The Delta of the Triple Elevens

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For breakfast the committee brought back an iron-bound kettle of
oatmeal; another kettle of prunes and a quantity of bread. The system
then was one of "help yourself and pass it on," which was all right
for the fellow at the head of the table, but the fellows on the
opposite end had to do the figuring.

The same procedure was followed at noon when slum was served. Night
mess in England invariably was cheese and tea and jam, which was
always good as far as it went. The entire 311th regiment was served
from one kitchen. It was good fortune that the Americans had
individual mess kits with them and that there occurred no sanitary
inspections of said eating utensils while in C Camp where fifteen
hundred mess kits were washed in a two by four bucket.

During the first day in an English camp many of the soldiers slipped
past the M. P.'s and made their way to the town; a quaint market town
and municipal borough, numbering almost 4,000 inhabitants, in the New
Forest Parliamentary division of Hampshire. As far as sight seeing,
the only thing of interest in the town was an old abbey. Cafes were
numerous, while English ale signs were more numerous.

An American Y. M. C. A. was housed under canvas at Camp Woodley. The
workers in charge prepared a royal entertainment, while the regimental
band gave a concert the second night of the soldiers' stay in
camp. Members of a Romsey dramatic club furnished the entertainment.
Towards the close the band struck up, "The Star Spangled Banner,"
then, "God Save the King." The Romsey entertainers started to sing
their National Anthem, while the Americans joined in with, "My Country
'Tis of Thee." All that was needed to complete the effect of the Babel
scene was John J. Jlosky and Otto Skirkie to sing, "Down Where the
Green River Flows."

Reveille for Friday, August 2nd, had been set for 7:30 a. m. All heads
were awakened by the bugle at 6:45 o'clock that morning. No one in
Battery D stirred. The impression was that the call was for another
outfit. Six fifty-five found First Sergeant James J. Farrell going
from tent to tent to find out the cause of the silence. Then there was
great hustling to get out in line and many a woolen puttee was missing
that morning.

The day was destined to be a rough one. It was raining at reveille
call and still raining when call was sounded at 9:30 o'clock for a
hike. The hike was started and continued for three miles, so did the
rain. The longer the soldiers walked the faster it rained. The scenery
was beautiful through the stretch of pleasantly situated country in
the rich valley of the Test. Picturesque English homesteads, set amid
hedges and roses, with moss-overgrown thatched roofs, dotted the
wayside. At a cross-roads the battery halted for rest. Along the road
came a baker's wagon. There was a raid on its gingerbread cookies. The
bakerman reaped a harvest of good American quarters for every three
cookies he handed out.

Drenched through slicker, et al. the soldiers retraced their step to
Camp Woodley, the beauties of the flowery countryside being lost to a
majority by the far-soaking rain. When Lieut. Hugh Clarke dismissed
the watery battery admonition was added for everybody to change to dry
clothing. But, alas, the advice was far better than expedient. The
only clothes the soldiers possessed at the time were wet on their
backs. Their extra uniform and clothing was in their barrack-bags,
which had not been seen since leaving Camp Meade. No fire was
available. The only open course was to let the clothes dry on the
back. The boys of Battery D spent a very lonely afternoon, sitting in
the tents, with wet clothes. And, it continued raining on the outside.

When the battery drew individual rations, consisting of one can of
corned-beef; a hunk of cheese; a box of hard bread and a can of jam,
at 9:30 o'clock, Saturday morning, August 3rd, the sun was shining
and the day was waxing warm. Under full pack the command started for
the seaport of Southampton.

Romsey is seven miles Northwest of Southampton by the London and
Southwest railway, but the 311th did not take the L. & S. W. The
hob-nail limited was the official troop train and the route covered
nine miles by winding road.

It was on this hike that "Corona" became lost. David B. Koenig, the
battery clerk, was the chaperon of "Corona." But he could not carry
her all the way, so the boys took turns at carrying the precious
thing. During one of the rest-halts, however, some one left poor
little "Corona" lay by the roadside. When her disappearance was
discovered it was necessary for Lieut. Clarke to hike back several
miles and find the lost. "Corona" was the battery typewriter.

Southampton was reached at 12:30 o'clock. Stop was made at the British
rest camp at the Commons where refreshments, in addition to the cheese
and jam rations, were secured at the British Y. M. C. A. canteen. At 2
p. m. that day it started to rain and at 2:15 the regiment resumed its
march and reached the docks at 3:15 o'clock.

It was a regiment of tired soldiers who sat on their packs in the big
warehouse pier at Southampton waiting for word to go up the gang-plank
of the vessel that was to take them across the English Channel.

"The King Edward" was the name of the channel-going vessel that drew
alongside the pier late in the afternoon. It was a cute-looking boat,
just big enough to transport Battery D across the channel in comfort.
At 6:30 p. m., Battery D and 1200 other members of the 311th were
loaded on the King Edward. Everybody had a pleasant time. No space
went to waste, whatever. Some tried to sleep during the long night
that ensued while standing against a post and others tried to strap
themselves to the ceiling with their cartridge belts. In general the
scene was like unto a large meat-cooler in a butcher shop, with the
exception that the ship furnished life-preservers instead of
meat-hooks and the temperature was the extreme of zero.

Convoyed by several destroyers with piercing search lights, which
scanned the same waters that held the dead of the Hospitalship
Walrilda, which was torpedoed in the English Channel while conveying
wounded back to England, the King Edward started on its dash across
the channel at 8:30 p. m., on the night of the day that the Walrilda
met its fate.

The troops huddled together in the small hatches of the King
Edward did not have much thought where they were or whither bound.
They did not recall at the time that they were passing the Isle of
Wight and the spot in the English Channel that witnessed the defeat of
the Armada in the same month, back in the year 1588.

Sufficient unto the night was the misery thereof. Sea sickness came
over quite a few, which was duly abetted by the stifling air. Those
near the hatch-ways were fortunate in getting to the deck rails when
their inner recesses were most severely tempest-tossed. Those who were
hemmed in on all sides by human forms, who lay stretched on the
stairs, in hallways, benches and wherever there was an inch of space,
had a difficult time when they attempted to find a passage way through
the closely matted carpet of humanity.

Col. C. G. Mortimer, the regimental commander, came down from his
station on the deck and found it well-nigh impossible to get through
the corridor of the forward saloon.

Through the hours of the long night the King Edward was convoyed
across the channel at a speed nearing 25 knots an hour. Early morning
of Sunday, August 4th, drew the King Edward near the shores of
Northern France. At 2 p. m. the ship approached a harbor, but it was
not until daylight that those on board could see a sign on a warehouse
of a pier, bearing the name Cherbourg.

CHAPTER XIV.

SO THIS IS FRANCE!

"So this is France!"

For the first time the boys of Battery D repeated this phrase in all
its reality as they stood upon elevated ground in the vicinity of the
British Rest Camp at Cherbourg and viewed the vista of harbor, four
miles distant, where, from the gang-plank of the King Edward they set
foot on French soil on Sunday morning, August 4th, at 8 o'clock.

The panorama presented the naval and commercial harbors, from which
Cherbourg, the seaport of Northwestern France, derives its chief
importance. The eye can see the three main basins, cut out of the
rock, with an area of fifty-five acres, which forms the naval harbor
and to which are connected dry-docks; the yards where the largest
ships in the French navy are constructed; magazines and the various
workshops required for an arsenal of the French navy.

A glance about reveals surrounding hills, in which batteries are
located in fortification of the works and the town.

A second glance toward the harbor shows a large naval hospital close
to the water's-edge, at the mouth of the Divette, on a small bay at
the apex of the indentation formed by the Northern shore of the
Peninsula of Cotentin. There is also at the mouth of Divette, the
commercial harbor, connecting with the sea by a channel. This harbor
consists of two parts, an outer harbor and an inner basin. Outside
these harbors is the triangular bay, which forms the road-stead of
Cherbourg.

The bay is admirably sheltered by the land on three sides, while on
the North it is sheltered by a large breakwater, which is protected
and leaves passage for vessels. The passages are guarded by forts
placed on islands intervening between the breakwater and the mainland,
and themselves united to the mainland by breakwaters.

Glimpses of the town of Cherbourg which the boys received as they
hiked the four miles from the docks to the rest camp, through narrow
and crooked streets, revealed no buildings of special interest, apart
from the church of La Trinite dating from the 15th century; a statue
of the painter J. F. Millet, born near Cherbourg, stands in the public
gardens and there is an equestrian statue of Napoleon I in the square
named after him. After reaching the rest camp the soldiers were
unable to get down to the town again, although they had been told that
the Hotel de Ville housed a rich collection of paintings.

It was at 10 a. m. when the regiment arrived at the British Rest Camp
at Cherbourg. Halt was made on a large parade ground in front of a
Y. M. C. A. hut. The boys stretched themselves on the ground while
search was instituted for the area the outfit was to occupy at its
second rest camp.

Rest had just been commanded a few minutes when the command to
"fall-in" was sounded. Everybody hustled to their feet, shouldered the
heavy pack and awaited the next order.

"About-Face" was ordered. And the regiment obeyed. "Rest" was next.
This was the first time in the history of the battery that it was
necessary to shoulder packs to execute an about-face.

The camp consisted of dome-shaped, sheet-iron barracks and tented
areas. After an hour's wait Battery D was assigned to the 13th row of
Section C of the tented area. Tents were pyramid in shape. Fourteen
men were crowded into each tent that was originally intended for
eight.

By laying in wheel formation, with fourteen pairs of feet meeting at
the center pole, the boys rested themselves on the board floors of the
tents that night. There was no room for packcarriers and other
paraphanelia in the tents. Most of the soldiers deposited their excess
luggage on the outside. About midnight it started to rain. There was a
scurry to get the equipment in out of the rain, which also disturbed
the sweet slumbers as water trickled in under the canvass or else came
through leaks in the roof.

Reveille sounded at 5:30 the next morning. Orders were given for packs
to be rolled preparatory to moving. A move was made from Section C to
row 19 of D Section of the same tented area. The remainder of the
morning was set apart for Battery D to take a bath. The soldiers' bath
had been a negligible quantity since leaving Camp Meade, with the
exception of some few who attempted to work up a lather with salt
water on the Morvada. To the boys, therefore, the prospect of a good
bath was hailed with delight.

No dressing room was attached to the bathhouse that was situated at
one end of the Cherbourg rest camp. Therefore the boys had to make
ready for the bath in their tents. With slickers and shoes on the
battery lined up and marched to the bathhouse, while the rain came
down and the wind was wont to play with the flaps of the raincoats, as
a battery of bare-legs was exposed to the elements.

Arrived at the bathhouse, it was discovered that the showers would
accommodate eight at one time. The first squad in line went into the
water sanctum, while everybody else waited their turn on the outside.

The showers consisted of three half-inch pipes suspended from the
ceiling. There were three lengths of pipe, each length being
perforated at two places to emit the shower of water. The perforations
comprised about four holes, each hole about one-sixteenth of an inch
in diameter.

The first eight who entered the bathhouse were eager to get under the
showers and consequently did not glance about to inspect the equipment
of the room. The eight soldiers braced themselves under the showers
and yelled for the man in charge to turn on the water. Instead of
being washed away by the force of the current, as the firmly braced
attitude of each gave evidence that such was to be the case, the
opening wide of the flood-gates let four needle-like streams of water
descend upon each figure.

The eight took the bath good-naturedly and as they passed out of the
bathhouse, making room for the next eight to enter, they passed word
along the end of the waiting line to the effect that it would be just
as expedient to take off the slicker and stand out in the rain, that
was still falling.

The same evening orders to leave the rest camp came forth. At 6 p. m.
the regiment was assembled on the parade ground and soon started its
march back over the four miles, through Cherbourg, to the railroad
yards of the Ouest-Etat railway, which skirted the docks.

Arrived there at 7:45 p. m., sections of French trains were assembled
ready to receive the soldiers. This assemblage of coaches was of
infinitely greater variety than those of English ownership. Third
class coaches were in evidence, but of greater import were the box
cars containing the inscription, "40 Hommes or 8 Chevaux."

Forty men or eight horses may have been the official capacity but when
forty soldiers with equipment C were assigned to such a car to spend
the night and several succeeding nights, all that was needed to make
sardines was a little oil.

Several sections of the battery were fortunate in securing third-class
accommodations, but the remainder prepared to settle themselves in the
box cars, the majority of which cars turned out to have flat wheels as
the journey started.

Daylight remained abroad for the first two hours of the journey;
while the cars jolted over the rails the boys sang and kept alive the
spirit. Then came darkness. No lights in the car. Forty men stretched
out in a small box-car. Incidently it might be added that a French
box-car is about one-half the size of similar type of car used on the
railroads in the United States. It wasn't fair to kick your buddy in
the face or get on his ear. The night, however, gradually wore on and
the towns of Valognes, Isigny and Manche St. Lo, were passed. Thence
out of the Manche department, through the railroad center at Vire, in
Calvados, the special, with its side-door Pullmans, rolled on, enroute
through Flers, Coutenne and Pre during the early hours of the morning
of August 6th. Daylight dawned as Alencon was reached and at 11:30 a.
m., Le Mans loomed in sight. A half-hour's ride from Le Mans and an
half-hour lay-over was ordered. The troops were allowed to alight for
the time. A supply of iron rations was also furnished each car from
the supply car of the special.

The next stop was made at Tours from 6 to 8 p. m. A short lay-over was
also made at Poitiers at 11 p. m. The troop special was then nearing
its destination. But few on board were aware that at the end of the
next thirty-four kilometers was Montmorillon, in the department of
Vienne, which was to be the stopping off place of Battery D for a stay
of several weeks.

The troop special of thirty-five coaches and box cars, pulled into the
station at Montmorillon at 1 a. m.; all was quiet about the station. A
majority of the soldiers were too tired to care about location. They
slumbered on as best they could in their box-car berths, while the
special was pulled in on a siding, to remain until daylight when the
order to detrain was to be issued.

[Illustration: MONTMORILLON STATION
Where Battery D Detrained in France After Leaving British Rest Camp
at Cherbourg.]

[Illustration: MONTMORILLON STREET SCENE
Building Marked X was Billet for Half of the Battery During the First
Month Spent on French Soil.]

CHAPTER XV.

WHITE TROOPS INVADE MONTMORILLON.

Dotted with quaint architecture of 12th and 13th century Romanesque
and Gothic design, the hills of Vienne department, France, cradle the
crystal-clear and drowsy-moving waters of the Gartempe, a river, which
in its course winds through the town of Montmorillon, where four
thousand French peasantry, on August 7th, received their first lesson
in American cosmopolitism.

Montmorillon, where the boys of Battery D were billeted for the first
time in the midst of the French people; where they received their
first impressions on French life and mannerisms, lives in memory of
the boys as the prettiest, cleanest and most-comfortable place of any
the outfit visited during its sojourn in France.

Despite the fact that a feeling of strained hospitality attended the
reception of the 311th Artillery, the first body of white American
troops to visit Montmorillon, the cloud of suspicion was soon lifted
and four weeks of smiling August sunshine days, undarkened by
rainclouds, were spent along the banks of the Gartempe.

When the 311th troops alighted from the troop special early on the
morning of their arrival, the station and avenues of approach to the
town were guarded by American negro M. P.'s, members of the 164th
Artillery Brigade, who had arrived in the town several weeks previous
and had made themselves at home with the natives.

The 311th was not in Montmorillon many days before the explanation of
the half-hearted reception came to light. An element of negro troops
had started the story on its rounds among the guileless French
peasants that the white troops, who had just arrived, comprised the
"Scum of America," and that they (the negroes) were the real
Americans; the whites being the so-called "American Indians." As the
flames of gossip spread from tongue to tongue, admonition was added
that the white arrivals were dangerous and corrupt and the French
should refrain from associating with the new arrivals.

Thus there was created an intense and bitter racial feeling that
loomed gigantic and threatened open racial hostilities as the white
and colored American troops traveled the same streets of a foreign
village; were admitted to the same cafes and vied with each other for
the friendship of the French populace.

Street fights were not infrequent, while scenes in cafes were
enacted wherein white refused to sit in the same room with colored
troops or vice-versa.

Persisting in their set standard of chivalry, the element of the white
soldiers often took it as ordained to induce the French demoiselles to
leave the company of their opposite in blood. Many of the colored
troops were equally persistent, with the result that the breach of
ill-feeling gaped bigger, until official cognizance came to bear.

Within a short time the 164th Brigade was withdrawn from Montmorillon,
leaving the 311th to commence its active and intensive course of
training on foreign soil.

On August 7th, the day of the 311th's arrival, the troops waited at
the station for several hours while the billeting officers were
locating billets throughout the town. Iron rations were partaken of at
the station and everybody was glad that battery mess outfits would
soon set up shop and the American Q. M. system of rationing would be
resumed.

The march through the town to the various assigned billeting districts
was started from the station at 9:30 o'clock. The batteries of the
regiment were scattered in various billets throughout the town. Every
vacant house, barn or shed that possibly could be pressed into
service, was designated as a billet for the troops.

Battery D continued its march through the town; across the cement
bridge over the Gartempe; into an octagon-shaped intersection of
public streets, lined with several three-story buildings, the
principal one of which gave evidence of being a cafe and bore the
sign, "Cafe du Commerce."

Opposite the bridge, the route was along Rue de Strasburg, where, in
the rear of the Cafe du Commerce, Battery D halted before a
three-story stone structure that bore signs of having been vacated for
many years.

The area billeting officer produced a large key, threw open the door
and half the battery was ushered inside. It immediately fell their
task to brush the cow-webs from the ceilings; gather up the fallen
plaster from the floor; sweep out several years' accumulation of dirt
and dust; while the old-fashioned shutters were pried open for the
first time in many years and the sunshine streamed into the rooms, to
drive away, to some degree, the mustiness of environment.

The other half of the battery was directed to a barn structure
about a block distant from the first battery abode. Clean-up
activities of similar nature were instituted in the barn.

About 3 o'clock that afternoon the barrack bags of the regiment were
received and distributed to the soldiers. The bags had been in transit
ever since leaving Camp Meade.

Arrangements were made with several French farmers to bring a quantity
of straw to the public square, where the soldiers, later in the
afternoon, filled their bed ticks. It was on a tick of straw, thrown
on the floor of the old dilapidated, vacated house, that one hundred
of the battery spent their nights of sleep in Montmorillon while the
other half occupied similar beds on the upper-lofts of the barn.

There were no formations the morning after arrival. The battery men
spent most of the time about town. It was strange to observe the
peasantry hobbling along in their wooden shoes, the flopping of the
loose footwear at the heels beating a rhythmic clap, clap on the
cobblestone pave.

Each day brought new scenes of peasant life. Quaintly and slowly oxen
under yoke were used on the streets to haul the farmers' grain to the
large public square, where, under the scorching sun the farmer and his
helpers toiled with hand flailers, thrashing the grain. Strange
looking carts, drawn by donkeys with large ears, vied with the
ox-carts for supremacy of traffic.

Along the river's edge were located public places for clothes-washing.
The peasant whose house adjoined the river had a private place at the
water's-edge where the family washing was done. The river served as a
huge tub for the entire community, the women carrying their wash to
the river, where, kneeling at special devised wash-boards, garments
were rubbed and paddled until they shown immaculate.

Washing was greatly increased at the river when the 311th came to
town. The hundreds of soldiers sought out washer-women. The peasant
women welcomed the opportunity of earning a few francs doing American
washing. The more active of the washer-women spent entire days washing
at the river for the soldiers. At first one franc was a standard price
for having a week's laundry done, but as days passed and business
became brisker, rates went up to two, five and in some instances
higher.

To the Americans the town of Montmorillon, as was the case of most of
the ancient towns visited in France, presented an impression of
isolation. Houses built during the 12th century with their high walls
surrounding and barricaded entrances, were greatly in evidence; houses
of such nature, history records, as furnishing protection in the days
when feudalism fought at spear-points. The stages and wages of war
advanced with the centuries, but not so with the ancient French town;
where the peasants live content with no sewerage or drainage system;
content to pursue the antiquated customs. To be thrown in the midst of
this 12th century environment was productive of lasting impressions on
the part of the American troops who were suddenly transplanted from a
land of 20th century civilization and advancement, to an old and
foreign soil.

The first night the 311th was in Montmorillon fire broke out in "The
Baines," an ornate and modern French homestead near the Cafe du
Commerce. Several officers of the 311th regiment had secured quarters
in the Baines. They were forced to vacate by the fire. Bucket brigades
was the only fire protection the prefecture afforded its citizenry.
The fire drew a large crowd of the new soldiers, a score of whom took
active charge of fighting the blaze; giving the Frenchmen a real
exhibition in the art of bucket-brigade fire extinction.

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