank of the Moselle River just south and a little west of Metz.
I’ll pass over the many interesting and trying happenings and experiences of the thirty-one straight days--intense, nerve-racking days and nights that we occupied that position, and take it up a few days before the armistice, or just before the preliminary to the long-talked of drive for Metz. I’ll only have time to tell you briefly of a small part of that, but perhaps you may gain some faint realization of how the boys fought and suffered and won.
First, just a few words to show you the way in which the Ninety-second Division had taken over and held the Marbace sector. At three o’clock on the morning of October 6th, after marching all night, the Second Battalion of the Three Hundred and Sixty-fifth Infantry arrived at Aton, a village about three miles behind the front lines. All that day I spent at the front with the commander of the French battalion then holding the C. R. During the afternoon my officers and part of the non-coms. came up and went over the positions assigned them. That night we stealthily moved in and the French moved out.
This was a key position. Through it, varying from two to five hundred yards from the bank of the river, ran what was known as the Great Metz Road. We held a front of about a mile and a half. I wish I had a big map or a blackboard and time to show you. I can see it all now as plainly as if I were there. Across the Moselle adjoining us on our left at that time was a white division. About two weeks before the armistice the C. R. next to us and adjoining the river, was taken over and occupied by a battalion of the Three Hundred and Sixty-seventh Infantry of our Division. The C. R. on our right was taken over the night following our arrival by the First Battalion of our Regiment. The First and Third Battalions took turns holding that C. R. The Three hundred and Sixty-sixth Infantry kept one battalion in line on their right. Adjoining it were the French. Our own division artillery got into position behind us only a few days before the end. At first our Division had three battalions, and during the last two weeks, four battalions in the front line. We held a front line section several times as long as did any other battalion of the Division, in the Marbache sector. Thirty-one straight days was a long, hard stretch for a battalion in an important and far from quiet front or first line position.
Finally, on the night of November 6th-7th we were at last moved back about five miles to the second line of defense. The officers and men were almost completely worn out, many of them bordering on nervous collapse. But even now the Battalion was to get no rest. On the 7th, in compliance with orders from the Commanding General, we put over an operation in which “H” Company and half of “E” went over the top, and on the 8th I was up in front again on very short notice in command of a daylight contact patrol in which I used all of “F” Company, half of “G” and part of the regimental machine gun company.
So during those two days in the second line, instead of resting, almost the entire Battalion had been all the way back up to the front, over the top, and back again. These were small but extremely trying--tired as we were--and also rather costly operations. I say small--I mean comparatively small as to the numbers of officers and men engaged, but to the individual engaged they were large, quite large. A number were killed and many wounded, including two captains, Mills, commanding “F” Company, and Cranson, commander of “G.”
This Battalion had caught most of the hell in the St. Die sector, had done its full share in the Argonne, though, due to the fortunes of war, I suppose, little if any mention is made of it, and in the Marbache sector had held the most important C. R. continuously up to the night of the 6th and 7th, and after the operations of the 7th and 8th just mentioned, you can judge what condition my outfit was in on the morning of November 9th.
Nevertheless, on the morning of November 9th, I received word that the Commanding General had just arrived at Regimental Headquarters in Loisey and wished to see me at once. So, dog-tired, aching all over and dead for sleep, I got into a sidecar and went back. Just as I expected, he handed me an order, Brigade order, that had been sanctioned by Division Headquarters, G. H. Q., and the High Allied Command covering our Brigade’s part in the inauguration or preliminary to the Metz drive. It started something like this: “Major Warner A. Ross, commanding the Second Battalion, Three Hundred and Sixty-fifth Infantry, will at five o’clock on the morning of November 10th, attack enemy positions--named them--to the east of the Moselle River, will advance to the northern edge of Bois Frehaut and to such and such a point on the river bank and hold until further orders,” etc. That evening I received a similar order, changed somewhat from the first one, but what it all meant was that it was up to us--the Battalion--to capture and above all to hold this strong key position just up the river from Metz.
In so far as we were concerned it was a frontal attack on the general position of Metz. How far the Allies intended or expected to drive straight on toward Metz I do not know. The long advance was to be southeast of us with the idea of eventually isolating Metz. Judging by what happened to us and to the attackers on our flanks during the tenth and eleventh, it would have been foolish, if not impossible, to advance further along the Moselle. That is why the capturing and holding of Bois Frehaut was especially glorious.
The generals commanding our Division and Brigade seemed very anxious that this operation prove a success. Up to this time the Division had not accomplished anything very startling in the way of capturing German strongholds, but here, before the expected armistice went into effect, was an opportunity to prove the Division’s ability and worth and refute any whisperings that might be in the air. In other words, to quote one of my high ranking superiors, full and real success here would forever give the division a leg to stand on.
Mine, then, was the honor of being in direct command of the main operation which started the long discussed Allied move to capture Metz, said to be the most impregnable German stronghold. Mine, too, was the opportunity to give a colored battalion a chance to prove its worth beyond all peradventure, to help them disprove the widely circulated report that colored troops could not advance and hold under real and prolonged heavy fire, to help them dispel the impression so many had that colored officers--platoon leaders and company commanders--could not successfully handle colored soldiers. In short, to give them a chance to win a victory that will stand out more clearly as the years go by, a victory requiring all the virtues that soldiers, individually and collectively should possess--a victory clear cut, unaided, complete and unquestionable, where others had failed and against a stronghold, a part of and guarding a strategic position that at all hazards the enemy meant to hold.
The Second Battalion of the Three Hundred and Sixty-fifth Infantry was chosen, despite its long and continuous work in the front lines, its greatly depleted ranks and shortness of officers. Reinforced by other units, other men and other officers of the Three Hundred and Sixty-fifth Infantry, the Second Battalion at last met its supreme test--its golden opportunity. I shall try briefly to tell you what it did, for “Bois Frehaut,” under the guns of Metz, will remain a memorial to the discipline, the efficiency, the bravery, and devotion to duty of an American colored battalion.
The Three Hundred and Sixty-seventh Infantry, as previously mentioned, had recently taken over one battalion sector or C. R. just across the river. They, too, had orders to advance. A battalion of the white division on their left also was to advance. On our right a small part of a battalion (to be exact, two platoons--about half of one company) of the Three Hundred and Sixty-sixth Infantry was to advance through our Third Battalion, then occupying that C. R.
I may as well tell you, what many people know, that although this was the beginning of the great Allied movement to reduce the strategic stronghold of Metz, with division after division massing behind us and to our right, the battalion of the white division to the left of the Three Hundred and Sixty-seventh rushed ahead at zero hour on the morning of the 10th, lost one hundred and fifty-six men in less than five minutes and withdrew to their trenches. The attack battalion of the Three Sixty-seventh sized up the situation and barely left their trenches so withering was the fire.
The troops of a part of a battalion of the Three Hundred and Sixty-sixth on our right rushed out to take a small wood that laid east of the positions we were to take, got almost to their objectives and rushed back owing to the accuracy and intensity of enemy fire. But it didn’t matter much outside of leaving my battalion’s right flank entirely wide open, for Bois de la tete d’Or and Bois Frehaut of our position far outflanked it and made it untenable for the Germans. A map of the positions involved tells the story. I tell you this not to discredit or belittle units on our right and left, but to prove that what the Second Battalion of the Three Hundred and Sixty-fifth Infantry there accomplished was far from easy and that when it came to defending Metz the enemy was decidedly on the job.
Bois Frehaut is a hilly, dense wood about five hundred yards east of the Moselle River, rising from low, flat, boggy land. This low ground extends around and eastward south of the wood, between it and the northern edge of East Pont-a-Musson, in the form of a broad swale gradually narrowing and rising from a point south of the center of the wood. This broad swale was no-man’s land. Behind Bois Frehaut to the north enemy ground continued to rise, culminating in a very high hill or mountain overlooking the wood, no-man’s land, Pont-a-Musson and the entire country for miles around. Near its summit was an exceptionally fine observation post, reached by a long tunnel.
In speaking of the action of Bois Frehaut or the capture of Bois Frehaut the places called Belle Aire Farm, Bois de la Tete d’Or and Ferme de Pence are included. They are parts of and join Bois Frehaut. This position was a separate and distinct place entirely surrounded by clear ground and most ideally situated for the enemy for defense purposes. My knowledge of what was done by units on our right and left was gained during the action through my efforts to keep in touch with and to establish liaison with those units on our flanks.
On three separate occasions during the preceding four months Allied troops had attempted to capture this Bois Frehaut. Once a French outfit, after considerable artillery preparation, got into the edge of it by a turning movement and stayed about ten minutes. Later French Senegalese troops penetrated its east flank a short distance and stayed less than one hour. At the time American troops reduced the St. Mihiel Salient they made a frontal attack on Bois Frehaut and Ferme de Belle Aire, an outpost position in front of and about half as wide as the wood proper. This advance or pinch was supposed to start east of Bois Frehaut and take it with the big salient, but it had to pivot on Bois Frehaut instead of straightening the line from Momeny, for this was near Metz and one of the strong outlying centers defending it, so the attackers never got through the outside systems of wire. As a result of this the Allied first line on the west side of the river was several kilometers in advance of our line on the east bank before we took Bois Frehaut and straightened it. I remember that as we went through the Ferme de Belle Aire wire I counted twenty-six American bodies or parts of bodies in one small section. They had been lying or hanging there since about September 13th.
Such, then, was the position the Second Battalion of the Three Hundred and Sixty-fifth Infantry, short two captains and nine lieutenants, its ranks badly thinned and the whole outfit dead tired, was ordered to capture and to hold. This was the morning of the ninth, the companies were widely separated, we were almost five miles behind our front line and we were to attack at five o’clock the next morning.
There was not a minute to lose. Early in the afternoon we were up in East Pont-a-Musson. We would spend the night completing our preparations there. Our first lines at the point where I had decided to leave them were just north of the edge of the town. From there, for several kilometers, they ran in a north-easterly direction, but my orders called for a _head-on_ attack along the entire enemy front. Prospective casualties for us seemed not to concern those of my superiors and their assistants who had laid down the general outline for this affair and for several previous affairs. I haven’t time here to go into details as to that statement, but I assure you I am not telling anything imaginative or that I can not substantiate. I am saying little or nothing of any battalion or organization other than my own. What I say of it and things pertaining to it are not meant to apply to anything else. They are the result of personal knowledge and experience.
The commanding General had wished me luck and departed. The Lieutenant Colonel practically had put the regiment at my disposal and gone to Loisey. The whole thing was now up to us. There were a thousand things to think of and do and very little time in which to do them. I called the officers together and gave instructions about equipment of all sorts--ammunition, gas masks, sag paste, rations--things that had to be sent back for, and so on.
I sent for certain units of the Headquarters Company, and annexed a part of the officers and men of the First Battalion. By the way, its Major had been killed by the Germans a few days before. I also sent for the Regimental Machine Gun Company, for I had a foreboding that the company of the Brigade Machine Gun Battalion designated to report to me in the orders would not arrive in time. So I played safe. Then I spent about two hours inspecting and watching the preparations go forward. At six P. M. I sat down to study in detail and to systematize our plan of attack. Everything must be thought out and arranged in advance. All contingencies must, if possible, be foreseen and provided for. The foe we were going against was highly organized and knew his position. He was experienced, efficient and crafty in the art of war.
Promptly at eight-thirty, as ordered, the officers assembled at the house we were using as temporary Battalion Headquarters. The company from the Machine Gun Battalion had not arrived and for what we were about to undertake, machine guns were important. So I called Captain Allen and his lieutenants of our Regimental Machine Gun Company into the conference. Had the other company arrived, Captain Allen of the company I had sent for on my own initiative, probably would not now be lying buried in France. So works fate, as some call it. It’s a sad thing to have to order officers and men on missions of almost certain death, especially when they are so willing, even anxious to go, and when you know them as well as I knew mine, but such is war.
For hours in a dimly candle-lighted room we worked. Studied charts and blue prints, planned each move of each detachment and platoon in detail. Company and platoon commanders laid their courses, drew maps and studied them carefully, for they would have to travel independently and by compass after entering enemy wire. We carefully rehearsed our plans of liaison. In short, every detail was gone over; all emergencies we could conceive of were discussed, so that each captain and each platoon leader (some were non-coms.) knew his part and its relation to the whole. Each one explained aloud just what he was to do and when and how, and how such and such developments were to affect his actions. For you must know that nothing but well-nigh faultless team work would enable us to accomplish our mission.
To capture and to hold this strong and seemingly impregnable key position under the big guns of the world renowned fortress of Metz, to say nothing of its other means of defense, with but one battalion and but five minutes’ artillery preparation, did not mean to rush out with a whoop and sweep all before us. It required a thorough, practical knowledge gained by experience of all the complicated phases of trench and open warfare. It required officers and non-commissioned officers of iron nerve and cool judgment under fire, and brave troops of exceptional discipline and the finest training. Whether those higher up expected us to succeed or could have expected any battalion to succeed, I doubted. So I had made up my mind we would succeed.
At one thirty-five A. M. I received word by telephone from the Brigade Adjutant that Zero hour would be seven o’clock instead of five. At three A. M. I said, “I’m going to lead you over and into that place. I’ll be with you and I’m going to _stick_. I’ll never come back except on orders from proper authority unless carried back unconscious or dead. This meeting is adjourned.” For fully a minute they remained perfectly still--not one moved. Then one at a time they got up, shook my hand and filed out into the cold and darkness--the vast, ominous outdoors. And I knew then by the look on each leader’s face that we would be annihilated or win.
They roused their men, for they had been ordered to get what rest they could, and there in the chill and dead of night, explained to them just what was to be done; explained each man’s part, for each man has a part in a job like that. Certain things had arrived during the night. These were distributed, final inspections were made and by five o’clock all was in readiness for the start. The four companies of infantry, “H,” “G,” “E” and “F,” the Regimental Machine Gun Company, the One-Pounder and Stokes Mortar Platoons, the Pioneer Platoon and Signal outfits from the Headquarters Company, the specialty detachments from Division Headquarters, the Doctors and Stretcher Bearers--all were there lined up in battalion front, at increased intervals, along the great Metz road.
For a moment I paused, feeling or sensing, as it were, my Battalion, for I could see only the shadowy forms of a few who were nearest. I wondered if those at home knew or could have any realization of what these men were doing and suffering for them. All through that awful night I had heard not one word of complaint. Not a grumble had reached my ears, and I smiled as I remembered the many times before, even away back in the Argonne or St. Die (it seemed ages ago then), how, when I had approached within hearing of disconsolate looking groups of men, shivering all night long, perhaps in deep mud and cold rain, because of mistakes higher up or for unavoidable causes, some old fellow in the group had started to sing or said some silly thing intended to be funny and how all the others had _laughed_--for my benefit. And these were the men I was about to lead out there where it looked to all of us like sure annihilation. These were the remnant of that Battalion, and I--, but the hour had come.
I started at the right of the line, which would be the rear when they swung into column, followed by my Adjutant, Lieutenant Pritchard. It was just before dawn, that most spookey and shivery of all hours--a few degrees above freezing, but the cold, fleecy mist that enveloped us seemed to penetrate our very bones. Just enough light was filtering through for me to recognize each officer and man as I walked slowly close to the line. Not a word was spoken--not a sound, save the never tearing _screech_ of an occasional shell with its ugly blast, or the rattling, echoing _tat, tat, tat-a-tat!_ of a machine gun or an automatic rifle in the distance.
Along the whole wide front I moved--sadly, looking into the face of each man, each so busy with his thoughts. How pinched, how tired--how worn they looked. Many cheeks were wet with tears. Each man made an effort to smile. Many chins and lips trembled. The very chill and the darkness seemed charged and potent with _death_. But every head was high. Every form was rigidly erect. “They are just great children,” I thought, “so proud in their sacrifice, so brave, so true in this awful preliminary hour--great trusting, innocent boys suffering for the sins and for the sakes of others, and mine the sad, oh, _unspeakably sad_, duty of leading them to death, or to horrors and suffering even worse.” Had I not been going _with_ them I could not have faced them then. I reached the end of the line. My staff and runners fell in behind me. The Captain of the leading company gave a signal, repeated down the line. They swung--“_Squads left!_” And the Death March had begun.
No band was playing, no colors flying, no loved ones and friends admiring, cheering--just on through the ghastly night--and I could feel the very heart beat of those twelve hundred and fifty brave men behind me as plainly as I could hear the muffled tread of their hob-nailed shoes. For I loved that Battalion. It was the pride of my life. And there was not one among all those hundreds of big, black heroes of mine that would not have gone through _hell_ for his Major. And no one knew it better than I.
On, on, thump, thump, thump, up the familiar road, under the great bare trees, past the deserted, shell marked houses, and damp, tomb-like ruins that had once been happy homes. Then we were in the outskirts of the town. On the left was the arch, the big iron gate and the ruined house under which were the dugouts of the battalion infirmary. Soon we were passing the Battalion graveyard to our right, with its rows of mounds and wooden crosses barely discernible.
And strangely enough, at a time like this, I thought of one very dark night, much darker than this, with flares and star shells and colored rockets lighting no-man’s land, not far away, and the flash and roar of big guns and screaming shells, when we buried our first man there, killed the night we first moved into the sector. And I remembered how helpless and small he seemed as they gently laid him in his shallow grave, and then when we bent near to conceal the brief glare of a pocket flashlight, how _proud_ he looked, with a great hole through his chest torn by a flying chunk of jagged steel, and only a blanket for a coffin, and the expression of peace on the young black face, for he had stuck and died at his post. And then when the little, muddy grave was filled, how pitiful and how lonely he seemed, as we left him to darkness in that blood soaked foreign soil--so far from his loved ones and home.