Produced by Don Kostuch





[Transcriber's Notes]

My father's part in WWI attracted me to this book. I recall him talking
briefly about fighting the Bolsheviki in Archangel. "The machine gun
bullets trimmed the leaves off the trees, as if it were fall." Like most
veterans, he had little else to say.

This book mentions his campaign on page 736; "August 3, 1918.--President
Wilson announces new policy regarding Russia and agrees to cooperate
with Great Britain, France and Japan in sending forces to Murmansk,
Archangel and Vladivostok."

My father's experience seems to be described in the following excerpt
from the University of Michigan "The University Record", April 5, 1999.
"Bentley showcases items from World War I 'Polar Bears'"; by Joanne
Nesbit.


"During the summer of 1918, the U.S. Army's 85th Division, made up
primarily of men from Michigan and Wisconsin, completed training at Fort
Custer in Battle Creek, Mich., and proceeded to England. The 5,000
troops of the division's 339th Infantry and support units realized that
they were not being sent to France to join the great battles on the
Western Front when they were issued Russian weapons and equipment and
lectured on life in the Arctic regions.

"When they reached their destination in early September, 600 miles north
of Moscow, the men of the 339th joined an international force commanded
by the British that had been sent to northern Russia for purposes that
were never made clear. The Americans were soon spread in small fighting
units across hundreds of miles of the Russian forest fighting the
Bolsheviks who had taken power in Petrograd and Moscow.

"The day of the Armistice (Nov. 11) when fighting ceased for other
American armies, the allied soldiers were fighting the Bolsheviks said
to be led by Trotsky himself. After three days, the allies finally were
able to drive off the Bolsheviks. While this fight was a victory for the
Americans, the battle led to the realization that the war was not over
for these men. As the weeks and months passed and more battles were
fought, the men began to wonder if they would ever get home.

"The men of the 339th generally were well equipped with winter clothing
during the winter of 1918-19 while stationed near the Arctic Circle,
where temperatures reached minus 50 degrees Fahrenheit.

"There was little daylight for months at a time. Knowing that the war was
over for other American soldiers, the morale of the troops declined
throughout the winter.

"Families and friends of the men began to clamor for their return.
Politicians unwilling to support an undeclared war against the Russian
government joined in their demand. A petition to Congress was
circulated. Several of the British and French units mutinied and refused
to continue fighting. In early April, the American troops learned that
they would be withdrawn as soon as the harbor at Archangel was cleared
of ice.

"It was not until June of 1919 that the men of the 339th sailed from
Russia and adopted the polar bear as their regimental symbol. After a
stop in New York, the troops went on to Detroit where they took part in
a gala July 4 homecoming parade at Belle Isle."


The converted text for several chapters is copied from Project
Gutenberg's eBook 16282, History of the World War, Vol. 3, prepared by
Juliet Sutherland, Jennifer Zickerman, and the Project Gutenberg Online
Distributed Proofreading Team. This edition has minor differences,
mostly additional passages and images.

When considering monetary values listed in the text, one United States
dollar in 1918 is equivalent to about thirteen dollars in 2006. One
United States dollar in 1918 is equivalent to about 5.6 French Francs in
1918; one Franc in 1918 is equivalent to about 2.3 dollars in 2006.

For additional insight  into the pilots and air battles of the war read
"The Red Knight of Germany; The Story of Baron von Richthofen, Germany's
Great War Bird" by  Floyd Gibbons. This book is copyright 1927 and will
not be freely available online until 2022.

In the PDf and Doc versions, the following pages contain additional maps
that may assist in understanding some of the references to locations in
the text. The first shows Western France. The second map contains many
of the locations of the European battles.  They are adapted from
Putnam's Handy Volume Atlas of the World, published by G.P. Putnam's
Sons, New York and London, 1921.

The next two maps from the USMA, West Point, map collection, compare
Europe before and after World War I.

Finally, a full map of the European theater has much detail. It should
be scaled up to about 500% for detail viewing. It is derived from a
larger map from Rand, McNally & Company's Indexed Atlas of the World,
Copyright 1898.


[Illustration: Western France; Southern England]


[Illustration: Western Front Battle Zone--Eastern France; Southern
Belgium; Western Germany]


[Illustration: WWI Locales; Lens; Cinde; Mons; Douai; Valenciennes;
Cambri Landrecies; St. Quentin; Sedan; Argonne Forest; Noyon; Chauny;
Soissons; Rheims; Verdun; Metz; Chateau-Thierry; St. Mihiel; Paris;
Sezanne]


[Illustration: Europe Before World War I]


[Illustration: Europe After World War I]


[Illustration: Europe, 1898]



This is a glossary of unfamiliar (to me) terms and places.

Boche
  Disparaging term for a German.

camion
  Truck or bus. [French]

charnel
  Repository for the dead.

colliers
  Coal miner

congerie
  Accumulation, aggregation, collection, gathering

consanguinities
  Relationship by blood or common ancestor. Close affinity.

deadweight
  Displacement of a ship at any loaded condition minus the lightship
  weight (weight of the ship with no fuel, passengers, cargo). It
  includes the crew, passengers, cargo, fuel, water, and stores.

debouch
  March from a confined area into the open; to emerge

Gross Tonnage
  Volume of all ship's enclosed spaces (from keel to funnel) measured to
  the outside of the hull framing (1 ton / 100 cu.ft.).

inst.
  The current month: your letter of the 15th instant.

invest
  Surround with troops or ships; besiege.

irredenta
  Region culturally or historically related to one nation, but subject
  to a foreign government.

Junker
  Member of the Prussian landed aristocracy, formerly associated with
  political reaction and militarism.

Kiao-chau
  German protectorate from 1898 to 1915, on the Yellow Sea coast of
  China. It was on 200 square miles of the Shantung Peninsula around the
  city of Tsingtao, leased to Germany for one hundred years by the
  imperial Chinese government. In 1898 Tsingtao was an obscure fishing
  village of 83,000 inhabitants. When Germany withdrew in 1915, Tsingtao
  was an important trading port with a population of 275,000.

kine
  Plural of cow.

kultur
  German culture and civilization as idealized by the exponents of
  German imperialism during the Hohenzollern and Nazi regimes.

lighterage
  Transportation of goods on a lighter (large flatbottom barge used to
  deliver or unload goods to or from a cargo ship or transport goods
  over short distances.)

lyddite
  An explosive consisting chiefly of picric acid, a poisonous, explosive
  yellow crystalline solid, C6H2(NO2)3OH.

mitrailleuse
  Machine gun.

morganatic
  Marriage between a person of royal birth and a partner of lower rank,
  where no titles or estates of the royal partner are to be shared by
  the partner of inferior rank nor by any of the offspring.

nugatory
  Of little or no importance; trifling; invalid.

pastils
  Small medicated or flavored tablet; tablet containing aromatic
  substances burned to fumigate or deodorize the air; pastel paste or
  crayon.

poilus
  French soldier, especially in World War I.

pourparler
  Discussion preliminary to negotiation.

prorogue
  Discontinue a session of parliament; postpone; defer.

punctilio
  Fine point of etiquette; precise observance of formalities.

rinderpest
  Contagious viral disease, chiefly of cattle, causing ulceration of the
  alimentary tract and diarrhea.

Sublime Porte
  [French. Porte: a gate] Ottoman court; government of the Turkish
  empire; from the gate of the sultan's palace.

Tsing-tao (Qing-dao)
  City in eastern China on the Yellow Sea, north-northwest of Shanghai.
  The city was leased in 1898 to the Germans, who established a famous
  brewery.

Uhlans
  Horse cavalry of the Polish, German, Austrian, and Russian armies.

ukase
  Order or decree; an edict; proclamation of a czar having the force of
  law in imperial Russia.

verbund
  [German] Interconnection.

Wipers
  British soldiers' pronunciation of "Ypres".

Zemstvos
  An elective council for the administration of a provincial district in
  czarist Russia.

[End Transcriber's notes]



[Illustration: THE VICTORIOUS GENERALS; photographs]
  General Foch, Commander-in-Chief of all Allied forces. General
  Pershing, Commander-in-Chief of the American armies. Field Marshal
  Haig, head of the British armies. General d'Esperey (French) to whom
  Bulgaria surrendered. General Diaz, Commander-in-Chief of the Italian
  armies. General Marshall (British), head of the Mesopotamian
  expedition. General Allenby (British), who redeemed Palestine from the
  Turks.




HISTORY OF THE WORLD WAR

An Authentic Narrative of The World's Greatest War

By FRANCIS A. MARCH, Ph.D.
In Collaboration with
RICHARD J. BEAMISH
Special War Correspondent
and Military Analyst

With an Introduction
By GENERAL PEYTON C. MARCH
Chief of Staff of the United States Army


Illustrated with Reproductions from
the Official Photographs of the United
States, British and French Governments


PUBLISHED FOR THE UNITED PUBLISHERS OF THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA
PHILADELPHIA   CHICAGO   TORONTO
1919



COPYRIGHT, 1918

FRANCIS A. MARCH

This history is an original work and is fully protected by the copyright
laws, including the right of translation. All persons are warned against
reproducing the text in whole or in part without the permission of the
publishers.


WAR DEPARTMENT,
OFFICE OF THE CHIEF OF STAFF.
WASHINGTON,

NOVEMBER 14, 1918.
With the signing of the Armistice on November 11, 1918, the World War
has been practically brought to an end. The events of the past four
years have been of such magnitude that the various steps, the numberless
battles, and the growth of Allied power which led up to the final
victory are not clearly defined even in the minds of many military men.
A history of this great period which will state in an orderly fashion
this series of events will be of the greatest value to the future
students of the war, and to everyone of the present day who desires to
refer in exact terms to matters which led up to the final conclusion.

The war will be discussed and re-discussed from every angle and the
sooner such a compilation of facts is available, the more valuable it
will be. I understand that this History of the World War intends to put
at the disposal of all who are interested, such a compendium of facts of
the past period of over four years; and that the system employed in
safeguarding the accuracy of statements contained in it will produce a
document of great historical value without entering upon any speculative
conclusions as to cause and effect of the various phases of the war or
attempting to project into an historical document individual opinions.
With these ends in view, this History will be of the greatest value.
Signature [Payton C. March]
General,
Chief of Staff.
United States Army.



CONTENTS

CHAPTER I. A WAR FOR INTERNATIONAL FREEDOM
  A Conflict that was Inevitable--The Flower of Manhood on the Fields of
  France--Germany's Defiance to the World--Heroic Belgium--Four
  Autocratic Nations against Twenty-four Committed to the Principles of
  Liberty--America's Titanic Effort--Four Million Men Under Arms, Two
  Million Overseas--France the Martyr Nation--The British Empire's
  Tremendous Share in the Victory--A River of Blood Watering the Desert
  of Autocracy

CHAPTER II. THE WORLD SUDDENLY TURNED UPSIDE DOWN
  The War Storm Breaks--Trade and Commerce Paralyzed--Homeward Rush of
  Travelers--Harrowing Scenes as Ships Sail for America--Stock Markets
  Closed--The Tide of Desolation Following in the Wake of War

CHAPTER III. WHY THE WORLD WENT TO WAR
  The Balkan Ferment--Russia, the Dying Giant Among Autocracies--Turkey
  the "Sick Man" of Europe--Scars Left by the Balkan War--Germany's
  Determination to Seize a Place in the Sun.

CHAPTER IV. THE PLOTTER BEHIND THE SCENES
  The Assassination at Sarajevo--The Slavic Ferment--Austria's
  Domineering Note--The Plotters of Potsdam--The Mailed Fist of
  Militarism Beneath the Velvet Glove of Diplomacy--Mobilization and
  Declarations of War

CHAPTER V. THE GREAT WAR BEGINS
  Germany Invades Belgium and Luxemburg--French Invade Alsace--England's
  "Contemptible Little Army" Lands in France and Belgium--The Murderous
  Gray-Green Tide--Heroic Retreat of the British from Mons--Belgium
  Overrun--Northern France Invaded--Marshal Joffre Makes Ready to Strike

CHAPTER VI. THE TRAIL OF THE BEAST IN BELGIUM
  Barbarities that Shocked Humanity--Planned as Part of the Teutonic
  Policy of Schrecklichkeit--How the German and the Hun Became
  Synonymous Terms--The Unmatchable Crimes of a War-Mad Army--A Record
  of Infamy Written in Blood and Tears--Official Reports

CHAPTER VII. THE FIRST BATTLE OF THE MARNE
  Joffre's Masterly Plan--The Enemy Trapped Between Verdun and
  Paris--Gallieni's "Army in Taxicabs"--Foch, the "Savior of
  Civilization," Appears--His Mighty Thrust Routs the Army of
  Hausen--Joffre Salutes Foch as "First Strategist in Europe"--Battle
  that Won the Baton of a Marshal

CHAPTER VIII. JAPAN IN THE WAR
  Tsing Tau Seized by the Mikado--German "Gibraltar" of the Far East
  Surrendered After Short Siege--Japan's Aid to the Allies in Money,
  Ships, Men and Nurses--German Propaganda in the Far East Fails

CHAPTER IX. CAMPAIGN IN THE EAST
  Invasion of East Prussia--Von Hindenburg and Masurian Lakes--Battle of
  Tannenberg--Augustovo--Russians Capture Lemberg--The Offer to Poland

CHAPTER X. STRUGGLE FOR SUPREMACY ON THE SEA
  The British Blockade--German Raiders and Their Fate--Story of the
  Emden's Remarkable Voyage--Appearance of the Submarine--British Naval
  Victory off Helgoland--U-9 Sinks Three British Cruisers

CHAPTER XI. THE SUBLIME PORTE
  Turkish Intrigues--The Holy War--Mesopotamia and Transcaucasia--The
  Suez Canal--Turkey the Catspaw of Germany

CHAPTER XII. RESCUE OF THE STARVING
  Famine in Belgium--Belgium Relief Commission Organized in
  London--Herbert C. Hoover--American Aid--The Great Cardinal's Famous
  Challenge

CHAPTER XIII. BRITANNIA RULES THE WAVES
  German and British Squadrons Grapple off the Chilean Coast--Germany
  Wins the First Round--England Comes Back with Terrific Force--Graphic
  Picture of the Destruction of the German Squadron off Falkland
  Islands--English Coast Towns Bombarded for the First Time in Many
  Years.

CHAPTER XIV. NEW METHODS AND HORRORS OF WARFARE
  Tanks--Poison Gas--Flame Projectors--Airplane Bombs--Trench
  Mortars--Machine Guns--Modern Uses of Airplanes for Liaison and
  Attacks on Infantry--Radio--Rifle and Hand Grenades--A War of
  Intensive Artillery Preparation--A Debacle of Insanities, Terrible
  Wounds and Horrible Deaths.

CHAPTER XV. GERMAN PLOTS AND PROPAGANDA IN AMERICA
  Trailing the German Plotters--Destruction of Ships--Pressure on
  Congress--Attacks in Canada--Zimmerman's Foolish Effort to Embroil
  America with Mexico and Japan--Lies of the Propagandists After America
  Entered the War--Dumba, Von Bernstorff, Van Papen and Boy-Ed, a quartet
  of Unscrupulous Destructionists

CHAPTER XVI. SINKING OF THE LUSITANIA
  The Submarine Murderers at Work--Germany's Blackband Warning--No
  Chance for Life--The Ship Unarmed and Without Munitions--The
  President's Note--Germany's Lying Denials--Coroner's Inquest Charges
  Kaiser with Wilful Murder--"Remember the Lusitania" One of America's
  Big Reasons for Declaring War

CHAPTER XVII. NEUVE CHAPELLE AND WAR IN BLOOD-SOAKED TRENCHES
  War Amid Barbed-Wire Entanglements and the Desolation of No Man's
  Land--Subterranean Tactics Continuing Over Four Years--Attacks that
  Cost Thousands of Lives for Every Foot of Gain

CHAPTER XVIII. STEADFAST SOUTH AFRICA
  Botha and Smuts, Rocks of Loyalty Amid a Sea of Treachery--Civil War
  that Ended with the Drowning of General Beyers and the Arrest of
  General De Wet--Conquest of German Colonies--Trail of the Hun in the
  Jungle

CHAPTER XIX. ITALY DECLARES WAR ON AUSTRIA
  Her Great Decision--D'Annunzio, Poet and Patriot--Italia
  Irredenta--German Indignation--The Campaigns on the Isonzo and in the
  Tyrol

CHAPTER XX. GLORIOUS GALLIPOLI
  A Titanic Enterprise--Its Objects--Disasters and Deeds of Deathless
  Glory--The Heroic Anzacs--Bloody Dashes up Impregnable
  Slopes--Silently they Stole Away--A Successful Failure

CHAPTER XXI. THE GREATEST NAVAL BATTLE IN HISTORY
  The Battle of Jutland--Every Factor on Sea and in Sky Favorable to the
  Germans--Low Visibility a Great Factor--A Modern Sea Battle--Light
  Cruisers Screening Battleship Squadron--Germans Run Away when British
  Fleet Marshals Its Full Strength--Death of Lord Kitchener

CHAPTER XXII. THE RUSSIAN CAMPAIGN
  The Advance on Cracow--Van Hindenburg Strikes at Warsaw--German
  Barbarism--The War in Galicia--The Fall of Przemysl--Russia's
  Ammunition Fails--The Russian Retreat--The Fall of Warsaw--Czernowitz

CHAPTER XXIII. HOW THE BALKANS DECIDED
  Ferdinand of Bulgaria Insists Upon Joining Germany--Dramatic Scene in
  the King's Palace--The Die is Cast--Bulgaria Succumbs to Seductions of
  Potsdam Gang--Greece Mobilizes--French and British Troops at
  Saloniki--Serbia Over-run--Roumania's Disastrous Venture in the Arena
  of Mars

CHAPTER XXIV. THE CAMPAIGN IN MESOPOTAMIA
  British Army Threatening Bagdad Besieged in Kut-el-Amara--After Heroic
  Defense General Townshend Surrenders After 143 Days of Siege--New
  British Expedition Recaptures Kut--Troops Push on up the Tigris--Fall
  of Bagdad, the Magnificent

CHAPTER XXV. CANADA'S PART IN THE GREAT WAR
By COL. GEORGE G. NASMITH, C. M. G.
  Enthusiastic Response to the Call to Action--Valcartier Camp a
  Splendid Example of the Driving Power of Sir Sam Hughes--Thirty-three
  Liners Cross the Atlantic with First Contingent of Men and
  Equipment--Largest Convoy Ever Gathered Together--At the Front with
  the Princess Pat's--Red Cross--Financial Aid--Half a Million Soldiers
  Overseas--Mons, the Last Stronghold of the Enemy, Won by the Men from
  Canada--A Record of Glory

CHAPTER XXVI. IMMORTAL VERDUN
  Grave of the Military Reputations of Von Falkenhayn and the Crown
  Prince--Hindenburg's Warning--Why the Germans Made the Disastrous
  Attempt to Capture the Great Fortress--Heroic France Reveals Itself to
  the World--"They Shall Not Pass"--Nivelle's Glorious Stand on Dead Man
  Hill--Lord Northcliffe's Description--A Defense Unsurpassed in the
  History of France

CHAPTER XXVII. MURDERS AND MARTYRS
  The Case of Edith Cavell--Nurse Who Befriended the Helpless, Dies at
  the Hands of the Germans--Captain Fryatt's Martyrdom--How Germany
  Sowed the Seeds of Disaster

CHAPTER XXVIII. THE SECOND BATTLE OF YPRES
  The Canadians in Action--Undismayed by the New Weapon of the
  Enemy--Holding the Line Against Terrific Odds--Men from the Dominion
  Fight Like Veterans

CHAPTER XXIX. ZEPPELIN RAIDS ON FRANCE AND ENGLAND
  First Zeppelin Attack Kills Twenty-eight and Injures Forty-four--Part
  of Germany's Policy of Frightfulness--Raids by German Airplanes on
  Unfortified Towns--Killing of Non-Combatants--The British Lion
  Awakes--Anti-Aircraft Precautions and Protections--Policy of Terrorism
  Fails

CHAPTER XXX. RED REVOLUTION IN RUSSIA
  Rasputin, the Mystic--The Cry for Bread--Rise of the Council of
  Workmen's and Soldiers' Delegates--Rioting in Petrograd--The
  Threatening Cloud of Disaster--Moderate Policy of the Duma Fails--The
  Fatal Easter Week of 1917--Abdication of the Czar--Last Tragic Moments
  of the Autocrat of All the Russias--Grand Duke Issues Declaration
  Ending Power of Romanovs in Russia--Release of Siberian
  Revolutionists--Free Russia

CHAPTER XXXI. THE DESCENT TO BOLSHEVISM
  Russia Intoxicated with Freedom--Elihu Root and His Mission--Last
  Brilliant Offensive in Galicia--The Great Mutiny in the Army--The
  Battalion of Death--Kerensky's Skyrocket Career--Kornilov's
  Revolt--Loss of Riga--Lenine, the Dictator--The Impossible "Peace" of
  Brest-Litovsk

CHAPTER XXXII. GERMANY'S OBJECT LESSON TO THE UNITED STATES
  Two Voyages of the Deutschland--U-53 German Submarine Reaches Newport
  and Sinks Five British and Neutral Steamers off Nantucket--Rescue of
  Survivors by United States Warships--Anti-German Feeling in America
  Reaching a Climax

CHAPTER XXXIII. AMERICA TRANSFORMED BY WAR
  The United States Enters the Conflict--The Efficiency of Democracy--
  Six Months in an American Training Camp Equal to Six Years of German
  Compulsory Service--American Soldiers and Their Resourcefulness on
  the Battlefield--Methods of Training and Their Results--
  The S. A. T. C.

CHAPTER XXXIV. HOW FOOD WON THE WAR
  The American Farmer a Potent Factor in Civilization's
  Victory--Scientific Studies of Food Production, Distribution and
  Consumption--Hoover Lays Down the Law Regulating Wholesalers and
  Grocers--Getting the Food Across--Feeding Armies in the Field

CHAPTER XXXV. THE UNITED STATES NAVY IN THE WAR
  Increase from 58,000 Men to Approximately 500,000--Destroyer Fleet
  Arrives in British Waters--"We Are Ready Now"--The Hunt of the
  U-Boats--Gunnery that is Unrivalled--Depth Charges and Other New
  Inventions--The U-Boat Menace Removed--Surrender of German Under-Sea
  Navy

CHAPTER XXXVI. CHINA JOINS THE FIGHTING DEMOCRACIES
  How the Germans Behaved in China Seventeen Years Before--The Whirligig
  of Time Brings Its Own Revenge--The Far Eastern Republic Joins Hands
  with the Allies--German Propaganda at Work--Futile Attempt to Restore
  the Monarchy--Fear of Japan--War--Thousands of Chinese Toil Behind the
  Battle Lines in France--Siam with Its Eight Millions Defies the
  Germans--End of Teuton Influence in the Orient

CHAPTER XXXVII. THE DEFEAT AND RECOVERY OF ITALY
  Subtle Socialist Gospel Preached by Enemy Plays Havoc with Guileless
  Italians--Sudden Onslaught of Germans Drives Cadorna's Men from
  Heights--The Spectacular Retreat that Dismayed the World--Glorious
  Stand of the Italians on the Piave--Rise of Diaz

CHAPTER XXXVIII. REDEMPTION OF THE HOLY LAND
  A Long Campaign Progressing Through Hardships to Glory--General
  Allenby Enters Jerusalem on Foot--Turkish Army Crushed in Palestine--
  Battle of Armageddon

CHAPTER XXXIX. AMERICA'S TRANSPORTATION PROBLEMS
  Government Ownership of Railroads, Telegraphs, Telephones--Getting the
  Men from Training Camps to the Battle Fronts--From Texas to Toul--A
  Gigantic System Working Without a Hitch

CHAPTER XL. SHIPS AND THE MEN WHO MADE THEM
  The Emergency Fleet Corporation--Charles M. Schwab as Master
  Shipbuilder--Hog Island the Wonder Shipyard of the World--An
  Unbeatable Record--Concrete Ships--Wooden Ships--Standardizing the
  Steel Ship--Attitude of Labor in the War--Samuel Gompers an Unofficial
  Member of the Cabinet--Great Task of the United States Employment
  Service

CHAPTER XLI. GERMANY'S DYING DESPERATE EFFORT
  The High Tide of German Success--An Army of Six Million Men Flung
  Recklessly on the Allies--Most Terrific Battles in all History--The
  Red Ruin of War from Arras to St. Quentin--Amiens Within Arms' Reach
  of the Invaders--Paris Bombarded by Long-Range Guns from Distance of
  Seventy-six Miles--A Generalissimo at Last--Marshal Foch in Supreme
  Command

CHAPTER XLII. CHATEAU-THIERRY, FIELD OF GLORY
  German Wave Stops with the Americans--Prussian Guard Flung Back--The
  Beginning of Autocracy's End--America's Record of Valor and Victory--
  Cantigny--Belleau Wood--Thierry--St. Mihiel--Shock Troops of
  the Enemy Annihilated--Soldier's Remarkable Letter.

CHAPTER XLIII. ENGLAND AND FRANCE STRIKE IN THE NORTH
  Second Terrific Blow of General Foch--Lens, the Storehouse of
  Minerals, Captured--Bapaume Retaken--British Snap the Famous
  Hindenburg Line--The Great Thrust Through Cambrai--Tanks to the
  Front--Cavalry in Action

CHAPTER XLIV. BELGIUM'S GALLANT EFFORT
  The Little Army Under King Albert Thrusts Savagely at the
  Germans--Ostend and Zeebrugge Freed from the Submarine
  Pirates--Pathetic Scenes as Belgians are Restored to Their Homes

CHAPTER XLV. ITALY'S TERRIFIC DRIVE
  Enemy Offensive Opens on Front of Ninety-Seven Miles--Repulse of the
  Austrians--Italy Turns the Tables--Terrific Counter-Thrusts from the
  Piave to Trente--Forcing the Alpine Passages--Battles High in the
  Air--English, French and Americans Back up the Italians in Humbling
  the Might of Austria--D'Annunzio's Romantic Bombardment of
  Vienna--Diaz Leads his Men to Victory

CHAPTER XLVI. BULGARIA DESERTS GERMANY
  Greece in the Throes of Revolution--Fall of Constantine--Serbians
  Begin Advance on Bulgars--Thousands of Prisoners Taken--Surrender of
  Bulgaria--Panic in Berlin--Passage Through the Country Granted for
  Armies of the Allies--Ferdinand Abdicates--Germany's Imagined
  Mittel-Europa Dream Forever Destroyed

CHAPTER XLVII. THE CENTRAL EMPIRES WHINE FOR PEACE
  Austria-Hungary Makes the First Plea--President Wilson's Abrupt
  Answer--Prince Max, Camouflaged as an Apostle of Peace, made
  Chancellor and Opens Germany's Pathetic Plea for a Peace by
  Negotiation--The President Replies on Behalf of all the Allied
  Powers--Foch Pushes on Regardless of Peace Notes

CHAPTER XLVIII. BATTLES IN THE AIR
  Conquering the Fear of Death--From Individual Fights to Battles
  Between Squadrons--Heroes of the Warring Nations--America's Wonderful
  Record--From Nowhere to First Place in Eighteen Months--The Liberty
  Motor

CHAPTER XLIX. HEALTH AND HAPPINESS OF THE AMERICAN FORCES
  Record of the Red Cross on all Fronts--A Gigantic Work Well
  Executed--Y. M. C. A.--Y. W. C. A.--Knights of Columbus--Jewish
  Welfare Association--Salvation Army--American Library
  Association--Other Organizations--Surgery and Sanitation

CHAPTER L. THE PIRATES OF THE UNDER-SEAS
  Germany's Ruthless Submarine Policy--A Boomerang Destroying the Hand
  that Cast It--Terrorism that Failed--One Hundred and Fifty U-Boats
  Sunk or Captured--Shameless Surrender of the German Submarines and of
  the Fleet They Protected

CHAPTER LI. APPROACHING THE FINAL STAGE
  Cutting the Railroads to Cambrai--Americans Co-operate with British in
  Furious Attack--Douai and St. Quentin Taken--The Battle Line
  Straightened for the Last Mighty Assault--All Hope Abandoned by the
  Kaiser

CHAPTER LII. LAST DAYS OF THE WAR
  American Troops Join with the Allies in Colossal Drive on 71-mile
  Front--Historic Sedan Taken by the Yanks--Stenay, the Last Battle of
  the War--How the Opposing Forces Greeted the News of the Armistice

CHAPTER LIII. THE DRASTIC TERMS OF SURRENDER
  Handcuffs for Four Nations--Bulgaria First to Fly the White Flag--
  Allenby's Great Victory Forces Turkey Out--Austria Signs Quickly--
  Germany's Capitulation Complete and Humiliating

CHAPTER LIV. PEACE AT LAST
  An Unfounded Rumor Starts Enormous Jubilation--Armistice Signed Four
  Days Later--Kaiser Abdicates and Flees to Holland--Cowardly Ruler
  Seeks Protection of Small Neutral Nation--Looking Into the
  Future--Cost of War to the Nations--Liberty Loans--Reconstruction
  Problems--McAdoo Resigns--American Ideals in the Old World

CHAPTER LV. AMERICA'S POSITION IN PEACE AND WAR
  President Wilson's Stirring Speech in Congress Which Brought the
  United States into the War--His Great Speech Before Congress Ending
  the War--The Fourteen Points Outlining America's Demands Before Peace
  Could be Concluded--Later Peace Principles Enunciated by the President

CHAPTER LVI. THE WAR BY YEARS
  Condensed Word-Picture of the Happenings of the Most Momentous
  Fifty-two Months in All History--Leading Up to the Eleventh Hour of
  the Eleventh Day of the Eleventh Month of 1918

CHAPTER LVII. BEHIND AMERICA'S BATTLE LINE
  General March's Story of the Work of the Military Intelligence
  Division--Of the War Plans Division--Of the Purchase and Traffic
  Divisions--How Men, Munitions and Supplies Reached the Western Front

CHAPTER LVIII. GENERAL PERSHING'S OWN STORY
  The Commander-in-Chief of the American Expeditionary Forces Tells the
  Story of the Magnificent Combat Operations of his Troops that Defeated
  Prussia's Legions--Official Account Discloses Full Details of the
  Fighting.

CHAPTER LIX. PRESIDENT WILSON'S REVIEW OF THE WAR
  A Year in the Life of the United States Crowded with Great
  Events--Tribute to the Soldiers and Sailors, the Workers at Home Who
  Supplied the Sinews of the Great Undertaking, the Women of the Land
  Who Contributed to the Great Result--The Future Safe in the Hands of
  American Businessmen

SUMMARIZED CHRONOLOGY OF THE WAR



FOREWORD

This is a popular narrative history of the world's greatest war. Written
frankly from the viewpoint of the United States and the Allies, it
visualizes the bloodiest and most destructive conflict of all the ages
from its remote causes to its glorious conclusion and beneficent
results. The world-shaking rise of new democracies is set forth, and the
enormous national and individual sacrifices producing that resurrection
of human equality are detailed.

Two ideals have been before us in the preparation of this necessary
work. These are simplicity and thoroughness. It is of no avail to
describe the greatest of human events if the description is so confused
that the reader loses interest. Thoroughness is an historical essential
beyond price. So it is that official documents prepared in many
instances upon the field of battle, and others taken from the files of
the governments at war, are the basis of this work. Maps and photographs
of unusual clearness and high authenticity illuminate the text. All that
has gone into war making, into the regeneration of the world, are herein
set forth with historical particularity. The stark horrors of Belgium,
the blighting terrors of chemical warfare, the governmental restrictions
placed upon hundreds of millions of civilians, the war sacrifices
falling upon all the civilized peoples of earth, are in these pages.

It is a book that mankind can well read and treasure.



CHAPTER I

A WAR FOR INTERNATIONAL FREEDOM

"My FELLOW COUNTRYMEN: The armistice was signed this morning. Everything
for which America fought has been accomplished. The war thus comes to an
end."

Speaking to the Congress and the people of the United States, President
Wilson made this declaration on November 11, 1918. A few hours before he
made this statement, Germany, the empire of blood and iron, had agreed
to an armistice, terms of which were the hardest and most humiliating
ever imposed upon a nation of the first class. It was the end of a war
for which Germany had prepared for generations, a war bred of a
philosophy that Might can take its toll of earth's possessions, of human
lives and liberties, when and where it will. That philosophy involved
the cession to imperial Germany of the best years of young German
manhood, the training of German youths to be killers of men. It involved
the creation of a military caste, arrogant beyond all precedent, a caste
that set its strength and pride against the righteousness of democracy,
against the possession of wealth and bodily comforts, a caste that
visualized itself as part of a power-mad Kaiser's assumption that he and
God were to shape the destinies of earth.

When Marshal Foch, the foremost strategist in the world, representing
the governments of the Allies and the United States, delivered to the
emissaries of Germany terms upon which they might surrender, he brought
to an end the bloodiest, the most destructive and the most beneficent
war the world has known. It is worthy of note in this connection that
the three great wars in which the United States of America engaged have
been wars for freedom. The Revolutionary War was for the liberty of the
colonies; the Civil War was waged for the freedom of manhood and for the
principle of the indissolubility of the Union; the World War, beginning
1914, was fought for the right of small nations to self-government and
for the right of every country to the free use of the high seas.

More than four million American men were under arms when the conflict
ended. Of these, more than two million were upon the fields of France
and Italy. These were thoroughly trained in the military art. They had
proved their right to be considered among the most formidable soldiers
the world has known. Against the brown rock of that host in khaki, the
flower of German savagery and courage had broken at Chateau-Thierry.
There the high tide of Prussian militarism, after what had seemed to be
an irresistible dash for the destruction of France, spent itself in the
bloody froth and spume of bitter defeat. There the Prussian Guard
encountered the Marines, the Iron Division and the other heroic
organizations of America's new army. There German soldiers who had been
hardened and trained under German conscription before the war, and who
had learned new arts in their bloody trade, through their service in the
World War, met their masters in young Americans taken from the shop, the
field, and the forge, youths who had been sent into battle with a scant
six months' intensive training in the art of war. Not only did these
American soldiers hold the German onslaught where it was but, in a
sudden, fierce, resistless counter-thrust they drove back in defeat and
confusion the Prussian Guard, the Pommeranian Reserves, and smashed the
morale of that German division beyond hope of resurrection.

The news of that exploit sped from the Alps to the North Sea Coast,
through all the camps of the Allies, with incredible rapidity. "The
Americans have held the Germans. They can fight," ran the message. New
life came into the war-weary ranks of heroic poilus and into the
steel-hard armies of Great Britain. "The Americans are as good as the
best. There are millions of them, and millions more are coming," was
heard on every side. The transfusion of American blood came as magic
tonic, and from that glorious day there was never a doubt as to the
speedy defeat of Germany. From that day the German retreat dated. The
armistice signed on November 11, 1918, was merely the period finishing
the death sentence of German militarism, the first word of which was
uttered at Chateau-Thierry.

Germany's defiance to the world, her determination to force her will and
her "kultur" upon the democracies of earth, produced the conflict. She
called to her aid three sister autocracies: Turkey, a land ruled by the
whims of a long line of moody misanthropic monarchs; Bulgaria, the
traitor nation cast by its Teutonic king into a war in which its people
had no choice and little sympathy; Austria-Hungary, a congeries of races
in which a Teutonic minority ruled with an iron scepter.

Against this phalanx of autocracy, twenty-four nations arrayed
themselves. Populations of these twenty-eight warring nations far
exceeded the total population of all the remainder of humanity. The
conflagration of war literally belted the earth. It consumed the most
civilized of capitals. It raged in the swamps and forests of Africa. To
its call came alien peoples speaking words that none but themselves
could translate, wearing garments of exotic cut and hue amid the smart
garbs and sober hues of modern civilization. A twentieth century Babel
came to the fields of France for freedom's sake, and there was born an
internationalism making for the future understanding and peace of the
world. The list of the twenty-eight nations entering the World War and
their populations follow:

Countries.      Population.   Countries.  Population.
United States   110,000,000   Italy       37,000,000
Austria-Hungary  50,000,000   Japan       54,000,000
Belgium           8,000,000   Liberia      2,000,000
Bulgaria          5,000,000   Montenegro     500,000
Brazil           23,000,000   Nicaragua      700,000
China           420,000,000   Panama         400,000
Costa Rica          425,000   Portugal*   15,000,000
Cuba              2,500,000   Roumania     7,500,000
France           90,000,000   Russia     180,000,000
Gautemala         2,000,000   San Marino      10,000
Germany          67,000,000   Serbia       4,500,000
Great Britain   440,000,000   Siam         6,000,000
Greece            5,000,000   Turkey      42,000,000
Haiti             2,000,000        -----------------
Honduras            600,000   Total    1,575,135,000
* Including colonies

The following nations, with their populations, took no part in the World
War:

Countries.   Population.   Countries.   Population.
Abyssinia     8,000,000    Argentina    8,000,000
Afghanistan   6,000,000    Bhutan         250,000
Andorra           6,000    Chile        5,000,000
Colombia      5,000,000    Paraguay       800,000
Denmark       3,000,000    Persia       9,000,000
Ecuador       1,500,000    Salvador     1,250,000
Mexico       15,000,000    Spain       20,000,000
Monaco           20,000    Switzerland  3,750,000
Nepal         4,000,000    Venezuela    2,800,000
Holland*     40,000,000         -----------------
Norway        2,500,000    Total      135,876,000
* Including colonies.

Never before in the history of the world were so many races and peoples
mingled in a military effort as those that came together under the
command of Marshal Foch. If we divide the human races into white,
yellow, red and black, all four were largely represented. Among the
white races there were Frenchmen, Italians, Portuguese, English,
Scottish, Welsh, Irish, Canadians, Australians, South Africans (of both
British and Dutch descent) New Zealanders; in the American army,
probably every other European nation was represented, with additional
contingents from those already named, so that every branch of the white
race figured in the ethnological total.

There were representatives of many Asiatic races, including not only the
volunteers from the native states of India, but elements from the French
colony in Cochin China, with Annam, Cambodia, Tonkin, Laos, and Kwang
Chau Wan. England and France both contributed many African tribes,
including Arabs from Algeria and Tunis, Senegalese, Saharans, and many
of the South African races. The red races of North America were
represented in the armies of both Canada and the United States, while
the Maoris, Samoans, and other Polynesian races were likewise
represented. And as, in the American Army, there were men of German,
Austrian, and Hungarian descent, and, in all probability, contingents
also of Bulgarian and Turkish blood, it may be said that Foch commanded
an army representing the whole human race, united in defense of the
ideals of the Allies.

It will be seen that more than ten times the number of neutral persons
were engulfed in the maelstrom of war. Millions of these suffered from
it during the entire period of the conflict, four years three months and
fifteen days, a total of 1,567 days. For almost four years Germany
rolled up a record of victories on land and of piracies on and under the
seas.

[Illustration: TERRITORY OCCUPIED BY THE ALLIES UNDER THE ARMISTICE OF
NOVEMBER 11, 1918 (East/West: Brussels to Berlin; North South: Keil to
Bern)]
  Dotted area, invaded territory of Belgium, France, Luxembourg and
  Alsace-Lorraine to be evacuated in fourteen days; area in small
  squares, part of Germany west of the Rhine to be evacuated in
  twenty-five days and occupied by Allied and U. S. troops; lightly
  shaded area to east of Rhine, neutral zone; black semi-circles
  bridge-heads of thirty kilometers radius in the neutral zone to be
  occupied by Allied armies.


Little by little, day after day, piracies dwindled as the murderous
submarine was mastered and its menace strangled. On the land, the
Allies, under the matchless leadership of Marshal Ferdinand Foch and the
generous co-operation of Americans, British, French and Italians, under
the great Generals Pershing, Haig, Petain and Diaz, wrested the
initiative from von Hindenburg and Ludendorf, late in July, 1918. Then,
in one hundred and fifteen days of wonderful strategy and the fiercest
fighting the world has ever witnessed, Foch and the Allies closed upon
the Germanic armies the jaws of a steel trap. A series of brilliant
maneuvers dating from the battle of Chateau-Thierry in which the
Americans checked the Teutonic rush, resulted in the defeat and rout on
all the fronts of the Teutonic commands.

In that titanic effort, America's share was that of the final deciding
factor. A nation unjustly titled the "Dollar Nation," believed by
Germany and by other countries to be soft, selfish and wasteful, became
over night hard as tempered steel, self-sacrificing with an altruism
that inspired the world and thrifty beyond all precedent in order that
not only its own armies but the armies of the Allies might be fed and
munitioned.

Leading American thought and American action, President Wilson stood out
as the prophet of the democracies of the world. Not only did he inspire
America and the Allies to a military and naval effort beyond precedent,
but he inspired the civilian populations of the world to extraordinary
effort, efforts that eventually won the war. For the decision was gained
quite as certainly on the wheat fields of Western America, in the shops
and the mines and the homes of America as it was upon the battle-field.

This effort came in response to the following appeal by the President:


These, then, are the things we must do, and do well, besides
fighting--the things without which mere fighting would be fruitless:

We must supply abundant food for ourselves and for our armies and our
seamen not only, but also for a large part of the nations with whom we
have now made common cause, in whose support and by whose sides we shall
be fighting;

We must supply ships by the hundreds out of our shipyards to carry to
the other side of the sea, submarines or no submarines, what will every
day be needed there; and--

Abundant materials out of our fields and our mines and our factories
with which not only to clothe and equip our own forces on land and sea
but also to clothe and support our people for whom the gallant fellows
under arms can no longer work, to help clothe and equip the armies with
which we are co-operating in Europe, and to keep the looms and
manufactories there in raw material;

Coal to keep the fires going in ships at sea and in the furnaces of
hundreds of factories across the sea;

Steel out of which to make arms and ammunition both here and there;

Rails for worn-out railways back of the fighting fronts;

Locomotives and rolling stock to take the place of those every day going
to pieces;

Everything with which the people of England and France and Italy and
Russia have usually supplied themselves, but cannot now afford the men,
the materials, or the machinery to make.

I particularly appeal to the farmers of the South to plant abundant
foodstuffs as well as cotton. They can show their patriotism in no
better or more convincing way than by resisting the great temptation of
the present price of cotton and helping, helping upon a large scale, to
feed the nation and the peoples everywhere who are fighting for their
liberties and for our own. The variety of their crops will be the
visible measure of their comprehension of their national duty.


The response was amazing in its enthusiastic and general compliance. No
autocracy issuing a ukase could have been obeyed so explicitly. Not only
did the various classes of workers and individuals observe the
President's suggestions to the letter, but they yielded up individual
right after right in order that the war work of the government might be
expedited. Extraordinary powers and functions were granted by the people
through Congress, and it was not until peace was declared that these
rights and powers returned to the people.

These governmental activities ceased functioning after the war:
Food administration;
Fuel administration;
Espionage act;
War trade board;
Alien property custodian (with extension of time for certain duties);
Agricultural stimulation;
Housing construction (except for shipbuilders);
Control of telegraphs and telephones;
Export control.

These functions were extended:
Control over railroads: to cease within twenty-one months after the
proclamation of peace.

The War Finance Corporation: to cease to function six months after the
war, with further time for liquidation.

The Capital Issues Committee: to terminate in six months after the peace
proclamation.

The Aircraft Board: to end in six months after peace was proclaimed; and
the government operation of ships, within five years after the war was
officially ended.


President Wilson, generally acclaimed as the leader of the world's
democracies, phrased for civilization the arguments against autocracy in
the great peace conference after the war. The President headed the
American delegation to that conclave of world re-construction. With him
as delegates to the conference were Robert Lansing, Secretary of State;
Henry White, former Ambassador to France and Italy; Edward M. House and
General Tasker H. Bliss.

Representing American Labor at the International Labor conference held
in Paris simultaneously with the Peace Conference were Samuel Gompers,
president of the American Federation of Labor; William Green,
secretary-treasurer of the United Mine Workers of America; John R.
Alpine, president of the Plumbers' Union; James Duncan, president of the
International Association of Granite Cutters; Frank Duffy, president of
the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners, and Frank Morrison,
secretary of the American Federation of Labor.

Estimating the share of each Allied nation in the great victory, mankind
will conclude that the heaviest cost in proportion to prewar population
and treasure was paid by the nations that first felt the shock of war,
Belgium, Serbia, Poland and France. All four were the battle-grounds of
huge armies, oscillating in a bloody frenzy over once fertile fields and
once prosperous towns.

Belgium, with a population of 8,000,000, had a casualty list of more
than 350,000; France, with its casualties of 4,000,000 out of a
population (including its colonies) of 90,000,000, is really the martyr
nation of the world. Her gallant poilus showed the world how cheerfully
men may die in defense of home and liberty. Huge Russia, including
hapless Poland, had a casualty list of 7,000,000 out of its entire
population of 180,000,000. The United States out of a population of
110,000,000 had a casualty list of 236,117 for nineteen months of war;
of these 53,169 were killed or died of disease; 179,625 were wounded;
and 3,323 prisoners or missing.


[Illustration: KINGS AND CHIEF EXECUTIVES OF THE PRINCIPAL POWERS
ASSOCIATED AGAINST THE GERMAN ALLIANCE (King George V of England,
President Raymond of France, President Woodrow Wilson of the United
States, King Victor Emmanuel II of Italy, King Albert I of Belgium)]


[Illustration: Photograph of Clemenceau]
  Copyright International Film Service.
  THE "TIGER" OF FRANCE
  George Benjamin Eugene Clemenceau, world-famous Premier of France, who
  by his inspiring leadership maintained the magnificent morale of his
  countrymen in the face of terrific assaults of the enemy.


[Illustration: THE RIGHT HONORABLE DAVID LLOYD GEORGE]
  British Premier, who headed the coalition cabinet which carried
  England through the war to victory.


[Illustration: KING GEORGE V]
  King of Great Britain and Ireland and Emperor of India, who struggled
  earnestly to prevent the war, but when Germany attacked Belgium sent
  the mighty forces of the British Empire to stop the Hun.


To the glory of Great Britain must be recorded the enormous effort made
by its people, showing through operations of its army and navy. The
British Empire, including, the Colonies, had a casualty list of
3,049,992 men out of a total population of 440,000,000. Of these 658,665
were killed; 2,032,122 were wounded, and 359,204 were reported missing.
It raised an army of 7,000,000, and fought seven separate foreign
campaigns, in France, Italy, Dardanelles, Mesopotamia, Macedonia, East
Africa and Egypt. It raised its navy personnel from 115,000 to 450,000
men. Co-operating with its allies on the sea, it destroyed approximately
one hundred and fifty German and Austrian submarines. It aided
materially the American navy and transport service in sending overseas
the great American army whose coming decided the war. The British navy
and transport service during the war made the following record of
transportation and convoy:

Twenty million men, 2,000,000 horses, 130,000,000 tons of food,
25,000,000 tons of explosives and supplies, 51,000,000 tons of oil and
fuels, 500,000 vehicles. In 1917 alone 7,000,000 men, 500,000 animals,
200,000 vehicles and 9,500,000 tons of stores were conveyed to the
several war fronts.

The German losses were estimated at 1,588,000 killed or died of disease;
4,000,000 wounded; and 750,000 prisoners and missing.

A tabulation of the estimates of casualties and the money cost of the
war reveals the enormous price paid by humanity to convince a
military-mad Germanic caste that Right and not Might must hereafter rule
the world. These figures do not include Serbian losses, which are
unavailable. Following is the tabulation:

  THE ENTENTE ALLIES                     THE CENTRAL POWERS
Russia                     7,000,000     Germany           6,338,000
France                     4,000,000     Austria-Hungary   4,500,000
British Empire (official)  3,049,992     Turkey              750,000
Italy                      1,000,000     Bulgaria            200,000
Belgium                      350,000
Roumania                     200,000
United States (official)     236,117
Total                     15,836,109     Total            11,788,000

Grand total of estimated casualties, 27,624,109, of which the dead alone
number perhaps 7,000,000.

ESTIMATED COST IN MONEY
THE ENTENTE ALLIES                THE CENTRAL POWERS
Russia        $30,000,000,000     Germany          $45,000,000,000
Britain        52,000,000,000     Austria-Hungary   25,000,000,000
France         32,000,000,000     Turkey             5,000,000,000
United States  40,000,000,000     Bulgaria           2,000,000,000
Italy          12,000,000,000                   ------------------
Roumania        3,000,000,000     Total            $77,000,000,000
Serbia          3,000,000,000
         --------------------
Total        $172,000,000,000

Grand total of estimated cost in money, $249,000,000,000. Was the cost
too heavy? Was the price of international liberty paid in human lives
and in sacrifices untold too great for the peace that followed?

Even the most practical of money changers, the most sentimental
pacifist, viewing the cost in connection with the liberation of whole
nations, with the spread of enlightened liberty through oppressed and
benighted lands, with the destruction of autocracy, of the military
caste, and of Teutonic kultur in its materialistic aspect, must agree
that the blood was well shed, the treasure well spent.

Millions of gallant, eager youths learned how to die fearlessly and
gloriously. They died to teach vandal nations that nevermore will
humanity permit the exploitation of peoples for militaristic purposes.

As Milton, the great philosopher poet, phrased the lesson taught to
Germany on the fields of France:

They err who count it glorious to subdue
By conquest far and wide, to overrun
Large countries, and in field great battles win,
Great cities by assault; what do these worthies
But rob and spoil, burn, slaughter, and enslave
Peaceable nations, neighboring or remote
Made captive, yet deserving freedom more
Than those their conquerors, who leave behind
Nothing but ruin wheresoe'er they rove
And all the flourishing works of peace destroy.



CHAPTER II

THE WORLD SUDDENLY TURNED UPSIDE DOWN

Demoralization, like the black plague of the middle ages, spread in
every direction immediately following the first overt acts of war. Men
who were millionaires at nightfall awoke the next morning to find
themselves bankrupt through depreciation of their stock-holdings.
Prosperous firms of importers were put out of business. International
commerce was dislocated to an extent unprecedented in history.

The greatest of hardships immediately following the war, however, were
visited upon those who unhappily were caught on their vacations or on
their business trips within the area affected by the war. Not only men,
but women and children, were subjected to privations of the severest
character. Notes which had been negotiable, paper money of every
description, and even silver currency suddenly became of little value.
Americans living in hotels and pensions facing this sudden shrinkage in
their money, were compelled to leave the roofs that had sheltered them.
That which was true of Americans was true of all other nationalities, so
that every embassy and the office of every consul became a miniature
Babel of excited, distressed humanity.

The sudden seizure of railroads for war purposes in Germany, France,
Austria and Russia, cut off thousands of travelers in villages that were
almost inaccessible. Europeans being comparatively close to their homes,
were not in straits as severe as the Americans whose only hope for aid
lay in the speedy arrival of American gold. Prices of food soared beyond
all precedent and many of these hapless strangers went under. Paris, the
brightest and gayest city in Europe, suddenly became the most somber of
dwelling places. No traffic was permitted on the highways at night. No
lights were permitted and all the cafes were closed at eight o'clock.
The gay capital was placed under iron military rule.

Seaports, and especially the pleasure resorts in France, Belgium and
England, were placed under a military supervision. Visitors were ordered
to return to their homes and every resort was shrouded with darkness at
night. The records of those early days are filled with stories of
dramatic happenings.

On the night of July 31st Jean Leon Jaures, the famous leader of French
Socialists, was assassinated while dining in a small restaurant near the
Paris Bourse. His assassin was Raoul Villein. Jaures had been
endeavoring to accomplish a union of French and German Socialists with
the aim of preventing the war. The object of the assassination appeared
to have been wholly political.

On the same day stock exchanges throughout the United States were
closed, following the example of European stock exchanges. Ship
insurance soared to prohibitive figures. Reservists of the French and
German armies living outside of their native land were called to the
colors and their homeward rush still further complicated transportation
for civilians. All the countries of Europe clamored for gold. North and
South America complied with the demand by sending cargoes of the
precious metal overseas. The German ship Kron Prinzessin with a cargo of
gold, attempted to make the voyage to Hamburg, but a wireless warning
that Allied cruisers were waiting for it off the Grand Banks of
Newfoundland, compelled the big ship to turn back to safety in America.

Channel boats bearing American refugees from the Continent to London
were described as floating hells. London was excited over the war and
holiday spirit, and overrun with five thousand citizens of the United
States tearfully pleading with the American Ambassador for money for
transportation home or assurances of personal safety.

The condition of the terror-stricken tourists fleeing to the friendly
shores of England from Continental countries crowded with soldiers
dragging in their wake heavy guns, resulted in an extraordinary
gathering of two thousand Americans at a hotel one afternoon and the
formation of a preliminary organization to afford relief. Some people
who attended the meeting were already beginning to feel the pinch of
want with little prospects of immediate succor. One man and wife, with
four children, had six cents when he appealed to Ambassador Page after
an exciting escape from German territory.


[Illustration: WHERE THE WORLD WAR BEGAN. Map showing 15 degrees East to
28 degrees East; 35 degrees North to 52 degrees North. Germany and
Russia on the North; the Mediterranean on the South; the Adriatic Sea
on the West; the Aegean and Western Turkey on the East.]


Oscar Straus, worth ten millions, struck London with nine dollars.
Although he had letters of credit for five thousand, he was unable to
cash them in Vienna. Women hugging newspaper bundles containing
expensive Paris frocks and millinery were herded in third-class
carriages and compelled to stand many hours. They reached London utterly
fatigued and unkempt, but mainly cheerful, only to find the hotels
choked with fellow countrymen fortunate to reach there sooner.

The Ambassador was harassed by anxious women and children who asked many
absurd questions which he could not answer. He said:

"The appeals of these people are most distressing. They are very much
excited, and no small wonder. I regret I have no definite news of the
prospects or plans of the government for relief. I have communicated
their condition to the Department of State and expect a response and
assurances of coming aid as soon as possible. That the government will
act I have not the slightest doubt. I am confident that Washington will
do everything in her power for relief. How soon, I cannot tell. I have
heard many distressing tales during the last forty-eight hours."

A crowd filled the Ambassador's office on the first floor of the flat
building, in Victoria Street, which was mainly composed of women, school
teachers, art students, and other persons doing Europe on a shoestring.
Many were entirely out of money and with limited securities, which were
not negotiable.

The action of the British Government extending the bank holiday till
Thursday of that week was discouraging news for the new arrivals from
the Continent, as it was uncertain whether the express and steamship
companies would open in the morning for the cashing of checks and the
delivery of mail, as was announced the previous Saturday.

Doctors J. Riddle Goffe, of New York; Frank F. Simpson, of Pittsburgh;
Arthur D. Ballon of Vistaburg, Mich., and B. F. Martin, of Chicago,
formed themselves into a committee, and asked the co-operation of the
press in America to bring about adequate assistance for the marooned
Americans, and to urge the bankers of the United States to insist on
their letters of credit and travelers' checks being honored so far as
possible by the agents in Europe upon whom they were drawn.


[Illustration: THE CATHEDRAL OF RHEIMS]
  In the first weeks of the war the Germans occupied Rheims, but were
  driven out after von Kluck's retreat. On September 20, 1914, they were
  reported as first shelling the Cathedral of Rheims and the civilized
  world stood aghast, for the edifice, begun in 1212, is one of the
  chief glories of Gothic architecture in all Europe.


[Illustration: Seven men marching abreast.]
  Photo by Underwood and Underwood. N.Y.
  THE KAISER AND HIS SIX SONS
  The ex-Emperor and his sons leading a procession in Berlin soon after
  the declaration of war. It was noted that in spite of their martial
  appearance the royal family were extremely careful to keep out of
  range of the Allied guns. From left to right they are: The Kaiser,
  Crown Prince Wilhelm, Princes Eitel Friedrich, Adalbert, August, Oscar
  and Joachim.


Dr. Martin and Dr. Simpson, who left London on Saturday for Switzerland
to fetch back a young American girl, were unable to get beyond Paris,
and they returned to London. Everywhere they found trains packed with
refugees whose only object in life apparently was to reach the channel
boats, accepting cheerfully the discomforts of those vessels if only
able to get out of the war.

Rev. J. P. Garfield, of Claremore, N. H., gave the following account of
his experiences in Holland:

"On sailing from the Hook of Holland near midnight we pulled out just as
the boat train from The Hague arrived. The steamer paused, but as she
was filled to her capacity she later continued on her voyage, leaving
fully two hundred persons marooned on the wharf.

"Our discomforts while crossing the North Sea were great. Every seat was
filled with sleepers, the cabins were given to women and children. The
crowd, as a rule, was helpful and kindly, the single men carrying the
babies and people lending money to those without funds. Despite the
refugee conditions prevailing it was noticeable that many women on the
Hook wharf clung tenaciously to bandboxes containing Parisian hats."

Travelers from Cologne said that searchlights were operated from the
tops of the hotels all night searching for airplanes, and machine guns
were mounted on the famous Cologne Cathedral. They also reported that
tourists were refused hotel accommodations at Frankfort because they
were without cash.

Men, women and children sat in the streets all night. The trains were
stopped several miles from the German frontier and the passengers,
especially the women and children, suffered great hardship being forced
to continue their journey on foot.

Passengers arriving at London from Montreal on the Cunard Line steamer
Andania, bound for Southampton, reported the vessel was met at sea by a
British torpedo boat and ordered by wireless to stop. The liner then was
led into Plymouth as a matter of precaution against mines. Plymouth was
filled with soldiers and searchlights were seen constantly flashing
about the harbor.

Otis B. Kent, an attorney for the Interstate Commerce Commission, of
Washington, arrived in London after an exciting journey from Petrograd.
Unable to find accommodations at a hotel he slept on the railway station
floor. He said:

"I had been on a trip to Sweden to see the midnight sun. I did not
realize the gravity of the situation until I saw the Russian fleet
cleared for action. This was only July 26th, at Kronstadt, where the
shipyards were working overtime.

"I arrived at the Russian capital on the following day. Enormous
demonstrations were taking place. I was warned to get out and left on
the night of the 28th for Berlin. I saw Russian soldiers drilling at the
stations and artillery constantly on the move.

"At Berlin I was warned to keep off the streets for fear of being
mistaken for an Englishmen. At Hamburg the number of warnings was
increased. Two Russians who refused to rise in a cafe when the German
anthem was played were attacked and badly beaten. I also saw two
Englishmen attacked in the street, but they finally were rescued by the
police.

"There was a harrowing scene when the Hamburg-American Line steamer
Imperator canceled its sailing. She left stranded three thousand
passengers, most of them short of money, and the women wailing. About
one hundred and fifty of us were given passage in the second class of
the American Line steamship Philadelphia, for which I was offered $400
by a speculator.

"The journey to Flushing was made in a packed train, its occupants
lacking sleep and food. No trouble was encountered on the frontier."

Theodore Hetzler, of the Fifth Avenue Bank, was appointed chairman of
the meeting for preliminary relief of the stranded tourists, and
committees were named to interview officials of the steamship companies
and of the hotels, to search for lost baggage, to make arrangements for
the honoring of all proper checks and notes, and to confer with the
members of the American embassy.

Oscar Straus, who arrived from Paris, said that the United States
embassy there was working hard to get Americans out of France. Great
enthusiasm prevailed at the French capital, he said, owing to the
announcement that the United States Government was considering a plan to
send transports to take Americans home.

The following committees were appointed at the meeting:

Finance--Theodore Hetzler, Fred I. Kent and James G. Cannon;
Transportation--Joseph F. Day, Francis M. Weld and George D. Smith, all
of New York; Diplomatic--Oscar S. Straus, Walter L. Fisher and James
Byrne; Hotels--L. H. Armour, of Chicago, and Thomas J. Shanley, New
York.

The committee established headquarters where Americans might register
and obtain assistance. Chandler Anderson, a member of the International
Claims Commission, arrived in London from Paris. He said he had been
engaged with the work of the commission at Versailles, when he was
warned by the American embassy that he had better leave France. He acted
promptly on this advice and the commission was adjourned until after the
war. Mr. Anderson had to leave his baggage behind him because the
railway company would not register it. He said the city of Paris
presented a strange contrast to the ordinary animation prevailing there.
Most of the shops were closed. There were no taxis in the streets, and
only a few vehicles drawn by horses.

The armored cruiser Tennessee, converted for the time being into a
treasure ship, left New York on the night of August 6th, 1914, to carry
$7,500,000 in gold to the many thousand Americans who were in want in
European countries. Included in the $7,500,000 was $2,500,000
appropriated by the government. Private consignments in gold in sums
from $1,000 to $5,000 were accepted by Colonel Smith, of the army
quartermaster's department, who undertook their delivery to Americans in
Paris and other European ports.

The cruiser carried as passengers Ambassador Willard, who returned to
his post at Madrid, and army and naval officers assigned as military
observers in Europe. On the return trip accommodations for 200 Americans
were available.

The dreadnaught Florida, after being hastily coaled and provisioned,
left the Brooklyn Navy Yard under sealed orders at 9.30 o'clock the
morning of August 6th and proceeded to Tompkinsville, where she dropped
anchor near the Tennessee.

The Florida was sent to protect the neutrality of American ports and
prohibit supplies to belligerent ships. Secretary Daniels ordered her to
watch the port of New York and sent the Mayflower to Hampton Roads.
Destroyers guarded ports along the New England coast and those at Lewes,
Del., to prevent violations of neutrality at Philadelphia and in that
territory. Any vessel that attempted to sail for a belligerent port
without clearance papers was boarded by American officials.

The Texas and Louisiana, at Vera Cruz and the Minnesota, at Tampico,
were ordered to New York, and Secretary Daniels announced that other
American vessels would be ordered north as fast as room could be found
for them in navy yard docks.

At wireless stations, under the censorship ordered by the President, no
code messages were allowed in any circumstances. Messages which might
help any of the belligerents in any way were barred.

The torpedo-boat destroyer Warrington and the revenue cutter
Androscoggin arrived at Bar Harbor on August 6th, to enforce neutrality
regulations and allowed no foreign ships to leave Frenchman's Bay
without clearance papers. The United States cruiser Milwaukee sailed the
same day from the Puget Sound Navy Yard to form part of the coast patrol
to enforce neutrality regulations.

Arrangements were made in Paris by Myron T. Herrick, the American
Ambassador, acting under instructions from Washington, to take over the
affairs of the German embassy, while Alexander H. Thackara, the American
Consul General, looked after the affairs of the German consulate.

President Poincare and the members of the French cabinet later issued a
joint proclamation to the French nation in which was the phrase
"mobilization is not war."

The marching of the soldiers in the streets with the English, Russian
and French flags flying, the singing of patriotic songs and the shouting
of "On to Berlin!" were much less remarkable than the general demeanor
and cold resolution of most of the people.

The response to the order of mobilization was instant, and the stations
of all the railways, particularly those leading to the eastward, were
crowded with reservists. Many women accompanied the men until close to
the stations, where, softly crying, farewells were said. The troop
trains left at frequent intervals. All the automobile busses
disappeared, having been requisitioned by the army to carry meat, the
coachwork of the vehicles being removed and replaced with specially
designed bodies. A large number of taxicabs, private automobiles and
horses and carts also were taken over by the military for transport
purposes.

The wildest enthusiasm was manifested on the boulevards when the news of
the ordering of the mobilization became known. Bodies of men formed into
regular companies in ranks ten deep, paraded the streets waving the
tricolor and other national emblems and cheering and singing the
"Marseillaise" and the "Internationale," at the same time throwing their
hats in the air. On the sidewalks were many weeping women and children.
All the stores and cafes were deserted.

All foreigners were compelled to leave Paris or France before the end of
the first day of mobilization by train but not by automobile. Time
tables were posted on the walls of Paris giving the times of certain
trains on which these people might leave the city.

American citizens or British subjects were allowed to remain in France,
except in the regions on the eastern frontier and near certain
fortresses, provided they made declaration to the police and obtained a
special permit.

As to Italy's situation, Rome was quite calm and the normal aspect made
tourists decide that Italy was the safest place. Austria's note to
Serbia was issued without consulting Italy. One point of the Triple
Alliance provided that no member should take action in the Balkans
before an agreement with the other allies. Such an agreement did not
take place. The alliance was of defensive, not aggressive, character and
could not force an ally to follow any enterprise taken on the sole
account and without a notice, as such action taken by Austria against
Serbia. It was felt even then that Italy would eventually cast its lot
with the Entente Allies.

Secretary of the Treasury William G. McAdoo; John Skelton Williams,
Comptroller of the Currency; Charles S. Hamblin and William P. G.
Harding, members of the Federal Reserve Board, went to New York early in
August, 1914, where they discussed relief measures with a group of
leading bankers at what was regarded as the most momentous conference of
the kind held in the country in recent years.

The New York Clearing House Committee, on August 2d, called a meeting of
the Clearing House Association, to arrange for the immediate issuance of
clearing house certificates. Among those at the conference were J. P.
Morgan and his partner, Henry P. Davison; Frank A. Vanderlip, president
of the National City Bank, and A. Barton Hepburn, chairman of the Chase
National Bank.



CHAPTER III

WHY THE WORLD WENT TO WAR

While it is true that the war was conceived in Berlin, it is none the
less true that it was born in the Balkans. It is necessary in order that
we may view with correct perspective the background of the World War,
that we gain some notion of the Balkan States and the complications
entering into their relations. These countries have been the adopted
children of the great European powers during generations of rulers.
Russia assumed guardianship of the nations having a preponderance of
Slavic blood; Roumania with its Latin consanguinities was close to
France and Italy; Bulgaria, Greece, and Balkan Turkey were debatable
regions wherein the diplomats of the rival nations secured temporary
victories by devious methods.

The Balkans have fierce hatreds and have been the site of sudden
historic wars. At the time of the declaration of the World War, the
Balkan nations were living under the provisions of the Treaty of
Bucharest, dated August 10, 1913. Greece, Roumania, Bulgaria, Serbia and
Montenegro were signers, and Turkey acquiesced in its provisions.


[Illustration: PROVISIONS OF THE TREATY OF BUCHAREST, 1913. (Map showing
the Adriatic on the West, the Black Sea on the East, Roumania on the
North and Crete on the South. Cross hatching show land allocations
among Serbia, Montenegro, Greece, Bulgaria and Roumania.)]


The assassination at Sarajevo had sent a convulsive shudder throughout
the Balkans. The reason lay in the century-old antagonism between the
Slav and the Teuton. Serbia, Montenegro and Russia had never forgiven
Austria for seizing Bosnia and Herzegovina and making these Slavic
people subjects of the Austrian crown. Bulgaria, Roumania and Turkey
remained cold at the news of the assassination. German diplomacy was in
the ascendant at these courts and the prospect of war with Germany as
their great ally presented no terrors for them. The sympathies of the
people of Greece were with Serbia, but the Grecian Court, because the
Queen of Greece was the only sister of the German Kaiser, was whole
heartedly with Austria. Perhaps at the first the Roumanians were most
nearly neutral. They believed strongly that each of the small nations of
the Balkan region as well as all of the small nations that had been
absorbed but had not been digested by Austria, should cut itself from
the leading strings held by the large European powers. There was a
distinct undercurrent, for a federation resembling that of the United
States of America between these peoples. This was expressed most clearly
by M. Jonesco, leader of the Liberal party of Roumania and generally
recognized as the ablest statesman of middle Europe. He declared:

"I always believed, and still believe, that the Balkan States cannot
secure their future otherwise than by a close understanding among
themselves, whether this understanding shall or shall not take the form
of a federation. No one of the Balkan States is strong enough to resist
the pressure from one or another of the European powers.

"For this reason I am deeply grieved to see in the Balkan coalition of
1912 Roumania not invited. If Roumania had taken part in the first one,
we should not have had the second. I did all that was in my power and
succeeded in preventing the war between Roumania and the Balkan League
in the winter of 1912-13.

"I risked my popularity, and I do not feel sorry for it. I employed all
my efforts to prevent the second Balkan war, which, as is well known,
was profitable to us. I repeatedly told the Bulgarians that they ought
not to enter it because in that case we would enter it too. But I was
not successful in my efforts.

"During the second Balkan war I did all in my power to end it as quickly
as possible. At the conference at Bucharest I made efforts, as Mr.
Pashich and Mr. Venizelos know very well, to secure for beaten Bulgaria
the best terms. My object was to obtain a new coalition of all the
Balkan States, including Roumania. Had I succeeded in this the situation
would be much better. No reasonable man will deny that the Balkan States
are neutralizing each other at the present time, which in itself makes
the whole situation all the more miserable.

"In October, 1913, when I succeeded in facilitating the conclusion of
peace between Greece and Turkey, I was pursuing the same object of the
Balkan coalition. On my return from Athens I endeavored, though without
success, to put the Greco-Turkish relations on a basis of friendship,
being convinced that the well-understood interest of both countries lies
not only in friendly relations, but even in an alliance between them.

"The dissensions that exist between the Balkan States can be settled in
a friendly way without war. The best moment for this would be after the
general war, when the map of Europe will be remade. The Balkan country
which would start war against another Balkan country would commit, not
only a crime against her own future, but an act of folly as well.

"The destiny and future of the Balkan States, and of all the small
European peoples as well, will not be regulated by fratricidal wars,
but, with this great European struggle, the real object of which is to
settle the question whether Europe shall enter an era of justice, and
therefore happiness for the small peoples, or whether we will face a
period of oppression more or less gilt-edged. And as I always believed
that wisdom and truth will triumph in the end, I want to believe, too,
that, in spite of the pessimistic news reaching me from the different
sides of the Balkan countries, there will be no war among them in order
to justify those who do not believe in the vitality of the small
peoples."

The conference at Rome, April 10, 1918, to settle outstanding questions
between the Italians and the Slavs of the Adriatic, drew attention to
those Slavonic peoples in Europe who were under non-Slavonic rule. At
the beginning of the war there were three great Slavonic groups in
Europe: First, the Russians with the Little Russians, speaking languages
not more different than the dialect of Yorkshire is from the dialect of
Devonshire; second, a central group, including the Poles, the Czechs or
Bohemians, the Moravians, and Slovaks, this group thus being separated
under the four crowns of Russia, Germany, Austria and Hungary; the
third, the southern group, included the Sclavonians, the Croatians, the
Dalmatians, Bosnians, Herzegovinians, the Slavs, generally called
Slovenes, in the western part of Austria, down to Goritzia, and also the
two independent kingdoms of Montenegro and Serbia.

Like the central group, this southern group of Slavs was divided under
four crowns, Hungary, Austria, Montenegro, and Serbia; but, in spite of
the fact that half belong to the Western and half to the Eastern Church,
they are all essentially the same people, though with considerable
infusion of non-Slavonic blood, there being a good deal of Turkish blood
in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The languages, however, are practically
identical, formed largely of pure Slavonic materials, and, curiously,
much more closely connected with the eastern Slav group--Russia and
Little Russia--than with the central group, Polish and Bohemian. A
Russian of Moscow will find it much easier to understand a Slovene from
Goritzia than a Pole from Warsaw. The Ruthenians in southern Galicia and
Bukowina, are identical in race and speech with the Little Russians of
Ukrainia.

Of the central group, the Poles have generally inclined to Austria,
which has always supported the Polish landlords of Galicia against the
Ruthenian peasantry; while the Czechs have been not so much
anti-Austrian as anti-German. Indeed, the Hapsburg rulers have again and
again played these Slavs off against their German subjects. It was the
Southern Slav question as affecting Serbia and Austria, that gave the
pretext for the present war. The central Slav question affecting the
destiny of the Poles--was a bone of contention between Austria and
Germany. It is the custom to call the Southern Slavs "Jugoslavs" from
the Slav word Yugo, "south," but as this is a concession to German
transliteration, many prefer to write the word "Yugoslav," which
represents its pronunciation. The South Slav question was created by the
incursions of three Asiatic peoples--Huns, Magyars, Turks--who broke up
the originally continuous Slav territory that ran from the White Sea to
the confines of Greece and the Adriatic.


[Illustration: Map: Austria-Hungary and surrounding nations]
  THE MIXTURE OF RACES IN SOUTH CENTRAL EUROPE.


[Illustration: Photograph of three soldiers firing artillery.]
  Copyright Underwood and Underwood, N. Y.
  SERBS DEFENDING THE MOUNTAIN PASSES LEADING TO THEIR CAPITAL
  Little Serbia, before she was overwhelmed by the concentrated force of
  a mighty Teuton drive, and afterward, did some fighting that
  astonished the world. The photo shows some of her artillery engaged in
  holding back the enemy in the mountain regions near Nish.


[Illustration: A SCENE FROM EARLY TRENCH WARFARE. Painting shows German
soldiers defending a trench line on the left. British attackers are
approaching from the right. Several men are already dead in front of the
trench.]
  From the woods in the background the British charge on an angle of the
  German breastworks under cover of artillery and machine-gun fire. This
  illustrates the early trench warfare before the development of the
  elaborate concrete-protected structures the Germans later devised.
  They can be seen wearing the famous spiked helmets which were later
  replaced by steel ones.


This was the complex of nationalities, the ferment of races existing in
1914. Out of the hatreds engendered by the domination over the
liberty-loving Slavic peoples by an arrogant Teutonic minority grew the
assassinations at Sarajevo. These crimes were the expression of hatred
not for the heir apparent of Austria but for the Hapsburg and their
Germanic associates.

By a twist of the wheel of fate, the same Slavic peoples whose
determination to rid themselves of the Teutonic yoke, started the war,
also bore rather more than their share in the swift-moving events that
decided and closed the war.

Russia, the dying giant among the great nations, championed the Slavic
peoples at the beginning of the war. It entered the conflict in aid of
little Serbia, but at the end Russia bowed to Germany in the infamous
peace treaty at Brest-Litovsk. Thereafter during the last months of the
war Russia was virtually an ally of its ancient enemy, Turkey, the "Sick
Man of Europe," and the central German empires. With these allies the
Bolshevik government of Russia attempted to head off the Czecho-Slovak
regiments that had been captured by Russia during its drive into Austria
and had been imprisoned in Siberia. After the peace consummated at
Brest-Litovsk, these regiments determined to fight on the side of the
Allies and endeavored to make their way to the western front.

No war problems were more difficult than those of the Czecho-Slovaks.
Few have been handled so masterfully. Surrounded by powerful enemies
which for centuries have been bent on destroying every trace of Slavic
culture, they had learned how to defend themselves against every trick
or scheme of the brutal Germans.

The Czecho-Slovak plan in Russia was of great value to the Allies all
over the world, and was put at their service by Professor Thomas G.
Masaryk. He went to Russia when everything was adrift and got hold of
Bohemian prisoners here and there and organized them into a compact
little army of 50,000 to 60,000 men. Equipped and fed, he moved them to
whatever point had most power to thoroughly disrupt the German plans.
They did much to check the German army for months. They resolutely
refused to take any part in Russian political affairs, and when it
seemed no longer possible to work effectively in Russia this remarkable
little band started on a journey all round the world to get to the
western front. They loyally gave up most of their arms under agreement
with Lenine and Trotzky that they might peacefully proceed out of Russia
via Vladivostok.

While they were carrying out their part of the agreement, and well on
the way, they were surprised by telegrams from Lenine and Trotzky to the
Soviets in Siberia ordering them to take away their arms and intern
them.

The story of what occurred then was told by two American engineers,
Emerson and Hawkins, who, on the way to Ambassador Francis, and not
being able to reach Vologda, joined a band of four or five thousand. The
engineers were with them three months, while they were making it safe
along the lines of the railroad for the rest of the Czecho-Slovaks to
get out, and incidentally for Siberians to resume peaceful occupations.
They were also supported by old railway organizations which had stuck
bravely to them without wages and which every little while were "shot
up" by the Bolsheviki.

Distress in Russia would have been much more intense had it not been for
the loyalty of the railway men in sticking to their tasks. Some American
engineers at Irkutsk, on a peaceful journey out of Russia, on descending
from the cars were met with a demand to surrender, and shots from
machine guns. Some, fortunately, had kept hand grenades, and with these
and a few rifles went straight at the machine guns. Although
outnumbered, the attackers took the guns and soon afterward took the
town. The Czecho-Slovaks, in the beginning almost unarmed, went against
great odds and won for themselves the right to be considered a nation.

Seeing the treachery of Lenine and Trotzky, they went back toward the
west and made things secure for their men left behind. They took town
after town with the arms they first took away from the Bolsheviki and
Germans; but in every town they immediately set up a government, with
all the elements of normal life. They established police and sanitary
systems, opened hospitals, and had roads repaired, leaving a handful of
men in the midst of enemies to carry on the plans of their leaders.
American engineers speaking of the cleanliness of the Czecho-Slovak
army, said that they lived like Spartans.

The whole story is a remarkable evidence of the struggle of these little
people for self-government.

The emergence of the Czecho-Slovak nation has been one of the most
remarkable and noteworthy features of the war. Out of the confusion of
the situation, with the possibility of the resurrection of oppressed
peoples, something of the dignity of old Bohemia was comprehended, and
it was recognized that the Czechs were to be rescued from Austria and
the Slovaks from Hungary, and united in one country with entire
independence. This was undoubtedly due, in large measure, to the
activities of Professor Masaryk, the president of the National Executive
Council of the Czecho-Slovaks. His four-year exile in the United States
had the establishment of the new nation as its fruit.

Professor Masaryk called attention to the fact that there is a peculiar
discrepancy between the number of states in Europe and the number of
nationalities--twenty-seven states to seventy nationalities. He
explained, also, that almost all the states are mixed, from the point of
nationality. From the west of Europe to the east, this is found to be
true, and the farther east one goes the more mixed do the states become.
Austria is the most mixed of all the states. There is no Austrian
language, but there are nine languages, and six smaller nations or
remnants of nations. In all of Germany there are eight nationalities
besides the Germans, who have been independent, and who have their own
literature. Turkey is an anomaly, a combination of various nations
overthrown and kept down.

Since the eighteenth century there has been a continuing strong movement
from each nation to have its own state. Because of the mixed peoples,
there is much confusion. There are Roumanians in Austria, but there is a
kingdom of Roumania. There are Southern Slavs, but there are also Serbia
and Montenegro. It is natural that the Southern Slavs should want to be
united as one state. So it is with Italy.

There was no justice in Poland being separated in three parts to serve
the dynasties of Prussia, Russia and Austria. The Czecho-Slovaks of
Austria and Hungary claimed a union. The national union consists in an
endeavor to make the suppressed nations free, to unite them in their own
states, and to readjust the states that exist; to force Austria and
Prussia to give up the states that should be free.

In the future, said Doctor Masaryk, there are to be sharp ethnological
boundaries. The Czecho-Slovaks will guarantee the minorities absolute
equality, but they will keep the German part of their country, because
there are many Bohemians in it and they do not trust the Germans.



CHAPTER IV

THE PLOTTER BEHIND THE SCENES

One factor alone caused the great war. It was not the assassination at
Sarajevo, not the Slavic ferment of anti-Teutonism in Austria and the
Balkans. The only cause of the world's greatest war was the
determination of the German High Command and the powerful circle
surrounding it that "Der Tag" had arrived. The assassination at Sarajevo
was only the peg for the pendant of war. Another peg would have been
found inevitably had not the projection of that assassination presented
itself as the excuse.

Germany's military machine was ready. A gray-green uniform that at a
distance would fade into misty obscurity had been devised after
exhaustive experiments by optical, dye and cloth experts co-operating
with the military high command. These uniforms had been standardized and
fitted for the millions of men enrolled in Germany's regular and reserve
armies. Rifles, great pyramids of munitions, field kitchens, traveling
post-offices, motor lorries, a network of military railways leading to
the French and Belgian border, all these and more had been made ready.
German soldiers had received instructions which enabled each man at a
signal to go to an appointed place where he found everything in
readiness for his long forced marches into the territory of Germany's
neighbors.

More than all this, Germany's spy system, the most elaborate and
unscrupulous in the history of mankind, had enabled the German High
Command to construct in advance of the declaration of war concrete gun
emplacements in Belgium and other invaded territory. The cellars of
dwellings and shops rented or owned by German spies were camouflaged
concrete foundations for the great guns of Austria and Germany. These
emplacements were in exactly the right position for use against the
fortresses of Germany's foes. Advertisements and shop-signs were used by
spies as guides for the marching German armies of invasion.


[Illustration: Painting of KAISER WILLIAM II.]
  Copyright Press Illustrating Service.
  KAISER WILLIAM II OF GERMANY
  Posterity will regard him as more responsible than any other human
  being for the sacrifice of millions of lives in the great war, as a
  ruler who might have been beneficent and wise, but attempted to
  destroy the liberties of mankind and to raise on their ruins an odious
  despotism. To forgive him and to forget his terrible transgressions
  would be to condone them.

[Illustration: Men marching past a band.]
  Copyright Underwood and Underwood, N, Y.
  FRANCIS JOSEPH I OF AUSTRIA, THE "OLD EMPEROR," ON A STATE OCCASION.
  Francis Joseph died before the war had settled the fate of the
  Hapsburgs. The end came on November 21, 1916, in the sixty-eighth year
  of his reign. His life was tragic. He lived to see his brother
  executed, his Queen assassinated, and his only son a suicide, with
  always before him the specter of the disintegration of his many-raced
  empire.


In brief, Germany had planned for war. She was approximately ready for
it. Under the shelter of such high-sounding phrases as "We demand our
place in the sun," and "The seas must be free," the German people were
educated into the belief that the hour of Germany's destiny was at hand.


[Illustration: Map of Africa.]
  GERMANY'S POSSESSIONS IN AFRICA PRIOR TO 1914


German psychologists, like other German scientists, had co-operated with
the imperial militaristic government for many years to bring the
Germanic mind into a condition of docility. So well did they understand
the mentality and the trends of character of the German people that it
was comparatively easy to impose upon them a militaristic system and
philosophy by which the individual yielded countless personal liberties
for the alleged good of the state. Rigorous and compulsory military
service, unquestioning adherence to the doctrine that might makes right
and a cession to "the All-Highest," as the Emperor was styled, of
supreme powers in the state, are some of the sufferances to which the
German people submitted.

German propaganda abroad was quite as vigorous as at home, but
infinitely less successful. The German High Command did not expect
England to enter the war. It counted upon America's neutrality with a
leaning toward Germany. It believed that German colonization in South
Africa and South America would incline these vast domains toward
friendship for the Central empires. How mistaken the propagandists and
psychologists were events have demonstrated.

It was this dream of world-domination by Teutonic kultur that supplied
the motive leading to the world's greatest war. Bosnia, an unwilling
province of Austria-Hungary, at one time a province of Serbia and
overwhelmingly Slavic in its population, had been seething for years
with an anti-Teutonic ferment. The Teutonic court at Vienna, leading the
minority Germanic party in Austria-Hungary, had been endeavoring to
allay the agitation among the Bosnian Slavs. In pursuance of that
policy, Archduke Francis Ferdinand, heir-presumptive to the thrones of
Austria and Hungary, and his morganatic wife, Sophia Chotek, Duchess of
Hohenberg, on June 28, 1914, visited Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia. On
the morning of that day, while they were being driven through the narrow
streets of the ancient town, a bomb was thrown at them, but they were
uninjured. They were driven through the streets again in the afternoon,
for purpose of public display. A student, just out of his 'teens, one
Gavrilo Prinzep, attacked the royal party with a magazine pistol and
killed both the Archduke and his wife.

Here was the excuse for which Germany had waited. Here was the dawn of
"The Day." The Germanic court of Austria asserted that the crime was the
result of a conspiracy, leading directly to the Slavic court of Serbia.
The Serbians in their turn declared that they knew nothing of the
assassination. They pointed out the fact that Sophia Chotek was a Slav,
and that Francis Ferdinand was more liberal than any other member of the
Austrian royal household, and finally, that he, more than any other
member of the Austrian court, understood and respected the Slavic
character and aspirations.

At six o'clock on the evening of July 23d, Austria sent an ultimatum to
Serbia, presenting eleven demands and stipulating that categorical
replies must be delivered before six o'clock on the evening of July
25th. Although the language in which the ultimatum was couched was
humiliating to Serbia, the answer was duly delivered within the
stipulated time.

The demands of the Austrian note in brief were as follows:

1. The Serbian Government to give formal assurance of its condemnation
of Serb propaganda against Austria.

2. The next issue of the Serbian "Official Journal" was to contain a
declaration to that effect.

3. This declaration to express regret that Serbian officers had taken
part in the propaganda.

4. The Serbian Government to promise that it would proceed rigorously
against all guilty of such activity.

5. This declaration to be at once communicated by the King of Serbia to
his army, and to be published in the official bulletin as an order of
the day.

6. All anti-Austrian publications in Serbia to be suppressed.

7. The Serbian political party known as the "National Union" to be
suppressed, and its means of propaganda to be confiscated.

8. All anti-Austrian teaching in the schools of Serbia to be suppressed.

9. All officers, civil and military, who might be designated by Austria
as guilty of anti-Austrian propaganda to be dismissed by the Serbian
Government.

10. Austrian agents to co-operate with the Serbian Government in
suppressing all anti-Austrian propaganda, and to take part in the
judicial proceedings conducted in Serbia against those charged with
complicity in the crime at Sarajevo.

11. Serbia to explain to Austria the meaning of anti-Austrian utterances
of Serbian officials at home and abroad, since the assassination.

To the first and second demands Serbia unhesitatingly assented. To the
third demand, Serbia assented, although no evidence was given to show
that Serbian officers had taken part in the propaganda.

The Serbian Government assented to the fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh and
eighth demands also.

Extraordinary as was the ninth demand, which would allow the Austrian
Government to proscribe Serbian officials, so eager for peace and
friendship was the Serbian Government that it assented to it, with the
stipulation that the Austrian Government should offer some proof of the
guilt of the proscribed officers.

The tenth demand, which in effect allowed Austrian agents to control the
police and courts of Serbia, it was not possible for Serbia to accept
without abrogating her sovereignty. However, it was not unconditionally
rejected, but the Serbian Government asked that it be made the subject
of further discussion, or be referred to arbitration. The Serbian
Government assented to the eleventh demand, on the condition that if the
explanations which would be given concerning the alleged anti-Austrian
utterances of Serbian officials would not prove satisfactory to the
Austrian Government, the matter should be submitted to mediation or
arbitration.

Behind the threat conveyed in the Austrian ultimatum was the menacing
figure of militant Germany. The veil that had hitherto concealed the
hands that worked the string, was removed when Germany, under the
pretense of localizing the quarrel to Serbian and Austrian soil,
interrogated France and England, asking them to prevent Russia from
defending Serbia in the event of an attack by Austria upon the Serbs.
England and France promptly refused to participate in a tragedy which
would deliver Serbia to Austria as Bosnia had been delivered. Russia,
bound by race and creed to Serbia, read into the ultimatum of Teutonic
kultur a determination for warfare. Mobilization of the Russian forces
along the Austrian frontier was arranged, when it was seen that Serbia's
pacific reply to Austria's demands would be contemptuously disregarded
by Germany and Austria.

During the days that intervened between the issuance of the ultimatum
and the actual declaration of war by Germany against Russia on Saturday,
August 1st, various sincere efforts were made to stave off the
world-shaking catastrophe. Arranged chronologically, these events may
thus be summarized: Russia, on July 24th, formally asked Austria if she
intended to annex Serbian territory by way of reprisal for the
assassination at Sarajevo. On the same day Austria replied that it had
no present intention to make such annexation. Russia then requested an
extension of the forty-eight-hour time-limit named in the ultimatum.

Austria, on the morning of Saturday, July 25th, refused Russia's request
for an extension of the period named in the ultimatum. On the same day,
the newspapers published in Petrograd printed an official note issued by
the Russian Government warning Europe generally that Russia would not
remain indifferent to the fate of Serbia. These newspapers also printed
the appeal of the Serbian Crown Prince to the Czar dated on the
preceding day, urging that Russia come to the rescue of the menaced
Serbs. Serbia's peaceful reply surrendering on all points except one,
and agreeing to submit that to arbitration, was sent late in the
afternoon of the same day, and that night Austria declared the reply to
be unsatisfactory and withdrew its minister from Belgrade.

England commenced its attempts at pacification on the following day,
Sunday, July 26th. Sir Edward Grey spent the entire Sabbath in the
Foreign Office and personally conducted the correspondence that was
calculated to bring the dispute to a peaceful conclusion. He did not
reckon, however, with a Germany determined upon war, a Germany whose
manufacturers, ship-owners and Junkers had combined with its militarists
to achieve "Germany's place in the sun" even though the world would be
stained in the blood of the most frightful war this earth has ever
known. Realization of this fact did not come to Sir Edward Grey until
his negotiations with Germany and with Austria-Hungary had proceeded for
some time. His first suggestion was that the dispute between Russia and
Austria be committed to the arbitration of Great Britain, France, Italy
and Germany. Russia accepted this but Germany and Austria rejected it.
Russia had previously suggested that the dispute be settled by a
conference between the diplomatic heads at Vienna and Petrograd. This
also was refused by Austria.

Sir Edward Grey renewed his efforts on Monday, July 27th, with an
invitation to Germany to present suggestions of its own, looking toward
a settlement. This note was never answered. Germany took the position
that its proposition to compel Russia to stand aside while Austria
punished Serbia had been rejected by England and France and it had
nothing further to propose.

During all this period of negotiation the German Foreign Office, to all
outward appearances at least, had been acting independently of the
Kaiser, who was in Norway on a vacation trip. He returned to Potsdam on
the night of Sunday, July 26th. On Monday morning the Czar of Russia
received a personal message from the Kaiser, urging Russia to stand
aside that Serbia might be punished. The Czar immediately replied with
the suggestion that the whole matter be submitted to The Hague. No reply
of any kind was ever made to this proposal by Germany.


[Illustration: THE GERMAN CONFEDERATION IN 1815 (Map: Baltic Sea on the
North, Adriatic Sea on the South, Eastern France and Belgium on the
West, Poland on the East.)]


All suggestions and negotiations looking forward to peace were brought
to a tragic end on the following day, Tuesday, July 28th, when Austria
declared war on Serbia, having speedily mobilized troops at strategic
points on the Serbian border. Russian mobilization, which had been
proceeding only in a tentative way, on the Austrian border, now became
general, and on July 30th, mobilization of the entire Russian army was
proclaimed.

Germany's effort to exclude England from the war began on Thursday, July
29th. A note, sounding Sir Edward Grey on the question of British
neutrality in the event of war was received, and a curt refusal to
commit the British Empire to such a proposal was the reply. Sir Edward
Grey, in a last determined effort to avoid a world-war, suggested to
Germany, Austria, Serbia and Russia that the military operations
commenced by Austria should be recognized as merely a punitive
expedition. He further suggested that when a point in Serbian territory
previously fixed upon should have been reached, Austria would halt and
would submit her further action to arbitration in the conference of the
Powers. Russia and Serbia agreed unreservedly to this proposition.
Austria gave a half-hearted assent to the principle involved. Germany
made no reply.

The die was cast for war on the following day, July 31st, when Germany
made a dictatorial and arrogant demand upon Russia that mobilization of
that nation's military forces be stopped within twelve hours. Russia
made no reply, and on Saturday, August 1st, Germany set the world aflame
with the dread of war's horror by her declaration of war upon Russia.

Germany's responsibility for this monumental crime against the peace of
the world is eternally fixed upon her, not only by these outward and
visible acts and negotiations, not only by her years of patient
preparation for the war into which she plunged the world. The
responsibility is fastened upon her forever by the revelations of her
own ambassador to England during this fateful period. Prince Lichnowsky,
in a remarkable communication which was given to the world, laid bare
the machinations of the German High Command and its advisers. He was a
guest of the Kaiser at Kiel on board the Imperial yacht Meteor when the
message was received informing the Kaiser of the assassination at
Sarajevo. His story continues:


Being unacquainted with the Vienna viewpoint and what was going on
there, I attached no very far-reaching significance to the event; but,
looking back, I could feel sure that in the Austrian aristocracy a
feeling of relief outweighed all others. His Majesty regretted that his
efforts to win over the Archduke to his ideas had thus been frustrated
by the Archduke's assassination.

I went on to Berlin and saw the Chancellor, von Bethmann-Hollweg. I told
him that I regarded our foreign situation as very satisfactory as it was
a long time indeed since we had stood so well with England. And in
France there was a pacifist cabinet. Herr von Bethmann-Hollweg did not
seem to share my optimism.

He complained of the Russian armaments. I tried to tranquilize him with
the argument that it was not to Russia's interest to attack us, and that
such an attack would never have English or French support, as both
countries wanted peace.

I went from him to Dr. Zimmermann (the under Secretary) who was acting
for Herr von Jagow (the Foreign Secretary), and learned from him that
Russia was about to call up nine hundred thousand new troops. His words
unmistakably denoted ill-humor against Russia, who, he said, stood
everywhere in our way. In addition, there were questions of commercial
policy that had to be settled. That General von Moltke was urging war
was, of course, not told to me. I learned, however, that Herr von
Tschirschky (the German Ambassador in Vienna) had been reproved because
he said that he had advised Vienna to show moderation toward Serbia.


Prince Lichnowsky went to his summer home in Silesia, quite unaware of the
impending crisis. He continues:


When I returned from Silesia on my way to London, I stopped only a few
hours in Berlin, where I heard that Austria intended to proceed against
Serbia so as to bring to an end an unbearable state of affairs.
Unfortunately, I failed at the moment to gauge the significance of the
news. I thought that once more it would come to nothing; that even if
Russia acted threateningly, the matter could soon be settled. I now
regret that I did not stay in Berlin and declare there and then that I
would have no hand in such a policy.

There was a meeting in Potsdam, as early as July 5th, between the German
and Austrian authorities, at which meeting war was decided on. Prince
Lichnowsky says:

I learned afterwards that at the decisive discussion at Potsdam on July
5th the Austrian demand had met with the unconditional approval of all
the personages in authority; it was even added that no harm would be
done if war with Russia did come out of it. It was so stated at least in
the Austrian report received at London by Count Mensdorff (the Austrian
Ambassador to England).

At this point I received instructions to endeavor to bring the English
press to a friendly attitude in case Austria should deal the death-blow
to "Greater-Serbian" hopes. I was to use all my influence to prevent
public opinion in England from taking a stand against Austria. I
remembered England's attitude during the Bosnian annexation crisis, when
public opinion showed itself in sympathy with the Serbian claims to
Bosnia; I recalled also the benevolent promotion of nationalist hopes
that went on in the days of Lord Byron and Garibaldi; and on these and
other grounds I thought it extremely unlikely that English public
opinion would support a punitive expedition against the Archduke's
murderers. I thus felt it my duty to enter an urgent warning against the
whole project, which I characterized as venturesome and dangerous, I
recommended that counsels of moderation he given Austria, as I did not
believe that the conflict could be localized (that is to say, it could
not be limited to a war between Austria and Serbia).


[Illustration: Photographs of Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg and Prince
Maximilian.]
  Photos from International Film Service.
  THE GERMAN CHANCELLORS
  On the right is Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg who is held responsible
  in large measure for bringing on the war. On the left is Prince
  Maximilian of Baden, the Kaiser's camouflage chancellor who was
  appointed in a vain attempt to fool the American people into thinking
  that a democratic government had been set up in Germany.


[Illustration: Photograph of ex-Emperor Charles and ex-Empress Zita.]
  Copyright Press Illustrating Service. THE DEPOSED RULERS OF
  AUSTRIA-HUNGARY The ex-Emperor Charles and his wife, the ex-Empress
  Zita, in deep conversation with Hungarian leaders who are explaining
  the distressing situation confronting the country.


Herr von Jagow answered me that Russia was not prepared; that there
would be more or less of a rumpus; but that the more firmly we stood by
Austria, the more surely would Russia give way. Austria was already
blaming us for flabbiness and we could not flinch. On the other hand,
Russian sentiment was growing more unfriendly all the time, and we must
simply take the risk. I subsequently learned that this attitude was
based on advices from Count Pourtales (the German Ambassador in
Petrograd), that Russia would not stir under any circumstances;
information which prompted us to spur Count Berchtold on in his course.
On learning the attitude of the German Government I looked for salvation
through English mediation, knowing that Sir Edward Grey's influence in
Petrograd could be used in the cause of peace. I, therefore, availed
myself of my friendly relations with the Minister to ask him
confidentially to advise moderation in Russia in case Austria demanded
satisfaction from the Serbians, as it seemed likely she would.

The English press was quiet at first, and friendly to Austria, the
assassination being generally condemned. By degrees, however, more and
more voices made themselves heard, in the sense that, however necessary
it might be to take cognizance of the crime, any exploitation of it for
political ends was unjustifiable. Moderation was enjoined upon Austria.
When the ultimatum came out, all the papers, with the exception of the
Standard, were unanimous in condemning it. The whole world, outside of
Berlin and Vienna, realized that it meant war, and a world war too. The
English fleet, which happened to have been holding a naval review, was
not demobilized.


The British Government labored to make the Serbian reply conciliatory,
and "the Serbian answer was in keeping with the British efforts." Sir
Edward Grey then proposed his plan of mediation upon the two points
which Serbia had not wholly conceded. Prince Lichnowsky writes:


M. Cambon (for France), Marquis Imperiali (for Italy), and I were to
meet, with Sir Edward in the chair, and it would have been easy to work
out a formula for the debated points, which had to do with the
co-operation of imperial and royal officials in the inquiries to be
conducted at Belgrade. By the exercise of good will everything could
have been settled in one or two sittings, and the mere acceptance of the
British proposal would have relieved the strain and further improved our
relations with England. I seconded this plan with all my energies. In
vain. I was told (by Berlin) that it would be against the dignity of
Austria. Of course, all that was needed was one hint from Berlin to
Count Berchtold (the Austrian Foreign Minister); he would have satisfied
himself with a diplomatic triumph and rested on the Serbian answer. That
hint was never given. On the contrary, pressure was brought in favor of
war....

After our refusal Sir Edward asked us to come forward with our proposal.
We insisted on war. No other answer could I get (from Berlin) than that
it was a colossal condescension on the part of Austria not to
contemplate any acquisition of territory. Sir Edward justly pointed out
that one could reduce a country to vassalage without acquiring
territory; that Russia would see this, and regard it as a humiliation
not to be put up with. The impression grew stronger and stronger that we
were bent on war. Otherwise our attitude toward a question in which we
were not directly concerned was incomprehensible. The insistent requests
and well-defined declarations of M. Sasanof, the Czar's positively
humble telegrams, Sir Edward's repeated proposals, the warnings of
Marquis San Guiliano and of Bollati, my own pressing admonitions were
all of no avail. Berlin remained inflexible--Serbia must be slaughtered.


Then, on the 29th, Sir Edward decided upon his well-known warning. I
told him I had always reported (to Berlin) that we should have to reckon
with English opposition if it came to a war with France. Time and again
the Minister said to me, "If war breaks out it will be the greatest
catastrophe the world has ever seen." And now events moved rapidly.
Count Berchtold at last decided to come around, having up to that point
played the role of "Strong man" under guidance of Berlin. Thereupon we
(in answer to Russia's mobilization) sent our ultimatum and declaration
of war--after Russia had spent a whole week in fruitless negotiation and
waiting.

Thus ended my mission in London. It had suffered shipwreck, not on the
wiles of the Briton but on the wiles of our own policy. Were not those
right who saw that the German people was pervaded with the spirit of
Treitschke and Bernhardi, which glorifies war as an end instead of
holding it in abhorrence as an evil thing? Properly speaking militarism
is a school for the people and an instrument to further political ends.
But in the patriarchal absolutism of a military monarchy, militarism
exploits politics to further its own ends, and can create a situation
which a democracy freed from junkerdom would not tolerate.

That is what our enemies think; that is what they are bound to think
when they see that in spite of capitalistic industrialism, and in spite
of socialistic organizations, the living, as Nietzsche said, are still
ruled by the dead. The democratization of Germany, the first war aim
proposed by our enemies, will become a reality.

This is the frank statement of a great German statesman made long before
Germany received its knock-out blow. It was written when Germany was
sweeping all before it on land, and when the U-boat was at the height of
its murderous powers on the high seas. No one in nor out of Germany has
controverted any of its statements and it will forever remain as one of
the counts in the indictment against Germany and the sole cause of the
world's greatest misery, the war.

America's outstanding authority on matters of international conduct,
former Secretary of State Elihu Root declared that the World War was a
mighty and all-embracing struggle between two conflicting principles of
human right and human duty; it was a conflict between the divine right
of kings to govern mankind through armies and nobles, and the right of
the peoples of the earth who toil and endure and aspire to govern
themselves by law under justice, and in the freedom of individual
manhood.

After the declaration of war against Russia by Germany, events marched
rapidly and inevitably toward the general conflagration. Germany's most
strenuous efforts were directed toward keeping England out of the
conflict. We have seen in the revelations of Prince Lichnowsky how eager
was England to divert Germany's murderous purpose. There are some
details, however, required to fill in the diplomatic picture.

President Poincare, of the French Republic, on July 30th, asked the
British Ambassador in Paris for an assurance of British support. On the
following day he addressed a similar letter to King George of England.
Both requests were qualifiedly refused on the ground that England wished
to be free to continue negotiations with Germany for the purpose of
averting the war. In the meantime, the German Government addressed a
note to England offering guarantees for Belgian integrity, providing
Belgium did not side with France, offering to respect the neutrality of
Holland and giving assurance that no French territory in Europe would be
annexed if Germany won the war. Sir Edward Grey described this as a
"shameful proposal," and rejected it on July 30th.

On July 31st England sent a note to France and Germany asking for a
statement of purpose concerning Belgian neutrality. France immediately
announced that it would respect the treaty of 1839 and its reaffirmation
in 1870 guaranteeing Belgium's neutrality. This treaty was entered into
by Germany, England, France, Austria and Russia. Germany's reply on
August 1st was a proposal that she would respect the neutrality of
Belgium if England would stay out of the war. This was promptly
declined. On August 2d the British cabinet agreed that if the German
fleet attempted to attack the coast of France the British fleet would
intervene. Germany, the next day, sent a note agreeing to refrain from
naval attacks on France provided England would remain neutral, but
declined to commit herself as to the neutrality of Belgium. Before this,
however, on August 2d, Germany had announced to Belgium its intention to
enter Belgium for the purpose of attacking France. The Belgian Minister
in London made an appeal to the British Foreign Office and was informed
that invasion of Belgium by Germany would be followed by England's
declaration of war. Monday, August 3d, was signalized by Belgium's
declaration of its neutrality and its firm purpose to defend its soil
against invasion by France, England, Germany or any other nation.

The actual invasion of Belgium commenced on the morning of August 4th,
when twelve regiments of Uhlans crossed the frontier near Vise, and came
in contact with a Belgian force driving it back upon Liege. King Albert
of Belgium promptly appealed to England, Russia and France for aid in
repelling the invader. England sent an ultimatum to Germany fixing
midnight of August 4th as the time for expiration of the ultimatum. This
demanded that satisfactory assurances be furnished immediately that
Germany would respect the neutrality of Belgium. No reply was made by
Germany and England's declaration of war followed.

Chancellor von Bethmann-Hollweg, of the German Empire, wrote Germany's
infamy into history when, in a formal statement, he acknowledged that
the invasion of Belgium was "a wrong that we will try to make good again
as soon as our military ends have been reached." To Sir Edward Vochen,
British Ambassador to Germany, he addressed the inquiry: "Is it the
purpose of your country to make war upon Germany for the sake of a scrap
of paper?" The treaty of 1839-1870 guaranteeing Belgium's neutrality was
the scrap of paper.


[Illustration: Photographs]
  KING ALBERT I,  QUEEN ELIZABETH, THE HEROIC RULERS OF BELGIUM


[Illustration: Photograph showing bombed out shells of buildings. In the
foreground a building has been leveled to the ground.]
  Copyright International News Service.
  THE RED RUINS OF YPRES
  Ypres, the British soldiers "Wipers," was the scene of much of the
  bloodiest fighting of the war. Three great battles were fought for its
  possession. The photograph shows what was once the market place.

With the entrance of England into the war, the issue between autocracy
and democracy was made plain before the people of the world. Austria,
and later Turkey, joined with Germany; France, and Japan, by reason of
their respective treaty obligations joined England and Russia. Italy for
the time preferred to remain neutral, ignoring her implied alliance with
the Teutonic empires. How other nations lined up on the one side and the
other is indicated by the State Department's list of war declarations,
and diplomatic severances, which follows:

Austria against Belgium, Aug. 28, 1914.
Austria against Japan, Aug. 27, 1914.
Austria against Montenegro, Aug. 9, 1914.
Austria against Russia, Aug. 6, 1914.
Austria against Serbia, July 28, 1914.
Belgium against Germany, Aug. 4, 1914.
Brazil against Germany, Oct. 26, 1917.
Bulgaria against Serbia, Oct. 14, 1915.
China against Austria, Aug. 14, 1917.
China against Germany, Aug. 14, 1917.
Costa Rica against Germany, May 23, 1918.
Cuba against Germany, April 7, 1917.
Cuba against Austria-Hungary, Dec. 16, 1917.
France against Austria, Aug. 13, 1914.
France against Bulgaria, Oct. 16, 1915.
France against Germany, Aug. 3, 1914.
France against Turkey, Nov. 5, 1914.
Germany against Belgium, Aug. 4, 1914.
Germany against France, Aug. 3, 1914.
Germany against Portugal, March 9, 1916.
Germany against Roumania, Sept. 14, 1916.
Germany against Russia, Aug. 1, 1914.
Great Britain against Austria, Aug. 13, 1914.
Great Britain against Bulgaria, Oct. 15, 1915.
Great Britain against Germany, Aug. 4, 1914.
Great Britain against Turkey, Nov. 5, 1914.
Greece against Bulgaria, Nov. 28, 1916. (Provisional Government.)
Greece against Bulgaria, July 2, 1917. (Government of Alexander.)
Greece against Germany, Nov. 28, 1916. (Provisional Government.)
Greece against Germany, July 2, 1917. (Government of Alexander.)
Guatemala against Germany and Austria-Hungary, April 22, 1918.
Haiti against Germany, July 15, 1918.
Honduras against Germany, July 19, 1918.
Italy against Austria, May 24, 1915.
Italy against Bulgaria, Oct. 19, 1915.
Italy against Germany, Aug. 28, 1916.
Italy against Turkey, Aug. 21, 1915.
Japan against Germany, Aug. 23, 1914.
Liberia against Germany, Aug. 4, 1917.
Montenegro against Austria, Aug. 8, 1914.
Montenegro against Germany, Aug. 9, 1914.
Nicaragua against Germany, May 24, 1918.
Panama against Germany, April 7,1917.
Panama against Austria, Dec. 10, 1917.
Portugal against Germany, Nov. 23, 1914. (Resolution passed authorizing
                                          military intervention as ally
                                          of England)
Portugal against Germany, May 19, 1915.  (Military aid granted.)
Roumania against Austria, Aug. 27, 1916. (Allies of Austria also
                                          consider it a declaration.)
Russia against Germany, Aug. 7, 1914.
Russia against Bulgaria, Oct. 19, 1915.
Russia against Turkey, Nov. 3, 1914.
San Marino against Austria, May 24, 1915.
Serbia against Bulgaria, Oct. 16, 1915.
Serbia against Germany, Aug. 6, 1914.
Serbia against Turkey, Dec. 2, 1914.
Siam against Austria, July 22, 1917.
Siam against Germany, July 22, 1917.
Turkey against Allies, Nov. 23, 1914.
Turkey against Roumania, Aug. 29, 1916.
United States against Germany, April 6, 1917.
United States against Austria-Hungary, Dec. 7, 1917.

SEVERANCE OF DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS

The Nations that formally severed relations whether afterward declaring
war or not, are as follows:

Austria against Japan, Aug. 26, 1914.
Austria against Portugal, March 16, 1916.
Austria against Serbia, July 26, 1914.
Austria against United States, April 8, 1917.
Bolivia against Germany, April 14, 1917.
Brazil against Germany, April 11, 1917.
China against Germany, March 14, 1917.
Costa Rica against Germany, Sept. 21, 1917.
Ecuador against Germany, Dec. 7, 1917.
Egypt against Germany, Aug. 13, 1914.
France against Austria, Aug. 10, 1914.
Greece against Turkey, July 2, 1917. (Government of Alexander.)
Greece against Austria, July 2, 1917. (Government of Alexander.)
Guatemala against Germany, April 27,1917.
Haiti against Germany, June 17, 1917.
Honduras against Germany, May 17, 1917.
Nicaragua against Germany, May 18, 1917.
Peru against Germany, Oct. 6, 1917.
Santo Domingo against Germany, June 8, 1917.
Turkey against United States, April 20, 1917.
United States against Germany, Feb. 3,1917.
Uruguay against Germany, Oct. 7, 1917.



CHAPTER V

THE GREAT WAR BEGINS

Years before 1914, when Germany declared war against civilization, it
was decided by the German General Staff to strike at France through
Belgium. The records of the German Foreign Office prove that fact. The
reason for this lay in the long line of powerful fortresses along the
line that divides France from Germany and the sparsely spaced and
comparatively out-of-date forts on the border between Germany and
Belgium. True, there was a treaty guaranteeing the inviolability of
Belgian territory to which Germany was a signatory party. Some of the
clauses of that treaty were:


Article 9. Belgium, within the limits traced in conformity with the
principles laid down in the present preliminaries, shall form a
perpetually neutral state. The five powers (England, France, Austria,
Prussia and Russia), without wishing to intervene in the internal
affairs of Belgium, guarantee her that perpetual neutrality as well as
the integrity and inviolability of her territory in the limits mentioned
in the present article.

Article 10. By just reciprocity Belgium shall be held to observe this
same neutrality toward all the other states and to make no attack on
their internal or external tranquillity while always preserving the
right to defend herself against any foreign aggression.


This agreement was followed on January 23, 1839, by a definitive treaty,
accepted by Belgium and by the Netherlands, which treaty regulates
Belgium's neutrality as follows:


Article 7. Belgium, within the limits defined in Articles 1, 2 and 4
shall form an independent and perpetually neutral state. She is
obligated to preserve this neutrality against all the other states.


To convert this solemn covenant into a "scrap of paper" it was necessary
that Germany should find an excuse for tearing it to pieces. There was
absolutely no provocation in sight, but that did not deter the German
High Command. That august body with no information whatever to afford an
excuse, alleged in a formal note to the Belgian Government that the
French army intended to invade Germany through Belgian territory. This
hypocritical and mendacious note and Belgium's vigorous reply follow:


Note handed in on August 2, 1914, at 7 o'clock P. M., by Herr von
Below-Saleske, German Minister, to M. Davignon, Belgian Minister for
Foreign Affairs.


BRUSSELS, 2d August, 1914.
IMPERIAL GERMAN LEGATION IN BELGIUM
(Highly confidential)

The German Government has received reliable information according to
which the French forces intend to march on the Meuse, by way of Givet
and Namur. This information leaves no doubt as to the intention of
France of marching on Germany through Belgian territory. The Imperial
Government cannot avoid the fear that Belgium, in spite of its best
will, will be in no position to repulse such a largely developed French
march without aid. In this fact there is sufficient certainty of a
threat directed against Germany.

It is an imperative duty for the preservation of Germany to forestall
this attack of the enemy.

The German Government would feel keen regret if Belgium should regard as
an act of hostility against herself the fact that the measures of the
enemies of Germany oblige her on her part to violate Belgian territory.
In order to dissipate any misunderstanding the German Government
declares as follows:

1. Germany does not contemplate any act of hostility against Belgium. If
Belgium consents in the war about to commence to take up an attitude of
friendly neutrality toward Germany, the German Government on its part
undertakes, on the declaration of peace, to guarantee the kingdom and
its possessions in their whole extent.

2. Germany undertakes under the conditions laid down to evacuate Belgian
territory as soon as peace is concluded.

3. If Belgium preserves a friendly attitude, Germany is prepared, in
agreement with the authorities of the Belgian Government, to buy against
cash all that is required by her troops, and to give indemnity for the
damages caused in Belgium.

4. If Belgium behaves in a hostile manner toward the German troops, and
in particular raises difficulties against their advance by the
opposition of the fortifications of the Meuse, or by destroying roads,
railways, tunnels, or other engineering works, Germany will be compelled
to consider Belgium as an enemy.


In this case Germany will take no engagements toward Belgium, but she
will leave the later settlement of relations of the two states toward
one another to the decision of arms. The German Government has a
justified hope that this contingency will not arise and that the Belgian
Government will know how to take suitable measures to hinder its taking
place. In this case the friendly relations which unite the two
neighboring states will become closer and more lasting.


THE REPLY BY BELGIUM
Note handed in by M. Davignon, Minister for Foreign Affairs, to Herr von
Below-Saleske, German Minister.


BRUSSELS, 3d August, 1914.
(7 o'clock in the morning.)

By the note of the 2d August, 1914, the German Government has made known
that according to certain intelligence the French forces intend to march
on the Meuse via Givet and Namur and that Belgium, in spite of her
good-will, would not be able without help to beat off an advance of the
French troops.

The German Government felt it to be its duty to forestall this attack
and to violate Belgian territory. Under these conditions Germany
proposes to the King's Government to take up a friendly attitude, and
undertakes at the moment of peace to guarantee the integrity of the
kingdom and of her possessions in their whole extent. The note adds that
if Belgium raises difficulties to the forward march of the German troops
Germany will be compelled to consider her as an enemy and to leave the
later settlement of the two states toward one another to the decision of
arms.

This note caused profound and painful surprise to the King's Government.

The intentions which it attributed to France are in contradiction with
the express declarations which were made to us on the 1st of August, in
the name of the government of the republic.

Moreover, if, contrary to our expectation, a violation of Belgian
neutrality were to be committed by France, Belgium would fulfil all her
international duties and her army would offer the most vigorous
opposition to the invader.

The treaties of 1839, confirmed by the treaties of 1870, establish the
independence and the neutrality of Belgium under the guarantee of the
powers, and particularly of the Government of his Majesty the King of
Prussia.

Belgium has always been faithful to her international obligations; she
has fulfilled her duties in a spirit of loyal impartiality; she has
neglected no effort to maintain her neutrality or to make it respected.

The attempt against her independence with which the German Government
threatens her would constitute a flagrant violation of international
law. No strategic interest justifies the violation of that law.

The Belgian Government would, by accepting the propositions which are
notified to her, sacrifice the honor of the nation while at the same
time betraying her duties toward Europe.

Conscious of the part Belgium has played for more than eighty years in
the civilization of the world, she refuses to believe that the
independence of Belgium can be preserved only at the expense of the
violation of her neutrality.

If this hope were disappointed the Belgian Government has firmly
resolved to repulse by every means in her power any attack upon her
rights.


The German attack upon Belgium and France came with terrible force and
suddenness. Twenty-four army corps, divided into three armies clad in a
specially designed and colored gray-green uniform, swept in three mighty
streams over the German borders with their objective the heart of
France. The Army of the Meuse was given the route through Liege, Namur
and Maubeuge. The Army of the Moselle violated the Duchy of Luxemburg,
which, under a treaty guaranteeing its independence and neutrality, was
not permitted to maintain an army. Germany was a signatory party to this
treaty also. The Army of the Rhine cut through the Vosges Mountains and
its route lay between the French cities of Nancy and Toul.

The heroic defense of the Belgian army at Liege against the Army of the
Meuse delayed the operation of Germany's plans and in all probability
saved Paris. It was the first of many similar disappointments and checks
that Germany encountered during the war.

The defense of Liege continued for ten heroic days. Within that interval
the first British Expeditionary Forces were landed in France and
Belgium, the French army was mobilized to full strength. The little
Belgian army falling back northward on Antwerp, Louvain and Brussels,
threatened the German flank and approximately 200,000 German soldiers
were compelled to remain in the conquered section of Belgium to garrison
it effectively.

Liege fortifications were the design of the celebrated strategist
Brialmont. They consisted of twelve isolated fortresses which had been
permitted to become out of repair. No field works of any kind connected
them and they were without provision for defense against encircling
tactics and against modern artillery.

The huge 42-centimeter guns, the first of Germany's terrible surprises,
were brought into action against these forts, and their concrete and
armored steel turrets were cracked as walnuts are cracked between the
jaws of a nut-cracker. The Army of the Meuse then made its way like a
gray-green cloud of poison gas through Belgium. A cavalry screen of
crack Uhlan regiments preceded it, and it made no halt worthy of note
until it confronted the Belgian army on the line running from Louvain to
Namur. The Belgians were forced back before Louvain on August 20th, the
Belgian Government removed the capital from Brussels to Antwerp, and the
German hosts entered evacuated Brussels.

During this advance of the Army of the Meuse, strong French detachments
invaded German soil, pouring into Alsace through the Belfort Gap. Brief
successes attended the bold stroke. Mulhausen was captured and the
Metz-Strassburg Railroad was cut in several places. The French suffered
a defeat almost immediately following this first flush of victory, both
in Alsace and in Lorraine, where a French detachment had engaged with
the Army of the Moselle. The French army thereupon retreated to the
strong line of forts and earthworks defending the border between France
and Germany.

England's first expeditionary force landed at Ostend, Calais and Dunkirk
on August 7th. It was dubbed England's "contemptible little army" by the
German General Staff. That name was seized upon gladly by England as a
spur to volunteering. It brought to the surface national pride and a
fierce determination to compel Germany to recognize and to reckon with
the "contemptible little army."

The contact between the French, Belgian and British forces was speedily
established and something like concerted resistance to the advance of
the enemy was made possible. The German army, however, followed by a
huge equipment of motor kitchens, munition trains, and other motor
transport evidencing great care in preparation for the movement, swept
resistlessly forward until it encountered the French and British on a
line running from Mons to Charleroi.

The British army was assigned to a position between two French armies.
By some miscalculation, the French army that was to have taken its
position on the British left, never appeared. The French army on the
right was attacked and defeated at Charleroi, falling back in some
confusion. The German Army of the Moselle co-operating with the Army of
the Meuse then attacked the British and French, and a great flanking
movement by the German joint commands developed.

This was directed mainly at the British under command of Sir John
French. There followed a retreat that for sheer heroism and dogged
determination has become one of the great battles of all time. The
British, outflanked and outnumbered three to one, fought and marched
without cessation for six days and nights. Time after time envelopment
and disaster threatened them, but with a determination that would not be
beaten they fought off the best that Germany could send against them,
maintained contact with the French army on their right, and delayed the
German advance so effectively that a complete disarrangement of all the
German plans ensued. This was the second great disappointment to
Germany. It made possible the victory of the Marne and the victorious
peace of 1918. The story of that immortal retreat is best told in the
words of Sir John French, transmitting the report of this encounter to
the British War Office:

"The transport of the troops from England both by sea and by rail was
effected in the best order and without a check. Each unit arrived at its
destination well within the scheduled time.

"The concentration was practically complete on the evening of Friday,
the 21st ultimo, and I was able to make dispositions to move the force
during Saturday, the 22d, to positions I considered most favorable from
which to commence operations which the French commander-in-chief,
General Joffre, requested me to undertake in pursuance of his plans in
prosecution of the campaign.

"The line taken up extended along the line of the canal from Conde on
the west, through Mons and Binche on the east. This line was taken up as
follows:

"From Conde to Mons, inclusive, was assigned to the Second Corps, and to
the right of the Second Corps from Mons the First Corps was posted. The
Fifth Cavalry Brigade was placed at Binche.

"In the absence of my Third Army Corps I desired to keep the cavalry
divisions as much as possible as a reserve to act on my outer flank, or
move in support of any threatened part of the line. The forward
reconnoissance was intrusted to Brig.-Gen. Sir Philip Chetwode, with the
Fifth Cavalry Brigade, but I directed General Allenby to send forward a
few squadrons to assist in this work.

"During the 22d and 23d these advanced squadrons did some excellent
work, some of them penetrating as far as Soignies, and several
encounters took place in which our troops showed to great advantage.

"2. At 6 A. M., on August 23d, I assembled the commanders of the First
and Second Corps and cavalry division at a point close to the position
and explained the general situation of the Allies, and what I understood
to be General Joffre's plan. I discussed with them at some length the
immediate situation in front of us.

"From information I received from French headquarters I understood that
little more than one, or at most two, of the enemy's army corps, with
perhaps one cavalry division, were in front of my position; and I was
aware of no attempted outflanking movement by the enemy. I was confirmed
in this opinion by the fact that my patrols encountered no undue
opposition in their reconnoitering operations. The observations of my
airplanes seemed to bear out this estimate.

"About 3 P. M. on Sunday, the 23d, reports began coming in to the effect
that the enemy was commencing an attack on the Mons line, apparently in
some strength, but that the right of the position from Mons and Bray was
being particularly threatened.

"The commander of the First Corps had pushed his flank back to some high
ground south of Bray, and the Fifth Cavalry Brigade evacuated Binche,
moving slightly south; the enemy thereupon occupied Binche.

"The right of the Third Division, under General Hamilton, was at Mons,
which formed a somewhat dangerous salient; and I directed the commander
of the Second Corps to be careful not to keep the troops on this salient
too long, but, if threatened seriously, to draw back the center behind
Mons. This was done before dark. In the meantime, about 5 P. M., I
received a most unexpected message from General Joffre by telegraph,
telling me that at least three German corps, viz., a reserve corps, the
Fourth Corps and the Ninth Corps, were moving on my position in front,
and that the Second Corps was engaged in a turning movement from the
direction of Tournay. He also informed me that the two reserve French
divisions and the Fifth French army on my right were retiring, the
Germans having on the previous day gained possession of the passages of
the Sambre, between Charleroi and Namur.

"3. In view of the possibility of my being driven from the Mons
position, I had previously ordered a position in rear to be
reconnoitered. This position rested on the fortress of Maubeuge on the
right and extended west to Jenlain, southeast to Valenciennes, on the
left. The position was reported difficult to hold, because standing
crops and buildings made the placing of trenches very difficult and
limited the field of fire in many important localities. It nevertheless
afforded a few good artillery positions.

"When the news of the retirement of the French and the heavy German
threatening on my front reached me, I endeavored to confirm it by
airplane reconnoissance; and as a result of this I determined to effect
a retirement to the Maubeuge position at daybreak on the 24th.

"A certain amount of fighting continued along the whole line throughout
the night and at daybreak on the 24th the Second Division from the
neighborhood of Harmignies made a powerful demonstration as if to retake
Binche. This was supported by the artillery of both the First and Second
Divisions, while the First Division took up a supporting position in the
neighborhood of Peissant. Under cover of this demonstration the Second
Corps retired on the line Dour-Quarouble-Frameries. The Third Division
on the right of the corps suffered considerable loss in this operation
from the enemy, who had retaken Mons.

"The Second Corps halted on this line, where they partially intrenched
themselves, enabling Sir Douglas Haig with the First Corps gradually to
withdraw to the new position; and he effected this without much further
loss, reaching the line Bavai-Maubeuge about 7 P. M. Toward midday the
enemy appeared to be directing his principal effort against our left.

"I had previously ordered General Allenby with the cavalry to act
vigorously in advance of my left front and endeavor to take the pressure
off.

"About 7.30 A. M. General Allenby received a message from Sir Charles
Ferguson, commanding the Fifth Division, saying that he was very hard
pressed and in urgent need of support. On receipt of this message
General Allenby drew in the cavalry and endeavored to bring direct
support to the Fifth Division.

"During the course of this operation General De Lisle, of the Second
Cavalry Brigade, thought he saw a good opportunity to paralyze the
further advance of the enemy's infantry by making a mounted attack on
his flank. He formed up and advanced for this purpose, but was held up
by wire about five hundred yards from his objective, and the Ninth
Lancers and the Eighteenth Hussars suffered severely in the retirement
of the brigade.

"The Nineteenth Infantry Brigade, which had been guarding the line of
communications, was brought up by rail to Valenciennes on the 22d and
23d. On the morning of the 24th they were moved out to a position south
of Quarouble to support the left flank of the Second Corps.

"With the assistance of the cavalry Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien was enabled
to effect his retreat to a new position; although, having two corps of
the enemy on his front and one threatening his flank, he suffered great
losses in doing so.

"At nightfall the position was occupied by the Second Corps to the west
of Bavai, the First Corps to the right. The right was protected by the
Fortress of Maubeuge, the left by the Nineteenth Brigade in position
between Jenlain and Bry, and the cavalry on the outer flank.

"4. The French were still retiring, and I had no support except such as
was afforded by the Fortress of Maubeuge; and the determined attempts of
the enemy to get round my left flank assured me that it was his
intention to hem me against that place and surround me. I felt that not
a moment must be lost in retiring to another position.

"I had every reason to believe that the enemy's forces were somewhat
exhausted and I knew that they had suffered heavy losses. I hoped,
therefore, that his pursuit would not be too vigorous to prevent me
effecting my object.

"The operation, however, was full of danger and difficulty, not only
owing to the very superior force in my front, but also to the exhaustion
of the troops.

"The retirement was recommenced in the early morning of the 25th to a
position in the neighborhood of Le Cateau, and rearguards were ordered
to be clear of the Maubeuge-Bavai-Eih Road by 5.30 A. M.

"Two cavalry brigades, with the divisional cavalry of the Second Corps,
covered the movement of the Second Corps. The remainder of the cavalry
division, with the Nineteenth Brigade, the whole under the command of
General Allenby, covered the west flank.

"The Fourth Division commenced its detrainment at Le Cateau on Sunday,
the 23d, and by the morning of the 25th eleven battalions and a brigade
of artillery with divisional staff were available for service.

"I ordered General Snow to move out to take up a position with his right
south of Solesmes, his left resting on the Cambrai-LeCateau Road south
of La Chaprie. In this position the division tendered great help to the
effective retirement of the Second and First Corps to the new position.

"Although the troops had been ordered to occupy the Cambrai-Le
Cateau-Landrecies position, and the ground had, during the 25th, been
partially prepared and intrenched, I had grave doubts, owing to the
information I had received as to the accumulating strength of the enemy
against me--as to the wisdom of standing there to fight.

"Having regard to the continued retirement of the French on my right, my
exposed left flank, the tendency of the enemy's western corps (II) to
envelop me, and, more than all, the exhausted condition of the troops, I
determined to make a great effort to continue the retreat until I could
put some substantial obstacle, such as the Somme or the Oise, between my
troops and the enemy, and afford the former some opportunity of rest and
reorganization. Orders were, therefore, sent to the corps commanders to
continue their retreat as soon as they possibly could toward the general
line Vermand-St. Quentin-Ribemont.

"The cavalry under General Allenby, were ordered to cover the
retirement.

"Throughout the 25th and far into the evening, the First Corps continued
its march on Landrecies, following the road along the eastern border of
the Foret de Mormal, and arrived at Landrecies about 10 o'clock. I had
intended that the corps should come further west so as to fill up the
gap between Le Cateau and Landrecies, but the men were exhausted and
could not get further in without rest.

"The enemy, however, would not allow them this rest, and about 9.30 P.
M. a report was received that the Fourth Guards Brigade in Landrecies
was heavily attacked by troops of the Ninth German Army Corps, who were
coming through the forest on the north of the town. This brigade fought
most gallantly, and caused the enemy to suffer tremendous loss in
issuing from the forest into the narrow streets of the town. This loss
has been estimated from reliable sources at from 700 to 1,000. At the
same time information reached me from Sir Douglas Haig that his First
Division was also heavily engaged south and east of Maroilles. I sent
urgent messages to the commander of the two French reserve divisions on
my right to come up to the assistance of the First Corps, which they
eventually did. Partly owing to this assistance, but mainly to the
skilful manner in which Sir Douglas Haig extricated his corps from an
exceptionally difficult position in the darkness of the night, they were
able at dawn to resume their march south toward Wassigny on Guise.

"By about 6 P. M. the Second Corps had got into position with their
right on Le Cateau, their left in the neighborhood of Caudry, and the
line of defense was continued thence by the Fourth Division toward
Seranvillers, the left being thrown back.

"During the fighting on the 24th and 25th the cavalry became a good deal
scattered, but by the early morning of the 26th, General Allenby had
succeeded in concentrating two brigades to the south of Cambrai.

"The Fourth Division was placed under the orders of the general officer
commanding the Second Army Corps.

"On the 24th the French Cavalry Corps, consisting of three divisions
under General Sordet, had been in billets north of Avesnes. On my way
back from Bavai, which was my 'Poste de Commandement' during the
fighting of the 23d and 24th, I visited General Sordet, and earnestly
requested his co-operation and support. He promised to obtain sanction
from his army commander to act on my left flank, but said that his
horses were too tired to move before the next day. Although he rendered
me valuable assistance later on in the course of the retirement, he was
unable, for the reasons given, to afford me any support on the most
critical day of all, viz., the 26th.

"At daybreak it became apparent that the enemy was throwing the bulk of
his strength against the left of the position occupied by the Second
Corps and the Fourth Division.

"At this time the guns of four German army corps were in position
against them, and Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien reported to me that he judged
it impossible to continue his retirement at daybreak (as ordered) in
face of such an attack.

"I sent him orders to use his utmost endeavors to break off the action
and retire at the earliest possible moment, as it was impossible for me
to send him any support, the First Corps being at the moment incapable
of movement.

"The French Cavalry Corps, under General Sordet, was coming up on our
left rear early in the morning, and I sent an urgent message to him to
do his utmost to come up and support the retirement of my left flank;
but owing to the fatigue of his horses he found himself unable to
intervene in any way.

"There had been no time to intrench the position properly, but the
troops showed a magnificent front to the terrible fire which confronted
them.

"The artillery, although outmatched by at least four to one, made a
splendid fight, and inflicted heavy losses on their opponents.

"At length it became apparent that, if complete annihilation was to be
avoided, a retirement must be attempted; and the order was given to
commence it about 3.30 P. M. The movement was covered with the most
devoted intrepidity and determination by the artillery, which had itself
suffered heavily, and the fine work done by the cavalry in the further
retreat from the position assisted materially in the final completion of
this most difficult and dangerous operation.

"Fortunately the enemy had himself suffered too heavily to engage in an
energetic pursuit.

"I cannot close the brief account of this glorious stand of the British
troops without putting on record my deep appreciation of the valuable
services rendered by Gen. Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien.

"I say without hesitation that the saving of the left wing of the army
under my command on the morning of the 26th of August, could never have
been accomplished unless a commander of rare and unusual coolness,
intrepidity, and determination had been present to personally conduct
the operation.

"The retreat was continued far into the night of the 26th and through
the 27th and 28th, on which date the troops halted on the line
Noyon-Chauny-LaFere, having then thrown off the weight of the enemy's
pursuit.

"On the 27th and 28th I was much indebted to General Sordet and the
French Cavalry Division which he commands for materially assisting my
retirement and successfully driving back some of the enemy on Cambrai.

"This closes the period covering the heavy fighting which commenced at
Mons on Sunday afternoon, 23d August, and which really constituted a
four days' battle.

"It is impossible for me to speak too highly of the skill evinced by the
two general officers commanding army corps; the self-sacrificing and
devoted exertions of their staffs; the direction of the troops by
divisional, brigade, and regimental leaders; the command of the smaller
units by their officers; and the magnificent fighting spirit displayed
by non-commissioned officers and men.

"I wish particularly to bring to your Lordship's notice the admirable
work done by the Royal Flying Corps under Sir David Henderson. Their
skill, energy, and perseverance have been beyond all praise. They have
furnished me with the most complete and accurate information, which has
been of incalculable value in the conduct of the operations. Fired at
constantly both by friend and foe, and not hesitating to fly in every
kind of weather, they have remained undaunted throughout.

"Further, by actually fighting in the air, they have succeeded in
destroying five of the enemy's machines."

The combined French and British armies, including the forces that had
retreated from Alsace and Lorraine, gave way with increasing
stubbornness before von Kluck. That German general disregarding the
fortresses surrounding Paris, swung southward to make a junction with
the Army of the Crown Prince of Germany advancing through the Vosges
Mountains. General Manoury's army opposed the German advance on the
entrenched line of Paris. General Gallieni commanding the garrison of
Paris, was ready with a novel mobile transport consisting of taxicabs
and fast trucks. The total number of soldiers in the French and British
armies now outnumbered those in the German armies opposed to them.

General Joffre, in supreme command of the French, had chosen the
battleground. He had set the trap with consummate skill. The word was
given; the trap was sprung; and the first battle of the Marne came as a
crashing surprise to Germany.



CHAPTER VI

THE TRAIL OF THE BEAST IN BELGIUM

Germany's onrush into heroic Belgium speedily resolved itself into a
saturnalia that drenched the land with blood and roused the civilized
world into resentful horror. As the tide of barbarity swept forward into
Northern France, stories of the horrors filtered through the close web
of German censorship. There were denials at first by German
propagandists. In the face of truth furnished by thousands of witnesses,
the denials faded away.

What caused these atrocities? Were they the spontaneous expression of
dormant brutishness in German soldiers? Were they a sudden reversion of
an entire nation to bestiality?

The answer is that the private soldier as an individual was not
responsible. The carnage, the rapine, the wholesale desolation was an
integral part of the German policy of schrecklichkeit or frightfulness.
This policy was laid down by Germany as part of its imperial war code.
In 1902 Germany issued a new war manual entitled "Kriegsbrauch im
Landkriege." In it is written this cold-blooded declaration:


All measures which conduce to the attainment of the object of war are
permissible and these may be summarized in the two ideas of violence and
cunning. What is permissible includes every means of war without which
the object of the war cannot be attained. All means which modern
invention affords, including the fullest, most dangerous, and most
massive means of destruction, may be utilized.


Brand Whitlock, United States Minister to Belgium, in a formal report to
the State Department, made this statement concerning Germany's policy in
permitting these outrages:

"All these deliberate organized massacres of civilians, all these
murders and outrages, the violation of women, the killing of children,
wanton destruction, burning, looting and pillage, and whole towns
destroyed, were acts for which no possible military necessity can be
pleaded. They were wilfully committed as part of a deliberately prepared
and scientifically organized policy of terrorism."


[Illustration: Painting]
  From a Painting by F. Gueldry to illustrate an official report.
  GERMAN ATROCITIES
  At Senlis, Department of Oise, on September 2,1914, French captives
  were made to walk in the open so as to be hit by French bullets. Many
  were killed and wounded. The townsman on the left was struck in the
  knee. A German officer asked to see the wound and shot him through the
  shoulder. On the right a German officer is seen torturing a wounded
  French soldier by beating him in the face with a stick.


[Illustration: Photographs]
  Copyright Underwood and Underwood, N. Y.
  THE SUPREME EXPONENTS OF GERMAN FRIGHTFULNESS
  On the left, General van Bossing, military commander of Belgium. On
  the right, Grand Admiral van Tirpitz, who inspired the German
  submarine campaign.

  THE TRAIL OF THE BEAST IN BELGIUM   91

And now, having considered these outrages as part of the German policy
of terrorism, let us turn to the facts presented by those who made
investigations at first hand in devastated Belgium and Northern France.

Let us first turn to the tragic story of the destruction of Louvain. The
first document comes in the form of a cable sent from the Belgian
Minister of Foreign Affairs under date of August 8,1914:


"On Tuesday evening a body of German troops who had been driven back
retired in disorder upon the town of Louvain. Germans who were guarding
the town thought that the retiring troops were Belgians and fired upon
them. In order to excuse this mistake the Germans, in spite of the most
energetic denials on the part of the authorities, pretended that
Belgians had fired on the Germans, although all the inhabitants,
including policemen, had been disarmed for more than a week. Without any
examination and without listening to any protest the commanding officer
announced that the town would be immediately destroyed. All inhabitants
had to leave their homes at once; some were made prisoners; women and
children were put into a train of which the destination was unknown;
soldiers with fire bombs set fire to the different quarters of the town;
the splendid Church of St. Pierre, the markets, the university and its
scientific establishments, were given to the flames, and it is probable
that the Hotel de Ville, this celebrated jewel of Gothic art, will also
have disappeared in the disaster. Several notabilities were shot at
sight. Thus a town of 40,000 inhabitants, which, since the fifteenth
century, has been the intellectual and scientific capital of the Low
Countries is a heap of ashes. Americans, many of whom have followed the
course at this illustrious alma mater and have there received such
cordial hospitality, cannot remain insensible to this outrage on the
rights of humanity and civilization which is unprecedented in history."


Minister Whitlock made the following report on the same outrage:


"A violent fusillade broke out simultaneously at various points in the
city (Louvain), notably at the Porte de Bruxelles, Porte de Tirlemont,
Rue Leopold, Rue Marie-Therese, Rue des Joyeuses Entrees. German
soldiers were firing at random in every street and in every direction.
Later fires broke out everywhere, notably in the University building,
the Library, in the old Church of St. Peter, in the Place du Peuple, in
the Rue de la Station, in the Boulevard de Tirlemont, and in the
Chaussee de Tirlemont. On the orders of their chiefs, the German
soldiers would break open the houses and set fire to them, shooting on
the inhabitants who tried to leave their dwellings. Many persons who
took refuge in their cellars were burned to death. The German soldiers
were equipped with apparatus for the purpose of firing dwellings,
incendiary pastils, machines for spraying petroleum, etc. . . .

"Major von Manteuffel (of the German forces) sent for Alderman Schmidt.
Upon the latter's arrival, the major declared that hostages were to be
held, as sedition had just broken out. He asked Father Parijs, Mr.
Schmidt, and Mgr. Coenraedts, First Vice-Rector of the University, who
was being held as a hostage, to make proclamations to the inhabitants
exhorting them to be calm and menacing them with a fine of twenty
million francs, the destruction of the city and the hanging of the
hostages, if they created disturbance. Surrounded by about thirty
soldiers and a few officers, Major Manteuffel, Father Parijs, Mr.
Schmidt and Mgr. Coenraedts left in the direction of the station, and
the alderman, in French, and the priest, in Flemish, made proclamations
at the street corners.. . .

"Near the statue of Juste-Lipse, a Dr. Berghausen, a German surgeon, in
a highly excited condition, ran to meet the delegation. He shouted that
a German soldier had just been killed by a shot fired from the house of
Mr. David Fishbach. Addressing the soldiers, Dr. Berghausen said: 'The
blood of the entire population of Louvain is not worth a drop of the
blood of a German soldier!' Then one of the soldiers threw into the
interior of the house of Mr. Fishbach one of the pastils which the
German soldiers carried and immediately the house flared up. It
contained paintings of a high value. The old coachman, Joseph
Vandermosten, who had re-entered the house to try to save the life of
his master, did not return. His body was found the next day amidst the
ruins. . . .

"The Germans made the usual claim that the civil population had fired
upon them and that it was necessary to take these measures, i. e., burn
the churches, the library and other public monuments, burn and pillage
houses, driving out and murdering the inhabitants, sacking the city in
order to punish and to spread terror among the people, and General von
Luttwitz had told me that it was reported that the son of the
burgomaster had shot one of their generals. But the burgomaster of
Louvain had no son and no officer was shot at Louvain. The story of a
general shot by the son of a burgomaster was a repetition of a tragedy
that had occurred at Aerschot, on the 19th, where the fifteen-year-old
son of the burgomaster had been killed by a firing squad, not because he
had shot a general, but because an officer had been shot, probably by
Belgian soldiers retreating through the town. The story of this tragedy
is told by the boy's mother, under oath, before the Belgian Commission,
and is so simple, so touching, so convincing in its verisimilitude, that
I attach a copy of it in extenso to this report. It seems to afford an
altogether typical example of what went on all over the stricken land
during those days of terror. (In other places it was the daughter of the
burgomaster who was said to have shot a general.)

"The following facts may be noted: From the avowal of Prussian officers
themselves, there was not one single victim, among their men at the
barracks of St. Martin, Louvain, where it was claimed that the first
shot had been fired from a house situated in front of the Caserne. This
would appear to be impossible had the civilians fired upon them point
blank from across the street. It was said that when certain houses near
the barracks were burning, numerous explosions occurred, revealing the
presence of cartridges; but these houses were drinking houses much
frequented by German soldiers. It was said that Spanish students shot
from the schools in the Rue de la Station, but Father Catala, rector of
the school, affirms that the schools were empty. . . .

"If it was necessary, for whatever reason, to do what was done at Vise,
at Dinant, at Aerschot, at Louvain, and in a hundred other towns that
were sacked, pillaged and burned, where masses were shot down because
civilians had fired on German troops, and if it was necessary to do this
on a scale never before witnessed in history, one might not unreasonably
assume that the alleged firing by civilians was done on a scale, if not
so thoroughly organized, at least somewhat in proportion to the rage of
destruction that punished it. And hence it would seem to be a simple
matter to produce at least convincing evidence that civilians had fired
on the soldiers; but there is no testimony to that effect beyond that of
the soldiers who merely assert it: Man hat geschossen. If there were no
more firing on soldiers by civilians in Belgium than is proved by the
German testimony, it was not enough to justify the burning of the
smallest of the towns that was overtaken by that fate. And there is not
a scintilla of evidence of organized bands of francs-tireurs, such as
were found in the war of 1870."

Under date of September 12, 1917, Minister Whitlock, in a report to the
State Department of the United States, made the following summary: "As
one studies the evidence at hand, one is struck at the outset by the
fact so general that it must exclude the hypothesis of coincidence, and
that is that these wholesale massacres followed immediately upon some
check, some reverse, that the German army had sustained. The German army
was checked by the guns of the forts to the east of Liege, and the
horrors of Vise, Verviers, Bligny, Battice, Hervy and twenty villages
follow. When they entered Liege, they burned the houses along two
streets and killed many persons, five or six Spaniards among them.
Checked before Namur they sacked Andenne, Bouvignies, and Champignon,
and when they took Namur they burned one hundred and fifty houses.
Compelled to give battle to the French army in the Belgian Ardennes they
ravaged the beautiful valley of the Semois; the complete destruction of
the village of Rossignlo and the extermination of its entire male
population took place there. Checked again by the French on the Meuse,
the awful carnage of Dinant results. Held on the Sambre by the French,
they burn one hundred houses at Charleroi and enact the appalling
tragedy of Tamines. At Mons, the English hold them, and after that all
over the Borinage there is a systematic destruction, pillage and murder.
The Belgian army drive them back from Malines and Louvain is doomed. The
Belgian army failing back and fighting in retreat took refuge in the
forts of Antwerp, and the burning and sack of Hougaerde, Wavre,
Ottignies, Grimde, Neerlinter, Weert, St. George, Shaffen and Aerschot
follow.


[Illustration: Painting: Three soldiers in a bombed out shack, one on a
telephone.]
  AN OBSERVATION POST
  Watching the effect of gun fire from a sand-bagged ruin near the
  German lines.


[Illustration: Photograph of King and soldiers parading on horses.]
  Photo by Trans-Atlantic News Service
  KING ALBERT AT THE HEAD OF THE HEROIC SOLDIERS OF BELGIUM
  It is universally agreed that the Belgian monarch was no figurehead
  general but a real leader of his troops. It was these men, facing
  annihilation, who astonished the world by opposing the German military
  machine successfully enough to allow France to get her armies into
  shape and prevent the immediate taking of Paris that was planned by
  Germany.

[Illustration: Painting of soldiers dragging large guns through mud;
shells are exploding in the background; in the foreground a dead
soldier lies face down in the mud.]
  THE TERRIBLE FLANDERS MUD
  A German battery endeavoring to escape from a British advance sinks in
  the mud. The gunners are endeavoring to pull the gun out with ropes.


"The Belgian troops inflicted serious losses on the Germans in the South
of the Province of Limbourg, and the towns of Lummen, Bilsen, and
Lanaeken are partially destroyed. Antwerp held out for two months, and
all about its outer line of fortifications there was blood and fire,
numerous villages were sacked and burned and the whole town of Termonde
was destroyed. During the battles of September the village of
Boortmeerbeek near Malines, occupied by the Germans, was retaken by the
Belgians, and when the Germans entered it again they burned forty
houses. Three times occupied by the Belgians and retaken by the Germans
Boortmeerbeek was three times punished in the same way. That is to say,
everywhere the German army met with a defeat it took it out, as we say
in America, on the civil population. And that is the explanation of the
German atrocities in Belgium."

A committee of the highest honor and responsibility was appointed by the
British Government to investigate the whole subject of atrocities in
Belgium and Northern France. Its chairman was the Rt. Hon. Viscount
James Bryce, formerly British Ambassador to the United States. Its other
members were the Rt. Hon. Sir Frederick Pollock, the Rt. Hon. Sir Edward
Clark, Sir Alfred Hopkinson, Mr. H. A. L. Fisher, Vice-Chancellor of the
University of Sheffield, Mr. Harold Cox and Sir Kenelm E. Digby.

The report of the commission bears upon its face the stamp of
painstaking search for truth, substantiates every statement made by
Minister Whitlock and makes known many horrible instances of cruelty and
barbarity. It makes the following deductions as having been proved
beyond question:

1. That there were in many parts of Belgium deliberate and
systematically organized massacres of the civil population, accompanied
by many isolated murders and other outrages.

2. That in the conduct of the war generally innocent civilians, both men
and women, were murdered in large numbers, women violated, and children
murdered.

3. That looting, house burning, and the wanton destruction of property
were ordered and countenanced by the officers of the German army, that
elaborate provision had been made for systematic incendiarism at the
very outbreak of the war, and that the burnings and destruction were
frequent where no military necessity could be alleged, being, indeed,
part of a system of general terrorization.

4. That the rules and usages of war were frequently broken, particularly
by the using of civilians, including women and children, as a shield for
advancing forces exposed to fire, to a less degree by killing the
wounded and prisoners and in the frequent abuse of the Red Cross and the
white flag.


The Bryce Commission's report on the destruction of Dinant is an example of
testimony laid before them. It follows:


"A clear statement of the outrages at Dinant, which many travelers will
recall as a singularly picturesque town on the Meuse, is given by one
witness, who says that the Germans began burning houses in the Rue St.
Jacques on the 21st of August, and that every house in the street was
burned. On the following day an engagement took place between the French
and the Germans, and the witness spent the whole day in the cellar of a
bank with his wife and children. On the morning of the 23d, about 5
o'clock, firing ceased, and almost immediately afterward a party of
Germans came to the house. They rang the bell and began to batter at the
door and windows. The witness' wife went to the door and two or three
Germans came in. The family were ordered out into the street. There they
found another family, and the two families were driven with their hands
above their heads along the Rue Grande. All the houses in the street
were burning.

"The party was eventually put into a forge where there were a number of
other prisoners, about a hundred in all, and were kept there from 11 A.
M. till 2 P. M. They were then taken to the prison. There they were
assembled in a courtyard and searched. No arms were found. They were
then passed through into the prison itself and put into cells. The
witness and his wife were separated from each other. During the next
hour the witness heard rifle shots continually and noticed in the corner
of a courtyard leading off the row of cells the body of a young man with
a mantle thrown over it. He recognized the mantle as having belonged to
his wife. The witness' daughter was allowed to go out to see what had
happened to her mother, and the witness himself was allowed to go across
the courtyard half an hour afterward for the same purpose. He found his
wife lying on the floor in a room. She had bullet wounds in four places
but was alive and told her husband to return to the children and he did
so.

"About 5 o'clock in the evening, he saw the Germans bringing out all the
young and middle-aged men from the cells, and ranging their prisoners,
to the number of forty, in three rows in the middle of the courtyard.
About twenty Germans were drawn up opposite, but before anything was
done there was a tremendous fusillade from some point near the prison
and the civilians were hurried back to their cells. Half an hour later
the same forty men were brought back into the courtyard. Almost
immediately there was a second fusillade and they were driven back to
the cells again.

"About 7 o'clock the witness and other prisoners were brought out of
their cells and marched out of the prison. They went between two lines
of troops to Roche Bayard, about a kilometer away. An hour later the
women and children were separated and the prisoners were brought back to
Dinant passing the prison on their way. Just outside the prison, the
witness saw three lines of bodies which he recognized as being those of
his neighbors. They were nearly all dead, but he noticed movement in
some of them. There were about one hundred and twenty bodies. The
prisoners were then taken up to the top of a hill outside Dinant and
compelled to stay there till 8 o'clock in the morning. On the following
day they were put into cattle trucks and taken thence to Coblenz. For
three months they remained prisoners in Germany.

"Unarmed civilians were killed in masses at other places near the
prison. About ninety bodies were seen lying on the top of one another in
a grass square opposite the convent. A witness asked a German officer
why her husband had been shot, and he told her that it was because two
of her sons had been in the civil guard and had shot at the Germans. As
a matter of fact, one of her sons was at that time in Liege and the
other in Brussels. It is stated that besides the ninety corpses referred
to above, sixty corpses of civilians were recovered from a hole in the
brewery yard and that forty-eight bodies of women and children were
found in a garden. The town was systematically set on fire by hand
grenades. Another witness saw a little girl of seven, one of whose legs
was broken and the other injured by a bayonet. We have no reason to
believe that the civilian population of Dinant gave any provocation, or
that any other defense can be put forward to justify the treatment
inflicted upon its citizens."


The Bryce Commission reports the outrages in a number of Belgian
villages in this terse fashion:


"In Hofstade a number of houses had been set on fire and many corpses
were seen, some in houses, some in back yards, and some in the streets.
Two witnesses speak of having seen the body of a young man pierced by
bayonet thrusts with the wrists cut also. On a side road the corpse of a
civilian was seen on his doorstep with a bayonet wound in his stomach
and by his side the dead body of a boy of five or six with his hands
nearly severed. The corpses of a woman and boy were seen at the
blacksmith's. They had been killed with the bayonet. In a cafe, a young
man, also killed with the bayonet, was holding his hands together as if
in the attitude of supplication.

"In the garden of a house in the main street, bodies of two women were
observed, and in another house, the body of a boy of sixteen with two
bayonet wounds in the chest. In Sempst a similar condition of affairs
existed. Houses were burning and in some of them were the charred
remains of civilians. In a bicycle shop a witness saw the burned corpse
of a man. Other witnesses speak of this incident. Another civilian,
unarmed, was shot as he was running away. As will be remembered, all the
arms had been given up some time before by the order of the burgomaster.

"At Weerde four corpses of civilians were lying in the road. It was said
that these men had fired upon the German soldiers; but this is denied.
The arms had been given up long before. Two children were killed in the
village of Weerde, quite wantonly as they were standing in the road with
their mother. They were three or four years old and were killed with the
bayonet. A small barn burning close by formed a convenient means of
getting rid of bodies. They were thrown into the flames from the
bayonets. It is right to add that no commissioned officer was present at
the time. At Eppeghem, on August 25th, a pregnant woman who had been
wounded with a bayonet was discovered in the convent. She was dying. On
the road six dead bodies of laborers were seen.

"At Boortmeerbeek a German soldier was seen to fire three times at a
little girl five years old. Having failed to hit her, he subsequently
bayoneted her. He was killed with the butt end of a rifle by a Belgian
soldier who had seen him commit this murder from a distance. At Herent
the charred body of a civilian was found in a butcher's shop, and in a
handcart twenty yards away was the dead body of a laborer. Two eye
witnesses relate that a German soldier shot a civilian and stabbed him
with a bayonet as he lay. He then made one of these witnesses, a
civilian prisoner, smell the blood on the bayonet. At Haecht the bodies
of ten civilians were seen lying in a row by a brewery wall. In a
laborer's house, which had been broken up, the mutilated corpse of a
woman of thirty to thirty-five was discovered."

Concerning the treatment of women and children in general, the report
continues: "The evidence shows that the German authorities, when
carrying out a policy of systematic arson and plunder in selected
districts, usually drew some distinction between the adult male
population on the one hand and the women and children on the other. It
was a frequent practice to set apart the adult males of the condemned
district with a view to the execution of a suitable number--preferably
of the younger and more vigorous--and to reserve the women and children
for milder treatment. The depositions, however, present many instances
of calculated cruelty, often going the length of murder, toward the
women and children of the condemned area.

"At Dinant sixty women and children were confined in the cellar of a
convent from Sunday morning till the following Friday, August 28th,
sleeping on the ground, for there were no beds, with nothing to drink
during the whole period, and given no food until Wednesday, when
somebody threw into the cellar two sticks of macaroni and a carrot for
each prisoner. In other cases the women and children were marched for
long distances along roads, as, for instance, the march of the women
from Louvain to Tirlemont, August 28th, the laggards pricked on by the
attendant Uhlans. A lady complains of having been brutally kicked by
privates. Others were struck at with the butt end of rifles. At Louvain,
at Liege, at Aerschot, at Malines, at Montigny, at Andenne, and
elsewhere, there is evidence that the troops were not restrained from
drunkenness, and drunken soldiers cannot be trusted to observe the rules
or decencies of war, least of all when they are called upon to execute a
preordained plan of arson and pillage. From the very first women were
not safe. At Liege women and children were chased about the streets by
soldiers.

"Witnesses recount how a great crowd of men, women and children from
Aerschot were marched to Louvain, and then suddenly exposed to a fire
from a mitrailleuse and rifles. 'We were all placed,' recounts a
sufferer, 'in Station Street, Louvain, and the German soldiers fired on
us. I saw the corpses of some women in the street. I fell down, and a
woman who had been shot fell on top of me.' Women and children suddenly
turned out into the streets, and, compelled to witness the destruction
of their homes by fire, provided a sad spectacle to such as were sober
enough to see.

"A humane German officer, witnessing the ruin of Aerschot, exclaimed in
disgust: 'I am a father myself, and I cannot bear this. It is not war
but butchery.' Officers as well as men succumbed to the temptation of
drink, with results which may be illustrated by an incident which
occurred at Campenhout. In this village there was a certain well-to-do
merchant (name given) who had a cellar of good champagne. On the
afternoon of the 14th or 15th of August three German cavalry officers
entered the house and demanded champagne. Having drunk ten bottles and
invited five or six officers and three or four private soldiers to join
them, they continued their carouse, and then called for the master and
mistress of the house.

"'Immediately my mistress came in,' says the valet de chambre, 'one of
the officers who was sitting on the floor got up, and, putting a
revolver to my mistress' temple, shot her dead. The officer was
obviously drunk. The other officers continued to drink and sing, and
they did not pay any great attention to the killing of my mistress. The
officer who shot my mistress then told my master to dig a grave and bury
my mistress. My master and the officer went into the garden, the officer
threatening my master with a pistol. My master was then forced to dig
the grave and to bury my mistress in it. I cannot say for what reason
they killed my mistress. The officer who did it was singing all the
time.'

"In the evidence before us there are cases tending to show that
aggravated crimes against women were sometimes severely punished. One
witness reports that a young girl who was being pursued by a drunken
soldier at Louvain appealed to a German officer, and that the offender
was then and there shot. Another describes how an officer of the
Thirty-second Regiment of the Line was led out to execution for the
violation of two young girls, but reprieved at the request or with the
consent of the girls' mother. These instances are sufficient to show
that the maltreatment of women was no part of the military scheme of the
invaders, however much it may appear to have been the inevitable result
of the system of terror deliberately adopted in certain regions. Indeed,
so much is avowed. 'I asked the commander why we had been spared,' says
a lady in Louvain, who deposes to having suffered much brutal treatment
during the sack. He said: 'We will not hurt you any more. Stay in
Louvain. All is finished.' It was Saturday, August 29th, and the reign
of terror was over.

"The Germans used men, women and children of Belgium as screens for
advancing infantry, as is shown in the following: Outside Fort Fleron,
near Liege, men and children were marched in front of the Germans to
prevent the Belgian soldiers from firing. The progress of the Germans
through Mons was marked by many incidents of this character. Thus, on
August 22d, half a dozen Belgian colliers returning from work were
marching in front of some German troops who were pursuing the English,
and in the opinion of the witnesses, they must have been placed there
intentionally. An English officer describes how he caused a barricade to
be erected in a main thoroughfare leading out of Mons, when the Germans,
in order to reach a crossroad in the rear, fetched civilians out of the
houses on each side of the main road and compelled them to hold up white
flags and act as cover.

"Another British officer who saw this incident is convinced that the
Germans were acting deliberately for the purpose of protecting
themselves from the fire of the British troops. Apart from this
protection, the Germans could not have advanced, as the street was
straight and commanded by the British rifle fire at a range of 700 or
800 yards. Several British soldiers also speak of this incident, and
their story is confirmed by a Flemish witness in a side street."

The French Government also appointed a commission, headed by M. Georges
Payelle. This body made an investigation of outrages committed by German
officers and soldiers in Northern France. Its report showed conditions
that outstripped in horror the war tactics of savages. It makes the
following accusations:

"In Rebais, two English cavalrymen who were surprised and wounded in
this commune were finished off with gunshots by the Germans when they
were dismounted and when one of them had thrown up his hands, showing
thus that he was unarmed.

"In the department of the Marne, as everywhere else, the German troops
gave themselves up to general pillage, which was carried out always
under similar conditions and with the complicity of their leaders. The
Communes of Heiltz-le-Maurupt, Suippes, Marfaux, Fromentieres and
Esternay suffered especially in this way. Everything which the invader
could carry off from the houses was placed on motor lorries and
vehicles. At Suippes, in particular, they carried off in this way a
quantity of different objects, among these sewing machines and toys. A
great many villages, as well as important country towns, were burned
without any reason whatever. Without doubt, these crimes were committed
by order, as German detachments arrived in the neighborhood with their
torches, their grenades, and their usual outfit for arson.

"At Marfaux nineteen private houses were burned. Of the Commune of
Glannes practically nothing remains. At Somme-Tourbe the entire village
has been destroyed, with the exception of the Mairie, the church and two
private buildings. At Auve nearly the whole town has been destroyed. At
Etrepy sixty-three families out of seventy are homeless. At Huiron all
of the houses, with the exception of five have been burned. At
Sermaize-les-Bains only about forty houses out of 900 remain. At
Bignicourt-sur-Saultz thirty houses out of thirty-three are in ruins.

"At Suippes, the big market town which has been practically burned out,
German soldiers carrying straw and cans of petrol have been seen in the
streets. While the mayor's house was burning, six sentinels with fixed
bayonets were under orders to forbid anyone to approach and to prevent
any help being given.

"All this destruction by arson, which only represents a small proportion
of the acts of the same kind in the Department of Seine-et-Marne, was
accomplished without the least tendency to rebellion or the smallest act
of resistance being recorded against the inhabitants of the localities
which are today more or less completely destroyed. In some villages the
Germans, before setting fire to them made one of their soldiers fire a
shot from his rifle so as to be able to pretend afterward that the
civilian population had attacked them, an allegation which is all the
more absurd since at the time when the enemy arrived, the only
inhabitants left were old men, sick persons, or people absolutely
without any means of aggression.


[Illustration: Painting]
  THE HORRORS OF GERMAN RULE IN FRANCE
  Forcibly removing French civilians from Lille to German labor
  colonies. Families were ruthlessly separated and led away into slavery
  often worse than death.


[Illustration: Hand to hand combat with bayonets.]
  Copyright Underwood and Underwood, N. Y.
  A FIGHT IN A CLOUD OF GAS
  The Germans had sent over gas and in this spot it lingered. Then the
  infantry advanced and here, amid the British wire entanglements, the
  foes meet. Both sides in gas masks, they struggle amid the "poisonous
  vapor, and when the bayonet fails they fight, like the pair in the
  foreground, to bring death by tearing away their opponent's mask.


"Numerous crimes against the person have also been committed. In the
majority of the communes hostages have been taken away; many of them
have not returned. At Sermaize-les-Bains, the Germans carried off about
one hundred and fifty people, some of whom were decked out with helmets
and coats and compelled, thus equipped, to mount guard over the bridges.

"At Bignicourt-sur-Saultz thirty men and forty-five women and children
were obliged to leave with a detachment. One of the men--a certain Emile
Pierre--has not returned nor sent any news of himself. At Corfelix, M.
Jacqet, who was carried off on the 7th of September with eleven of his
fellow-citizens, was found five hundred meters from the village with a
bullet in his head.

"At Champuis, the cure, his maid-servant, and four other inhabitants who
were taken away on the same day as the hostages of Corfelix had not
returned at the time of our visit to the place.

"At the same place an old man of seventy, named Jacquemin, was tied down
in his bed by an officer and left in this state without food for three
days. He died a little time after. At Vert-la-Gravelle a farm hand was
killed. He was struck on the head with a bottle and his chest was run
through with a lance. The garde champetre Brulefer of le Gault-la-Foret
was murdered at Maclaunay, where he had been taken by the Germans. His
body was found with his head shattered and a wound on his chest.

"At Champguyon, a commune which has been fired, a certain Verdier was
killed in his father-in-law's house. The latter was not present at the
execution, but he heard a shot and next day an officer said to him, 'Son
shot. He is under the ruins.' In spite of the search made the body has
not been found among them. It must have been consumed in the fire.

"At Sermaize, the roadmaker, Brocard, was placed among a number of
hostages. Just at the moment when he was being arrested with his son,
his wife and his daughter-in-law in a state of panic rushed to throw
themselves into the Saulx. The old man was able to free himself for a
moment and ran in all haste after them and made several attempts to save
them, but the Germans dragged him away pitilessly, leaving the two
wretched women struggling in the river. When Brocard and his son were
restored to liberty, four days afterward, and found the bodies, they
discovered that their wives had both received bullet wounds in the head.

"At Triaucourt the Germans gave themselves up to the worst excesses.
Angered doubtless by the remark which an officer had addressed to a
soldier, against whom a young girl of nineteen, Mlle. Helene Proces, had
made complaint of on account of the indecent treatment to which she had
been subjected, they burned the village and made a systematic massacre
of the inhabitants. They began by setting fire to the house of an
inoffensive householder, M. Jules Gand, and by shooting this unfortunate
man as he was leaving his house to escape the flames. Then they
dispersed among the houses in the streets, firing off their rifles on
every side. A young man, seventeen years, Georges Lecourtier, who tried
to escape, was shot. M. Alfred Lallemand suffered the same fate. He was
pursued into the kitchen of his fellow-citizen Tautelier, and murdered
there, while Tautelier received three bullets in his hand.

"Fearing, not without reason, for their lives, Mlle. Proces, her mother
and her grandmother of seventy-one and her old aunt of eighty-one, tried
to cross the trellis which separates their garden from a neighboring
property with the help of a ladder. The young girl alone was able to
reach the other side and to avoid death by hiding in the cabbages. As
for the other women, they were struck down by rifle shots. The village
cure collected the brains of the aunt on the ground on which they were
strewn and had the bodies carried into Proces' house. During the
following night, the Germans played the piano near the bodies.

"While the carnage raged, the fire rapidly spread and devoured
thirty-five houses. An old man of seventy and a child of two months
perished in the flames. M. Igier, who was trying to save his cattle, was
pursued for 300 meters by soldiers, who fired at him ceaselessly. By a
miracle this man had the good fortune not to be wounded, but five
bullets went through his clothing."

This summary merely hints at the atrocities that were perpetrated. And
these are the crimes that France and Belgium will remember after
indemnities have been paid, after borders have been re-established and
after generations shall have past. The horrors of blazing villages, of
violated womanhood, of mutilated childhood, of stark and senseless
butcheries, will flash before the minds of French and Belgian men and
women when Germany's name shall be mentioned long after the declaration
of peace.

Schrecklichkeit had its day. It took its bloody toll of the fairest and
bravest of two gallant nations. It ravaged Poland as well and wreaked
its fiendish will on wounded soldiers on the battle-fields.

But Schrecklichkeit is dead. Belgium and France have shown that murder
and rape and arson can not destroy liberty nor check the indomitable
ambitions of the free peoples of earth.

The lesson to Germany was taught at a terrible cost to humanity, but it
was taught in a fashion that nations hereafter who shall dream of
emulating the Hun will know in advance that frightfulness serves no end
except to feed the lust for destruction that exists only in the most
debased and brutish of men.



CHAPTER VII

THE FIRST BATTLE OF THE MARNE

France and civilization were saved by Joffre and Foch at the first
battle of the Marne, in September, 1914. Autocracy was destroyed by Foch
at the second battle of the Marne, in July, 1918.

This in a nutshell embraces the dramatic opening and closing episodes of
the World War on the soil of France. Bracketed between these two
glorious victories were the agonies of martyred France, the deaths and
life-long cripplings of millions of men, the up-rooting of arrogant
militarism, the liberation of captive nations.

The first battle of the Marne was wholly a French operation. The British
were close at hand, but had no share in the victory. Generals Gallieni
and Manoury, acting under instructions from Marshal Joffre, were driven
by automobile to the headquarters of the British commander, Sir John
French, in the village of Melun. They explained in detail General
Joffre's plan of attack upon the advancing German army. An urgent
request was made that the British army halt its retreat, face about, and
attack the two corps of von Kluck's army then confronting the British.
Simultaneously with this attack General Manoury's forces were to fall
upon the flank and the rear guard of von Kluck along the River Ourcq.
This operation was planned for the next day, September 5th. Sir John
French replied that he could not get his tired army in readiness for
battle within forty-eight hours. This would delay the British attack in
all probability until September 7th.

Joffre's plan of battle, however, would admit of no delay. The case was
urgent; there was grave danger of a union between the great forces
headed by the Crown Prince and those under von Kluck. He resolved to go
ahead without the British, and ordered Manoury to strike as had been
planned.

He fixed as an extreme limit for the movement of retreat, which was
still going on, the line of Bray-sur-Seine, Nogent-sur-Seine,
Arcis-sur-Aube, Vitry-le-Francois, and the region to the north of
Bar-le-Duc. This line might be reached if the troops were compelled to
go back so far. They would attack before reaching it, as soon as there
was a possibility of bringing about an offensive disposition, permitting
the co-operation of the whole of the French forces. On September 5 it
appeared that this desired situation existed.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright Underwood and Underwood, N.Y.
  GENERAL PERSHING AND MARSHAL JOFFRE
  The Commander-in-Chief of the American Expeditionary Forces chatting
  with the veteran Marshal of France, the hero of the first battle of
  the Marne.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  MARSHAL FERDINAND FOCH, GENERALISSIMO OF THE ALLIED ARMIES
  No leader could command greater confidence than the brilliant
  strategist to whom was mainly due the great victory of the Marne in
  the first autumn of the war. He also directed the French offensive on
  the Somme in 1916 and in November, 1917, he was chosen as the French
  representative and subsequently chairman of the Central Military
  Committee appointed to assist the Supreme Allied War Council. Marshal
  Foch was formerly for five years lecturer on strategy and tactics at
  the Ecole de Guerre. At the close of the war he said to the Allied
  armies: "You have won the greatest battle in history and saved the
  most sacred cause--the liberty of the world,"


[Illustration: Map; Paris in the lower left corner, showing various
battle lines Eastward to Luxumburg.]
  THE FIRST GERMAN DASH FOR PARIS


The First German army, carrying audacity to temerity, had continued its
endeavor to envelop the French left, had crossed the Grand Morin, and
reached the region of Chauffry, to the south of Rebais and of Esternay.
It aimed then at cutting Joffre off from Paris, in order to begin the
investment of the capital.

The Second army had its head on the line Champaubert, Etoges, Bergeres,
and Vertus.

The Third and Fourth armies reached to Chalons-sur-Marne and
Bussy-le-Repos. The Fifth army was advancing on one side and the other
from the Argonne as far as Triacourt-les-Islettes and Juivecourt. The
Sixth and Seventh armies were attacking more to the east.

The French left army had been able to occupy the line Sezanne,
Villers-St. Georges and Courchamps. This was precisely the disposition
which the General-in-Chief had wished to see achieved. On the 4th he
decided to take advantage of it, and ordered all the armies to hold
themselves ready. He had taken from his right two new army corps, two
divisions of infantry, and two divisions of cavalry, which were
distributed between his left and his center.

On the evening of the 5th he addressed to all the commanders of armies a
message ordering them to attack.

"The hour has come," he wrote, "to advance at all costs, and to die
where you stand rather than give way."

If one examines the map, it will be seen that by his inflection toward
Meaux and Coulommiers General von Kluck was exposing his right to the
offensive action of the French left. This is the starting point of the
victory of the Marne.

On the evening of September 5th the French left army had reached the
front Penchard-Saint-Souflet-Ver. On the 6th and 7th it continued its
attacks vigorously with the Ourcq as objective. On the evening of the
7th it was some kilometers from the Ourcq, on the front
Chambry-Marcilly-Lisieux-Acy-en-Multien. On the 8th, the Germans, who
had in great haste reinforced their right by bringing their Second and
Fourth army corps back to the north, obtained some successes by attacks
of extreme violence. But in spite of this pressure the French held their
ground. In a brilliant action they took three standards, and being
reinforced prepared a new attack for the 10th. At the moment that this
attack was about to begin the enemy was already in retreat toward the
north. The attack became a pursuit, and on the 12th the French
established themselves on the Aisne.

Why did the German forces which were confronting the French, and on the
evening before attacking so furiously, retreat on the morning of the
10th? Because in bringing back on the 6th several army corps from the
south to the north to face the French left, the enemy had exposed his
left to the attacks of the now rested British, who had immediately faced
around toward the north, and to those of the French armies which were
prolonging the English lines to the right. This is what the French
command had sought to bring about. This is what happened on September
8th and allowed the development and rehabilitation which it was to
effect.

On the 6th the British army set out from the line Rozcy-Lagny and that
evening reached the southward bank of the Grand Morin. On the 7th and
8th it continued its march, and on the 9th had debouched to the north of
the Marne below Chauteau-Thierry--the town that was to become famous
for the American stand in 1918--taking in flank the German forces which
on that day were opposing, on the Ourcq, the French left army. Then it
was that these forces began to retreat, while the British army, going in
pursuit and capturing seven guns and many prisoners, reached the Aisne
between Soissons and Longueval.

The role of the French army, which was operating to the right of the
British army, was threefold. It had to support the British attacking on
its left. It had on its right to support the center, which, from
September 7th, had been subjected to a German attack of great violence.
Finally, its mission was to throw back the three active army corps and
the reserve corps which faced it.

On the 7th, it made a leap forward, and on the following days reached
and crossed the Marne, seizing, after desperate fighting, guns,
howitzers, mitrailleuses, and a million cartridges. On the 12th it
established itself on the north edge of the Montagne-de-Reime in contact
with the French center, which for its part had just forced the enemy to
retreat in haste.

The French center consisted of a new army created on August 29th and of
one of those which at the beginning of the campaign had been engaged in
Belgian Luxemburg. The first had retreated, on August 29th to September
5th, from the Aisne to the north of the Marne and occupied the general
front Sezanne-Mailly.

The second, more to the east, had drawn back to the south of the line
Humbauville-Chateau-Beauchamp-Bignicourt-Blesmes-Maurupt-le-Montoy.

The enemy, in view of his right being arrested and the defeat of his
enveloping movement, made a desperate effort from the 7th to the 19th to
pierce the French center to the west and to the east of
Fere-Champenoise. On the 8th he succeeded in forcing back the right of
the new French army, which retired as far as Gouragancon. On the 9th, at
6 o'clock in the morning, there was a further retreat to the south of
that village, while on the left the other army corps also had to go back
to the line Allemant-Connantre.

Despite this retreat General Foch, commanding the army of the center,
ordered a general offensive for the same day. With the Morocco division,
whose behavior was heroic, he met a furious assault of the Germans on
his left toward the marshes of Saint Gond. Then, with the divisions
which had just victoriously overcome the attacks of the enemy to the
north of Sezanne, and with the whole of his left army corps, he made a
flanking attack in the evening of the 9th upon the German forces, and
notably the guard, which had thrown back his right army corps. The
enemy, taken by surprise by this bold maneuver, did not resist, and beat
a hasty retreat. This marked Foch as the most daring and brilliant
strategist of the war.

On the 11th the French crossed the Marne between Tours-sur-Marne and
Sarry, driving the Germans in front of them in disorder. On the 12th
they were in contact with the enemy to the north of the Camp de Chalons.
The reserve army of the center, acting on the right of the one just
referred to, had been intrusted with the mission during the 7th, 8th,
and 9th of disengaging its neighbor, and it was only on the 10th that
being reinforced by an army corps from the east, it was able to make its
action effectively felt. On the 11th the Germans retired. But,
perceiving their danger, they fought desperately, with enormous
expenditure of projectiles, behind strong intrenchments. On the 12th the
result had none the less been attained, and the two French center armies
were solidly established on the ground gained.

To the right of these two armies were three others. They had orders to
cover themselves to the north and to debouch toward the west on the
flank of the enemy, which was operating to the west of the Argonne. But
a wide interval in which the Germans were in force separated them from
the French center. The attack took place, nevertheless, with very
brilliant success for the French artillery, which destroyed eleven
batteries of the Sixteenth German army corps.

On the 10th inst., the Eighth and Fifteenth German army corps
counter-attacked, but were repulsed. On the 11th French progress
continued with new successes, and on the 12th the French were able to
face round toward the north in expectation of the near and inevitable
retreat of the enemy, which, in fact, took place from the 13th.

The withdrawal of the mass of the German force involved also that of the
left. From the 12th onward the forces of the enemy operating between
Nancy and the Vosges retreated in a hurry before the two French armies
of the East, which immediately occupied the positions that the enemy had
evacuated. The offensive of the French right had thus prepared and
consolidated in the most useful way the result secured by the left and
center.

Such was this seven days' battle, in which more than two millions of men
were engaged. Each army gained ground step by step, opening the road to
its neighbor, supported at once by it, taking in flank the adversary
which the day before it had attacked in front, the efforts of one
articulating closely with those of the other, a perfect unity of
intention and method animating the supreme command.

To give this victory all its meaning it is necessary to add that it was
gained by troops which for two weeks had been retreating, and which,
when the order for the offensive was given, were found to be as ardent
as on the first day. It has also to be said that these troops had to
meet the whole Germany army. Under their pressure the German retreat at
certain times had the appearance of a rout.

In spite of the fatigue of the poilus, in spite of the power of the
German heavy artillery, the French took colors, guns, mitrailleuses,
shells, and thousands of prisoners. One German corps lost almost the
whole of its artillery.

In that great battle the spectacular rush of General Gallieni's army
defending Paris, was one of the dramatic surprises that decided the
issue. In that stroke Gallieni sent his entire force forty miles to
attack the right wing of the German army. In this gigantic maneuver
every motor car in Paris was utilized, and the flying force of Gallieni
became the "Army in Taxicabs," a name that will live as long as France
exists.

General Clergerie, Chief of Staff to Gallieni told the story for
posterity. He said:

"From August 26, 1914, the German armies had been descending upon Paris
by forced marches. On September 1st they were only three days' march
from the advanced line of the intrenched camp, which the garrison were
laboring desperately to put into condition for defense. It was necessary
to cover with trenches a circuit of 110 miles, install siege guns,
assure the coming of supplies for them over narrow-gauge railways,
assemble the food and provisions of all kinds necessary for a city of
4,000,000 inhabitants.

"But on September 3d, the intelligence service, which was working
perfectly, stated, about the middle of the day, that the German columns,
after heading straight for Paris, were swerving toward the southeast and
seemed to wish to avoid the fortified camp.

"General Gallieni and I then had one of those long conferences which
denoted grave events; they usually lasted from two to five minutes at
most. The fact is that the military government of Paris did little
talking--it acted. The conference reached this conclusion: 'If they do
not come to us, we will go to them with all the force we can muster.'
Nothing remained but to make the necessary preparations. The first thing
to do was not to give the alarm to the enemy. General Manoury's army
immediately received orders to lie low and avoid any engagement that was
not absolutely necessary." Then care was taken to reinforce it by every
means. All was ready at the designated time.

In the night of September 3d, knowing that the enemy would have to leave
only a rear guard on one bank of the Ourcq, General Gallieni and General
Clergerie decided to march against that rear guard, to drive it back
with all the weight of the Manoury army, to cut the enemy's
communications, and take full advantage of his hazardous situation.
Immediately the following order was addressed to General Manoury:


Because of the movement of the German armies, which seem to be slipping
in before our front to the southeast, I intend to send your army to
attack them in the flank, that is to say, in an easterly direction. I
will indicate your line of march as soon as I learn that of the British
army. But make your arrangements now so that your troops shall be ready
to march this afternoon and to begin a general movement east of the
intrenched camp tomorrow.


At ten in the morning a consultation was held by Generals Gallieni,
Clergerie, and Manoury, and the details of the plan of operations were
immediately decided. General Joffre gave permission to attack and
announced that he would himself take the offensive on the 6th. On the
5th, at noon, the army from Paris fired the first shot; the battle of
the Ourcq, a preface to the Marne, had begun.

General Clergerie then told what a precious purveyor of information he
had found in General von der Marwitz, cavalry commander of the German
first army, who made intemperate use of the wireless telegraph and did
not even take the trouble to put into cipher his dispatches, of which
the Eiffel Tower made a careful collection. "In the evening of September
9th," he said, "an officer of the intelligence corps brought me a
dispatch from this same Marwitz couched in something like these terms:
'Tell me exactly where you are and what you are doing. Hurry up, because
XXX.' The officer was greatly embarrassed to interpret those three X's.
Adopting the language of the poilu, I said to him, 'Translate it, "I am
going to bolt."' True enough, next day we found on the site of the
German batteries, which had been precipitately evacuated, stacks of
munitions; while by the roadside we came upon motors abandoned for the
slightest breakdown, and near Betz almost the entire outfit of a field
bakery, with a great store of flour and dough half-kneaded. Paris and
France were saved.

"Von Kluck could not get over his astonishment. He has tried to explain
it by saying he was unlucky, for out of a hundred governors not one
would have acted as Gallieni did, throwing his whole available force
nearly forty miles from his stronghold. It was downright imprudence."



CHAPTER VIII

JAPAN IN THE WAR

On August 15, 1914, the Empire of Japan issued an ultimatum to Germany.
She demanded the evacuation of Tsing-tau, the disarming of the warships
there and the handing over of the territory to Japan for ultimate
reversion to China. The time limit for her reply was set at 12 o'clock,
August 24th. To this ultimatum Germany made no reply, and at 2.30 P. M.,
August 23d, the German Ambassador was handed his passports and war was
declared.

The reason for the action of Japan was simple. She was bound by treaty
to Great Britain to come to her aid in any war in which Great Britain
might be involved. On August 4th a note was received from Great Britain
requesting Japan to safeguard British shipping in the Far East. Japan
replied that she could not guarantee the safety of British shipping so
long as Germany was in occupation of the Chinese province of Tsing-tau.
She suggested in turn that England agree to allow her to remove this
German menace. The British Government agreed, on the condition that
Tsing-tau be subsequently returned to China.

The Japanese Government in taking this stand was acting with courage and
with loyalty. Toward individual Germans she entertained no animosity.
She had the highest respect for German scholarship and German military
science. She had been sending her young men to German seats of learning,
and had based the reorganization of her army upon the German military
system. But she did not believe that a treaty was a mere "scrap of
paper," and was determined to fulfill her obligations in the treaty with
England.

It seems to have been the opinion of the highest Japanese military
authorities that Germany would win the war. Japan's statesmen, however,
believed that Germany was a menace to both China and Japan and had
lively recollections of her unfriendly attitude in connection with the
Chino-Japanese war and in the period that followed. Germany had been
playing the same game in China that she had played in the Mediterranean
and which had ultimately brought about the war.

The Chino-Japanese war had been a great Japanese triumph. One of Japan's
greatest victories had been the capture of Port Arthur, but the joy
caused in Japan had not ended before it was turned into mourning because
of German interference. Germany had then compelled Japan to quit Port
Arthur, and to hand over that great fort to Russia so that she herself
might take Kiao-chau without Russia's objection.

Japan had never forgotten or forgiven. The German seizure of Kiao-chau
had led to the Russian occupation of Port Arthur, the British occupation
of Wei-hai-wei and French occupation of Kwan-chow Bay. The vultures were
swooping down on defenseless China. This had led to the Boxer
disturbance of 1910, where again the Kaiser had interfered.

Japan, who recognized that her interests and safety were closely allied
with the preservation of the territorial integrity of China, had
proposed to the powers that she be permitted to send her troops to the
rescue of the beleaguered foreigners, but this proposition was refused
on account of German suspicion of Japan's motives. Later on, during the
Russo-Japanese war, Russia was assisted in many ways by the German
Government.

Furthermore, the popular sympathy with the Japanese was strongly with
the Allies. It was the Kaiser who started the cry of the "yellow peril,"
which had deeply hurt Japanese pride. Yet, even with this strong
feeling, it was remarkable that Japan was willing to ally herself with
Russia. She knew very well that after all the greatest danger to her
liberties lay across the Japan Sea. Russian autocracy, with its
militarism, its religious intolerance, its discriminating policy against
foreign interests in commerce and trade, was the natural opponent of
liberal Japan.

The immediate object of Japan in joining hands with England was to
destroy the German menace in the Pacific. Before she delivered her
ultimatum the Germans had been active; ignoring the rights of Japan
while she was still neutral they had captured a Russian steamer within
Japanese jurisdiction, as well as a number of British merchant vessels,
and even a few Japanese ships had been intercepted by German cruisers.
This was the disturbance to general peace in the Far East, which had
prompted England to request Japan's assistance.

Japan, when she entered the war, was at least twice as strong as when
she began the war with Russia. She had an army of one million men, and a
navy double the size of that which she had possessed when the Treaty of
Portsmouth was signed. As soon as war was declared she proceeded to act.
A portion of her fleet was directed against the German forces in the
Pacific, one squadron occupying Jaluit, the seat of government of the
Marshall Islands, on October 3d, but her main forces were directed
against the fortress of Tsing-tau.

The Germans had taken great pride in Tsing-tau, and had made every
effort to make it a model colony as well as an impregnable fortress.
They had built costly water works, fine streets and fine public
buildings. They had been making great preparations for a state of siege,
although it was not expected that they would be able to hold out for a
long time. There were hardly more than five thousand soldiers in the
fortress, and in the harbor but four small gunboats and an Austrian
cruiser, the Kaiserin Elizabeth. As Austria was not at war with Japan
the authorization of Japan was asked for the removal of the Kaiserin
Elizabeth to Shanghai, where she could be interned. The Japanese were
favorable to this proposition, but at the last moment instructions
arrived from Vienna directing the Austro-Hungarian Ambassador to ask for
his passports at Tokio and the commander of the Kaiserin Elizabeth to
assist the Germans in the defense of Tsing-tau. The Germans also
received orders to defend their fortress to the very last. A portion of
the German squadron, under Admiral von Spee, had sailed away before the
Japanese attack, one of these being the famous commerce raider, the
Emden.

On the 27th of August the Japanese made their first move by taking
possession of some of the small islands at the mouth of the harbor of
Kiao-chau. From these points as bases they swept the surrounding waters
for mines, with such success that during the whole siege but one vessel
of their fleet was injured by a mine. On the 2d of September they landed
troops at the northern base of the peninsula upon which Tsing-tau was
situated, with the object of cutting off the fortress from the mainland.

The heavy rains which were customary at that season prevented much
action, but airplanes were sent which dropped bombs upon the wireless
station, electric power station and railway station of Kiao-chau, and
upon the ships in the harbor. On September 13th General Kamio captured
the railway station of Kiao-chau which stands at the head of the bay.
This placed him twenty-two miles from Tsing-tau itself. On September
27th he captured Prince Heinrich Hill giving him a gun position from
which he could attack the inner forts. On the 23d a small British force
arrived from Wei-hai-wei to co-operate with the Japanese.


[Illustration: Map of the city Tsing-Tau and Kiao-Chau Bay.]
  THE GERMAN GIBRALTAR IN THE FAR EAST WHICH FELL TO THE JAPANESE


The combined forces then advanced until they were only five miles from
Tsing-tau. The German warships were bombarding the Japanese troops
fiercely, and were being replied to by the Japanese squadron in the
mouth of the harbor. The great waste of German ammunition led General
Kamio to the opinion that the Germans did not contemplate a long siege.
He then determined on a vigorous assault.

Before the attack was made he gave the non-combatants an opportunity of
leaving, and on the 15th of October a number of women and children and
Chinese were allowed to pass through the Japanese lines. On October 31st
the bombardment began, and the German forts were gradually silenced. On
November 2d the Kaiserin Elizabeth was sunk in the harbor.

The Allied armies were pushing their way steadily down, until, on
November 6th, their trenches were along the edge of the last German
redoubts. At 6 o'clock on that day white flags were floating over the
central forts and by 7.30 Admiral Waldeck, the German Governor, had
signed the terms of capitulation.

Germany's prize colony on the continent of Asia had disappeared. The
survivors, numbering about three thousand, were sent to Japan as
prisoners of war. Japanese losses were but two hundred and thirty-six
men killed. They had, however, lost one third-class cruiser, the
Takachiho, and several smaller crafts. The whole expedition was a
notable success. It had occupied much less time than either Japan or
Germany had expected, and the news was received in Germany with a
universal feeling of bitterness and chagrin.

After the Japanese capture of Kiao-chau Japan's assistance to the
Allies, while not spectacular, was extremely important, and its
importance increased during the last two years of the war. Her cruiser
squadrons did continuous patrol duty in the Pacific and in the China Sea
and even in the Indian Ocean. She occupied three groups of German
Islands in the South Sea, assisted in driving German raiders from the
Pacific, and by her efficiency permitted a withdrawal of British
warships to points where they could be useful nearer home. She patrolled
the Pacific coast of North and South America, landed marines to quell
riots at Singapore, and finally entered into active service in European
waters by sending a destroyer squadron to the assistance of the Allies
in the Mediterranean.

But while the aid of Japan's navy was important to the Allies, her
greatest assistance to the Allied cause was what she did in supplying
Russia with military supplies. The tremendous struggle carried on by
Russia's forces during the first years prevented an easy German victory,
and was only made possible through the assistance of Japan. Enormous
quantities of guns, ammunition, military stores, hospital and Red Cross
supplies, were sent into Russia, with skilled officers and experts to
accompany them.

In the last year of the war Japan once more came prominently in the
public eye in connection with the effort made by the Allies to protect
from the Russian Bolsheviki vast stores of ammunition which had been
landed in ports of Eastern Siberia. She was compelled to land troops to
do this and to preserve order in localities where her citizens were in
danger. Upon the development of the Czecho-Slovak movement in Eastern
Siberia a Japanese force, in association with troops from the United
States and Great Britain, was landed to protect the Czecho-Slovaks from
Bolsheviki treachery. These troops succeeded in their object, and
throughout the latter period of the war kept Eastern Siberia friendly to
the Allied cause. In this campaign there was but little blood shed. The
expedition was followed by the strong sympathy of the allied world which
was full of admiration for the loyalty and courage of the Czecho-Slovaks
and their heroic leaders.



CHAPTER IX

CAMPAIGN IN THE EAST

Long before the declaration of war the German military experts had made
their plans. They recognized that in case of war with Russia, France
would come to the rescue of its ally. They hoped that Italy, and felt
sure that England, would remain neutral, but, no doubt, had provided for
the possibility that these two nations would join the ranks of their
foes. They recognized that they would be compelled to fight against
greatly superior numbers, but they had this advantage, that they were
prepared to move at once, while England was unprepared, and Russia, with
enormous numbers, was so unprovided with railroad facilities that it
would take weeks before her armies would be dangerous.

Their plan of campaign, then, was obvious. Leaving in the east only such
forces as were necessary for a strong defense, they would throw the bulk
of their strength against the French. They anticipated an easy march to
Paris, and then with France at their mercy they would gather together
all their powers and deal with Russia. But they had underestimated both
the French power of resistance, and the Russian weakness, and in
particular they had not counted upon the check that they were to meet
with in gallant Belgium.

The Russian mobilization was quicker by far than had been anticipated.
Her armies were soon engaged with the comparatively small German forces,
and met with great success.

To understand the Russian campaign one must have some knowledge of the
geography of western Russia. Russian Poland projects as a great
quadrilateral into eastern Germany. It is bounded on the north by East
Prussia, on the south by Galicia, and the western part reaches deep into
Germany itself. The land is a broad, level plain, through which from
south to north runs the River Vistula. In the center lies the capital,
Warsaw, protected by a group of fortresses. The Russian army, therefore,
could not make a direct western advance until it had protected its
flanks by the conquest of East Prussia on the north, and Galicia on the
south.

By the beginning of the third week in August the first Russian armies
were ready. Her forces were arranged as follows: Facing East Prussia was
the Army of the Niemen, four corps strong; the Army of Poland,
consisting of fifteen army corps, occupied a wide front from Narev on
the north to the Bug Valley; a third army, the Army of Galicia, directed
its line of advance southward into the country between Lemberg and the
River Sareth. The fortresses protecting Warsaw, still further to the
east, were well garrisoned, and in front of them to the west were troops
intended to delay any German advance from Posen. The Russian
commander-in-chief was the Grand Duke Nicholas, uncle of the late Czar,
and one of the most admirable representatives of the Russian at his
best; a splendid soldier, honest, straightforward, and patriotic, he was
the idol of his men. He had with him a brilliant staff, but the strength
of his army lay in its experience. They had learned war in the bitter
school of the Manchurian campaign.

The German force on the frontier was not less than five hundred thousand
men, and they were arranged for defense. Austria, in Galicia, had
gathered nearly one million men under the auspices of Frederick. The
first movement of these armies took place in East Prussia. The Army of
the Niemen had completed its mobilization early in August, and was under
the command of General Rennenkampf, one of the Russian leaders in
Manchuria. In command of the German forces was General von Francois, an
officer of Huguenot descent.

The first clash of these armies took place on the German frontier near
Libau, on August 3d. Two days later, the Russians crossed the frontier,
drove in the German advance posts, and seized the railway which runs
south and east of the Masurian Lakes. The German force fell back,
burning villages and destroying roads, according to their usual plan. On
the 7th of August the main army of Rennenkampf crossed the border at
Suwalki, advancing in two main bodies: the Army of the Niemen moving
north from Suwalki, the Army of the Narev marching through the region of
the Masurian Lakes. In the lake district they advanced toward Boyen, and
then directed their march toward Insterburg.

To protect Insterburg, General van Francois made his first stand at
Gumbinnen, where, on the 16th of August, the first important battle of
this campaign took place. The result was the defeat and retirement of
the Germans, and von Francois was forced to fall back on Koenigsberg.

Meantime, the Army of the Narev, under General Samsonov, was advancing
through the country west of the Masurian Lakes. On the 20th his vanguard
came upon a German army corps, strongly entrenched at the northwest end
of the lakes. The Germans were defeated, and fled in great disorder
toward Koenigsberg, abandoning their guns and wagons. Many prisoners
were taken, and the Russians found themselves masters of all of East
Prussia except that inside the Koenigsberg line. They then marched on
Koenigsberg, and East Prussia was for a moment at the mercy of the
conqueror.

Troops were left to invest Koenigsberg, and East Prussia was overrun
with the enemy. The report as to the behavior of these troops met with
great indignation in Germany; but better information insists that they
behaved with decorum and discretion. The peasantry of East Prussia,
remembering wild tales of the Cossacks of a hundred years before, fled
in confusion with stories of burning and slaughter and outrage.

Germany became aroused. To thoroughly understand the effect of the
Russian invasion of East Prussia, one must know something of the
relations of that district with the German Empire. Historically, this
was the cradle of the Prussian aristocracy, whose dangerous policies had
alarmed Europe for so many decades. The Prussian aristocracy originated
in a mixture of certain west German and Christian knights, with a pagan
population of the eastern Baltic plain. The district was separate from
Poland and never fell under the Polish influence. It was held by the
Teutonic knights who conquered it in a sort of savage independence. The
Christian faith, which the Teutonic knights professed to inculcate, took
little root, but such civilization as Germany itself had absorbed did
filter in. The chief noble of Borussia, the governing Duke, acquired in
time the title of King, and it was here, not in Berlin, nor in
Brandenburg, that the Hohenzollern power originated.


[Illustration: Painting]
  THE FURY OF A COSSACK CHARGE
  Some of the most bitter fighting of the war took place on the
  snow-covered heights of the Carpathians when Russia's armies struggled
  with the foe. Here is illustrated a charge by Cossacks on an Austrian
  battery. There is nothing in warfare quite like the furious onslaught
  of the little men of the steppes on their wiry ponies.


[Illustration: Painting]
  HIDE AND SEEK IN THE BALTIC
  A Zeppelin flying over a British submarine in the stormy sea.


[Illustration: Map bounded by Koenigsberg on the North, Warsaw on the East,
Cracow on the South and Posen on the West.]
  THE EASTERN FIGHTING ZONE


East Prussia, therefore, had a sentimental importance in the eyes of the
Prussian nobility. The Prussian Royal House, in particular, had toward
this country an especial regard. Moreover, it was regarded by the
Germans as a whole as their rampart against the Slav, a proof of the
German power to withstand the dreaded Russian. That this sacred soil
should now be in the hands of a Cossack army was not to be borne. The
Kaiser acted at once.

Large forces were detached from the west and sent to the aid of the
eastern army. A new commander was appointed. He was General von
Hindenburg, a veteran of the Franco-Prussian War who had been for some
years retired. After his retirement he devoted his time to the study of
East Prussia, especially the ground around the Masurian Lakes. He became
more familiar with its roads, its fields, its marshes, its bogs than any
of the peasants who spent their lives in the neighborhood of the lakes.
Before his retirement, in the annual maneuvers, he had often rehearsed
his defense against Russian invaders. Indeed report, perhaps unfounded,
described his retirement to the displeasure of the Emperor William at
being badly worsted in one of these mimic combats. He had prevented the
country from being cleared and the swamps from being drained, arguing
that they were worth more to Germany than a dozen fortresses. A man of
rugged strength, his face suggesting power and tenacity, he was to
become the idol of the German people.

His chance had come. His army consisted of remnants of the forces of von
Francois and large reinforcements sent him from the west. In all,
perhaps, he had with him 150,000 men, and he had behind him an admirable
system of strategic railways.

The Russian High Command was full of confidence. Rennenkampf had
advanced with the Army of the Niemen toward Koenigsberg, whose fall was
reported from time to time, without foundation. Koenigsberg was in fact
impregnable to armies no stronger than those under Rennenkampf's
command. Samsonov with the Army of the Narev, had pushed on to the
northeastern point of the lakes, and defeated the German army corps at
Frankenau. Misled by his success, he decided to continue his advance
through the lake region toward Allenstein. He marched first toward
Osterode, in the wilderness of forest, lake and marsh, between
Allenstein and the Lower Vistula. His force numbered 200,000 men, but
the swamps made it impossible to proceed in mass. His column had to be
temporarily divided, nor was he well informed as to the strength of his
enemy. On Wednesday, the 26th of August, his advance guards were
everywhere driven in. As he pushed on he discovered the enemy in great
numbers, and late in the day realized that he was facing a great army.

Von Hindenburg had taken a position astride the railway from Allenstein
to Soldau, and all access to his front was barred by lakes and swamps.
He was safe from frontal attack, and could reinforce each wing at
pleasure. From his right ran the only two good roads in the region, and
at his left was the Osterode railway. On the first day he stood on the
defensive, while the Russians, confident of victory, attacked again and
again. Some ground was won and prisoners captured, and the news of a
second victory was sent to western Europe.

The battle continued, however, until the last day of August and is known
as the battle of Tannenberg, from a village of that name near the
marshes. Having worn down his enemy, von Hindenburg counter-attacked.
His first movement was on his right. This not only deceived Samsonov and
led him to reinforce his left, but also enabled von Hindenburg to seize
the only good road that would give the Russian army a chance of retreat.
Meanwhile the German general was hurrying masses of troops northeastward
to outflank the Russian right. While the Russians were reinforcing one
flank, he was concentrating every man he could upon the other. Then his
left swept southward, driving in and enveloping the Russian right, and
Samsonov was driven into a country full of swamps and almost without
roads.

To thoroughly understand the plight of the Russian army one must have
some idea of the character of the Masurian Lake district. It was
probably molded by the work of ice in the past. Great glaciers, in their
progress toward the sea, have ground out hundreds of hollows, where are
found small pools and considerable lakes. From these glaciers have been
dropped patches of clay which hold the waters in wide extents of marsh
and bog. The country presents a monotonous picture of low, rounded
swells and flats, interspersed with stunted pine and birch woods. The
marshes and the lakes form a labyrinth, difficult to pass even to those
familiar with the country. The Masurian region is a great trap for any
commander who has not had unlimited acquaintance with the place.
Causeways, filled with great care, and railroads permit an orderly
advance, but in a confused retreat disaster at once threatens.

This was the ground that von Hindenburg knew so well. The Russians
resisted desperately, but their position could not be held. Disaster
awaited them. They found their guns sinking to the axle-trees in mire.
Whole regiments were driven into the lakes and drowned. On the last day
of battle, August 31st, Samsonov himself was killed, and his army
completely destroyed. Fifty thousand prisoners were taken with hundreds
of guns and quantities of supplies. Von Hindenburg had attained the
triumph of which he had so long dreamed.

It was an immensely successful example of that enveloping movement
characteristic of German warfare, a victory recalling the battle of
Sedan, and it was upon a scale not inferior to that battle.

The news of this great triumph reached Berlin upon the anniversary of
the battle of Sedan, and on the same day that the news came from the
west that von Kluck had reached the gates of Paris and it had a profound
effect upon the German mind. They had grown to believe that the Germans
were a sort of superman; these wonderful successes confirmed them in
this belief.

No longer did they talk of a mere defense in the east; an advance on
Warsaw was demanded and von Hindenburg was acclaimed the greatest
soldier of his day. The Emperor made him Field Marshal, and placed him
in command of the Teutonic armies in the east.

But von Hindenburg was not satisfied. The remnant of the defeated army
had fled toward Narev, and without losing a moment von Hindenburg set
off in pursuit. Rennenkampf, all this time, strange to say, had made no
move, and at the news of Samsonov's disaster he abandoned the siege of
Koenigsberg and retreated toward the Niemen. At Gumbinnen he fought a
rear-guard action with the German left, but had made up his mind that
the Niemen must be the Russian line of defense. Von Hindenburg,
following, crossed the Russian frontier and in the wide forests near
Augustovo there was much fighting.


[Illustration: Photographs]
  LEADING GERMAN GENERALS
  Von Hindenburg, Chief of the German General Staff; von Ludendorff,
  Strategist of the General Staff; von Moltke, dismissed by the Kaiser
  for incompetency; von Mackensen, Commander in the East; Crown Prince
  Rupprecht of Bavaria, Army Commander in the West.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Photo by Press Illustrated Service.
  THE GERMAN GENERAL STAFF
  von Mackensen, von Moltke, Crown Prince Wilhelm, von Francois,
  von Falkenhayn, von Beseler, von Bethmann-Hollweg, von Bulow,
  Duke Albrecht, Ludendorf, von Einem, von Hindenburg, von Heeringen,
  Crown Prince Rupprecht, von Kluck, von Haeseler, von Tirpitz,
  Kaiser Wilhelm II, von Emmich


This action, described as the first battle of Augustovo, was only a
rear-guard action, the Russians desiring merely to delay the enemy for a
day or two. German reports, however, described it as a victory only
second in importance to Tannenberg. Von Hindenburg then occupied
Suwalki. He apparently had become over confident, and hardly realized
that Rennenkampf was continually being reinforced by the Russian
mobilization.

The Russian High Command understood the situation very well. Their aim
was to keep von Hindenburg busy on the Niemen, while their armies in the
south were overwhelming the fleeing Austrians. Von Hindenburg was
deceived, and continued his advance until he got into serious trouble.
His movement had begun on September 7th; his army consisted of the four
corps with which he had won Tannenberg, and large reinforcements from
Germany, including at least one guards battalion, and a number of Saxons
and Bavarians. The country is one vast mixture of marsh and lake and
bog. The roads are few, and advance must therefore be slow and
difficult. Rennenkampf made no attempt to delay him beyond a little
rear-guard fighting. The German army reached the Niemen on September
21st, and found behind it the Russian army in prepared positions, with
large reinforcements from Vilna.

The river at this point was wide and deep, and hard to cross. The battle
of the Niemen Crossings was an artillery duel. The Russians quietly
waited in their trenches to watch the Germans build their pontoon
bridges. Then their guns blew the bridges to pieces. Thereupon von
Hindenburg bombarded the Russian lines hoping to destroy the Russian
guns. On Friday, the 26th, his guns boomed all day; the Russians made no
reply. So on the morning of the 27th he built bridges again, and again
the Russians blew them to pieces. On the 28th he gave the order for
retreat.

He realized that the game wasn't worth the candle; he might easily be
kept fighting on the Niemen for months, while the main armies of the
Russians were crossing Austria. Von Hindenburg conducted the retreat
with a skill which came to him naturally from his knowledge of the
marshes.

Rennenkampf followed him closely, keeping up persistent attacks through
the woods and marshes. The path of the retreating army lay through the
forest of Augustovo, a country much like that around the Masurian Lakes,
and there the Germans suffered heavy losses. Von Hindenburg managed,
however, to get the bulk of his forces back across the frontier and
continued his retreat to the intrenchments on the Masurian Lakes.

The Germans lost 60,000 men in killed, wounded and prisoners, and von
Hindenburg handed over the command of the German armies in East Prussia
to General von Schubert, and hastened south to direct the movement to
relieve the Austrians at Cracow.

But quite as important as the campaign in East Prussia was the struggle
in Galicia. When the war began the Germans contemplated merely defense
in their own domain; such offense as was planned was left to the
Austrians farther south.

Galicia is a long, level country lying north of the Carpathian
Mountains, and in this country Austria-Hungary had gathered together a
force of hardly less than one million men. A quarter of these lay in
reserve near the mountains; the remaining three-quarters was divided
into two armies; the first, the northern army, being under the command
of General Dankl, the second was that of von Offenberg. The base of the
first army was Przemysl; that of the second was Lemberg.

The first army, it was planned, was to advance into Russian territory in
the direction of Lublin. The second army, stationed southeast of the
first army, was to protect it from any Russians who might strike in upon
the south. The first army, therefore, contained more picked material
than the second, which included many troops from the southern parts of
the empire, including certain disaffected contingents. The first army
made its advance as soon as possible, and entered Russian territory on
the 11th of August. It went forward with very little loss and against
very little resistance. The Russian forces which were against it were
inferior in number, and fell back towards the Bug. The Austrians
followed, turning somewhat toward the east, when their advance was
checked by news of catastrophe in their rear. On the 14th of August the
Russian army under General Ruzsky crossed the frontier, and advanced
toward the Austrian second army.

The Russian army was in far greater strength than had been expected, and
when its advance was followed by the appearance upon the right flank of
von Offenberg's command, of yet another Russian army, under Brussilov,
the Austrian second army found itself in great danger. Ruzsky advanced
steadily from August 14th until, on the 21st, it was not more than one
day's advance from the outer works of Lemberg, and the third Russian
army under Brussilov was threatening von Offenberg's right flank.

Von Offenberg, underestimating the strength of the enemy, undertook to
give battle. The first outpost actions were successful for the
Austrians, and helped them in their blunder. On the 24th of August the
two Russian armies effected a junction, and their Austrian opponents
found themselves threatened with disaster. An endeavor was made to
retreat, but the retreat turned into a rout. On the 28th Tarnopol was
captured by the Russians, and the Austrian army found itself compelled
to fall back upon defense positions to the south and east of Lemberg
itself.

The attack of the Russian armies was completely successful. The Austrian
army was driven from its positions, and on September 4th the Austrians
evacuated Lemberg and the Russian forces took possession of the town.
The Austrians fled. The population welcomed the conquerors with the
greatest enthusiasm. An immense quantity of stores of every kind were
captured by the Russians together with at least 100,000 prisoners. There
was no looting, nor any kind of outrage. The Russian policy was to make
friends of the inhabitants of Galicia.

But there was no halt after Lemberg. Brussilov divided his army, and
sent his left wing into the Carpathian passes; his center and right
moved west toward Przemysl; while Ruzsky moved northwest to reinforce
the Russian army on the Bug. Meanwhile the position of Dankl's army was
perilous in the extreme. There were two possible courses, one to fall
back and join the remnants of von Offenberg's army, the other to attack
at once, before the first Russian army could be reinforced, and if
victorious to turn on Ruzsky.

Dankl's army was now very strong. He had received reinforcements, not
only from Austria but from Germany. On the 4th of September he attacked
the Russian center; his attack was a failure, although he outnumbered
the Russians. The battle continued until the tenth.

Everywhere the Austrians were beaten, and driven off in ignominious
retreat. The whole Austrian force fled southward in great disorder; a
part directed its flight toward Przemysl, others still farther west
toward Cracow. Austria had been completely defeated. Poland was clear of
the enemy. The Russian flag flew over Lemberg, while the Russian army
was marching toward Cracow. The Russian star was in the ascendant.

But the Austrian armies had not been annihilated. An army of nearly a
million men cannot be destroyed in so short a time. The Austrian failure
was due in part to the disaffection of some of the elements of the army,
and in part to the poor Austrian generalship. They had underestimated
their foe, and ventured on a most perilous plan of campaign.

Russian generalship had been most admirable, and the Russian generals
were men of ability and experience. Brussilov had seen service in the
Turkish War of 1877. Ruzsky was a professor in the Russian War Academy.
In the Japanese war he had been chief of staff to General Kaulbars, the
commander of the Second Manchurian army. Associated with him was General
Radko Dmitrieff, an able officer with a most interesting career. General
Dmitrieff was born in Bulgaria, when it was a Turkish province. He
graduated at the Military School at Sofia, and afterwards at the War
Academy at Petrograd. On his return to Bulgaria he commanded a regiment
in the Serbian-Bulgarian war. Later he became mixed up in the conspiracy
against Prince Alexander, and was forced to leave Bulgaria. For ten
years he served in the Russian army, returning to Bulgaria on the
accession of Prince Ferdinand. Later on he became Chief of the General
Staff, and when the Balkan war broke out he commanded one of the
Bulgarian armies, won several important victories, and became a popular
hero of the war. Disgusted with the political squabbles which followed
the war, he returned to Russia as a general in the Russian army. With
men like these in command, the Russian Empire was well served.

After the decisive defeat of the Austrian army under General Dankl,
certain changes were made in the Russian High Command. General Ruzsky
was made commander of the center, which was largely reinforced. General
Ivanov was put in command of the armies operating in Galicia with
Dmitrieff and Brussilov as his chief lieutenants. Brussilov's business
was to seize the deep passes in the Carpathians and to threaten Hungary.
Dmitrieff's duty was to press the Austrian retreat, and capture the main
fortresses of central Galicia.

There are two great fortresses on the River San, Jaroslav and Przemysl,
both of them controlling important railroad routes. Jaroslav on the main
line from Lemberg to Cracow, Przemysl with a line which skirts the
Carpathians, and connects with lines going south to Hungary. Jaroslav
was fortified by a strong circle of intrenchments and was looked to by
Austria for stout resistance. The Austrians were disappointed, for
Ivanov captured it in three days, on the 23d of September. Dmitrieff
found Przemysl a harder nut to crack. It held out for many months, while
operations of greater importance were being carried on by the Russian
armies. The plans of the Russian generals in some respects were not
unlike the plan previously suggested as that of the German High Command.
At the beginning of the war they had no desire to carry on a powerful
offensive against Germany. The expedition into East Prussia was
conducted more for political than for military purposes. The real
offensive at the start was to be against Austria. The Russian movements
were cautious at first, but the easy capture of Lemberg, the fall of
Jaroslav, and the demoralization of the Austrian armies, encouraged more
daring strategy. With the Germans stopped on the north, little aid to
the Austrians could come from that source. The Grand Duke Nicholas was
eager to strike a great blow before the winter struck in, so his armies
swept to the great Polish city of Cracow. The campaign against Austria
also had a political side.

Russia had determined upon a new attitude toward Poland. On August 15th
the Grand Duke Nicholas, on behalf of the Czar, had issued a
proclamation offering self-government to Russian Poland. Home rule for
Poland had long been a favorite plan with the Czar. Now he promised, not
only to give Russian Poland home rule, but to add to it the Polish
peoples in Austria and Germany. This meant that Austria and Germany
would have to give up Galicia on the one hand, and Prussian Poland on
the other, if they should lose the war. In the old days Poland had been
one of the greatest kingdoms in Europe, with a proud nobility and high
civilization. She was one of the first of the great Slav peoples to
penetrate the west. Later she had protected Europe against Tartar
invasion, but internal differences had weakened her, and, surrounded by
enemies, she had first been plundered, and later on divided between
Austria, Russia and Prussia. Never had the Poles consented to this
destruction of their independence. Galicia had constantly struggled
against Austria; Prussian Poland was equally disturbing to the Prussian
peace, and Russia was only able to maintain the control of her Polish
province by the sword.

Of the three the Pole was probably more inclined to keep on friendly
terms with Russia, also a Slav people. The policy of the Czar encouraged
this inclination and produced disaffection among the Poles in Galicia
and in Posen. Moreover, it gave Russia the sympathy of the world which
had long regarded the partition of Poland as a political crime. It
encouraged the Czecho-Slavs and other dissatisfied portions of the
Austrian Empire.

The results were seen immediately in the demoralization of the Austrian
armies where considerable numbers of Czecho-Slovak troops deserted to
the Russian army, and later in the loyalty to Russia of the Poles, and
their refusal, even under the greatest German pressure, to give the
German Empire aid.



CHAPTER X

THE STRUGGLE FOR SUPREMACY ON THE SEA

Captain Mahan's thesis that in any great war the nation possessing the
greater sea power is likely to win, was splendidly illustrated during
the World War.

The great English fleets proved the insuperable obstacle to the
ambitious German plans of world dominion. The millions of soldiers
landed in France from Great Britain, and its provinces, the millions of
Americans transported in safety across the water, and the enormous
quantities of supplies put at the disposal of the Allies depended,
absolutely, upon the Allied control of the sea routes of the world. With
a superior navy a German blockade of England would have brought her to
terms in a short period, and France, left to fight alone, would have
been an easy victim. The British navy saved the world.

Germany had for many years well understood the necessity of power upon
the sea. When the war broke out it was the second greatest of the sea
powers. Its ships were mostly modern, for its navy was a creation of the
past fifteen years, and its development was obviously for the purpose of
attacking the British supremacy. The father of this new navy was a naval
officer by the name of von Tirpitz, who, in 1897, had become the German
Naval Minister. With the aid of the Emperor he had aroused among the
Germans a great enthusiasm for maritime power, and had built up a navy
in fifteen years, which was second only to the English navy.

Von Tirpitz was an interesting character. In appearance he looked like
an old sea-wolf who had passed his life on the wave, but such a thought
would be a mistake. The great admiral's work was done on land; he was an
organizer, a diplomatist, and a politician. He created nothing new; in
all its details he merely copied the English fleet. He is tall, heavily
built, with a great white beard, forked in the middle. He is a man of
much dignity, with a smile which has won him renown. He might have been
Chancellor of the Empire but he preferred to devote himself to the navy,
to prove that the future of Germany is on the seas. His glories are the
Lusitania, the fleet safely anchored at Kiel, and the long rows of
innocent victims of the submarine.

He was born in 1850 at Kustrion on the Ildor, when the German navy was
only a little group of worthless boats. In 1865 he entered the School of
Cadets, in 1869 he was gazetted lieutenant, in 1875 he was
lieutenant-commander with a reputation as an able organizer. In 1891 he
was appointed Chief of Staff at Kiel. This was his opportunity, and he
set himself at the task of creating and protecting the submarine
division of the navy. As time went on he grew in importance. In 1898 he
became Assistant Secretary of State at the Admiralty in Berlin. Two
years later he became vice-admiral. His admirers recognized his powers,
and he was called the master. In 1899 a patent of nobility was conferred
upon him. In 1902 he gained permission to build 13,000-ton war ships,
and the following year he was made admiral. In 1907 enormous
appropriations were made at his desire for the enlargement of the fleet.
In 1908 Emperor William conferred on him the Order of the Black Eagle.
In 1914 the Kiel Canal was completed under his direction, and he
informed the Emperor that the fleet was ready. It is only fair to add
that in all his plans he had the active support of his Imperial Master.
The Kaiser, too, had dreamed a dream. Von Tirpitz admired the English.
His children had been brought up in England, as was also his wife. He
imitated the English, but on the day of the declaration of war he
absolutely forbade his family to talk English, and he made a bonfire of
his fine scientific library of English books. The Kaiser treated Von
Tirpitz as his friend, asked his advice, and followed his counsel. His
son, Sub-Lieutenant Wolf Von Tirpitz, studied at Oxford, and is on the
most friendly terms with many English gentlemen of importance. He was on
board the Mainz, which was sunk off Helgoland in August, 1916. In full
uniform he swam for twenty minutes, before being picked up by one of the
boats of the cruiser Liverpool. He was a lucky prisoner of war. The
German battleships and cruisers which represent the toil of von Tirpitz
for more than half a century, lay hidden away in the shelter of the Kiel
Canal during the war to be ingloriously surrendered at its end. His name
will remain linked with that of the Lusitania.


[Illustration: Painting: Seven sailors firing a large deck gun against
a sinking ship in the background.]
  DRIVING THE GERMAN COMMERCE RAIDERS OFF THE SEAS
  The British light cruiser, "Highflyer," sinking the "Kaiser Wilhelm
  der Grosse" off the West Coast of Africa early in the war. The
  commerce-destroyer was attacking a British steamer when the cruiser
  came up and sent her to the bottom. Inserts show both ships.


[Illustration: Painting: Torpedo crossing behind the path of a small ship.]
  Copyright International Film Service.
  ESCAPING A TORPEDO BY RAPID MANEUVERING
  This destroyer escaped a torpedo from a hunted submarine by quickly
  turning. Generally the torpedo travels at about fifteen feet under
  water.


The German High Sea Fleet, at the beginning of the war, consisted of
forty-one battleships, seven battle cruisers, nine armored cruisers,
forty-nine light cruisers, one hundred and forty-five destroyers, eighty
torpedo boats, and thirty-eight submarines. Under the direction of Von
Tirpitz the navy had become democratic and had drawn to it many able men
of the middle class. Its training was highly specialized and the
officers were enthusiasts in their profession. The navy of
Austria-Hungary had also expanded in recent years under the inspiration
of Admiral Montecuculi. At the outbreak of the war the fleet comprised
sixteen battleships, two armored and twelve light cruisers, eighteen
destroyers, eighty-five torpedo boats and eleven submarines. The Allies
were much more powerful. The French navy had in the matter of invention
given the lead to the world, but its size had not kept pace with its
quality. At the beginning of the war France had thirty-one battleships,
twenty-four armored cruisers, eight light cruisers, eighty-seven
destroyers, one hundred and fifty-three torpedo boats and seventy-six
submarines. Russia, after the war with Japan, had begun the creation of
a powerful battle fleet, which had not been completed when war was
declared. At that time she had on the Baltic four dreadnaughts, ten
armored cruisers, two light cruisers, eighty destroyers and twenty-four
submarines, and a fleet of about half the strength in the Black Sea.

The English fleet had reached a point of efficiency which was
unprecedented in its history. The progress of the German sea power had
stimulated the spirit of the fleet, and led to a steady advance in
training and equipment. The development of armament, and of battleship
designing, the improvement in gunnery practice, the revision of the rate
of pay, the opening up of careers from the lower deck, and the provision
of a naval air service are landmarks in the advance. In the navy
estimates of March, 1914, Parliament sanctioned over 51,000,000 Pounds
for a naval defense, the largest appropriation for the purpose ever
made. The home fleet was arranged in three units, the first fleet was
divided into four battle squadrons, together with the flagship of the
commander-in-chief. The first squadron was made up of eight battleships,
the second squadron contained eight, the third eight and the fourth
four. Attached to each fleet was a battle cruiser squadron, consisting
of four ships in the first fleet, four in the second, four in the third
and five in the fourth.

The fourth also contained a light cruiser squadron, a squadron of six
gunboats for mine sweeping, and four flotillas of destroyers, each with
a flotilla cruiser attached. The second fleet was composed of two battle
squadrons, the first containing eight pre-dreadnaughts, and the second
six. Attached to this fleet were also two cruiser squadrons, a mine
layer squadron of seven vessels, four patrol flotillas, consisting of
destroyers and torpedo boats, and seven flotillas of submarines. A third
fleet contained two battle squadrons, mainly composed of old ships, with
six cruiser squadrons. The English strength, outside home waters,
consisted of the Mediterranean fleet, containing three battle cruisers,
four armored cruisers, four ordinary cruisers and a flotilla of
seventeen destroyers, together with submarines and torpedo boats. In
eastern waters there were a battleship, two cruisers, and four sloops.
In the China squadron there were one battleship, two armored cruisers,
two ordinary cruisers, and a number of gunboats, destroyers, submarines,
and torpedo boats. In New Zealand there were four cruisers. The
Australian fleet contained a battle cruiser, three ordinary cruisers,
three destroyers and two submarines. Other cruisers and gunboats were
stationed at the Cape, the west coast of Africa, and along the western
Atlantic. At the outbreak of the war two destroyers were purchased from
Chile, and two Turkish battleships, building in England, were
commandeered by the government.

It is evident that the union of France and Britain made the Allies
easily superior in the Mediterranean Sea, so that France was able to
transport her African troops in safety, and the British commerce with
India and the East could safely continue. The main field of the naval
war, therefore, was the North Sea and the Baltic, where Germany had all
her fleet, except a few naval raiders. The entrance to the Baltic was
closed to the enemy by Denmark, which, as a neutral, was bound to
prevent an enemy fleet from passing. Germany, however, by means of the
Kiel Canal, could permit the largest battle fleet to pass from the
Baltic to the North Sea. The German High Sea Fleet was weaker than the
British home fleet by more than forty per cent, and the German policy,
therefore, was to avoid a battle, until, through mine layers and
submarines, the British power should have been sufficiently weakened.
The form of the German coast made this plan easily possible. The various
bays and river mouths provided safe retreat for the German ships, and
the German fleet were made secure by the fortifications along the coast.
On July the 29th, 1914, at the conclusion of the annual maneuvers,
instead of being demobilized as would have been usual, the Grand Fleet
of Great Britain sailed from Portland along the coast into the mists,
and from that moment dominated the whole course of the war.

From the 4th of August, the date of the declaration of war, the oceans
of the world were practically rid of enemy war ships, and were closed to
enemy mercantile marine. Although diplomacy had not yet failed, the
masters of the English navy were not caught napping. The credit for this
readiness has been given to Mr. Winston Churchill, one of the first
Lords of the Admiralty, who had divined the coming danger. When the
grand fleet sailed it seemed to disappear from English view.
Occasionally some dweller along the coast might see an occasional
cruiser or destroyer sweeping by in the distance, but the great
battleships had gone. Somewhere, in some hidden harbor, lay the vigilant
fleets of England.

Sea fighting had changed since the days of Admiral Nelson. The old
wooden ship belonged to a past generation. The guns of a battleship
would have sunk the Spanish Armada with one broadside. In this modern
day the battleship was protected by aircraft, which dropped bombs from
the clouds. Unseen submarines circled about her. Beneath her might be
mines, which could destroy her at the slightest touch. Everything had
changed but the daring of the English sailor.

In command of the Home fleet was Admiral Sir John Jellicoe. He had had a
distinguished career. Beginning as a lieutenant in the Egyptian War of
1882, he had become a commander in 1891. In 1897 he became a captain,
and served in China, commanding the Naval Brigade in the Pekin
Expedition of 1900, where he was severely wounded. Later he became naval
assistant to the Controller of the Navy, Director of Naval Ordnance and
Torpedoes, Rear-Admiral in the United Fleet, Lord Commissioner of the
Admiralty and Controller of the Navy, Vice-Admiral commanding the
Atlantic fleet, Vice-Admiral commanding the second division of the Home
fleet, and second Sea Lord of the Admiralty. He had distinguished
himself in the naval maneuvers of 1913, and was one of the officers
mainly responsible for the development of the modern English navy. He
had the confidence of his colleagues, and a peculiar popularity among
the British seamen.

On the day after the declaration of war, the first shots were fired.
German mine layers, it is now believed, in disguise, had been dropping
mines during the preceding week over a wide area of the North Sea. On
the 5th of August the mine layer, Koenigen Luise, was sunk by the
destroyer Lance, and on August 6th the British light cruiser Amphion
struck one of the mines laid by the Koenigen Luise and was sunk with
great loss of life. On August 9th, German submarines attacked a cruiser
squadron without causing any damage, and one submarine was sunk.

It was in the Mediterranean, however, that the greatest interest was
felt during the first week of the war. Two German war ships, the Goeben
and the Breslau, were off the Algerian coast when war broke out. It is
probable that when these ships received their sailing orders, Germany
depended on the assistance of Italy, and had sent these ships to its
assistance. They were admirably suited for commerce destroyers. They
began by bombarding the Algerian coast towns of Bona and Phillipe, doing
little damage. They then turned toward the coast of Gibraltar, but found
before them the British fleet. Eluding the British they next appeared at
Messina. There the captains and officers made their wills and deposited
their valuables, including signed portraits of the Kaiser, with the
German consul. The decks were cleared for action, and with the bands
playing they sailed out under a blood-red sunset.

However, they seem to have been intent only on escape, and they went at
full speed eastward toward the Dardanelles, meeting in their way only
with the British cruiser Gloucester, which, though much inferior in
size, attacked them boldly but was unable to prevent their escape. On
entering Constantinople they were reported as being sold to the Turkish
Government, the Turks thus beginning the line of conduct which was
ultimately to bring them into the war.

Picturesque as this incident was it was of no importance as compared
with the great British blockade of Germany which began on the 4th of
August. German merchantmen in every country of the empire were seized,
and hundreds of ships were captured on the high seas. Those who escaped
to neutral ports were at once interned. In a week German commerce had
ceased to exist. A few German cruisers were still at large but it was
not long before they had been captured, or driven into neutral ports.
Among the most picturesque of these raiders were the Emden and the
Koenigsberg. The Emden, in particular, interested the world with her
romantic adventures. Her story is best told in the words of
Lieutenant-Captain von Mucke, and Lieutenant Gyssing, whose return to
Germany with forty-four men, four officers and one surgeon, after the
destruction of the ship, was a veritable Odyssey.


[Illustration: Painting]
  A BATTLE OF FOUR ELEMENTS
  British monitors shelling the German land batteries near Nieuport.
  German submarines were actively engaged in trying to torpedo these
  monitors and the British monoplane was useful for giving the range to
  the ship and reporting the accuracy of the shots.


[Illustration: Painting]
  TORPEDOING OF THE BRITISH BATTLESHIP, "ABOUKIR"
  In the first few weeks of the war, when the navies of the world were
  still at open warfare, during a sharp engagement off the Hook of
  Holland in the North Sea the British warships "Aboukir", "Cressy" and
  "Hogue" fell victims to the enemy. This sketch shows the "Aboukir"
  after a German torpedo had found its mark in her hull.


"We on the Emden had no idea where we were going, as, on August 11,
1914, we separated from the cruiser squadron, escorted only by the
coaler Markomannia. Under way the Emden picked up three officers from
German steamers. That was a piece of luck, for afterward we needed many
officers for the capturing and sinking of steamers, or manning them when
we took them with us. On September 10th, the first boat came in sight.
We stopped her; she proved to be a Greek tramp returning from England.
On the next day we met the Indus, bound for Bombay, all fitted up as a
troop transport, but still without troops. That was the first one we
sunk. The crew we took aboard the Markomannia. Then we sank the Lovat,
a troop transport ship, and took the Kambinga along with us. One gets
used quickly to new forms of activity. After a few days, capturing ships
became a habit. Of the twenty-three which we captured most of them
stopped after our first signal; when they didn't, we fired a blank shot.
Then they all stopped. Only one, the Clan Matteson, waited for a real
shot across the bow before giving up its many automobiles and
locomotives to the seas.

"The officers were mostly very polite, and let down rope ladders for us.
After a few hours they would be on board with us. We ourselves never set
foot in their cabins, nor took charge of them. The officers often acted
on their own initiative, and signaled to us the nature of their cargo.
Then the commandant decided as to whether to sink the ship or take it
with us. Of the cargo we always took every thing we could use,
particularly provisions. Many of the English officers and sailors made
good use of the hours of transfer to drink up the supply of whisky
instead of sacrificing it to the waves. I heard that one captain was
lying in tears at the enforced separation from his beloved ship, but on
investigation found that he was merely dead drunk, The captain on one
ship once called out cheerily 'Thank God, I've been captured.' He had
received expense money for the trip to Australia, and was now saved half
the journey."

Parenthetically it may be remarked, that the Emden's captain, Karl von
Mueller, conducted himself at all times with chivalrous bravery,
according to the accounts of the English themselves, who in their
reports say of him, admiringly, "He played the game." Captain von
Mucke's account continues:

"We had mostly quiet weather, so that communication with captured ships
was easy. They were mostly dynamited, or else shot close to the water
line. At Calcutta we made one of our richest hauls, the Diplomat, chock
full of tea, we sunk $2,500,000 worth. On the same day the Trabbotch,
too, which steered right straight towards us, was captured. By now we
wanted to beat it out of the Bay of Bengal, because we had learned from
the papers that the Emden was being keenly searched for. By Rangoon we
encountered a Norwegian tramp, which, for a cash consideration, took
over all the rest of our prisoners of war.

"On September 23d we reached Madras, and steered straight for the
harbor. We stopped still 3,000 yards before the city. Then we shot up
the oil tanks; three or four of them burned up and illuminated the city.
Two days later we navigated around Ceylon, and could see the lights of
Colombo. On the same evening we gathered in two more steamers, the King
Lund, and Tywerse. The next evening we got the Burresk, a nice steamer
with 500 tons of nice Cardiff coal. Then followed in order, the Ryberia,
Foyle, Grand Ponrabbel, Benmore, Troiens, Exfort, Graycefale, Sankt
Eckbert, Chilkana. Most of them were sunk. The coal ships were kept. All
this happened before October 20th. Then we sailed southward to Deogazia,
southwest of Colombo."

The captain then tells with much gusto a story of a visit paid to the
Emden by some English farmers, at Deogazia, who were entertained royally
by the Emden officers. They knew nothing about the war, and the Emden
officers told them nothing. His narrative continues:

"Now we went toward Miniko, where we sank two ships more. On the next
day we found three steamers to the north, one of them with much desired
Cardiff coal. From English papers on the captured ships we learned that
we were being hotly pursued. One night we started for Penang. On October
28th we raised a very practicable fourth smokestack (for disguise). The
harbor of Penang lies in a channel difficult of access. There was
nothing doing by night. We had to do it at daybreak. At high speed,
without smoke, with lights out, we steered into the mouth of the
channel. A torpedo boat on guard slept well. We steamed past its small
light. Inside lay a dark silhouette. That must be a warship. We
recognized the silhouette dead sure. That was the Russian cruiser
Jemtchud. There it lay, there it slept like a rat, no watch to be seen.
They made it easy for us. Because of the narrowness of the harbor we had
to keep close; we fired the first torpedo at four hundred yards.

"Then, to be sure, things livened up a bit on the sleeping warship. At
the same time we took the crew quarters under fire five shells at a
time. There was a flash of flame on board, then a kind of burning
aureole. After the fourth shell the flame burned high. The first torpedo
had struck the ship too deep, because we were too close to it. A second
torpedo which we fired off from the other side didn't make the same
mistake. After twenty seconds there was absolutely not a trace of the
ship to be seen.

"But now another ship which we couldn't see was firing. That was the
French D'Ivrebreville, toward which we now turned at once. A few minutes
later an incoming torpedo destroyer was reported. It proved to be the
French torpedo boat Mousquet. It came straight toward us. That's always
remained a mystery to me, for it must have heard the shooting. An
officer whom we fished up afterward explained to me that they had only
recognized we were a German warship when they were quite close to us.
The Frenchman behaved well, accepted battle and fought on, but was
polished off by us with three broadsides. The whole fight with those
ships lasted half an hour. The commander of the torpedo boat lost both
legs by the first broadside. When he saw that part of his crew were
leaping overboard he cried out 'Tie me fast. I will not survive after
seeing Frenchmen desert their ship.' As a matter of fact he went down
with his ship, as a brave captain, lashed fast to the mast. That was my
only sea-fight.

"On November 9th I left the Emden in order to destroy the wireless plant
on the Cocos Island. I had fifty men, four machine guns and about thirty
rifles. Just as we were about to destroy the apparatus it reported
'Careful. Emden near.' The work of destruction went smoothly. Presently
the Emden signaled to us 'Hurry up.' I pack up, but simultaneously wails
the Emden's siren. I hurry up to the bridge, see the flag 'Anna' go up.
That means weigh anchor. We ran like mad into our boat, but already the
Emden's pennant goes up, the battle flag is raised, they fire from
starboard. The enemy is concealed by the island, and therefore not to be
seen, but I see the shell strike the water. To follow and catch the
Emden is out of question. She is going twenty knots, I only four with my
steam pinnace. Therefore I turn back to land, raise the flag, declare
German laws of war in force, seize all arms, set out my machine guns on
shore in order to guard against a hostile landing. Then I run again in
order to observe the fight."

The cable operator at Cocos Island gives the following account of what
happened from this point. After describing the sudden flight of the
Emden, he goes on: "Looking to the eastward we could see the reason for
this sudden departure, for a warship, which we afterwards learned was
the Australian cruiser Sydney, was coming up at full speed in pursuit.
The Emden did not wait to discuss matters, but, firing her first shot at
a range of about 3,700 yards, steamed north as hard as she could go. At
first the firing of the Emden seemed excellent, while that of the Sydney
was somewhat erratic. This, as I afterward learned, was due to the fact
that the Australian cruiser's range finder was put out of action by one
of the only two shots the Germans got home. However, the British gunners
soon overcame any difficulties that this may have caused, and settled
down to their work, so that before long two of the Emden's funnels had
been shot away. She also lost one of her masts quite early in the fight.
Both blazing away with their big guns the two cruisers disappeared below
the horizon, the Emden being on fire.

"Early the next morning, Tuesday, November 10th, we saw the Sydney
returning, and at 8.45 A. M. she anchored off the island. From various
members of the crew I gathered some details of the running fight with
the Emden. The Sydney, having an advantage in speed, was able to keep
out of range of the Emden's guns, and to bombard with her own heavier
metal. The engagement lasted eighty minutes, the Emden finally running
ashore on North Keeling Island, and becoming an utter wreck. Only two
German shots proved effective, one of these failed to explode, but
smashed the main range finder and killed one man, the other killed three
men and wounded fourteen.

"Each of the cruisers attempted to torpedo the other, but both were
unsuccessful, and the duel proved a contest in hard pounding at long
range. The Sydney's speed during the fighting was twenty-six knots, and
the Emden's twenty-four knots. The British ship's superiority of two
knots enabled her to choose the range at which the battle should be
fought and to make the most of her superior guns. Finally, with a number
of wounded prisoners on board, the Sydney left here yesterday, and our
few hours of war excitement were over."

Captain Mucke's return home from the Cocos Island was filled with the
most extraordinary adventures, and when he finally arrived in country
controlled by his Allies he was greeted as a hero.

While the story of the Emden especially interested the world, the
Koenigsberg also caused much trouble to English commerce. Her chief
exploit occurred on the 20th of September, when she caught the British
cruiser Pegasus in Zanzibar harbor undergoing repairs. The Pegasus had
no chance, and was destroyed by the Koenigsberg's long-range fire.
Nothing much was heard later of the Koenigsberg, which was finally
destroyed by an English cruiser, July 11, 1915.

The exploits of these two German commerce raiders attracted general
attention, because they were the exceptions to the rule. The British, on
the other hand, were able to capture such German merchantmen as ventured
on the sea without great difficulty, and as they did not destroy their
capture, but brought them before prize courts, the incidents attracted
no great attention. The Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse, which had been fitted
up as a commerce destroyer by the Germans at the beginning of the war,
as was the Spreewald of the Hamburg-American Line, and the Cap
Trafalgar, were caught and sunk during the month of September. On the
whole, English foreign trade was unimpaired.

But though the German fleet had been bottled up in her harbors, Germany
was not yet impotent. There remained the submarine.

Up to 1905 Germany had not a single submarine. The first German
submarine was launched on August 30, 1905. Even then it was considered
merely an experiment. In February, 1907, it was added to the register of
the fleet. On January 1, 1901, there were only four nations that
possessed submarines, France, with fourteen; the United States, with
eight; England, with six, of which not one was completed, and finally
Italy, with two. In 1910, Germany appropriated 18,750,000 marks for
submarines, and in 1913, 25,000,000 marks. On January 1, 1914, the total
number of submarines of all nations was approximately four hundred.

Early in the war the submarine became a grave menace to the English navy
and to English commerce. On the 5th of September the Pathfinder, a light
cruiser, was torpedoed and sunk with great loss of life. On September
22d, three cruisers, the Cressy, Hogue, and Aboukir were engaged in
patrolling the coast of Holland. A great storm had been raging and the
cruisers were not protected by the usual screen of destroyers. At
half-past six in the morning the seas had fallen and the cruisers
proceeded to their posts. The report of Commander Nicholson, of the
Cressy, of what followed gives a good idea of the effectiveness of the
submarine.

"The Aboukir," says this report, "was struck at about 6.25 A. M. on the
starboard beam. The Hogue and Cressy closed, and took up a position, the
Hogue ahead of the Aboukir, and the Cressy about four hundred yards on
her port beam. As soon as it was seen that the Aboukir was in danger of
sinking, all the boats were sent away from the Cressy, and a picket boat
was hoisted out without steam up. When cutters full of the Aboukir's men
were returning to the Cressy, the Hogue was struck, apparently under the
aft 9.2 magazine, as a very heavy explosion took place immediately.
Almost directly after the Hogue was hit we observed a periscope on our
port bow about three hundred yards off. Fire was immediately opened, and
the engines were put full speed ahead with the intention of running her
down. . . .

"Captain Johnson then maneuvered the ship so as to render assistance to
the crews of the Hogue and Aboukir. About five minutes later another
periscope was seen on our starboard quarter, and fire was opened. The
track of the torpedo she fired at a range of from 500 to 600 yards was
plainly visible, and it struck us on the starboard side just before the
after bridge. The ship listed about ten degrees to the starboard and
remained steady. The time was 7.15 A. M. All the water-tight doors, dead
lights and scuttles had been securely closed before the torpedoes left
the ship. All mess stools and table shores and all available timber
below and on deck had been previously got up and thrown overside for the
saving of life. A second torpedo fired by the same submarine missed and
passed about ten feet astern.

"About a quarter of an hour after the first torpedo had hit, a third
torpedo fired from the submarine just before the starboard beam, hit us
under the No. 5 boiler room. The time was 7.30 A. M. The ship then began
to heel rapidly, and finally turned keel up remaining so for about
twenty minutes before she finally sank. It is possible that the same
submarine fired all three torpedoes at the Cressy."

Of the total crews of 1,459 officers and men only 779 were saved. The
survivors believed that they had seen at least three submarines, but the
German official account mentions only one, the U-9, under
Captain-Lieutenant Otto Weddigen whose account of this battle confirms
the report of Commander Nicholson. Referring to the reports that a
flotilla of German submarines had attacked the cruisers, he says:

"These reports were absolutely untrue. U-9 was the only submarine on
deck." He adds: "I reached the home port on the afternoon of the 23d and
on the 24th went to Wilhelmshaven to find that news of my effort had
become public. My wife, dry-eyed when I went away, met me with tears.
Then I learned that my little vessel and her brave crew had won the
plaudit of the Kaiser who conferred upon each of my co-workers the Iron
Cross of the second class and upon me the Iron Crosses of the first and
second classes."

Weddigen was the hero of the hour in Germany. He had with him
twenty-five men. He seems to have acted with courage and skill, but it
is also evident that the English staff work was to blame. Three such
vessels should never have been sent out without a screen of destroyers,
nor should the Hogue and the Cressy have gone to the rescue of the
Aboukir. A few days after the disaster the English Admiralty issued the
following statement:


The sinking of the Aboukir was of course an ordinary hazard of
patrolling duty. The Hogue and Cressy, however, were sunk because they
proceeded to the assistance of their consort, and remained with engines
stopped, endeavoring to save life, thus presenting an easy target to
further submarine attacks. The natural promptings of humanity have in
this case led to heavy losses, which would have been avoided by a strict
adhesion to military consideration. Modern naval war is presenting us
with so many new and strange situations that an error of judgment of
this character is pardonable. But it has become necessary to point out
for the future guidance of His Majesty's ships that the conditions which
prevail when one vessel of a squadron is injured in the mine field, or
is exposed to submarine attack, are analogous to those which occur in
action, and that the rule of leaving ships to their own resources is
applicable, so far, at any rate, as large vessels are concerned.


On the 28th of August occurred the first important naval action of the
war, the battle of Helgoland. From the 9th of August German cruisers had
shown activity in the seas around Helgoland and had sunk a number of
British trawlers. The English submarines, E-6 and E-8, and the light
cruiser Fearless, had patrolled the seas, and on the 21st of August the
Fearless had come under the enemy's shell fire. On August 26th the
submarine flotilla, under Commodore Keyes, sailed from Harwich for the
Bight of Helgoland, and all the next day the Lurcher and the Firedrake,
destroyers, scouted for submarines. On that same day sailed the first
and third destroyer flotillas, the battle cruiser squadron, first light
cruiser squadron, and the seventh cruiser squadron, having a rendezvous
at this point on the morning of the 28th.

The morning was beautiful and clear, so that the submarines could be
easily seen. Close to Helgoland were Commodore Keyes' eight submarines,
and his two small destroyers. Approaching rapidly from the northwest
were Commodore Tyrwhitt's two destroyer flotillas, a little to the east
was Commodore Goodenough's first light cruiser squadron. Behind this
squadron were Sir David Beatty's battle cruisers with four destroyers.
To the south and west of Helgoland lay Admiral Christian's seventh
cruiser squadron.

Presently from behind Helgoland came a number of German destroyers,
followed by two cruisers; and the English submarines, with the two small
destroyers, fled westwards, acting as a decoy. As the Germans followed,
the British destroyer flotillas on the northwest came rapidly down. At
the sight of these destroyers the German destroyers fled, and the
British attempted to head them off.

According to the official report the principle of the movement was to
cut the German light craft from home, and engage it at leisure on the
open sea.

But between the two German cruisers and the English cruisers a fierce
battle took place. The Arethusa was engaged with the German Ariadne, and
the Fearless with the Strasburg. A shot from the Arethusa shattered the
fore bridge of the Ariadne and killed the captain, and both German
cruisers drew off toward Helgoland.

Meanwhile the destroyers were engaged in a hot fight. They sunk the
leading boat of the German flotilla and damaged a dozen more. Between
nine and ten o'clock there was a lull in the fight; the submarines, with
some of the destroyers, remained in the neighborhood of Helgoland, and
the Germans, believing that these boats were the only hostile vessels in
the neighborhood, determined to attack them.

The Mainz, the Koln, and the Strasburg came again on the scene, and
opened a heavy fire on some of the boats of the first flotilla which
were busy saving life. The small destroyers were driven away, but the
seamen in the boats were rescued by an English submarine. The Arethusa
and the Fearless, with the destroyers in their company, engaged with
three enemy cruisers. The Strasburg, seriously injured, was compelled to
flee. The boilers of the Mainz blew up, and she became a wreck. The Koln
only remaining and carrying on the fight.

The English destroyers were much crippled, and as the battle had now
lasted for five hours any moment the German great battleships might come
on the scene. A wireless signal had been sent to Sir David Beatty,
asking for help, and about twelve o'clock the Falmouth and the
Nottingham arrived on the scene of action. By this time the first
destroyer flotilla was out of action and the third flotilla and the
Arethusa had their hands full with the Koln. The light cruisers were
followed at 12.15 by the English battle cruisers, the Lion came first,
and she alone among the battle cruisers seems to have used her guns. Her
gun power beat down all opposition. The Koln made for home, but the
Lion's guns set her on fire. The luckless Ariadne hove in sight, but the
terrible 13.5-inch guns sufficed for her. The battle cruisers circled
around, and in ten minutes the Koln went to the bottom.

At twenty minutes to two, Admiral Beatty turned homeward. The German
cruisers Mainz, Koln, and the Ariadne had been sunk; the Strasburg was
seriously damaged. One destroyer was sunk, and at least seven seriously
injured. About seven hundred of the German crew perished and there were
three hundred prisoners. The British force returned without the loss of
a single ship. The Arethusa had been badly damaged, but was easily
repaired. The casualty list was thirty-two killed and fifty-two wounded.
The battle was fought on both sides with great gallantry, the chief
glory belonging to the Arethusa and the Fearless who bore the brunt of
the battle. The strategy and tactical skill employed were admirable, and
the German admiral, von Ingenohl from that time on, with one exception,
kept his battleships in harbor, and confined his activities to mine
laying and the use of submarines.

In the first days of the war the German mine layers had been busy. By
means of trawlers disguised as neutrals, mines were dropped off the
north coast of Ireland, and a large mine field was laid off the eastern
coast of England. One of the most important duties of the Royal Naval
Reserve was the task of mine sweeping. Over seven hundred mine-sweeping
vessels were constantly employed in keeping an area of 7,200 square
miles clear for shipping. These ships swept 15,000 square miles monthly,
and steamed over 1,100,000 miles in carrying out their duties.

It would be hard to overestimate the effect of the British blockade of
the German ports upon the fortunes of the war. The Germans for a long
time attempted, by the use of neutral ships, to obtain the necessary
supplies through Holland, Sweden, Norway, and Switzerland. Millions of
dollars' worth of food and munitions ultimately reached German hands.
The imports of all these nations were multiplied many times, but as the
time went on the blockade grew stricter and stricter until the Germans
felt the pinch. To conduct efficiently this blockade meant the use of
over 3,600 vessels which were added to the auxiliary patrol service.
Over 13,000 vessels were intercepted and examined by units of the
British navy employed on blockade channels.

The Germans protested with great vigor against this blockade, and
ultimately endeavored to counteract it by declaring unrestricted
submarine warfare. In fact, Great Britain had gone too far, and vigorous
protests from America followed her attempt to seize contraband goods in
American vessels.

The code of maritime law, adopted in the Declaration at Paris of 1856,
as well as the Declaration in London of 1909, had been framed in the
interests of unmaritime nations. The British plenipotentiaries had
agreed to these laws on the theory that in any war of the future Britain
would be neutral. The rights of neutrals had been greatly increased. A
blockade was difficult to enforce, for the right of a blockading power
to capture a blockade runner did not cover the whole period of her
voyage, and was confined to ships of the blockading force. A ship
carrying contraband could only be condemned if the contraband formed
more than half its cargo. A belligerent warship could destroy a neutral
vessel without taking it into a port for a judgment. The transfer of an
enemy vessel to a neutral flag was presumed to be valid, if effected
more than thirty days before the outbreak of war. Belligerents in
neutral vessels on the high seas were exempt from capture. The Emden
could justify its sinking of British ships, but the English were
handicapped in their endeavor to prevent neutral ships from carrying
supplies to Germany.

But Germany had become a law unto itself. And England found it necessary
in retaliation to issue orders in council which made nugatory many of
the provisions of the maritime code. The protests of the American
Government and those of other neutrals were treated with the greatest
consideration, and every endeavor was made that no real injustice should
be done. When America itself later entered the war these differences of
opinion disappeared from public view.



CHAPTER XI

THE SUBLIME PORTE

As soon as the diplomatic relations between Austria and Serbia had been
broken, the Turkish Grand Vizier informed the diplomatic corps in
Constantinople that Turkey would remain neutral in the conflict. The
declaration was not formal, for war had not yet been declared. The
policy of Turkey, as represented in the ministerial paper,
Tasfiri-Efkiar, was as follows:

"Turkey has never asked for war, as she always has worked toward
avoiding it, but neutrality does not mean indifference. The present
Austro-Serbian conflict is to a supreme degree interesting to us. In the
first place, one of our erstwhile opponents is fighting against a much
stronger enemy. In the natural course of things Serbia, which till
lately was expressing, in a rather open way, her solidarity as a nation,
still provoking us, and Greece, will be materially weakened. In the
second place, the results of this war may surpass the limits of the
conflict between two countries, and in that case our interests will be
just as materially affected. We must, therefore, keep our eyes open, as
the circumstances are momentarily changing, and do not permit us to let
escape certain advantages which we can secure by active, and rightly
acting, diplomacy. The policy of neutrality will impose on us the
obligation of avoiding to side with either of the belligerents. But the
same policy will force us to take all the necessary measures for
safeguarding our interests and our frontiers."

Whereupon a Turkish mobilization was at once ordered. The war had hardly
begun when Turkey received the news that her two battleships, building
in British yards, had been taken over by England. A bitter feeling
against England was at once aroused, Turkish mobs proceeded to attack
the British stores and British subjects, and attempts were even made
against the British embassy in Constantinople, and the British consulate
at Smyrna.

At this time Turkey was in a peculiar position. For a century she had
been on the best of terms with France and Great Britain. On the other
hand Russia had been her hereditary enemy. She was still suffering from
her defeat by the Balkan powers, and her statesmen saw in this war great
possibilities. She desired to recover her lost provinces in Europe, and
saw at once that she could hope for little from the Allies in this
direction.


[Illustration: Map: Black Sea to the North, Caspian Sea to the East,
Persian Gulf to South, Crete to the West.]
  SKETCH OF TERRITORY CONTROLLED BY TURKEY IN 1914


For some years, too, German intrigues, and, according to report, German
money, had enabled the German Government to control the leading Turkish
statesmen. German generals, under General Liman von Sanders, were
practically in control of the Turkish army. The commander-in-chief was
Enver Bey, who had been educated in Germany and was more German than the
Germans. A new system of organization for the Turkish army had been
established by the Germans, which had substituted the mechanical German
system for the rough and inefficient Turkish methods. Universal
conscription provided men, and the Turkish soldier has always been known
as a good soldier. Yet as it turned out the German training did little
for him. Under his own officers he could fight well, but under German
officers, fighting for a cause which he neither liked nor understood, he
was bound to fail.

At first the Turkish mobilization was conducted in such a way as to be
ready to act in common with Bulgaria in an attack against Greek and
Serbian Macedonia, as soon as the Austrians had obtained a decisive
victory over the Serbians. The entry of Great Britain into the war
interfered with this scheme. Meantime, though not at war, the Turks were
suffering almost as much as if war had been declared. Greedy speculators
took advantage of the situation, and the government itself requisitioned
everything it could lay its hands on.

A Constantinople correspondent, writing on the 6th of August, says as
follows;

"Policemen and sheriffs followed by military officers are taking by
force everything in the way of foodstuffs, entering the bakeries and
other shops selling victuals, boarding ships with cargoes of flour,
potatoes, wheat and rice, and taking over virtually everything, giving
in lieu of payment a receipt which is not worth even the paper on which
it is written. In this way many shops are forced to close, bread has
entirely disappeared from the bakeries, and Constantinople, the capital
of a neutral country, is already feeling all the troubles and privations
of a besieged city. Prices for foodstuffs have soared to inaccessible
heights, as provisions are becoming scarce. Actual hand-to-hand combats
are taking place in the streets outside the bakeries for the possession
of a loaf of bread, and hungry women with children in their arms are
seen crying and weeping with despair. Many merchants, afraid lest the
government requisition their goods, hasten to have their orders
canceled, the result being that no merchandise of any kind is coming to
Constantinople either from Europe or from Anatolia. Both on account of
the recruiting of their employees, and of shortage of coal, the
companies operating electric tramways of the city have reduced their
service to the minimum, as no power is available for the running of the
cars. Heartrending scenes are witnessed in front of the closed doors of
the various banking establishments, where large posters are to be seen
bearing the inscription 'Closed temporarily by order of the government.'"

Immediately after war was declared between Germany and Russia the Porte
ordered the Bosporus and Dardanelles closed to every kind of shipping,
at the same time barring the entrances of these channels with rows of
mines. The first boat to suffer from this measure was a British
merchantman which was sunk outside the Bosporus, while another had a
narrow escape in the Dardanelles. A large number of steamers of every
nationality waited outside the straits for the special pilot boats of
the Turkish Government, in order to pass in safety through the dangerous
mine field. This measure of closing the straits was suggested to Turkey
by Austria and Germany, and was primarily intended against Russia, as it
was feared that her Black Sea fleet might force its way into the Sea of
Marmora and the AEgean.

On August 2d the Turkish Parliament was prorogued, so that all political
power might center around the Imperial throne. A vigorous endeavor was
made to strengthen the Turkish navy. Djemal Pasha was placed at its head
with Arif Bey as chief of the naval staff. Talaat Bey and Halil Bey were
sent to Bucharest to exchange views with Roumanian statesmen, and
representatives of the Greek Government, in regard to the outstanding
Greco-Turkish difficulties.

On September 10th an official announcement from the Sublime Porte was
issued defining in the first place many constitutional reforms, and in
particular abolishing the capitulation, that is, the concessions made by
law to foreigners, allowing them participation in the administration of
justice, exemption from taxation, and special protection in their
business transactions. In abolishing these capitulations the Ottoman
Government declared that it would treat foreign countries in accordance
with the rules of international law, and that it was acting without any
hostile feeling against any of the foreign states.

The Allied governments formally protested against this action of the
Turkish Government. Meantime Constantinople was the center of most
elaborate intrigues. The Turkish Government grew more and more warlike,
and began to threaten, not only Greece, but Russia and the Triple
Entente as well. During this period the Turkish press maintained an
active campaign against England and the Allies. Every endeavor was made
by the Sublime Porte to secure Roumanian or Bulgarian co-operation in a
militant policy. The Allies, seeing the situation, made many promises to
Bulgaria, Greece and Roumania. Bulgaria was offered Adrianople and
Thrace; Greece was to have Smyrna, and Roumania the Roumanian provinces
in Austria. The jealousy of these powers of each other prevented an
agreement. The influence of Germany became more and more preponderant
with the Ottoman Empire; indeed, it is probable that an understanding
had existed between the two powers from the beginning. The action of the
Turkish Government in regard to the Goeben and Breslau could hardly have
been possible unless with a previous understanding. At last the rupture
came. The following was the official Turkish version of the events which
led to the Turkish declaration of war:

"While on the 27th of October a small part of the Turkish fleet was
maneuvering on the Black Sea, the Russian fleet, which at first confined
its activities to following and hindering every one of our movements,
finally, on the 29th, unexpectedly began hostilities by attacking the
Ottoman fleet. During the naval battle which ensued the Turkish fleet,
with the help of the Almighty, sank the mine layer Pruth, inflicted
severe damage on one of the Russian torpedo boats, and captured a
collier. A torpedo from the Turkish torpedo boat Gairet-i-Millet sank
the Russian destroyer Koubanietz, and another from the Turkish torpedo
boat Mouavenet-i-Millet inflicted serious damage on a Russian coast
guard ship. Three officers and seventy-two sailors rescued by our men
and belonging to the crews of the damaged and sunken vessels of the
Russian fleet have been made prisoners. The Ottoman Imperial fleet,
glory be given to the Almighty, escaped injury, and the battle is
progressing favorably for us. Information received from our fleet, now
in the Black Sea, is as follows:

"From accounts of Russian sailors taken prisoners, and from the presence
of a mine layer among the Russian fleet, evidence is gathered that the
Russian fleet intended closing the entrance to the Bosporus with mines,
and destroying entirely the Imperial Ottoman fleet, after having split
it in two. Our fleet, believing that it had to face an unexpected
attack, and supposing that the Russians had begun hostilities without a
formal declaration of war, pursued the scattered Russian fleet,
bombarded the port of Sebastopol, destroyed in the city of Novorossisk
fifty petroleum depots, fourteen military transports, some granaries,
and the wireless telegraph station. In addition to the above our fleet
has sunk in Odessa a Russian cruiser, and damaged severely another. It
is believed that this second boat was likewise sunk. Five other steamers
full of cargoes lying in the same port were seriously damaged. A
steamship belonging to the Russian volunteer fleet was also sunk, and
five petroleum depots were destroyed. In Odessa and Sebastopol the
Russians from the shore opened fire against our fleet."


[Illustration: Photographs and Paintings]
  FAMOUS BRITISH GENERALS
  General Smith-Dorrien, British Corps Commander in the famous retreat
  from Mons; Generals Plumer, Rawlinson and Byng, Commanders on the
  Western Front; General Birdwood, Commander of the Australian-New
  Zealand troops at Gallipoli.


[Illustration: Photographs and Paintings]
  FAMOUS FRENCH GENERALS
  Marshal Petain, Commander-in-Chief of the French armies in the West;
  Generals Mangin, Gouraud and Humbert, Army Commanders in the West;
  Generals Gallieni, Commander of Paris, who sent forward an army in
  taxicabs to save the day at the First Battle of the Marne.


The Sultan at once declared war against Russia, England and France, and
issued a proclamation to his troops, declaring that he had called them
to arms to resist aggression and that "the very existence of our Empire
and of three hundred million Moslems whom I have summoned by sacred
Fetwa to a supreme struggle, depend on your victory. Do not forget that
you are brothers in arms of the strongest and bravest armies of the
world, with whom we are now fighting shoulder to shoulder."

The Fetwa, or proclamation announcing a holy war, called upon all
Mussulmans capable of carrying arms, and even upon Mussulman women to
fight against the powers with whom the Sultan was at war. In this manner
the holy war became a duty, not only for all Ottoman subjects, but for
the three hundred million Moslems of the earth. On November 5th Great
Britain declared war against Turkey, ordered the seizure in British
ports of Turkish vessels, and, by an order in Council, annexed the
Island of Cyprus. On the 17th of December, the Khedive Abbas II, having
thrown in his lot with Turkey and fled to Constantinople, Egypt was
formally proclaimed a British Protectorate. The title of Khedive was
abolished, and the throne of Egypt, with the title of Sultan, was
offered to Prince Hussein Kamel Pasha, the eldest living prince of the
house of Mahomet Ali, an able and enlightened man. This meant that
Britain was now wholly responsible for the defense of Egypt. The new
Sultan of Egypt made his state entry on December 20th into the Abdin
Palace in Cairo. The progress of the new ruler was received with great
enthusiasm by thousands of spectators.

The King of England sent a telegram of congratulation with his promise
of support:


On the occasion when your Highness enters upon your high office I desire
to convey to your Highness the expression of my most sincere friendship,
and the assurance of my unfailing support in safeguarding the integrity
of Egypt, and in securing her future well being and prosperity. Your
Highness has been called upon to undertake the responsibilities of your
high office at a grave crisis in the national life of Egypt, and I feel
convinced that you will be able, with the co-operation of your
Ministers, and the Protectorate of Great Britain, successfully to
overcome all the influences which are seeking to destroy the
independence of Egypt and the wealth, liberty and happiness of its
people.


This was Britain's answer to the Turkish proclamation of war. The Turks
had not taken this warlike course with entire unanimity. The Sultan, the
Grand Vizier, and Djavid Bey were in favor of peace, but Enver Pasha and
his colleagues overruled them. The Odessa incident was unjustified
aggression, deliberately planned to provoke hostilities. The tricky and
corrupt German diplomacy had won its point.

It is interesting to observe that the proclamation of the holy war, a
favorite German scheme, fell flat. The Kaiser, and his advisers, had
counted much upon this raising of the sacred flag. The Kaiser had
visited Constantinople and permitted himself to be exploited as a
sympathizer with Mohammedanism. Photographs of him had been taken
representing him in Mohammedan garb, accompanied by Moslem priests, and
a report had been deliberately circulated throughout Turkey that he had
become a Moslem. The object of this camouflage was to stir up the
Mohammedans in the countries controlled by England, risings were hoped
for in Egypt and India, and German spies had been distributed through
those countries to encourage religious revolts. But there was almost no
response. The Sultan, it is true, was the head of the Church, but who
was the Sultan? The old Sultan, now dethroned, and imprisoned, or this
new and insignificant creature placed on the throne by the young Turk
party? The Mohammedan did not feel himself greatly moved.

At the beginning of the war Turkey found herself unable to make any move
to recover her provinces in Thrace. Greece and Bulgaria were neutral,
and could not be attacked. Placing herself, therefore, in the hands of
her German advisers, she moved her new army to those frontiers where it
could meet the powers with whom she was at war. In particular Germany
and Austria desired her aid in Transcaucasia against the Russian armies.
An attack upon Russia from that quarter would mean that many troops
which otherwise would have been used against the Central Powers must be
sent to the Caucasus. The Suez Canal, too, must be attacked. An
expedition there would compel Great Britain to send out troops, and
perhaps would encourage the hoped-for rebellion in Egypt and give an
opportunity for religious insurrection in India, where the Djehad was
being preached among the Mohammedan tribes in the northwest. The
Dardanelles, to be sure, might be threatened but the Germans had sent
there many heavy guns and fortifications had been built which, in expert
opinion, made Constantinople safe.

The Turkish offensive along her eastern frontier in Transcaucasia and
in Persia was first undertaken. The Persian Gulf had long been
controlled by Great Britain; even in the days of Elizabeth the East
India Company had fought with Dutch and Portuguese rivals for control of
its commerce. The English had protected Persia, suppressed piracy and
slavery, and introduced sanitary measures in the marshes along the
coast. They regarded a control of the Persian Gulf as necessary for the
prosperity of India and the Empire. The Turkish Government had never had
great power along the Persian Gulf. Bagdad, indeed, had been captured by
Suleiman the Magnificent in the sixteenth century, but in eastern Arabia
lived many independent Arabian chieftains who had no idea of subjecting
themselves to Turkish rule.

For years Germany had been looking with jealous eyes in this direction.
Her elaborate intrigues with Turkey were mainly designed to open up the
way to the Persian Gulf. She had planned a great railway to open up
trade, and her endeavor to build the Bagdad Railway is a story in
itself. Her efforts had lasted for many years, but she found herself
constantly blocked by the agents of Great Britain.

Before the Ottoman troops were ready, the British in the Gulf had made a
start. On November 7th a British force under Brigadier-General Delamain
bombarded the Turkish fort at Falon, landed troops and occupied the
village. Sailing north from this point they disembarked at Sanijah,
where they intrenched themselves and waited for reinforcements. On
November 13th reinforcements arrived, and on November 17th the British
army advanced toward Sahain. From there they moved on Sahil, where they
encountered a Turkish force. Some lively fighting ensued and the Turks
broke and fled. Turkish casualties were about one thousand five hundred
men, the English killed numbered thirty-eight.

The British then moved on Basra, moving by steamer along the
Shat-el-Arab River. On November 22d Basra was reached and it was found
that the Turks had evacuated the place. A base camp was then prepared,
for it was certain that there would be further fighting. Bagdad was only
about three hundred miles distant; and fifty miles above Basra, at the
junction of the Tigris and the Euphrates, lies the town of Kurna where
the Turks were gathering an army. On December 4th an attack was made on
Kurna but without success. The British obtained reinforcements, but on
December 9th the Turkish garrison surrendered unconditionally. The
British troops then intrenched themselves, having established a
barricade against a hostile advance upon India.

Farther north the war was between Turkey and Russia. Since Persia had no
military power, each combatant was able to occupy that country whenever
they desired. The Turks advanced into Persia south of Lake Urmia, and,
meeting with no resistance from Persia, moved northward toward the
Russian frontier. On the 30th of January, 1915, Russian troops heavily
defeated the invaders and followed them south as far as Tabriz, which
they occupied and held. The Russian armies had also undertaken movements
in this section. In the extreme northwest of Persia a Russian column had
crossed the frontier, and occupied, on the 3d of November, the town of
Bayazid close to Mt. Ararat. Other columns entered Kurdestan, and an
expedition against Van was begun. Further north another Russian column
crossed the frontier and captured the town of Karakilissa, but was held
there by the Turks.

These were minor expeditions. The real struggle was in Transcaucasia,
where the main body of the Turkish army under Enver Pasha himself was in
action. At this point the boundaries of Turkey touch upon the Russian
Empire. To the north is the Great Russian fortress of Kars, to the south
and west the Turkish stronghold of Erzerum. The whole district is a
great mountain tangle, the towns standing at an altitude of 5,000 and
6,000 feet, surrounded by lofty hills. None of the roads are good, and
in winter the passes are almost impassable. In all the wars between
Russia and Turkey, these mountain regions have been the scenes of
desperate battles.

The Turkish plan of battle was to entice the Russians from Sarakamish
across the frontier, leading them on to some distance from their base,
then, while holding their front, a second force was to swing around and
attack them on the left flank. The plan was simple, the difficulty was
the swing of the left flank, which had to be made through mountain
paths, deeply covered with snow. The Turkish army was composed of about
150,000 men under the command of Hassan Izzet Pasha, but Enver, with a
large German staff was the true commander. The Russian army, under
General Woronzov was about 100,000 men.

Early in November the Russians crossed the frontier and reached
Koprikeui, which they occupied on the 20th of November. The Turkish
Eleventh corps was entrusted with the duty of holding the Russian
forces; the remainder of the army was to advance over the passes and
take their stations behind the Russian right. On December 25th the
Turkish attack began. The Eleventh corps forced back the Russians from
Koprikeui to Khorasan, while the extreme Turkish left was endeavoring to
outflank them. But the weather was desperate. A blizzard was sweeping
down the steeps. The Turkish forces were indeed able to carry out the
plan, for they obtained the position desired. But by this time they were
worn out, and half starved, and their attack on New Year's Day resulted
in their defeat and retreat. The Ninth corps was utterly wiped out, and
the remainder of the Turkish forces driven off in confusion. Only the
strenuous efforts of the Turkish Eleventh corps prevented a debacle.
After a three days' battle it, too, was broken, and with heavy losses it
retreated toward Erzerum. The snowdrifts and blizzards must have
accounted for not less than 50,000 of the Turkish troops. The result of
the battle made Russia safe in the Caucasus.

But the Germans had another use for the Turkish forces. England was in
control of Egypt and the Suez Canal. The German view of England's
position has been well stated by Dr. Paul Rohrbach:

"As soon as England acquired Egypt it was incumbent upon her to guard
against any menace from Asia. Such a danger apparently arose when
Turkey, weakened by her last war with Russia and by difficult conditions
at home, began to turn to Germany for support. And now war has come, and
England is reaping the crops which she has sown. England, not we,
desired this war. She knows this, despite all her hypocritical talk, and
she fears that, as soon as connection is established along the
Berlin-Vienna-Budapest-Sofia-Constantinople Line, the fate of Egypt
may be decided. Through the Suez Canal goes the route to all the lands
surrounding the Indian Ocean, and by way of Singapore to the western
shores of the Pacific. These two worlds together have about nine hundred
million inhabitants, more than half the population of the universe, and
India lies in a controlling position in their midst. Should England lose
the Suez Canal she will be obliged, unlike the powers in control of that
waterway, to use the long route around the Cape of Good Hope, and depend
on the good will of the South African Boers. The majority among the
latter have not the same views as Botha. However, it is too early to
prophesy, and it is not according to German ideas to imitate our
opponents by singing premature paeans of victory. But anyhow we are well
aware why anxious England already sees us on the road to India."

Following out this view a Turkish force was directed toward the Suez
Canal, while the German intriguers did their best to stir up revolt in
Egypt itself. The story of Egypt is one of the most interesting parts of
the world's history. In the early days of the world it led mankind. Its
peculiar geographical position at first gave it strength, and afterward
made it the prize for which all nations were ready to contend. In 1517
the Sultan Selim conquered Egypt and made it part of the Turkish realm,
and in spite of many changes the sovereignty of Constantinople had
continued. In recent years the misgovernment of the Khedive Ismael had
brought into its control France and Britain; then came the deposition of
Ismael, the revolt under Arabi, the bombardment of Alexandria and the
battle of Tel-el-Kebir. Since then Egypt has been occupied by Great
Britain, who restored order, defeated the armies of the Mahdi, and
turned Egyptian bankruptcy into prosperity. Lord Kitchener was the
English hero of the wars with the Mahdi, and Lord Cromer the
administrator who gave the Egyptian peasant a comfort unknown since the
days of the Pharaohs. With prosperity came political agitation, and
Germany, as has been seen, looked upon Egypt as fertile territory for
German propaganda.

Intrigue having failed in Egypt, a Turkish force was directed against
the Suez Canal. If that could be captured Great Britain could be cut off
from India. An expeditionary army of about 65,000 men was gathered under
the command of Djemal Pasha, the former Turkish Minister of Marine. He
had been bitterly indignant at the seizure of the two Turkish
dreadnaughts building in England, and was burning for revenge. But he
found great difficulties before him. To reach the Canal it was necessary
to cross a trackless desert, varying from 120 to 150 miles in width.
Over this desert there were three routes. The first touched the
Mediterranean coast at El-Arish and then went across the desert to
El-Kantara on the Canal, twenty-five miles south of Port Said. On this
route there were only a few wells, quite insufficient for an army. A
second route ran from Akaba, on the Red Sea, across the Peninsula of
Sinai to a point a little north of Suez. This was also badly supplied
with wells. Between the two was the central route. Leaving the
Mediterranean at El-Arish it ran up the valley called the Wady El-Arish
to where that valley touched the second road. There was no railway, nor
were these roads suitable for motor transports; for an army to move it
would be necessary either to build a railway or to improve the roads.
The best route for railway was the Wady El-Arish. The Suez Canal,
moreover, can be easily defended. It is over two hundred feet wide, with
banks rising to a height of forty feet. A railway runs along the whole
Canal, and most of the ground to the east is flat, offering a good field
of fire either to troops on the banks or to ships on the Canal.

A considerable force of British troops, under the command of
Major-General Sir John Maxwell, were assigned for the protection of the
Canal. About the end of October it was reported that 2,000 Bedouins were
marching on the Canal, and on November 21st a skirmish took place
between this force and some of the English troops in which the Bedouins
were repelled. Nothing more was heard for more than two months, but on
January 28, 1915, a small advance party from the Turkish army was beaten
back east of El-Kantara. British airmen watched the desert well and kept
the British army well informed of the Turkish movements. The Turks had
found it impossible to convey their full force across the desert, and
the forces which finally arrived seemed to have numbered only about
twelve thousand men. The main attack was not developed until February
2d.

According to an account in the London Times, on that date, the enemy
began to move toward the Ismailia Ferry. They met a reconnoitering party
of Indian troops of all arms, and a desultory engagement ensued to which
a violent sandstorm put a sudden end about three o'clock in the
afternoon. The main attacking force pushed forward toward its
destination after nightfall. From twenty-five to thirty galvanized iron
pontoon boats, seven and a half meters in length, which had been dragged
in carts across the desert, were hauled by hand toward the water. With
one or two rafts made of kerosene tins in a wooden frame, all was ready
for the attack. The first warning of the enemy's approach was given by a
sentry of a mountain battery who heard, to him, an unknown tongue across
the water. The noise soon increased. It would seem that Mudjah
Ideem--"Holy Warriors"--said to be mostly old Tripoli fighters,
accompanied the pontoon section, and regulars of the Seventy-fifth
regiment, for loud exultations, often in Arabic, of "Brothers, die for
the faith; we can die but once," betrayed the enthusiastic irregular.

The Egyptians waited until the Turks were pushing their boats into the
water, then the Maxims attached to the battery suddenly spoke, and the
guns opened at point-blank range at the men and boats crowded under the
steep bank opposite them. Immediately a violent fire broke out on both
sides of the Canal.

A little torpedo boat with a crew of thirteen, patrolling the Canal,
dashed up and landed a party of four officers and men to the south of
Tussum, who climbed up the eastern bank and found themselves in a
Turkish trench, and escaped by a miracle with the news. Promptly the
midget dashed in between the fires and enfiladed the eastern bank amid a
hail of bullets, and destroyed several pontoon boats lying unlaunched on
the bank. It continued to harass the enemy, though two officers and two
men were wounded.

As the dark, cloudy night lightened toward dawn fresh forces went into
action. The Turks, who occupied the outer, or day, line of the Tussum
post, advanced, covered by artillery, against the Indian troops, holding
the inner or night position, while an Arab regiment advanced against the
Indian troop at the Serapeum post. The warships on the Canal and lake
joined in the fray. The enemy brought some six batteries of field guns
into action from the slopes west of Kataiba-el-kaeli. Shells admirably
fused made fine practice at all the visible targets, but failed to find
the battery above mentioned which with some help from a detachment of
infantry, beat down the fire of the riflemen on the opposite bank and
inflicted heavy losses on the hostile supports advancing toward the
Canal.

Supported by land and naval artillery the Indian troops took the
offensive, the Serapeum garrison, which had stopped the enemy
three-quarters of a mile from the position, cleared its front, and the
Tussum garrison, by a brilliant counter-attack, drove the enemy back.
Two battalions of Anatolians of the Twenty-eighth regiment were thrown
into the fight, but the artillery gave them no chance, and by 3.30 in
the afternoon a third of the enemy, with the exception of a force that
lay hid in bushy hollows on the east bank between the two posts, were in
full retreat, leaving many dead, a large proportion of whom had been
killed by shrapnel. Meanwhile the warships on the lake had been in
action, a salvo from a battleship woke up Ismailia early, and crowds of
soldiers and some civilians climbed every available sand hill to see
what was doing, till the Turkish guns sent shells sufficiently near to
convince them that it was safer to watch from cover.

At about eleven in the morning two six-inch shells hit the Hardinge near
the southern entrance of the lake. They first damaged the funnel, and
the second burst inboard. Pilot Carew, a gallant old merchant seaman,
refused to go below when the firing opened and lost a leg. Nine others
were wounded, one or two merchantmen were hit but no lives were lost. A
British gunboat was struck. Then came a dramatic duel between the
Turkish big gun, or guns, and a warship. The Turks fired just over, and
then just short, at 9,000 yards. The warship sent in a salvo of more
six-inch shells than had been fired that day.

Late in the afternoon of the 3d there was sniping from the east bank
between Tussum and Serapeum, and a man was killed on the tops of a
British battleship. Next morning the sniping was renewed and the Indian
troops, moving out to search the ground, found several hundred of the
enemy in the hollow previously mentioned. During the fighting some of
the enemy, either by accident or design, held up their hands, while
others fired on the Punjabis, who were advancing to take the surrender,
and killed a British officer. A sharp fight with the cold steel
followed, and a British officer killed a Turkish officer with a sword
thrust in single combat. A body of a German officer with a white flag
was afterward found here, but there is no proof that the white flag was
used. Finally all the enemy were killed, captured or put to flight. With
this the fighting ended, and the subsequent operations were confined to
the rounding up of prisoners, and the capture of a considerable amount
of military material left behind. The Turks, who departed with their
guns and baggage during the night of the 3d, still seemed to be moving
eastward.

So ended the battle of the Suez Canal.

Two more incidents in the Turkish campaign remain to be noticed. Report
having come that the town of Akaba on the Red Sea was being used as a
mine-laying station, H. M. S. Minerva visited the place, and found it
occupied by soldiers under a German officer. The Minerva destroyed the
fort and the barracks and the government buildings. Another British
cruiser, with a detachment of Indian troops, captured the Turkish fort
at Sheik Said, at the southern end of the Red Sea. And so for the time
ended all Turkish movements against Great Britain. That such movements
should have been possible seems hard to believe. For a century the
British had been the friends and allies of the Turkish Government. In
the Crimean War their armies had fought side by side with the Turkish
troops against Russia. In the Russo-Turkish War Lord Beaconsfield, in
the negotiations which preceded the treaty of Berlin, had saved for
Turkey much of its territory. It was only the British influence and the
fear of the British power which had prevented Russia from taking
possession of Constantinople a half a century before. The English had
always been popular in Turkey and there was every reason at the
beginning of the war to believe that their popularity had not waned.
There is reason to believe that the average Turk had little sympathy
with the course of his government, and if a free expression of the
popular will had been possible the Turkish army would never have been
sent against either the Englishmen or the Frenchmen. But long years of
German propaganda had done their work. The power of Enver Pasha was
greater than that of the weakling Sultan and the war was forced upon the
Turkish people by German tools and German bribes.



CHAPTER XII

RESCUE OF THE STARVING

The sufferings of Belgium during the German occupation were terrible,
and attracted the attention and the sympathy of the whole world. To
understand conditions it is necessary to know something of the economic
situation. Since it had come under the protection of the Great Powers,
Belgium had developed into one of the greatest manufacturing countries
in the world. Nearly two million of her citizens were employed in the
great industries, and one million two hundred thousand on the farms. She
was peaceful, industrious and happy. But on account of the fact that
more than one-half of her citizenship earned their living by daily labor
she found it impossible to produce foodstuff enough for her own needs.
Seventy-eight per cent of her breadstuffs had to be imported. From her
own fields she could hardly supply her population for more than four
months.

The war, and the German occupation, almost destroyed business. Mines,
workshops, factories and mills were closed. Labor found itself without
employment and consequently without wages. The banks would extend no
credit. But even if there had been money enough it soon became apparent
that the food supply was rapidly going. The German invasion had come
when the crops were standing ripe upon the field. Those crops had not
been reaped, but had been trampled under foot by the hated German.

One feature of Belgian industrial life should be understood. Hundreds of
thousands of her workmen were employed each day in workshops at
considerable distances from their own homes. In times of peace the
morning and evening trains were always crowded with laborers going to
and returning from their daily toil. One of the first things seized upon
by the German officials was the railroads, and it was with great
difficulty that anyone, not belonging to the German army, could obtain
an opportunity to travel at all, and it was with still greater
difficulty that supplies of food of any kind could be transported from
place to place. Every village was cut off from its neighbor, every town
from the next town. People were unable even to obtain news of the great
political events which were occurring from day to day, and the food
supply was automatically cut off.

But this was not the worst. One of the first moves of the German
occupation was to quarter hundreds of thousands of troops upon their
Belgian victims, and these troops must be fed even though the Belgian
and his family were near starvation. Then followed the German seizure of
what they called materials for war. General von Beseler in a despatch to
the Kaiser, after the fall of Antwerp, speaks very plainly:


The war booty taken at Antwerp is enormous--at least five hundred cannon
and huge quantities of ammunition, sanitation materials, high-power
motor cars, locomotives, wagons, four million kilograms of wheat, large
quantities of flour, coal and flax wool, the value of which is estimated
at ten million marks, copper, silver, one armored train, several
hospital trains, and quantities of fish.


The Germans proceeded to commandeer foodstuffs and raw materials of
industry. Linseed oil, oil cakes, nitrates, animal and vegetable oils,
petroleum and mineral oils, wool, copper, rubber, ivory, cocoa, rice,
wine, beer, all were seized and sent home to the Fatherland. Moreover,
cities and provinces were burdened with formidable war contributions.
Brussels was obliged to pay ten million dollars, Antwerp ten million
dollars, the province of Brabant, ninety millions of dollars, Namur and
seventeen surrounding communes six million four hundred thousand
dollars. Finally Governor von Bissing, on the 10th of December, 1914,
issued the following decree:


A war contribution of the amount of eight million dollars to be paid
monthly for one year is imposed upon the population of Belgium. The
payment of these amounts is imposed upon the nine provinces which are
regarded as joint debtors. The two first monthly payments are to be made
by the 15th of January, 1915, at latest, and the following monthly
payments by the tenth of each following month to the military chest of
the Field Army of the General Imperial Government in Brussels. If the
provinces are obliged to resort to the issue of stock with a view to
procuring the necessary funds, the form and terms of these shares will
be determined by the Commissary General for the banks in Belgium.

At a meeting of the Provincial Councils the vice-president declared:
"The Germans demand these $96,000,000 of the country without right and
without reason. Are we to sanction this enormous war tax? If we listened
only to our hearts, we should reply 'No I ninety-six million times no!
because our hearts would tell us we were a small, honest nation living
happily by its free labor; we were a small, honest nation having faith
in treaties and believing in honor; we were a nation unarmed, but full
of confidence, when Germany suddenly hurled two million men upon our
frontiers, the most brutal army that the world has ever seen, and said
to us, 'Betray the promise you have given. Let my armies go by, that I
may crush France, and I will give you gold.' Belgium replied, 'Keep your
gold. I prefer to die, rather than live without honor.' The German army
has, therefore, crushed our country in contempt of solemn treaties. 'It
is an injustice,' said the Chancellor of the German Empire. 'The
position of Germany has forced us to commit it, but we will repair the
wrong we have done to Belgium by the passage of our armies.' They want
to repair the injustice as follows: Belgium will pay Germany
$96,000,000! Give this proposal your vote. When Galileo had discovered
the fact that the earth moved around the sun, he was forced at the foot
of the stake to abjure his error, but he murmured, 'Nevertheless it
moves.' Well, gentlemen, as I fear a still greater misfortune for my
country I consent to the payment of the $96,000,000 and I cry
'Nevertheless it moves.' Long live our country in spite of all."

At the end of a year von Bissing renewed this assessment, inserting in
his decree the statement that the decree was based upon article
forty-nine of The Hague Convention, relating to the laws and usages of
war on land. This article reads as follows: "If in addition to the taxes
mentioned in the above article the occupant levies other moneyed
contributions in the occupied territory, they shall only be applied to
the needs of the army, or of the administration, of the territory in
question." In the preceding article it says: "If in the territory
occupied the occupant collects the taxes, dues and tolls payable to the
state, he shall do so as far as possible in accordance with the legal
basis and assessment in force at the time, and shall in consequence be
bound to defray the expenses of the administration of the occupied
territories to the same extent as the National Government had been so
bound."

The $96,000,000 per annum was more than six times the amount of the
direct taxes formerly collected by the Belgian state, taxes which the
German administration, moreover, collected in addition to the war
assessment. It was five times as great as the ordinary expenditure of
the Belgian War Department.


[Illustration: Map: Denmark on the North, Elbe River on the East,
Switzerland on the South, Eastern England on the West.]
  SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN AND ALSACE-LORRAINE ACQUISITIONS


But this was not all. In addition to the more or less legitimate German
methods of plunder the whole country had been pillaged. In many towns
systematic pillage began as soon as the Germans took possession. At
Louvain the pillage began on the 27th of August, 1914, and lasted a
week. In small bands the soldiers went from house to house, ransacked
drawers and cupboards, broke open safes, and stole money, pictures,
curios, silver, linen, clothing, wines, and food. Great loads of such
plunder were packed on military baggage wagons and sent to Germany. The
same conditions were reported from town after town. In many cases the
houses were burnt to destroy the proof of extensive thefts.

Nor were these offenses committed only by the common soldiers. In many
cases the officers themselves sent home great collections of plunder.
Even the Royal Family were concerned in this disgraceful performance.
After staying for a week in a chateau in the Liege District, His
Imperial Highness, Prince Eitel Fritz and the Duke of Brunswick, had all
the dresses which were found in a wardrobe sent back to Germany. This is
said to be susceptible of absolute proof.

In addition to this form of plunder special pretexts were made use of to
obtain money. At Arlon a telephone wire was broken, whereupon the town
was given four hours to pay a fine of $20,000 in gold, in default of
which one hundred houses would be sacked. When the payment was made
forty-seven houses had already been plundered. Instance after instance
could be given of similar unjustifiable and exorbitant fines.

Under treatment like this Belgium was brought in a short time into
immediate sight of starvation. They made frantic appeals for help. First
they appealed to the Germans, but the German authorities did nothing,
though in individual cases German soldiers shared their army rations
with the people. Then an appeal was made to Holland, but Holland was a
nation much like Belgium. It did not raise food enough for itself, and
was not sure that it could import enough for its own needs.

From all over Belgium appeals were sent from the various towns and
villages to Brussels. But Brussels, too, was face to face with famine.
To cope with famine there were many relief organizations in Belgium.
Every little town had its relief committee, and in the larger cities
strong branches of the Red Cross did what they could. Besides such
secular organizations, there were many religious organizations,
generally under the direction of the Roman Catholic Church.

In Brussels a strong volunteer relief organization was formed on
September 5th under the patronage of the American and Spanish Ministers,
Mr. Brand Whitlock and the Marquis of Villalobar. This committee, known
as the Central Relief Committee, or more exactly La Comite Central de
Secours et d'Alimentation pour l'Agglomeration bruxelloise, did
wonderful work until the end of the war. But though there was plenty of
organization there were great difficulties ahead.

In order to import food, credit had to be established abroad, permission
had to be obtained to transport food stuffs into Belgium through the
British blockade. Permission to use the railroads and canals of Belgium
had to be obtained from Germany, and, most important of all, it had to
be made certain that no food thus imported should be seized by the
German troops.

Through the American and Spanish ministers permission was obtained from
Governor-General Kolmar von der Goltz to import food, and the
Governor-General also gave assurance that, "Foodstuffs of all sorts
imported by the committee to assist the civil population shall be
reserved exclusively for the nourishment of the civil population of
Belgium, and that consequently these foodstuffs shall be exempt from
requisition on the part of the military authorities, and shall rest
exclusively at the disposition of the committee."

With this assurance the Central Relief Committee sent Emil Francqui and
Baron Lambert, members of their committee, together with Mr. Hugh
Gibson, secretary of the American Legation, whose activities in behalf
of Belgium attracted much favorable notice, to the city of London, to
explain to the British Government the suffering that existed in Belgium,
and to obtain permission to transport food through the British blockade.
In the course of this work they appealed to the American Ambassador in
England, Mr. Walter Hines Page, and were introduced by him to an
American mining engineer named Herbert Clark Hoover, who had just become
prominent as the chairman of a committee to assist Americans who had
found themselves in Europe when the war broke out, and had been unable
to secure funds.

Mr. Hoover took up the matter with great vigor, and organized an
American committee under the patronage of the ministers of the United
States and of Spain in London, Berlin, The Hague and Brussels, which
committee obtained permission from the British Government to purchase
and transport through the British blockade, to Rotterdam, Holland,
cargoes of foodstuffs, to be ultimately transferred into Belgium and
distributed by the Belgian Central Relief Committee under the direction
of American citizens headed by Mr. Brand Whitlock.


[Illustration: Painting: Several ships and two airplanes.]
  AN AIRPLANE CONVOY
  Food ships successfully convoyed by seaplanes in clear weather when
  submarines were easier to detect.


188  HISTORY OF THE WORLD WAR

[Illustration: Painting]
  BRITISH LIGHT ARTILLERY GETTING IN ON THE GALLOP
  Always the guns must follow closely in the wake of the infantry to
  break up German counter attacks and hold the ground gained. Here a
  detachment of the Royal Horse Artillery storms through a deserted
  Flanders village, straining every nerve to save those few seconds that
  may mean the saving or the loss of the new positions won.


The following brief notices, in connection with this committee appeared
in the London Times:

October 24 1914.--A commission has been set up in London, under the
title of The American Commission for Relief in Belgium. The Brussels
committee reports feeding 300,000 daily.

November 4.--The Commission for Relief in Belgium yesterday issued their
first weekly report, 3 London Wall Buildings. A cargo was received
yesterday at Brussels just in time. Estimated monthly requirements,
60,000 tons grain, 15,000 tons maize, 3,000 tons rice and peas. Approved
by the Spanish and American ministers, Brussels.

The personality of the various gentlemen who devoted themselves to
Belgian relief is interesting, not only because of what they did, but
because they are unusual men. The Spanish Minister, who bore the
peculiar name of Marquis of Villalobar y O'Neill, had the appearance of
an Irishman, as he was on the maternal side, and was a trained diplomat,
with delightful manners and extraordinary strength of character. Another
important aid in the Belgian relief work was the Mexican Charge
d'Affaires Senor don German Bulle. Hugh Gibson, secretary of the
American Legation, wittily described this gentleman as the
"representative of a country without a government to a government
without a country." The businessman in the American Legation was this
secretary. Mr. Gibson had the appearance of a typical Yankee, though he
came from Indiana. He was about thirty years old, with dark eyes, crisp
hair, and a keen face. He was noted for his wit as well as his courage.
Many interesting stories are told of him. He had been often under fire,
and he was full of stories of his exploits told in a witty and modest
way.

The following incident shows something of his humor. Like most of the
Americans in Belgium he was followed by spies. With one of these Gibson
became on the most familiar terms, much to the spy's disgust. One very
rainy day, when Gibson was at the Legation, he discovered his pet spy
standing under the dripping eaves of a neighboring house. Gibson picked
up a raincoat and hurried over to the man.

"Look here, old fellow," said he, "I'm going to be in the Legation for
three hours. You put on this coat and go home. Come back in three hours
and I'll let you watch me for the rest of the day."

Mr. Brand Whitlock, the American Minister, was a remarkable man. Before
coming to Belgium he had become a distinguished man of letters.
Beginning as a newspaper reporter in Chicago, he had studied law and
been admitted to the Illinois Bar in 1894, and to the Bar of the State
of Ohio in 1897. He had entered into politics, and been elected mayor of
Toledo, Ohio, in 1905, again in 1907, 1909 and 1911. Meanwhile he had
been writing novels, "The Thirteenth District," "The Turn of the
Balance," "The Fall Guy," and "Forty Years of It." He had accepted the
appointment of American Minister to Belgium with the idea that he would
find leisure for other literary work, but the outbreak of the war
affected him deeply. A man of a sympathetic character who had lived all
his life in an amiable atmosphere, had been a member of prison reform
associations and charitable societies, he now found himself surrounded
by a storm of horrors. Day by day he had to see the distress and
suffering of thousands of people. He threw himself at once into the work
of relief. His health was not strong and he always looked tired and
worn. He was the scholarly type of man, the kind who would be happy in a
library, or in the atmosphere of a college, but he rose to the
emergency.

The American Legation became the one staple point around which the
starving and suffering population could rally. Belgians will never
forget what he did in those days. On Washington's Birthday they filed
before the door of the American Legation at Number 74 Rue de Treves,
men, women and children of all classes; some in furs, some in the
garments of the poor; noblemen, scholars, workmen, artists, shopkeepers
and peasants to leave their visiting cards, some engraved, some printed
and some written on pieces of paper, in tribute to Mr. Whitlock and the
nation which he represented.

But the man whose name stands cut above all others as one of the biggest
figures in connection with the work of relief was Mr. Herbert C. Hoover.
Mr. Hoover came of Quaker stock. He was born at West Branch, Iowa, in
1874, graduated from Leland Stanford University in 1895, specialized in
mining engineering, and spent several years in mining in the United
States and in Australia. He married Miss Lou Henry, of Monterey,
California, in 1899, and with his bride went to China as chief engineer
of the Chinese Imperial Bureau of Mines. He aided in the defense of
Tientsin during the Boxer Rebellion. After that he continued engineering
work in China until 1902, when he became a partner of the firm of
Bewick, Moreing & Co., mine operators, of London, and was consulting
engineer for more than fifty mining companies. He looked extremely
youthful; smooth shaven, with a straight nose, and a strong mouth and
chin. To him, more than anyone else, was due the creation and the
success of the Commission for Relief in Belgium. The splendid
organization which saved from so much suffering more than seven million
non-combatants in Belgium and two million in Northern France, was his
achievement.

A good story is told in the Outlook of September 8, 1915, which
illustrates his methods. It seems that before the commission was fairly
on its feet, there came a day when it was a case of snarling things in
red tape and letting Belgium starve, or getting food shipped and letting
governments howl. Hoover naturally chose the latter.

When the last bag had been stowed and the hatches were battened down
(writes Mr. Lewis R. Freeman, who tells the story), Hoover went in
person to the one Cabinet Minister able to arrange for the only things
he could not provide for himself--clearance papers.

"If I do not get four cargoes of food to Belgium by the end of the
week," he said bluntly, "thousands are going to die from starvation, and
many more may be shot in food riots."

"Out of the question," said the distinguished Minister; "there is no
time, in the first place, and if there was, there are no good wagons to
be spared by the railways, no dock hands, and no steamers. Moreover, the
Channel is closed for a week to merchant vessels, while troops are being
transferred to the Continent."

"I have managed to get all these things," Hoover replied quietly, "and
am now through with them all, except the steamers. This wire tells me
that these are now loaded and ready to sail, and I have come to have you
arrange for their clearance."

The great man gasped. "There have been--there are even now--men in the
Tower for less than you have done!" he ejaculated. "If it was for
anything but Belgium Relief--if it was anybody but you, young man--I
should hate to think of what might happen. As it is--er--I suppose
there is nothing to do but congratulate you on a jolly clever coup. I'll
see about the clearance at once."

Mr. Lloyd George tells the following story: It seems that the Commission
on Belgian Relief was attempting to simplify its work by arranging for
an extension of exchange facilities on Brussels. Mr. Lloyd George, then
Chancellor of the Exchequer, sent for Hoover. What happened is told in
Mr. George's words:

"'Mr. Hoover,' I said, 'I find I am quite unable to grant your request
in the matter of Belgian exchange, and I have asked you to come here
that I might explain why.'

"Without waiting for me to go on, my boyish-looking caller began
speaking. For fifteen minutes he spoke without a break--just about the
clearest expository utterance I have ever heard on any subject. He used
not a word too much, nor yet a word too few. By the time he had finished
I had come to realize, not only the importance of his contentions, but,
what was more to the point, the practicability of granting his request.
So I did the only thing possible under the circumstance, told him I had
never understood the question before, thanked him for helping me to
understand, and saw to it that things were arranged as he wanted them."

On April 10, 1915, a submarine torpedoed one of the food ships chartered
by the commission. A week later a German hydro-airplane tried to drop
bombs on the deck of another commission ship. So Hoover paid a flying
visit to Berlin. He was at once assured that no more incidents of the
sort would occur.

"Thanks," said Hoover. "Your Excellency, have you heard the story of the
man who was nipped by a bad-tempered dog? He went to the owner to have
the dog muzzled. 'But the dog won't bite you,' insisted the owner. 'You
know he won't bite me, and I know he won't bite me,' said the injured
party doubtfully, 'but the question is, does the dog know?'"

"Herr Hoover," said the high official, "pardon me if I leave you for a
moment. I am going at once to 'let the dog know.'"

This story, which is told by Mr. Edward Eyre Hunt in his delightful book
about Belgium, "War Bread," may be apocryphal, but it illustrates well
Hoover's habit of getting exactly what he wants.

When Mr. Hoover accepted the chairmanship of the Commission for Relief
in Belgium he established his headquarters at 3 London Wall Buildings,
London, England, and marshaled a small legion of fellow Americans,
business men, sanitary experts, doctors and social workers, who, as
unpaid volunteers, set about the great task of feeding the people of
Belgium and Northern France. The commission soon became a great
institution, recognized by all governments, receiving contributions from
all parts of the earth, with its own ships in every big port, and in the
eyes of the Belgians and French, who received their daily bread through
its agency, a monument of what Americans could do in social organization
and business efficiency, for Americans furnished the entire personnel of
the commission from the beginning.

The commission was a distinct organization from the Belgian National
Committee, through and with which it worked in Belgium itself. Its
functions were those of direction, and supervision of all matters that
had to be dealt with outside Belgium. In the occupied territories it had
the help of thousands of Belgian and French workers, many of them women.


The commission did not depend, according to Mr. Hoover, on anyone of its
American members for leadership. Anyone of them could at any time take
charge and carry on the work. "Honold, Poland, Gregory, Brown, Kellogg,
Lucey, White, Hunsiker, Connet, and many others who, at various periods,
have given of their great ability and experience in administration could
do it." At the same time it was admitted that the commission would never
have been so successful if Belgium had not already had in existence a
well-developed communal system. The base of the commission's
organization was a committee in every commune or municipality.

"You can have no idea what a great blessing it was in Belgium and
Northern France to have the small and intimate divisions which exist
under the communal system," said Mr. Hoover. "It is the whole unit of
life, and a political entity much more developed than in America. It has
been not only the basis of our relief organization, but the salvation of
the people."

Altogether there were four thousand communal committees linked up in
larger groups under district and provincial committees, which in turn
came under the Belgian National Committee. Contributions were received
from all over the world, but the greater part from the British and
French governments.

When Mr. Hoover began his work he appealed to the people of the United
States, but the American response to the appeal was sadly disappointing.
During his stay in America, in the early part of 1917, Mr. Hoover
expressed himself on the subject of his own country's niggardliness,
pointing out at the same time that the chief profits made out of
providing food for Belgium had gone into American pockets. Out of the
two hundred and fifty millions of dollars spent by the commission at
that time, one hundred and fifty millions had been used in the United
States to purchase supplies and on these orders America had made a war
profit of at least thirty million dollars. Yet in those two years the
American people had contributed only nine million dollars!

Mr. Hoover declared: "Thousands of contributions have come to us from
devoted people all over the United States, but the truth is that, with
the exception of a few large gifts, American contributions have been
little rills of charity of the poor toward the poor. Everywhere abroad
America has been getting the credit for keeping alight the lamp of
humanity, but what are the facts? America's contributions have been
pitifully inadequate and, do not forget it, other peoples have begun to
take stock of us. We have been getting all the credit. Have we deserved
it? We lay claim to idealism, to devotion to duty and to great
benevolence, but now the acid test is being applied to us. This has a
wider import than mere figures. Time and time again, when the door to
Belgium threatened to close, we have defended its portals by the
assertion that this was an American enterprise; that the sensibilities
of the American people would be wounded beyond measure, would be
outraged, if this work were interfered with. Our moral strength has been
based upon this assertion. I believe it is true, but it is difficult in
the face of the figures to carry conviction. And in the last six or
eight months time and again we have felt our influence slip from under
us."

The statement that Germans had taken food intended for the Belgians was
disposed of by Mr. Hoover in a speech in New York City. "We are
satisfied," he said, "that the German army has never eaten one-tenth of
one per cent of the food provided. The Allied governments never would
have supplied us with two hundred million dollars if we were supplying
the German army. If the Germans had absorbed any considerable quantity
of this food the population of Belgium would not be alive today."

The plan of operation of the Belgian Commission needs some description.
Besides the headquarters in London there was an office in Brussels, and,
as Rotterdam was the port of entry for all Belgian supplies, a
transshipping office for commission goods was opened in that city. The
office building was at 98 Haringvliet, formerly the residence of a Dutch
merchant prince.

Captain J. F. Lucey, the first Rotterdam director, sat in a roomy office
on the second floor overlooking the Meuse. From his windows he could see
the commission barges as they left for Belgium, their huge canvas flags
bearing the inscription "Belgian Relief Committee." He was a nervous,
big, beardless American, a volunteer who had left his business to
organize and direct a great transshipping office in an alien land for an
alien people.

Out of nothing he created a large staff of clerks, wrung from the Dutch
Government special permits, loaded the immense cargoes received from
England into canal boats, obtained passports for cargoes and crews, and
shipped the foodstuffs consigned personally to Mr. Brand Whitlock.

Something of what was done at this point may be understood from a
reference in the first annual report of the commission published October
31, 1915:


The chartering and management of an entire fleet of vessels, together
with agency control practically throughout the world, has been carried
out for the commission quite free of the usual charges by large
transportation firms who offered these concessions in the cause of
humanity. Banks generally have given their exchange services and have
paid the full rate of interest on deposits. Insurance has been
facilitated by the British Government Insurance Commissioners, and the
firms who fixed the insurance have subscribed the equivalent of their
fees. Harbor dues and port charges have been remitted at many points and
stevedoring firms have made important concessions in rates and have
afforded other generous services. In Holland, exemption from harbor dues
and telegraph tolls has been granted and rail transport into Belgium
provided free of charge. The total value of these Dutch concessions is
estimated at 147,824 guilders. The German military authorities in
Belgium have abolished custom and canal dues on all commission imports,
have reduced railway rates one-half and on canals and railways they give
right of way to commission foodstuffs wherever there is need.


By mid-November gift ships from the United States were on their way to
Rotterdam, but the Canadian province of Nova Scotia was first in the
transatlantic race.

One of the most thrilling experiences of the first year's work was the
coming of the Christmas ship, a steamer full of Christmas gifts
presented by the children of America to the children of war-ridden
Belgium. The children knew all about it long before the ship arrived in
Rotterdam. St. Nicholas' day had brought them few presents. They were
hungry for friendliness, and the thought of getting gifts from children
across the sea filled them with joy.

Many difficulties arose, which delayed the distribution of these gifts.
The Germans insisted that every package should be opened and every scrap
of writing taken out before the gifts were sent into Belgium. This was a
tremendous task, for notes written by American children were tucked away
into all sorts of impossible places.

Three motor boats made an attempt to carry these gifts into Belgium by
Christmas day. They carried boxes of clothing, outfits for babies,
blankets, caps, bonnets, cloaks, shoes of every description, babies'
boots, candy, fish, striped candy canes, chocolates and mountains of
nuts, nuts such as the Belgians had never seen in their lives before:
pecans, hickory nuts, American walnuts, and peanuts galore. There were
scores of dolls, French bisques, smiling pleasantly, pop-eyed rag dolls,
old darky mammy dolls, and Santa Clauses, teddy bears, picture books,
fairy books and story books.

One child had written on the cover of her book: "Father says I ought to
send you my best picture book, but I think that this one will do."

These gifts made the American aid to Belgium a thousand times more
intimate and real, and never after that was American help thought of in
other terms than those of burning gratitude. Among these gifts were
hundreds of American flags, which soon became familiar to all Belgium.

The commission automobiles bore the flag, and the children would
recognize the Stars and Stripes and wave and cheer as it went by.
Thousands upon thousands of gifts to the Belgian people followed the
Christmas ship. All, or a great part, of the cargoes of one hundred and
two ships consisted of gift goods from America and indeed from all parts
of the world, and the Belgians sent back a flood of acknowledgments and
thousands of beautiful souvenirs. Some of the most touching remembrances
came from the children. Every child in the town of Tamise, for example,
wrote a letter to America.

One addressed to the President of the United States reads as follows:


Highly Honored Mr. President: Although I am still very young I feel
already that feeling of thankfulness which we, as Belgians, owe to you,
Highly Honored Mr. President, because you have come to our help in these
dreary times. Without your help there would certainly have been
thousands of war victims, and so, Noble Sir, I pray that God will bless
you and all the noble American people. That is the wish of all the
Belgian folk.


On New Year's day Cardinal Mercier, Archbishop of Malines, issued his
famous pastoral:


Belgium gave her word of honor to defend her independence. She has kept
her word. The other powers had agreed to protect and to respect
Belgium's neutrality. Germany has broken her word, England has been
faithful to it. These are the facts. I consider it an obligation of my
pastoral charge to define to you your conscientious duties toward the
power which has invaded our soil, and which for the moment occupies the
greater part of it. This power has no authority, and, therefore, in the
depth of your heart, you should render it neither esteem, nor
attachment, nor respect. The only legitimate power in Belgium is that
which belongs to our King, to his government, to the representatives of
the nation; that alone is authority for us; that alone has a right to
our heart's affection and to our submission.


Cardinal Mercier was called the bravest man in Belgium. Six feet five in
height, a thin, scholarly face, with grayish white hair, and a forehead
so white that one feels one looks on the naked bone, he presented the
appearance of some medieval ascetic. But there was a humorous look about
his mouth, and an expression of sympathy and comprehension which gave
the effect of a keenly intelligent, as well as gentle, leader of the
nation.

At the beginning of the war the Roman Catholic party was divided. Some
of its leaders were opposed to resistance to the invaders. Many priests
fled before the German armies. But the pastoral letter of Cardinal
Mercier restored to the Church its old leadership. In him conquered
Belgium had found a voice.

On New Year's Sunday, 1915, every priest at the Mass read out the
Cardinal's ringing challenge. There were German soldiers in the
churches, but no word of the letter had been allowed to reach the ears
of the authorities, and the Germans were taken completely by surprise.
Immediately orders came from headquarters prohibiting further
circulation of the letter, and ordering that every copy should be
surrendered to the authorities. Soldiers at the bayonet's point extorted
the letter from the priests, and those who had read it were put under
arrest. Yet, somehow, copies of the letter were circulated throughout
Belgium, and every Belgian took new heart.

As far as the Cardinal was concerned German action was a very delicate
matter. They could not arrest and imprison so great a dignitary of the
Church for fear of the effect, not only upon the Catholics of the outer
world, but on the Catholics in their own empire. An officer was sent to
the Cardinal to demand that the letter be recalled. The Cardinal
refused. He was then notified that it was desired that he remain in his
palace for the present. His confinement lasted only for a day.

The Americans who were in Belgium as representatives of the Relief
Commission had two duties. First, to see that the Germans did not seize
any of the food supplies, and second, to see that every Belgian who was
in need should receive his daily bread. The ration assigned to each
Belgian was 250 grams of bread per day. This seems rather small, but the
figure was established by Horace Fletcher, the American food expert, who
was one of the members of the commission.

Mr. Fletcher also prepared a pamphlet on food values, which gave recipes
for American dishes which were up to that time unknown to the Belgians.
He soon got not only the American but the Belgian committeemen talking
of calories with great familiarity.

Some of the foods sent from America were at first almost useless to the
Belgians. They did not know how to cook cornmeal and oatmeal, and some
of the famished peasants used them as feed for chickens. Teachers had to
be sent out through the villages to give instructions.

A great deal of difficulty developed in connection with the bread. The
supply of white flour was limited; wheat had to be imported, and milled
in Belgium. It was milled so as to contain all the bran except ten per
cent, but in some places ten or fifteen per cent of cornmeal was added
to the flour, not only to enable the commission to provide the necessary
ration, but also to keep down the price. As a result the price of bread
was always lower in Belgium than in London, Paris or New York.

Much less trouble occurred in connection with the distribution of bread
and soup from the soup kitchens. In Antwerp thirty-five thousand men
were fed daily at these places. At first it often occurred that soup
could be had, but no bread. The ration of soup and bread given in the
kitchens cost about ten cents a day. There were four varieties of soup,
pea, bean, vegetable and bouillon, and it was of excellent quality.
Every person carried a card with blank spaces for the date of the
deliveries of soup. There were several milk kitchens maintained for the
children, and several restaurants where persons with money might obtain
their food.

It was necessary not only to fight starvation in Belgium but also
disease. There were epidemics of typhoid and black measles. The
Rockefeller Foundation established a station in Rotterdam called the
Rockefeller Foundation War Relief Commission, and some of the women
among its workers acted as volunteer health officers. People were
inoculated against typhoid, and the sources of infection traced and
destroyed. Another form of relief work was providing labor for the
unemployed. A plan of relief was drawn up and it was arranged that a
large portion of them should be employed by the communal organizations,
in public works, such as draining, ditching, constructing embankments
and building sewers. The National Committee paid nine-tenths of the
wages, the commune paying the other tenth. The first enrolment of
unemployed amounted to more than 760,000 names, and nearly as many
persons were dependent upon these workers.

Providing employment for these led to certain complications. The Germans
had been able up to this time to secure a certain amount of labor from
the Belgians. Now the Belgian could refuse to work for the German, and a
great deal of tact was necessary to prevent trouble. As time went on the
relief work of the Commission was extended into the north of France,
where a population of more than 2,000,000 was within the German zone.
The work was handled in the same way, with the same guarantees from
Germany.

In conclusion a word may be said of the effect of all this suffering
upon the Belgian people, and let a Belgian speak, who knew his country
well and had traveled it over, going on foot, as he says, or by tram,
from town to town, from village to village:

"I have seen and spoken with hundreds of men of all classes and all
parts of the country, and all these people, taken singly or united in
groups, display a very definite frame of mind. To describe this new
psychology we must record the incontestably closer union which has been
formed between the political sections of the country. There are no
longer any political parties, there are Belgians in Belgium, and that is
all; Belgians better acquainted with their country, feeling for it an
impulse of passionate tenderness such as a child might feel who saw his
mother suffering for the first time, and on his account. Walloons and
Flemings, Catholics and Liberals or Socialists, all are more and more
frankly united in all that concerns the national life and decisions for
the future.

"By uniting the whole nation and its army, by shedding the blood of all
our Belgians in every corner of the country, by forcing all hearts, all
families, to follow with anguish the movement of those soldiers who
fought from Liege to Namur, from Wavre to Antwerp or the Oise, the war
has suddenly imposed wider horizons upon all, has inspired all minds
with noble and ardent passions, has compelled the good will of all to
combine and act in concert in order to defend the common interests.

"Of these profoundly tried minds, of these wonderful energies now
employed for the first time, of these atrocious sufferings which have
brought all hearts into closer contact, a new Belgium is born, a
greater, more generous, more ideal Belgium."



CHAPTER XIII

BRITANNIA RULES THE WAVES

The month of October, 1914, contained no important naval contests. On
the 15th, the old British cruiser Hawke was torpedoed in the North Sea
and nearly five hundred men were lost. On the other hand, on the 17th of
October, the light cruiser Undaunted, accompanied by the destroyers,
Lance, Legion and Loyal, sank four German destroyers off the Dutch
coast. But the opening of November turned the interest of the navy to
the Southern Pacific. When the war began Admiral von Spee, with the
German Pacific squadron, was at Kiaochau in command of seven vessels.
Among these was the Emden, whose adventurous career has been already
described. Another, the Karlsruhe, became a privateer in the South
Atlantic.

Early in August von Spee set sail from Kiaochau with two armored
cruisers, the Gneisenau and the Scharnhorst and three light cruisers,
the Dresden, Leipzig and Nurmberg. These ships were comparatively new,
well armed, and of considerable speed. They set off for the great trade
highways to destroy, as far as possible, British commerce. Their route
led them to the western coast of South America, and arrangements were
made so that they were coaled and provisioned from bases in some of the
South American states which permitted a slack observance of the laws
respecting the duties of neutrals.

A small British squadron had been detailed to protect British commerce
in this part of the world. It was commanded by Rear Admiral Sir
Christopher Cradock, a distinguished and popular sailor, who had under
his command one twelve-year-old battleship, the Canopus, two armored
cruisers, the Good Hope and the Monmouth, the light cruiser Glasgow, and
an armed liner, the Otranto. None of these vessels had either great
speed or heavy armament. The equipment of the Canopus, indeed, was
obsolete. Admiral Cradock's squadron arrived at Halifax on August 14th,
thence sailed to Bermuda, then on past Venezuela and Brazil around the
Horn. It visited the Falkland Islands, and by the third week of October
was on the coast of Chile. The Canopus had dropped behind for repairs,
and though reinforcements were expected, they had not yet arrived.

One officer wrote, on the 12th of October, "From now till the end of the
month is the critical time, as it will decide whether we shall have to
fight a superior German force from the Pacific before we can get
reinforcements from home or the Mediterranean. We feel that the
admiralty ought to have a better force here, but we shall fight
cheerfully whatever odds we have to face."

Admiral Cradock knew well that his enemy was superior in force. From
Coronel, where he sent off some cables, he went north on the first of
November, and about four o'clock in the afternoon the Glasgow sighted
the enemy. The two big German armored cruisers were leading the way, and
two light cruisers were following close. The German cruiser Leipzig does
not seem to have been in company. The British squadron was led by the
Good Hope, with the Monmouth, Glasgow and Otranto following in order. It
was a beautiful spectacle. The sun was setting in the wonderful glory
which one sees in the Pacific, and the British ships, west of the
German, must have appeared to them in brilliant colors. On the east were
the snowy peaks of the Andes. Half a gale was blowing and the two
squadrons moved south at great speed. About seven o'clock they were
about seven miles apart and the Scharnhorst, which was leading the
German fleet, opened fire. At this time the Germans were shaded by the
inshore twilight, but the British ships must have showed up plainly in
the afterglow. The enemy fired with great accuracy. Shell after shell
hit the Good Hope and the Monmouth, but the bad light and inferior guns
saved the German ships from much damage. The Good Hope was set on fire
and at 7.50 exploded and sank. The Monmouth was also on fire, and turned
away to the western sea. The Glasgow had escaped so far, but the whole
German squadron bore down upon her. She turned and fled and by nine
o'clock was out of sight of the enemy. The Otranto, only an armed liner,
had disappeared early in the fight. On the following day the Glasgow
worked around to the south, and joined the Canopus, and the two
proceeded to the Straits of the Magellan. The account of this battle by
the German Admiral von Spee is of especial interest:


"Wind and swell were head on, and the vessels had heavy going,
especially the small cruisers on both sides. Observation and distance
estimation were under a severe handicap because of the seas which washed
over the bridges. The swell was so great that it obscured the aim of the
gunners at the six-inch guns on the middle deck, who could not see the
sterns of the enemy ships at all, and the bows but seldom. At 6.20 P.
M., at a distance of 13,400 yards, I turned one point toward the enemy,
and at 6.34 opened fire at a distance of 11,260 yards. The guns of both
our armored cruisers were effective, and at 6.39 already we could note
the first hit on the Good Hope. I at once resumed a parallel course,
instead of bearing slightly toward the enemy. The English opened their
fire at this time. I assume that the heavy sea made more trouble for
them than it did for us. Their two armored cruisers remained covered by
our fire, while they, so far as could be determined, hit the Scharnhorst
but twice, and the Gneisenau only four times. At 6.53, when 6,500 yards
apart, I ordered a course one point away from the enemy. They were
firing more slowly at this time, while we were able to count numerous
hits. We could see, among other things, that the top of the Monmouth's
forward turret had been shot away, and that a violent fire was burning
in the turret. The Scharnhorst, it is thought, hit the Good Hope about
thirty-five times. In spite of our altered course the English changed
theirs sufficiently so that the distance between us shrunk to 5,300
yards. There was reason to suspect that the enemy despaired of using his
artillery effectively, and was maneuvering for a torpedo attack.

"The position of the moon, which had risen at six o'clock, was favorable
to this move. Accordingly I gradually opened up further distances
between the squadrons by another deflection of the leading ship, at
7.45. In the meantime it had grown dark. The range finders on the
Scharnhorst used the fire on the Monmouth as a guide for a time, though
eventually all range finding, aiming and observations became so inexact
that fire was stopped at 7.26. At 7.23 a column of fire from an
explosion was noticed between the stacks of the Good Hope. The Monmouth
apparently stopped firing at 7.20. The small cruisers, including the
Nuremburg, received by wireless at 7.30 the order to follow the enemy
and to attack his ships with torpedoes. Vision was somewhat obscured at
this time by a rain squall. The light cruisers were not able to find the
Good Hope, but the Nuremburg encountered the Monmouth and at 8.58 was
able, by shots at closest range, to capsize her, without a single shot
being fired in return. Rescue work in the heavy sea was not to be
thought of, especially as the Nuremburg immediately afterward believed
she had sighted the smoke of another ship and had to prepare for another
attack. The small cruisers had neither losses nor damage in the battle.
On the Gneisenau there were two men slightly wounded. The crews of the
ships went into the fight with enthusiasm, everyone did his duty, and
played his part in the victory."


Little criticism can be made of the tactics used by Vice-Admiral Spee.
He appears to have maneuvered so as to secure the advantage of light,
wind and sea. He also seems to have suited himself as regards the range.

Admiral Cradock was much criticised for joining battle with his little
fleet against such odds, but he followed the glorious traditions of the
English navy. He, and 1,650 officers and men, were lost, and the news
was hailed as a great German victory. But the British admiralty were
thoroughly roused. Rear-Admiral Sir Frederick Doveton Sturdee, chief of
the war staff, proceeded at once with a squadron to the South Atlantic.
With him were two battle cruisers, the Invincible and the Inflexible,
three armored cruisers, the Carnovan, the Kent and the Cornwall. His
fleet was joined by the light cruiser Bristol and the armed liner
Macedonia. The Glasgow, fresh from her rough experience, was found in
the South Atlantic. Admiral Sturdee then laid his plans to come in touch
with the victorious German squadron. A wireless message was sent to the
Canopus, bidding her proceed to Port Stanley in the Falkland Islands.
This message was intercepted by the Germans, as was intended.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright International News Service
  THE SINKING OF THE GERMAN CRUISER "BLUECHER"
  This dramatic photograph from the great North Sea Battle in 1915 shows
  the stricken ship just as she turned turtle and was about to sink.
  Officers and men can be seen swarming like ants on the upper side of
  the hull. Others, who either fell or preferred to take their chance in
  the sea, are shown swimming away from the wreck.


[Illustration: Painting]
  GERMANY BRINGS THE WAR TO EAST COAST TOWNS OF ENGLAND
  By raids with light cruisers on the coast towns, and Zeppelins and
  airplanes further inland, Germany sought to frighten the British
  populace. At Hartlepool, where this scene was enacted, several
  civilians, some of them women and children, were killed by bursting
  shells of the raiders.


Admiral von Spee, fearing the Japanese fleet, was already headed for
Cape Horn. He thought that the Canopus could be easily captured at Port
Stanley, and he started at once to that port. Admiral Sturdee's
expedition had been kept profoundly secret. On December 7th the British
squadron arrived at Port Stanley, and spent the day coaling. The
Canopus, the Glasgow and the Bristol were in the inner harbor, while the
remaining vessels lay outside. On December 8th, Admiral von Spee arrived
from the direction of Cape Horn. The battle that followed is thoroughly
described in the report of Vice-Admiral Sturdee from which the
following extracts have been made:


"At 8 A. M., Tuesday, December 8th, a signal was received from the
signal station on shore. 'A four-funnel and two-funnel man-of-war in
sight from Sapper Hill steering north.' The Kent was at once ordered to
weigh anchor, and a general signal was made to raise steam for full
speed. At 8.20 the signal service station reported another column of
smoke in sight, and at 8.47 the Canopus reported that the first two
ships were eight miles off, and that the smoke reported at 8.20 appeared
to be the smoke of two ships about twenty miles off. At 9.20 A. M. the
two leading ships of the enemy, the Gneisenau and Nuremburg, with guns
trained on the wireless station, came within range of the Canopus, which
opened fire at them across the lowland at a range of 11,000 yards. The
enemy at once hoisted their colors, and turned away. A few minutes later
the two cruisers altered course to port, as though to close the Kent at
the entrance to the harbor. But at about this time it seems that the
Invincible and Inflexible were seen over the land, and the enemy at once
altered course, and increased speed to join their consorts. At 9.45 A.
M. the squadron weighed anchor and proceeded out of the harbor, the
Carnovan leading. On passing Cape Pembroke light, the five ships of the
enemy appeared clearly in sight to the southeast, hull down. The
visibility was at its maximum, the sea was calm, with a bright sun, a
clear sky, and a light breeze from the northwest. At 10.20 the signal
for a general chase was made. At this time the enemy's funnels and
bridges showed just above the horizon. Information was received from the
Bristol at 11.27 that three enemy ships had appeared off Port Pleasant,
probably colliers or transports. The Bristol was therefore directed to
take the Macedonia under orders and destroy transports.

"The enemy were still maintaining their distance, and I decided at 12.20
P. M. to attack, with the two battle cruisers and the Glasgow. At 12.47
P. M. the signal to 'Open fire and engage the enemy' was made. The
Inflexible opened fire at 12.55 P. M. at the right-hand ship of the
enemy, and a few minutes later the Invincible opened fire at the same
ship. The deliberate fire became too threatening, and when a shell fell
close alongside her at 1.20 p. m. she, the Leipsig, turned away, with
the Nuremburg and Dresden, to the southwest. These light cruisers were
at once followed by the Kent, Glasgow and Cornwall.

"The action finally developed into three separate encounters. First, the
action with the armored cruisers. The fire of the battle cruisers was
directed on the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau. The effect of this was
quickly seen, when, with the Scharnhorst leading, they turned about
seven points to port, and opened fire. Shortly afterwards the battle
cruisers were ordered to turn together with the Invincible leading. The
enemy then turned about ten points to starboard, and a second chase
ensued until, at 2.45, the battle cruisers again opened fire. This
caused the enemy to turn into line ahead to port and open fire. The
Scharnhorst caught fire forward, but not seriously, and her fire
slackened perceptibly. The Gneisenau was badly hit by the Inflexible.

"At 3.30 P. M. the Scharnhorst turned about ten points to starboard, her
fire had slackened perceptibly, and one shell had shot away her third
funnel. Some guns were not firing, and it would appear that the turn was
dictated by a desire to bring her starboard guns into action. The effect
of the fire on the Scharnhorst became more and more apparent in
consequence of smoke from fires and also escaping steam. At times a
shell would cause a large hole to appear in her side, through which
could be seen a dull, red glow of flame.

"At 4.04 P. M. the Scharnhorst, whose flag remained flying to the last,
suddenly listed heavily to port, and within a minute it became clear
that she was a doomed ship, for the list increased very rapidly until
she lay on her beam ends. At 4.17 P. M. she disappeared. The Gneisenau
passed on the far side of her late flagship, and continued a determined,
but ineffectual, effort to fight the two battle cruisers. At 5.08 P. M.
the forward funnel was knocked over, and remained resting against the
second funnel. She was evidently in serious straits, and her fire
slackened very much.

"At 5.15 P. M. one of the Gneisenau's shells struck the Invincible. This
was her last effective effort. At 5.30 P. M. she turned toward the
flagship with a heavy list to starboard, and appeared to stop, the steam
pouring from her escape pipes, and smoke from shell and fires rising
everywhere. About this time I ordered the signal 'Cease fire,' but
before it was hoisted, the Gneisenau opened fire again, and continued to
fire from time to time with a single gun. At 5.40 P. M. the three ships
closed in on the Gneisenau, and at this time the flag flying at her fore
truck, was apparently hauled down, but the flag at the peak continued
flying. At 5.50 'Cease fire' was made. At 6 P. M. the Gneisenau keeled
over very suddenly, showing the men gathered on her decks, and then
walking on her side as she lay for a minute on her beam ends before
sinking.

"The prisoners of war from the Gneisenau report that by the time the
ammunition was expended some six hundred men had been killed and
wounded. When the ship capsized and sank there were probably some two
hundred unwounded survivors in the water, but, owing to the shock of the
cold water, many were drowned within sight of the boats and ships. Every
effort was made to save life as quickly as possible, both by boats and
from the ships. Life buoys were thrown and ropes lowered, but only a
portion could be rescued. The Invincible alone rescued a hundred and
eight men, fourteen of whom were found to be dead after being brought on
board. These men were buried at sea the following day, with full
military honors.

"Second, action with the light cruisers. About one P. M. when the
Scharnhorst and the Gneisenau turned to port to engage the Invincible
and the Inflexible, the enemy's light cruisers turned to starboard to
escape. The Dresden was leading, and the Nuremburg and Leipzig followed
on each quarter. In accordance with my instructions, the Glasgow, Kent
and Cornwall at once went in chase of these ships. The Glasgow drew well
ahead of the Cornwall and Kent, and at 3 P. M. shots were exchanged with
the Leipzig at 12,000 yards. The Glasgow's object was to endeavor to
outrange the Leipzig, and thus cause her to alter course and give the
Cornwall and Kent a chance of coming into action. At 4.17 P. M. the
Cornwall opened fire also on the Leipzig; at 7.17 P. M. the Leipzig was
on fire fore and aft, and the Cornwall and Glasgow ceased fire. The
Leipzig turned over on her port side and disappeared at 9 P. M. Seven
officers and eleven men were saved. At 3.36 P. M. the Cornwall ordered
the Kent to engage the Nuremburg, the nearest cruiser to her. At 6.35 P.
M. the Nuremburg was on fire forward, and ceased firing. The Kent also
ceased firing, then, as the colors were still observed to be flying on
the Nuremburg, the Kent opened fire again. Fire was finally stopped five
minutes later, on the colors being hauled down, and every preparation
was made to save life. The Nuremburg sank at 7.27, and as she sank a
group of men were waving the German ensign attached to a staff.

"Twelve men were rescued, but only seven survived. The Kent had four
killed and twelve wounded, mostly caused by one shell. During the time
the three cruisers were engaged with the Nuremburg and Leipzig, the
Dresden, which was beyond her consorts, effected her escape, owing to
her superior speed. The Glasgow was the only cruiser with sufficient
speed to have had any chance of success, however she was fully employed
in engaging the Leipzig for over an hour before either the Cornwall or
Kent could come up and get within range. During this time the Dresden
was able to increase her distance and get out of sight. Three, Action
with the enemy's transports. H.M.S. Macedonia reports that only two
ships, the steamships Baden and Santa Isabel, were present. Both ships
were sunk after removal of the crews."


Thus was annihilated the last squadron belonging to Germany outside the
North Sea. The defeat of Cradock had been avenged. The British losses
were very small, considering the length of the fight and the desperate
efforts of the German fleet. Only one ship of the German squadron was
able to escape, and this on account of her great speed. The German
sailors went down with colors flying. They died as Cradock's men had
died.

The naval war now entered upon a new phase. The shores of Great Britain
had for many years been so thoroughly protected by the British navy that
few coast fortifications had been built, except at important naval
stations. Invasion on a grand scale was plainly impossible, so long as
the British fleets held control of the sea. With German guns across the
Channel almost within hearing it was evident that a raiding party might
easily reach the English shore on some foggy night. The English people
were much disturbed. They had read the accounts of the horrible
brutalities of the German troops in Belgium and eastern France, and they
imagined their feelings if a band of such ferocious brutes were to land
in England and pillage their peaceful homes. There was a humorous side
to the way in which the yeomanry and territorials entrenched themselves
along the eastern coast line, but the Germans, angry at the failure of
their fleets, determined to disturb the British peace by raids, slight
as the military advantage of such raids might be.

On November 2d a fleet of German warships sailed from the Elbe. They
were three battle cruisers, the Seydlitz, the Moltke, and the Von Der
Tann; two armored cruisers, the Blucher and the York, and three light
cruisers, the Kolberg, the Graudenz, and the Strasburg. They were mainly
fast vessels and the battle cruisers carried eleven-inch guns. Early in
the morning they ran through the nets of a British fishing fleet. Later
an old coast police boat, the Halcyon, was shot at a few times. About
eight o'clock they were opposite Yarmouth, and proceeded to bombard that
naval station from a distance of about ten miles. Their range was poor
and their shells did no damage. They then turned swiftly for home, but
on the road back the York struck a mine, and was sunk.


[Illustration: Map: Great Britain on the West, Denmark and Germany on
the East.]
  ENGLISH COAST TOWNS THAT WERE RAIDED


On the 16th of December they came again, full of revenge because of the
destruction of von Spee and his squadron. Early in the morning early
risers in Scarborough saw in the north four strange ships. Scarborough
was absolutely without defense. It had once been an artillery depot but
in recent years had been a cavalry station, and some few troops of this
service were quartered there. Otherwise it was an open seaside resort.
The German ships poured shells into the defenseless town, aiming at
every large object they could see, the Grand Hotel, the gas works, the
water works and the wireless station. Churches, public buildings, and
hospitals were hit, as well as private houses. Over five hundred shells
were fired. Then the ships turned around and moved away. The streets
were crowded with puzzled and scared inhabitants, many of whom, as is
customary in watering places, were women, children and invalids.

At nine o'clock Whitby, a coast town near Scarborough, saw two great
ships steaming up from the south. Ten minutes later the ships were
firing. The old Abbey of Hilda and Cedman was struck, but on the whole
little damage was done. Another division of the invaders visited the
Hartlepools. There there was a small fort, with a battery of
old-fashioned guns, and off the shore was a small British flotilla, a
gunboat and two destroyers. The three battle cruisers among the German
raiders opened fire. The little British fleet did what they could but
were quickly driven off. The German ships then approached the shore and
fired on the English battery, the first fight with a foreign foe in
England since 1690. The British battery consisted of some territorials
who stood without wavering to their guns and kept up for half an hour a
furious cannonading. A great deal of damage was done; churches,
hospitals, workhouses and schools were all hit. The total death roll was
119, and the wounded over 300. Six hundred houses were damaged or
destroyed, but there was a great deal of heroism, not only among the
territorials, but among the inhabitants of the town, and when the last
shots were fired all turned to the work of relief.

Somewhere between nine and ten o'clock the bold German fleet started for
home. The British Grand Fleet had been notified of the raid and two
battle cruiser squadrons were hurrying to intercept them. But the
weather had thickened and the waters of the North Sea were covered with
fog belts stretching for hundreds of miles. And so the raiders returned
safe to receive their Iron Crosses. The German aim in such raids was
probably to create a panic, and so interfere with the English military
plans. If the English had not looked at the matter with common sense
they might easily have been tempted to spend millions of pounds on
seaboard fortifications, and keep millions of men at home who were more
necessary in the armies in France. But the English people kept their
heads.

Germany, perceiving the indignation of the world at these bombardments
of defenseless watering places, endeavored to appease criticism by
describing them as fortified towns. But the well-known excellence of the
German system of espionage makes it plain that they knew the true
condition of affairs. These towns were not selected as fortified towns,
but because they were not, and destruction in unfortified towns it was
thought would have a greater effect than in a fortified town where it
would be regarded as among the natural risks of war.

During the rest of the year of 1914 no further sea fight took place in
the North Sea nor was there any serious loss to the navy from torpedo or
submarine. But on the first of January, 1915, the British ship
Formidable, 15,000 tons, was struck by two torpedoes and sunk. The
previous day she had left Sheerness with eight vessels of the Channel
fleet and with no protection from destroyers. The night was a bright
moonlight and for such vessels to be moving in line on such a night
without destroyers shows gross carelessness. Out of a crew of 800 men
only 201 were saved, and the rescue of this part of the crew was due to
the seamanship of Captain Pillar of the trawler Providence, who managed
to take most of those rescued on board his vessel.

On January 24th the German battle cruiser squadron under Rear-Admiral
Hipper set sail from Wilhelmshaven. What his object was is not known. He
had enlarged the mine field north of Helgoland and north of the mine
field had stationed a submarine flotilla. It is likely that he was
planning to induce the British fleet to follow him into the mine field,
or within reach of his submarines. That same morning the British battle
cruiser squadron under Vice-Admiral Sir David Beatty put to sea.

According to the official report of the English Admiral he was in
command of the following vessels; battle cruisers, the Lion, Princess
Royal, the Tiger, the New Zealand, and the Indomitable; light cruisers,
the Southampton, the Nottingham, the Birmingham, the Lowestoft, the
Arethusa, the Aurora and the Undaunted, with destroyer flotillas under
Commodore Tyrwhitt. The German Admiral had with him the Seydlitz, the
Moltke, the Derfflinger, the Blucher, six light cruisers and a destroyer
flotilla. The English Admiral apparently had some hint of the plans of
the German squadron. The night of the 23d had been foggy; in the
morning, however, the wind came from the northeast and cleared off the
mists. An abridgment of the official report gives a good account of the
battle, sometimes called the battle of Dogger Bank:


"At 7.25 A. M. the flash of guns was observed south-southeast; shortly
afterwards the report reached me from the Aurora that she was engaged
with enemy ships. I immediately altered course to south-southeast,
increased speed, and ordered the light cruisers and flotillas to get in
touch and report movements of enemy. This order was acted upon with
great promptitude, indeed my wishes had already been forestalled by the
respective senior officers, and reports almost immediately followed from
the Southampton, Arethusa, and Aurora as to the position and composition
of the enemy. The enemy had altered their course to southeast; from now
onward the light cruisers maintained touch with the enemy and kept me
fully informed as to their movements. The battle cruisers worked up to
full speed, steering to the southward; the wind at the time was
northeast, light, with extreme visibility.

"At 7.30 A. M. the enemy were sighted on the port bow, steaming fast,
steering approximately southeast, distance fourteen miles. Owing to the
prompt reports received we had attained our position on the quarter of
the enemy, and altered course to run parallel to them. We then settled
down to a long stern chase, gradually increasing our speed until we
reached 28.5 knots.

"Great credit is due to the engineer staffs of the New Zealand and
Indomitable. These ships greatly exceeded their speed. At 8.52 A. M., as
we had closed within 20,000 yards of the rear ship, the battle cruisers
maneuvered so that guns would bear and the Lion fired a single shot
which fell short. The enemy at this time were in single line ahead, with
light cruisers ahead and a large number of destroyers on their starboard
beam. Single shots were fired at intervals to test the range, and at
9.09 the Lion made her first hit on the Blucher, the rear ship of the
German line. At 9.20 the Tiger opened fire on the Blucher, and the Lion
shifted to the third in the line, this ship being hit by several salvos.
The enemy returned our fire at 9.14 A. M., the Princess Royal, on coming
into range, opened fire on the Blucher. The New Zealand was also within
range of the Blucher which had dropped somewhat astern, and opened fire
on her. The Princess Royal then shifted to the third ship in the line
(Derfflinger) inflicting considerable damage on her. Our flotilla
cruisers and destroyers had gradually dropped from a position, broad on
our beam, to our port quarter, so as not to foul our range with their
smoke. But the enemy's destroyers threatening attack, the Meteor and M
division passed ahead of us.

"About 9.45 the situation was about as follows: The Blucher, the fourth
in their line, showed signs of having suffered severely from gun fire,
their leading ship and number three were also on fire. The enemy's
destroyers emitted vast columns of smoke to screen their battle
cruisers, and under cover of this the latter now appeared to have
altered course to the northward to increase their distance. The battle
cruisers therefore were ordered to form a line of bearing
north-northwest, and proceeded at the utmost speed. Their destroyers
then showed evident signs of an attempt to attack. The Lion and the
Tiger opened fire upon them, and caused them to retire and resume their
original course.

"At 10.48 A. M. the Blucher, which had dropped considerably astern of
the enemy's line, hauled out to port, steering north with a heavy list,
on fire, and apparently in a defeated condition. I consequently ordered
the Indomitable to attack the enemy breaking northward. At 10.54
submarines were reported on the starboard bow, and I personally observed
the wash of a periscope. I immediately turned to port. At 10.03 an
injury to the Lion being reported as being incapable of immediate
repair, I directed the Lion to shape course northwest.

"At 11.20 I called the Attack alongside, shifting my flag to her, and
proceeded at utmost speed to rejoin the squadron. I met them at noon,
retiring north-northwest. I boarded and hoisted my flag on the Princess
Royal, when Captain Brock acquainted me with what had occurred since the
Lion fell out of line, namely, that the Blucher had been sunk and that
the enemy battle cruisers had continued their course to the eastward in
a considerably damaged condition. He also informed me that a Zeppelin
and a seaplane had endeavored to drop bombs on the vessels which went to
the rescue of the survivors of the Blucher."


It appears from this report that as soon as the Germans sighted the
British fleet they promptly turned around and fled to the southeast.
This flight, before they could have known the full British strength,
suggests that the German Admiral was hoping to lure the British vessels
into the Helgoland trap. The British gunnery was remarkably good, shot
after shot taking effect at a distance of ten miles, and that too when
moving at over thirty miles an hour. Over 120 of the crew of the Blucher
were rescued and more would have been rescued if it had not been for the
attack upon the rescue parties by the German aircraft. The injury to the
Lion was very unfortunate. Admiral Beatty handed over charge of the
battle cruisers to Rear-Admiral Moore, and when he was able to overtake
the squadron he found that under Admiral Moore's orders the British
fleet were retiring. The British squadron at the moment of turning was
seventy miles from Helgoland, and in no danger from its mine fields.
What might have been a crushing victory became therefore only a partial
one: the Germans lost the Blucher; the Derfflinger and the Seydlitz were
badly injured, but it seems that with a little more persistence the
whole German squadron might have been destroyed.

The result was a serious blow to Germany. This engagement was the first
between modern big-gun ships. Particular interest is also attached to it
because each squadron was accompanied by scouting and screening light
cruisers and destroyers. It was fear of submarines and mines, moreover,
that influenced the British to break off the engagement. A Zeppelin
airship and a seaplane also took part, and perhaps assisted in the fire
control of the Germans. The conditions surrounding this battle were
ideal for illustrating the functions of battle cruisers. The German
warship raid on the British coast of the previous month was still fresh
in mind, and when this situation off the Dogger Bank arose the timely
interposing of Admiral Beatty's superior force, the fast chase, the
long-range fighting, the loss of the Blucher and the hasty retreat of
the enemy, were all particularly pleasing to the British people. As a
result the battle cruiser type of ship attained great popularity.



CHAPTER XIV

NEW METHODS AND HORRORS OF WARFARE

When Germany embarked upon its policy of frightfulness, it held in
reserve murderous inventions that had been contributed to the German
General Staff by chemists and other scientists working in conjunction
with the war. Never since the dawn of time had there been such a
perversion of knowledge to criminal purposes; never had science
contributed such a deadly toll to the fanatic and criminal intentions of
a war-crazed class.

As the war uncoiled its weary length, and month after month of embargo
and privation saw the morale of the German nation growing steadily
lower, these murderous inventions were successively called into play
against the Allies, but as each horror was put into play on the
battle-field, its principles were solved by the scientists of the Allied
nations, and the deadly engine of destruction was turned with trebled
force against the Huns.

This happened with the various varieties of poison gas, with liquid
fire, with trench knives, with nail-studded clubs, with armor used by
shock troops, with airplane bombs, with cannon throwing projectiles
weighing thousands of pounds great distances behind the battle lines.
Not only did America and the Allies improve upon Germany's pattern in
these respects, but they added a few inventions that went far toward
turning the scale against Germany. An example of these is the "tank."
Originally this was a caterpillar tractor invented in America and
adopted in England. At first these were of two varieties, the male,
carrying heavy guns only, and the females, equipped with machine guns.
To these was later added the whippet tank, named after the racing dog
developed in England. These whippet tanks averaged eighteen miles an
hour, carrying death and terror into the ranks of the enemy. All the
tanks were heavily armored and had as their motto the significant words
"Treat 'Em Rough." The Germans designed a heavy anti-tank rifle about
three feet longer than the ordinary rifle and carrying a charge
calculated to pierce tank armor. These were issued to the German first
line trenches at the rate of three to a company. That they were not
particularly effective was proved by the ease with which the tanks of
all varieties tore through the barbed wire entanglements and passed over
the Hindenburg and Kriemhild lines, supposed by the Germans to be
impregnable.

The tanks in effect were mobile artillery and were used as such by all
the Allied troops. Germany frantically endeavored to manufacture tanks
to meet the Allied monsters, but their efforts were feeble when compared
with the great output opposed to them.

Before considering other inventions used for the first time in this war,
it is well to understand the tremendous changes in methods and tactics
made necessary by these discoveries.

Put into a sentence, the changed warfare amounts to this: it is a
mobilization of material, of railroads, great guns, machine guns, food,
airplanes and other engines of destruction quite as much as it is a
mobilization of men.

The Germans won battle after battle at the beginning of the war because
of their system of strategic railways that made it possible to transport
huge armies to selected points in the shortest possible time both on the
eastern and the western fronts. Lacking a system of transportation to
match this, Russia lost the great battles that decided her fate, Belgium
was over-run, and France, once the border was passed, became a
battle-field upon which the Germans might extend their trench systems
over the face of the land.

Lacking strategic railways to match those of Germany, France evolved an
effective substitute in the modern system of automobile transportation.
When von Kluck swung aside from Paris in his first great rush, Gallieni
sent out from Paris an army in taxicabs that struck the exposed flank
and went far toward winning the first battle of the Marne. It was the
truck transportation system of the French along the famous "Sacred Road"
back of the battle line at Verdun that kept inviolate the motto of the
heroic town, "They Shall Not Pass." Motor trucks that brought American
reserves in a khaki flood won the second battle of the Marne. It was
automobile transportation that enabled Haig to send the British
Canadians and Australians in full cry after the retreating Germans when
the backbone of the German resistance was broken before Lens, Cambrai,
and Ostend.

America's railway transportation system in France was one of the marvels
of the war. Stretching from the sector of seacoast set apart for America
by the French Government, it radiated far into the interior, delivering
men, munitions and food in a steady stream. American engineers worked
with their brothers-in-arms with the Allies to construct an
inter-weaving system of wide-gauge and narrow-gauge roads that served to
victual and munition the entire front and further serve to deliver at
top speed whole army corps. It was this network of strategic railways
that enabled the French to send an avalanche clad in horizon-blue to the
relief of Amiens when Hindenburg made his final tremendous effort of
1918.

In its essentials, military effort in the great conflict may be roughly
divided into
  Open warfare,
  Trench warfare,
  Crater warfare.

The first battle of the Marne was almost wholly open warfare; so also
were the battles of the Masurian Lakes, Allenstein, and Dunajec in the
eastern theater of war, and most of the warfare on the Italian front
between the Piave River and Gorizia.

In this variety of battle, airplanes and observation balloons play a
prominent part. Once the enemy is driven out of its trenches, the
message is flashed by wireless to the artillery and slaughter at long
range begins. If there have been no intrenchments, as was the case in
the first battle of the Marne, massed artillery send a plunging fire
into the columns moving in open order and prepare the way for machine
gunners and infantry to finish the rout.

In previous wars, cavalry played a heroic role in open warfare; only
rarely has it been possible to use cavalry in the Great War. The Germans
sent a screen of Uhlans before its advancing hordes into Belgium and
Northern France in 1914. The Uhlans also were in the van in the Russian
invasion, but with these exceptions, German cavalry was a negligible
factor.

British and French cavalry were active in pursuit of the fleeing Teutons
when the Hindenburg line was smashed in September of 1918. Outside of
that brief episode, the cavalry did comparatively nothing so far as the
Allies were concerned. It was the practice on both sides to dismount
cavalry and convert it into some form of trench service. Trench mortar
companies, bombing squads, and other specialty groups were organized
from among the cavalrymen. Of course the fighting in the open stretches
of Mesopotamia, South Africa and Russia involved the use of great bodies
of cavalry. The trend of modern warfare, however, is to equip the
cavalryman with grenades and bayonets, in addition to his ordinary gear,
and to make of him practically a mounted infantryman.

Trench warfare occupied most of the time and made nine-tenths of the
discomforts of the soldiers of both armies. If proof of the adaptive
capacity of the human animal were needed, it is afforded by the manner
in which the men burrowed in vermin-infested earth and lived there under
conditions of Arctic cold, frequently enduring long deprivations of
food, fuel, and suitable clothing. During the early stages of the war,
before men became accustomed to the rigors of the trenches, many
thousands died as a direct result of the exposure. Many thousand of
others were incapacitated for life by "trench feet," a group of maladies
covering the consequences of exposure to cold and water which in those
early days flowed in rivulets through most of the trenches. The trenches
at Gallipoli had their own special brand of maladies. Heatstroke and a
malarial infection were among these disabling agencies. Trench fever, a
malady beginning with a headache and sometimes ending in partial
paralysis and death, was another common factor in the mortality records.


But in spite of all these and other discomforts, in spite of the
disgusting vermin that crawled upon the men both in winter and in
summer, both sides mastered the trenches and in the end learned to live
in them with some degree of comfort.

At first the trenches were comparatively straight, shallow affairs; then
as the artillery searched them out, as the machine gunners learned the
art of looping their fire so that the bullets would drop into the hiding
places of the enemy, the trench systems gradually became more
scientifically involved. After the Germans had been beaten at the Marne
and had retired to their prepared positions along the Aisne, there
commenced a series of flanking attempts by one side and the other which
speedily resolved itself into the famous "race to the sea." This was a
competition between the opposing armies in rapid trench digging. The
effort on either side was made to prevent the enemy from executing a
flank movement. In an amazingly short time the opposing trenches
extended from the Belgian coast to the Swiss border, making further
outflanking attempts impossible of achievement.


[Illustration: Map: The North Sea and surrounding countries--Norway,
Denmark, Great Britain, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany.]
  FORTS, FLYING AND NAVAL BASES ON THE NORTH SEA


This was not the first time in history that intrenched armies opposed
each other. The Civil War in this country set the fashion in that
respect. The contending sides in the Great War, however, improved vastly
upon the American example. Communicating trenches were constructed,
leading back to the company kitchens, and finally to the open road
leading back to the rest billets of the armies.

When night raiding commenced, it was speedily seen that straight
trenches exposed whole companies of men to enfilading fire. Thereupon
bastions were made and new defenses presented by zig-zagging the
front-line trenches and the communicating ditches as well.

To the formidable obstacles presented by the trenches, equipped as they
were with sand-bag parapets and firing steps, were added barbed-wire
entanglements and pitfalls of various sorts. The greatest improvement
was made by the Germans, and they added "pill boxes." These were really
miniature fortresses of concrete and armor plate with a dome-shaped
roof and loopholes for machine gunners. Only a direct hit by a
projectile from a big gun served to demolish a "pill box." The Allies
learned after many costly experiments that the best method to overcome
these obstacles was to pass over and beyond them, leaving them isolated
in Allied territory, where they were captured at the leisure of the
attackers.

Trench warfare brings with it new instruments. There are the flame
projectors, which throw fire to a distance of approximately a hundred
feet. The Germans were the first to use these, but they were excelled in
this respect by the inventive genius of the nations opposing them.

The use of poison gas, the word being used in its broad sense, is now
general. It was first used by the Germans, but as in the case of flame
throwers, the Allies soon gained the ascendency.


[Illustration: Four photographs of tanks.]
  TYPES OF LAND BATTLESHIPS DEVELOPED BY ALLIES AND GERMANS
  British light tank, of 1918, with turret action and high speed
  British Tank of earliest type, as used at Cambrai.
  German land battleship in 1918 on the Western front
  Improved French Tank first used in Champagne in 1916.


[Illustration: Painting]
  CHARGING ON GERMAN TRENCHES IN GAS MASKS
  Each British soldier carried two gas-proof helmets. At the first alarm
  of gas the helmet was instantly adjusted, for to breathe even a whiff
  of the yellow cloud meant death or serious injury. This picture shows
  the earlier type before the respirator mask was devised to keep up
  with Germany's development of gas warfare.


The first use of asphyxiating gas was by the Germans during the first
battle of Ypres. There the deadly compound was mixed in huge reservoirs
back of the German lines. From these extended a system of pipes with
vents pointed toward the British and Canadian lines. Waiting until air
currents were moving steadily westward, the Germans opened the
stop-cocks shortly after midnight and the poisonous fumes swept slowly,
relentlessly forward in a greenish cloud that moved close to the earth.
The result of that fiendish and cowardly act was that thousands of men
died in horrible agony without a chance for their lives.

Besides that first asphyxiating gas, there soon developed others even
more deadly. The base of most of these was chlorine. Then came the
lachrymatory or "tear-compelling" gases, calculated to produce
temporary or permanent blindness. Another German "triumph" was mustard
gas. This is spread in gas shells, as are all the modern gases. The
Germans abandoned the cumbersome gas-distributing system after the
invention of the gas shell. These make a peculiar gobbling sound as they
rush overhead. They explode with a very slight noise and scatter their
contents broadcast. The liquids carried by them are usually of the sort
that decompose rapidly when exposed to the air and give off the acrid
gases dreaded by the soldiers. They are directed against the artillery
as well as against intrenched troops. Every command, no matter how
small, has its warning signal in the shape of a gong or a siren warning
of approaching gas.

Gas masks were speedily discovered to offset the dangers of poison gases
of all kinds. These were worn not only by troops in the field, but by
artillery horses, pack mules, liaison dogs, and by the civilian
inhabitants in back of the battle lines. Where used quickly and in
accordance with instructions, these masks were a complete protection
against attacks by gas.

The perfected gas masks used by both sides contained a chamber filled
with a specially prepared charcoal. Peach pits were collected by the
millions in all the belligerent countries to make this charcoal, and
other vegetable substances of similar density were also used. Anti-gas
chemicals were mixed with the charcoal. The wearer of the mask breathed
entirely through the mouth, gripping a rubber mouthpiece while his nose
was pinched shut by a clamp attached to the mask.

In training, soldiers were required to hold their breath for six seconds
while the mask was being adjusted. It was explained to them that four
breaths of the deadly chlorine gas was sufficient to kill; the first
breath produced a spasm of the glottis; the second brought mental
confusion and delirium; the third produced unconsciousness; and the
fourth, death. The bag containing the gas mask and respirator was
carried always by the soldier.

The soldier during the winter season in the front line trenches was a
grotesque figure. His head was crowned with a helmet covered with khaki
because the glint of steel would advertise his whereabouts. Beneath the
helmet he wore a close fitting woolen cap pulled down tightly around his
ears and sometimes tied or buttoned beneath his chin. Suspended upon his
chest was the khaki bag containing gas mask and respirator. Over his
outer garments were his belt, brace straps, bayonet and ammunition
pouches. His rifle was slung upon his shoulder with the foot of a woolen
sock covering the muzzle and the leg of the same sock wrapped around the
breech. A large jerkin made of leather, without sleeves, was worn over
the short coat. Long rubber boots reaching to the hips and strapped at
ankle and hip completely covered his legs. When anticipating trench
raids, or on a raiding party, a handy trench knife and carefully slung
grenades were added to his equipment.

Airplane bombing ultimately changed the whole character of the war. It
extended the fighting lines miles behind the battle front. It brought
the horrors of night attacks upon troops resting in billets. It visited
destruction and death upon the civilian population of cities scores of
miles back of the actual front.

Germany transgressed repeatedly the laws of humanity by bombing
hospitals far behind the battle front. Describing one of these atrocious
attacks, which took place May 29, 1918, Colonel G. H. Andrews, chaplain
of a Canadian regiment, said:

"The building bombed was one of three large Red Cross hospitals at
Boulenes and was filled with Allied wounded. A hospital in which were a
number of wounded German prisoners stood not very far away.

"The Germans could not possibly have mistaken the building they bombed
for anything else but a hospital. There were flags with a red cross
flying, and lights were turned on them so that they would show
prominently. And the windows were brilliantly lighted. Those inside
heard the buzz of the advancing airplanes, but did not give them a
thought.

"The machines came right on, ignoring the hospital with the German
wounded, indicating they had full knowledge of their objective, until
they were over a wing of the Red Cross hospital that contained the
operating room on the ground floor. In the operating room a man was on
the table for a most difficult surgical feat. Around him were gathered
the staff of the hospital and its brilliant surgeons. Lieutenant Sage of
New York had just given him the anesthetic when one of the airplanes let
the bomb drop. It was a big fellow. It must have been all of 250 pounds
of high explosive.

"It hurtled downward, carrying the two floors before it. Through the gap
thus made wounded men, the beds in which they lay, convalescents, and
all on the floors came crashing down to the ground. The bomb's force
extended itself to wreck the operating room, where the man on the table,
Lieutenant Sage, and all in the room were killed. In all there were
thirty-seven lives lost, including three Red Cross nurses.

"The building caught fire. The concussion had blown the stairs down, so
that escape from the upper floors seemed impossible. But the
convalescents and the soldiers, who had run to the scene of the bombing,
let the very ill ones out of the windows, and escape was made in that
way.

"And then, to cap the climax, the German airplanes returned over the
spot of their ghastly triumph and fired on the rescuers with machine
guns. God will never forgive the Huns for that act alone. Nor will our
comrades ever forget it."

The statement of Colonel Andrews was corroborated by a number of other
officers.

To protect artillery against counter-fire of all kinds, both sides from
the beginning used the art of camouflage. This was resorted to
particularly against scouting airplanes. At first the branches of trees
and similar natural cover were used to deceive the airmen. Later the
guns themselves were painted with protective colorations, and screens of
burlap were used instead of branches. The camoufleur, as the camouflage
artist was called, speedily extended his activities to screens over
highways, preventing airmen from seeing troops in motion, to the
protective coloration of lookout posts, and of other necessary factors
along the fighting front. Camouflage also found great usefulness in the
protective coloration of battleships and merchant vessels. Scientific
study went hand in hand with the art, the object being to confuse the
enemy and to offer targets as small as possible to the enemy gunners.

Crater warfare came as a development of intensified artillery attacks
upon trench systems. It was at Dunajec on the eastern front that for the
first time in modern war the wheels of artillery were placed hub to hub
in intensified hurricane fire upon enemy positions. The result there
under von Mackensen's direction was the rout of the Russians. When later
the same tactics were employed on the western front, the result was to
destroy whole trench systems with the exception of deep dugouts, and to
send the occupants of the trenches into the craters, made by shell
explosions, for protection.

It was observed that, these craters made excellent cover and when linked
by vigorous use of the intrenching tools carried by every soldier, they
made a fair substitute for the trenches. This observation gave root to
an idea which was followed by both armies; this was the deliberate
creation of crater systems by the artillery of the attacking force. Into
these lines of craters the attacking infantry threw itself in wave after
wave as it rushed toward the enemy trenches. The ground is so riddled by
this intensive artillery fire that there is created what is known as
"moon terrain", fields resembling the surface of the moon as seen
through a powerful telescope. Troops on both sides were trained to
utilize these shell holes to the utmost, each little group occupying a
crater, keeping in touch with its nearest group and moving steadily in
unison toward the enemy.

One detail in which this war surpassed all others was in the use of
machine guns and grenades. The Germans were first to make extensive use
of the machine gun as a weapon with which to produce an effective
barrage. They established machine-gun nests at frequent intervals
commanding the zone over which infantry was to advance and by skilful
crossfire kept that terrain free from every living thing. The Germans
preferred a machine gun, water cooled and of the barrel-recoil type. The
English used a Vickers-Maxim and a Lewis gun, the latter the invention
of an officer in the American army. The French preferred the Hotchkiss
and the Saint-Etienne. The Americans standardized the Browning light and
heavy machine guns, and these did effective service. It was asserted by
American gunnery experts that the Browning excels all other weapons of
its type.

Two general types of grenades were used on both sides. One a defensive
bomb about the size of an orange, containing a bursting charge weighing
twenty-two ounces. Then there was a grenade used for offensive work
carrying about thirty-two ounces of high explosives. The defensive
grenades were of cast iron and so made that they burst into more than a
hundred jagged pieces when they exploded. These wounded or killed within
a radius of one hundred and fifty yards. In exceptional instances, the
range was higher.

The function of artillery in a modern battle is constantly extending.
Both the big guns and the howitzers were the deciding factors in most of
the military decisions reached during the war. Artillery is divided
first between the big guns having a comparatively flat trajectory and
the howitzers whose trajectory is curved. Then there is a further
division into these four classes:
  Field artillery,
  Heavy artillery,
  Railroad artillery,
  Trench artillery.

The type of field artillery is the famous 75-millimeter gun used
interchangeably by the French and Americans. It is a quick-firing weapon
and is used against attacking masses and for the various kind of
barrages, including an anti-aircraft barrage.

Included in the heavy artillery are guns and howitzers of larger caliber
than the 75-millimeter. Three distinct and terrifying noises accompany
explosions of these guns. First, there is the explosion when the shell
leaves the gun; then there is the peculiar rattling noise like the
passing of a railway train when the shells pass overhead; then there is
the explosion at point of contact, a terrific concussion which produces
the human condition called "shell-shock," a derangement of body and
brain, paralyzing nerve and muscle centers and frequently producing
insanity.

The railroad artillery comprises huge guns pulled on railways by
locomotives, each gun having a number of cars as part of its equipment.
These are slow-firing guns of great power and hurling the largest
projectiles known to warfare. The largest guns of this class were
produced by American inventive genius as a reply to the German gun of
St. Gobain Forest. This was a weapon which hurled a nine-inch shell from
a distance of sixty-two miles into the heart of Paris. The damage done
by it was comparatively slight and it had no appreciable effect upon the
morale of the Parisians.

Its greatest damage was when it struck the Roman Catholic Church of St.
Gervais on Good Friday, March 29, 1918, killing seventy-five persons and
wounding ninety. Fifty-four of those killed were women, five being
Americans. The total effect of the bombardment by this big gun was to
arouse France, England and America to a fiercer fighting pitch. The late
Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York, expressed this sentiment, when
he sent the following message to the Archbishop of Paris:


Shocked by the brutal killing of innocent victims gathered at religious
services to commemorate the passing of our blessed Saviour on Good
Friday, the Catholics of New York join your noble protest against this
outrage of the sanctuary on such a day and at such an hour and,
expressing their sympathy to the bereaved relatives of the dead and
injured, pledge their unfaltering allegiance in support of the common
cause that unites our two great republics. May God bless the brave
officers and men of the Allied armies in their splendid defense of
liberty and justice!


Trench artillery are Stokes guns and other mortars hurling aerial
torpedoes containing great quantities of high explosives. These have
curved trajectories and are effective not only against trenches but also
against deep dugouts, wire entanglements and listening posts.

One of the most important details of modern warfare is that of
communication or liaison on the battlefield. This is accomplished by
runners recruited from the trenches, by dogs, pigeons, telephone, radio.

As has been heretofore stated, the airplane considered in all its
developments, is the newest and most important of factors in modern
warfare. It photographs the enemy positions, it detects concentrations
and other movements of the enemy, it makes surprise impossible, it is a
deadly engine of destruction when used in spraying machine-gun fire upon
troops in the open. As a bombing device, it surpasses the best and most
accurate artillery.



CHAPTER XV

GERMAN PLOTS AND PROPAGANDA IN AMERICA

The pages of Germany's militaristic history are black with many shameful
deeds and plots. Those pages upon which are written the intrigues
against the peace of America and against the lives and properties of
American citizens during the period between the declaration of war in
1914 and the armistice ending the war, while not so bloody as those
relating to the atrocities in Belgium and Northern France are still
revolting to civilized mankind.

Germany not only paid for the murder of passengers on ships where its
infernal machines were placed, not only conspired for the destruction of
munition plants and factories of many kinds, not only sought to embroil
the United States, then neutral, in a war with Mexico and Japan, but it
committed also the crime of murderous hypocrisy by conspiring to do
these wrongs under the cloak of friendship for this country.

It was in December of 1915 that the German Government sent to the United
States for general publication in American newspapers this statement:


The German Government has naturally never knowingly accepted the support
of any person, group of persons, society or organization seeking to
promote the cause of Germany in the United States by illegal acts, by
counsel of violence, by contravention of law, or by any means whatever
that could offend the American people in the pride of their own
authority.


The answer to this imperial lie came from the President of the United
States, when, in his address to Congress, April 2, 1917, urging a
declaration of war on Germany, he characterized the German spy system
and its frightful fruits in the following language:

"One of the things that has served to convince us that the Prussian
autocracy was not and could never be our friend is that from the very
outset of the present war it has filled our unsuspecting communities,
and even our offices of government, with spies, and set criminal
intrigues everywhere afoot against our national unity of counsel, our
peace within and without, our industries and our commerce. Indeed it is
now evident that its spies were here even before the war began; and it
is unhappily not a matter of conjecture, but a fact proved in our courts
of justice, that the intrigues which have more than once come perilously
near to disturbing the peace and dislocating the industries of the
country have been carried on at the instigation, with the support, and
even under the personal direction of official agents of the Imperial
Government accredited to the Government of the United States."

Austria co-operated with Germany in a feeble way in these plots and
propaganda, but the master plotter was Count Johann von Bernstorff,
Germany's Ambassador. The Austro-Hungarian Ambassador, Constantin
Theodor Dumba, Captain Franz von Papen, Captain Karl Boy-Ed, Dr.
Heinrich F. Albert, and Wolf von Igel, all of whom were attached to the
German Embassy, were associates in the intrigues. Franz von Rintelen
operated independently and received his funds and instructions directly
from Berlin.

One of the earliest methods of creating disorder in American munition
plants and other industrial establishments engaged in war work was
through labor disturbances. With that end in view a general German
employment bureau was established in August, 1915, in New York City. It
had branches in Philadelphia, Bridgeport, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Chicago
and Cincinnati. These cities at that time were the centers of industries
engaged in furnishing munitions and war supplies to the Entente allies.
Concerning this enterprise Ambassador Dumba, writing to Baron Burian,
Foreign Minister of Austria-Hungary, said:


A private German employment office has been established which provides
employment for persons who have voluntarily given up their places, and
it is already working well. We shall also join in and the widest support
is assured us.


The duties of men sent from the German employment offices into munition
plants may be gathered from the following frank circular issued on
November 2, 1914, by the German General Headquarters and reprinted in
the Freie Zeitung, of Berne.


GENERAL HEADQUARTERS TO THE MILITARY REPRESENTATIVE
ON THE RUSSIAN AND FRENCH FRONTS, AS WELL AS IN ITALY AND NORWAY.

In all branch establishments of German banking houses in Sweden, Norway,
Switzerland, China and the United States, special military accounts have
been opened for special war necessities. Main headquarters authorizes
you to use these credits to an unlimited extent for the purpose of
destroying factories, workshops, camps, and the most important centers
of military and civil supply belonging to the enemy. In addition to the
incitement of labor troubles, measures must be taken for the damaging of
engines and machinery plants, the destruction of vessels carrying war
material to enemy countries, the burning of stocks of raw materials and
finished goods, and the depriving of large industrial centers of
electric power, fuel and food. Special agents, who will be placed at
your disposal, will supply you with the necessary means for effecting
explosions and fires, as well as with a list of people in the country
under your supervision who are willing to undertake the task of
destruction.
(Signed) DR. E. FISCHER.


Shortly after the establishment of the German employment bureau,
Ambassador Dumba sent the following communication to the Austrian
Foreign Office:


It is my impression that we can disorganize and hold up for months, if
not entirely prevent, the manufacture of munitions in Bethlehem and the
Middle West, which, in the opinion of the German military attache, is of
importance and amply outweighs the comparatively small expenditure of
money involved.


Concerning the operations of the arson and murder squad organized by von
Bernstorff, Dumba and their associates, it is only necessary to turn to
the records of the criminal courts of the United States and Canada. Take
for example the case against Albert Kaltschmidt, living in Detroit,
Michigan. The United States grand jury sitting in Detroit indicted
Kaltschmidt and his fellow conspirators upon the following counts:

"To blow up the factory of the Peabody's Company, Limited, at
Walkerville, Ontario, ... engaged in manufacturing uniforms, clothing
and military supplies ...

"To blow up the building known as the Windsor Armories of the City of
Windsor.

"To blow up and destroy other plants and buildings in said Dominion of
Canada, which were used for the manufacture of munitions of war,
clothing and uniforms.

"To blow up and destroy the great railroad bridges of the Canadian
Pacific Railroad at Nipigon.  . . .

"To employ and send into said Dominion of Canada spies to obtain
military information."

Besides the acts enumerated in the indictment it was proved upon trial
that Kaltschmidt and his gang planned to blow up the Detroit Screw Works
where shrapnel was being manufactured, and to destroy the St. Clair
tunnel, connecting Canada with the United States. Both of these plans
failed. Associated with Kaltschmidt in these plots were Captain von
Papen, Baron Kurt von Reiswitz, German consul-general in Chicago;
Charles F. Respa, Richard Herman, and William M. Jarasch, the latter two
German reservists. Testifying in the case Jarasch, a bartender, said:
"Jacobsen (an aide) told me that munition factories in Canada were to be
blown up. Before I left for Detroit, Jacobsen and I went to the
consulate. We saw the consul and he shook hands with me and wished me
success."

Charles F. Respa, in his testimony made the following revelations in
response to questions by the government's representatives:

Q. How long had you been employed before he (Kaltschmidt) told you that
he wanted you to blow up some of these factories? A. About three weeks.

Q. Did Kaltschmidt at the time speak of any particular place that he
wanted you to blow up? A. The particular place was the Armory.

Q. Did he mention the Peabody Building at that time? A. Not
particularly--he was more after the bridges and the armories and wanted
those places blown up that made ammunition and military clothing.

Q. The explosion at the armories was to be timed so that it would occur
when the soldiers were asleep there? A. Yes--he did not mention that he
wanted to kill soldiers.

Q. Did he say that if the dynamite in the suitcase exploded it would
kill the soldiers? A. I do not remember that he said so, but he must
have known it.

Q. Did you take both grips? A. Yes. Q. Where did you set the first grip?
A. By the Peabody plant (blown up on June 20,1915).

Q. Where did you put the other suitcase? A. Then I walked down the
Walkerville road to the Armories at Windsor, and carried the suitcase.

Q. When you got to the Armories did you know where to place it? A. I had
my instructions.

Q. From Kaltschmidt? A. Yes.

Q. Did you place this suitcase containing the dynamite bomb at the
armory in a proper place to explode and do any damage? A. Yes.

Q. Was it properly connected so that the cap would explode and strike
the dynamite? A. I fixed it so that it would not.

Q. Did you deliberately fix this bomb that you took to the Armories so
that it would not explode? A. Yes.

Q. Why did you do that? A. I knew that the suitcase contained thirty
sticks of dynamite and if exploded would blow up the Armories and all
the ammunition and kill every man in it.

It is interesting to note in this connection that Kaltschmidt was
sentenced to four years in the federal prison at Leavenworth, Kansas,
and to pay a fine of $20,000. Horn's sentence was eighteen months in the
Atlanta penitentiary and a fine of $1,000.

Attempts were also made to close by explosions the tunnels through which
the Canadian Pacific Railroad passes under the Selkirk Mountains in
British Columbia. The German General Staff in this instance operated
through Franz Bopp, the German consul-general in San Francisco, and
Lieutenant von Brincken. J. H. van Koolbergen was hired to do this work.
Concerning the negotiations, van Koolbergen made this statement:

"Not knowing what he wanted I went to see him. He was very pleasant and
told me that he was an officer in the German army and at present working
in the secret service of the German Empire under Mr. Franz Bopp, the
Imperial German consul.

"I went to the consulate and met Franz Bopp and then saw von Brincken in
another room. He asked me if I would do something for him in Canada and
I answered him, 'Sure, I will do something, even blow up bridges, if
there is money in it.' And he said, 'You are the man; if that is so, you
can make good money.'

"Von Brincken told me that they were willing to send me up to Canada to
blow up one of the bridges on the Canadian Pacific Railroad or one of
the tunnels. I asked him what was in it and he said he would talk it
over with the German consul, Bopp.

"I had accepted von Brincken's proposition to go to Canada and he
offered me $500 to defray my expenses. On different occasions, in his
room, von Brincken showed me maps and information about Canada, and
pointed out to me where he wanted the act to be done. This was to be
between Revelstake and Vancouver on the Canadian Pacific Railroad, and I
was to get $3,000 in case of a successful blowing up of a military
bridge or tunnel."

Van Koolbergen only made a pretended effort to blow up the tunnel. He
did furnish the evidence, however, which served to send Bopp and his
associates to the penitentiary.

Even more sensational was the plot against the international bridge upon
which the Grand Trunk Railway crosses the border between the United
States and Canada at Vanceboro, Me.

Werner Horn was a German reserve lieutenant. Von Papen delivered to him
a flat order to blow up the bridge and he gave him $700 for the purpose
of perpetrating the outrage. Horn was partially successful. At his trial
in Boston in June, 1917, he made the following confession:


"I admit and state that the facts set forth in the indictments as to the
conveyance of explosives on certain passenger trains from New York to
Boston and from Boston to Vanceboro, in the State of Maine, are true. I
did, as therein alleged, receive an explosive and conveyed the same from
the city of New York to Boston, thence by common carrier from Boston to
Vanceboro, Maine. On or about the night of February 1, 1915, I took said
explosive in a suitcase in which I was conveying it and carried the same
across the bridge at Vanceboro to the Canadian side, and there, about
1.10 in the morning of February 2, 1915, I caused said explosive to be
exploded near or against the abutments of the bridge on the Canadian
side, with intent to destroy the abutment and cripple the bridge so that
the same could not be used for the passage of trains."


Bribery of Congressmen was intended by Franz von Rintelen, operating
directly in touch with the German Foreign Office in Berlin. Count von
Bernstorff sent the following telegram to Berlin in connection with his
plan:


I request authority to pay out up to $50,000 in order, as on former
occasions, to influence Congress through the organization you know of,
which can perhaps prevent war. I am beginning in the meantime to act
accordingly. In the above circumstances, a public official German
declaration in favor of Ireland is highly desirable, in order to gain
the support of the Irish influence here.


That it was Rintelen's purpose to use large sums of money for the
purpose of bribing Congressmen was stated positively by George Plochman,
treasurer of the Transatlantic Trust Company, where Rintelen kept his
deposits.

Rintelen was the main figure on this side of the water in the fantastic
plot to have Mexico and Japan declare war upon the United States. During
the trial of Rintelen in New York City in May, 1917, it was testified
"that he came to the United States in order to embroil it with Mexico
and Japan if necessary; that he was doing all he could and was going to
do all he could to embroil this country with Mexico; that he believed
that if the United States had a war with Mexico it would stop the
shipment of ammunition to Europe; that he believed it would be only a
matter of time until we were involved with Japan."

Rintelen also said that "General Huerta was going to return to Mexico
and start a revolution there which would cause the United States to
intervene and so make it impossible to ship munitions to Europe.
Intervention," he said, "was one of his trump cards."

Mexico was the happy hunting-ground for pro-German plotters, and the
German Ambassador in Mexico, Heinrich von Eckhardt, was the leader in
all the intrigues. The culmination of Germany's effort against America
on this continent came on January 19, 1917, when Dr. Alfred Zimmerman,
head of the German Foreign Office, sent the following cable to
Ambassador von Eckhardt:


On the first of February we intend to begin submarine warfare
unrestricted. In spite of this, it is our intention to endeavor to keep
neutral the United States of America.

If this attempt is not successful, we propose an alliance on the
following basis with Mexico: That we shall make war together and
together make peace. We shall give general financial support, and it is
understood that Mexico is to reconquer the lost territory in New Mexico,
Texas and Arizona. The details are left to you for settlement. You are
instructed to inform the President of Mexico of the above in the
greatest confidence as soon as it is certain that there will be an
outbreak of war with the United States, and suggest that the President
of Mexico, on his own initiative, should communicate with Japan
suggesting adherence at once to this plan; at the same time, offer to
mediate between Germany and Japan.

Please call to the attention of the President of Mexico that the
employment of ruthless submarine warfare now promises to compel England
to make peace in a few months.
ZIMMERMAN.


This was almost three months before the United States entered the war.
As an example of German blindness and diplomatic folly it stands
unrivaled in the annals of the German Foreign Office.

Plots against shipping were the deadliest in which the German
conspirators engaged. Death and destruction followed in their wake. In
direct connection of von Bernstorff and his tools with these outrages
the following testimony by an American secret service man employed by
Wolf von Igel is interesting. It refers to an appointment with Captain
von Kleist, superintendent of Scheele's bomb factory in Hoboken, N. J.

"We sat down and we spoke for about three hours. I asked him the
different things that he did, and said if he wanted an interview with
Mr. von Igel, my boss, he would have to tell everything. So he told me
that von Papen gave Dr. Scheele, the partner of von Kleist in this
factory, a check for $10,000 to start this bomb factory. He told me that
he, Mr. von Kleist, and Dr. Scheele and a man by the name of Becker on
the Friedrich der Grosse were making the bombs, and that Captain
Wolpert, Captain Bode and Captain Steinberg, had charge of putting these
bombs on the ships; they put these bombs in cases and shipped them as
merchandise on these steamers, and they would go away on the trip and
the bombs would go off after the ship was out four or five days, causing
a fire and causing the cargo to go up in flames. He also told me that
they have made quite a number of these bombs; that thirty of them were
given to a party by the name of O'Leary, and that he took them down to
New Orleans where he had charge of putting them on ships down there,
this fellow O'Leary."

About four hundred bombs were made under von Igel's direction;
explosions and fires were caused by them on thirty-three ships sailing
from New York harbor alone.

Four of the bombs were found at Marseilles on a vessel which sailed from
Brooklyn in May, 1915. The evidence collected in the case led to the
indictment of the following men for feloniously transporting on the
steamship Kirk Oswald a bomb or bombs filled with chemicals designed to
cause incendiary fires: Rintelen, Wolpert, Bode, Schmidt, Becker,
Garbade, Praedel, Paradies, von Kleist, Schimmel, Scheele, Steinberg and
others. The last three named fled from justice, Scheele being supplied
with $1,000 for that purpose by Wolf von Igel. He eluded the Federal
authorities until April, 1918, when he was found hiding in Cuba under
the protection of German secret service agents. All the others except
Schmidt were found guilty and sentenced, on February 5, 1918, to
imprisonment for eighteen months and payment of a fine of $2,000 each.
It was proved during the trial that Rintelen had hired Schimmel, a
German lawyer, to see that bombs were placed on ships.

Schmidt, von Kleist, Becker, Garbade, Praedel and Paradies had already
been tried for conspiracy to make bombs for concealment on ocean-going
vessels, with the purpose of setting the same on fire. All were found
guilty, and on April 6, 1917, von Kleist and Schmidt were sentenced to
two years imprisonment and a fine of $500 each.

Robert Fay, a former officer in the German army, who came to the United
States in April, 1915, endeavored to prevent the traffic in munitions by
sinking the laden ships at sea. In recounting the circumstances of his
arrival here to the chief of the United States secret service, Fay said:


". . .I had in the neighborhood of $4,000.... This money came from a man
who sent me over ... (named) Jonnersen. The understanding was that it
might be worth while to stop the shipment of artillery munitions from
this country. . . . I imagined Jonnersen to be in the (German) secret
service."

After stating that he saw von Papen and Boy-Ed, and that neither would
have anything to do with him, apparently because suspicious of his
identity, Fay continued:

"I did not want to return (to Germany) without having carried out my
intention, that is, the destruction of ships carrying munitions. I
proceeded with my experiments and tried to get hold of as much explosive
matter as in any way possible. . . ."

Fay and two confederates were arrested in a lonely spot near Grantwood,
New Jersey, while testing an explosive. During his examination at police
headquarters in Weehawken immediately after the arrest he was questioned
as follows:

Q. That large machine you have downstairs, what is that?

A. That is a patent of mine. It is a new way of getting a time fuse. ...

Q. Did you know where Scholz (Fay's brother-in-law) had this machine
made?

A. In different machine shops.

Q. What material is it you wanted (from Daeche, an accomplice)?

A. Trinitrotoluol (T. N. T.). ...

Q. How much did the machinery cost?

A. Roughly speaking, $150 or $200.

Q. What would be the cost of making one and filling it with explosives?

A. About $250 each ... If they had given me money enough I should simply
have been able to block the shipping entirely.

Q. Do you mean you could have destroyed every ship that left the harbor
by means of those bombs?

A. I would have been able to stop so many that the authorities would not
have dared (to send out any ships).

It was proved during Fay's trial that his bomb was a practical device,
and that its forty pounds of explosive would sink any ship to which it
was attached.

Fay and his accomplices, Scholz and Daeche, were convicted of conspiracy
to attach explosive bombs to the rudders of vessels, with the intention
of wrecking the same when at sea, and were sentenced, on May 9, 1916, to
terms of eight, four and two years respectively, in the federal
penitentiary at Atlanta. Dr. Herbert Kienzle and Max Breitung, who
assisted Fay in procuring explosives, were indicted on the same charge.
Both were interned.

Another plan for disabling ships was suggested by a man who remained for
some time unknown. He called one day at the German Military Information
Bureau, maintained at 60 Wall Street by Captain von Papen, of the German
embassy, and there gave the following outline of his plan:

"I intend to cause serious damage to vessels of the Allies leaving ports
of the United States by placing bombs, which I am making myself, on
board. These bombs resemble ordinary lumps of coal and I am planning to
have them concealed in the coal to be laden on steamers of the Allies. I
have already discussed this plan with ... at ... and he thinks favorably
of my idea. I have been engaged on similar work in ... after the outbreak
of the war, together with Mr. von ..."


[Illustration: Painting]
  WOMEN AT WORK THAT MEN MAY FIGHT
  The women of the world took up quickly almost every masculine task in
  industry to release their menfolk for the firing line. They were
  especially valuable in the munitions factories of England, as shown
  above. The women in the foreground are testing shell cases for size,
  while those in the background work the lathes.


[Illustration: Painting]
  THE FINAL TRIBUTE
  Allied airman dropping a wreath on the grave of a comrade who fell and
  was buried within the German lines.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  A BELGIAN MILITARY OBSERVATION BALLOON
  Large numbers of these balloons, which came to be known as sausages,
  were used by the Allied armies on all fronts.


The German secret service report from which the above excerpt is taken
states that the maker of the bomb was paid by check No. 146 for $150
drawn on the Riggs National Bank of Washington. A photographic copy of
this check shows that it was payable to Paul Koenig, of the
Hamburg-American Line, and was signed by Captain von Papen. On the
counterfoil is written this memorandum, "For F. J. Busse." Busse
confessed later that he had discussed with Captain von Papen at the
German Club in New York City the plan of damaging the boilers of
munition ships with bombs which resembled lumps of coal.

Free access to Allied ships laden with supplies for Vladivostok would
have been invaluable to the conspirators, and in order to obtain it
Charles C. Crowley, a detective employed by Consul-General Bopp,
resorted to the extraordinary scheme revealed in the following letter to
Madam Bakhmeteff, wife of the Russian Ambassador to the United States:


MME J. BAKHMETEFF, care Imperial Russian Embassy, Newport, R. I.: DEAR
MADAM:--By direction of the Imperial Russian Consul-General of San
Francisco, I beg to submit the following on behalf of several
fruit-growers of the State of California. As it is the wish of certain
growers to contribute several tons of dried fruit to the Russian Red
Cross they desire to have arrangements made to facilitate the
transportation of this fruit from Tacoma, Washington, to Vladivostok,
and as we are advised that steamships are regularly plying between
Tacoma and Vladivostok upon which government supplies are shipped we
would like to have arrangements made that these fruits as they might
arrive would be regularly consigned to these steamers and forwarded. It
would be necessary, therefore, that an understanding be had with the
agents of these steamship lines at Tacoma that immediate shipments be
made via whatever steamers might be sailing.

It is the desire of the donors that there be no delay in the shipments
as delays would lessen the benefits intended to those for whom the fruit
was provided ....
Respectfully yours,
C. C. CROWLEY.


The statements of Louis J. Smith and van Koolbergen, combined with a
mass of other evidence consisting in part of letters and telegrams,
caused the grand jury to indict Consul-General Bopp, his staff and his
hired agents, for conspiracy to undertake a military enterprise against
Canada. Among the purposes of this enterprise specified in the
indictment was the following:

"To blow up and destroy with their cargoes and crews any and all vessels
belonging to Great Britain, France, Japan or Russia found within the
limits of Canada, which were laden with horses, munitions of war, or
articles of commerce in course of transportation to the above
countries...."

The following descriptions have been made by the United States
Government of the tools of von Bernstorff in German plots:

Paul Koenig, the head of the Hamburg-American secret service, who was
active in passport frauds, who induced Gustave Stahl to perjure himself
and declare the Lusitania armed, and who plotted the destruction of the
Welland Canal. In his work as a spy he passed under thirteen aliases in
this country and Canada.

Captains Boy-Ed, von Papen, von Rintelen, Tauscher, and von Igel were
all directly connected with the German Government itself. There is now
in the possession of the United States Government a check made out to
Koenig and signed by von Papen, identified by number in a secret report
of the German Bureau of Investigation as being used to procure $150 for
the payment of a bomb-maker, who was to plant explosives disguised as
coal in the bunkers of the merchant vessels clearing from the port of
New York. Boy-Ed, Dr. Bunz, the German ex-minister to Mexico, the German
consul at San Francisco, and officials of the Hamburg-American and North
German Lloyd steamship lines evaded customs regulations and coaled and
victualed German raiders at sea. Von Papen and von Igel supervised the
making of the incendiary bombs on the Friedrich der Grosse, then in New
York Harbor, and stowed them away on outgoing ships. Von Rintelen
financed Labor's National Peace Council, which tried to corrupt
legislators and labor leaders.

A lesser light of this galaxy was Robert Fay, who invented an explosive
contrivance which he tied to the rudder posts of vessels. According to
his confession and that of his partner in murder, the money came from
the German secret police.

Among the other tools of the German plotters were David Lamar and Henry
Martin, who, in the pay of Captain von Rintelen, organized and managed
the so-called Labor's National Peace Council, which sought to bring
about strikes, an embargo on munitions, and a boycott of the banks which
subscribed to the Anglo-French loan. A check for $5,000 to J. F. J.
Archibald for propaganda work, and a receipt from Edwin Emerson, the war
correspondent, for $1,000 traveling expenses were among the documents
found in Wolf von Igel's possession.

Others who bore English names were persuaded to take leading places in
similar organizations which concealed their origin and real purpose. The
American Embargo Conference arose out of the ashes of Labor's Peace
Council, and its president was American, though the funds were not.
Others tampered with were journalists who lent themselves to the German
propaganda and who went so far as to serve as couriers between the
Teutonic embassies in Washington and the governments in Berlin and
Vienna. A check of $5,000 was discovered which Count von Bernstorff had
sent to Marcus Braun, editor of Fair Play. And a letter was discovered
which George Sylvester Viereck, editor of the Fatherland, sent to Privy
Councilor Albert, the German agent, arranging for a monthly subsidy of
$1,750, to be delivered to him through the hands of
intermediaries--women whose names he abbreviates "to prevent any
possible inquiry." There is a record of $3,000 paid through the German
embassy to finance the lecture tour of Miss Ray Beveridge, an American
artist, who was further to be supplied with German war pictures.

The German propagandists also directed their efforts to poisoning the
minds of the people through the circulation of lies concerning affairs
in France and at home. Here are some of the rumors circulated throughout
the country that were nailed as falsehoods:

It was said that the national registration of women by the Food
Administration was to find out how much money each had in the bank, how
much of this was owed, and everything about each registrant's personal
affairs.

That the millions collected from the public for the Red Cross went into
the pockets of thieves, and that the soldiers and sailors got none of
it, nor any of its benefits.

That base hospital units had been annihilated while en route overseas.

That leading members of other hospital units had been executed as spies
by the American Government.

That canned goods put up by the housewives were to be seized by the
government and appropriated to the use of the army and navy.

That soldiers in training were being instructed to put out the eyes of
every German captured.

That all of the "plums" at the officers' training camps fell to Roman
Catholics. The plums went to Protestants when the propagandist talked to
a Catholic.

That the registration of women was held so that girls would be enticed
into the cities where white slaves were made of them.

That the battleship Pennsylvania had been destroyed with everyone on
board by a German submarine.

That more than seventy-five per cent of the American soldiers in France
had been infected with venereal diseases.

That intoxicants were given freely to American soldiers in Y. M. C. A.
and Knights of Columbus huts in France.

But the lies and the plots failed to make any impression on the morale
of American citizenry. In fact, America from the moment war was declared
against Germany until the time an armistice was declared, seemed to care
for nothing but results. Charges of graft made with bitter invective in
Congress created scarcely more than a ripple. The harder the pro-German
plotters worked for the destruction of property and the incitement to
labor disturbances, the closer became the protective network of
Americanism against these anti-war influences. After half a dozen German
lies had been casually passed from mouth to mouth as rumors; the
American people came to look upon other mischievous propaganda in its
true light. Patriotic newspapers in every community exposed the false
reports and citizens everywhere were on their guard against the
misstatements. It was noticeable that the propaganda was intensified
just previous to and during the several Liberty Loan campaigns. Proof
that the American spirit rises superior to anti-American influences is
furnished by the glorious records of these Liberty Loans. Every one was
over-subscribed despite the severest handicaps confronted by any nation.



CHAPTER XVI

SINKING OF THE LUSITANIA

The United States was brought face to face with the Great War and with
what it meant in ruthless destruction of life when, on May 7, 1915, the
crack Cunard Liner Lusitania, bound from New York to Liverpool, with
1,959 persons aboard, was torpedoed and sunk by a German submarine off
Old Head of Kinsale, Southwestern Ireland. Two torpedoes reached their
mark. The total number of lives lost when the ship sunk was 1,198. Of
these 755 were passengers and the remainder were members of the crew. Of
the drowned passengers, 124 were Americans and 35 were infants.

"Remember the Lusitania!" later became a battlecry just as "Remember the
Maine!" acted as a spur to Americans during the war with Spain. It was
first used by the famous "Black Watch" and later American troops shouted
it as they went into battle.

The sinking of the Lusitania, with its attendant destruction of life,
sent a thrill of horror through the neutral peoples of the world.
General opposition to the use of submarines in attacking peaceful
shipping, especially passenger vessels, crystallized as the result of
the tragedy, and a critical diplomatic controversy between the United
States and Germany developed. The American Government signified its
determination to break off friendly relations with the German Empire
unless the ruthless practices of the submarine commanders were
terminated. Germany temporarily agreed to discontinue these practices.

Among the victims of the Cunarder's destruction were some of the best
known personages of the Western Hemisphere. Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt,
multimillionaire; Charles Frohman, noted theatrical manager; Charles
Klein, dramatist, who wrote "The Lion and the Mouse;" Justus Miles
Forman, author, and Elbert Hubbard, known as Fra Elbertus, widely read
iconoclastic writer, were drowned.

The ocean off the pleasant southern coast of Ireland was dotted with
bodies for days after the sinking of the liner. The remains of many of
the victims, however, never were recovered.

When the Lusitania prepared to sail from New York on her last trip,
fifty anonymous telegrams addressed to prominent persons aboard the
vessel warned the recipients not to sail with the liner. In addition to
these warnings was an advertisement inserted in the leading metropolitan
newspapers by the German embassy, advising neutral persons that British
steamships were in danger of destruction in the war zone about the
British Isles. This notice appeared the day the Lusitania sailed, May
1st, and was placed next the advertisement of the Cunard Line. Following
is the advertisement:


NOTICE!
Travelers intending to embark on the Atlantic voyage are reminded that a
state of war exists between Germany and her allies and Great Britain and
her allies; that the zone of war includes the waters adjacent to the
British Isles; that, in accordance with formal notice given by the
Imperial German Government, vessels flying the flag of Great Britain, or
of any of her allies, are liable to destruction in those waters and that
travelers sailing in the war zone on ships of Great Britain or her
allies do so at their own risk.
Imperial German Embassy,
Washington, D. C., April 22, 1915.


Little or no attention was paid to the warnings, only the usual number
of persons canceling their reservations, The general agent of the Cunard
Line at New York assured the passengers that the Lusitania's voyage
would be attended by no risk whatever, referring to the liner's speed
and water-tight compartments.

As the great Cunarder drew near the scene of her disaster, traveling at
moderate speed along her accustomed route, there was news of freight
steamers falling victims to Germany's undersea campaign. It was not
definitely established, however, whether the liner was warned of danger.

At two o'clock on the fine afternoon of May 7th, some ten miles off the
Old Head of Kinsale, the Lusitania was sighted by a submarine 1,000
yards away. A second later the track of a torpedo, soon followed by
another, was seen and each missile crashed into the Lusitania's hull
with rending detonations.

Many were killed or injured immediately by the explosions.

Before the liner's headway was lost, some boats were lowered, and
capsized as a result. The immediate listing of the steamship added to
the difficulties of rescue and increased the tragical toll of dead.

Much heroism and calmness were displayed by many in the few minutes the
liner remained afloat. The bearing of Frohman, Vanderbilt, Hubbard and
other Americans was declared to have been particularly inspiring.

Rescue ships and naval vessels rushed to the aid of the survivors from
all nearby ports of Ireland.

It has been said that the sinking of the Lusitania was carefully planned
by the chiefs of the German admiralty. They expected, it was believed,
to demoralize British shipping and strike terror into the minds of the
British people by showing that the largest and swiftest of liners could
easily be destroyed by submarines.

According to the Paris paper, La Guerre Sociale, published by Gustave
Herve, the submarine responsible was the U-21, commanded by Lieutenant
Hersing. Hersing was said to have been decorated for his deed. The U-21
afterwards was destroyed and the story of its participation in the
sinking of the great Cunarder never was confirmed.

Immediately upon the news of the Lusitania disaster, President Wilson
took steps to hold Germany to that "strict accountability" of which he
had notified Berlin when the war-zone operations were begun earlier in
the year. His first communication, protesting against the sinking of the
liner in the name of humanity and demanding disavowal, indemnity and
assurance that the crime would not be repeated, was despatched on May
13th. On May 30th the German reply argued that the liner carried
munitions of war and probably was armed.

The following official German version of the incident by the German
Admiralty Staff over the signature of Admiral Behncke was given:

"The submarine sighted the steamer, which showed no flag, May 7th, at
2.20 o'clock, Central European time, afternoon, on the southeast coast
of Ireland, in fine, clear weather.

"At 3.10 o'clock one torpedo was fired at the Lusitania, which hit her
starboard side below the captain's bridge. The detonation of the torpedo
was followed immediately by a further explosion of extremely strong
effect. The ship quickly listed to starboard and began to sink.

"The second explosion must be traced back to the ignition of quantities
of ammunition inside the ship."

These extenuations were all rejected by the United States, and the next
note prepared by President Wilson was of such character that Secretary
of State Bryan resigned. This second communication was sent on June
11th, and on June 22d another was cabled. September 1st Germany accepted
the contentions of the United States in regard to submarine warfare upon
peaceful shipping. There were continued negotiations concerning the
specific settlement to be made in the case of the Lusitania.

On February 4th, 1916, arrived a German proposition which, coupled with
personal parleys carried on between German Ambassador von Bernstorff and
United States Secretary of State Lansing, seemed in a fair way to
conclude the whole controversy. It was announced on February 8th that
the two nations were in substantial accord and Germany was declared to
have admitted the sinking of the liner was wrong and unjustified and
promised that reparation would be made.

However, a week later, when Germany took advantage of tentative American
proposals concerning the disarming of merchant ships, by announcing that
all armed hostile merchantmen would be treated as warships and attacked
without warning, the almost completed agreement was overthrown. The
renewed negotiations were continuing when the torpedoing of the
cross-channel passenger ship Sussex, without warning, on March 24th,
impelled the United States to issue a virtual ultimatum, demanding that
the Germans immediately cease their present methods of naval warfare on
pain of the rupture of diplomatic relations with the most powerful
existing neutral nation.

The Lusitania, previous to her sinking, had figured in the war news,
first at the conflict, when it was feared she had been captured by a
German cruiser while she was dashing across the Atlantic toward
Liverpool, and again in February of 1915, when she flew the American
flag as a ruse to deceive submarines while crossing the Irish Sea. This
latter incident called forth a protest from the United States.

On her fatal trip the cargo of the Lusitania was worth $735,000.

As a great transatlantic liner, the Lusitania was a product of the race
for speed, which was carried on for years among larger steamship
companies, particularly of England and Germany. When the Lusitania was
launched, it was the wonder of the maritime world. Its mastery of the
sea, from the standpoint of speed, was undisputed.

Progress of the Lusitania on its first voyage to New York, September 7,
1907, was watched by the world. The vessel made the voyage in five days
and fifty-four minutes, at that time a record. Its fastest trip, made on
the western voyage, was four days eleven hours forty-two minutes. This
record, however, was wrested from it subsequently by the Mauretania, a
sister ship, which set the mark of four days ten hours forty-one
minutes, that still stands.

Although the Lusitania was surpassed in size by several other liners
built subsequently, it never lost the reputation acquired at the outset
of its career. Its speed and luxurious accommodations made it a
favorite, and its passenger lists bore the names of many of the most
prominent Atlantic wayfarers. The vessel was pronounced by its builders
to be as nearly unsinkable as any ship could be.

Everything about the Lusitania was of colossal dimensions.

Her rudder weighed sixty-five tons. She carried three anchors of ten
tons each. The main frames and beams, placed end to end, would extend
thirty miles. The Lusitania was 785 feet long, 88 feet beam, and 60 feet
deep. Her gross tonnage was 32,500 and her net tonnage, 9,145.

Charges were made that one or more guardian submarines deliberately
drove off ships nearby which might have saved hundreds of lives lost
when the Lusitania went down. Captain W. F. Wood, of the Leyland Line
steamer Etonian, said his ship was prevented from going to the rescue of
the passengers of the sinking Lusitania by a warning that an attack
might be made upon his own vessel.

The Etonian left Liverpool, May 6th. When Captain Wood was forty-two
miles from Kinsale he received a wireless call from the Lusitania for
immediate assistance.

The call was also picked up by the steamers City of Exeter and
Narragansett. The Narragansett, Captain Wood said, was made a target for
submarine attack, a torpedo missing her by a few feet, and her commander
then warned Captain Wood not to attempt to reach the Lusitania.

"It was two o'clock in the afternoon, May 7th, that we received the
wireless S O S," said Captain Wood. "I was then forty-two miles distant
from the position he gave me. The Narragansett and the City of Exeter
were nearer the Lusitania and she answered the SOS.

"At five o'clock I observed the City of Exeter cross our bows and she
signaled, 'Have you heard anything of the disaster?'

"At that moment I saw a periscope of a submarine between the Tonina and
the City of Exeter, about a quarter of a mile directly ahead of us. She
dived as soon as she saw us.

"I signaled to the engine room for every available inch of speed. Then
we saw the submarine come up astern of us. I now ordered full speed
ahead and we left the submarine behind. The periscope remained in sight
about twenty minutes.

"No sooner had we lost sight of the submarine astern, than another
appeared on the starboard bow. This one was directly ahead and on the
surface, not submerged.

"I starboarded hard away from him, he swinging as we did. About eight
minutes later he submerged. I continued at top speed for four hours and
saw no more of the submarines. It was the ship's speed that saved her,
that's all.

"The Narragansett, as soon as she heard the S O S call, went to the
assistance of the Lusitania. One of the submarines discharged a torpedo
at her and missed her by not more than eight feet. The Narragansett then
warned us not to attempt to go to the rescue, and I got her wireless
call while I was dodging the two submarines. You can see that three
ships would have gone to the assistance of the Lusitania had they not
been attacked by the two submarines."

The German Government defended the brutal destruction of non-combatants
by the false assertions that the Lusitania was an armed vessel and that
it was carrying a great store of munitions. Both of these accusations
were proved to be mere fabrications. The Lusitania was absolutely
unarmed and the nearest approach to munitions was a consignment of 1,250
empty shell cases and 4,200 cases of cartridges for small arms.

Intense indignation swept over the neutral world, the tide rising
highest in America. It well may be said that the destruction of the
Lusitania was one of the greatest factors in driving America into the
war with Germany.

Concerning the charge that the Lusitania carried munitions, Dudley Field
Malone, Collector of the port of New York, testified that he made
personal and close inspection of the ship's cargo and saw that it
carried no guns and that there were no munitions in its cargo.

His statement follows:

"This report is not correct. The Lusitania was inspected before sailing,
as is customary. No guns were found, mounted or unmounted, and the
vessel sailed without any armament. No merchant ship would be allowed to
arm in this port and leave the harbor."

Captain W. T. Turner, of the Lusitania, testifying before the coroner's
inquest at Kinsale, Ireland, was interrogated as follows:

"You were aware threats had been made that the ship would be torpedoed?"

"We were," the Captain replied.

"Was she armed?"

"No, sir."

"What precautions did you take?"

"We had all the boats swung when we came within the danger zone, between
the passing of Fastnet and the time of the accident."

The coroner asked him whether he had received a message concerning the
sinking of a ship off Kinsale by a submarine. Captain Turner replied
that he had not.

"Did you receive any special instructions as to the voyage?"

"Yes, sir."

"Are you at liberty to tell us what they were?"

"No, sir."

"Did you carry them out?"

"Yes, to the best of my ability."

"Tell us in your own words what happened after passing Fastnet."

"The weather was clear," Captain Turner answered. "We were going at a
speed of eighteen knots. I was on the port side and heard Second Officer
Hefford call out:

"'Here's a torpedo!'

"I ran to the other side and saw clearly the wake of a torpedo. Smoke
and steam came up between the last two funnels. There was a slight
shock. Immediately after the first explosion there was another report,
but that may possibly have been internal.

"I at once gave the order to lower the boats down to the rails, and I
directed that women and children should get into them. I also had all
the bulkheads closed.

"Between the time of passing Fastnet, about 11 o'clock, and of the
torpedoing I saw no sign whatever of any submarines. There was some haze
along the Irish coast, and when we were near Fastnet I slowed down to
fifteen knots. I was in wireless communication with shore all the way
across."

Captain Turner was asked whether he had received any message in regard
to the presence of submarines off the Irish coast. He replied in the
affirmative. Questioned regarding the nature of the message, he replied:

"I respectfully refer you to the admiralty for an answer." "I also gave
orders to stop the ship," Captain Turner continued, "but we could not
stop. We found that the engines were out of commission. It was not safe
to lower boats until the speed was off the vessel. As a matter of fact,
there was a perceptible headway on her up to the time she went down.

"When she was struck she listed to starboard. I stood on the bridge when
she sank, and the Lusitania went down under me. She floated about
eighteen minutes after the torpedo struck her. My watch stopped at 2.36.
I was picked up from among the wreckage and afterward was brought aboard
a trawler.

"No warship was convoying us. I saw no warship, and none was reported to
me as having been seen. At the time I was picked up I noticed bodies
floating on the surface, but saw no living persons."

"Eighteen knots was not the normal speed of the Lusitania, was it?"

"At ordinary times," answered Captain Turner, "she could make
twenty-five knots, but in war times her speed was reduced to twenty-one
knots. My reason for going eighteen knots was that I wanted to arrive at
Liverpool bar without stopping, and within two or three hours of high
water."

"Was there a lookout kept for submarines, having regard to previous
warnings?"

"Yes, we had double lookouts."

"Were you going a zigzag course at the moment the torpedoing took
place?"

"No. It was bright weather, and land was clearly visible."

"Was it possible for a submarine to approach without being seen?"

"Oh, yes; quite possible."

"Something has been said regarding the impossibility of launching the
boats on the port side?"

"Yes," said Captain Turner, "owing to the listing of the ship."

"How many boats were launched safely?"

"I cannot say."

"Were any launched safely?"

"Yes, and one or two on the port side."

"Were your orders promptly carried out?"

"Yes."

"Was there any panic on board?"

"No, there was no panic at all. It was almost calm."

"How many persons were on board?"

"There were 1,500 passengers and about 600 crew."

By the Foreman of the Jury--"In the face of the warnings at New York
that the Lusitania would be torpedoed, did you make any application to
the admiralty for an escort?"

"No, I left that to them. It is their business, not mine. I simply had
to carry out my orders to go, and I would do it again."

Captain Turner uttered the last words of this reply with great emphasis.

By the Coroner--"I am glad to hear you say so, Captain."

By the Juryman--"Did you get a wireless to steer your vessel in a
northern direction?"

"No," replied Captain Turner.

"Was the course of the vessel altered after the torpedoes struck her?"

"I headed straight for land, but it was useless. Previous to this the
watertight bulkheads were closed. I suppose the explosion forced them
open. I don't know the exact extent to which the Lusitania was damaged."

"There must have been serious damage done to the water-tight bulkheads?"

"There certainly was, without doubt."

"Were the passengers supplied with lifebelts?"

"Yes."

"Were any special orders given that morning that lifebelts be put on?"

"No."

"Was any warning given before you were torpedoed?"

"None whatever. It was suddenly done and finished."

"If there had been a patrol boat about, might it have been of
assistance?"

"It might, but it is one of those things one never knows."

With regard to the threats against his ship, Captain Turner said he saw
nothing except what appeared in the New York papers the day before the
Lusitania sailed. He had never heard the passengers talking about the
threats, he said.

"Was a warning given to the lower decks after the ship had been struck?"
Captain Turner was asked.

"All the passengers must have heard the explosion," Captain Turner
replied.

Captain Turner, in answer to another question, said he received no
report from the lookout before the torpedo struck the Lusitania.

Ship's Bugler Livermore testified that the watertight compartments were
closed, but that the explosion and the force of the water must have
burst them open. He said that all the officers were at their posts and
that earlier arrivals of the rescue craft would not have saved the
situation.

After physicians had testified that the victims had met death through
prolonged immersion and exhaustion the coroner summed up the case.

He said that the first torpedo fired by the German submarine did serious
damage to the Lusitania, but that, not satisfied with this, the Germans
had discharged another torpedo. The second torpedo, he said, must have
been more deadly, because it went right through the ship, hastening the
work of destruction.

The characteristic courage of the Irish and British people was
manifested at the time of this terrible disaster, the coroner continued,
and there was no panic. He charged that the responsibility "lay on the
German Government and the whole people of Germany, who collaborated in
the terrible crime."

"I propose to ask the jury," he continued, "to return the only verdict
possible for a self-respecting jury, that the men in charge of the
German submarine were guilty of wilful murder."

The jury then retired and after due deliberation prepared this verdict:


We find that the deceased met death from prolonged immersion and
exhaustion in the sea eight miles south-southeast of Old Head of
Kinsale, Friday, May 7, 1915, owing to the sinking of the Lusitania by
torpedoes fired by a German submarine.

We find that the appalling crime was committed contrary to international
law and the conventions of all civilized nations.

We also charge the officers of said submarine and the Emperor and the
Government of Germany, under whose orders they acted, with the crime of
wholesale murder before the tribunal of the civilized world.

We desire to express sincere condolences and sympathy with the relatives
of the deceased, the Cunard Company, and the United States, many of
whose citizens perished in this murderous attack on an unarmed liner.

President Wilson's note to Germany, written consequent on the torpedoing
of the Lusitania, was dated six days later, showing that time for
careful deliberation was duly taken. The President's Secretary, Joseph
P. Tumulty, on May 8th, the day following the tragedy, made this
statement:


Of course the President feels the distress and the gravity of the
situation to the utmost, and is considering very earnestly but very
calmly, the right course of action to pursue. He knows that the people
of the country wish and expect him to act with deliberation as well as
with firmness.


Although signed by Mr. Bryan, as Secretary of State, the note was
written by the President in shorthand--a favorite method of Mr. Wilson
in making memoranda--and transcribed by him on his own typewriter. The
document was presented to the members of the President's Cabinet, a
draft of it was sent to Counselor Lansing of the State Department, and
after a few minor changes, it was transmitted by cable to Ambassador
Gerard in Berlin.


DEPARTMENT OF STATE,
WASHINGTON, MAY 13, 1915.
The Secretary of State to the American Ambassador at Berlin:

Please call on the Minister of Foreign Affairs and after reading to him
this communication leave with him a copy.

In view of recent acts of the German authorities in violation of
American rights on the high seas, which culminated in the torpedoing and
sinking of the British steamship Lusitania on May 7, 1915, by which over
100 American citizens lost their lives, it is clearly wise and desirable
that the Government of the United States and the Imperial German
Government should come to a clear and full understanding as to the grave
situation which has resulted.

The sinking of the British passenger steamer Falaba by a German
submarine on March 28th, through which Leon C. Thrasher, an American
citizen, was drowned; the attack on April 28th, on the American vessel
Cushing by a German aeroplane; the torpedoing on May 1st of the American
vessel Gulflight by a German submarine, as a result of which two or more
American citizens met their death; and, finally, the torpedoing and
sinking of the steamship Lusitania, constitute a series of events which
the Government of the United States has observed with growing concern,
distress, and amazement.

Recalling the humane and enlightened attitude hitherto assumed by the
Imperial German Government in matters of international right, and
particularly with regard to the freedom of the seas; having learned to
recognize the German views and the German influence in the field of
international obligation as always engaged upon the side of justice and
humanity; and having understood the instructions of the Imperial German
Government to its naval commanders to be upon the same plane of humane
action prescribed by the naval codes of the other nations, the
Government of the United States was loath to believe--it cannot now
bring itself to believe--that these acts, so absolutely contrary to the
rules, the practices, and the spirit of modern warfare, could have the
countenance, or sanction of that great government. It feels it to be its
duty, therefore, to address the Imperial German Government concerning
them with the utmost frankness and in the earnest hope that it is not
mistaken in expecting action on the part of the Imperial German
Government, which will correct the unfortunate impressions which have
been created, and vindicate once more the position of that government
with regard to the sacred freedom of the seas.

The Government of the United States has been apprised that the Imperial
German Government considered themselves to be obliged by the
extraordinary circumstances of the present war and the measure adopted
by their adversaries in seeking to cut Germany off from all commerce, to
adopt methods of retaliation which go much beyond the ordinary methods
of warfare at sea, in the proclamation of a war zone from which they
have warned neutral ships to keep away. This government has already
taken occasion to inform the Imperial German Government that it cannot
admit the adoption of such measures or such a warning of danger to
operate as in any degree an abbreviation of the rights of American
shipmasters or of American citizens bound on lawful errands as
passengers on merchant ships of belligerent nationality, and that it
must hold the Imperial German Government to a strict accountability for
any infringement of those rights, intentional or incidental. It does not
understand the Imperial German Government to question these rights. It
assumes, on the contrary, that the Imperial Government accept, as of
course, the rule that the lives of noncombatants, whether they be of
neutral citizenship or citizens of one of the nations at war, cannot
lawfully or rightfully be put in jeopardy by the capture or destruction
of an unarmed merchantman, and recognize also, as all other nations do,
the obligation to take the usual precaution of visit and search to
ascertain whether a suspected merchantman is in fact of belligerent
nationality or is in fact carrying contraband of war under a neutral
flag.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright Underwood and Underwood. N. Y.
  THE LUSITANIA
  The sinking of this great liner by a German submarine, with the loss
  of more than a thousand lives, caused a thrill of horror throughout
  all neutral nations and crystallized public opinion in the United
  States into a fierce resentment of German barbarism which indirectly
  led to the entry into the World War.


[Illustration]
  SUBMARINE HUNTING
  A small naval dirigible used for scouting by the British Navy. Under
  the cigar-shaped balloon is swung an airplane chassis equipped with
  powerful motors and steering apparatus, together with a light gun.


The Government of the United States, therefore, desires to call the
attention of the Imperial German Government with the utmost earnestness
to the fact that the objection to their present method of attack against
the trade of their enemies lies in the practical impossibility of
employing submarines in the destruction of commerce without disregarding
those rules of fairness, reason, justice, and humanity which all modern
opinion regards as imperative. It is practically impossible for the
officers of a submarine to visit a merchantman at sea and examine her
papers and cargo. It is practically impossible for them to make a prize
of her; and, if they cannot put a prize crew on board of her, they
cannot sink her without leaving her crew and all on board of her to the
mercy of the sea in her small boats. These facts, it is understood, the
Imperial German Government frankly admit. We are informed that in the
instances of which we have spoken time enough for even that poor measure
of safety was not given, and in at least two of the cases cited not so
much as a warning was received. Manifestly, submarines cannot be used
against merchantmen, as the last few weeks have shown, without an
inevitable violation of many sacred principles of justice and humanity.

American citizens act within their indisputable rights in taking their
ships and in traveling wherever their legitimate business calls them
upon the high seas, and exercise those rights in what should be the
well-justified confidence that their lives will not be endangered by
acts done in clear violation of universally acknowledged international
obligations, and certainly in the confidence that their own government
will sustain them in the exercise of their rights.

There was recently published in the newspapers of the United States, I
regret to inform the Imperial German Government, a formal warning,
purporting to come from the Imperial German Embassy at Washington,
addressed to the people of the United States, and stating, in effect,
that any citizen of the United States who exercised his right of free
travel upon the seas would do so at his peril if his journey should take
him within the zone of waters within which the Imperial German Navy was
using submarines against the commerce of Great Britain and France,
notwithstanding the respectful but very earnest protest of the
Government of the United States. I do not refer to this for the purpose
of calling the attention of the Imperial German Government at this time
to the surprising irregularity of a communication from the Imperial
German Embassy at Washington addressed to the people of the United
States through the newspapers, but only for the purpose of pointing out
that no warning that an unlawful and inhumane act will be committed can
possibly be accepted as an excuse or palliation for that act or as an
abatement of the responsibility for its commission.

Long acquainted as this government has been with the character of the
Imperial Government, and with the high principles of equity by which
they have in the past been actuated and guided, the Government of the
United States cannot believe that the commanders of the vessels which
committed these acts of lawlessness did so except under a
misapprehension of the orders issued by the Imperial German naval
authorities. It takes for granted that, at least within the practical
possibilities of every such case, the commanders even of submarines were
expected to do nothing that would involve the lives of noncombatants or
the safety of neutral ships, even at the cost of failing of their object
of capture or destruction. It confidently expects, therefore, that the
Imperial German Government will disavow the acts of which the Government
of the United States complains; that they will make reparation so far as
reparation is possible for injuries which are without measure, and that
they will take immediate steps to prevent the recurrence of anything so
obviously subversive of the principles of warfare for which the Imperial
German Government have in the past so wisely and so firmly contended.

The government and people of the United States look to the Imperial
German Government for just, prompt, and enlightened action in this vital
matter with the greater confidence, because the United States and
Germany are bound together not only by ties of friendship, but also by
the explicit stipulations of the Treaty of 1828, between the United
States and the Kingdom of Prussia.

Expressions of regret and offers of reparation in case of the
destruction of neutral ships sunk by mistake, while they may satisfy
international obligations, if no loss of life results, cannot justify or
excuse a practice the natural and necessary effect of which is to
subject neutral nations and neutral persons to new and immeasurable
risks.

The Imperial German Government will not expect the Government of the
United States to omit any word or any act necessary to the performance
of its sacred duty of maintaining the rights of the United States and
its citizens and of safeguarding their free exercise and enjoyment.
BRYAN.


Ex-President Roosevelt, after learning details of the sinking of the
Lusitania, made these statements:

"This represents not merely piracy, but piracy on a vaster scale of
murder than old-time pirate ever practiced. This is the warfare which
destroyed Louvain and Dinant and hundreds of men, women and children in
Belgium. It is a warfare against innocent men, women, and children
traveling on the ocean, and our own fellowcountrymen and countrywomen,
who were among the sufferers.

"It seems inconceivable that we can refrain from taking action in this
matter, for we owe it not only to humanity, but to our own national
self-respect."

Former President Taft made this statement:

"I do not wish to embarrass the President of the Administration by a
discussion of the subject at this stage of the information, except to
express confidence that the President will follow a wise and patriotic
course. We must bear in mind that if we have a war it is the people, the
men and women, fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, who must pay
with lives and money the cost of it, and therefore they should not be
hurried into the sacrifices until it is made clear that they wish it and
know what they are doing when they wish it.

"I agree that the inhumanity of the circumstances in the case now
presses us on, but in the heat of even just indignation is this the best
time to act, when action involves such momentous consequences and means
untold loss of life and treasure? There are things worse than war, but
delay, due to calm deliberation, cannot change the situation or minimize
the effect of what we finally conclude to do.

"With the present condition of the war in Europe, our action, if it is
to be extreme, will not lose efficiency by giving time to the people,
whose war it will be, to know what they are facing.

"A demand for war that cannot survive the passion of the first days of
public indignation and will not endure the test of delay and
deliberation by all the people is not one that should be yielded to."

President Wilson was criticised later by many persons for not insisting
upon a declaration of war immediately after the sinking of the
Lusitania. Undoubtedly the advice of former President Taft and of others
high in statesmanship, prevailed with the President. This in substance
was that America should prepare resolutely and thoroughly, giving
Germany in the meantime no excuse for charges that America's entrance
into the conflict was for aggression or for selfish purposes.

It was seen even as early as the sinking of the Lusitania that Germany's
only hope for final success lay in the submarine. It was reasoned that
unrestricted submarine warfare against the shipping of the world, so far
as tended toward the provisioning and munitioning of the Allies, would
be the inevitable outcome. It was further seen that when that
declaration would be made by Germany, America's decision for war must be
made. The President and his Cabinet thereupon made all their plans
looking toward that eventuality.

The resignation of Mr. Bryan from the Cabinet was followed by the
appointment of Robert Lansing as Secretary of State. It was recognized
on both sides of the Atlantic that President Wilson in all essential
matters affecting the war was active in the preparation of all state
papers and in the direction of that department. Another Cabinet vacancy
was created when Lindley M. Garrison, of New Jersey, resigned the
portfolio of Secretary of War because of a clash upon his militant views
for preparedness. Newton D. Baker, of Cleveland, Ohio, a close friend
and supporter of President Wilson, was appointed in his stead.



CHAPTER XVII

NEUVE CHAPELLE AND WAR IN BLOOD-SOAKED TRENCHES

After the immortal stand of Joffre at the first battle of the Marne and
the sudden savage thrust at the German center which sent von Kluck and
his men reeling back in retreat to the prepared defenses along the line
of the Aisne, the war in the western theater resolved itself into a play
for position from deep intrenchments. Occasionally would come a sudden
big push by one side or the other in which artillery was massed until
hub touched hub and infantry swept to glory and death in waves of gray,
or blue or khaki as the case might be. But these tremendous efforts and
consequent slaughters did not change the long battle line from the Alps
to the North Sea materially. Here and there a bulge would be made by the
terrific pressure of men and material in some great assault like that
first push of the British at Neuve Chapelle, like the German attack at
Verdun or like the tremendous efforts by both sides on that bloodiest of
all battlefields, the Somme.

Neuve Chapelle deserves particular mention as the test in which the
British soldiers demonstrated their might in equal contest against the
enemy. There had been a disposition in England as elsewhere up to that
time to rate the Germans as supermen, to exalt the potency of the
scientific equipment with which the German army had taken the field.
When the battle of Neuve Chapelle had been fought, although its losses
were heavy, there was no longer any doubt in the British nation that
victory was only a question of time.

The action came as a pendant to the attack by General de Langle de
Cary's French army during February, 1915, at Perthes, that had been a
steady relentless pressure by artillery and infantry upon a strong
German position. To meet it heavy reinforcements had been shifted by the
Germans from the trenches between La Bassee and Lille. The earthworks at
Neuve Chapelle had been particularly depleted and only a comparatively
small body of Saxons and Bavarians defended them. Opposite this body was
the first British army. The German intrenchments at Neuve Chapelle
surrounded and defended the highlands upon which were placed the German
batteries and in their turn defended the road towards Lille, Roubaix and
Turcoing.

The task assigned to Sir John French was to make an assault with only
forty-eight thousand men on a comparatively narrow front. There was only
one practicable method for effective preparation, and this was chosen by
the British general. An artillery concentration absolutely unprecedented
up to that time was employed by him. Field pieces firing at point-blank
range were used to cut the barbed wire entanglements defending the enemy
intrenchments, while howitzers and bombing airplanes were used to drop
high explosives into the defenseless earthworks.

Sir Douglas Haig, later to become the commander-in-chief of the British
forces, was in command of the first army. Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien
commanded the second army. It was the first army that bore the brunt of
the attack.

No engagement during the years on the western front was more sudden and
surprising in its onset than that drive of the British against Neuve
Chapelle. At seven o'clock on the morning of Wednesday, March 10, 1915,
the British artillery was lazily engaged in lobbing over a desultory
shell fire upon the German trenches. It was the usual breakfast
appetizer, and nobody on the German side took any unusual notice of it.
Really, however, the shelling was scientific "bracketing" of the enemy's
important position. The gunners were making sure of their ranges.

At 7.30 range finding ended, and with a roar that shook the earth the
most destructive and withering artillery action of the war up to that
time was on. Field pieces sending their shells hurtling only a few feet
above the earth tore the wire emplacements of the enemy to pieces and
made kindling wood of the supports. Howitzers sent high explosive
shells, containing lyddite, of 15-inch, 9.2-inch and 6-inch caliber into
the doomed trenches and later into the ruined village. It was eight
o'clock in the morning, one-half hour after the beginning of the
artillery action, that the village was bombarded. During this time
British soldiers were enabled to walk about in No Man's Land behind the
curtain of fire with absolute immunity. No German rifleman or machine
gunner left cover. The scene on the German side of the line was like
that upon the blasted surface of the moon, pock-marked with shell holes,
and with no trace of human life to be seen above ground.


[Illustration: Map: Neuve Chapelle and surroundings.]
  THE BATTLE GROUND OF NEUVE CHAPELLE


An eye witness describing the scene said:

"The dawn, which broke reluctantly through a veil of clouds on the
morning of Wednesday, March 10, 1915, seemed as any other to the Germans
behind the white and blue sandbags in their long line of trenches
curving in a hemicycle about the battered village of Neuve Chapelle. For
five months they had remained undisputed masters of the positions they
had here wrested from the British in October. Ensconced in their
comfortably-arranged trenches with but a thin outpost in their fire
trenches, they had watched day succeed day and night succeed night
without the least variation from the monotony of trench warfare, the
intermittent bark of the machine guns--rat-tat-tat-tat-tat--and the
perpetual rattle of rifle fire, with here and there a bomb, and now and
then an exploded mine.

"For weeks past the German airmen had grown strangely shy. On this
Wednesday morning none were aloft to spy out the strange doings which,
as dawn broke, might have been descried on the desolate roads behind the
British lines.

"From ten o'clock of the preceding evening endless files of men marched
silently down the roads leading towards the German positions through
Laventie and Richebourg St. Vaast, poor shattered villages of the dead
where months of incessant bombardment have driven away the last
inhabitants and left roofless houses and rent roadways....

"Two days before, a quiet room, where Nelson's Prayer stands on the
mantel-shelf, saw the ripening of the plans that sent these sturdy sons
of Britain's four kingdoms marching all through the night. Sir John
French met the army corps commanders and unfolded to them his plans for
the offensive of the British army against the German line at Neuve
Chapelle.

"The onslaught was to be a surprise. That was its essence. The Germans
were to be battered with artillery, then rushed before they recovered
their wits. We had thirty-six clear hours before us. Thus long, it was
reckoned (with complete accuracy as afterwards appeared), must elapse
before the Germans, whose line before us had been weakened, could rush
up reinforcements. To ensure the enemy's being pinned down right and
left of the 'great push,' an attack was to be delivered north and south
of the main thrust simultaneously with the assault on Neuve Chapelle."



[Illustration: Map bounded by Armentieres on the North, Lille on the
East, Estaires on the West and Carvin on the South.]
  MAP OF THE BATTLE FRONT BETWEEN ARMENTIERES AND LA BASSEE
  On the left, half way up the map, may be seen Neuve Chapelle; a little
  to the right of it is Aubers, where some of the sternest fighting
  occurred.


After describing the impatience of the British soldiers as they awaited
the signal to open the attack, and the actual beginning of the
engagement, the narrator continues:

"Then hell broke loose. With a mighty, hideous, screeching burst of
noise, hundreds of guns spoke. The men in the front trenches were
deafened by the sharp reports of the field-guns spitting out their
shells at close range to cut through the Germans' barbed wire
entanglements. In some cases the trajectory of these vicious missiles
was so flat that they passed only a few feet above the British trenches.

"The din was continuous. An officer who had the curious idea of putting
his ear to the ground said it was as though the earth were being smitten
great blows with a Titan's hammer. After the first few shells had
plunged screaming amid clouds of earth and dust into the German
trenches, a dense pall of smoke hung over the German lines. The
sickening fumes of lyddite blew back into the British trenches. In some
places the troops were smothered in earth and dust or even spattered
with blood from the hideous fragments of human bodies that went hurtling
through the air. At one point the upper half of a German officer, his
cap crammed on his head, was blown into one of our trenches.

"Words will never convey any adequate idea of the horror of those five
and thirty minutes. When the hands of officers' watches pointed to five
minutes past eight, whistles resounded along the British lines. At the
same moment the shells began to burst farther ahead, for, by previous
arrangement, the gunners, lengthening their fuses, were 'lifting' on to
the village of Neuve Chapelle so as to leave the road open for our
infantry to rush in and finish what the guns had begun.

"The shells were now falling thick among the houses of Neuve Chapelle, a
confused mass of buildings seen reddish through the pillars of smoke and
flying earth and dust. At the sound of the whistle--alas for the bugle,
once the herald of victory, now banished from the fray!--our men
scrambled out of the trenches and hurried higgledy-piggledy into the
open. Their officers were in front. Many, wearing overcoats and carrying
rifles with fixed bayonets, closely resembled their men.

"It was from the center of our attacking line that the assault was
pressed home soonest. The guns had done their work well. The trenches
were blown to irrecognizable pits dotted with dead. The barbed wire had
been cut like so much twine. Starting from the Rue Tilleloy the Lincolns
and the Berkshires were off the mark first, with orders to swerve to
right and left respectively as soon as they had captured the first line
of trenches, in order to let the Royal Irish Rifles and the Rifle
Brigade through to the village. The Germans left alive in the trenches,
half demented with fright, surrounded by a welter of dead and dying men,
mostly surrendered. The Berkshires were opposed with the utmost
gallantry by two German officers who had remained alone in a trench
serving a machine gun. But the lads from Berkshire made their way into
that trench and bayoneted the Germans where they stood, fighting to the
last. The Lincolns, against desperate resistance, eventually occupied
their section of the trench and then waited for the Irishmen and the
Rifle Brigade to come and take the village ahead of them. Meanwhile the
second Thirty-ninth Garhwalis on the right had taken their trenches with
a rush and were away towards the village and the Biez Wood.

"Things had moved so fast that by the time the troops were ready to
advance against the village the artillery had not finished its work. So,
while the Lincolns and the Berks assembled the prisoners who were
trooping out of the trenches in all directions, the infantry on whom
devolved the honor of capturing the village, waited. One saw them
standing out in the open, laughing and cracking jokes amid the terrific
din made by the huge howitzer shells screeching overhead and bursting in
the village, the rattle of machine guns all along the line, and the
popping of rifles. Over to the right where the Garhwalis had been
working with the bayonet, men were shouting hoarsely and wounded were
groaning as the stretcher-bearers, all heedless of bullets, moved
swiftly to and fro over the shell-torn ground.

"There was bloody work in the village of Neuve Chapelle. The capture of
a place at the bayonet point is generally a grim business, in which
instant, unconditional surrender is the only means by which bloodshed, a
deal of bloodshed, can be prevented. If there is individual resistance
here and there the attacking troops cannot discriminate. They must go
through, slaying as they go such as oppose them (the Germans have a
monopoly of the finishing-off of wounded men), otherwise the enemy's
resistance would not be broken, and the assailants would be sniped and
enfiladed from hastily prepared strongholds at half a dozen different
points.

"The village was a sight that the men say they will never forget. It
looked as if an earthquake had struck it. The published photographs do
not give any idea of the indescribable mass of ruins to which our guns
reduced it. The chaos is so utter that the very line of the streets is
all but obliterated.

"It was indeed a scene of desolation into which the Rifle Brigade--the
first regiment to enter the village, I believe--raced headlong. Of the
church only the bare shell remained, the interior lost to view beneath a
gigantic mound of debris. The little churchyard was devastated, the very
dead plucked from their graves, broken coffins and ancient bones
scattered about amid the fresher dead, the slain of that morning--
gray-green forms asprawl athwart the tombs. Of all that once fair
village but two things remained intact--two great crucifixes reared
aloft, one in the churchyard, the other over against the chateau. From
the cross, that is the emblem of our faith, the figure of Christ, yet
intact though all pitted with bullet marks, looked down in mute agony on
the slain in the village.

"The din and confusion were indescribable. Through the thick pall of
shell smoke Germans were seen on all sides, some emerging half dazed
from cellars and dugouts, their hands above their heads, others dodging
round the shattered houses, others firing from the windows, from behind
carts, even from behind the overturned tombstones. Machine guns were
firing from the houses on the outskirts, rapping out their
nerve-racking note above the noise of the rifles.

"Just outside the village there was a scene of tremendous enthusiasm.
The Rifle Brigade, smeared with dust and blood, fell in with the Third
Gurkhas with whom they had been brigaded in India. The little brown men
were dirty but radiant. Kukri in hand they had very thoroughly gone
through some houses at the cross-roads on the Rue du Bois and silenced a
party of Germans who were making themselves a nuisance there with some
machine guns. Riflemen and Gurkhas cheered themselves hoarse."


[Illustration: Map:  Bapaume on the North, Albert on the West, Rosieres and
Chaulnes on the South and Peronne on the East.]
  SCENE OF THE BLOODY BATTLES OF THE SOMME
  The tide of war swept over this terrain with terrific violence.
  Peronne was taken by the British in their great offensives of 1916-17;
  in the last desperate effort of the Germans in 1918 they plunged
  through Peronne advancing 35 miles, only to be hurled back with awful
  losses by Marshal Foch. The town of Albert was taken and retaken
  several times.


Unfortunately for the complete success of the brilliant attack a great
delay was caused by the failure of the artillery that was to have
cleared the barbed wire entanglements for the Twenty-third Brigade, and
because of the unlooked for destruction of the British field telephone
system by shell and rifle fire. The check of the Twenty-third Brigade
banked other commands back of it, and the Twenty-fifth Brigade was
obliged to fight at right angles to the line of battle. The Germans
quickly rallied at these points, and took a terrific toll in British
lives. Particularly was this true at three specially strong German
positions. One called Port Arthur by the British, another at Pietre Mill
and the third was the fortified bridge over Des Layes Creek.

Because of the lack of telephone communication it was impossible to send
reinforcements to the troops that had been held up by barbed wire and
other emplacements and upon which German machine guns were pouring a
steady stream of death.

As the Twenty-third Brigade had been held up by unbroken barbed wire
northwest of Neuve Chapelle, so the Seventh Division of the Fourth Corps
was also checked in its action against the ridge of Aubers on the left
of Neuve Chapelle. Under the plan of Sir Douglas Haig the Seventh
Division was to have waited until the Eighth Division had reached Neuve
Chapelle, when it was to charge through Aubers. With the tragic mistake
that cost the Twenty-third Brigade so dearly, the plan affecting the
Seventh Division went awry. The German artillery, observing the
concentration of the Seventh Division opposite Aubers, opened a vigorous
fire upon that front. During the afternoon General Haig ordered a charge
upon the German positions. The advance was made in short rushes in the
face of a fire that seemed to blaze from an inferno. Inch by inch the
ground was drenched with British blood. At 5.30 in the afternoon the men
dug themselves in under the relentless German fire. Further advance
became impossible.

The night was one of horror. Every minute the men were under heavy
bombardment. At dawn on March 11th the dauntless British infantry rushed
from the trenches in an effort to carry Aubers, but the enemy artillery
now greatly reinforced made that task an impossible one. The trenches
occupied by the British forces were consolidated and the salient made by
the push was held by the British with bulldog tenacity.

The number of men employed in the action on the British side was
forty-eight thousand. During the early surprise of the action the loss
was slight. Had the wire in front of the Twenty-third Brigade been cut
by the artillery assigned to such action, and had the telephone system
not been destroyed the success of the thrust would have been complete.
The delay of four and a half hours between the first and second phases
of the attack caused virtually all the losses sustained by the attacking
force. The total casualties were 12,811 men of the British forces. Of
these 1,751 officers and privates were taken prisoners and 10,000
officers and men were killed and wounded.

The action continued throughout Thursday, March 11th, with little change
in the general situation. The British still held Neuve Chapelle and
their intrenchments threatened Aubers. On Friday morning, March 12th,
the Crown Prince of Bavaria made a desperate attempt under cover of a
heavy fog to recapture the village. The effort was made in
characteristic German dense formations. The Westphalian and Bavarian
troops came out of Biez Wood in waves of gray-green, only to be blown to
pieces by British guns already loaded and laid on the mark. Elsewhere
the British waited until the Germans were scarcely more than fifty paces
away when they opened with deadly rapid fire before which the German
waves melted like snow before steam. It was such slaughter as the
British had experienced when held up before Aubers. Slaughter that
staggered Germany.

So ended Neuve Chapelle, a battle in which the decision rested with the
British, a victory for which a fearful price had been paid but out of
which came a confidence that was to hearten the British nation and to
put sinews of steel into the British army for the dread days to come.

The story of Neuve Chapelle was repeated in large and in miniature many
times during the deadlock of trench warfare on the western front until
victory finally came to the Allies. During those years the western
battle front lay like a wounded snake across France and Belgium. It
writhed and twisted, now this way, now that, as one side or the other
gambled with men and shells and airplanes for some brief advantage. It
bent back in a great bulge when von Hindenburg made his famous retreat
in the winter of 1916 after the Allies had pressed heavily against the
Teutonic front upon the ghastly field of the Somme. The record is one of
great value to military strategists, to the layman it is only a
succession of artillery barrages, of gas attacks, of aerial
reconnaissances and combats.

One day grew to be very much like another in that deadlock of pythons. A
play for position here was met by a counter-thrust in another place.
German inventions were out-matched and outnumbered by those coming from
the Allied side.

Trench warfare became the daily life of the men. They learned to fight
and live in the open. The power of human adaptation to abnormal
conditions was never better exemplified than in those weary, dreary
years on the western front.

The fighting-lines consisted generally of one, two, or three lines of
shelter-trenches lying parallel, measuring twenty or twenty-five inches
in width, and varying in length according to the number they hold; the
trenches were joined together by zigzag approaches and by a line of
reinforced trenches (armed with machine guns), which were almost
completely proof against rifle, machine gun, or gun fire. The ordinary
German trenches were almost invisible from 350 yards away, a distance
which permitted a very deadly fire. It is easy to realize that if the
enemy occupied three successive lines and a line of reinforced
intrenchments, the attacking line was likely, at the lowest estimate, to
be decimated during an advance of 350 yards--by rifle fire at a range of
350 yards' distance, and by the extremely quick fire of the machine
guns, each of which delivered from 300 to 600 bullets a minute with
absolute precision. In the field-trench, a soldier enjoyed far greater
security than he would if merely prone behind his knapsack in an
excavation barely fifteen inches deep. He had merely to stoop down a
little to disappear below the level of the ground and be immune from
infantry fire; moreover, his machine guns fired without endangering him.
In addition, this stooping position brought the man's knapsack on a
level with his helmet, thus forming some protection against shrapnel and
shell-splinters.

At the back of the German trenches shelters were dug for
non-commissioned officers and for the commander of the unit.


[Illustration: Painting: Several planes flying over troops in a
demolished town.]
  THE STRUGGLE FOR ARMENTIERES
  Allied forces holding up a German attack on the Lys Canal. Airplanes
  flying low peppered the Germans with machine guns and broke up their
  concentrations, aiding greatly in the severe repulse of the attacking
  Huns.


[Illustration: Painting]
  AFTER A DRIVE ON THE SOMME
  British advancing over the captured German trenches, after heavy
  artillery fire had reduced them to tangled ruins and crushed their
  powers of resistance.


Ever since the outbreak of the war, the French troops in Lorraine, after
severe experiences, realized rapidly the advantages of the German
trenches, and began to study those they had taken gloriously. Officers,
non-commissioned officers, and men of the engineers were straightway
detached in every unit to teach the infantry how to construct similar
shelters. The education was quick, and very soon they had completed the
work necessary for the protection of all. The tools of the enemy
"casualties," the spades and picks left behind in deserted villages,
were all gladly piled on to the French soldiers' knapsacks, to be
carried willingly by the very men who used to grumble at being loaded
with even the smallest regulation tool. As soon as night had set in on
the occasion of a lull in the fighting, the digging of the trenches was
begun. Sometimes, in the darkness, the men of each fighting nation--less
than 500 yards away from their enemy--would hear the noise of the
workers of the foe: the sounds of picks and axes; the officers' words of
encouragement; and tacitly they would agree to an armistice during which
to dig shelters from which, in the morning, they would dash out, to
fight once more.

Commodious, indeed, were some of the trench barracks. One French soldier
wrote:

"In really up-to-date intrenchments you may find kitchens, dining-rooms,
bedrooms, and even stables. One regiment has first class cow-sheds. One
day a whimsical 'piou-piou,' finding a cow wandering about in the
danger zone, had the bright idea of finding shelter for it in the
trenches. The example was quickly followed, and at this moment the
----th Infantry possess an underground farm, in which fat kine, well
cared for, give such quantities of milk that regular distributions of
butter are being made--and very good butter, too."

But this is not all. An officer writes home a tale of yet another one of
the comforts of home added to the equipment of the trenches:

"We are clean people here. Thanks to the ingenuity of ----, we are able
to take a warm bath every day from ten to twelve. We call this teasing
the 'bosches,' for this bathing-establishment of the latest type is
fitted up--would you believe it?--in the trenches!"



CHAPTER XVIII

STEADFAST SOUTH AFRICA

When Germany struck at the heart of France through Belgium simultaneous
action was undertaken by the German Command in Southwest Africa through
propaganda and mobilization of the available German troops. Insidiously
and by the use of money systematic propaganda was instituted to corrupt
the Boers against their allegiance to the Union of South Africa. One
great character stood like a rock against all their efforts. It was the
character of General Louis Botha, formerly arrayed in battle against the
British during the Boer uprising.

With characteristic determination he formulated plans for the invasion
of German Southwest Africa without asking permission of the citizens of
the South African Union or of the British Foreign Office. His vision
comprehended an invasion that would have as its culmination a
British-Boer colony where the German colony had been, and that from
Cable Bay to the source of the Nile there would be one mighty union,
with a great trunk railway feeding Egypt, the Soudan, Rhodesia, Uganda,
and the Union of South Africa. An able lieutenant to Botha was General
Smuts. He co-operated with his chief in a campaign of education. They
pointed out the absolute necessity for deafness to the German tempters,
and succeeded in obtaining full co-operation for the Botha plan of
invasion from the British Imperial Government and the South African
Union. Concerning this agreement General Botha said:

"To forget their loyalty to the empire in this hour of trial would be
scandalous and shameful, and would blacken South Africa in the eyes of
the whole world. Of this South Africans were incapable. They had endured
some of the greatest sacrifices that could be demanded of a people, but
they had always kept before them ideals, founded on Christianity, and
never in their darkest days had they sought to gain their ends by
treasonable means. The path of treason was an unknown path to Dutch and
English alike.

"Their duty and their conscience alike bade them be faithful and true to
the Imperial Government in all respects in this hour of darkness and
trouble. That was the attitude of the Union Government; that was the
attitude of the people of South Africa. The government had cabled to the
Imperial Government at the outbreak of war, offering to undertake the
defense of South Africa, thereby releasing the Imperial troops for
service elsewhere. This was accepted, and the Union Defense Force was
mobilized."

Preliminary to the invasion of German Southwest Africa, General Botha
proclaimed martial law throughout the Union. The first act in
consequence of this proclamation was the arrest of a number of
conspirators who were planning sedition throughout the Union. The head
of this conspiracy was Lieutenant-Colonel S. G. Maritz. General Beyers
and General De Wet, both Boer officers of high standing, co-operated
with Maritz in an abortive rebellion. The situation was most trying for
the native Boers and, to their credit be it recorded, the great majority
of them stood out strongly against the Germans. Vigorous action by Botha
and Smuts smashed the rebellion in the fall of 1914. A force acting
under General Botha in person attacked the troops under General Beyers
at Rustemburg on October 27th, and on the next day General Beyers sought
refuge in flight. A smaller force acting under General Kemp was also
routed on November 5th.

General De Wet opened his campaign of rebellion on November 7th in an
action at Wimburg, where he defeated a smaller force of Loyalists under
General Cronje. The decisive battle at Marquard occurred on November
12th, Botha commanding the Loyalists forces in person and De Wet the
rebels. The victory of Botha in this fierce engagement was complete. De
Wet was routed and was captured on December 1st with a rear-guard of
fifty-two men. General Beyers was drowned on December 9th while
attempting to escape from the Vall into the Transvaal. This virtually
ended all opposition to General Botha. The invasion of German Southwest
Africa began on January 5, 1915, and was one uninterrupted chapter of
successes. Through jungle and swamp, swept by torrential rains and
encountering obstacles that would have disheartened any but the stoutest
heart, the little force of invasion swept forward. Most of the
engagements by the enemy were in the nature of guerrilla and rear-guard
actions. The backbone of the German command was broken and the remaining
forces capitulated in July, 1915.

With the capitulation came the story of the German mismanagement in
Southwest Africa, and particularly their horrible treatment of the
Hereros and Hottentots in the country misgoverned by them. An official
report fully authenticated was made and none of its essential details
were refuted.

The report told the story of how the German authorities exterminated the
native Hereros. When Germany annexed the country in 1890 they were
believed to possess well over 150,000 head of cattle. After the
rinderpest scourge of 1897 they still owned something like 90,000 head.
By 1902, less than ten years after the arrival of the first German
settlers, the Hereros had only 45,898 head of cattle, while the 1,051
German traders and farmers then in the country owned 44,487. The policy
of robbing and killing the natives had by that time received the
sanction of Berlin. By the end of 1905 the surviving Hereros had been
reduced to pauperism and possessed nothing at all. In 1907 the Imperial
German Government by ordinance prohibited the natives of Southwest
Africa from possessing live stock.

The wholesale theft of the natives' cattle, their only wealth, with the
direct connivance and approval of the Berlin Government, was one of the
primary causes of the Herero rebellion of 1904. The revolt was
suppressed with characteristic German ruthlessness. But the Germans were
not content with a mere suppression of the rising; they had decided upon
the practical extinction of the whole tribe. For this purpose Leutwein,
who was apparently regarded as too lenient, was superseded by von
Trotha, noted for his merciless severity. He had played a notorious part
in the Chinese Boxer rebellion, and had just suppressed the Arab rising
in German East Africa by the wholesale massacre of men, women, and
children. As a preliminary von Trotha invited the Herero chiefs to come
in and make peace, "as the war was now over," and promptly shot them in
cold blood. Then he issued his notorious "extermination order," in terms
of which no Herero--man, woman, child, or babe--was to receive mercy or
quarter. "Kill every one of them," he said, "and take no prisoners."

The hanging of natives was a common occurrence. A German officer had the
right to order a native to be hanged. No trial or court was necessary.
Many were hanged merely on suspicion.

The Hereros were far more humane in the field than the Germans. They
were once a fine race. Now there is only a miserable remnant left.

This is amply proved by official German statistics. Out of between
80,000 and 90,000 souls, only about 15,000 starving and fugitive Hereros
were alive at the end of 1905, when von Trotha relinquished his task. In
1911, after all rebellions had been suppressed and tranquillity
restored, the government had a census taken. The figures, reproduced
below, speak for themselves:

                Estimate   Official Census
                  1904         1911
                                            Decrease
  Hereros        80,000      15,130          64,870
  Hottentots     20,000       9,781          10,219
  Berg-Damaras   30,000      12,831          17,169
                -------      ------          ------
                130,000      37,742          92,258

In other words, eighty per cent of the Herero people disappeared, and
more than half of the Hottentot and Berg-Damara races shared the same
fate. Dr. Paul Rohrbach's dictum, "It is applicable to a nation in the
same way as to the individual that the right of existence is primarily
justified in the degree that such existence is useful for progress and
general development," comes forcible to mind. These natives of Southwest
Africa had been, weighed in the German balance and had been found
wanting.

Germany lost more than a million square miles of territory in Africa as
a direct consequence of General Botha's bold action. These are divided
in four great regions, Southwest Africa, Kamerun, Togo and East Africa.
Togoland as this region is popularly known extends from the north shore
of the Gulf of Guinea into the interior and is bounded by French and
British colonies. By a joint attack of French and British forces,
beginning the second week in August, 1914, the German power in this rich
domain was completely broken, and the conquest of Togoland was complete
on August 26, 1914. The military operation was of a desultory nature,
and the losses negligible in view of the area of 33,000 square miles of
highly productive land passed from German control.

The fighting in the great region of Kamerun was somewhat more stubborn
than that in Togoland. The villages of Bonaberi and Duala were
particularly well defended. The British and French fought through swamps
and jungle under the handicap of terrific heat, and always with victory
at the end of the engagement. The conquest of the Kamerun was complete
by the end of June, 1915. In addition to the operations by the British
and French a combined Belgian and French force captured Molundu and
Ngaundera in the German Congo.

The raids by General Botha on German Southwest Africa, commenced on
September 27, 1914. A series of brilliant strategic actions resulted in
the conquest of a region once and a half the size of the German Empire
at the time the Great War began. A British description of the operation
states:

The occupation of Windhoek was effected by General Botha's North
Damaraland forces working along the railway from Swakopmund. At the
former place General Vanderventer joined up with General Botha's forces.
The force from Swakopmund met with considerable opposition, first at
Tretskopje, a small township in the great Namib Desert fifty miles to
the northeast of Swakopmund, and secondly at Otjimbingwe, on the Swakop
River, sixty miles northwest of Windhoek. Apart from these two
determined stands, however, little other opposition was encountered, and
Karibib was occupied on May 5th and Okahandja and Windhoek on May 12th.
With the fall of the latter place, 3,000 Europeans and 12,000 natives
became prisoners.

The wireless station--one of Germany's most valuable high-power
stations, which was able to communicate with one relay only, with
Berlin--was captured almost intact, and much rolling stock also fell
into the hands of the Union forces.

The advance from the south along the Luderitzbucht-Seeheim-Keetmanshoop
Railway, approximately 500 miles in length, was made by two forces which
joined hands at Keetmanshoop. The advance from Aus (captured on April
10th) was made by General Smuts's forces. Colonel (afterward General)
Vanderventer, moving up from the direction of Warmbad and Kalkfontein,
around the flanks of Karas Mountain, pushed on after reaching
Keetmanshoop in the direction of Gibeon. Bethany had previously been
occupied during the advance to Seeheim. At Kabus, twenty miles to the
north of Keetmanshoop, and at Gibeon pitched battles were fought between
General Vanderventer's forces and the enemy. No other opposition of
importance was encountered, and the operations were brought to a
successful conclusion.

The stiffest fighting in all Africa came in German East Africa. It began
in late September, 1914, and continued until mid-June, 1915. The
Germans, curiously enough, commenced the offensive here with an attack
upon Monbasa, the terminus of the Uganda railway and the capital of
British East Africa. The attack was planned as a joint naval and
military operation, the German cruiser Koenigsburg being assigned to
move into the harbor and bombard the town simultaneously with the
assault by land. The plan went awry when the presence of British
warships frightened off the Koenigsburg. The land attack was easily
checked by a detachment of the King's African Rifles and native Arabian
troops until the detachments of Indian Regulars arrived upon the scene.
The enemy thereupon retreated to his original plans.

British reprisals came early in November, when the towns of Tanga and
Gassin were attacked by British troops. The troops selected for this
adventure numbered 6,000 and carried only food, water, guns and
munitions. No protection of any kind nor any other equipment was taken
by the soldiers. Reinforcements to the German forces delayed the capture
of Gassin until January. A garrison of three hundred men was left there
and this in turn was besieged by three thousand Germans. After a
stubborn defense the Germans recaptured the town. A union of two British
forces was accomplished early in June, 1915. One of these cut through
German East Africa along the Kagera River and the other advanced on
steamers from Kisumu. They met the enemy on June 22d and defeated it
with heavy casualties. Later General Tighe, commanding the combined
British forces, was congratulated on the completeness of his victory on
June 28th, by General Kitchener.

The territory acquired by the British as a consequence of the invasion
of Germany's African possessions, possesses formidable natural barriers,
but once these are past the traveller finds lands of wonderful fertility
and great natural resources. Approaching German Southwest Africa from
the east access is across the Kalahari Desert. This in its trackless
desolation, its frequent sandstorms and torrid heat through which only
the hardiest and best provisioned caravans may penetrate is worse than
the worst that Sahara can show. There is not a sign of life. Approached
from the sea the principal port is Walfish Bay, a fair harbor that was
improved by the British when they occupied it. Near Walfish some of the
largest diamonds in the history of the world have been found and gold
fields of considerable richness have been worked. The climate of German
Southwest Africa, after the torrential storms of the seacoast and the
terrific heat of the desert have been passed, is one of the most
salubrious in the world. It is unique among African regions in the
opportunities it affords for colonization by white men. Great Britain
possessed large holdings of this land before Germany came into
possession, but abandoned them under the belief that the region was
comparatively worthless. There was no misapprehension on this score when
all of the lands came into the possession of England as the result of
the war.



CHAPTER XIX

ITALY DECLARES WAR ON AUSTRIA

For many years before the great war began the great powers of Europe
were divided into two great alliances, the Triple Entente, composed of
Russia, France and England, and the Triple Alliance, composed of
Germany, Austria and Italy. When the war began Italy refused to join
with Germany and Austria. Why? The answer to this question throws a
vivid light on the origin of the war.

Italy was a member of the Triple Alliance; she knew the facts, not only
what was given to the public, but the inside facts. According to the
terms of the alliance each member was bound to stand by each other only
in case of attack. Italy refused to join with Austria and Germany
because they were the aggressors. The constant assertions of the German
statesmen, and of the Kaiser himself, that war had been forced upon them
were declared untrue by their associate Italy in the very beginning, and
the verdict of Italy was the verdict of the world. Not much was said in
the beginning about Italy's abstention from war. The Germans, indeed,
sneered a little and hinted that some day Italy would be made to regret
her course, but now that the Teuton snake is scotched the importance of
Italy's action has been perceived and appraised at its true value.

The Germans from the very beginning understood the real danger that
might come to the Central Powers through Italian action. Every effort
was made by the foreign office to keep her neutral. First threats were
used, later promises were held out of addition to Italian territory if
she would send her troops to Germany's assistance. When this failed the
most strenuous efforts were made to keep Italy neutral, and a former
German premier, Prince von Bulow, was sent to Italy for this purpose.
Socialist leaders, too, were sent from Germany to urge the Italian
Socialists to insist upon neutrality.

In July, 1914, the Italian Government was not taken by surprise. They
had observed the increase year by year of the German army and of the
German fleet. At the end of the Balkan wars they had been asked whether
they would agree to an Austrian attack upon Serbia. They had
consequently long been deliberating as to what their course should be in
case of war, and they had made up their minds that under no
circumstances would they aid Germany against England.

Quite independently of her long-standing friendship with England it
would be suicide to Italy in her geographical position to enter a war
which should permit her coast to be attacked by the English and French
navies, and her participation in the Triple Alliance always carried the
proviso that it did not bind her to fight England. This was well known
in the German foreign office, and, indeed, in France where the writers
upon war were reckoning confidently on the withdrawing of Italy from the
Triple Alliance, and planning to use the entire forces of France against
Germany.

A better understanding of the Italian position will result from a
consideration of the origin of the Triple Alliance.

After the war of 1870, Bismarck, perceiving the quick recovery of
France, considered the advisability of attacking her again, and, to use
his own words, "bleeding her white." He found, however, that if this
were attempted France would be joined by Russia and England and he gave
up this plan. In order, however, to render France powerless he planned
an alliance which should be able to control Europe. A league between
Germany, Austria and Russia was his desire, and for some time every
opportunity was taken to develop friendship with the Czar. Russia,
however, remained cool. Her Pan-Slavonic sympathies were opposed to the
interests of Germany. Bismarck, therefore, determined, without losing
the friendship of Russia, to persuade Italy to join in the continental
combination. Italy, at the time, was the least formidable of the six
great powers, but Bismarck foresaw that she could be made good use of in
such a combination.

At that time Italy, just after the completion of Italian unity, found
herself in great perplexity. Her treatment of the Pope had brought about
the hostility of Roman Catholics throughout the world. She feared both
France and Austria, who were strong Catholic countries, and hardly knew
where to look for friends. The great Italian leader at the time was
Francesco Crispi, who, beginning as a Radical and a conspirator, had
become a constitutional statesman. Bismarck professed the greatest
friendship for Crispi, and gave Crispi to understand that he approved of
Italy's aspirations on the Adriatic and in Tunis.

The next year, however, at the Berlin Congress, Italy's interests were
ignored, and finally, in 1882, France seized Tunis, to the great
indignation of the Italians. It has been shown in more recent times that
the French seizure of Tunis was directly due to Bismarck's instigation.

The Italians having been roused to wrath, Bismarck proceeded to offer
them a place in the councils of the Triple Alliance. It was an easy
argument that such an alliance would protect them against France, and no
doubt it was promised that it would free them from the danger of attack
by Austria. England, at the time, was isolated, and Italy continued on
the best understanding with her.

The immediate result of the alliance was a growth of Italian hostility
toward France, which led, in 1889, to a tariff war on France. Meanwhile
German commercial and financial enterprises were pushed throughout the
Italian peninsula. What did Italy gain by this? Her commerce was
weakened, and Austria permitted herself every possible unfriendly act
except open war.

As time went on Germany and Austria became more and more arrogant.
Italy's ambitions on the Balkan peninsula were absolutely ignored. In
1908 Austria appropriated Bosnia and Herzegovina, another blow to Italy.
By this time Italy understood the situation well, and that same year,
seeing no future for herself in Europe, she swooped down on Tripoli. In
doing this she forestalled Germany herself, for Germany had determined
to seize Tripoli.

Both Germany and Austria were opposed to this action of Italy, but
Italy's eyes were now open. Thirty years of political alliance had
created no sympathy among the Italians for the Germans. Moreover, it was
not entirely a question of policy. The lordly arrogance of the Prussians
caused sharp antagonism. The Italians were lovers of liberty; the
Germans pledged toward autocracy. They found greater sympathy in England
and in France.

"I am a son of liberty," said Cavour, "to her I owe all that I am."
That, too, is Italy's motto. When the war broke out popular sympathy in
Italy was therefore strongly in favor of the Allies. The party in power,
the Liberals, adopted the policy of neutrality for the time being, but
thousands of Italians volunteered for the French and British service,
and the anti-German feeling grew greater as time went on.

Finally, on the 23rd of May, 1915, the Italian Government withdrew its
ambassador to Austria and declared war. A complete statement of the
negotiations between Italy and Austria-Hungary, which led to this
declaration, was delivered to the Government of the United States by the
Italian Ambassador on May 25th. This statement, of which the following
is an extract, lucidly presented the Italian position:

"The Triple Alliance was essentially defensive, and designed solely to
preserve the status quo, or in other words equilibrium, in Europe. That
these were its only objects and purposes is established by the letter
and spirit of the treaty, as well as by the intentions clearly described
and set forth in official acts of the ministers who created the alliance
and confirmed and renewed it in the interests of peace, which always has
inspired Italian policy. The treaty, as long as its intents and purposes
had been loyally interpreted and regarded, and as long as it had not
been used as a pretext for aggression against others, greatly
contributed to the elimination and settlement of causes of conflict, and
for many years assured to Europe the inestimable benefits of peace. But
Austria-Hungary severed the treaty by her own hands. She rejected the
response of Serbia which gave to her all the satisfaction she could
legitimately claim. She refused to listen to the conciliatory proposals
presented by Italy in conjunction with other powers in the effort to
spare Europe from a vast conflict, certain to drench the Continent with
blood and to reduce it to ruin beyond the conception of human
imagination, and finally she provoked that conflict.

"Article first of the treaty embodied the usual and necessary obligation
of such pacts--the pledge to exchange views upon any fact and economic
questions of a general nature that might arise pursuant to its terms.
None of the contracting parties had the right to undertake without a
previous agreement any step the consequence of which might impose a duty
upon the other signatories arising under the alliance, or which would in
any way whatsoever encroach upon their vital interests. This article was
violated by Austria-Hungary, when she sent to Serbia her note dated July
23, 1914, an action taken without the previous assent of Italy. Thus,
Austria-Hungary violated beyond doubt one of the fundamental provisions
of the treaty. The obligation of Austria-Hungary to come to a previous
understanding with Italy was the greater because her obstinate policy
against Serbia gave rise to a situation which directly tended toward the
provocation of a European war.

"As far back as the beginning of July, 1914, the Italian Government,
preoccupied by the prevailing feeling in Vienna, caused to be laid
before the Austro-Hungarian Government a number of suggestions advising
moderation, and warning it of the impending danger of a European
outbreak. The course adopted by Austria-Hungary against Serbia
constituted, moreover, a direct encroachment upon the general interests
of Italy both political and economical in the Balkan peninsula.
Austria-Hungary could not for a moment imagine that Italy could remain
indifferent while Serbian independence was being trodden upon. On a
number of occasions theretofore, Italy gave Austria to understand, in
friendly but clear terms, that the independence of Serbia was considered
by Italy as essential to the Balkan equilibrium. Austria-Hungary was
further advised that Italy could never permit that equilibrium to be
disturbed through a prejudice. This warning had been conveyed not only
by her diplomats in private conversations with responsible
Austro-Hungarian officials, but was proclaimed publicly by Italian
statesmen on the floors of Parliament.

"Therefore, when Austria-Hungary ignored the usual practices and menaced
Serbia by sending her an ultimatum, without in any way notifying the
Italian Government of what she proposed to do, indeed leaving that
government to learn of her action through the press, rather than through
the usual channels of diplomacy, when Austria-Hungary took this
unprecedented course she not only severed her alliance with Italy but
committed an act inimical to Italy's interests....

"After the European war broke out Italy sought to come to an
understanding with Austria-Hungary with a view to a settlement
satisfactory to both parties which might avert existing and future
trouble. Her efforts were in vain, notwithstanding the efforts of
Germany, which for months endeavored to induce Austria-Hungary to comply
with Italy's suggestion thereby recognizing the propriety and legitimacy
of the Italian attitude. Therefore Italy found herself compelled by the
force of events to seek other solutions.

"Inasmuch as the treaty of alliance with Austria-Hungary had ceased
virtually to exist and served only to prolong a state of continual
friction and mutual suspicion, the Italian Ambassador at Vienna was
instructed to declare to the Austro-Hungarian Government that the
Italian Government considered itself free from the ties arising out of
the treaty of the Triple Alliance in so far as Austria-Hungary was
concerned. This communication was delivered in Vienna on May 4th.

"Subsequently to this declaration, and after we had been obliged to take
steps for the protection of our interests, the Austro-Hungarian
Government submitted new concessions, which, however, were deemed
insufficient and by no means met our minimum demands. These offers could
not be considered under the circumstances. The Italian Government taking
into consideration what has been stated above, and supported by the vote
of Parliament and the solemn manifestation of the country came to the
decision that any further delay would be inadvisable. Therefore, on May
23d, it was declared, in the name of the King, to the Austro-Hungarian
Ambassador at Rome, that, beginning the following day, May 24th, it
would consider itself in a state of war with Austria-Hungary."

It was a closely reasoned argument that the Italian statesmen presented,
but there was something more than reasoned argument in Italy's course.
She had been waiting for years for the opportunity to bring under her
flag the men of her own race still held in subjection by hated Austria.
Now was the time or never. Her people had become roused. Mobs filled the
streets. Great orators, even the great poet, D'Annunzio, proclaimed a
holy war. The sinking of the Lusitania poured oil on the flames, and the
treatment of Belgium and eastern France added to the fury.

Italian statesmen, even if they had so desired, could not have withstood
the pressure. It was a crusade for Italia Irredenta, for civilization,
for humanity. The country had been flooded by representatives of German
propaganda, papers had been hired and, by all report, money in large
amounts distributed. But every German effort was swept away in the flood
of feeling. It was the people's war.

Amid tremendous enthusiasm the Chamber of Deputies adopted by vote of
407 to 74 the bill conferring upon the government full power to make
war. All members of the Cabinet maintained absolute silence regarding
what step should follow the action of the chamber. When the chamber
reassembled on May 20th, after its long recess, there were present 482
Deputies out of 500, the absentees remaining away on account of illness.
The Deputies especially applauded were those who wore military uniforms
and who had asked permission for leave from their military duties to be
present at the sitting. All the tribunes were filled to overflowing. No
representatives of Germany, Austria or Turkey were to be seen in the
diplomatic tribune. The first envoy to arrive was Thomas Nelson Page,
the American Ambassador, who was accompanied by his staff. M. Barrere,
Sir J. Bennell Rodd, and Michel de Giers, the French, British and
Russian Ambassadors, respectively, appeared a few minutes later and all
were greeted with applause, which was shared by the Belgian, Greek and
Roumanian ministers. George B. McClellan, one-time mayor of New York,
occupied a seat in the President's tribune.

A few minutes before the session began the poet, Gabrielle D'Annunzio,
one of the strongest advocates of war, appeared in the rear of the
public tribune which was so crowded that it seemed impossible to squeeze
in anybody else. But the moment the people saw him they lifted him
shoulder high and passed him over their heads to the first row.

The entire chamber, and all those occupying the other tribunes, rose and
applauded for five minutes, crying "Viva D'Annunzio!" Later thousands
sent him their cards and in return received his autograph bearing the
date of this eventful day. Senor Marcora, President of the Chamber, took
his place at three o'clock. All the members of the House, and everybody
in the galleries, stood up to acclaim the old follower of Garibaldi.
Premier Salandra, followed by all the members of the Cabinet, entered
shortly afterward. It was a solemn moment. Then a delirium of cries
broke out.

"Viva Salandra!" roared the Deputies, and the cheering lasted for a long
time. After the formalities of the opening, Premier Salandra, deeply
moved by the demonstration, arose and said:

"Gentlemen, I have the honor to present to you a bill to meet the
eventual expenditures of a national war."

The announcement was greeted by further prolonged applause. The
Premier's speech was continually interrupted by enthusiasm, and at times
he could hardly continue on account of the wild cheering. The climax was
reached when he made a reference to the army and navy. Then the cries
seemed interminable, and those on the floor of the House and in the
galleries turned to the military tribune from which the officers
answered by waving their hands and handkerchiefs.

At the end of the Premier's speech there were deafening vivas for the
King, war and Italy. Thirty-four Socialists refused to join the cheers,
even in the cry "Viva Italia!" and they were hooted and hissed.

The action of the Italian Government created intense feeling. A
newspaper man in Vienna, describing the Austrian indignation, said:

"The exasperation and contempt which Italy's treacherous surprise attack
and her hypocritical justification aroused here, are quite
indescribable. Neither Serbia nor Russia, despite a long and costly war,
is hated. Italy, however, or rather those Italian would-be politicians
and business men who offer violence to the majority of peaceful Italian
people, are unutterably hated." On the other hand German papers spoke
with much more moderation and recognized that Italy was acting in an
entirely natural manner.

On the very day on which war was declared active operations were begun.
Both sides had been making elaborate preparations. Austria had prepared
herself by building strong fortifications in which were employed the
latest technical improvements in defensive warfare. Upon the Carso and
around Gorizia the Austrians had placed innumerable batteries of
powerful guns mounted on rails and protected by armor plates. They also
had a great number of medium and smaller guns. A net of trenches had
been excavated and constructed in cement all along the edge of the hills
which dominated the course of the Isonzo River.


[Illustration: Painting: Hundreds of soldiers using ropes to drag a
large gun up a mountain slope.]
  ITALY'S TITANIC LABOR TO CONQUER THE ALPS
  When the Italians were making their first mighty advance against
  Austria descriptions came through of the almost unbelievable natural
  obstacles they were conquering. Getting one of the monster guns into
  position in the mountains, as shown above, over the track that had to
  be built for every foot of its progress, was one such handicap.


[Illustration: Painting: Soldiers debarking from a transport under heavy
gun fire.]
  THE HISTORIC LANDING FROM THE "RIVER CLYDE" AT SEDDUL BARR
  An incident of the Dardanelles Expedition. Horrible losses were
  sustained by the Allied troops from the concentrated fire of the
  Turkish machine guns on shore.


These trenches, occupying a position nearly impregnable because so
mountainous, were defended by every modern device. They were protected
with numerous machine guns, surrounded by wire entanglements through
which ran a strong electric current. These lines of trenches followed
without interruption from the banks of the Isonzo to the summit of the
mountains which dominate it; they formed a kind of formidable staircase
which had to be conquered step by step with enormous sacrifice.

During this same period General Cadorna, then head of the Italian army,
had been bringing that army up to date, working for high efficiency and
piling up munitions.

The Army of Italy was a formidable one. Every man in Italy is liable to
military service for a period of nineteen years from the age of twenty
to thirty-nine.

At the time of the war the approximate war strength of the army was as
follows: Officers, 41,692; active army with the colors, 289,910;
reserve, 638,979; mobile militia, 299,956; territorial militia,
1,889,659; total strength, 3,159,836. The above number of total men
available included upward of 1,200,000 fully trained soldiers, with
perhaps another 800,000 partially trained men, the remaining million
being completely untrained men. This army was splendidly armed, its
officers well educated, and the men brave and disciplined.

The Italian plan of campaign apparently consisted first, in neutralizing
the Trentino by capturing or covering the defenses and cutting the two
lines of communication with Austria proper, the railway which ran south
from Insbruck, and that which ran southwest from Vienna and joined the
former at Fransensfets; and second, in a movement in force on the
eastern frontier, with Trieste captured or covered on the right flank in
the direction of the Austrian fortress at Klagenfurt and Vienna.

The first blow was struck by Austria on the day that war was declared.
On that day bombs were dropped on Venice, and five other Adriatic ports
were shelled from air, and some from sea. The Italian armies invaded
Austria on the east with great rapidity, and by May 27th a part of the
Italian forces had moved across the Isonzo River to Monfalcone, sixteen
miles northwest of Trieste. Another force penetrated further to the
north in the Crown land of Gorizia, and Gradisca. Reports from Italy
were that encounters with the enemy had thus far been merely outpost
skirmishes, but had allowed Italy to occupy advantageous positions on
Austrian territory By June 1st, the Italians had occupied the greater
part of the west bank of the Isonzo, with little opposition. The left
wing was beyond the Isonzo, at Caporetto, fighting among the boulders of
Monte Nero, where the Austrian artillery had strong positions.
Monfalcone was kept under constant bombardment.

A general Italian advance took place on June 7th across the Isonzo River
from Caporetto to the sea, a distance of about forty miles. Monfalcone
was taken by the Italians on June the 10th, the first serious blow
against Trieste, as Monfalcone was a railway junction, and its
electrical works operated the light and power of Trieste.

Next day the center made a great blow against Gradisca and Sagrado, but
the river line proved too strong. The only success was won that night at
Plava, north of Borrigia, which was carried by a surprise attack. The
Isonzo was in flood, and presented a serious obstacle to the onrush of
the Italians. By June 14th the Italian eastern army had pushed forward
along the gulf of Trieste toward the town of Nebrosina, nine miles from
Trieste.

Meanwhile, the Austrian armies were being constantly strengthened. The
initial weakness of the Austrian defensive was due to the fact that the
armies normally assigned to the invaded region had been sent to defend
the Austrian line in Galicia against the Russians. When Italy began her
invasion the defenses of the country were chiefly in the hands of
hastily mobilized youths below the military age of nineteen, and men
above the military age of forty-two. From now on Austrian troops began
to arrive from the Galician front, some of these representing the finest
fighting material in the Austrian ranks. The chance of an easy victory
was slipping from Italy's hands. The Italian advance was checked.

On the 15th of June the Italians carried an important position on Monte
Nero, climbing the rocks by night and attacking by dawn. But this
conquest did not help much. No guns of great caliber could be carried on
the mountain, and Tolmino, which had been heavily fortified, and
contained a garrison of some thirty thousand men, was entirely safe. The
following week there were repeated counter-attacks at Plava and on Monte
Nero, but the Italians held what they had won.


[Illustration: Map]
  AREA OF GENERAL CADORNA'S SUCCESSFUL OPERATIONS AGAINST GORIZIA
  The Isonzo valley forms the eastern line for the defense of Italy and
  its possession was essential to the realization of Italian ideals.
  Gorizia, its main strategic position, first fell to the Italians
  August 9, 1916.


The position was now that Cadorna's left wing was in a strong position,
but could not do much against Tolmino. His center was facing the great
camp of Gorizia, while his right was on the edge of the Carso, and had
advanced as far as Dueno, on the Monfalcone-Trieste Railroad. The army
was in position to make an attack upon Gorizia. On the 2d of July an
attack on a broad front was aimed directly at Gorizia. The left was to
swing around against the defenses of Gorizia to the north; the center
was directed against the Gorizia bridge head, and the right was to swing
around to the northeast through the Doberdo plateau. If it succeeded the
Trieste railway would be cut and Gorizia must fall.

Long and confused fighting followed. The center and the right of the
Italian army slowly advanced their line, taking over one thousand
prisoners. For days there was continuous bombardment and
counter-bombardment. The fighting on the left was terrific. In the
neighborhood of Plava the Italian forces found themselves opposed by
Hungarian troops, unaccustomed to mountain warfare, who at first fell
back. Austrian reserves came to their aid, and flung back three times
the Italian charge.

Three new Italian brigades were brought up, and King Victor Emanuel
himself came to encourage his troops. The final assault carried the
heights. On the 22d of July the Italian right captured the crest of San
Michele, which dominates the Doberdo plateau.

Meanwhile the Austrian armies were being heavily reinforced, and General
Cadorna found himself unable to make progress. Much ground had been won
but Gorizia was still unredeemed. Many important vantage points were in
Italian hands, but it was difficult to advance. The result of the three
months' campaign was a stalemate. In the high mountains to the north
Italy's campaign was a war of defense. To undertake her offensive on the
Isonzo it was necessary that she guard her flanks and rear. The Tyrolese
battle-ground contained three distinct points where it was necessary to
operate; the Trentino Salient, the passes of the Dolomites, and the
passes of the Carnic Alps.

Early in June Italy had won control of the ridges of the mountains in
the two latter points, but the problem in the Trentino was more
difficult. It was necessary, because of the converging valleys, to push
her front well inland. On the Carnic Alps the fighting consisted of
unimportant skirmishes. The main struggle centered around the pass of
Monte Croce Carnico.

In two weeks the Alpini had seized dominating positions to the west of
the pass, but the Austrians clung to the farther slopes. A great deal of
picturesque fighting went on, but not much progress was made. Further
west in the Dolomite region there was more fighting. On the 30th of May
Cartina had been captured, and the Italians moved north toward the
Pusterthal Railway. Progress was slow, as the main routes to the railway
were difficult.

By the middle of August they were only a few miles from the railway, but
all the routes led through defiles, and the neighboring heights were in
the possession of the Austrians. To capture these heights was a most
difficult feat, which the Italians performed in the most brilliant way;
but even after they had passed these defiles success was not yet won.
Each Italian column was in its own grove, with no lateral communication.
The Austrians could mass themselves where they pleased. As a result the
Italian forces were compelled to halt.

In the Trentino campaign the Italians soon captured the passes, and
moved against Trente and Roverito. These towns were heavily fortified,
as were their surrounding heights. The campaign became a series of small
fights on mountain peaks and mountain ridges. Only small bodies of
troops could maneuver, and the raising of guns up steep precipices was
extremely difficult. The Italians slowly succeeded in gaining ground,
and established a chain of posts around the heights so that often one
would see guns and barbed wire intrenchments at a height of more than
ten thousand feet among the crevasses of the glaciers. The Alpini
performed wonderful feats of physical endurance, but the plains of
Lombardy were still safe.



CHAPTER XX

GLORIOUS GALLIPOLI

If ever the true mettle and temper of a people were tried and
exemplified in the crucible of battle, that battle was the naval and
land engagement embracing Gallipoli and the Dardanelles and the people
so tested, the British race. Separated in point of time but united in
its general plan, the engagements present a picture of heroism founded
upon strategic mistakes; of such perseverance and dogged determination
against overwhelming natural and artificial odds as even the pages of
supreme British bravery cannot parallel. The immortal charge of the
Light Brigade was of a piece with Gallipoli, but it was merely a battle
fragment and its glorious record was written in blood within the scope
of a comparatively few inspired minutes. In the mine-strewn Dardanelles
and upon the sun-baked, blood-drenched rocky slopes of Gallipoli, death
always partnered every sailor and soldier. As at Balaklava, virtually
everyone knew that some one had blundered, but the army and the navy as
one man fought to the bitter end to make the best of a bad bargain, to
tear triumph out of impossibilities.

France co-operated with the British in the naval engagement, but the
greater sacrifice, the supreme charnel house of the war, the British
race reserved for itself. There, the yeomanry of England, the unsung
county regiments whose sacrifices and achievements have been neglected
in England's generous desire to honor the men from "down under," the
Australians and New Zealanders grouped under the imperishable title of
the Anzacs--there the Scotch, Welsh and Irish knit in one devoted
British Army with the great fighters from the self-governing colonies
waged a battle so hopeless and so gallant that the word Gallipoli shall
always remind the world how man may triumph over the fear of death; how
with nothing but defeat and disaster before them, men may go to their
deaths as unconcernedly as in other days they go to their nightly sleep.

On November 5, 1914, Great Britain declared war upon Turkey.
Hostilities, however, had preceded the declaration. On November 3d the
combined French and British squadrons had bombarded the entrance forts.
This was merely intended to draw the fire of the forts and make an
estimate of their power. From that time on a blockade was maintained,
and on the 13th of December a submarine, commanded by Lieutenant
Holbrook, entered the straits and torpedoed the Turkish warship
Messoudieh, which was guarding the mine fields.

By the end of January the blockading fleet, through constant
reinforcement, had become very strong, and had seized the Island of
Tenedos and taken possession of Lemnos, which nominally belonged to
Greece, as bases for naval operations. On the 19th of February began the
great attack upon the forts at the entrance to the Dardanelles, which
attracted the attention of the world for nearly a year.

The expedition against the Dardanelles had been considered with the
greatest care, and approved by the naval authorities. That their
judgment was correct, however, is another question. The history of naval
warfare seems to make very plain that a ship, however powerful, is at a
tremendous disadvantage when attacking forts on land. The badly served
cannon of Alexandria fell, indeed, before a British fleet, but Gallipoli
had been fortified by German engineers, and its guns were the Krupp
cannon. The British fleet found itself opposed by unsurmountable
obstacles. Looking backward it seems possible, that if at the very start
Lord Kitchener had permitted a detachment of troops to accompany the
fleet, success might have been attained, but without the army the navy
was powerless.

The Peninsula of Gallipoli is a tongue of land about fifty miles long,
varying in width from twelve to two or three miles. It is a mass of
rocky hills so steep that in many places it is a matter of difficulty to
reach their tops. On it are a few villages, but there are no decent
roads and little cultivated land. On the southern shore of the
Dardanelles conditions are nearly the same. Here, the entrance is a flat
and marshy plain, but east of this plain are hills three thousand feet
high. The high ground overhangs the sea passage on both sides, and with
the exception of narrow bits of beach at their base, presents almost no
opportunity for landing.


[Illustration:  Map: Gallipoli and surroundings]
  MAP OF THE GALLIPOLI PENINSULA Showing the various landing places,
  with inset of the Sari-Bair Region.


A strong current continually sifts down the straits from the Sea of
Marmora.

Forts were placed at the entrance on both the north and south side, but
they were not heavily armed and were merely outposts. Fourteen miles
from the mouth the straits become quite narrow, making a sharp turn
directly north and then resuming their original direction. The channel
thus makes a sharp double bend. At the entrance to the strait, known as
the Narrows, were powerful fortresses, and the slopes were studded with
batteries. Along both sides of the channel the low ground was lined with
batteries. It was possible to attack the forts at fairly long range, but
there was no room to bring any large number of ships into action at the
same time.

At the time of the Gallipoli adventure there were probably nearly half a
million of men available for a defense of the straits, men well armed
and well trained under German leadership. The first step was
comparatively easy. The operations against the other forts began at 8
A.M. on Friday, the 19th of February. The ships engaged were the
Inflexible, the Agamemnon, the Cornwallis, the Vengeance and the Triumph
from the British fleet, and the Bouvet, Suffren, and the Gaulois from
the French, all under the command of Vice-Admiral Sackville Carden. The
French squadron was under Rear-Admiral Gueprette. A flotilla of
destroyers accompanied the fleet, and airplanes were sent up to guide
the fire of the battleships.

At first the fleet was arranged in a semicircle some miles out to sea
from the entrance to the strait. It afforded an inspiring spectacle as
the ships came along and took up position, and the picture became most
awe-inspiring when the guns began to boom. The bombardment at first was
slow. Shells from the various ships screaming through the air at the
rate of about one every two minutes.

The Turkish batteries, however, were not to be drawn, and, seeing this,
the British Admiral sent one British ship and one French ship close in
shore toward the Sedd-el-Bahr forts. As they went in they sped right
under the guns of the shore batteries, which could no longer resist the
temptation to see what they could do. Puffs of white smoke dotted the
landscape on the far shore, and dull booms echoed over the placid water.
Around the ships fountains of water sprang up into the air. The enemy
had been drawn, but his marksmanship was obviously very bad. Not a
single shot directed against the ships went within a hundred yards of
either.

At sundown on account of the failing light Admiral Carden withdrew the
fleet. On account of the bad weather the attack was not renewed until
February 25th. It appeared that the outer forts had not been seriously
damaged on the 19th, and that what injury had been done had been
repaired. In an hour and a half the Cape Helles fort was silenced. The
Agamemnon was hit by a shell fired at a range of six miles, which killed
three men and wounded five. Early in the afternoon Sedd-el-Bahr was
attacked at close range, but not silenced till after 5 P.M. At this time
British trawlers began sweeping the entrance for mines, and during the
next day the mine field was cleared for a distance of four miles up the
straits.

As soon as this clearance was made the Albion, Vengeance and Majestic
steamed into the strait and attacked Fort Dardanos, a fortification some
distance below the Narrows. The Turks replied vigorously, not only from
Dardanos but from batteries scattered along the shore. Believing that
the Turks had abandoned the forts at the entrance, landing parties of
marines were sent to shore. In a short time, however, they met a
detachment of the enemy and were compelled to retreat to their boats.
The outer forts, however, were destroyed, and their destruction was
extremely encouraging to the Allies.

For a time a series of minor operations was carried on, meeting with
much success. Besides attacks on forts inside of the strait, Smyrna was
bombarded on March the 5th, and on March the 6th the Queen Elizabeth,
the Agamemnon and the Ocean bombarded the forts at Chanak on the Asiatic
side of the Narrows, from a position in the gulf of Saros on the outer
side of the Gallipoli Peninsula. To all of these attacks the Turks
replied vigorously and the attacking ships were repeatedly struck, but
with no loss of life. On the 7th of March Fort Dardanos was silenced,
and Fort Chanak ceased firing, but, as it turned out, only temporarily.

Preparations were now being made for a serious effort against the
Narrows. The date of the attack was fixed for March 17th, weather
permitting. On the 16th Admiral Carden was stricken down with illness
and was invalided by medical authority. Admiral de Roebeck, second in
command, who had been very active in the operations, was appointed to
succeed him. Admiral de Roebeck was in cordial sympathy with the
purposes of the expedition and determined to attack on the 18th of
March. At a quarter to eleven that morning, the Queen Elizabeth,
Inflexible, Agamemnon, Lord Nelson, the Triumph and Prince George
steamed up the straits towards the Narrows, and bombarded the forts of
Chanak. At 12.22 the French squadron, consisting of the Suffren,
Gaulois, Charlemagne, and Bouvet, advanced up the Dardanelles to aid
their English associates.

Under the combined fire of the two squadrons the Turkish forts, which at
first replied strongly, were finally silenced. All of the ships,
however, were hit several times during this part of the action. A third
squadron, including the Vengeance, Irresistible, Albion, Ocean,
Swiftshore and Majestic, then advanced to relieve the six old
battleships inside the strait.

As the French squadron, which had engaged the forts in a most brilliant
fashion, was passing out the Bouvet was blown up by a drifting mine and
sank in less than three minutes, carrying with her most of her crew. At
2.36 P.M. the relief battleships renewed the attack on the forts, which
again opened fire. The Turks were now sending mines down with the
current. At 4.09 the Irresistible quitted the line, listing heavily, and
at 5.50 she sank, having probably struck a drifting mine. At 6.05 the
Ocean, also having struck a mine, sank in deep water. Practically the
whole of the crews were removed safely. The Gaulois was damaged by
gunfire; the Inflexible had her forward control position hit by a heavy
shell, which killed and wounded the majority of the men and officers at
that station and set her on fire. At sunset the forts were still in
action, and during the twilight the Allied fleet slipped out of the
Dardanelles.

Meantime, an expeditionary force was being gathered. The largest portion
of this force came from Great Britain, but France also provided a
considerable number from her marines and from her Colonial army. Both
nations avoided, as far as possible, drawing upon the armies destined
for service in France.

In the English army there were divisions from Australia and New Zealand
and there were a number of Indian troops and Territorials. The whole
force was put under the command of General Sir Ian Hamilton. The
commander-in-chief on the Turkish side was the German General Liman von
Sanders, the former chief of the military mission at Constantinople. The
bulk of the expeditionary force, which numbered altogether about a
hundred and twenty thousand men, were, therefore, men whose presence in
the east did not weaken the Allied strength in the west.

The great difficulty of the new plan was that it was impossible to
surprise the enemy. The whole Gallipoli Peninsula was so small that a
landing at any point would be promptly observed, and the nature of the
ground was of such a character that progress from any point must
necessarily be slow. The problem was therefore a simple one.

The expeditionary force gathered in Egypt during the first half of
April, and about the middle of the month was being sent to Lemnos.
Germany was well aware of the English plans, and was doing all that it
could to provide a defense.

On April 23d the movement began, and about five o'clock in the afternoon
the first of the transports slowly made its way through the maze of
shipping toward the entrance of Mudros Bay.

Immediately the patent apathy, which had gradually overwhelmed everyone,
changed to the utmost enthusiasm, and as the liners steamed through the
fleet, their decks yellow with khaki, the crews of the warships cheered
them on to victory while the bands played them out with an unending
variety of popular airs. The soldiers in the transports answered this
last salutation from the navy with deafening cheers, and no more
inspiring spectacle has ever been seen than this great expedition.

The whole of the fleet from the transports had been divided up into five
divisions and there were three main landings. The 29th Division
disembarked off the point of the Gallipoli Peninsula near Sedd-el-Bahr,
where its operations were covered both from the gulf of Saros and from
the Dardanelles by the fire of the covering warships. The Australian and
New Zealand contingent disembarked north of Gaba Tepe. Further north a
naval division made a demonstration.

Awaiting the Australians was a party of Turks who had been intrenched
almost on the shore and had opened up a terrific fusillade. The
Australian volunteers rose, as a man, to the occasion. They waited
neither for orders nor for the boats to reach the beach, but springing
out into the sea they went in to the shore, and forming some sort of a
rough line rushed straight on the flashes of the enemy's rifles. In less
than a quarter of an hour the Turks were in full flight.

While the Australians and New Zealanders, or Anzacs as they are now
generally known from the initials of the words Australian-New Zealand
Army Corps, were fighting so gallantly at Gaba Tepe, the British troops
were landing at the southern end of the Gallipoli Peninsula. The advance
was slow and difficult. The Turk was pushed back, little by little, and
the ground gained organized. The details of this progress, though full
of incidents of the greatest courage and daring, need not be recounted.

On June the 4th a general attack was made, preceded by heavy
bombardments by all guns, but after terrific fighting, in which many
prisoners were captured and great losses suffered, the net result was an
advance of about five hundred yards. As time went on the general
impression throughout the Allied countries was that the expedition had
failed. On June 30th the losses of the Turks were estimated at not less
than seventy thousand, and the British naval and military losses up to
June 1st, aggregated 38,635 officers and men. At that time the British
and French allies held but a small corner of the area to be conquered.
In all of these attacks the part played by the Australian and New
Zealand army corps was especially notable. Reinforcements were
repeatedly sent to the Allies, who worked more and more feverishly as
time went on with the hope of aiding Russia, which was then desperately
struggling against the great German advance.

On August 17th it was reported that a landing had been made at Suvla
Bay, the extreme western point of the Peninsula. From this point it was
hoped to threaten the Turkish communications with their troops at the
lower end of the Peninsula. This new enterprise, however, failed to make
any impression, and in the first part of September, vigorous Turkish
counter-offensives gained territory from the Franco-British troops.
According to the English reports the Turks paid a terrible price for
their success.

It had now become evident that the expedition was a failure. The Germans
were already gloating over what they called the "failure of British sea
power," and English publicists were attempting to show that, though the
enterprise had failed, the very presence of a strong Allied force at
Saloniki had been an enormous gain. The first official announcement of
failure was made December 20, 1916, when it was announced that the
British forces at Anzac and Suvla Bay had been withdrawn, and that only
the minor positions near Sedd-el-Bahr were occupied. Great Britain's
loss of officers and men at the Dardanelles up to December 11th was
112,921, according to an announcement made in the House of Commons by
the Parliamentary Under Secretary for War. Besides these casualties the
number of sick admitted to hospitals was 96,683. The decision to
evacuate Gallipoli was made in the course of November by the British
Government as the result of the early expressed opinion of General
Monro, who had succeeded General Hamilton on October 28, 1915.

General Monro found himself confronted with a serious problem in the
attempt to withdraw an army of such a size from positions not more than
three hundred yards from the enemy's trenches, and to embark on open
beaches every part of which was within effective range of Turkish guns.
Moreover, the evacuation must be done gradually, as it was impossible to
move the whole army at once with such means of transportation as
existed. The plan was to remove the munitions, supplies and heavy guns
by instalments, working only at night, carrying off at the same time a
large portion of the troops, but leaving certain picked battalions to
guard the trenches. Every endeavor had to be made for concealment. The
plan was splendidly successful, and the Turks apparently completely
deceived. On December 20th the embarkation of the last troops at Suvla
was accomplished. The operations at Anzac were conducted in the same
way. Only picked battalions were left to the end, and these were carried
safely off.

The success of the Suvla and Anzac evacuation made the position at Cape
Helles more dangerous. The Turks were on the lookout, and it seemed
almost impossible that they could be again deceived. On January 7th an
attack was made by the Turks upon the trenches, which was beaten back.
That night more than half the troops had left the Peninsula. The next
day there was a heavy storm which made embarkation difficult, but it was
nevertheless accomplished. The whole evacuation was a clever and
successful bit of work.



CHAPTER XXI

THE GREATEST NAVAL BATTLE IN HISTORY

Germany's ambition for conquest at sea had been nursed and carefully
fostered for twenty years. During the decade immediately preceding the
declaration of war, it had embarked upon a policy of naval upbuilding
that brought it into direct conflict with England's sea policy.
Thereafter it became a race in naval construction, England piling up a
huge debt in its determination to construct two tons of naval shipping
to every one ton built by Germany.

Notwithstanding Great Britain's efforts in this direction, Germany's
naval experts, with the ruthless von Tirpitz at their head, maintained
that, given a fair seaway with ideal weather conditions favoring the low
visibility tactics of the German sea command, a victory for the Teutonic
ships would follow. It was this belief that drew the ships of the German
cruiser squadron and High Seas Fleet off the coast of Jutland and Horn
Reef into the great battle that decided the supremacy of the sea.

The 31st of May, 1916, will go down in history as the date of this
titanic conflict. The British light cruiser Galatea on patrol duty near
Horn Reef reported at 2.20 o'clock on the afternoon of that day, that it
had sighted smoke plumes denoting the advance of enemy vessels from the
direction of Helgoland Bight. Fifteen minutes later the smoke plumes
were in such number and volume that the advance of a considerable force
to the northward and eastward was indicated. It was reasoned by
Vice-Admiral Beatty, to whom the Galatea had sent the news by radio,
that the enemy in rounding Horn Reef would inevitably be brought into
action. The first ships of the enemy were sighted at 3.31 o'clock. These
were the battle screen of fast light cruisers. Back of these were five
modern battle cruisers of the highest power and armament.

The report of the battle, by an eye-witness, that was issued upon
semiofficial authority of the British Government, follows:

First Phase, 3.30 P.M. May 31st. Beatty's battle cruisers, consisting of
the Lion, Princess Royal, Queen Mary, Tiger, Inflexible, Indomitable,
Invincible, Indefatigable, and New Zealand, were on a southeasterly
course, followed at about two miles distance by the four battleships of
the class known as Queen Elizabeths.

Enemy light cruisers were sighted and shortly afterward the head of the
German battle cruiser squadron, consisting of the new cruiser
Hindenburg, the Seydlitz, Derfflinger, Lutzow, Moltke, and possibly the
Salamis.

Beatty at once began firing at a range of about 20,000 yards (twelve
miles) which shortened to 16,000 yards (nine miles) as the fleets
closed. The Germans could see the British distinctly outlined against
the light yellow sky. The Germans, covered by a haze, could be very
indistinctly made out by the British gunners.

The Queen Elizabeths opened fire on one after another as they came
within range. The German battle cruisers turned to port and drew away to
about 20,000 yards.

Second Phase, 4.40 P.M. A destroyer screen then appeared beyond the
German battle cruisers. The whole German High Seas Fleet could be seen
approaching on the northeastern horizon in three divisions, coming to
the support of their battle cruisers.

The German battle cruisers now turned right around 16 points and took
station in front of the battleships of the High Fleet.

Beatty, with his battle cruisers and supporting battleships, therefore,
had before him the whole of the German battle fleet, and Jellicoe was
still some distance away.

The opposing fleets were now moving parallel to one another in opposite
directions, and but for a master maneuver on the part of Beatty the
British advance ships would have been cut off from Jellicoe's Grand
Fleet. In order to avoid this and at the same time prepare the way so
that Jellicoe might envelop his adversary, Beatty immediately also
turned right around 16 points, so as to bring his ships parallel to the
German battle cruisers and facing the same direction.

As soon as he was around he increased to full speed to get ahead of the
Germans and take up a tactical position in advance of their line. He was
able to do this owing to the superior speed of the British battle
cruisers.


[Illustration: Photographs]
  Copyright Harris & Ewing.
  ADMIRAL WILLIAM S. SIMS; Commander-in-Chief of the United States Navy
  in European waters.
  ADMIRAL SIR DAVID BEATTY;  Commander-in-Chief of the British Grand
  Fleet.


[Illustration: Photographs]
  FIELD-MARSHAL EARL KITCHENER;  British Secretary for War, who built up
  the  British army at the beginning of the war.
  FIELD-MARSHAL SIR JOHN D. FRENCH; Commander-in-chief of the British
  force in France and Belgium from the beginning of the war to December,
  1915.


Just before the turning point was reached, the Indefatigable sank, and
the Queen Mary and the Invincible also were lost at the turning point,
where, of course, the High Seas Fleet concentrated their fire.

A little earlier, as the German battle cruisers were turning the Queen
Elizabeths had in similar manner concentrated their fire on the turning
point and destroyed a new German battle cruiser, believed to be the
Hindenburg.

Beatty had now got around and headed away with the loss of three ships,
racing parallel to the German battle cruisers. The Queen Elizabeths
followed behind engaging the main High Seas Fleet.

Third Phase, 5 P.M. The Queen Elizabeths now turned short to port 16
points in order to follow Beatty. The Warspite jammed her steering gear,
failed to get around, and drew the fire of six of the enemy, who closed
in upon her.

The Germans claimed her as a loss, since on paper she ought to have been
lost, but, as a matter of act, though repeatedly straddled by shell fire
with the water boiling up all around her, she was not seriously hit, and
was able to sink one of her opponents. Her captain recovered control of
the vessel, brought her around, and followed her consorts.

In the meantime the Barham, Valiant and Malaya turned short so as to
avoid the danger spot where the Queen Mary and the Invincible had been
lost, and for an hour, until Jellicoe arrived, fought a delaying action
against the High Seas Fleet.

The Warspite joined them at about 5.15 o'clock, and all four ships were
so successfully maneuvered in order to upset the spotting corrections of
their opponents that no hits of a seriously disabling character were
suffered. They had the speed over their opponents by fully four knots,
and were able to draw away from part of the long line of German
battleships, which almost filled up the horizon.

At this time the Queen Elizabeths were steadily firing on at the flashes
of German guns at a range which varied between 12,000 and 15,000 yards,
especially against those ships which were nearest them. The Germans were
enveloped in a mist and only smoke and flashes were visible.

By 5.45 half of the High Seas Fleet had been left out of range, and the
Queen Elizabeths were steaming fast to join hands with Jellicoe.

To return to Beatty's battle cruisers. They had succeeded in outflanking
the German battle cruisers, which were, therefore, obliged to turn a
full right angle to starboard to avoid being headed.

Heavy fighting was renewed between the opposing battle cruiser
squadrons, during which the Derfflinger was sunk; but toward 6 o'clock
the German fire slackened very considerably, showing that Beatty's
battle cruisers and the Queen Elizabeths had inflicted serious damage on
their immediate opponents.

Fourth Phase, 6 P.M. The Grand Fleet was now in sight, and, coming up
fast in three directions, the Queen Elizabeths altered their course four
points to the starboard and drew in toward the enemy to allow Jellicoe
room to deploy into line.

The Grand Fleet was perfectly maneuvered and the very difficult
operation of deploying between the battle cruisers and the Queen
Elizabeths was perfectly timed.

Jellicoe came up, fell in behind Beatty's cruisers, and followed by the
damaged but still serviceable Queen Elizabeths, steamed right across the
head of the German fleet.

The first of the ships to come into action were the Revenue and the
Royal Oak with their fifteen-inch guns, and the Agincourt which fired
from her seven turrets with the speed almost of a Maxim gun.

The whole British fleet had now become concentrated. They had been
perfectly maneuvered, so as to "cross the T" of the High Seas Fleet,
and, indeed, only decent light was necessary to complete their work of
destroying the Germans in detail. The light did improve for a few
minutes, and the conditions were favorable to the British fleet, which
was now in line approximately north and south across the head of the
Germans.

During the few minutes of good light Jellicoe smashed up the first three
German ships, but the mist came down, visibility suddenly failed, and
the defeated High Seas Fleet was able to draw off in ragged divisions.

Fifth Phase, Night. The Germans were followed by the British, who still
had them enveloped between Jellicoe on the west, Beatty on the north,
and Evan Thomas with his three Queen Elizabeths on the south. The
Warspite had been sent back to her base.


[Illustration: Map]
  HOW THE GREAT NAVAL BATTLE OF JUTLAND WAS FOUGHT
  This chart must be taken only as a general indication of the courses
  of the opposing fleets. Sir David Beatty with two squadrons of battle
  cruisers and one squadron of fast battleships, first steamed southward
  and southeastward of the German battle cruiser squadron; then,
  sighting the German battle fleet, turned northward, afterwards bearing
  eastward and connecting with Sir John Jellicoe's battle squadron.


During the night the torpedo boat destroyers heavily attacked the German
ships, and, although they lost seriously themselves, succeeded in
sinking two of the enemy.

Coordination of the units of the fleet was practically impossible to
keep up, and the Germans discovered by the rays of their searchlights
the three Queen Elizabeths, not more than 4,000 yards away.
Unfortunately they were then able to escape between the battleships and
Jellicoe, since the British gunners were not able to fire, as the
destroyers were in the way.

So ended the Jutland battle, which was fought as had been planned and
very nearly a great success. It was spoiled by the unfavorable weather
conditions, especially at the critical moment, when the whole British
fleet was concentrated and engaged in crushing the head of the German
line.

Commenting on the engagement, Admiral Jellicoe said: "The battle cruiser
fleet, gallantly led by Vice-Admiral Beatty, and admirably supported by
the ships of the fifth battle squadron under Rear Admiral Evan-Thomas,
fought the action under, at times, disadvantageous conditions,
especially in regard to light, in a manner that was in keeping with the
best traditions of the service."

His estimate of the German losses was: two battleships of the
dreadnought type, one of the Deutschland type, which was seen to sink;
the battle cruiser Lutzow, admitted by the Germans; one battle cruiser
of the dreadnought type, one battle cruiser seen to be so severely
damaged that its return was extremely doubtful; five light cruisers,
seen to sink--one of them possibly a battleship; six destroyers seen to
sink, three destroyers so damaged that it was doubtful if they would be
able to reach port, and a submarine sunk. The official German report
admitted only eleven ships sunk; the first British report placed the
total at eighteen, but Admiral Jellicoe enumerated twenty-one German
vessels as probably lost.

The Admiral paid a fine tribute to the German naval men: "The enemy," he
said, "fought with the gallantry that was expected of him. We
particularly admired the conduct of those on board a disabled German
light cruiser which passed down the British line shortly after the
deployment under a heavy fire, which was returned by the only gun left
in action. The conduct of the officers and men war entirely beyond
praise. On all sides it is reported that the glorious traditions of the
past were most worthily upheld; whether in the heavy ships, cruisers,
light cruisers, or destroyers, the same admirable spirit prevailed. The
officers and men were cool and determined, with a cheeriness that would
have carried them through anything. The heroism of the wounded was the
'admiration' of all. I cannot adequately express the pride with which
the spirit of the fleet filled me."

At daylight on the 1st of June the British battle fleet, being southward
of Horn Reef, turned northward in search of the enemy vessels. The
visibility early on the first of June was three to four miles less than
on May 31st, and the torpedo-boat destroyers, being out of visual touch,
did not rejoin the fleet until 9 A.M. The British fleet remained in the
proximity of the battlefield and near the line of approach to the German
ports until 11 A.M., in spite of the disadvantage of long distances from
fleet bases and the danger incurred in waters adjacent to the enemy's
coasts from submarines and torpedo craft.

The enemy, however, made no sign, and the admiral was reluctantly
compelled to the conclusion that the High Sea Fleet had returned into
port. Subsequent events proved this assumption to have been correct. The
British position must have been known to the enemy, as at 4 A.M. the
fleet engaged a Zeppelin about five minutes, during which time she had
ample opportunity to note and subsequently report the position and
course of the British fleet.

The Germans at first claimed a victory for their fleet. The test, of
course, was the outcome of the battle. The fact that the German fleet
retreated and nevermore ventured forth from beneath the protecting guns
and mine fields around Helgoland, demonstrates beyond dispute that the
British were entitled to the triumph. The German official report makes
the best presentation of the German case. It follows in full:


The High Sea Fleet, consisting of three battleship squadrons, five
battle cruisers, and a large number of small cruisers, with several
destroyer flotillas, was cruising in the Skagerrak on May 31 for the
purpose, as on earlier occasions, of offering battle to the      British
fleet. The vanguard of the small cruisers at 4.30 o'clock in the
afternoon (German time) suddenly encountered ninety miles west of
Hanstholm, (a cape on the northwest coast of Jutland), a group of eight
of the newest cruisers of the Calliope class and fifteen or twenty
of the most modern destroyers.

While the German light forces and the first cruiser squadron under Vice
Admiral Hipper were following the British, who were retiring
north-westward, the German battle cruisers sighted to the westward Vice
Admiral Beatty's battle squadron of six ships, including four of the
Lion type and two of the Indefatigable type. Beatty's squadron developed
a battle line on a southeasterly course and Vice Admiral Hipper formed
his line ahead on the same general course and approached for a running
fight. He opened fire at 5.49 o'clock in the afternoon with heavy
artillery at a range of 13,000 meters against the superior enemy. The
weather was clear and light, and the sea was light with a northwest
wind.

After about a quarter of an hour a violent explosion occurred on the
last cruiser of the Indefatigable type. It was caused by a heavy shell,
and destroyed the vessel.

About 6.20 o'clock in the afternoon five warships of the Queen Elizabeth
type came from the west and joined the British battle cruiser line,
powerfully reinforcing with their fifteen-inch guns the five British
battle cruisers remaining after 6.20 o'clock. To      equalize this
superiority Vice Admiral Hipper ordered the destroyers to attack the
enemy. The British destroyers and small cruisers interposed, and a
bitter engagement at close range ensued, in the course of which a light
cruiser participated.

The Germans lost two torpedo boats, the crews of which were rescued by
sister ships under a heavy fire. Two British destroyers were sunk by
artillery, and two others--the Nestor and Nomad--remained on the scene
in a crippled condition. These later were destroyed by the main fleet
after German torpedo boats had rescued all the survivors.

While this engagement was in progress, a mighty explosion, caused by a
big shell, broke the Queen Mary, the third ship in line, asunder, at
6.30 o'clock.

Soon thereafter the German main battleship fleet was sighted to the
southward, steering north. The hostile fast squadrons thereupon turned
northward, closing the first part of the fight, which lasted about an
hour.

The British retired at high speed before the German fleet, which
followed closely. The German battle cruisers continued the artillery
combat with increasing intensity, particularly with the division of the
vessels of the Queen Elizabeth type, and in this the leading German
battleship division participated intermittently. The hostile ships
showed a desire to run in a flat curve ahead of the point of our line
and to cross it.

At 7.45 o'clock in the evening British small cruisers and destroyers
launched an attack against our battle cruisers, who avoided the
torpedoes by maneuvering, while the British battle cruisers retired from
the engagement, in which they did not participate further as far as can
be established. Shortly thereafter a German reconnoitering group, which
was parrying the destroyer attack, received an attack from the
northeast. The cruiser Wiesbaden was soon put out of action in this
attack. The German torpedo flotillas immediately attacked the heavy
ships.

Appearing shadow-like from the haze bank to the northeast was made out a
long line of at least twenty-five battleships, which at first sought a
junction with the British battle cruisers and those of the Queen
Elizabeth type on a northwesterly to westerly course, and then turned on
an easterly to southeasterly course.

With the advent of the British main fleet, whose center consisted of
three squadrons of eight battleships each, with a fast division of three
battle cruisers of the Invincible type on the northern-end, and three of
the newest vessels of the Royal Sovereign class, armed with fifteen-inch
guns, at the southern end, there began about 8 o'clock in the evening
the third section of the engagement, embracing the combat between the
main fleets.

Vice Admiral Scheer determined to attack the British main fleet, which
he now recognized was completely assembled and about doubly superior.
The German battleship squadron, headed by battle cruisers, steered first
toward the extensive haze bank to the      northeast, where the crippled
cruiser Wiesbaden was still receiving a heavy fire. Around the Wiesbaden
stubborn individual fights under quickly changing conditions now
occurred.

The light enemy forces, supported by an armored cruiser squadron of five
ships of the Minatour, Achilles, and Duke of Edinburgh classes coming
from the northeast, were encountered and apparently surprised on account
of the decreasing visibility of our battle      cruisers and leading
battleship division. The squadron came under a violent and heavy fire by
which the small cruisers Defense and Black Prince were sunk. The cruiser
Warrior regained its own line a wreck and later sank. Another small
cruiser was damaged severely.

 Two destroyers already had fallen victims to the attack of German
 torpedo boats against the leading British battleships and a small
 cruiser and two destroyers were damaged. The German battle cruisers and
 leading battleship division had in these engagements come under
 increased fire of the enemy's battleship squadron, which, shortly after
 8 o'clock, could be made out in the haze turning to the north-eastward
 and finally to the east, Germans observed, amid the artillery combat
 and shelling of great intensity, signs of the effect of good shooting
 between 8.20 and 8.30 o'clock particularly.      Several officers on
 German ships observed that a battleship of the Queen Elizabeth class
 blew up under conditions similar to that of the Queen Mary. The
 Invincible sank after being hit severely. A ship of the Iron Duke class
 had earlier received a torpedo hit, and      one of the Queen Elizabeth
 class was running around in a circle,  its steering apparatus
 apparently having been hit.

The Lutzow was hit by at least fifteen heavy shells and was unable to
maintain its place in line. Vice Admiral Hipper, therefore,
trans-shipped to the Moltke on a torpedo boat and under a heavy fire.
The Derfflinger meantime took the lead temporarily. Parts of the German
torpedo flotilla attacked the enemy's main fleet and heard detonations.
In the action the Germans lost a torpedo boat. An enemy destroyer was
seen in a sinking condition, having been hit by a torpedo.

After the first violent onslaught into the mass of the superior enemy
the opponents lost sight of each other in the smoke by powder clouds.
After a short cessation in the artillery combat Vice Admiral Scheer
ordered a new attack by all the available forces.

German battle cruisers, which with several light cruisers and torpedo
boats again headed the line, encountered the enemy soon after 9 o'clock
and renewed the heavy fire, which was answered by them from the mist,
and then by the leading division of the main      fleet. Armored
cruisers now flung themselves in a reckless onset at extreme speed
against the enemy line in order to cover the attack of the torpedo
boats. They approached the enemy line, although covered with shot from
6,000 meters distances. Several German torpedo flotillas dashed forward
to attack, delivered torpedoes, and returned, despite the most severe
counterfire, with the loss of only one boat. The bitter artillery fire
was again interrupted, after this second violent onslaught, by the smoke
from guns and funnels.

Several torpedo flotillas, which were ordered to attack somewhat later,
found, after penetrating the smoke cloud, that the enemy fleet was no
longer before them; nor, when the fleet commander again brought the
German squadrons upon the southerly and southwesterly course where
the enemy was last seen, could our opponents be found. Only once
more--shortly before 10.30 o'clock--did the battle flare up. For a short
time in the late twilight German battle cruisers sighted four enemy
capital ships to seaward and opened fire immediately. As the two German
battleship squadrons attacked, the enemy turned and vanished in the
darkness. Older German light cruisers of the fourth reconnoissance group
also were engaged with the older enemy armored cruisers in a short
fight. This ended the day battle.

The German divisions, which, after losing sight of the enemy, began a
night cruise in a southerly direction, were attacked until dawn by enemy
light force in rapid succession.

The attacks were favored by the general strategic situation and the
particularly dark night.

The cruiser Frauenlob was injured severely during the engagement of the
fourth reconnoissance group with a superior cruiser force, and was lost
from sight.

One armored cruiser of the Cressy class suddenly appeared close to a
German battleship and was shot into fire after forty seconds, and sank
in four minutes.

The Florent (?) Destroyer 60, (the names were hard to decipher in the
darkness and therefore were uncertainly established) and four
destroyers--3, 78, 06, and 27--were destroyed by our fire. One destroyer
was cut in two by the ram of a German battleship. Seven destroyers,
including the G-30, were hit and severely damaged. These, including the
Tipperary and Turbulent, which after saving survivors, were left behind
in a sinking condition, drifted past our line, some of them burning at
the bow or stern.

The tracks of countless torpedoes were sighted by the German ships, but
only the Pommern (a battleship) fell an immediate victim to a torpedo.
The cruiser Rostock was hit, but remained afloat. The cruiser Elbing was
damaged by a German battleship during an unavoidable maneuver. After
vain endeavors to keep the ship afloat the Elbing was blown up, but only
after her crew had embarked on torpedo boats. A post torpedo boat was
struck by a mine laid by the enemy.

Following are the statistics of the fight:

                                ADMITTED LOSSES--BRITISH
NAME                            TONNAGE  PERSONNEL
Queen Mary (battle cruiser)      27,000  1,000
Indefatigable (battle cruiser)   18,750    800
Invincible (battle cruiser)      17,250    750
Defense (armored cruiser)        14,600    755
Warrior (armored cruiser)        13,550    704
Black Prince (armored cruiser)   13,550    704
Tipperary (destroyer)             1,850    150
Turbulent (destroyer)             1,850    150
Shark (destroyer)                   950    100
Sparrowhawk (destroyer)             950    100
Ardent  (destroyer)                 950    100
Fortune (destroyer)                 950    100
Nomad (destroyer)                   950    100
Nestor (destroyer)                  950    100

                                 BRITISH TOTALS
Battle cruisers                  63,000  2,550
Armored cruisers                 41,700  2,163
Destroyers                        9,400    900
                               --------  ------
Fourteen ships                  114,100  5,613

                         ADMITTED LOSSES--GERMAN*
NAME                            TONNAGE  PERSONNEL
Lutzow (battle cruiser)          26,600  1,200
Pommern (battleship)             13,200    729
Wiesbaden (cruiser)               5,600    450
Frauenlob (cruiser)               2,715    264
Elbing (cruiser)                  5,000    450
Rostock (cruiser)                 4,900    373
Five destroyers                   5,000    500

GERMAN TOTALS
Battle cruisers                  39,800  1,929
Cruisers                         18,215  1,537
Destroyers                        5,000    500
                                 ------  -----
Eleven ships                     63,015  3,966

* These figures are given for what they are worth, but no one outside of
Germany doubted but that their losses were very much greater than
admitted in the official report.


TOTAL LOSSES OF MEN
BRITISH
Dead or missing.  6,104
Wounded             513
                -------
Total             6,617

GERMAN
Dead or missing   2,414
Wounded             449
                -------
Total             2,863

LOSS IN MONEY VALUE   (Rough Estimate)
British   $115,000,000
German     $63,000,000
    ----------------
Total     $178,000,000


While the world was still puzzling over the conflicting reports of the
Battle of Jutland came the shocking news that Field Marshal Lord Horatio
Herbert Kitchener, the British Secretary of State for War, had perished
off the West Orkney Islands on June 5th, through the sinking of the
British cruiser Hampshire. The entire crew was also lost, except twelve
men, a warrant officer and eleven seamen, who escaped on a raft. Earl
Kitchener was on his way to Russia, at the request of the Russian
Government, for a consultation regarding munitions to be furnished the
Russian army. He was intending to go to Archangel and visit Petrograd,
and expected to be back in London by June 20th. He was accompanied by
Hugh James O'Beirne, former Councillor of the British Embassy at
Petrograd, O.A. Fitz-Gerald, his military secretary, Brigadier-General
Ellarshaw, and Sir Frederick Donaldson, all of whom were lost.

The cause of the sinking of the Hampshire is not known. It is supposed
that it struck a mine, but the tragedy very naturally brought into
existence many stories which ascribe his death to more direct German
action.

Seaman Rogerson, one of the survivors, describes Lord Kitchener's last
moments as follows: "Of those who left the ship, and have survived, I
was the one who saw Lord Kitchener last. He went down with the ship, he
did not leave her. I saw Captain Seville help his boat's crew to clear
away his galley. At the same time the Captain was calling to Lord
Kitchener to come to the boat, but owing to the noise made by the wind
and sea, Lord Kitchener could not hear him, I think. When the explosion
occurred, Kitchener walked calmly from the Captain's cabin, went up the
ladder and on to the quarter deck. There I saw him walking quite
collectedly, talking to two of the officers. All three were wearing
khaki and had no overcoats on. Kitchener calmly watched the preparations
for abandoning the ship, which were going on in a steady and orderly
way. The crew just went to their stations, obeyed orders, and did their
best to get out the boats. But it was impossible. Owing to the rough
weather, no boats could be lowered. Those that were got out were smashed
up at once. No boats left the ship. What people on the shore thought to
be boats leaving, were rafts. Men did get into the boats as these lay in
their cradles, thinking that as the ship went under the boats would
float, but the ship sank by the head, and when she went she turned a
somersault forward, carrying down with her all the boats and those in
them. I do not think Kitchener got into a boat. When I sprang to a raft
he was still on the starboard side of the quarter deck, talking with the
officers. From the little time that elapsed between my leaving the ship
and her sinking I feel certain Kitchener went down with her, and was on
deck at the time she sank."


[Illustration: Map]
  WHERE EARL KITCHENER MET HIS DEATH


The British Admiralty, after investigation, gave out a statement
declaring that the vessel struck a mine, and sank about fifteen minutes
after.

The news of Lord Kitchener's death shocked the whole Allied world. He
was the most important personality in the British Empire. He had built
up the British army, and his name was one to conjure by. His efficiency
was a proverb, and he had an air of mystery about him that made him a
sort of a popular hero. He was great before the World War began; he was
the conqueror of the Soudan; the winner of the South African campaign;
the reorganizer of Egypt. In his work as Secretary of War he had met
with some criticism, but he possessed, more than any other man, the
public confidence. At the beginning of the war he was appointed
Secretary of War at the demand of an overwhelming public opinion. He
realized more than any one else what such a war would mean. When others
thought of it as an adventure to be soon concluded, he recognized that
there would be years of bitter conflict. He asked England to give up its
cherished tradition of a volunteer army; to go through arduous military
training; he saw the danger to the Empire, and he alone, perhaps, had
the authority to inspire his countrymen with the will to sacrifice. But
his work was done. The great British army was in the field.



CHAPTER XXII

THE RUSSIAN CAMPAIGN

In the very beginning Russia had marked out one point for attack. This
was the city of Cracow. No doubt the Grand Duke Nicholas had not hoped
to be able to invest that city early. The slowness of the mobilization
of the Russian army made a certain prudence advisable at the beginning
of the campaign. But the great success of his armies in Lemberg
encouraged more daring aims. He had invested Przemysl, and Galicia lay
before him. Accordingly, he set his face toward Cracow.

Cracow, from a military point of view, is the gate both of Vienna and
Berlin. A hundred miles west of it is the famous gap of Moravia, between
the Carpathian and the Bohemian mountains, which leads down into
Austria. Through this gap runs the great railway connecting Silesia with
Vienna, and the Grand Duke knew that if he could capture Cracow he would
have an easy road before him to the Austrian capital. Cracow also is the
key of Germany.

Seventy miles from the city lies the Oder River. An army might enter
Germany by this gate and turn the line of Germany's frontier fortresses.
The Oder had been well fortified, but an invader coming from Cracow
might move upon the western bank. The Russian plan no doubt was to
threaten both enemy capitals. Moreover, an advance of Russia from Cracow
would take its armies into Silesia, full of coal and iron mines, and one
of the greatest manufacturing districts in the German Empire. This would
be a real success, and all Germany would feel the blow.

Another reason for the Russian advance in Galicia was her desire to
control the Galician oil wells. To Germany petrol had become one of the
foremost munitions of war. Since she could not obtain it from either
America or Russia she must get it from Austria, and the Austrian oil
fields were all in Galicia. This, in itself, would explain the Galician
campaign. Moreover, through the Carpathian Mountains it was possible to
make frequent raids into Hungary, and Russia understood well the feeling
of Hungary toward her German allies.

She hoped that when Hungary perceived her regiments sacrificed and her
plains overrun by Russian troops, she would regret that she had allowed
herself to be sacrificed to Prussian ambition. The Russians, therefore,
suddenly, moved toward Cracow.

Then von Hindenburg came to the rescue. The supreme command of the
Austrian forces was given to him. The defenses of Cracow were
strengthened under the direction of the Germans, and a German army
advanced from the Posen frontier toward the northern bank of the
Vistula. The advance threatened the Russian right, and, accordingly,
within ten days' march of Cracow, the Russians stopped. The German
offensive in Poland had begun. The news of the German advance came about
the fifth of October. Von Hindenburg, who had been fighting in East
Prussia, had at last perceived that nothing could be gained there. The
vulnerable part of Russia was the city of Warsaw. This was the capital
of Poland, with a population of about three-quarters of a million. If he
could take Warsaw, he would not only have pleasant quarters for the
winter but Russia would be so badly injured that no further offensive
from her need be anticipated for a long period. Von Hindenburg had with
him a large army. In his center he probably had three-quarters of a
million men, and on his right the Austrian army in Cracow, which must
have reached a million.

Counting the troops operating in East Prussia and along the Carpathians,
and the garrison of Przemysl, the Teuton army must have had two and a
half million soldiers. Russia, on the other hand, though her
mobilization was still continuing, at this time could not have had as
many as two million men in the whole nine hundred miles of her battle
front.

The fight for Warsaw began Friday, October 16th, and continued for three
days, von Hindenburg being personally in command. On Monday the Germans
found themselves in trouble. A Russian attack on their left wing had
come with crushing force. Von Hindenburg found his left wing thrown
back, and the whole German movement thrown into disorder. Meanwhile an
attempt to cross the Vistula at Josefov had also been a failure. The
Russians allowed the Germans to pass with slight resistance, waited
until they arrived at the village Kazimirjev, a district of low hills
and swampy flats, and then suddenly overwhelmed them.

Next day the Russians crossed the river themselves, and advanced along
the whole line, driving the enemy before them, through great woods of
spruce out into the plains on the west. This forest region was well
known to the Russian guides, and the Germans suffered much as the
Russians had suffered in East Prussia. Ruzsky, the Russian commander,
pursued persistently; the Germans retreating first to Kielce, whence
they were driven, on the 3d of November, with great losses, and then
being broken into two pieces, with the north retiring westward and the
south wing southwest toward Cracow.

Rennenkampf's attack on the German left wing was equally successful, and
von Hindenburg was driven into full retreat. The only success won during
this campaign was that in the far south where Austrian troops were
sweeping eastward toward the San. This army drove back the Russians
under Ivanov, reoccupied Jaroslav and relieved Przemysl. This was a
welcome relief to Przemysl, for the garrison was nearly starved, and it
was well for the garrison that the relief came, for in a few days the
Russians returned, recaptured Jaroslav and reinvested Przemysl. As von
Hindenburg retreated he left complete destruction in his wake, roads,
bridges, railroad tracks, water towers, railway stations, all were
destroyed; even telegraph posts, broken or sawn through, and insulators
broken to bits.

It was now the turn of Russia to make a premature advance, and to pay
for it. Doubtless the Grand Duke Nicholas, whose strategy up to this
point had been so admirable, knew very well the danger of a new advance
in Galicia, but he realized the immense political as well as military
advantages which were to be obtained by the capture of Cracow. He
therefore attempted to move an army through Poland as well as through
Galicia, hoping that the army in Poland would keep von Hindenburg busy,
while the Galician army would deal with Cracow.

The advance was slow on account of the damaged Polish roads. It was
preceded by a cavalry screen which moved with more speed. On November
10th, the vanguard crossed the Posen frontier and cut the railway on the
Cracow-Posen line. This reconnaissance convinced the Russian general
that the German army did not propose to make a general stand, and it
seemed to him that if he struck strongly with his center along the
Warta, he might destroy the left flank of the German southern army,
while his own left flank was assaulting Cracow. He believed that even if
his attack upon the Warta failed, the Russian center could at any rate
prevent the enemy from interfering with the attack further south upon
Cracow.

The movement therefore began, and by November 12th, the Russian cavalry
had taken Miechow on the German frontier, about twenty miles north of
Cracow. Its main forces were still eighty miles to the east. About this
time Grand Duke Nicholas perceived that von Hindenburg was preparing a
counter stroke. He had retreated north, and then, by means of his
railways, was gathering a large army at Thorn. Large reinforcements were
sent him, some from the western front, giving him a total of about eight
hundred thousand men. In his retreat from Warsaw, while he had destroyed
all roads and railways in the south and west, he had carefully preserved
those of the north already planning to use them in another movement. He
now was beginning an advance, once again, against Warsaw. On account of
the roads he perceived that it would be difficult for the Russians to
obtain reinforcements. Von Hindenburg had with him as Chief of Staff
General von Ludendorff, one of the cleverest staff officers in the
German army, and General von Mackensen, a commander of almost equal
repute.

The Russian army in the north had been pretty well scattered. The
Russian forces were now holding a front of nearly a thousand miles, with
about two million men. The Russian right center, which now protected
Warsaw from the new attack could hardly number more than two hundred
thousand men. Von Hindenburg's aim was Warsaw only, and did not affect
directly the Russian advance to Cracow, which was still going on.
Indeed, by the end of the first week in December, General Dmitrieff had
cavalry in the suburbs of Cracow, and his main force was on the line of
the River Rava about twelve miles away. Cracow had been strongly
fortified, and much entrenching had been done in a wide circle around
the city.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright Press Illustrating Service.
  THE FAMOUS WITHERED ARM
  A most unusual photograph of the ex-Kaiser showing his withered left
  arm.  The sale of this picture was forbidden in Germany. The other
  figure is the Hetman of the Ukrainia, Skoropadski.


[Illustration: Painting]
  THE FIRST STAGE HOMEWARDS
  Stretcher bearers bringing in wounded from the battlefield to the
  collecting posts.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  GERMAN FRIGHTFULNESS FROM THE AIR
  A gas attack on the eastern front photographed by a Russian airman.


The German plan was to use its field army in Cracow's defense rather
than a garrison. Two separate forces were used; one moving southwest of
Cracow along the Carpathian hills, struck directly at Ivanov's left; the
other, operating from Hungary, threatened the Russian rear. These two
divisions struck at the same time and the Russians found it necessary to
fight rear actions as they moved forward. They were doing this with
reasonable success and working their way toward Cracow, when, on the
12th of December, the Austrian forces working from Hungary carried the
Dukla Pass. This meant that the Austrians would be able to pour troops
down into the rear of the Russian advance, and the Russian army would be
cut off. Dmitrieff, therefore, fell rapidly back, until the opening of
the Dukla Pass was in front of his line, and the Russian army was once
more safe.

Meanwhile the renewed siege of Przemysl was going on with great vigor,
and attracting the general attention of the Allied world. The Austrians
attempted to follow up their successes at the Dukla Pass by attempting
to seize the Lupkow Pass, and the Uzzok Pass, still further to the east,
but the Russians were tired of retreating. New troops had arrived, and
about the 20th of December a new advance was begun.

With the right of the army swinging up along the river Nida, northeast
of Cracow, the Russian left attacked the Dukla Pass in great force,
driving Austrians back and capturing over ten thousand men. On Christmas
Day all three great western passes were in Russian hands. The Austrian
fighting, during this period, was the best they had so far shown, the
brunt of it being upon the Hungarian troops, who, at this time, were
saving Germany.

Meantime von Hindenburg was pursuing his movement in the direction of
Warsaw. The Russian generals found it difficult to obtain information.
Each day came the chronicle of contests, some victories, some defeats,
and it soon appeared that a strong force was crushing in the Russian
outposts from the direction of Thorn and moving toward Warsaw. Ruzsky
found himself faced by a superior German force, and was compelled to
retreat. The Russian aim was to fall back behind the river Bzura, which
lies between the Thorn and Warsaw. Bzura is a strong line of defense,
with many fords but no bridges. The Russian right wing passed by the
city of Lowicz, moved southwest to Strykov and then on past Lodz. West
of Lowicz is a great belt of marshes impossible for the movement of
armies.

The first German objective was the city of Lodz. Von Hindenburg knew
that he must move quickly before the Russians should get up reserves.
His campaign of destruction had made it impossible for aid to be sent to
the Russian armies from Ivanov, far in the south, but every moment
counted. His right pushed forward and won the western crossings of the
marshes. His extreme left moved towards Plock, but the main effort was
against Piontek, where there is a famous causeway engineered for heavy
transport through the marshes.

At first the Russians repelled the attack on the causeway, but on
November 19th the Russians broke and were compelled to fall back. Over
the causeway, then, the German troops were rushed in great numbers,
splitting the Russian army into two parts; one on the south surrounding
Lodz, and the other running east of Brezin on to the Vistula. The
Russian army around Lodz was assailed on the front flank and rear. It
looked like an overwhelming defeat for the Russian army. At the very
last moment possible, Russian reinforcements appeared--a body of
Siberians from the direction of Warsaw. They were thrown at once into
the battle and succeeded in re-establishing the Russian line. This left
about ninety thousand Germans almost entirely surrounded, as if they
were in a huge sack. Ruzsky tried his best to close the mouth of the
sack, but he was unsuccessful. The fighting was terrific, but by the
26th the Germans in the sack had escaped.

The Germans were continually receiving reinforcements and still largely
outnumbered the Russians. Von Hindenburg therefore determined on a new
assault. The German left wing was now far in front of the Russian city
of Lodz, one of the most important of the Polish cities. The population
was about half a million. Such a place was a constant danger, for it was
the foundation of a Russian salient.  When the German movement began the
Russian general, perceiving how difficult it would have been to hold the
city, deliberately withdrew, and on December 6th the Germans entered
Lodz without opposition.

The retreat relieved the Russians of a great embarrassment. Its capture
was considered in Germany as a great German victory, and at this time
von Hindenburg seems to have felt that he had control of the situation.
His movement, to be sure, had not interfered with the Russian advance on
Cracow, but Warsaw must have seemed to him almost in his power. He
therefore concentrated his forces for a blow at Warsaw. His first new
movement was directed at the Russian right wing, which was then north of
the Bzura River and east of Lowicz. He also directed the German forces
in East Prussia to advance and attempted to cut the main railway line
between Warsaw and Petrograd. If this attempt had been successful it
would have been a highly serious matter for the Russians. The Russians,
however, defeated it, and drove the enemy back to the East Prussian
border. The movement against the Russian right wing was more successful,
and the Russians fell back slowly. This was not because they were
defeated in battle, but because the difficult weather interfered with
communications. There had been a thaw, and the whole country was
waterlogged. The Grand Duke was willing that the Germans should fight in
the mud.

This slow retreat continued from the 7th of December to Christmas Eve,
and involved the surrender of a number of Polish towns, but it left the
Russians in a strong position. They were able to entrench themselves so
that every attack of the enemy was broken. The Germans tried hard. Von
Hindenburg would have liked to enter Warsaw on Christmas. The citizens
heard day and night the sound of the cannon, but they were entirely
safe.

The German attack was a failure. On the whole, the Grand Duke Nicholas
had shown better strategy than the best of the German generals.
Outnumbered from the very start, his tactics had been admirable. Twice
he had saved Warsaw, and he was still threatening Cracow. The Russian
armies were fighting with courage and efficiency, and were continually
growing in numbers as the days went by.

During the first weeks of 1915 while there were a number of attacks and
counter attacks both armies had come to the trench warfare, so familiar
in France. The Germans in particular had constructed a most elaborate
trench system, with underground rooms containing many of the ordinary
comforts of life. Toward the end of the month the Russians began to move
in East Prussia in the north and also far south in the Bukovina. The
object of these movements was probably to prevent von Hindenburg from
releasing forces on the west. Russia was still terribly weak in
equipment and was not ready for a serious advance. An attack on sacred
East Prussia would stir up the Germans, while Hungary would be likewise
disturbed by the advance on Bukovina. Von Hindenburg, however, was still
full of the idea of capturing Warsaw. He had failed twice but the old
Field Marshal was stubborn and moreover he knew well what the capture of
Warsaw would mean to Russia, and so he tried again.

The Russian front now followed the west bank of the Bzura for a few
miles, changed to the eastern bank following the river until it met with
the Rawka, from there a line of trenches passed south and east of
Balinov and from there to Skiernievice. Von Mackensen concentrated a
considerable army at Balinov and had on the 1st of February about a
hundred and forty thousand men there. That night, with the usual
artillery preparation, he moved from Balinov against the Russian
position at the Borzymov Crest. The Germans lost heavily but drove
forward into the enemy's line, and by the 3d of February had almost made
a breach in it. This point, however, could be readily reinforced and
troops were hurried there from Warsaw in such force that on February 4th
the German advance was checked. Von Mackensen had lost heavily, and by
the time it was checked he had become so weak that his forces yielded
quickly to the counter-attack and were flung back.

This was the last frontal attack upon Warsaw. Von Hindenburg then
determined to attack Warsaw by indirection. Austria was instructed to
move forward along the whole Carpathian front, while he himself, with
strong forces, undertook to move from East Prussia behind the Polish
capital, and cut the communications between Warsaw and Petrograd. If
Austria could succeed, Przemysl might be relieved, Lemberg recaptured,
and Russia forced back so far on the south that Warsaw would have to be
abandoned. On the other hand if the East Prussia effort were successful,
the Polish capital would certainly fall. These plans, if they had
developed successfully, would have crippled the power of Russia for at
least six months. Meantime, troops could be sent to the west front, and
perhaps enable Germany to overwhelm France. By this time almost all of
Poland west of the Vistula was in the power of the Germans, while
three-fourths of Galicia was controlled by Russia.

Von Hindenburg now returned to his old battle-ground near the Masurian
Lakes. The Russian forces, which, at the end of January, had made a
forward movement in East Prussia, had been quite successful. Their right
was close upon Tilsit, and their left rested upon the town of
Johannisburg. Further south was the Russian army of the Narev. Von
Hindenburg determined to surprise the invaders, and he gathered an army
of about three hundred thousand men to face the Russian forces which did
not number more than a hundred and twenty thousand, and which were under
the command of General Baron Sievers. The Russian army soon found itself
in a desperate position. A series of bitter fights ensued, at some of
which the Kaiser himself was present. The Russians were driven steadily
back for a week, but the German stories of their tremendous losses are
obviously unfounded. They retreated steadily until February 20th,
fighting courageously, and by that date the Germans began to find
themselves exhausted.

Russian reinforcements came up, and a counter-attack was begun. The
German aim had evidently been to reach Grodno and cut the main line from
Warsaw to Petrograd, which passes through that city. They had now
reached Suwalki, a little north of Grodno, but were unable to advance
further, though the Warsaw-Petrograd railway was barely ten miles away.
The southern portion of von Hindenburg's army was moving against the
railway further west, in the direction of Ossowietz. But Ossowietz put
up a determined resistance, and the attack was unsuccessful. By the
beginning of March, von Hindenburg ordered a gradual retreat to the East
Prussian frontier.

While this movement to drive the Russians from East Prussia was under
way, von Hindenburg had also launched an attack against the Russian army
on the Narev. If he could force the lower Narev from that point, too, he
could cut the railroad running east from the Polish capital. He had
hoped that the attacks just described further east would distract the
Russian attention so that he would find the Narev ill guarded. The
advance began on February 22d, and after numerous battles captured
Przasnysz, and found itself with only one division to oppose its
progress to the railroad. On the 23d this force was attacked by the
German right, but resisted with the utmost courage. It held out for more
than thirty-six hours, until, on the evening of the 24th, Russian
reinforcements began to come up, and drove the invaders north through
Przasnysz in retreat.

It was an extraordinary fight. The Russians were unable to supply all
their troops with munitions and arms. At Przasnysz men fought without
rifles, armed only with a bayonet. All they could do was to charge with
cold steel, and they did it so desperately that, though they were
outnumbered, they drove the Germans before them. By all the laws of war
the Russians should have been defeated with ease. As it was, the German
attempt to capture Warsaw by a flank movement was defeated. While the
struggle was going on in the north, the Austrian armies in Galicia were
also moving, Russia was still holding the three great passes in the
Carpathian Mountains, but had not been able to begin an offensive in
Hungary.

The Austrians had been largely reinforced by German troops, and were
moving forward to the relief of Przemysl, and also to drive Brussilov
from the Galician mountains. Brussilov's movements had been partly
military and partly political. From the passes in those mountains
Hungary could be attacked, and unless he could be driven away there was
no security for the Hungarian cornfields, to which Germany was looking
for food supplies. Moreover, from the beginning of the Russian movement
in Galicia, northern Bukovina had been in Russian hands. Bukovina was
not only a great supply ground for petrol and grain, but she adjoined
Roumania which, while still neutral, had a strong sympathy with the
Allies, especially Italy. The presence of a Russian army on her border
might encourage her to join the Allies. Austria naturally desired to
free Roumania from this pressure. The leading Austrian statesmen, at
this time, were especially interested in Hungary. The Austrian Minister
of Foreign Affairs was Baron Stephen Burian, the Hungarian diplomatist,
belonging to the party of the Hungarian Premier, Count Tisza. It was his
own country that was threatened. The prizes of a victorious campaign
were therefore great.

The campaign began in January amid the deepest snow, and continued
during February in the midst of blizzards. The Austrians were divided
into three separate armies. The first was charged with the relief of
Przemysl. The second advanced in the direction of Lemberg, and the third
moved upon Bukovina. The first made very little progress, after a number
of lively battles. It was held pretty safely by Brussilov. The second
army was checked by Dmitrieff. Further east, however, the army of the
Bukovina crossed the Carpathian range, and made considerable advances.
This campaign was fought out in a great number of battles, the most
serious of which, perhaps, was the battle of Koziowa. At that point
Brussilov's center withstood for several days the Austrian second army
which was commanded by the German General von Linsengen. The Russian
success here saved Lemberg, prevented the relief of Przemysl and gave
time to send reinforcements into Bukovina.

The Austrian third army, moving on Bukovina, had the greatest Austrian
success. They captured in succession Czernowitz, Kolomea, and Stanislau.
They did not succeed, however, in driving the Russians from the
province. The Russians retired slowly, waiting for reinforcements. These
reinforcements came, whereupon the Austrians were pushed steadily back.
The passes in the Carpathians still remained in Austrian hands, but
Przemysl was not relieved or Lemberg recaptured. On March 22d Przemysl
fell.

The capture of Przemysl was the greatest success that Russia had so far
attained. It had been besieged for about four months, and the taking of
the fortress was hailed as the first spectacular success of the war. Its
capture altered the whole situation. It released a large Russian army,
which was sent to reinforce the armies of Ivanov, where the Austrians
were vigorously attacked.

By the end of March the Russians had captured the last Austrian position
on the Lupkow pass and were attacking vigorously the pass of Uzzok,
which maintained a stubborn defense. Brussilov tried to push his way to
the rear of the Uzzok position, and though the Austrians delivered a
vigorous counter-attack they were ultimately defeated. In five weeks of
fighting Ivanov captured over seventy thousand prisoners.

During this period there was considerable activity in East Prussia, and
the Courland coast was bombarded by the German Baltic squadron. There
was every indication that Austria was near collapse, but all the time
the Germans were preparing for a mighty effort, and the secret was kept
with extraordinary success. The little conflicts in the Carpathians and
in East Prussia were meant to deceive, while a great army, with an
enormous number of guns of every caliber, and masses of ammunition, were
being gathered. The Russian commanders were completely deceived. There
had been no change in the generals in command except that General
Ruzsky, on account of illness, was succeeded by General Alexeiev. The
new German army was put under the charge of von Hindenburg's former
lieutenant, General von Mackensen. This was probably the strongest army
that Germany ever gathered, and could not have numbered less than two
millions of men, with nearly two thousand pieces in its heavy batteries.

On April 28th, the action began. The Austro-German army lay along the
left of the Donajetz River to its junction with the Biala, and along the
Biala to the Carpathian Mountains. Von Mackensen's right moved in the
direction of Gorlice. General Dmitrieff was compelled to weaken his
front to protect Gorlice and then, on Saturday, the 1st of May, the
great attack began. Under cover of artillery fire such as had never been
seen before bridges were pushed across the Biala and Ciezkowice was
taken. The Russian positions were blown out of existence. The Russian
armies did what they could but their defense collapsed and they were
soon in full retreat.

The German armies advanced steadily, and though the Russians made a
brave stand at many places they could do nothing. On the Wisloka they
hung on for five days, but they were attempting an impossibility. From
that time on each day marked a new German victory, and in spite of the
most desperate fighting the Russians were forced back until, on the
11th, the bulk of their line lay just west of the lower San as far as
Przemysl and then south to the upper Dniester. The armies were in
retreat, but were not routed. In a fortnight the army of Dmitrieff had
fallen back eighty-five miles.

The Grand Duke Nicholas by this time understood the situation. He
perceived that it was impossible to make a stand. The only thing to do
was to retreat steadily until Germany's mass of war material should be
used up, even though miles of territory should be sacrificed. It should
be a retreat in close contact with the enemy, so that the Austro-German
troops would have to fight for every mile. This meant a retreat not for
days, but perhaps for weeks. It meant that Przemysl must be given up,
and Lemberg, and even Warsaw, but the safety of the Russian army was of
more importance than a province or a city.

On May 18th the German War Office announced their successes in the
following terms: "The army under General von Mackensen in the course of
its pursuit of the Russians reached yesterday the neighborhood of
Subiecko, on the lower Wisloka, and Kolbuezowa, northeast of Debica.
Under the pressure of this advance the Russians also retreated from
their positions north of the Vistula. In this section the troops under
General von Woyrach, closely following the enemy, penetrated as far as
the region northwest of Kielce. In the Carpathians Austro-Hungarian and
German troops under General von Linsingen conquered the hills east of
the Upper Stryi, and took 3,660 men prisoners, as well as capturing six
machine guns. At the present moment, while the armies under General von
Mackensen are approaching the Przemysl fortresses and the lower San, it
is possible to form an approximate idea of the booty taken. In the
battles of Tarno and Gorlika, and in the battles during the pursuit of
these armies, we have so far taken 103,500 Russian prisoners, 69 cannon,
and 255 machine guns. In these figures the booty taken by the Allied
troops fighting in the Carpathians, and north of the Vistula, is not
included. This amounts to a further 40,000 prisoners. Przemysl
surrendered to the German's on June 3, 1915, only ten weeks after the
Russian capture of the fortress, which had caused such exultation."

General von Mackensen continued toward Lemberg, the capital of Galicia.
On June 18th, when the victorious German armies were approaching the
gates of Lemberg, the Russian losses were estimated at 400,000 dead and
wounded, and 300,000 prisoners, besides 100,000 lost before Marshal von
Hindenburg's forces in Poland and Courland. On June 23d Lemberg fell.
The weakness of Russia in this campaign arose from the exhaustion of her
ammunition supplies, but great shipments of such supplies were being
constantly forwarded from Vladivostock.

When the German army crossed the San, Wilhelm II, then German Emperor,
was present. It is interesting to look back on the scene. Here is a
paragraph from the account of the Wolff Telegraphic Bureau: "The Emperor
had hurried forward to his troops by automobile. On the way he was
greeted with loud hurrahs by the wounded, riding back in wagons. On the
heights of Jaroslav the Emperor met Prince Eitel Friedrich, and then,
from several points of observation, for hours followed with keen
attention the progress of the battle for the crossing."

While the great offensive in Galicia was well under way, the Germans
were pushing forward in East Prussia. Finding little resistance they
ultimately invaded Courland, captured Libau, and established themselves
firmly in that province. The sweep of the victorious German armies
through Galicia was continued into Poland. On July 19th William the War
Lord bombastically telegraphed his sister, the Queen of Greece, to the
effect that he had "paralyzed Russia for at least six months to come"
and was on the eve of "delivering a coup on the western front that will
make all Europe tremble."

It would be futile to recount the details of the various German
victories which followed the advance into Poland. On July 24th, the
German line ran from Novgorod in the north, south of Przasnysz, thence
to Novogeorgievsk, then swinging to the southeast below Warsaw it passed
close to the west of Ivangorad, Lublin, Chelm, and then south to a point
just east of Lemberg. Warsaw at that time was in the jaws of the German
nutcracker.

On July 21st, the bells in all the churches throughout Russia clanged a
call to prayer for twenty-four hours' continual service of intercession
for victory. In spite of the heat the churches were packed. Hour after
hour the people stood wedged together, while the priests and choirs
chanted their litanies. Outside the Kamian Cathedral an open-air mass
was celebrated in the presence of an enormous crowd. But the German
victories continued.

On August 5th Warsaw was abandoned. Up to July 29th hope was entertained
in military quarters in London and Paris that the Germans would stand a
siege in their fortresses along the Warsaw salient, but on that date
advices came from Petrograd that in order to save the Russian armies a
retreat must be made, and the Warsaw fortresses abandoned. For some time
before this the Russian resistance had perceptibly stiffened, and many
vigorous counter-attacks had been made against the German advance, but
it was the same old story, the lack of ammunition. The armies were
compelled to retire and await the munitions necessary for a new
offensive.

The last days of Russian rule in Warsaw were days of extraordinary
interest. The inhabitants, to the number of nearly half a million,
sought refuge in Russia. All goods that could be useful to the Germans
were either removed or burned. Crops were destroyed in the surrounding
fields. When the Germans entered they found an empty and deserted city,
with only a few Poles and the lowest classes of Jews still left. Warsaw
is a famous city, full of ancient palaces, tastefully, adorned shops,
finely built streets, and fourscore church towers where the bells are
accustomed to ring melodiously for matins and vespers. In the Ujazdowske
Avenue one comes to the most charming building in all Warsaw, the
Lazienki Palace, with its delicious gardens mirrored in a lovely lake.
It is a beautiful city.

The fall of Warsaw meant the fall of Russian Poland, but Russia was not
yet defeated. Von Hindenburg was to be treated as Napoleon was in 1812,
The strategy of the Grand Duke was sound; so long as he could save the
army the victories of Germany would be futile. It is true that the
German armies were not compelled, like those of Napoleon, to live on the
land. They could bring their supplies from Berlin day by day, but every
mile they advanced into hostile territory made their task harder. The
German line of communication, as it grew longer, became weaker and the
troops needed for garrison duty in the captured towns, seriously
diminished the strength of the fighting army, The Russian retreat was
good strategy and it was carried on with extraordinary cleverness.

It is unnecessary to describe the events which succeeded the fall of
Warsaw in great detail. There was a constant succession of German
victories and Russian defeats, but never one of the Russian armies
enveloped or destroyed. Back they went, day after day, always fighting;
each great Russian fortress resisted until it saw itself in danger, and
then safely withdrew its troops. Kovno fell and Novogeorgievsk, and
Ivangorad, then Ossowietz was abandoned, and Brest-Litovsk and Grodno.

On September 5th the Emperor of Russia signed the following order:


Today I have taken supreme command of all the forces of the sea and land
armies operating in the theater of war. With firm faith in the clemency
of God, with unshakable assurance in final victory, we shall fulfil our
sacred duty to defend our country to the last. We will not dishonor the
Russian land.


The Grand Duke Nicholas was made Viceroy of the Caucasus, a post which
took him out of the main theater of fighting but gave him a great field
for fresh military activity. He had been bearing a heavy burden, and had
shown himself to be a great commander. He had outmaneuvered von
Hindenberg again and again, and though finally the Russian armies under
his command had been driven back, the retreat itself was a proof of his
military ability, not only in its conception, but in the way in which it
was done.

The Emperor chose General Alexieff as his Chief of General Staff. He was
the ablest of the great generals who had been leading the Russian army.
With this change in command a new spirit seemed to come over Russia. The
German advance, however, was not yet completely checked. It was
approaching Vilna.

The fighting around Vilna was the bitterest in the whole long retreat.
On the 18th of September it fell, but the Russian troops were safely
removed and the Russian resistance had become strong. Munitions were
pouring into the new Russian army. The news from the battle-front began
to show improvement. On September 8th General Brussilov, further in the
south, had attacked the Germans in front of Tarnopol, and defeated them
with heavy loss. More than seventeen thousand men were captured with
much artillery. Soon the news came of other advances. Dubno was retaken
and Lutsk.

The end of September saw the German advance definitely checked. The
Russian forces were now extended in a line from Riga on the north, along
the river Dvina, down to Dvinsk. Then turning to the east along the
river, it again turned south and so on down east of the Pripet Marshes,
it followed an almost straight line to the southern frontier. Its two
strongest points were Riga, on the Gulf of Riga, which lay under the
protection of the guns of the fleet, and Dvinsk, through which ran the
great Petrograd Railway line. Against these two points von Hindenburg
directed his attack. And now, for the first time in many months, he met
with complete failure. The German fleet attempted to assist him on the
Gulf of Riga, but was defeated by the Russian Baltic fleet with heavy
losses. A bombardment turned out a failure and the German armies were
compelled to retire.


[Illustration: Map: Riga and Surroundings.]
  THE GERMAN ATTACK ON THE ROAD TO PETROGRAD


A more serious effort was made against Dvinsk but was equally
unsuccessful and the German losses were immense. Again and again the
attempt was made to cross the Dvina River, but without success; the
German invasion was definitely stopped. By the end of October there was
complete stagnation in the northern sector of the battle line, and
though in November there were a number of battles, nothing happened of
great importance.

During the year 1916 the Russian armies seemed to have had a new birth.
At last they were supplied with guns and munitions. They waited until
they were ready. In March a series of battles was fought in the
neighborhood of Lake Narotch, and eight successive attacks were made
against the German army, intrenched between Lake Narotch and Lake
Vischenebski. The Germans at first were driven back and badly defeated.
Later on, however, the Russian artillery was sent to another section,
and the Germans were able to recover their position. During June the
Russians attacked all along the southern part of their line. In three
weeks they had regained a whole province. Lutsk and Dubno had been
retaken; two hundred thousand men and hundreds of guns, had been
captured, and the Austrian line had been pierced and shattered. Further
south the German army had been compelled to retreat and the Russian
armies were in Bukovina and Galicia. On the 10th of August Stanislau
fell.

By this time two Austrian armies had been shattered, over three hundred
and fifty thousand prisoners taken, and nearly a million men put out of
action. Germany, however, was sending reinforcements as fast as
possible, and putting up a desperate defense. Nevertheless everything
was encouraging for Russia and she entered upon the winter in a very
different condition from her condition in the previous year. Then she
had just ended her great retreat. Now she had behind her a series of
successes. But a new difficulty had arisen in the loss of the political
harmony at home which had marked the first years of the war. Dark days
were ahead.



CHAPTER XXII

HOW THE BALKANS DECIDED

 For more than half a century the Balkans have presented a problem which
 disturbed the minds of the statesmen of Europe. Again and again, during
 that period, it seemed that in the Balkan mountains might be kindled a
 blaze which might set the world afire. Balkan politics is a labyrinth
 in which one might easily be lost. The inhabitants of the Balkans
 represent many races, each with its own ambition, and, for the most
 part, military. There were Serbs, and Bulgarians, and Turks, and
 Roumanians, and Greeks, and their territorial divisions did not
 correspond to their nationalities. The land was largely mountainous,
 with great gaps that make it, in a sense, the highway of the world.
 From 1466 to 1878 the Balkans was in the dominion of the Turks. In the
 early days while the Turks were warring against Hungary, their armies
 marched through the Balkan hills. The natives kept apart, and preserved
 their language, religion and customs.

In the nineteenth century, as the Turks grew weaker, their subject
people began to seek independence. Greece came first, and, in 1829,
aided by France, Russia and Great Britain, she became an independent
kingdom. Serbia revolted in 1804, and by 1820 was an autonomous state,
though still tributary to Turkey. In 1859, Roumania became autonomous.
The rising of Bulgaria in 1876, however, was really the beginning of the
succession of events which ultimately led to the World War of 1914-18.
The Bulgarian insurrection was crushed by the Turks in such a way as to
stir the indignation of the whole world. What are known as the
"Bulgarian Atrocities" seem mild today, but they led to the
Russo-Turkish War in 1877.

The treaty of Berlin, by which that war was settled in 1878, was one of
those treaties which could only lead to trouble. It deprived Russia of
much of the benefit of her victory, and left nearly every racial
question unsettled. Roumania lost Bessarabia, which was mainly inhabited
by Roumanians. Bosnia and Herzegovina were handed over to the
administration of Austria. Turkey was allowed to retain Macedonia,
Albania and Thrace. Serbia was given Nish, but had no outlet to the sea.
Greece obtained Thessaly, and a new province was made of the country
south of the Balkans called Eastern Rumelia. From that time on, quarrel
after quarrel made up the history of the Balkan peoples, each of whom
sought the assistance and support of some one of the great powers.
Russia and Austria were constantly intriguing with the new states, in
the hope of extending their own domains in the direction of
Constantinople.

The history of Bulgaria shows that that nation has been continually the
center of these intrigues. In 1879 they elected as their sovereign
Prince Alexander of Battenburg, whose career might almost be called
romantic. A splendid soldier and an accomplished gentleman, he stands
out as an interesting figure in the sordid politics of the Balkans. He
identified himself with his new country. In 1885 he brought about a
union with Eastern Rumelia, which led to a disagreement with Russia.

Serbia, doubtless at Russian instigation, suddenly declared war, but was
overwhelmed by Prince Alexander in short order. Russia then abducted
Prince Alexander, but later was forced to restore him. However, Russian
intrigues, and his failure to obtain support from one of the great
powers, forced his abdication in 1886.

In 1887 Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha became the Prince of
Bulgaria. He, also, was a remarkable man, but not the romantic of his
predecessor. He seems to have been a sort of a parody of a king. He was
fond of ostentation, and full of ambition. He was a personal coward, but
extremely cunning. During his long reign he built up Bulgaria into a
powerful, independent kingdom, and even assumed the title of Czar of
Bulgaria. During the first days of his reign he was kept safely on the
throne by his mother, the Princess Clementine, a daughter of Louis
Phillippe, who, according to Gladstone, was the cleverest woman in
Europe, and for a few years Bulgaria was at peace. In 1908 he declared
Bulgaria independent, and its independence was recognized by Turkey on
the payment of an indemnity. During this period Russia was the protector
of Bulgaria, but the Bulgarian fox was looking also for the aid of
Austria. Serbia more and more relied upon Russia.


[Illustration: Painting]
  Official Canadian War Records.
  "TIME'S UP! OVER YOU GO!"
  The word comes from the officer, watch in hand, "Time's up! Over you
  go!" and instantly the men from the Dominion begin to climb out of the
  trench. The picture shows the departure of the first of the three or
  more lines or "waves" that moves forward over "No Man's Land" against
  the enemy trenches.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Photo by International Film Service.
  TRANSPORTING WOUNDED AMID THE DIFFICULTIES OF THE ITALIAN MOUNTAIN FRONT
  The isolated mountain positions were only accessible to the bases of
  operations by these aerial cable cars. This picture, taken during the
  Austrian retreat, shows a wounded soldier being taken down the
  mountain by this means.


[Illustration: Photograph: Soldier working on a telephone connection.]
  Copyright Underwood and Underwood, N. Y.
  British Official Photo
  THE NERVE-SYSTEM OF THE FIGHTING ARMIES
  What the nerves are to the human body the signal system was to the
  armies, transmitting warnings of danger from the outposts to a central
  brain, and flashing back the thing to be done to meet it.


The Austrian treatment of the Slavs was a source of constant irritation
to Serbia. Roumania had a divided feeling. Her loss of Bessarabia to
Russia had caused ill feeling, but in Austria's province of Transylvania
there were millions of Roumanians, whom Roumania desired to bring under
her rule. Greece was fearful of Russia, because of Russia's desire for
the control of Constantinople. All of these nations, too, were deeply
conscious of the Austro-German ambitions for extension of their power
through to the East. Each of these principalities was also jealous of
the other. Bulgaria and Serbia had been at war; many Bulgarians were in
the Roumanian territory, many Serbians, Bulgarians and Greeks in
Macedonia. There was only one tie in common, that was their hatred of
Turkey. In 1912 a league was formed, under the direction of the Greek
statesman, Venizelos, having for its object an attack on Turkey. By
secret treaties arrangements were made for the division of the land,
which they hoped to obtain from Turkey.

War was declared, and Turkey was decisively defeated, and then the
trouble began. Serbia and Bulgaria had been particularly anxious for an
outlet to the sea, and in the treaty between them it had been arranged
that Serbia should have an outlet on the Adriatic, while Bulgaria was to
obtain an outlet on the AEgean. The Triple Alliance positively refused
Serbia its share of the Adriatic coast. Serbia insisted, therefore, on a
revision of the treaty, which would enable her to have a seaport on the
AEgean.

An attempt was made to settle the question by arbitration, but King
Ferdinand refused, whereupon, in July, 1913, the Second Balkan War
began. Bulgaria was attacked by Greece and Serbia, and Turkey took a
chance and regained Adrianople, and even Roumania, which had been
neutral in the First Baltic War, mobilized her armies and marched toward
Sofia. Bulgaria surrendered, and on the 10th of August the Treaty of
Bucharest was signed by the Balkan States.

As a result of this Bulgaria was left in a thoroughly dissatisfied state
of mind. She had been the leader in the war against Turkey, she had
suffered heavy losses, and she had gained almost nothing. Moreover she
had lost to Roumania, a territory containing a quarter of a million
Bulgarians, and a splendid harbor on the Black Sea. Serbia and Greece
were the big winners. Such a treaty could not be a final settlement. The
Balkans were left seething with unrest. Serbia, though she had gained
much, was still dissatisfied. Her ambitions, however, now turned in the
direction of the Jugoslavs under the rule of Austria, and it was her
agitation in this matter which directly brought on the Great War. But
Bulgaria was sullen and ready for revenge. When the Great War began,
therefore, Roumania, Serbia, Montenegro and Greece were strongly in
sympathy with Russia, who had been their backer and friend. Bulgaria, in
spite of all she owed to Russia in the early days, was now ready to find
protection from an alliance with the Central Powers. Her feeling was
well known to the Allies, and every effort was made to obtain her
friendship and, if possible, her aid.

Viviani, then Premier of France, in an address before the French Chamber of
Deputies, said:


The Balkan question was raised at the outset of the war, even before it
came to the attention of the world. The Bucharest Treaty had left in
Bulgaria profound heartburnings. Neither King nor people were resigned
to the loss of the fruits of their efforts and sacrifices, and to the
consequences of the unjustifiable war they had waged upon their former
allies. From the first day, the Allied governments took into account the
dangers of such a situation, and sought a means to remedy it. Their
policy has proceeded in a spirit of justice and generosity which has
characterized the attitude of Great Britain, Russia and Italy as well as
France. We have attempted to re-establish the union of the Baltic
peoples, and in accord with them seek the realization of their principal
national aspirations. The equilibrium thus obtained by mutual sacrifices
really made by each would have been the best guarantee of future peace.
Despite constant efforts in which Roumania, Greece and Serbia lent their
assistance, we have been unable to obtain the sincere collaboration of
the Bulgarian Government. The difficulties respecting the negotiations
were always at Sofia.


At the beginning of the war it appears, therefore, that Bulgaria was
entering into negotiations with the Allies, hoping to regain in this
way, some of the territory she had lost in the Second Baltic War. Many
of her leading statesmen and most distinguished generals favored the
cause of Russia, but in May came the great German advance in Galicia,
and the Allies' stalemate in the Dardanelles, and the king, and his
supporters, found the way clear for a movement in favor of Germany.
Still protesting neutrality they signed a secret treaty with Berlin,
Vienna and Constantinople on July 17th. The Central Powers had promised
them not only what they had been asking, in Macedonia, but also the
Greek territory of Epirus. This treaty was concealed from those
Bulgarian leaders who still held to Russia, and on the 5th of October
Bulgaria formally entered into war on the side of Germany, and began an
attack on Serbia.

The full account of the intrigue which led to this action has never been
told. It is not improbable that King Ferdinand himself never had any
other idea than to act as he did, but he dissembled for a long time. He
set forth his claims in detail to the Allies, who used every effort to
induce Roumania, Greece and Serbia to make the concessions that would be
necessary. Such concessions were made, but not until it was too late. In
a telegram from Milan dated September 24th, an account is given of an
interview between Czar Ferdinand and a committee from those Bulgarians
who were opposed to the King's policy.

"Mind your own head. I shall mind mine!" are the words which the King
spoke to M. Stambulivski when he received the five opposition members
who had come to warn him of the danger to which he was exposing himself
and the nation.

The five members were received by the King in the red room at the Royal
Palace and chairs had been placed for them around a big table. The King
entered the room, accompanied by Prince Boris, the heir apparent, and
his secretary, M. Boocovitch.

"Be seated, gentlemen," said the King, as he sat down himself, as if for
a very quiet talk. His secretary took a seat at the table, a little
apart to take notes, but the conversation immediately became so heated
and rapid that he was unable to write it down.

The first to speak was M. Malinoff, leader of the Democratic party, who
said: "The policy adopted by the Government is one of adventure, tending
to throw Bulgaria into the arms of Germany, and driving her to attack
Serbia. This policy is contrary to the aspirations, feeling and
interests of the country, and if the Government obstinately continues in
this way it will provoke disturbances of the greatest gravity." It was
the first allusion to the possibility of a revolution, but the King
listened without flinching. M. Malinoff concluded: "For these reasons we
beg your Majesty, after having vainly asked the Government, to convoke
the Chamber immediately, and we ask this convocation for the precise
object of saving the country from dangerous adventures by the formation
of a coalition Ministry."

The King remained silent, and, with a nod, invited M. Stambulivski to
speak. M. Stambulivski was a leader of the Agrarian party, a man of
sturdy, rustic appearance, accustomed to speak out his mind boldly, and
exceedingly popular among the peasant population. He grew up himself as
a peasant, and wore the laborer's blouse up till very recently. He stood
up and looking the King straight in the face said in resolute tones: "In
the name of every farmer in Bulgaria I add to what M. Malinoff has just
said, that the Bulgarian people hold you personally responsible more
than your Government, for the disastrous adventure of 1913. If a similar
adventure were to be repeated now its gravity this time would be
irreparable. The responsibility would once more fall on your policy,
which is contrary to the welfare of our country, and the nation would
not hesitate to call you personally to account. That there may be no
mistake as to the real wishes of the country I present to your Majesty
my country's demand in writing."

He handed the King a letter containing the resolution voted by the
Agrarians. The King read it and then turned to M. Zanoff, leader of the
Radical Democrats, and asked him to speak. M. Zanoff did so, speaking
very slowly and impressively, and also looking the King straight in the
face: "Sire, I had sworn never again to set foot inside your palace, and
if I come today it is because the interests of my country are above
personal questions, and have compelled me. Your Majesty may read what I
have to say in this letter, which I submit to you in behalf of our
party."

He handed the letter and the King read it and still remained silent.
Then he said, turning to his former Prime Minister and ablest
politician: "Gueshoff, it is now your turn to speak."

M. Gueshoff got up and said: "I also am fully in accord with what M.
Stambulivski has just said. No matter how severe his words may have been
in their simple unpolished frankness, which ignores the ordinary
formalities of etiquette, they entirely express our unanimous opinion.
We all, as representing the opposition, consider the present policy of
the Government contrary to the sentiments and interests of the country,
because by driving it to make common cause with Germany it makes us the
enemies of Russia, which was our deliverer, and the adventure into which
we are thus thrown compromises our future. We disapprove most absolutely
of such a policy, and we also ask that the Chamber be convoked, and a
Ministry formed with the co-operation of all parties."

After M. Gueshoff, the former Premier, M. Daneff also spoke, and
associated himself with what had already been said.

The King remained still silent for a while, then he, also, stood up and
said: "Gentlemen, I have listened to your threats, and will refer them
to the President of the Council of Ministers, that he may know and
decide what to do."

All present bowed, and a chilly silence followed. The King had evidently
taken the frank warning given him as a threat to him personally, and he
walked up and down nervously for a while. Prince Boris turned aside to
talk with the Secretary, who had resumed taking notes. The King
continued pacing to and fro, evidently very nettled. Then, approaching
M. Zanoff, and as if to change the conversation, he asked him for news
about this season's harvest.

M. Zanoff abruptly replied: "Your Majesty knows that we have not come
here to talk about the harvest, but of something far more important at
present, namely, the policy of your Government, which is on the point of
ruining our country. We can on no account approve the policy that is
anti-Russian. If the Crown and M. Radoslavoff persist in their policy we
shall not answer for the consequences. We have not desired to seek out
those responsible for the disaster of 1913, because other grave events
have been precipitated. But it was a disaster due to criminal folly. It
must not be repeated by an attack on Serbia by Bulgaria, as seems
contemplated by M. Radoslavoff, and which according to all appearances,
has the approval of your Majesty. It would be a premeditated crime, and
deserve to be punished."

The King hesitated a moment, and then held out his hand to M. Zanoff,
saying: "All right. At all events I thank you for your frankness." Then,
approaching M. Stambulivski, he repeated to him his question about the
harvest.

M. Stambulivski, as a simple peasant, at first allowed himself to be led
into a discussion of this secondary matter, and had expressed the hope
that the prohibition on the export of cereals would be removed, when he
suddenly remembered, and said:

"But this is not the moment to speak of these things. I again repeat to
your Majesty that the country does not want a policy of adventure which
cost it so dear in 1913. It was your own policy too. Before 1913 we
thought you were a great diplomatist, but since then we have seen what
fruits your diplomacy bears. You took advantage of all the loopholes in
the Constitution to direct the country according to your own views. Your
Ministers are nothing. You alone are the author of this policy and you
will have to bear the responsibility."

The King replied frigidly, "The policy which I have decided to follow is
that which I consider the best for the welfare of the country."

"It is a policy which will only bring misfortune," replied the sturdy
Agrarian. "It will lead to fresh catastrophes, and compromise not only
the future of our country, but that of your dynasty, and may cost you
your head."

It was as bold a saying as ever was uttered before a King, and Ferdinand
looked astonished at the peasant who was thus speaking to him. He said,
"Do not mind my head; it is already old. Rather mind your own!" he added
with a disdainful smile, and turned away.

M. Stambulivski retorted: "My head matters little, Sire. What matters
more is the good of our country."

The King paid no more attention to him, and took M. Gueshoff and M.
Danoff apart, who again insisted on convoking the Chamber, and assured
him that M. Radoslavoff's government would be in a minority. They also
referred to the Premier's oracular utterances.

"Ah!" said the King. "Has Radoslavoff spoken to you, and what has he
said?"

"He has said--" replied the leaders, "that Bulgaria would march with
Germany and attack Serbia."

The King made a vague gesture, and then said: "Oh, I did not know."

This incident throws a strong light upon the conflict which was going on
in the Balkan states, between those Kings who were of German origin, and
who believed in the German power, and their people who loved Russia.
King Ferdinand got his warning. He did not listen, and he lost his
throne. All this, however, took place before the Bulgarian declaration
of war. Yet much had already shown what King Ferdinand was about to do.
The Allies, to be sure, were incredulous, and were doing their best to
cultivate the good will of the treacherous King, On September 23rd the
official order was given for Bulgaria's mobilization. She, however,
officially declared that her position was that of armed neutrality and
that she had no aggressive intentions. As it has developed, she was
acting under the direction of the German High Command.

It was at this period that Germany had failed to crush Russia in the
struggle on the Vilna, and, in accordance with her usual strategy when
one plan failed, another was undertaken. It seemed to her, therefore,
that the punishment of Serbia would make up for other failures, and
moreover would enable her to assist Turkey, which needed munitions,
besides releasing for Germany supplies of food and other material which
might come from Turkey. They therefore entrusted an expedition against
Serbia to Field Marshal von Mackensen, and had begun to gather an army
for that purpose, north of the Danube.

This army of course was mainly composed of Austrian troops, but was
stiffened throughout by some of the best regiments from the German army.
To assist this new army they counted upon Bulgaria, with whom they had
already a secret treaty, and in spite of the falsehoods issued from
Sofia, the Bulgarian mobilization was meant for an attack on Serbia. The
condition of affairs was well understood in Russia.

On October 2, 1915, M. Sazonov, Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs,
issued the following statement: "The situation in the Balkans is very
grave. The whole Russian nation is aroused by the unthinkable treachery
of Ferdinand and his Government to the Slavic cause. Bulgaria owes her
independence to Russia, and yet seems willing now to become a vassal of
Russia's enemies. In her attitude towards Serbia, when Serbia is
fighting for her very existence, Bulgaria puts herself in the class with
Turkey. We do not believe that the Bulgarian people sympathize with the
action of their ruler therefore, the Allies are disposed to give them
time for reflection. If they persist in their present treacherous course
they must answer to Russia." The next day the following ultimatum from
Russia was handed the Bulgarian Prime Minister:


Events which are taking place in Bulgaria at this moment give evidence
of the definite decision of King Ferdinand's Government to place the
fate of its country in the hands of Germany. The presence of German and
Austrian officers at the Ministry of War and on the staffs of the army,
the concentration of troops in the zone bordering on Serbia, and the
extensive financial support accepted from her enemies by the Sofia
Cabinet, no longer leave any doubt as to the object of the present
military preparations of Bulgaria. The powers of the Entente, who have
at heart the realization of the      aspirations of the Bulgarian
people, have on many occasions warned M. Radoslavoff that any hostile
act against Serbia would be considered as directed against themselves.
The assurances given by the head of the Bulgarian Cabinet in reply to
these warnings are      contradicted by facts. The representative of
Russia, bound to Bulgaria by the imperishable memory of her liberation
from the Turkish yoke, cannot sanction by his presence preparations for
fratricidal aggression against a Slav and allied people. The
Russian Minister has, therefore, received orders to leave Bulgaria with
all the staffs of the Legation and the Consulates if the Bulgarian
Government does not within twenty-four hours openly break with the
enemies of the Slav cause and of Russia, and does not at once proceed to
send away the officers belonging to the armies of states who are at war
with the powers of the Entente.


Similar ultimatums were presented by representatives of France and Great
Britain. Bulgaria's reply to these ultimatums was described as bold to
the verge of insolence. In substance she denied that German officers
were on the staffs of Bulgarian armies, but said that if they were
present that fact concerned only Bulgaria, which reserved the right to
invite whomsoever she liked. The Bulgarian Government then issued a
manifesto to the nation, announcing its decision to enter the war on the
side of the Central Powers. The manifesto reads as follows:


The Central Powers have promised us parts of Serbia, creating an
Austro-Hungarian border line, which is absolutely necessary for
Bulgaria's independence of the Serbians. We do not believe in the
promises of the Quadruple Entente. Italy, one of the Allies,
treacherously broke her treaty of thirty-three years. We believe in
Germany, which is fighting the whole world to fulfill her treaty with
Austria. Bulgaria must fight at the victor's side. The Germans and
Austro-Hungarians are victorious on all fronts. Russia soon will have
collapsed entirely. Then will come the turn of France, Italy and Serbia.
Bulgaria would commit suicide if she did not fight on the side of the
Central Powers, which offer the only possibility of realizing her desire
for a union of all Bulgarian peoples.


The manifesto also stated that Russia was fighting for Constantinople
and the Dardanelles; Great Britain to destroy Germany's competition;
France for Alsace and Lorraine, and the other allies to rob foreign
countries; the Central Powers were declared to be fighting to defend
property and assure peaceful progress. The manifesto filled seven
columns in the newspapers, and discussed at some length Bulgaria's trade
interests. It attacked Serbia most bitterly, declaring that Serbia had
oppressed the Bulgarian population of Macedonia in a most barbarous
manner; that she had attacked Bulgarian territory and that the Bulgarian
troops had been forced to fight for the defense of their own soil. In
fact it was written in quite the usual German manner.

Long before this M. Venizelos, the Greek Premier, had perceived what was
coming. Greece was bound by treaty to assist Serbia if she were attacked
by Bulgaria. On September 21st, Venizelos asked France and Britain for a
hundred and fifty thousand troops. On the 24th, the Allies agreed to
this and Greece at once began to mobilize. His policy was received with
great enthusiasm in the Greek Chamber, and former Premier Gounaris, amid
applause, expressed his support of the government.

On October 6th an announcement from Athens stated that Premier Venizelos
had resigned, the King having informed him that he was unable to support
the policy of his Minister. King Constantine was a brother-in-law of the
German Emperor, and although professing neutrality he had steadily
opposed M. Venizelos' policy. He had once before forced M. Venizelos'
resignation, but at the general elections which followed, the Greek
statesman was returned to power by a decisive majority.

Intense indignation was caused by the King's action, though the King was
able to procure the support of a considerable party. Venizelos'
resignation was precipitated by the landing of the Allied troops in
Saloniki. They had come at the invitation of Venizelos, but the
opposition protested against the occupation of Greek territory by
foreign troops. After a disorderly session in which Venizelos explained
to the Chamber of Deputies the circumstances connected with the landing,
the Chamber passed a vote of confidence in the Government by 142 to 102.
The substance of his argument may be found in his conclusion:


"We have a treaty with Serbia. If we are honest we will leave nothing
undone to insure its fulfillment in letter and spirit. Only if we are
rogues may we find excuses to avoid our obligations."


[Illustration: Map]
  TWELVE MILES EAST OF MONASTIR BEGAN THE GREAT ALLIED
  OFFENSIVE THAT DEFEATED BULGARIA IN SEPTEMBER, 1918


Upon his first resignation M. Zaimis was appointed Premier, and declared
for a policy of armed neutrality. This position was sharply criticised
by Venizelos, but for a time became the policy of the Greek Government.
Meantime the Allied troops were arriving at Saloniki. On October 3d,
seventy thousand French troops arrived. A formal protest was made by the
Greek commandant, who then directed the harbor officials to assist in
arranging the landing. In a short time the Allied forces amounted to a
hundred and fifty thousand men, but the German campaign was moving
rapidly.

The German Balkan army captured Belgrade on the 9th of October, and by
that date two Bulgarian armies were on the Serbian frontier. Serbia
found herself opposed by two hundred thousand Austro-Germans and a
quarter of a million Bulgarians. Greece and Roumania fully mobilized and
were watching the conflict, and the small allied contingent at Saloniki
was preparing to march inland to the aid of Serbia.

The conduct of Greece on this occasion has led to universal criticism.
The King himself, no doubt, was mainly moved by his German wife and the
influence of his Imperial brother-in-law. Those that were associated
with him were probably moved by fear. They had been much impressed by
the strength of the German armies. They had seen the success of the
great German offensive in Russia, while the French and British were
being held in the West. They knew, too, the strength of Bulgaria. The
national characteristic of the Greeks is prudence, and it cannot be
denied that there was great reason to suppose that the armies of Greece
would not be able to resist the new attack. With these views Venizelos,
the greatest statesman that Greece had produced for many years, did not
agree, and the election seemed to show that he was supported by the
majority of the Greek people.

This was another case where the Allies, faced by a dangerous situation,
were acting with too great caution. In Gallipoli they had failed,
because at the very beginning they had not used their full strength.
Now, again, knowing as they did all that depended upon it, bound as they
were to the most loyal support of Serbia, the aid they sent was too
small to be more than a drop in the bucket. It must be remembered,
however, that the greatest leaders among the Allies were at all times
opposed to in any way scattering their strength. They believed that the
war was to be won in France. Military leaders in particular yielded
under protest to the political leaders when expeditions of this
character were undertaken.

Certainly this is true, that the world believed that Serbia had a right
to Allied assistance. The gallant little nation was fighting for her
life, and public honor demanded that she should be aided. It was this
strong feeling that led to the action that was taken, in spite of the
military opinions. It was, however, too late.

In the second week of October Serbia found herself faced by an enemy
which was attacking her on three sides. She herself had been greatly
weakened. Her losses in 1914, when she had driven Austria from her
border, must have been at least two hundred thousand men. She had
suffered from pestilence and famine. Her strength now could not have
been more than two hundred thousand, and though she was fairly well
supplied with munitions, she was so much outnumbered that she could
hardly hope for success. On her west she was facing the Austro-German
armies; on her east Bulgaria; on the south Albania. Her source of
supplies was Saloniki and this was really her only hope. If the Allies
at Saloniki could stop the Bulgarian movement, the Serbians might face
again the Austro-Germans. They expected this help from the Allies.

At Nish the town was decorated and the school children waited outside
the station with bouquets to present to the coming reinforcements. But
the Allies did not come.

Von Mackensen's plan was simple enough. His object was to win a way to
Constantinople. This could be done either by the control of the Danube
or the Ottoman Railroad. To control the Danube he had to seize
northeastern Serbia for the length of the river. This was comparatively
easy and would give him a clear water way to the Bulgarian railways
connected with Constantinople. The Ottoman railway was a harder route to
win. It meant an advance to the southeast, which would clear the Moravo
valley up to Nish, and then the Nishava valley up to Bulgaria. The
movements involved were somewhat complex, but easily carried out on
account of the very great numerical superiority of von Mackensen's
forces.

On September 19th Belgrade was bombarded. The Serbian positions were
gradually destroyed. On the 7th of October the German armies crossed the
Danube, and on the 8th the Serbians began to retreat. There was great
destruction in Belgrade and the Bulgarian General, Mishitch, was forced
slowly back to the foothills of the Tser range.

For a time von Mackensen moved slowly. He did not wish to drive the
Serbians too far south. On the 12th of October the Bulgarian army began
its attack. At first it was held, but by October 17th was pushing
forward all along the line. On the 20th they entered Uskub, a central
point of all the routes of southern Serbia. This practically separated
the Allied forces at Saloniki from the Serbian armies further north.
Disaster followed disaster. On Tuesday, October 26th, a junction of
Bulgarian and Austro-German patrols was completed in the Dobravodo
mountains. General von Gallwitz announced that a moment of world
significance had come, that the "Orient and Occident had been united,
and on the basis of this firm and indissoluble union a new and mighty
vierbund comes into being, created by the victory of our arms."


[Illustration: Map: Proposed railroad through Germany, Austria-Hungary,
the Balkans, Turkey, to Bagdad and the Persian Gulf.]
 GERMANY'S DREAM: "THE BREMEN-BERLIN-BOSPORUS-BAGDAD-BAHN"


The road from Germany, through Austria-Hungary and Bulgaria to Turkey
lay open. On October 31st, Milanovac was lost, and on November 2nd,
Kraguyevac surrendered, the decisive battle of the war. On November 7th,
Nish was captured. General Jecoff announced: "After fierce and
sanguinary fighting the fortress of Nish has been conquered by our brave
victorious troops and the Bulgarian flag has been hoisted to remain
forever."

The Serbian army continued steadily to retreat, until on November 8th,
advancing Franco-British troops almost joined with them, presenting a
line from Prilep to Dorolovo on the Bulgarian frontier. At this time the
Bulgarian army suffered a defeat at Izvor, and also at Strumitza. The
Allied armies were now reported to number three hundred thousand men.
The Austro-Germans by this time had reached the mountainous region of
Serbia, and were meeting with strong resistance.

On November 13th, German despatches from the front claimed the capture
of 54,000 Serbian prisoners. The aged King Peter of Serbia was in full
flight, followed by the Crown Prince. The Serbians, however, were still
fighting and on November 15th, made a stand on the western bank of the
Morava River, and recaptured the town of Tatova.

At this time the Allied world was watching the Serbian struggle with
interest and sympathy. In the House of Lords, Lord Lansdowne in a
discussion of the English effort to give them aid said: "It is
impossible to think or speak of Serbia without a tribute to the wondrous
gallantry with which that little country withstood two separate
invasions, and has lately been struggling against a third. She repelled
the first two invasions by an effort which I venture to think formed one
of the most glorious chapters in the history of this Great War."

Serbia, however, was compelled once more to retreat, and their retreat
soon became a rout. Their guns were abandoned and the roads were strewn
with fainting, starving men. The sufferings of the Serbian people during
this time are indescribable. Men, women, and children struggled along in
the wake of the armies without food or shelter. King Peter himself was
able to escape, with the greatest difficulty. By traveling on horseback
and mule back in disguise he finally reached Scutari and crossed to
Brindisi and finally arrived at Saloniki on New Year's Day, crippled and
almost blind, but still full of fight.

"I believe," he said, "in the liberty of Serbia, as I believe in God. It
was the dream of my youth. It was for that I fought throughout manhood.
It has become the faith of the twilight of my life, I live only to see
Serbia free. I pray that God may let me live until the day of redemption
of my people. On that day I am ready to die, if the Lord wills. I have
struggled a great deal in my life, and am tired, bruised and broken from
it, but I will see, I shall see, this triumph. I shall not die before
the victory of my country."

The Serbian army had been driven out of Serbia. But the Allies who had
come up from Saloniki were still unbeaten. On October 12th, the French
General Serrail arrived and moved with the French forces, as has already
been said, to the Serbian aid. They met with a number of successes. On
October 19th they seized the Bulgarian town of Struminitza, and occupied
strong positions on the left bank of the Vardar. On October 27th they
occupied Krivolak, with the British Tenth Division, which had joined
them on their right. They then occupied the summit of Karahodjali, which
commanded the whole section of the valley. This the Bulgarians attacked
in force on the 5th of November, but were badly repulsed. They then
attempted to move toward Babuna Pass, twenty-five miles west of
Krivolak, where they hoped to join hands with the Serbian column at that
point.

They were being faced by a Bulgarian army numbering one hundred and
twenty-five thousand men, and found themselves in serious danger. They
were compelled to fall back into what is called the "Entrenched Camp of
Kavodar" without bringing the aid to the Serbian army that they had
hoped. The Allied expedition to aid Serbia had failed. It was hopeless
from the start, and, if anything, had injured Serbia by raising false
expectations which had interfered with their plans.

During the whole of this disastrous campaign a desperate political
struggle was going on in Greece. On November 3rd, the Zaimis Cabinet
tendered its resignation to King Constantine. The trouble was over a
bill for extra pay to army officers, but it led to an elaborate
discussion of the Greek war policy. M. Venizelos made two long speeches
defending his policy, and condemning the policy of his opponents in
regard to the Balkan situation. He said that he deplored the fact that
Serbia was being left to be crushed by Bulgaria, Greece's hereditary
enemy, who would not scruple later to fall on Greece herself. He spoke
of the King in a friendly way, criticizing, however, his position. He
had been twice removed from the Premiership, although he had a majority
behind him in the Greek Chamber.

"Our State," he said, "is a democracy, presided over by the King, and
the whole responsibility rests with the Cabinet. I admit that the Crown
has a right to disagree with the responsible Government if he thinks the
latter is not in agreement with the national will. But after the recent
election, non-agreement is out of the question, and now the Crown has
not the right to disagree again on the same question. It is not a
question of patriotism but of constitutional liberty."

When the vote was taken the Government was defeated by 147 to 114.
Instead of appointing Venizelos Premier, King Constantine gave the
position to M. Skouloudis, and then dissolved the Greek Chamber by royal
decree. Premier Skouloudis declared his policy to be neutrality with the
character of sincerest benevolence toward the Entente Powers. The
general conditions at Athens during this whole time were causing great
anxiety in the Allied capitals, and the Allied expedition were in
continual fear of an attack in the rear in case of reverse. They
endeavored to obtain satisfactory assurances on this point, and while
assurances were given, during the whole period of King Constantine's
reign aggressive action was prevented because of the doubt as to what
course King Constantine would take.

It was not till August 27th, 1916, that Roumania cast aside her role of
neutral and entered the war with a declaration of hostilities on
Austria-Hungary. Great expectations were founded upon the supposedly
well-trained Roumanian army and upon the nation which, because of its
alertness and discipline, was known as "the policeman of Europe." The
belief was general in Paris and London that the weight of men and
material thrown into the scale by Roumania would bring the to a speedy,
victorious end.

Germany, however, was confident. A spy system excelling in its detailed
reports anything that had heretofore been attempted, made smooth the
path of the German army. Scarcely had the Roumanian army launched a
drive in force into Transylvania on August 30th, when the message spread
from Bucharest "von Mackensen is coming. Recall the army. Draft all
males of military age. Prepare for the worst."

And the worst fell upon hapless Roumania. A vast force of military
engineers moving like a human screen in front of von Mackensen's array,
followed routes carefully mapped out by German spies during the period
of Roumanians neutrality. Military bridges, measured to the inch, had
been prepared to carry cannon, material and men over streams and
ravines. Every Roumanian oil well, mine and storehouse had been located
and mapped. German scientists had studied Roumanian weather conditions
and von Mackensen attacked while the roads were at their best and the
weather most favorable. As the Germans swept forward, spies met them
giving them military information of the utmost value. A swarm of
airplanes spied out the movements of the Roumanians and no Roumanian
airplanes rose to meet them.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  THE USEFUL ROLE OF THE CARRIER PIGEON AT THE FRONT
  No one would think of giving a Distinguished Service Medal to a
  pigeon, but some of them performed service under fire that would have
  entitled a soldier to it. Here American officers heading a division
  are attaching a message to a pigeon in front of the headquarters
  dugout.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  BAGDAD THE MAGNIFICENT FALLS TO THE BRITISH
  General Maude is here shown making his formal entry at the head of his
  troops into the ancient city. This occurred on March 11, 1917, and was
  the most notable exploit of General Maude, commander of the British
  Mesopotamian expedition until his death by cholera nine months
  afterwards.


General von Falkenhayn, co-operating with von Mackensen, smashed his way
through Vulkan Pass, and cut the main line running to Bucharest at
Craiova. The Dobrudja region was over-run and the central Roumanian
plain was swept clear of all Roumanian opposition to the German advance.
The seat of government transferred from Bucharest to Jassy on November
28, 1916, and on December 6th Bucharest was entered by von Mackensen,
definitely putting an end to Roumania as a factor in the war.

The result of the fall of Roumania was to release immense stores of
petroleum for German use. British and Roumanian engineers had done their
utmost by the use of explosives to make useless the great Roumanian oil
wells, but German engineers soon had the precious fluid in full flow.
This furnished the fuel which Germany had long and ardently desired. The
oil-burning submarine now came into its own. It was possible to plan a
great fleet of submersibles to attempt execution of von Tirpitz's plan
for unrestricted submarine warfare. This was decided upon by the German
High Command, the day Bucharest fell. It was realized that such a policy
would bring the United States into the war, but the Kaiser and his
advisers hoped the submarine on sea and a great western front offensive
on land would force a decision in favor of Germany before America could
get ready. How that hope failed was revealed at Chateau-Thierry and in
the humiliation of Germany.



CHAPTER VII

THE CAMPAIGN IN MESOPOTAMIA

In our previous discussion of the British campaign in Mesopotamia we
left the British forces intrenched at Kurna, and also occupying Basra,
the port of Bagdad. The object of the Mesopotamia Expedition was
primarily to keep the enemy from the shores of the Gulf of Persia. If
the English had been satisfied with that, the misfortune which was to
come to them might never have occurred, but the whole expedition was
essentially political rather than military in its nature.

The British were defending India. The Germans, unable to attack the
British Empire by sea, were hoping to attack her by land. They had
already attempted to stir up a Holy War with the full expectation that
it would lead to an Indian revolution. In this they had failed, for the
millions of Mohammedans in India cared little for the Turkish Sultan or
his proclamations. Through Bagdad, however, they hoped to strike a blow
at the English influence on the Persian Gulf. The English, therefore,
felt strongly that it was not enough to sit safely astride the Tigris,
but that a blow at Bagdad would produce a tremendous political effect.
It would practically prevent German communication with Persia, and the
Indian frontier.

As a matter of fact the Persian Gulf and the oil fields were safe so
long as the English held Kurna and Basra, and the Arabs were of no
special consequence. The real reason for the expedition was probably
that about this time matters were moving badly for the Allies. Serbia
was in trouble in the Balkans, Gallipoli was a failure, something it
seemed ought to be done to restore the British prestige. Up to this time
the Mesopotamia Expedition had been a great success, but it had made no
great impression on the world. The little villages in the hands of the
British had unknown names, but if Bagdad should be captured Great
Britain would have something to boast of; something would keep up its
prestige among its Mohammedan subjects.

Before the expedition to Bagdad was determined on, there had been
several lively fights between the English forces and the Turks. On March
3d a Turkish force numbering about twelve thousand appeared at Ahwaz
where the British had placed a small garrison to protect the pipe line
of the Anglo-Persian Oil Company. The British retirement led to heavy
fighting, with severe losses.

A number of lively skirmishes followed, and then the serious attack
against Shaiba. The Turkish army numbered about eighteen thousand men,
of whom eleven thousand were regulars. The fighting lasted for several
days, the Turks being reinforced. On the 14th of April, however, the
English attacked in turn and put the whole enemy force to flight. The
British lost about seven hundred officers and men, reported a Turkish
loss of about six thousand. In their retreat the Turks were attacked by
their Arab allies, and suffered additional losses. From that time till
summer there were no serious contests, although there were occasional
skirmishes which turned out favorably to the British.

By this time the Turks had collected a considerable army north of Kurna,
and on May 31st an expedition was made to disperse it. On June 3d the
British captured Amara, seventy-five miles above Kurna, scattering the
Turkish army. Early in July a similar expedition was sent against
Nasiriyeh, which led to serious fighting, the Turks being badly defeated
with a loss of over two thousand five hundred men.

Kut-el-Amara still remained, and early in August an expedition was
directed against that point. The Turks were found in great force, well
intrenched, and directed by German officers. The battle lasted for four
days. The English suffered great hardship on account of the scarcity of
water and the blinding heat, but on September 29th they drove the enemy
from the city and took possession. More than two thousand prisoners were
taken. The town was found thoroughly fortified, with an elaborate system
of trenches extending for miles, built in the true German fashion. Its
capture was the end of the summer campaign.

The British now had at last made up their minds to push on to Bagdad.
General Townshend, whose work so far had been admirable, protested, but
Sir John Nixon, and the Indian military authorities, were strongly in
favor of the expedition. By October, Turkey was able to gather a large
army. She was fighting in Transcaucasia, Egypt, Gallipoli and
Mesopotamia. Little was going on in the first three of these fronts, and
she was able therefore to send to Mesopotamia almost a quarter of a
million men.


[Illustration: Map: Bagdad in the Northwest corner, Basra in the Southeast
corner.]
  THE MESOPOTAMIAN SECTOR, WHERE THE BRITISH ROUTED THE TURKISH ARMY
  Kut-el-Amara first besieged and captured by the Turks, was retaken by
  General Maude on February 26,1917; Bagdad the Magnificent felt on
  March 11th. It was here that General Maude, the hero of Mesopotamia,
  died on November 18, 1917.


To meet these, General Townshend had barely fifteen thousand men, of
whom only one-third were white soldiers.  He was backed by a flotilla of
boats of almost every kind,--river boats, motor launches, paddle
steamers, native punts. The British army was almost worn out by the
fighting during the intense heat of the previous summer. But their
success had given them confidence.

In the early days of October the advance began. For some days it
proceeded with no serious fighting. On the 23d of October it reached
Azizie, and was halted by a Turkish force numbering about four thousand.
These were soon routed, and the advance continued until General
Townshend arrived at Lajj, about seven miles from Ctesiphon, where the
Turks were found heavily intrenched and in great numbers. Ctesiphon was
a famous old city which had been the battle ground of Romans and
Parthians, but was now mainly ruins. In these ruins, however, the Turks
found admirable shelter for nests of machine guns. On the 21st of
November General Townshend made his attack.

[Illustration: Map]
  Map of Gen. Townshend's Lines of Attack on Kut-El-Amara

The Turks occupied two lines of intrenchments, and had about twenty
thousand men, the English about twelve thousand. General Townshend's
plan was to divide his army into three columns. The first was to attack
the center of the first Turkish position. A second was directed at the
left of that position, and a third was to swing widely around and come
in on the rear of the Turkish force. This plan was entirely successful,
but the Turkish army was not routed, and retreated fighting desperately
to its second line. There it was reinforced and counter-attacked with
such vigor that it drove the British back to its old first trenches. The
next day the Turks were further reinforced and attacked again. The
British drove them back over and over, but found themselves unable to
advance. The Turks had lost enormously but the English had lost about
one-third of their strength, and were compelled to fall back. They
therefore returned on the 26th to Lajj, and ultimately, after continual
rear guard actions, to Kut. There they found themselves surrounded, and
there was nothing to do but to wait for help.

By this time the eyes of the world were upon the beleaguered British
army. Help was being hurried to them from India, but Germany also was
awake and Marshal von Der Goltz, who had been military instructor in the
Turkish army, was sent down to take command of the Turkish forces. The
town of Kut lies in the loop of the Tigris, making it almost an island.
There was an intrenched line across the neck of land on the north, and
the place could resist any ordinary assault. The great difficulty was
one of supplies. However, as the relieving force was on the way, no
great anxiety was felt. For some days there was constant bombardment,
which did no great damage. On the 23d an attempt was made to carry the
place by assault, but this too failed. The relieving force, however, was
having its troubles. These were the days of floods, and progress was
slow and at times almost impossible. Moreover, the Turks were constantly
resisting.

The relief expedition was composed of thirty thousand Indian troops, two
Anglo-Indian divisions, and the remnants of Townshend's expedition, a
total of about ninety thousand men. General Sir Percy Lake was in
command of the entire force. The march began on January 6th. By January
8th the British had reached Sheikh Saad, where the Turks were defeated
in two pitched battles. On January 22d he had arrived at Umm-el-Hanna,
where the Turks had intrenched themselves.

After artillery bombardment the Turkish positions were attacked, but
heavy rains had converted the ground into a sea of mud, rendering rapid
movement impossible. The enemy's fire was heavy and effective,
inflicting severe losses, and though every effort was made, the assault
failed.

For weeks the British troops bivouacked in driving rain on soaked and
sodden ground. Three times they were called upon to advance over a
perfectly flat country, deep in mud, and absolutely devoid of cover
against well-constructed and well-planned trenches, manned by a brave
and stubborn enemy, approximately their equal in numbers. They showed a
spirit of endurance and self-sacrifice of which their country may well
be proud.

But the repulse at Hanna did not discourage the British army. It was
decided to move up the left bank of the Tigris and attack the Turkish
position at the Dujailah redoubt. This meant a night march across the
desert with great danger that there would be no water supply and that,
unless the enemy was routed, the army would be in great danger.

General Lake says: "On the afternoon of March 7th, General Aylmer
assembled his subordinate commanders and gave his final instructions,
laying particular stress on the fact that the operation was designed to
effect a surprise, and that to prevent the enemy forestalling us, it was
essential that the first phase of the operation should be pushed through
with the utmost vigor. His dispositions were, briefly, as follows: The
greater part of a division under General Younghusband, assisted by naval
gunboats, controlled the enemy on the left bank. The remaining troops
were formed into two columns, under General Kemball and General Keary
respectively, a reserve of infantry, and the cavalry brigade, being held
at the Corps Commander's own disposal. Kemball's column covered on the
outer flank by the cavalry brigade was to make a turning movement to
attack the Dujailah redoubt from the south, supported by the remainder
of the force, operating from a position to the east of the redoubt. The
night march by this large force, which led across the enemy's front to a
position on his right flank, was a difficult operation, entailing
movement over unknown ground, and requiring most careful arrangement to
attain success."

Thanks to excellent staff work and good march discipline the troops
reached their allotted position apparently undiscovered by the enemy,
but while Keary's column was in position at daybreak, ready to support
Kemball's attack, the latter's command did not reach the point selected
for its deployment in the Dujailah depression until more than an hour
later. This delay was highly prejudicial to the success of the
operation.

When, nearly three hours later, Kemball's troops advanced to the attack,
they were strongly opposed by the enemy from trenches cleverly concealed
in the brushwood, and were unable to make further ground for some time,
though assisted by Keary's attack upon the redoubt from the east. The
southern attack was now reinforced, and by 1 P.M. had pushed forward to
within five hundred yards of the redoubt, but concealed trenches again
stopped further progress and the Turks made several counter-attacks with
reinforcements which had by now arrived from the direction of Magasis.

It was about this time that the Corps Commander received from his
engineer officers the unwelcome news that the water supply contained in
rain-water pools and in Dujailah depression, upon which he had reckoned,
was insufficient and could not be increased by digging. It was clear,
therefore, that unless the Dujailah redoubt could be carried that day
the scarcity of water would, of itself, compel the troops to fall back.
Preparations were accordingly made for a further assault on the redoubt,
and attacks were launched from the south and east under cover of a heavy
bombardment.

The attacking forces succeeded in gaining a foothold in the redoubt. But
here they were heavily counter-attacked by large enemy reinforcements,
and being subjected to an extremely rapid and accurate shrapnel fire
from concealed guns in the vicinity of Sinn After, they were forced to
fall back to the position from which they started. The troops who had
been under arms for some thirty hours, including a long night march,
were now much exhausted, and General Aylmer considered that a renewal of
the assault during the night could not be made with any prospect of
success. Next morning the enemy's position was found to be unchanged and
General Aylmer, finding himself faced with the deficiency of order
already referred to, decided upon the immediate withdrawal of his troops
to Wadi, which was reached the same night.

For the next month the English were held in their positions by the
Tigris floods. On April 4th the floods had sufficiently receded to
permit of another attack upon Umm-el-Hanna, which this time was
successful. On April 8th the Turkish position at Sanna-i-yat was
attacked, but the English were repulsed. They then determined to make
another attempt to capture the Sinn After redoubt. On April 17th the
fort of Beit-Aiessa, four miles from Es Sinn, on the left bank, was
captured after heavy bombardment, and held against serious
counter-attacks. On the 20th and 21st the Sanna-i-yat position was
bombarded and a vigorous assault was made, which met with some success.
The Turks, however, delivered a strong counter-attack, and succeeded in
forcing the British troops back.

General Lake says: "Persistent and repeated attempts on both banks have
thus failed, and it was known that at the outside not more than six
days' supplies remained to the Kut garrison. The British troops were
nearly worn out. The same troops had advanced time and again to assault
positions strong by art and held by a determined enemy. For eighteen
consecutive days they had done all that men could do to overcome, not
only the enemy, but also exceptional climatic and physical obstacles,
and this on a scale of rations which was far from being sufficient in
view of the exertions they had undergone but which the shortage of river
transports, had made it impossible to augment. The need for rest was
imperative."

On April 28th the British garrison at Kut-el-Amara surrendered
unconditionally, after a heroic resistance of a hundred and forty-three
days. According to British figures the surrendered army was composed of
2,970 English and 6,000 Indian troops. The Turkish figures are 13,300.
The Turks also captured a large amount of booty, although General
Townshend destroyed most of his guns and munitions.

During the period in which Kut-el-Amara was besieged by the Turks, the
British troops had suffered much. The enemy bombarded the town almost
every day, but did little damage. The real foe was starvation. At first
the British were confident that a relief expedition would soon reach
them, and they amused themselves by cricket and hockey and fishing in
the river. By early February, however, it was found necessary to reduce
the rations, and a month later they were suffering from hunger. Some
little help was given them by airplanes, which brought tobacco and some
small quantities of supplies. Soon the horses and the mules were
slaughtered and eaten. As time went on the situation grew desperate;
till almost the end, however, they did not lose hope. Through the
wireless they were informed about the progress of the relief expeditions
and had even heard their guns in the distance. They gradually grew,
however, weaker and weaker, so that on the surrender the troops in the
first lines were too weak to march back with their kits.

The Turks treated the prisoners in a chivalric manner; food and tobacco
was at once distributed, and all were interned in Anatolia, except
General Townshend and his staff, who were taken to Constantinople. Later
on it was General Townshend who was to have the honor of carrying the
Turkish plea for an armistice in the closing days of the war.

The surrender of Kut created a world-wide sensation. The loss of eight
thousand troops was, of course, not a serious matter, and the road to
India was still barred, but the moral effect was most unfortunate. That
the great British nation, whose power had been so respected in the
Orient, should now be forced to yield, was a great blow to its prestige.
In England, of course, there was a flood of criticism. It was very plain
that a mistake had been made. A commission was appointed to inquire into
the whole business. This committee reported to Parliament on June 26,
1917, and the report created a great sensation. The substance of the
report was, that while the expedition was justifiable from a political
point of view, it was undertaken with insufficient forces and inadequate
preparation, and it sharply criticized those that were responsible.

It seems plain that the military authorities in India under-estimated
their opponent. The report especially criticized General Sir John Eccles
Nixon, the former commander of the British forces in Mesopotamia, who
had urged the expedition, in spite of the objection of General
Townshend. Others sharing the blame were the Viceroy of India, Baron
Hardinge, General Sir Beauchamp Duff, Commander-in-Chief of the British
forces in India, and, in England, Major-General Sir Edmund Barrow,
Military Secretary of the India office, J. Austen Chamberlain, Secretary
for India, and the War Committee of the Cabinet. According to the
report, beside the losses incurred by the surrender more than
twenty-three thousand men were lost in the relieving expedition. The
general armament and equipment were declared to be not only
insufficient, but not up to the standard.

In consequence of this report Mr. Chamberlain resigned as secretary for
India. In the House of Commons, Mr. Balfour, Secretary of Foreign
Affairs, supported Lord Hardinge, who, at the time of the report, was
Under Secretary of Foreign Affairs. He declared the criticism of Baron
Hardinge to be grossly unjust. After some discussion the House of
Commons supported Mr. Balfour's refusal to accept Baron Hardinge's
resignation, by a vote of 176 to 81. It seems to be agreed that the
civil administration of India were not responsible for the blunders of
the expedition. Ten years before, Lord Kitchener, after a bitter
controversy with Lord Curzon, had made the military side of the Indian
Government free of all civilian criticism and control. The blunders here
were military blunders.

The English, of course, were not satisfied to leave the situation in
such a condition, and at once began their plans for a new attempt to
capture Bagdad. The summer campaign, however, was uneventful, though on
May 18th a band of Cossacks from the Russian armies in Persia joined the
British camp. A few days afterwards the British army went up the Tigris
and captured the Dujailah redoubt, where they had been so badly defeated
on the 8th of March. They then approached close to Kut, but the weather
was unsuitable, and there was now no object in capturing the city.

In August Sir Percy Lake was succeeded by Lieutenant-General Sir
Frederick Stanley Maude, who carefully and thoroughly proceeded to
prepare for an expedition which should capture Bagdad. A dispatch from
General Maude dated July 10, 1917, gives a full account of this
expedition. It was thoroughly successful. This time with a sufficient
army and a thorough equipment the British found no difficulties, and on
February 26th they captured Kut-el-Amara, not after a hard-fought
battle, but as the result of a successful series of small engagements.
The Turks kept up a steady resistance, but the British blood was up.
They were remembering General Townshend's surrender, and the Turks were
driven before them in great confusion.

The capture of Kut, however, was not an object in itself, and the
British pushed steadily on up the Tigris. The Turks occasionally made a
stand, but without effect. On the 28th of February the English had
arrived at Azizie, half way to Bagdad, where a halt was made. On the 5th
of March the advance was renewed. The Ctesiphon position, which had
defied General Townshend, was found to be strongly intrenched, but
empty. On March 7th the enemy made a stand on the River Diala, which
enters the Tigris eight miles below Bagdad. Some lively fighting
followed, the enemy resisting four attempts to cross the Diala. However,
on March 10th the British forces crossed, and were now close to Bagdad.
The enemy suddenly retired and the British troops found that their main
opponent was a dust storm. The enemy retired beyond Bagdad, and on March
11th the city was occupied by the English.

The fall of Bagdad was an important event. It cheered the Allies, and
proved, especially to the Oriental world, the power of the British army.
Those who originally planned its capture had been right, but those who
were to carry out the plan had not done their duty. Under General Maude
it was a comparatively simple operation, though full of admirable
details, and it produced all the good effects expected. The British, of
course, did not stop at Bagdad. The city itself is not of strategic
importance. The surrounding towns were occupied and an endeavor was made
to conciliate the inhabitants. The real object of the expedition was
attained.



CHAPTER XXV

CANADA'S PART IN THE GREAT WAR

By COL. GEO. G. NASMITH, C. M. G., TORONTO

When, in August,1914, war burst suddenly upon a peaceful world like
distant thunder in a cloudless summer sky, Canada, like the rest of the
British Empire, was profoundly startled. She had been a peace-loving,
non-military nation, satisfied to develop her great natural resources,
and live in harmony with her neighbors; taking little interest in
European affairs, Canadians, in fact, were a typical colonial people,
with little knowledge even of the strength of the ties that linked them
to the British Empire.

Upon declaration of war by Great Britain Canada immediately sprang to
arms. The love of country and empire which had been no obvious thing
burst forth in a patriotic fervor as deep as it was spontaneous and
genuine. The call to action was answered with an enthusiasm the like of
which had rarely, if ever, been seen in any British colony.

The Canadian Government called for 20,000 volunteers--enough for a
single division--as Canada's contribution to the British army. In less
than a month 40,000 men had volunteered, and the Minister of Militia was
compelled to stop the further enrolment of recruits. From the gold
fields of the Yukon, from the slopes of the Rockies on the west to the
surf-beaten shores of the Atlantic on the east; from workshop and mine;
from farm, office and forest, Canada's sons trooped to the colors.

It will be the everlasting glory of the men of the first Canadian
contingent, that they needed no spur, either of victory or defeat: they
volunteered because they were quick to perceive that the existence of
their Empire was threatened by the action of the most formidable
nation-in-arms that the world had ever seen. They had been stirred by
the deepest emotion of a race--the love of country.

A site for a concentration camp was chosen at Valcartier, nestling among
the blue Laurentian hills, sixteen miles from Quebec, and convenient to
that point of embarkation. Within four days 6,000 men had arrived at
Valcartier; in another week there were 25,000 men. From centers all over
Canada troop trains, each carrying hundreds of embryo soldiers, sped
towards Valcartier and deposited their burdens on the miles of sidings
that had sprung up as though by magic.

The rapid evolution of that wild and wooded river valley into a model
military camp was a great tribute to the engineering skill and energy of
civilians who had never done the like before. One day an army of woodmen
were seen felling trees; the next day the stumps were torn out and the
hollows filled; on the third day long rows of tents in regular camp
formation covered the ground, and on the fourth day they were occupied
by civilian soldiers concentrated upon learning the rudiments of the art
and science of war.

Streets were laid out; miles of water pipes, sunk in machine-made
ditches, were connected to hundreds of taps and shower baths; electric
light was installed; three miles of rifle butts completed, and in two
weeks the camp was practically finished--the finest camp that the first
Canadians were destined to see. The building of Valcartier camp was
characteristic of the driving power, vision and genius of the Minister
of Militia, General Sir Sam Hughes.

Of the 33,000 men assembled at Valcartier, the great majority were
civilians without any previous training in warfare. About 7,000
Canadians had taken part in the South African war, fifteen years before,
and some of these, together with a few ex-regulars who had seen active
service, were formed into the Princess Patricia's Light Infantry.
Otherwise, with the exception of the 3,000 regulars that formed the
standing army of Canada, the men and most of the officers were amateurs.

It was therefore a feat that the Canadian people could well afford to be
proud of, that in the great crisis they were able, through their
aggressive Minister of Militia, not only to gather up these forces so
quickly but that they willingly and without delay converted their
industries to the manufacture of all necessary army equipment. Factories
all over the country immediately began turning out vast quantities of
khaki cloth, uniforms, boots, ammunition, harness, wagons, and the
thousand and one articles necessary for an army.

Before the end of September, 1914, the Canadian Expeditionary Force had
been roughly hewn into shape, battalions had been regrouped and
remodeled, officers transferred and re-transferred, intensive training
carried on, and all the necessary equipment assembled. On October 3,
1914, thirty-three Atlantic liners, carrying the contingent of 33,000
men, comprising infantry, artillery, cavalry, engineers, signalers,
medical corps, army service supply and ammunition columns, together with
horses, guns, ammunition, wagons, motor lorries and other essentials,
sailed from Gaspe basin on the Quebec seaboard to the battle-field of
Europe.

It was probably the largest convoy that had ever been gathered together.
This modern armada in three long lines, each line one and one-half miles
apart, led by cruisers and with battleships on the front, rear and
either flank, presented a thrilling spectacle. The voyage proved
uneventful, and on October 14th, the convoy steamed into Plymouth,
receiving an extraordinary ovation by the sober English people, who
seemed temporarily to have gone wild with enthusiasm. Back of that
demonstration was the conviction that blood had proved thicker than
water and that the apparently flimsy ties that bound the colonies to the
empire were bonds that were unbreakable. The German conviction that the
British colonies would fall away and the British Empire disintegrate
upon the outbreak of a great war had proved fallacious. It was,
moreover, a great demonstration of how the much-vaunted German navy had
already been swept from the seas and rendered impotent by the might of
Britain's fleet.

A few days later the Canadians had settled down on Salisbury Plain in
southern England for the further course of training necessary before
proceeding to France. There, for nearly four months in the cold and the
wet, in the fog and mud, in crowded, dripping tents and under constantly
dripping skies, they carried on and early gave evidence of their powers
of endurance and unquenchable spirit.

Lord Roberts made his last public appearance before this division and
addressing the men said in part: "Three months ago we found ourselves
involved in this war--a war not of our own seeking, but one which those
who have studied Germany's literature and Germany's aspirations, knew
was a war which we should inevitably have to deal with sooner or later.
The prompt resolve of Canada to give us such valuable assistance has
touched us deeply. . . .

"We are fighting a nation which looks upon the British Empire as a
barrier to her development, and has in consequence, long contemplated
our overthrow and humiliation. To attain that end she has manufactured a
magnificent fighting machine, and is straining every nerve to gain
victory.... It is only by the most determined efforts that we can defeat
her."

And this superb German military organization, created by years of
tireless effort, was that which Canadian civilians had volunteered to
fight. Was it any wonder that some of the most able leaders doubted
whether men and officers, no matter how brave and intelligent, could
ever equal the inspired barbarians who, even at that very moment, were
battling with the finest British and French regulars and pressing them
steadily towards Paris?

In a short chapter of this kind attempting to deal with Canada's effort
in the great war it is obviously impossible to go into detail or give
more than the briefest of historical pictures. Consequently much that is
fascinating can be given but a passing glance: for greater detail larger
works must be consulted. Nevertheless it is well to try and view in
perspective events as they occurred, in order to obtain some idea of
their relative importance.

In February, 1915, the first Canadian division crossed the Channel to
France, and began to obtain front-line experiences in a section of the
line just north of Neuve Chapelle.

While the first division had been going through its course of training
in England a second division had been raised in Canada and arrived in
England shortly after the first left it.

During that period the conflict in Europe had passed through certain
preliminary phases--most of them fortunate for the Allies. The
unexpected holding up of the German armies by the Belgians had prevented
the enemy from gaining the channel ports of Calais and Boulogne in the
first rush. Later on the battle of the Marne had resulted in the rolling
back of the German waves until they had subsided on a line roughly drawn
through Dixmude, Ypres, Armentieres, La Bassee, Lens, and southward to
the French border and the trench phase of warfare had begun.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  ON VIMY RIDGE, WHERE CANADA WON LAURELS
  The Canadians took the important position of Vimy Ridge on Easter
  Monday, April 9, 1917. They advanced with brilliance, having taken the
  whole system of German front-line trenches between dawn and 6.30 A.
  M. This shows squads of machine gunners operating from shell-craters
  in support of the infantry on the plateau above the ridge.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Photo from Western Newspaper Union
  GENERAL SIR ARTHUR CURRIE
  Commander of the Canadian forces on the Western Front.


The British held the section of front between Ypres and La-Bassee, about
thirty miles in length, the Germans, unfortunately, occupying all the
higher grounds.

Shortly after the arrival of the Canadian division the British,
concentrating the largest number of guns that had hitherto been gathered
together on the French front, made an attack on the Germans at Neuve
Chapelle. This attack, only partially successful in gains of terrain,
served to teach both belligerents several lessons. It showed the British
the need for huge quantities of high explosives with which to blast away
wire and trenches and, that in an attack, rifle fire, no matter how
accurate, was no match for unlimited numbers of machine guns.

It showed the enemy what could be done with concentrated artillery
fire--a lesson that he availed himself of with deadly effect a few weeks
later.

Though Canadian artillery took part in that bombardment the infantry was
not engaged in the battle of Neuve Chapelle; it received its baptism of
fire, however, under excellent conditions, and after a month's
experience in trench warfare was taken out of the line for rest.

The division was at the time under the command of a British general and
the staff included several highly trained British staff officers.
Nevertheless the commands were practically all in the hands of
Canadians--lawyers, business men, real-estate agents, newspapermen and
other amateur soldiers, who, in civilian life as militiamen, had spent
more or less time in the study of the theory of warfare. This should
always be kept in mind in view of subsequent events, as well as the fact
that these amateur soldiers were faced by armies whose officers and
men--professionals in the art and science of warfare--regarded
themselves as invincible.

In mid-April the Canadians took over a sector some five thousand yards
long in the Ypres salient. On the left they joined up with French
colonial troops, and on their right with the British. Thus there were
Canadian and French colonial troops side by side.

Toward the end of April the Germans reverted to supreme barbarism and
used poison gas. Undismayed, though suffering terrible losses, the
heroic Canadians fought the second battle of Ypres and held the line in
the face of the most terrific assaults.

When the news of the second battle of Ypres reached Canada her people
were profoundly stirred. The blight of war had at last fallen heavily,
destroying her first-born, but sorrow was mixed with pride and
exaltation that Canadian men had proved a match for the most
scientifically trained troops in Europe. As fighters Canadians had at
once leaped into front rank. British, Scotch and Irish blood, with
British traditions, had proved greater forces than the scientific
training and philosophic principles of the Huns. It was a glorious
illustration of the axiom "right is greater than might," which the
German had in his pride reversed to read "might is right." It was
prophetic of what the final issue of a contest based on such divergent
principles was to be. So in those days Canadian men and women held their
heads higher and carried on their war work with increased determination,
stimulated by the knowledge that they were contending with an enemy more
remorseless and implacable than those terrible creatures which used to
come to them in their childish dreams. It was felt that, a nation which
could scientifically and in cold blood resort to poison gases--contrary
to all accepted agreements of civilized countries--to gain its object
must be fought with all the determination, resources and skill which it
was possible to employ.

Canada's heart had been steeled. She was now in the war with her last
dollar and her last man if need be. She had begun to realize that
failure in Europe would simply transfer the struggle with the German
fighting hordes to our Atlantic provinces and the eastern American
states.

The famous Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry was originally
composed of soldiers who had actually seen service and were therefore
veterans. Incidentally they were older men and most of them were married
but the call of the Empire was insistent.

In the winter of 1914-15 the British line in Flanders was very thin and
the P. P. C. L. I's. being a trained regiment was sent over to France
several weeks before the first Canadian division. It soon earned the
name of a regiment of extraordinarily hard-fighting qualities and was
all but wiped out before spring arrived. The immortal story of this
gallant unit must be read in detail if one wishes to obtain any clear
conception of their deeds of valor--of what it is possible for man to go
through and live. However, it was but one regiment whose exploits were
later equaled by other Canadian regiments and it would therefore be
invidious to select anyone for special praise. After operating as a
separate regiment for nearly two years and having been recruited from
the regular Canadian depots in England, it became in composition like
other Canadian regiments and was finally incorporated in the third
Canadian division.

In the spring of 1915, a Canadian cavalry brigade was formed in France
made up of Strathcona's Horse, King Edward's Horse, the Royal Canadian
Dragoons and Canadian Mounted Rifles.

After the second battle of Ypres, the Canadians after resting and
re-organization, were moved to a section of the line near LaBassee. Here
they fought the battle of Festubert--a series of infantry attacks and
artillery bombardments, which gained little ground.

Shortly afterwards they fought the battle of Givenchy, equally futile,
as far as material results were concerned. Both of these battles had the
double object of feeling out the strength of the German line and of
obtaining the Aubers Ridge, should the attacks prove successful. In both
battles the Canadians showed great aptitude for attack, and tenacity in
their hold of captured trenches. They also learned the difficult lesson
that if an objective is passed by the infantry the latter enter the zone
of their own artillery fire and suffer accordingly.

In September, 1915, the Second Canadian Division arrived in Flanders and
took its place at the side of the First Canadian Division, then
occupying the Ploegsteert section in front of the Messines-Wytschaete
Ridge. The rest of the winter was spent more or less quietly by both
divisions in the usual trench warfare, and battling with mud, water and
weather.

It was here that the Canadians evolved the "trench raid," a method of
cutting off a section of enemy trench, killing or taking prisoners all
the enemy inhabitants, destroying it and returning with little or no
loss to the attacking party. This method was quickly copied from one end
of the Franco-British line to the other; it proved a most valuable
method of gaining information, and served to keep the troops, during the
long cold winter months, stimulated and keen when otherwise life would
have proved most dull and uninteresting.

The Third Canadian Division was formed in January and February, 1916.
One infantry brigade was composed of regiments which had been acting as
Canadian corps troops, including the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light
Infantry, and the Royal Canadian Regiment. The second infantry brigade
was made up of six Canadian mounted rifle regiments, which had comprised
part of the cavalry brigade. These two brigades, of the Third Division,
under the command of General Mercer of Toronto, almost immediately began
front-line work.

During this period, the Germans, making desperate efforts extending over
weeks of time, did their utmost to break through the French line at
Verdun and exhaust the French reserves. To offset these objects, a
fourth British army was assembled, which took over still more of the
French line, while a series of British attacks, intended to pin down the
German reserves all along the line, was inaugurated. One of these
developed into a fight for the craters--a terrible struggle at St. Eloi,
where, blasted from their muddy ditches, with rifles and machine guns
choked with mud and water; with communications lost and lack of
artillery support, the men of the Second Canadian Division fought gamely
from April 6th to April 20th, but were forced to yield the craters and
part of their front line system to the enemy.

Notwithstanding this the men of the Second Canadian Division at St. Eloi
fought quite as nobly as had their brothers of the First Division just a
year before, at the glorious battle of Ypres, a few miles farther north.
But it was a bitter experience. The lesson of failure is as necessary in
the education of a nation as that of success.

On June 2d and 3d, the Third Canadian Division, which then occupied part
of the line in the Ypres salient, including Hooge and Sanctuary Wood,
was smothered by an artillery bombardment unprecedented in length and
intensity. Trenches melted into irregular heaps of splintered wood,
broken sand bags and mangled bodies. Fighting gallantly the men of this
division fell in large numbers, where they stood. The best infantry in
the world is powerless against avalanches of shells projected from
greatly superior numbers of guns. The Canadian trenches were
obliterated, not captured.

By this time Britain had thoroughly learned her lesson, and now
countless shells and guns were pouring into France from Great Britain
where thousands of factories, new and old, toiled night and day, under
the inspiring energy of Mr. Lloyd George.

On June 13th, in a terrific counter-attack, the Canadians in turn
blasted the Huns from the trenches taken from them a few days before.
The First Canadian Division recaptured and consolidated all the ground
and trench systems that had been lost Thus ended the second year of
Canadian military operations in the Ypres salient. Each of the three
Canadian divisions had been tried by fire in that terrible region, from
which, it was said, no man ever returned the same as he entered it.
Beneath its torn and rifted surface, thousands of Canadians lie, mute
testimony to the fact that love of liberty is still one of the most
powerful, yet most intangible, things that man is swayed by.

A very distinguished French general, speaking of the part that Canada
was playing in the war, said, "Nothing in the history of the world has
ever been known quite like it. My countrymen are fighting within fifty
miles of Paris, to push back and chastise a vile and leprous race, which
has violated the chastity of beautiful France, but the Australians at
the Dardanelles and the Canadians at Ypres, fought with supreme and
absolute devotion for what to many must have seemed simple abstractions,
and that nation which will support for an abstraction the horror of this
war of all wars will ever hold the highest place in the records of human
valor."

The Fourth Canadian Division reached the Ypres region in August, 1916,
just as the other three Canadian divisions were leaving for the Somme
battle-field farther south. For a while it occupied part of the line
near Kemmel, but soon followed the other divisions to the Somme, there
to complete the Canadian corps.

It may be stated here that though a fifth Canadian division was formed
and thoroughly trained in England, it never reached France. Canada,
until the passing of the Military Service Act on July 6,1917, depended
solely on voluntary enlistment. Up to that time Canada, with a
population of less than 9,000,000, had recruited 525,000 men by
voluntary methods. Of this number 356,986 had actually gone overseas.
Voluntary methods at last, however, failed to supply drafts in
sufficient numbers to keep up the strength of the depleted reserves in
England, and in consequence conscription was decided upon. By this
means, 56,000 men were drafted in Canada before the war ended. In the
meantime, through heavy fighting the demand for drafts became so
insistent that the Fifth Canadian Division in England had to be broken
up to reinforce the exhausted fighting divisions in France.

It would be an incomplete summary of Canada's part in the war that did
not mention some of the men who have been responsible for the success of
Canadian arms. It is obviously impossible to mention all of those
responsible; it is even harder to select a few. But looking backward one
sees two figures that stand forth from all the rest--General Sir Sam
Hughes in Canada, and General Sir Arthur Currie commander of the
Canadian corps.

To General Sir Sam Hughes must be given the credit of having foreseen
war with Germany and making such preparations as were possible in a
democracy like Canada. He it was of all others who galvanized Canada
into action; he it was whose enthusiasm and driving power were so
contagious that they affected not only his subordinates but the country
at large.

Sir Sam Hughes will be remembered for the building of Valcartier camp
and the dispatch of the first Canadian contingent. But he did things of
just as great importance. It was he who sought and obtained for Canada,
huge orders for munitions from Great Britain and thereby made it
possible for Canada to weather the financial depression, pay her own war
expenditures and emerge from the war in better financial shape than she
was when the war broke out. It was easy to build up a business once
established but the chief credit must go to the man who established it.

Sir Sam Hughes was also responsible for the selection of the officers
who went overseas with the first Canadian contingent. Among those
officers who subsequently became divisional commanders were General Sir
Arthur Currie, General Sir Richard Turner, General Sir David Watson,
Generals Lipsett, Mercer and Hughes.

Of these generals, Sir Arthur Currie through sheer ability ultimately
became commander of the Canadian corps. This big, quiet man, whose
consideration, prudence and brilliancy had won the absolute confidence
of Canadian officers and men alike, welded the Canadian corps into a
fighting force of incomparable effectiveness--a force which was set the
most difficult tasks and, as events proved, not in vain.

When Canada entered the war she had a permanent force of 3,000 men. When
hostilities ceased on November 11, 1918, Canada had sent overseas
418,980 soldiers. In addition to this about 15,000 men had joined the
British Royal Air Service, several hundred physicians and veterinarians,
as well as 200 nurses, had been supplied to the British army, while many
hundreds of university men had received commissions in the imperial army
and navy.

In September, October and November, 1916, the Canadian corps of four
divisions, which had been welded by General Byng and General Currie into
an exceedingly efficient fighting machine, took its part in the battle
of the Somme--a battle in which the British army assumed the heaviest
share of the fighting and casualties, and shifted the greatest burden of
the struggle from the shoulders of the French to their own. The British
army had grown vastly in power and efficiency and in growing had taken
over more and more of the line from the French.

The battle of the Somme was long and involved. The Franco-British forces
were everywhere victorious and by hard and continuous fighting forced
the Hun back to the famous Hindenburg line. It was in this battle that
the tanks, evolved by the British, were used for the first time, and
played a most important part in breaking down wire entanglements and
rounding up the machine gun nests. The part played in this battle by the
Canadian corps was conspicuous, and it especially distinguished itself
by the capture of Courcelette. Although the battles which the Canadian
corps took part in subsequently were almost invariably both successful
and important, they can be merely mentioned here. The Canadian corps now
known everywhere to consist of shock troops second to none on the
western front, was frequently used as the spearhead with which to pierce
particularly tough parts of the enemy defenses.

On April 9th to 13th, 1917, the Canadian corps, with some British
support, captured Vimy Ridge, a point which had hitherto proved
invulnerable. When a year later, the Germans, north and south, swept the
British line to one side in gigantic thrusts they were unable to disturb
this key point, Vimy Ridge, which served as an anchor to the sagging
line. The Canadian corps was engaged at Arleux and Fresnoy in April and
May and was effective in the operations around Lens in June. Again on
August 15th, it was engaged at Hill 70 and fought with conspicuous
success in that toughest, most difficult, and most heart-breaking of all
battles--Passchendaele.

In 1918, the Canadian Cavalry Brigade won distinction in the German
offensive of March and April. On August 12, 1918, the Canadian corps was
engaged in the brilliantly successful battle of Amiens, which completely
upset the German offensive plan. On August 26th to 28th the Canadians
captured Monchy-le-Preux, and, in one of the hammer blows which Foch
rained on the German front, were given the most difficult piece of the
whole line to pierce--the Queant-Drocourt line. This section of the
famous Hindenburg line was considered by the enemy to be absolutely
impregnable, but was captured by the Canadians on September 3d and 4th.
With this line outflanked a vast German retreat began, which ended on
November 11th with the signing of the armistice.

To the Canadians fell the honors of breaking through the first
Hindenburg line by the capture of Cambrai, on October 1st to 9th. They
also took Douai on October 19th, and Dena on October 20th. On October
26th to November 2d they had the signal honor of capturing Valenciennes
thereby being the first troops to break through the fourth and last
Hindenberg line.

It surely was a curious coincidence that Mons, from which the original
British army--the best trained, it is said, that has taken the field
since the time of Caesar--began its retreat in 1914, should have been
the town which Canadian civilians were destined to recapture. The war
began for the professional British army--the Contemptibles--when it
began its retreat from Mons in 1914; the war ended for the British army
at the very same town four years and three months later, when on the day
the armistice was signed the men from Canada re-entered it. Was it
coincidence, or was it fate?

During the war Canadian troops had sustained 211,000 casualties, 152,000
had been wounded and more than 50,000 had made the supreme sacrifice.
Put into different language this means that the number of Canadians
killed was just a little greater than the total number of infantrymen in
their corps of four divisions.

The extent of the work involved in the care of the wounded and sick of
the Canadians overseas may be gathered from the fact that Canada
equipped and sent across the Atlantic, 7 general hospitals, 10
stationary hospitals, 16 field ambulances, 3 sanitary sections, 4
casualty clearing stations and advanced and base depots of medical
stores: The personnel of these medical units consisted of 1,612
officers, 1,994 nursing sisters and 12,382 of other ranks, or a total of
about 16,000. This will give some conception of the importance of the
task involved in the caring for the sick and wounded of about 90,000
fighting troops, some 60,000 auxiliary troops behind the lines and the
reserve depots in England.


[Illustration: Map]
  FROM THE VOSGES MOUNTAINS TO YPRES
  Map showing the Northeastern frontiers of France, and neutral Belgium
  through which the German armies poured in 1914. The battle line held
  straight from Belfort to Verdun, with the exception of the St. Mihiel
  salient. Above Verdun the line veered to the west, north of Rheims,
  marking a wide curve toward St. Quentin and Arras and bending back to
  Ypres, held by the Canadians throughout the war.


The work of the Canadian Red Cross Society included the building and
equipping of auxiliary hospitals to those of the Canadian Army Medical
Corps; providing of extra and emergency stores of all kinds, recreation
huts, ambulances and lorries, drugs, serums and surgical equipment
calculated to make hospitals more efficient; the looking after the
comfort of patients in hospitals providing recreation and entertainment
to the wounded, and dispatching regularly to every Canadian prisoner
parcels of food, as well as clothes, books and other necessaries: The
Canadian Red Cross expended on goods for prisoners in 1917 nearly
$600,000.

In all the Canadian Red Cross distributed since the beginning of the war
to November 23, 1918, $7,631,100.

The approximate total of voluntary contributions from Canada for war
purposes was over $90,000,000.

The following figures quoted from tables issued by the Department of
Public Information at Ottawa, show the exports in certain Canadian
commodities, having a direct bearing on the war for the last three
fiscal years before the war (1912-13-14), and for the last fiscal year
(1918); and illustrates the increase, during this period, in the value
of these articles exported:

                                   VALUES
                   Average for 1912-1913-1914      1918
Foodstuffs                       $143,133,374   $617,515,690
Clothing, metals, leather, etc     45,822,717    215,873,357
                                  -----------    -----------
Total                            $188,956,091   $833,389,047

As practically all of the increase of food and other materials went to
Great Britain, France and Italy, the extent of Canada's effort in
upholding the allied cause is clearly evident and was by no means a
small one.

The trade of Canada for 1914 was one billion dollars; for the fiscal
year of 1917-18 it was two and one-half billion dollars.

Approximately 60,000,000 shells were made in Canada during the war.
Shortly after the outbreak of hostilities a shell committee was formed
in Canada to really act as an agent for the British war office in
placing contracts. The first shells were shipped in December, 1914, and
by the end of May, 1915, approximately 400 establishments were
manufacturing shells in Canada. By November, 1915, orders had been
placed by the Imperial Government to the value of $300,000,000, and an
Imperial Munitions Board, replacing the shell committee, was formed,
directly responsible to the Imperial Ministry of Munitions.

During the war period Canada purchased from her bank savings
$1,669,381,000 of Canadian war loans.

Estimates of expenditures for the fiscal year ending March 31,1919,
demonstrated the thoroughness with which Canada went to war. They
follow:

                              Expenditure   Expenditure   Total
                              In Canada     Overseas      Expenditures
Pay of 110,000 troops in
Canada and 290,000
in England and France.          $50,187,500  $70,312,500   $120,500,000

Assigned pay, overseas troops    54,000,000          ---     54,000,000

Separation allowances            21,750,000    6,000,000     27,750,000

Rations, Canada,
50 cents per day;
England, 38-1/2 cents per day.   20,075,000   21,000,000     41,075,000

Clothing and necessaries         19,080,000          ---     19,080,000

Outfit allowances,
officers and nurses               1,000,000      700,000      1,700,000

Equipment, including harness,
vehicles, tents, blankets, but
not rifles, machine guns, etc    20,000,000          ---     20,000,000

Ordnance service                        ---    1,800,000      1,800,000

Medical services                  5,000,000          ---      5,000,000

Ammunition                        5,000,000          ---      5,000,000

Machine guns                      2,000,000          ---      2,000,000

Ocean transport                   4,612,500          ---      4,612,500

Railway transport                11,062,500      450,000     11,512,500

Forage                              450,000          ---        450,000

Veterinary service, remounts            ---    3,000,000      3,000,000

Engineer works, housing           2,750,000    1,250,000      4,000,000

Civilian employees                2,920,000      750,000      8,670,000

Sundries, including recruiting,
censors, customs dues, etc.       3,000,000          ---      3,000,000

Overseas printing and stationery        ---      300,000        300,000

General expenses overseas               ---    1,800,000      1,800,000

Maintenance of troops in France
at 9s. 4d. each per day                 ---  115,000,000    115,000,000
                                ----------- ------------   ------------
Total                          $217,887,500 $225,162,500   $443,050,000



CHAPTER VIII

IMMORTAL VERDUN

France was revealed to herself, to Germany and to the world as the
heroic defender of civilization, as a defender defying death in the
victory of Verdun. There, with the gateway to Paris lying open at its
back, the French army, in the longest pitched battle in all history,
held like a cold blue rock against the uttermost man power and resources
of the German army.

General von Falkenhayn, Chief of the German General Staff and military
dictator of the Teutonic allies, there met disaster and disgrace. There
the mettle of the Crown Prince was tested and he was found to be merely
a thing of straw, a weak creature whose mind was under the domination of
von Falkenhayn.

For the tremendous offensive which was planned to end the war by one
terrific thrust, von Falkenhayn had robbed all the other fronts of
effective men and munitions. Field Marshal von Hindenburg and his crafty
Chief of Staff, General Ludendorf, had planned a campaign against Russia
designed to put that tottering military Colossus out of the war. The
plans were upon a scale that might well have proved successful. The
Kaiser, influenced by the Crown Prince and by von Falkenhayn, decreed
that the Russian campaign must be postponed and that von Hindenburg must
send his crack troops to join the army of the Crown Prince fronting
Verdun. Ludendorf promptly resigned as Chief of Staff to von Hindenburg
and suggested that the Field Marshal also resign. That grim old warrior
declined to take this action, preferring to remain idle in East Prussia
and watch what he predicted would be a useless effort on the western
front. His warning to the General Staff was explicit, but von Falkenhayn
coolly ignored the message.


[Illustration: Map: Verdun in the Southwest corner, to Maucourt toward
the Northeast.]
  IMMORTAL VERDUN, WHERE THE FRENCH HELD THE GERMANS WITH THE INSPIRING
  SLOGAN "THEY SHALL NOT PASS"


Why did Germany select this particular point for its grand offensive?
The answer is to be found in a demand made by the great Junker
associations of Germany in May, 1915, nine months before the attack was
undertaken. That demand was to the effect that Verdun should be attacked
and captured. They declared that the Verdun fortifications made a
menacing salient thrust into the rich iron fields of the Briey basin.
From this metalliferous field of Lorraine came the ore that supplied
eighty per cent of the steel required for German and Austrian guns and
munitions. These fields of Briey were only twenty miles from the great
guns of Verdun. They were French territory at the beginning of the war
and had been seized by the army of the Crown Prince, co-operating with
the Army of Metz because of their immense value to the Germans in war
making.

As a preliminary to the battle, von Falkenhayn placed a semicircle of
huge howitzers and rifles around the field of Briey. Then assembling the
vast forces drained from all the fronts and having erected ammunition
dumps covering many acres, the great battle commenced with a surprise
attack upon the village of Haumont on February 21, 1916.

The first victory of the Germans at that point was an easy one. The
great fort of Douaumont was the next objective. This was taken on
February 25th after a concentrated bombardment that for intensity
surpassed anything that heretofore had been shown in the war.

Von Falkenhayn, personally superintending the disposition of guns and
men, had now penetrated the outer defenses of Verdun. The tide was
running against the French, and shells, more shells for the guns of all
caliber; men, more men for the earthworks surrounding the devoted city
were needed. The narrow-gauge railway connecting Verdun with the great
French depots of supplies was totally inadequate for the transportation
burdens suddenly cast upon it. In this desperate emergency a transport
system was born of necessity, a system that saved Verdun. It was fleet
upon fleet of motor trucks, all sizes, all styles; anything that could
pack a few shells or a handful of men was utilized. The backbone of the
system was a great fleet of trucks driven by men whose average daily
rest was four hours, and upon whose horizon-blue uniforms the stains of
snow and sleet, of dust and mud, were indelibly fixed through the
winter, spring, summer and fall of 1916, for the glorious engagement
continued from February 21st until November 2d, when the Germans were
forced into full retreat from the field of honor, the evacuation of Fort
Vaux putting a period to Germany's disastrous plan and to von
Falkenhayn's military career.

Lord Northcliffe, describing the early days of the immortal battle,
wrote:

"Verdun is, in many ways, the most extraordinary of battles. The mass of
metal used on both sides is far beyond all parallel; the transformation
on the Douaumont Ridge was more suddenly dramatic than even the battle
of the Marne; and, above all, the duration of the conflict already looks
as if it would surpass anything in history. More than a month has
elapsed since, by the kindness of General Joffre and General Petain, I
was able to watch the struggle from various vital viewpoints. The battle
had then been raging with great intensity for a fortnight, and, as I
write, four to five thousand guns are still thundering round Verdun.
Impossible, therefore, any man to describe the entire battle. The most
one can do is to set down one's impressions of the first phases of a
terrible conflict, the end of which cannot be foreseen.

"My chief impression is one of admiration for the subtle powers of mind
of the French High Command. General Joffre and General Castelnau are men
with especially fine intellects tempered to terrible keenness. Always
they have had to contend against superior numbers. In 1870, when they
were subalterns, their country lost the advantage of its numerous
population by abandoning general military service at a time when Prussia
was completely realizing the idea of a nation in arms. In 1914, when
they were commanders, France was inferior to a still greater degree in
point of numbers to Prussianized Germany. In armament, France was
inferior at first to her enemy. The French High Command has thus been
trained by adversity to do all that human intellect can against almost
overwhelming hostile material forces. General Joffre, General
Castelnau--and, later, General Petain, who at a moment's notice
displaced General Herr--had to display genius where the Germans were
exhibiting talent, and the result is to be seen at Verdun. They there
caught the enemy in a series of traps of a kind hitherto unknown in
modern warfare--something elemental, and yet subtle, neo-primitive, and
befitting the atavistic character of the Teuton. They caught him in a
web of his own unfulfilled boasts.

"The enemy began by massing a surprising force on the western front.
Tremendous energy and organizing power were the marks of his supreme
efforts to obtain a decision. It was usually reckoned that the Germans
maintain on all fronts a field army of about seventy-four and a half
army corps, which at full strength number three million men. Yet, while
holding the Russians from Riga to the south of the Pripet Marshes, and
maintaining a show of force in the Balkans, Germany seems to have
succeeded in bringing up nearly two millions and a half of men for her
grand spring offensive in the west. At one time her forces in France and
Flanders were only ninety divisions. But troops and guns were withdrawn
in increasing numbers from Russia and Serbia in December, 1915, until
there were, it is estimated, a hundred and eighteen divisions on the
Franco-British-Belgian front. A large number of six-inch and twelve-inch
Austrian howitzers were added to the enormous Krupp batteries. Then a
large proportion of new recruits of the 1916 class were moved into
Rhine-land depots to serve as drafts for the fifty-nine army corps, and
it is thought that nearly all the huge shell output that had accumulated
during the winter was transported westward.

"The French Staff reckoned that Verdun would be attacked when the ground
had dried somewhat in the March winds. It was thought that the enemy
movement would take place against the British front in some of the
sectors of which there were chalk undulations, through which the rains
of winter quickly drained. The Germans skilfully encouraged this idea by
making an apparent preliminary attack at Lions, on a five-mile front
with rolling gas-clouds and successive waves of infantry. During this
feint the veritable offensive movement softly began on Saturday,
February 19, 1916, when the enormous masses of hostile artillery west,
east, and north of the Verdun salient started registering on the French
positions. Only in small numbers did the German guns fire, in order not
to alarm their opponents. But even this trial bombardment by shifts was
a terrible display of power, calling forth all the energies of the
outnumbered French gunners to maintain the artillery duels that
continued day and night until Monday morning, February 21st.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  AMMUNITION FOR THE GUNS
  Canadian narrow-gauge line taking ammunition up the line through a
  shattered village.


[Illustration: Truck convoy running parallel to troops marching.]
  HOW VERDUN WAS SAVED
  The motor transport never faltered when the railroads were put out of
  action.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  NURSE EDITH CAVELL
  A victim of German savagery. An English lady whose life had been
  devoted to works of mercy, was shot after summary trial, at Brussels
  on October 11, 1915, for helping British and Belgian fugitives.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright Underwood and Underwood, N. Y.
  CAPTAIN CHARLES A. FRYATT
  The martyred British Merchant-Marine Captain, who was executed by the
  Germans because his ship attempted to sink a German submarine which
  attacked her.


"The enemy seems to have maintained a bombardment all round General
Herr's lines on February 21, 1916, but this general battering was done
with a thousand pieces of field artillery. The grand masses of heavy
howitzers were used in a different way. At a quarter past seven in the
morning they concentrated on the small sector of advanced intrenchments
near Brabant and the Meuse; twelve-inch shells fell with terrible
precision every few yards, according to the statements made by the
French troops. I afterwards saw a big German shell, from at least six
miles distant from my place of observation, hit quite a small target. So
I can well believe that, in the first bombardment of French positions,
which had been photographed from the air and minutely measured and
registered by the enemy gunners in the trial firing, the great,
destructive shots went home with extraordinary effect. The trenches were
not bombarded--they were obliterated. In each small sector of the
six-mile northward bulge of the Verdun salient the work of destruction
was done with surprising quickness.

"After the line from Brabant to Haumont was smashed, the main fire power
was directed against the other end of the bow at Herbebois, Ornes, and
Maucourt. Then when both ends of the bow were severely hammered, the
central point of the Verdun salient, Caures Woods, was smothered in
shells of all sizes, poured in from east, north and west. In this manner
almost the whole enormous force of heavy artillery was centered upon
mile after mile of the French front. When the great guns lifted over the
lines of craters, the lighter field artillery placed row after row in
front of the wreckage, maintained an unending fire curtain over the
communicating saps and support intrenchments.

"Then came the second surprising feature in the new German system of
attack. No waves of storming infantry swept into the battered works.
Only strong patrols at first came cautiously forward, to discover if it
were safe for the main body of troops to advance and reorganize the
French line so as to allow the artillery to move onward. There was thus
a large element of truth in the marvelous tales afterwards told by
German prisoners. Their commanders thought it would be possible to do
all the fighting with long-range artillery, leaving the infantry to act
as squatters to the great guns and occupy and rebuild line after line of
the French defenses without any serious hand-to-hand struggles. All they
had to do was to protect the gunners from surprise attack, while the
guns made an easy path for them.

"But, ingenious as was this scheme for saving the man-power of Germany
by an unparalleled expenditure of shell, it required for full success
the co-operation of the French troops. But the French did not
co-operate. Their High Command had continually improved their system of
trench defense in accordance with the experiences of their own hurricane
bombardments in Champagne and the Carency sector. General Castelnau, the
acting Commander-in-Chief on the French front, was indeed the inventor
of hurricane fire tactics, which he had used for the first time in
February, 1915, in Champagne. When General Joffre took over the conduct
of all French operations, leaving to General Castelnau the immediate
control of the front in France, the victor of the battle of Nancy
weakened his advance lines and then his support lines, until his troops
actually engaged in fighting were very little more than a thin covering
body, such as is thrown out towards the frontier while the main forces
connect well behind.

"We shall see the strategical effect of this extraordinary measure in
the second phase of the Verdun battle, but its tactical effect was to
leave remarkably few French troops exposed to the appalling tempest of
German and Austrian shells. The fire-trench was almost empty, and in
many cases the real defenders of the French line were men with machine
guns, hidden in dug-outs at some distance from the photographed
positions at which the German gunners aimed. The batteries of light
guns, which the French handled with the flexibility and continuity of
fire of Maxims, were also concealed in widely scattered positions. The
main damage caused by the first intense bombardment was the destruction
of all the telephone wires along the French front. In one hour the
German guns plowed up every yard of ground behind the observing posts
and behind the fire trench. Communications could only be slowly
re-established by messengers, so that many parties of men had to fight
on their own initiative, with little or no combination of effort with
their comrades.

"Yet, desperate as were their circumstances, they broke down the German
plan for capturing trenches without an infantry attack. They caught the
patrols and annihilated them, and then swept back the disillusioned and
reluctant main bodies of German troops. First, the bombing parties were
felled, then the sappers as they came forward to repair the line for
their infantry, and at last the infantry itself in wave after wave of
field-gray. The small French garrison of every center of resistance
fought with cool, deadly courage, and often to the death.

"Artillery fire was practically useless against them, for though their
tunnel shelters were sometimes blown in by the twelve-inch shells, which
they regarded as their special terror by reason of their penetrative
power and wide blast, even the Germans had not sufficient shells to
search out all their underground chambers, every one of which have two
or three exits.

"The new organization of the French Machine-gun Corps was a fine factor
in the eventual success. One gun fired ten thousand rounds daily for a
week, most of the positions selected being spots from which each German
infantry advance would be enfiladed and shattered. Then the French 75's
which had been masked during the overwhelming fire of the enemy
howitzers, came unexpectedly into action when the German infantry
attacks increased in strength. Near Haumont, for example, eight
successive furious assaults were repulsed by three batteries of 75's.
One battery was then spotted by the Austrian twelve-inch guns, but it
remained in action until all its ammunition was exhausted. The gunners
then blew up their guns and retired, with the loss of only one man.

"Von Falkenhayn had increased the Crown Prince's army from the fourteen
divisions--that battled at Douaumont Fort--to twenty-five divisions. In
April he added five more divisions to the forces around Verdun by
weakening the effectives in other sectors and drawing more troops from
the Russian front. It was rumored that von Hindenburg was growing
restive and complaining that the wastage at Verdun would tell against
the success of the campaign on the Riga-Dvinsk front, which was to open
when the Baltic ice melted.

"Great as was the wastage of life, it was in no way immediately
decisive. But when the expenditure of shells almost outran the highest
speed of production of the German munition factories, and the wear on
the guns was more than Krupp and Skoda could make good, there was danger
to the enemy in beginning another great offensive likely to overtax his
shellmakers and gunmakers."

Immortal and indomitable France had won over her foe more power than she
had possessed even after the battle of the Marne.

Throughout the entire summer Verdun, with the whole population of France
roused to the supreme heights of heroism behind it, held like a rock.
Wave after wave of Germans in gray-green lines were sent against the
twenty-five miles of earthworks, while the French guns took their toll
of the crack German regiments. German dead lay upon the field until
exposed flesh became the same ghastly hue of their uniforms. No Man's
Land around Verdun was a waste and a stench.

General Joffre's plan was very simple. It was to hold out. As was
afterwards revealed, much to the satisfaction of the French people, Sir
Douglas Haig had placed himself completely at the service of the French
Commander-in-Chief, and had suggested that he should use the British
army to weaken the thrust at Verdun. But General Joffre had refused the
proffered help. No man knew better than he what his country, with its
exceedingly low birthrate, was suffering on the Meuse. He had but to
send a telegram to British Headquarters, and a million Britons, with
thousands of heavy guns, would fling themselves upon the German lines
and compel Falkenhayn to divide his shell output, his heavy artillery,
and his millions of men between Verdun and the Somme. But General
Joffre, instead of sending the telegram in question, merely dispatched
officers to British Headquarters to assure and calm the chafing Scotsman
commanding the military forces of the British Empire.

Throughout that long summer the battle cry of Verdun, "Ne passeront
pas!" ("They shall not pass!"), was an inspiration to the French army
and to the world. Then as autumn drifted its red foliage over the
heights surrounding the bloody field, the French struck back. General
Nivelle, who had taken command at Verdun under Joffre, commenced a
series of attacks and a persistent pressure against the German forces on
both sides of the Meuse. These thrusts culminated in a sudden sweeping
attack which on October 24th, resulted in the recapture by Nivelle's
forces of Fort Douaumont and on November 2d, in the recapture of Fort
Vaux.

Thus ended in glory the most inspiring battle in the long and honorable
history of France.



CHAPTER XXVII

MURDERS AND MARTYRS

Many examples might be cited to show that the Central empires were dead
to the humanities. There were apparently no limits to the brutality of
the German war-makers. Among the outstanding deeds of the Teutons that
sickened the world was the killing of Miss Edith Cavell, an English
nurse working in Belgian hospitals.

A shudder of horror circled the world when announcement was formally
made that this splendid woman was sentenced to death and murdered by a
German firing squad at two o'clock on the morning of October 12, 1915.

The killing of this gentle-natured, brave woman typified to the world
Germany's essentially brutal militarism. It placed the German military
command in a niche of dishonor unique in all history.

The specific charge against Miss Cavell was that she had helped English
and French soldiers and Belgian young male civilians to cross the border
into Holland. The direct evidence against her was in the form of letters
intercepted by the Germans in which some of these soldiers and civilians
writing from England thanked her for the aid she had given to them.

Upon the farcical trial that resulted in the predetermined sentence of
death, Miss Cavell courageously and freely admitted her assistance in
the specified cases of escape. When she was asked why she did it, she
declared her fear that if she had not done so the men would have been
shot by the Germans. Her testimony was given in a clear conversational
tone that betrayed no nervousness and her entire bearing was such as to
win the sympathy of everyone except her stony-hearted judges.

The German officers in command at Brussels made it impossible for Miss
Cavell to see counsel before the trial, and a number of able lawyers who
were solicited to undertake her defense declined to do so because of
their fear of the Germans.

Sentence was imposed upon her at five o'clock on the afternoon of
October 11th. In accordance with its terms, she was taken from her cell
and placed against a blank wall at two o'clock the following
morning--the darkness of the hour vying with the blackness of the deed.
Mr. Gahan, the English clergyman connected with the prison, was
permitted to see her a short time before her murder. He gave her Holy
Communion at ten o'clock on the night of October 11th. To him she
declared she was happy in her contemplation of death; that she had no
regret for what she had done; and that she was glad to die for her
country.

Brand Whitlock, American Minister to Belgium, and Hugh Gibson, Secretary
of the Legation, did all that was humanly possible to avert the crime,
but without avail. They were told that, "the Emperor himself could not
intervene."

Defending the murder, Dr. Alfred Zimmermann, German Under Secretary for
Foreign Affairs, callously disposed of the matter thus:

"I see from the English and American press that the shooting of an
Englishwoman and the condemnation of several other women in Brussels for
treason has caused a sensation, and capital against us is being made out
of the fact. Men and women are equal before the law, and only the degree
of guilt makes a difference in the sentence for the crime and its
consequences."

Monuments to Edith Cavell were reared in widely scattered communities. A
mountain was named in her honor. Her murder multiplied enlistments and
fed the fires of patriotism throughout the Allied countries. In the end,
Germany lost heavily. The Teutons aimed to strike terror into the hearts
of men and women. They only succeeded in arousing a righteous anger that
ultimately destroyed the Imperial government.

Another instance equally flagrant of the utter callousness of the men
who at that time ruled Germany, was the murder of Captain Fryatt, a
gallant British seaman, who had dared to attack the pirates of the
under-seas.

Captain Charles Fryatt was the master of the steamship Brussels, a
merchant vessel owned by the Great Eastern Railway. It was captured by
the Germans on June 23, 1916. Captain Fryatt was taken to Zeebrugge. A
court-martial went through the motions of a trial at Bruges on July
27th. The charge against Captain Fryatt was that of attempting to ram
the German submarine U-33.

Mute testimony against Captain Fryatt was a gold watch found upon his
person. This carried an inscription testifying that the watch had been
presented by the mayor and people of Harwich in recognition of the
Captain's bravery in attempting to ram a submarine, and his successful
escape when the U-boat called upon him to surrender.

The prisoners who were captured with Captain Fryatt were sent to the
prison camp at Ruhlaben, but Captain Fryatt was condemned to death as a
"franc-tireur." The news of the murder was sent to the world through a
German communique dated July 28th. It stated:


The accused was condemned to death because, although he was not a member
of a combatant force, he made an attempt on the afternoon of March 20,
1915, to ram the German submarine U-33 near the Maas lightship. The
accused, as well as the first officer and the chief engineer of the
steamer, received at the time from the British Admiralty a gold watch as
a reward of his brave conduct on that occasion, and his action was
mentioned with praise in the House of Commons.

On the occasion in question, disregarding the U-boat's signal to stop
and show his national flag, he turned at a critical moment at high speed
on the submarine, which escaped the steamer by a few meters only by
immediately diving. He confessed that in so doing he had acted in
accordance with the instructions of the Admiralty. One of the many
nefarious franc-tireur proceedings of the British merchant marine
against our war vessels has thus found a belated but merited expiation.


This brutal action by Germany coming after the murder of Edith Cavell
created intense indignation throughout the world. It ranked with the
poison gas at Ypres, the Lusitania, the Belgian atrocities, the killing
of Edith Cavell and the unrestricted submarine sinkings, as a factor in
arousing the democratic peoples of the world to a fighting pitch.

Germany sowed its seeds of destruction in the wind that bore the fumes
of poison gas, and in the ruthless brutality that decreed the sinking of
the Lusitania and the murders of Edith Cavell and Captain Fryatt.

It reaped the whirlwind in the world-wide wrath that brought America
into the war, and that visited disgrace and defeat upon the German
Empire.



CHAPTER XXVIII

THE SECOND BATTLE OF YPRES

First to feel the effects of German terrorism through poison gas were
the gallant Canadian troops on the afternoon of April 22, 1915, at
Ypres, Belgium. Gas had been used by the Germans previously to this, but
they were mere experimental clouds directed against Belgian troops.

Before the battle, the English and Canadians held a line from
Broodseinde to half a mile north of St. Julien on the crest of the
Grafenstafel Ridge. The French prolonged the line to Steenstraate on the
Yperlee Canal. The Germans originally planned the attack for Tuesday,
April 20th, but with satanic ingenuity the offensive was postponed until
between 4 and 5 o'clock on the afternoon of Thursday, the 22d. During
the morning the wind blew steadily from the north and the scientists
attached to the German Field Headquarters predicted that the strong wind
would continue at least twelve hours longer.

The Canadian division held a line extending about five miles from the
Ypres-Roulers Railway to the Ypres-Poelcapelle road. The division
consisted of three infantry brigades, in addition to the artillery
brigades. Upon this unsuspecting body of men the poison fumes were
projected by means of pipes and force pumps. The immediate consequences
were that the asphyxiating gas of great intensity rendered immediately
helpless thousands of men. The same gas attack that was projected upon
the Canadians also fell with murderous effect upon the French. The
consequences were that the French division on the left of the Canadians
gave way and the Third brigade of the Canadian division, so far as the
left was concerned, was "up in the air," to use the phrase of its
commanding officer.

It became necessary for Brigadier-General Turner, commanding the Third
brigade, to throw back his left flank southward to protect his rear.
This caused great confusion, and the enemy, advancing rapidly, took a
number of guns and many prisoners, penetrating to the village of St.
Julien, two miles in the rear of the original French trenches. The
Canadians fought heroically, although greatly outnumbered and pounded by
artillery that inflicted tremendous losses. The Germans, as they came
through the gas clouds, were protected by masks moistened with a
solution containing bi-carbonate of soda.

The tactics of General Turner off-set the numerical superiority of the
enemy, and prevented a disastrous rout. General Curry, commanding the
Second brigade of Canadians, repeated this successful maneuver when he
flung his left flank southward and, presenting two fronts to the enemy,
held his line of trenches from Thursday at 5 o'clock until Sunday
afternoon. The reason the trenches were held no longer than Sunday
afternoon was that they had been obliterated by heavy artillery fire.
The Germans finally succeeded in capturing a line, the forward point of
which was the village of St. Julien. Reinforcements under General
Alderson had come up by this time and the enemy's advance was suddenly
checked. Enemy attacks upon the line running from Ypres to Passchendaele
completely broke down under the withering fire of the reinforced and
reformed artillery and infantry brigades. The record officer of the
Canadians makes this comment of the detailed fighting:

The story of the second battle of Ypres is the story of how the Canadian
division, enormously outnumbered--for they had in front of them at least
four divisions, supported by immensely heavy artillery, with a gap still
existing, though reduced, in their lines, and with dispositions made
hurriedly under the stimulus of critical danger, fought through the day
and through the night, and then through another day and night; fought
under their officers until, as happened to so many, those perished
gloriously, and then fought from the impulsion of sheer valor because
they came from fighting stock.

The enemy, of course, was aware--whether fully or not may perhaps be
doubted--of the advantage his breach in the line had given him, and
immediately began to push a formidable series of attacks upon the whole
of the newly-formed Canadian salient. The attack was everywhere fierce,
but developed with particular intensity at this moment upon the apex of
the newly-formed line, running in the direction of St. Julien.

It has already been stated that some British guns were taken in a wood
comparatively early in the evening of the 22d. In the course of that
night, and under the heaviest machine-gun fire, this wood was assaulted
by the Canadian Scottish, Sixteenth battalion of the Third brigade, and
the Tenth battalion of the Second brigade, which was intercepted for
this purpose on its way to a reserve trench. The battalions were
respectively commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel Leckie and
Lieutenant-Colonel Boyle, and after a most fierce struggle in the light
of a misty moon they took the position at the point of the bayonet. At
midnight the Second battalion, under Colonel Watson, and the Toronto
regiment, Queen's Own, Third battalion, under Lieutenant-Colonel Rennie,
both of the First brigade, brought up much-needed reinforcement, and
though not actually engaged in the assault, were in reserve.

All through the following days and nights these battalions shared the
fortunes and misfortunes of the Third brigade. An officer who took part
in the attack describes how the men about him fell under the fire of the
machine guns, which, in his phrase, played upon them "like a watering
pot." He added quite simply "I wrote my own life off." But the line
never wavered. When one man fell another took his place, and with a
final shout the survivors of the two battalions flung themselves into
the wood. The German garrison was completely demoralized, and the
impetuous advance of the Canadians did not cease until they reached the
far side of the wood and intrenched themselves there in the position so
dearly gained. They had, however, the disappointment of finding that the
guns had been blown up by the enemy, and later on in the same night a
most formidable concentration of artillery fire, sweeping the wood as a
tropical storm sweeps the leaves from a forest, made it impossible for
them to hold the position for which they had sacrificed so much.

The fighting continued without intermission all through the night, and,
to those who observed the indications that the attack was being pushed
with ever-growing strength, it hardly seemed possible that the
Canadians, fighting in positions so difficult to defend and so little
the subject of deliberate choice, could maintain their resistance for
any long period. At 6 A. M. on Friday it became apparent that the left
was becoming more and more involved, and a powerful German attempt to
outflank it developed rapidly. The consequences, if it had been broken
or outflanked, need not be insisted upon. They were not merely local.

It was there decided, formidable as the attempt undoubtedly was, to try
and give relief by a counter-attack upon the first line of German
trenches, now far, far advanced from those originally occupied by the
French. This was carried out by the Ontario First and Fourth battalions
of the First brigade, under Brigadier-General Mercer, acting in
combination with a British brigade.


[Illustration: Map: Ypres and the surroundings.]
  THE TOWN OF YPRES IS FULL OF MEMORIES FOR THE CANADIANS


It is safe to say that the youngest private in the rank, as he set his
teeth for the advance, knew the task in front of him, and the youngest
subaltern knew all that rested upon its success. It did not seem that
any human being could live in the shower of shot and shell which began
to play upon the advancing troops. They suffered terrible casualties.
For a short time every other man seemed to fall, but the attack was
pressed ever closer and closer.

The Fourth Canadian battalion at one moment came under a particularly
withering fire. For a moment--not more--it wavered. Its most gallant
commanding officer, Lieutenant-Colonel Burchill, carrying, after an old
fashion, a light cane, coolly and cheerfully rallied his men and, at the
very moment when his example had infected them, fell dead at the head of
his battalion. With a hoarse cry of anger they sprang forward (for,
indeed they loved him), as if to avenge his death. The astonishing
attack which followed--pushed home in the face of direct frontal fire
made in broad daylight by battalions whose names should live forever in
the memories of soldiers--was carried to the front line of the German
trenches. After a hand-to-hand struggle the last German who resisted was
bayoneted, and the trench was won.

The measure of this success may be taken when it is pointed out that
this trench represented in the German advance the apex in the breach
which the enemy had made in the original line of the Allies, and that it
was two and a half miles south of that line. This charge, made by men
who looked death indifferently in the face (for no man who took part in
it could think that he was likely to live) saved, and that was much, the
Canadian left. But it did more. Up to the point where the assailants
conquered, or died, it secured and maintained during the most critical
moment of all the integrity of the allied line. For the trench was not
only taken, it was held thereafter against all comers, and in the teeth
of every conceivable projectile, until the night of Sunday, the 25th,
when all that remained of the war-broken but victorious battalion was
relieved by fresh troops.



CHAPTER XXIX

ZEPPELIN RAIDS ON FRANCE AND ENGLAND

The idea of warfare in the air has been a dream of romancers from a
period long before Jules Verne. Indeed, balloons were used for
observation purposes in the eighteenth century by the French armies. The
crude balloon of that period, in a more developed form, was used in the
Franco-Prussian War, and during the siege of Paris by its assistance
communication was kept up between Paris and the outside world. Realizing
its possibilities inventors had been trying to develop a balloon which
could be propelled against the wind and so guided that explosives could
be dropped upon a hostile army. Partially successful dirigible balloons
have been occasionally exhibited for a number of years.

The idea of such a balloon took a strong hold upon the imagination of
the German army staff long before the Great War, and Count Ferdinand
Zeppelin gave the best years of his life to its development. From the
beginning he met with great difficulties. His first ships proved
mechanical failures, and after these difficulties were overcome he met
with a series of accidents which almost put an end to his efforts. By
popular subscription, and by government support, he was able to
continue, and when the war began Germany had thirty-five dirigible
balloons of the Zeppelin and other types, many of them as much as 490
feet long.

The Zeppelin balloon, called the Zeppelin from the name of its inventor,
was practically a vast ship, capable of carrying a load of about fifteen
thousand pounds. It would carry a crew of twenty men or more, fuel for
the engines, provisions, a wireless installation, and armament with
ammunition. For a journey of twenty hours such a vessel would need at
least seven thousand pounds of fuel. It would probably be able to carry
about two tons of explosives. These Zeppelins could travel great
distances. Before the war one of them flew from Lake Constance to
Berlin, a continuous flight of about one thousand miles, in thirty-one
hours.

These great aerial warships were given a thorough trial by the Germans.
They disliked to admit that they had made a costly mistake in adding
them to their armament. It soon turned out, however, that the Zeppelins
were practically useless in battle. Whatever they could do, either for
scouting purposes or in dropping explosives behind the enemy's lines,
could be better done by the airplane. The French and the English, who
before the war had decided that the airplane was the more important
weapon, were right. But the Germans did not give up their costly toy so
easily, and they determined to use it in the bombardment of cities and
districts situated far away from the German line, in dropping bombs, not
upon fortifications, or armed camps where they might meet with
resistance, but upon peaceful non-belligerents in the streets of great
unfortified cities.

It was their policy of frightfulness once again. And once again they had
made a mistake. The varied expeditions of the Zeppelin airships sent
from Germany to bombard Paris, or to cross the Channel and, after
dropping bombs on seaside resorts, to wander over the city of London in
the hope of spreading destruction there, did little real damage and
their net effects, from a military point of view, were practically nil.

The first Zeppelin raid upon England took place on January 19, 1915. The
Zeppelins passed over the cities of Yarmouth, Cromer, Sherringham and
King's Lynn. On this expedition there were two Zeppelins. They reached
the coast of Norfolk about 8.30 in the evening and then steered
northwest across the country toward King's Lynn, dropping bombs as they
went. In these towns there were no military stations and the damage
suffered was very slight. Nine persons were killed, all civilians. This
raid was followed by many others, which at first usually wasted their
ammunition, dropping their bombs on small country towns or in empty
fields.

On the 31st of May an expedition reached London and killed six persons
in the east end. The result of this raid was to stir the English to
intense indignation. Mobs gathered in the London streets, and persons
suspected of being Germans, or with German sympathies, were attacked.
Other raids followed, none of them doing serious military damage, but
usually killing or wounding innocent non-combatants. The stupid policy
of secrecy which they maintained during the first year of the war
unfortunately permitted great exaggeration of the real damages which
they had suffered.

During the first year, according to Mr. Balfour, in eighteen Zeppelin
raids there were only seventy-one civilian adults and eighteen children
killed, one hundred and eighty-nine civilian adults and thirty-one
children wounded. No soldier or sailor was killed and only seven
wounded.

In France similar attacks had been made on Paris and Calais. On the 20th
of March two Zeppelins dropped bombs on Paris, but Paris, unlike London,
was a fortified city, and the sky soldiers were driven off by the
anti-aircraft guns. The French also devised an efficient method of
defense. On the appearance of an airship great searchlights flashed into
the air and the enemy was made at once a target, not only for the guns
of all the forts, but also for airplane attack. In order to attack
successfully a Zeppelin it was necessary that an airplane should attain
a position above the enemy. For an airplane to rise to such a height
time was required, as the airplane rises slowly. The French, therefore,
devised a scheme by which two or more airplanes were kept constantly
circling at a very great height above the city. Relays were formed which
relieved each other at regular intervals. When an airship approached it
would therefore be compelled in the first place to pass through the fire
of the guns on the great forts, and then would find in the air above
airplanes in waiting. The Germans, therefore, practically gave up
attacks upon Paris. They were dangerous.

London, practically unarmed, seemed to them an easy mark. But the
British Lion was now awake. The English had been taken by surprise. They
attempted at first, in an unorganized way, to protect their city, and,
though occasionally successful in destroying an airship through the
gallantry of some individual hero, they soon found that their defense
must be organized, and Admiral Sir Percy Scott was entrusted with the
task. Lights were extinguished on the streets and screened on the water
front. Illumination for advertising purposes was forbidden; windows were
covered, so that London became at night a mass of gloom. The Zeppelins,
compelled to fly at a very great height, because of anti-aircraft guns,
were blinded. As in Paris airplanes were constantly kept on the alert
and searchlights and anti-airship guns placed at every convenient point.

The suggestion was made that the English should undertake reprisals, but
the suggestion was strongly opposed on the ground that the British
should not be a "party to a line of conduct condemned by every
right-thinking man of every civilized nation."

The effect of the English improved defenses was soon obvious, when the
German expeditions began to lose airship after airship. Under the new
regime, when such an attack was signaled, the whole city immediately
received warning and the sky was swept by dozens of searchlights. Safe
retreats were ready for those who cared to use them, but ordinarily the
whole population rushed out to watch the spectacle. Airplanes would dash
at the incoming foe; the searchlights would be switched off and the guns
be silent to avoid hindering the aviators. Then would come the attack
and Zeppelin after Zeppelin would be seen falling, a great mass of
flames, while their companions would hurry back across the Channel. Even
there they would not be safe, for many an airship was brought down on
English fields, or on the waters of the sea.

The Germans, however, did not confine their policy of frightfulness in
the air to the performances of their Zeppelins. Before the Zeppelins had
crossed the Channel their airplanes had visited England. On Christmas
Day, 1914, an airplane attacked Dover, doing, however, no damage. Other
airplanes also visited the British Isles from time to time, dropping
bombs, and as the Germans began to lose faith in the efficacy of their
Zeppelin fleets they began more and more to substitute airplanes for
their airships.

On some of these expeditions much more damage was done than had ever
been done by the Zeppelins. The airplane expedition grew serious in the
year 1917; between May 23d and June 16th of that year there were five
such aerial attacks. The airplanes could not only move with greater
speed but with better direction. An attack on May 25th resulted in the
killing of seventy-six persons and the injuring of one hundred and
seventy-four, the principal victims being women and children. This was
at the town of Folkestone on the southeast coast. In this attack there
were about sixteen airplanes, and the time of the attack was not more
than three minutes. Scarcely any part of Folkestone escaped injury. The
attack was methodically organized. Four separate squadrons passed over
the city, following each other at short intervals. It was impossible to
tell when the attack would end, and people in shelters or cellars were
kept waiting for hours without being able to feel certain that the
danger had passed.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  AN AIRPLANE ALARM
  Sailors dashing to the fighting tops of a battleship and putting an
  anti-aircraft gun in action to repel a hostile airplane.


[Illustration: Painting]
  LONDON'S WELCOME TO A ZEPPELIN RAIDER
  In the early part of the war Zeppelin raids on England were frequent.
  The rapid perfecting of searchlights, anti-aircraft guns and airplane
  defenses soon discouraged them. This picture shows an airplane about
  to attack with flaming bullets.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  GUARDING PARIS FROM THE HUN
  Observation post fitted with instruments for gauging the height and
  speed of enemy aircraft, a giant searchlight, a listening post and a
  "75" gun installed on the outskirts of Paris.


It is probable that one of the motives of these raids was to keep at
home fleets of English airplanes which might be more useful on the
front. Indeed, many Englishmen, alarmed by the damage, urged such a
policy, but the good sense of the English leaders prevented such a
mistake from being made. Pitiful as must have been the suffering in
individual cases, the whole of the damage caused by the German
frightfulness was but a trifle as compared with the usefulness of the
English air-fleets when directly sent against the German armies.
Nevertheless, every squadron of German airplanes sent to England was
attacked by British aviators, and in those attacks the Germans suffered
many losses.


[Illustration: Map]
  THE FIRST GERMAN ARMY WHICH INVADED FRANCE (1,200,000) WOULD HAVE
  STRETCHED FROM PARIS INTO RUSSIA (1,200 MILES) IF MARCHING IN SINGLE
  FILE

The worst raid of all those made was one on June 13th, which was
directed upon the city of London. On that occasion ninety-seven persons
were killed and four hundred and thirty-seven wounded. These airplane
operations differed from the Zeppelin expeditions in being carried on in
the daytime, and this raid took place while the schools were in session
and large numbers of people were in the street. Only one of the
attacking airplanes was brought down. The raiding machines were of a new
type, about three times the size of the ordinary machine, and there were
twenty-two such machines in the squadron. The battle in the air was a
striking spectacle and in spite of the danger was watched by millions of
the population. The raiders were easily seen and their flight seemed
like a flight of swallows as they dived and swerved through the air.

The raids on England were not the only raids conducted by the Germans
during the war. Paris suffered, but as soon as the warning sounded, the
sky over the city was alive with defense airplanes. An attack on the
French capital took place on the 27th of July and began about midnight.
The German airmen, however, never got further than a suburban section of
the city, and their bombardment caused but little damage. In one of the
suburbs, however, a German flyer dropped four bombs on a Red Cross
Hospital, killing two doctors, a chemist and a male nurse, and injuring
a number of patients. The raider was flying low and the distinguishing
marks of the hospital were plainly apparent.

Almost every day during the bitter fighting of 1918, reports came in
that Allied hospitals had been bombed by German raiders. Attacks on
hospitals were, of course, strictly forbidden by the Hague Convention,
and they caused bitter indignation. Such attacks were of a piece with
those upon hospital ships which were made from time to time. From the
very beginning of the war the Germans could not understand the
psychology of the people of the Allied countries. They were not fighting
with slaves, ready to cower under the lash, but with free people, ready
to fight for liberty and roused to fury by lawlessness.



CHAPTER XXX

RED REVOLUTION IN RUSSIA

The Russian Revolution was not a sudden movement of the people. Long
before the war it had raised its head. The Duma itself came into
existence as one of its fruits; but when the war began all parties
joined in patriotic support of the Russian armies and laid aside for the
time their cherished grievances. The war was immensely popular. Slavonic
nationalism turned against Austria-Hungary and Germany who were bent
upon crushing the Slavonic sister state, Serbia. The Liberal elements
saw in Germany the stronghold of reaction and of militarism, and trusted
that its downfall would be followed by that of Russian autocracy. But so
glaring was the incapacity of the old regime, that a union was formed
during the war by all the Liberal parties. This group united on the
single aim of pushing on the war, and silently preparing for the moment
when the catastrophe to Czarism was to come.

This was long before the revolution. But a conviction of the necessity
of immediate change gradually came to all. The Czar himself brought
matters to an issue. His vacillation, his appointment of ministers who
were not only reactionary, but were suspected of being German tools,
were too much for even honest supporters of the Imperial regime. Some of
these reactionaries, it is true, were easily driven from power. In 1915
Sukhomlinov and Maklakov were overthrown by the influence of the army
and the Duma. But in 1916 the parasites came to life again. M. Boris
Stuermer became Prime Minister, and appointed as Minister of the
Interior the notorious Protopopov. On November 14, 1916, Miliukov, the
leader of the Constitutional Democrats, or Cadet Party, attacked the
Premier in one of the fiercest speeches ever made in the Russian Duma.
Stuermer was compelled to resign, but his successor, M. Trepov, though
an honest man with high ambitions, was forced to retain Protopopov at
the Interior. For a moment there was calm. But it was the calm before
the storm.

The Russian Revolution, now recognized as the most bloody revolution in
history, began with the assassination of a single man. This man was
Gregory Novikh, known throughout the world under the name of Rasputin. A
Siberian peasant by birth, immoral, filthy in person, untrained in mind,
he had early received the nickname of Rasputin, which means
"ne'er-do-well," on account of his habits. A drunkard, and a libertine
always, he posed as a sort of saint and miracle worker, let his hair
grow long, and tramped about the world barefoot.

Rasputin had left his district of Tobolsk and at Moscow had started a
new cult, where mystical seances were mingled with debauchery. Through
Madame Verubova he had been introduced to the Empress herself. He became
the friend of Count Witte, of Stuermer, and Protopopov was his tool.
Rumor credited him with exercising an extraordinary influence upon the
Czarina, and through her upon the Czar. This influence was thought to be
responsible for many of the Czar's unpopular policies. In times of great
public agitation the wildest rumors are easily taken for truth and the
absurd legends which were easily associated with his name were greedily
accepted by people of every rank. The influence of Rasputin over the
Imperial family was denied again and again. It has been said from
authoritative sources that the Czar did not know him by sight, and that
the Czarina knew him only as a superstitious and neurotic woman might
know some fortune teller or other charlatan. Nevertheless the credulous
public believed him to be the evil spirit of the Imperial circle, and
every false move, every unpopular act, was ascribed to his baneful
influence. But such a career could not last long, and the end became a
tragedy.

Several times Rasputin had been attacked, but had escaped. At last, on
the 29th of December, 1916, Prince Yusapov, a young man of wealth and
position, invited him to dine with him at his own home. The Prince came
for him in his own car. Entering the dining-room, they found there the
Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovitch. M. Purishkevitch, a member of the Duma,
had acted as chauffeur, and he followed him in. The three told him that
he was to die and he was handed a pistol that he might kill himself;
instead of doing so, he shot at the Grand Duke, but missed, and then was
shot in turn by his captors. The noise attracted the attention of the
police who inquired what had happened. "I have just killed a dog," was
the reply.

His body was taken in an automobile to the Neva River, a hole cut in the
ice, and weighted with stones, it was dropped into the waters. On the
next day his executioners notified the police of what they had done, and
the news was announced at the Imperial Theatre, whose audience went wild
with enthusiasm, and sang the National Hymn. No legal action was ever
taken against Rasputin's executioners. His body was recovered and given
honorable burial. The Czarina, according to report, following the coffin
to the grave. And so disappeared from the Imperial Court one evil force.

But his tool, Alexander Protopopov, still survived. Protopopov was an
extraordinary man. In 1916 he had visited England and France and made a
splendid impression. His speeches, full of fire and patriotism, were
regarded as the best made by any deputation that had come from Russia.
But on his return to Petrograd he fell completely into the hands of the
Court party. He became associated with Rasputin, and his wild talk and
restless conduct suggested to many that his mind had become affected.

After the death of Rasputin, the meeting of the Duma, which should have
taken place on January 25, 1917, was postponed for a month. The
censorship was drawn tighter, the members of the secret police were
greatly increased, and a deliberate endeavor, under the direction of
Protopopov was made to encourage an abortive revolution, so that its
overthrow might establish the reactionaries in power. But the attempt
failed.

During January and February the people were calm. No one wanted
revolution then. On February 9th, the labor members of the War Industry
Committee were arrested. This was regarded as plainly provocative, and
M. Miliukov wrote appeals to the people for patience. These were
suppressed, but no disturbance ensued. A British Commission, then on a
visit to Russia, reported that there was no danger of revolution. But
the people were hungry. Speakers in the Duma discussed the food problem.
It became harder and harder to procure bread, and little that was
practical seemed to be done to improve the situation, though in some
parts of the country there were large surplus stocks. On March 8th
crowds gathered around the bakery shops, and looted several of them. The
next day the crowds in the streets increased. Groups of Cossacks rode
here and there, fraternizing with the people. They, too, were hungry. In
the afternoon two workmen were arrested for disorder by the police. A
band of Cossacks freed them. Street speakers began to appear here and
there, and crowds gathered to listen to their fiery denunciations of the
government.

On March 11th, General Khabalov, military governor of the city, issued a
proclamation announcing that the police had orders to disperse all
crowds, and that any workman who did not return to work on Monday
morning would be sent to the trenches. The main streets of the city were
cleared and guarded by the police and soldiery. The crowds were
enormous, and disorderly, and more than two hundred of the rioters were
killed. Yet it seemed as if the government had the situation in a firm
grasp, though an ominous incident was that the Pavlovsk regiment on
being ordered to fire upon the mob, mutinied and had to be ordered to
their quarters.

Meantime Rodzianko, the President of the Duma, had telegraphed to the
Czar:


Situation serious. Anarchy reigns in Capital. Government is paralyzed.
Transport food and fuel supplies are utterly disorganized. General
discontent is growing. Disorderly firing is going on in streets. Various
companies of soldiers are shooting at each other. It is absolutely
necessary to invest someone, who enjoys the confidence of the people,
with powers to form a new government. No time must be lost, and delay
may be fatal. I pray to God that in this hour responsibility may not
fall on the wearer of the crown.


The Prime Minister, Prince Golitzin, acting under powers which he had
received from the Czar, prorogued the Duma. But the Duma refused to be
prorogued. Its President, Rodzianko, holding in his hand the order for
dissolution, announced that the Duma was now the sole constitutional
authority of Russia.

During the night following, the soldiers at the Capital, and the
Socialists, decided upon their course. The soldiers determined that they
would not fire upon their civilian brothers. The Socialists planned an
alternative scheme of government.

On March the 12th, the city was taken possession of by a mob. The Preo
Crajenski Guards refused to fire upon the crowd. The Volynsky regiment,
sent to coerce them, joined in the mutiny. Followed by the mob, the two
regiments seized the arsenal. A force of 25,000 soldiers was in the
revolt. At 11 A. M., the Courts of Law were set on fire and the fortress
of SS. Peter and Paul was seized. The police, fighting desperately, were
hunted from their quarters, their papers destroyed and the prisoners,
political and criminal, released from the jails.

During the day the Duma kept in constant session, awaiting the Emperor,
who did not come. Telegram after telegram was sent him, each more
urgent. There is reason to believe that these telegrams never reached
the Czar. When information finally did come to him it was too late.
Meantime the Duma appointed an executive committee. Their names were
Rodzianko, Nekrasov, Konovalov, Dmitrikov, Lvov, Rjenski, Karaulov,
Miliukov, Schledlovski, Schulgin, Tcheidze and Kerensky. The workmen and
soldiers also formed a committee, which undertook to influence the
troops now pouring into Petrograd. But the center of the revolution was
still the Duma, and crowds gathered to listen to its speeches. In the
evening Protopovo surrendered to the Russian guards, but General
Khabalov still occupied the Admiralty building with such forces as were
faithful.

On March 13th it became evident that the army in the field were
accepting the authority of the provisional government. The Duma
committee was composed mainly of men of moderate political views. They
moved slowly, fearing on the one hand the Reactionaries who still
preserved their loyalty to the Czar, and on the other hand the Council
of Labor, with its extreme views, and its influence--with the troops.
The siege of the Admiralty building was ended by the surrender of
General Khabalov. The police, however, were still keeping up a desultory
resistance, but the mob were hunting them like wild beasts. On
Wednesday, the 14th of March, the revolution was over.

The Executive Committee of the Duma and the Council of the Workmen's and
Soldiers' Delegates, now universally known as the Soviet, were working
in harmony. Every hour proclamations were issued, some of them foolish,
some of them, it is thought, inspired by German agents, and some of them
wise and patriotic. One of the most unfortunate of these proclamations
was one to the army directing that "the orders of the War Committee must
be obeyed, saving only on those occasions when they shall contravene the
orders and regulations of the labor deputies and military delegates."
This same proclamation abolished saluting for private soldiers off duty.
It was the beginning of the destruction of the Russian military power.
The proclamation of the Duma committee itself was admirable:


CITIZENS:
The Provisional Executive Committee of the Duma, with the aid and
support of the garrison of the capital and its inhabitants, has now
triumphed over the baneful forces of the old regime in such a manner as
to enable it to proceed to the more stable organization of the executive
power. With this object, the Provisional Committee will name ministers
of the first national cabinet, men whose past public activity assures
them the confidence of the country.

The new cabinet will adopt the following principles as the basis of its
policy:

1. An immediate amnesty for all political and religious offenses,
including military revolts, acts of terrorism, and agrarian crimes.

2. Freedom of speech, of the press, of associations and labor
organizations, and the freedom to strike; with an extension of these
liberties to officials and troops, in so far as military and technical
conditions permit.

3. The abolition of social, religious, and racial restrictions and
privileges.

4. Immediate preparation for the summoning of a Constituent Assembly,
which, with universal suffrage as a basis, shall establish the
governmental regime and the constitution of the country.

5. The substitution for the police of a national militia, with elective
heads and subject to the self-governing bodies.

6. Communal elections to be carried out on the basis of universal
suffrage.

7. The troops that have taken part in the revolutionary movement shall
not be disarmed, but they are not to leave Petrograd.

8. While strict military discipline must be maintained on active
service, all restrictions upon soldiers in the enjoyment of social
rights granted to other citizens are to be abolished.


Meantime the Emperor, "the Little Father," at first thoroughly
incredulous of the gravity of the situation, had at last become alarmed.
He appointed General Ivanov Commander-in-Chief of the army, and ordered
him to proceed to Petrograd at the head of a division of loyal troops.
General Ivanov set out, but his train was held up at Tsarkoe Selo, and
he returned to Pskov. The Czar himself then started for the city, but
he, too, was held up at the little station of Bologoi, where workmen had
pulled up the track, and he returned to Pskov.

He sent for Ruzsky and declared that he was ready to yield to the Duma
and grant a responsible ministry. Ruzsky advised him to get in touch
with Rodzianko, and as a result of a telephone communication with
Rodzianko and with several of his trusted generals, it became clear that
there was no other course than abdication. Guchkov and Shulgin,
messengers from the Duma, arrived on the evening of March 15th, and
found the Emperor alone, except for his aide-de-camp, Count Fredericks.

"What do you want me to do?" he asked.

"You must abdicate," Guchkov told him, "in favor of your son, with the
Grand Duke Michael Alexandrovitch as Regent."

The Emperor sat for a long time silent. "I cannot be separated from my
boy," he said. "I will hand the throne to my brother." Taking a sheet of
paper he wrote as follows:


By the Grace of God, We, Nicholas II, Emperor of all the Russias, to all
our faithful subjects:

In the course of a great struggle against a foreign enemy, who has been
endeavoring for three years to enslave our country, it has pleased God
to send Russia a further bitter trial. Internal troubles have threatened
to compromise the progress of the war. The destinies of Russia, the
honor of her heroic army, the happiness of her people, and the whole
future of our beloved country demand that at all costs victory shall be
won. The enemy is making his last efforts, and the moment is near when
our gallant troops, in concert with their glorious Allies, will finally
overthrow him.

In these days of crisis we have considered that our nation needs the
closest union of all its forces for the attainment of victory. In
agreement with the Imperial Duma, we have recognized that for the good
of our land we should abdicate the throne of the Russian state and lay
down the supreme power.

Not wishing to separate ourselves from our beloved son, we bequeath our
heritage to our brother, the Grand Duke Michael Alexandrovitch, with our
blessing upon the future of the Russian throne. We bequeath it to him
with the charge to govern in full unison with the national
representatives who may sit in the legislature, and to take his
inviolable oath to them in the name of our well-beloved country.

We call upon all faithful sons of our land to fulfil this sacred and
patriotic duty in obeying their Emperor at this painful moment of
national trial, and to aid him, together with the representatives of the
nation, to lead the Russian people in the way of prosperity and glory.

May God help Russia.


So ended the reign of Nicholas the Second, Czar of all the Russias. The
news of the Czar's abdication spread over the world with great rapidity,
and was received by the Allies with mixed feelings. The Czar had been
scrupulously loyal to the alliance. He was a man of high personal
character, and his sympathies on the whole, liberal; but he was a weak
man in a position in which even a strong man might have failed. He was
easily influenced, especially by his wife. Warned again and again of the
danger before him, he constantly promised improvement, only to fail in
keeping his promises. He deeply loved his wife, and yielded continually
to her unwise advice.

The Empress Alexandra Feodorovna is but another instance of a devoted
queen who dethroned her consort. She believed in Divine Right and looked
with suspicion upon popular leaders. Her one object in life was to hand
on the Russian crown to her son, with no atom of its power diminished.
She surrounded herself and her husband with scoundrels and charlatans.

On the whole, the feeling among the Allies was one of relief. There was
a general distrust of the influences which had been surrounding the
Czar. The patriotism of the Grand Duke Michael was well known, and a
government conducted by him was sure to be a great improvement. But it
was not to be. Before the news of the abdication reached Petrograd a new
ministry had been formed by the Duma. Miliukov announced their names and
explained their credentials. The Prime Minister was Prince George Lvov.
Miliukov was Minister of Foreign Affairs, Guchkov Minister of War and
Marine, Kerensky, a new name in the government, Minister of Justice. The
ministry included representatives of every party of the left and center.

Miliukov declared that their credentials came from the Russian
revolution: "We shall not fight for the sake of power. To be in power is
not a reward or pleasure but a sacrifice. As soon as we are told that
the sacrifice is no longer needed, we shall give up our places with
gratitude for the opportunity which has been accorded us."

He concluded by informing his hearers that the despot who had brought
Russia to the brink of ruin would either abdicate of his free will, or
be deposed. He added that the Grand Duke Michael would be appointed
Regent.

This announcement at once produced an explosion. A ministry of moderates
and a continuance of the Imperial government under a regency stirred the
delegates of the workmen and soldiers to revolt. For a time it seemed as
if the new government would disappear in the horrors of mob rule. But
Kerensky saved the situation. Making his way into the meeting of the
Soviet he burst into an impassioned speech.

"Comrades!" he cried, "I have been appointed Minister of Justice. No one
is a more ardent Republican than I, but we must bide our time. Nothing
can come to its full growth at once. We shall have our Republic but we
must first win the war. The need of the moment is organization and
discipline and that need will not wait."

His eloquence carried the day. The Soviet passed a resolution supporting
the provisional government with only fifteen dissenting votes. But it
had been made clear that the people did not approve of the regency, and
on the night of the 15th of March, Prince Lvov, Kerensky and other
leaders of the Duma sought out the Grand Duke Michael and informed him
of the situation. The Grand Duke yielded to the people, and on Friday,
March the 16th, issued a declaration which ended the power of the
Romanovs in Russia:


I am firmly resolved to accept the supreme power only if this should be
the desire of our great people, who must, by means of a plebiscite
through their representatives in the Constituent Assembly, establish the
form of government and the new fundamental laws of the Russian state.
Invoking God's blessing, I, therefore, request all citizens of Russia to
obey the provisional government, set up on the initiative of the Duma,
and invested with plenary powers, until within as short a time as
possible the Constituent Assembly elected on a basis of equal, universal
and secret suffrage, shall enforce the will of the nation regarding the
future form of the constitution.


With this declaration the sacred monarchy had disappeared. In one week
the people had come to their own and Russia was free. But what form of
new government was to replace the old regime was still the question.
There were two rival theories as to the principles to be followed, one
that of the Moderates, the other of the Extremists. The Moderates, who
controlled the provisional government were practical men. They realized
that Russia was at war and that efficient administration was the great
need.

The Extremists of the Soviet were a different type of men. They were
profoundly ignorant of all practical questions of government; their
creed was socialism. The Socialistic party in Russia may be divided into
three different groups. The first, the Social Revolutionary party, came
into prominence in Russia about 1900. It was composed of followers of
the Russian Lavrov who believed in the socialist state, but a state
which should not be a tyrant overriding the individual. Liberty was his
watchword and he made his appeal not only to the workmen in the shops
but with a special force to the peasant. He did not preach class war in
the ordinary sense, and believed in the value of national life. To this
party belonged Kerensky, more and more becoming the leader of the
revolutionary movement.

The second group of the Socialist party were the Bolsheviki. This group
were followers of the German Karl Marx. The revolution which they sought
was essentially a class revolution. To the Bolsheviki the fate of their
country mattered not at all. They were eager for peace on any terms. The
only war in which they were interested was a class war; they recognized
no political boundaries. The leader of this group was Vladimir Iljetch
Uljanov, who, under his pen name of Lenine, was already widely known and
who had now obtained the opportunity which he had long desired.

The third group were the Mensheviki. The Mensheviki believed in the
importance of the working classes, but they did not ignore other
classes. They were willing to use existing forms of government to carry
out the reforms they desired. They saw that the Allied cause was their
own cause, the cause of the workman as well as the intellectual.

The Soviet contained representatives of these three groups. It did not
represent Russia, but it was in Petrograd and could exert its influence
directly upon the government.

The attitude of the provisional government toward the Imperial family
was at first not unkindly. The Czar and the Czarina were escorted to the
Alexandrovsky Palace in Tsarskoe-Selo. The Czar for a time lived quietly
as plain Nicholas Romanov. The Czarina and her children were very ill
with measles, the case of the little Prince being complicated by the
breaking out of an old wound in his foot. The Grand Duchess Tatiana was
in a serious condition and oxygen had been administered. As his family
improved in health the Czar amused himself by strolls in the palace
yard, and even by shoveling snow. Later on Nicholas was transferred to
Tobolsk, Siberia, and then, in May, 1918, to Yekaterinberg. His wife and
his daughter Marie accompanied him to the latter place, while Alexis and
his other three daughters remained in Tobolsk. On July 20th a Russian
government dispatch announced his assassination. It read as follows:


At the first session of the Central Executive Committee, elected by the
Fifth Congress of the Councils, a message was made public that had been
received by direct wire from the Ural Regional Council, concerning the
shooting of the ex-Czar, Nicholas Romanov. Recently Yekaterinberg, the
Capital of the Red Urals, was seriously threatened by the approach of
Czecho-Slovak bands, and a counter-revolutionary conspiracy was
discovered, which had as its object the wresting of the ex-Czar from the
hands of the Council's authority. In view of this fact the President of
the Ural Regional Council decided to shoot the ex-Czar, and the decision
was carried out on July 16th.


The wife and the son of Nicholas Romanov had been sent to a place of
security. In a detailed account of the execution, published in Berlin,
it appeared that the Czar had been awakened at five o'clock in the
morning, and informed that he was to be executed in two hours. He spent
some time with a priest in his bedroom and wrote several letters.
According to this account, when the patrol came to take him out for
execution he was found in a state of collapse. His last words, uttered
just before the executioners fired, are reported to have been "Spare my
wife and my innocent and unhappy children. May my blood preserve Russia
from ruin."

The Russian press, including the Socialist papers, condemned the
execution as a cruel and unnecessary act. The charges of conspiracy were
utterly unproven, and were merely an excuse. The Central Executive
Committee, however, accepted the decision of the Ural Regional Soviet as
being regular, and a decree by the Bolshevist Government declared all
the property of the former Emperor, his wife, his mother and all the
members of the Imperial house, forfeit to the Soviet Republic.

Meantime the provisional government, which had taken power on the 16th
of March, seemed as if it might succeed. Miliukov, whose announcement of
the Regency had made him unpopular, declared for a Republic. The great
army commanders for the most part accepted the revolution. The Grand
Duke Nicholas was removed from his command and the other Grand Dukes
were ordered not to leave Petrograd. Alexiev became commander-in-chief;
Ruzsky had the northern group of armies, Brusilov the southern; Kornilov
was in command of Petrograd, and the central group was put under the
command of Lechitsky. Reports came that discipline was improving
everywhere on the front.


[Illustration: Map of Petrograd]
  CAPITAL OF THE NEW REPUBLIC OF RUSSIA


The plans of the government, too, met with general approval. Their
policy was announced by Prince Lvov. "The new government considers it
its duty to make known to the world that the object of free Russia is
not to dominate other nations and forcibly to take away their territory.
The object of independent Russia is a permanent peace and the right of
all nations to determine their own destiny."

Kerensky, in inspiring speeches, encouraged the country to war, and
declared against a separate peace. The new government announced that
Poland was to receive complete independence, with a right to determine
its own form of government, and its relation, if any, to Russia. In
Finland the Governor, Sein, was removed. A Liberal was appointed
Governor and the Finnish Diet was convened. A manifesto was issued on
March 21st, completely restoring the Finnish constitution. To the
Armenians Kerensky expressed himself as in favor of an autonomous
government for them, under Russia's protection, and on March 25th,
absolute equality of the Jews was proclaimed by the new government. A
number of Jews were made officers in the army, and two Jewish advocates
were appointed members of the Russian Senate and of the Supreme Court.
On April 4th full religious liberty was proclaimed, and on the same date
the Prime Minister promised a delegation of women that women would be
given the right to vote.

These acts caused a general subsidence of unrest, and public good
feeling was increased by the return of the political exiles and
prisoners from Siberia. A full hundred thousand of such prisoners were
released, and their progress across Siberia to Russia was one grand
triumphal march.

The most celebrated of these political prisoners were two women,
Catherine Breshkovskaya and Marie Spiridonova. Catherine Breshkovskaya
was known as the grandmother of the revolution. Forty-four years of her
life were spent in exile. When she reached Petrograd she was met at the
railroad depot by a military band, and carried in procession through the
streets. Equally popular was Marie Spiridonova, who, though still young,
had suffered martyrdom. She had been tortured with cruelty that is
unprintable. Her face had been disfigured for life. The agents who had
inflicted the torture were assassinated by the revolutionists.

It was a great day for Russia, and the outlook seemed full of promise.



CHAPTER XXXI

THE DESCENT TO BOLSHEVISM

The hopes entertained for the new Republic of Russia were doomed to
disappointment. For a short time, under the leadership of Lvov, the
Russians marched along the path of true democracy. But the pace became
too rapid.

The government prospered in Petrograd, and the economic organization of
the country proceeded with great speed. An eight-hour day was introduced
in the capital and in many other cities throughout the republic. The
fever of organization spread even to the peasants. They formed a Council
of Peasants' Deputies, modeled after the Council of Workmen and
Soldiers. On the 13th of April, 1917, came the first meeting of the
All-Russia Congress of Soviets, and with it a revival of the differences
of opinion which ultimately were to destroy the government. The great
majority were for war, but the minority, led by Lenine and the
Bolsheviki element, demanded an immediate peace. They declared that the
enemies of the Revolution were not the Central Powers; but the
capitalists in all countries, and not least the Provisional Government
of Russia.

Some clew to the meaning of the Bolsheviki movement in Russia is to be
found in the life of Lenine, its leading spirit. It has been charged
that he was the tool of the German Government. He undoubtedly received
facilities from the German Government to return to Russia from
Switzerland immediately after the Revolution in March. His whole career,
however, suggests that he was not a tool, but a fanatic.

He was born in Simbirsk, in Central Russia, in the year 1870. Lenine was
only one of the several aliases that he had found it necessary to adopt
at various times. He was of good family, and received his education at
the Petrograd University. From the very beginning he took an active
interest in the political and social problems of the day. In 1887 his
brother, A. Uljanov, was arrested, and after a secret trial condemned to
death and hanged as a participant in a plot to wreck the imperial train
carrying Alexander III. Lenine was also arrested, but was released on
account of a lack of evidence. At this time the Russian Socialistic
movement was still in its infancy.


[Illustration: Photograph: About 50 women in military uniforms.]
  Copyright Underwood and Underwood, N. Y
  THE WOMEN'S "BATTALION OF DEATH" IN NATIONAL DANCE
  A unique outgrowth of the Russian revolution was this organization of
  women which came into prominence at the beginning of the Russian
  front's break-up.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright Underwood and Underwood, N. Y
  DEMONSTRATION OF CITIZENS BEFORE THIS WINTER PALACE
  The formation of the Red Guard adopting the propaganda of the
  Bolshevists resulted, which drove Russia into a chaos of Revolution.


[Illustration: Photograph]
Copyright International Film Service.
  SPOILS OF THE VICTORY AT ST. MIHIEL
  The Germans left everything behind when they fled to avoid being
  trapped in the St. Mihiel salient by the swift American advance. This
  shows a soldier examining an abandoned German machine-gun, fully
  loaded and not a shot fired.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  AN AERIAL BOMB
  British airmen examining a huge bomb which later scattered death among
  the Huns.


Lenine spent his Sundays in a circle of uneducated workmen, explaining
to them the elements of socialistic economics. Along with this
propaganda work he studied deeply the economic phases of Russian life,
being especially interested in its working and peasant classes. He wrote
several books on the subject, which are still accepted as valuable
representatives of Russian economic literature. Because of his
socialistic activities, Lenine was compelled to leave Russia on several
occasions, when he lived in Switzerland, France and Austria. From these
countries he directed the work of one of the groups of the Social
Democratic party, and became an important leader.

In the General Russian Socialistic Convention, held in 1903, this group
made a definite stand for its program and policies. This was the time
when the word "Bolsheviki" was coined, meaning the "majority," who had
voted in accord with Lenine's proposals. Lenine believed in the seizure
of political power by means of violent revolution and in establishing a
proletarian government. After the Revolution of 1905, the Lenine faction
dwindled and it seemed as if Bolshevism was destined to die out. But in
1911, with the awakening of a new spirit in the political and social
life of Russia, a new impetus was given to the activities of the
Bolsheviki. The first Socialist daily paper, Pravda, ("the Truth,") was
one of their efforts. In 1913 the Bolsheviki sent six representatives to
the Duma.

At the outbreak of the war Lenine was in Cracow. Like other
revolutionary leaders he was compelled to live in exile. He went to
Switzerland where he remained until the news of the successful
revolution caused his return to Russia. On his arrival in Petrograd he
gathered together his followers and began the agitation in favor of the
Bolshevist program and of peace.

The first sign of the conflict between the Provisional Government and
the Soviet arose in connection with the joint note sent to the Allies by
the Provisional Government on May 1st. This note was signed by Foreign
Secretary Miliukov. It declared, among other things, that the
Provisional Government would "maintain a strict regard for its
engagements with the Allies of Russia."

The document aroused strong disapproval among many members of the
Council of the Soviet, and serious anti-government demonstrations
occurred in Petrograd on May 3d and 4th. These demonstrations were
directed distinctly against Miliukov. Detachments of soldiers and
workmen gathered in front of the headquarters of the Provisional
Government, carrying banners, with inscriptions "Down with Miliukov!
Down with the Provisional Government!" Miliukov appealed to the crowd
for confidence, and his words were greeted with hearty cheering.

The Soviet Council ultimately voted confidence in the government by a
narrow margin of 35 in a total of 2,500. But the agitation against the
government persisted, and on May 16th Miliukov resigned. General
Kornilov, Commander of the Petrograd Garrison, and Guchkov, Minister of
War, finding their control of the army weakened by the interference of
the Soviet Council, also resigned.

The situation became critical. As a result of this agitation a new
coalition government was formed. Prince Lvov remained Prime Minister.
Terestchenko became Foreign Minister. Most significant of all, Kerensky
became the Minister of War. The new government issued a new declaration
of policy, promising a firm support of the war with Germany, and an
effort to call together at the earliest possible date a Constituent
Assembly to deal with questions of land and of finance. This manifesto
was received coldly by the Soviets and their press.

It was at this time that the Allies sent special missions to Russia to
aid the Russian Government in forwarding the fight against the common
enemy. The American mission to Russia was headed by Elihu Root, former
Secretary of State. It was cordially received, and housed in the former
Winter Palace of the Czar. On June 15th the American Ambassador, David
R. Francis, presented the Root mission to the Council of Ministers in
the Marinsky Palace, and Mr. Root made an eloquent address, declaring
the sympathy of the American Republic with the new Russian Democracy. He
declared that the liberty of both nations was in danger. "The armed
forces of military autocracy are at the gates of Russia and the Allies.
The triumph of Germans will mean the death of liberty in Russia. No
enemy is at the gates of America, but America has come to realize that
the triumph of German arms means the death of Liberty in the world."

At Moscow Mr. Root addressed representatives of the Zemstvo and the
local Council of the Workmen and Soldiers. He was warmly applauded, and
on motion of the Mayor a telegram was sent to President Wilson, thanking
him for sending the Root Commission to Russia. The Root Mission returned
to the United States early in August, and reported to Washington August
12th. At a public reception given by the citizens of New York, Senator
Root expressed supreme confidence in the stability of the Revolution.

On July 1st, inspired by Kerensky, and under the personal leadership of
General Kornilov, the Russian army began an offensive in Galicia. It
first met with complete success, capturing Halicz, and sweeping forward
close to Dolina in the Carpathian foothills. Then under a very slight
hostile German pressure, the Russian armies, immediately to the north
and south of Kornilov's army, broke and ran. This action was directly
traced to orders subversive of discipline, emanating from the Petrograd
Soviet. Kornilov's army was compelled to retire, and by July 21st was in
full retreat from Galicia.

The Russian mutiny spread. Regiments refused to fight or to obey their
officers.

One of the most picturesque episodes of this phase of the war was the
formation of a woman's regiment, known as the "Command of Death," which
was reviewed at Petrograd June 21st, by Minister of War, Kerensky. In
front of the barracks assigned to this regiment a visitor found posted
at the gate a little blue-eyed sentry in a soldier's khaki blouse, short
breeches, green forage cap, ordinary woman's black stockings and neat
shoes. The sentry was Mareya Skridlov, daughter of Admiral Skridlov,
former commander of the Baltic fleet and Minister of Marines. In the
courtyard three hundred girls were drilling, mostly between 18 and 25
years old, of good physique and many of them pretty. They wore their
hair short or had their heads entirely shaved. They were drilling under
the instruction of a male sergeant of the Volynsky regiment, and marched
to an exaggerated goose step.

The girl commander, Lieutenant Buitchkarev, explained that most of the
recruits were from the higher educational academies, with a few
peasants, factory girls and servants. Some married women were accepted,
but none who had children. The Battalion of Death distinguished itself
on the field, setting an example of courage to the mutinous regiments
during the retreat of Brusilov.

With the army thus demoralized the Russian Revolution encountered a
perilous period toward the end of July, 1917, and civil war or anarchy
seemed almost at hand, when out of the depths of the national spirit
there arose a new revolution to save the situation and to maintain
order. The country was everywhere the scene of riotous disturbances.
Anarchists, radicals, and monarchists seemed to be working hand-in-hand
to precipitate a reign of terror, when once more Kerensky saved the
situation. On July 20th, it was announced that the Premier, Prince Lvov,
had resigned, and that Alexander Kerensky had been appointed Premier,
but would also retain his portfolio as Minister of War.

A new government was quickly formed. Kerensky was made practical
Dictator, and his government received the complete endorsement of a
joint Congress of the Soviets and the Council of peasant delegates.
Kerensky acted with the utmost vigor. Orders were given to fire on
deserters and warrants issued for the arrest of revolutionary agitators
whoever they might be. Rear-Admiral Verdervski, commander of the Baltic
fleet, was seized for communicating a secret government telegram to
sailors' committees. Agitators from the Soviet were arrested, charged
with inciting the Peterhof troops against the Federal Government. On
July 22d, the following resolution was passed by the joint Congress.


Recognizing that the country is menaced by a military debacle on the
front and by anarchy at home, it is resolved:

1. That the country and the revolution are in danger.

2. That the Provisional Government is proclaimed the Government of
   National Safety.

3. That unlimited powers are accorded the government for re-establishing
   the organization and discipline of the army for a fight to a finish
   against the enemies of public order, and for the realization of the
   whole program embodied in the governmental program just announced.


The reorganization of the Councils of the All-Russia, and Workmen's and
Peasants' Organizations on the 23d, issued a ringing address to the army
denouncing its mutinous spirit and warning it of the inevitable result.
The Provisional Government also issued a proclamation on July 22d,
charging that the disorders were precipitated to bring about a
counter-revolution by the enemies of the country. But the army was
demoralized. It disregarded discipline and refused to recognize military
rule. A general retreat followed. The Germans and Austrians steadily
advanced through Galicia and crossed the frontier before the Russian
armies could be forced to make a stand.

The death penalty for treason or mutiny was restored in the army on July
25th, when Kerensky threatened to resign unless this was done. On that
same date the government authorized the Minister of the Interior to
suspend the publication of periodicals that incite to insubordination or
disobedience to orders given by the military authorities. By July 28th
the situation had become more hopeful. On that day General Ruzsky,
formerly commander-in-chief of the northern armies of Russia, and
General Gurko, ex-commander on the Russian southwestern front, were
summoned to Petrograd. Each had retired on account of the interference
of the Council of Workmen and Soldiers' delegates. Their return to the
service was a hopeful sign. The Soviet also passed by an overwhelming
majority a resolution censuring Lenine, and demanding that he should be
publicly tried. Charges had been made that Lenine and his associates
were working under German direction and financed by Germans. On August
2d, Kornilov became Commander-in-Chief of the Russian army. A
disagreement in the Cabinet led to its reorganization. In the new
Cabinet appeared again representatives of the Constitutional Democratic
party. Conditions began to show improvement from this time forth.

An extraordinary National Council met at Moscow August 26th, 1917. This
conference consisted of 2,500 delegates representing the Duma, the
Soviets, the Zemstvos, and indeed all organized Russia. Kerensky opened
the conference in a speech of great length in which he reviewed the
general situation, declaring that the destructive period of the
Revolution had past and that the time had come to consolidate its
conquests.

Perhaps the most important address before the Council was that made by
General Kornilov, Commander-in-Chief of the army. General Kornilov was
received with prolonged cheers, which in the light of his subsequent
action were especially significant. General Kornilov described with much
detail the disorganization and insubordination in the army, and
continued:


"We are implacably fighting anarchy in the army. Undoubtedly it will
finally be repressed, but the danger of fresh debacles is weighing
constantly on the country. The situation on the front is bad. We have
lost the whole of Galicia, the whole of Bukowina, and all the fruits of
our recent victories. If Russia wishes to be saved the army must be
regenerated at any cost." General Kornilov then outlined the most
important of the reform measures which he recommended, and concluded: "I
believe that the genius and the reason of the Russian people will save
the country. I believe in a brilliant future for our army. I believe its
ancient glory will be restored."


General Kaledines, leader of the Don Cossacks, mounted the tribune and
read a resolution passed by the Cossacks demanding the continuation of
the war until complete victory was attained. He defied the extreme
Radicals. "Who saved you from the Bolsheviki on the 14th of July?" he
asked contemptuously. "We Cossacks have been free men. We are not made
drunk by our new-found liberties and are unblinded by party or program.
We tell you plainly and categorically, 'Remove yourselves from the place
which you have neither the ability or the courage to fill, and let
better men than yourselves step in, or take the consequences of your
folly.'"

The conference took no definite action, being invested with no
authority, but it served to bring out clearly the line of cleavage
between the Radical or Socialistic element represented by Kerensky and
the Conservatives represented by the generals of the army.

Immediately on the heels of the Moscow conference an important German
advance was made in the direction of Riga, the most important Russian
Baltic port. In spite of a vigorous defense the Germans captured the
city.

The loss of Riga intensified the political excitement in Russia, and
produced a profound crisis. A wave of unrest spread throughout the
country. The Grand Duke Michael, and the Grand Duke Paul with their
families, were arrested on a charge of conspiracy. The Provisional
Government was charged with responsibility of the collapse of the army.

It was on September 9th, that the storm broke, and General Kornilov, the
Commander-in-Chief of the Russian armies, raised the flag of revolt
against the Provisional Government. The details of the revolt are as
follows:

At one o'clock Saturday afternoon, Deputy Lvov, of the Duma, called upon
Premier Kerensky, and declared that he had come as the representative of
General Kornilov to demand the surrender of all power into Kornilov's
hands. M. Lvov said that this demand did not emanate from Kornilov only
but was supported by an organization of Duma members, Moscow industrial
interests, and other conservatives. This group, said M. Lvov, did not
object to Kerensky personally, but demanded that he transfer the
Portfolio of War to M. Savinkov, assistant Minister of War, who all
along had supported Kornilov.

"If you agree," M. Lvov added, "we invite you to come to headquarters
and meet General Kornilov, giving you a solemn guarantee that you will
not be arrested."

Premier Kerensky replied that he could not believe Kornilov to be guilty
of such an act of treason, and that he would communicate with him
directly. In an exchange of telegrams Kornilov confirmed fully to the
Premier his demands. Kerensky promptly placed Lvov under arrest,
denounced Kornilov as a traitor and deposed him from his position as
Commander-in-Chief, General Klembovsky being appointed in his place.
General Kornilov responded to the order of dismissal by moving an army
against the Capital.

Martial law was declared in Moscow and in Petrograd. Kerensky assumed
the functions of Commander-in-Chief and took military measures to defend
Petrograd and resist the rebels. On the 12th it was clear that the
Kornilov revolt had failed to receive the expected support. Kornilov
advanced toward Petrograd, and occupied Jotchina, thirty miles southwest
of the Capital, but there was no bloodshed. On the night of the 13th,
General Alexief demanded Kornilov's unconditional surrender, and the
revolt collapsed. Kornilov was arrested and the Provisional Government
reconstituted on stronger lines.

After the so-called Kornilov revolt, the Russian Revolution assumed a
form which might almost be called stable. A democratic congress met at
Moscow, September 27th, and adopted a resolution providing for a
preliminary parliament to consist of 231 members, of whom 110 were to
represent the Zemstvos and the towns. The congress refused its sanction
to a coalition cabinet in which the Constitutional Democrats should
participate, but Kerensky practically defied the congress, and named a
coalition cabinet, in which several portfolios were held by members of
the Constitutional Democratic Party. The new government issued a
statement declaring that it had three principal aims: to raise the
fighting power of the army and navy; to bring order to the country by
fighting anarchy; to call the Constituent Assembly as soon as possible.
The Constituent Assembly was called to assemble in December. It was to
consist of 732 delegates to be elected by popular vote.

Meantime agitation against the Coalition Government continued. On
November 1st, the Premier issued a statement through the Associated
Press, to all the newspapers of the Entente, which conveyed the
information that he almost despaired of restoring civil law in the
distracted country. He said that he felt that help was needed urgently
and that Russia asked it as her right. "Russia has fought consistently
since the beginning," he said. "She saved France and England from
disaster early in the war. She is worn out by the strain and claims as
her right that the Allies now shoulder the burden."

On November 7th, an armed insurrection against the Coalition Government
and Premier Kerensky was precipitated by the Bolsheviki faction. The
revolt was headed by Leon Trotzky, President of the Central Executive
Committee of the Petrograd Council, with Nicholas Lenine, the Bolsheviki
leader. The Revolutionists seized the offices of the telephone and
telegraph companies and occupied the state bank and the Marie Palace
where the preliminary Parliament had been sitting. The garrison at
Petrograd espoused the cause of the Bolsheviki and complete control was
seized with comparatively little fighting. The government troops were
quickly overpowered, except at the Winter Palace, whose chief guardians
were the Woman's Battalion, and the Military Cadets. The Woman's
Battalion fought bravely, and suffered terribly, and with the Military
Cadets who also remained true, held the Palace for several hours. The
Bolsheviki brought up armored cars and the cruiser Aurora, and turned
the guns of the Fortress of SS. Peter and Paul upon the Palace before
its defenders would surrender.

That evening the Revolutionary Committee issued a characteristic
proclamation, denouncing the government of Kerensky as opposed to the
government and the people, and calling upon the soldiers in the army to
arrest their officers if they did not at once join the Revolution. They
announced the following program:


First: The offer of an immediate democratic peace.

Second: The immediate handing over of large proportional lands to the
peasants.

Third: The transmission of all authority to the Council of Workmen's and
Soldiers' Delegates.

Fourth: The honest convocation of the Constituent Assembly.


At a meeting of the Council, Trotzky declared that the government no
longer existed, and introduced Lenine as an old comrade whom he welcomed
back. Lenine was received with prolonged cheers, and said: "Now we have
a Revolution. The peasants and workmen control the government. This is
only a preliminary step toward a similar revolution everywhere."

Proclamation after proclamation came from the new government. In one of
them it was stated "M. Kerensky has taken flight, and all military
bodies have been empowered to take all possible measures to arrest
Kerensky and bring him back to Petrograd. All complicity with Kerensky
will be dealt with as high treason."

A Bolsheviki Cabinet was named. The Premier was Nicholas Lenine; the
Foreign Minister, Leon Trotzky. The other Cabinet members were all
Bolsheviki, including Bibenko, a Kronstadt sailor, of the Committee on
War and Marine, and Shliapnikov, a laborer, who was Minister of Labor.
Lenine's personality has already been described. Trotzky, the chief aid
of Lenine's rebellion, had been living in New York City three months
before the Czar was overthrown, but he had previously been expelled from
Germany, France, Switzerland and Spain. His real name was Leber
Braunstein, and he was born in the Russian Government of Kherson, near
the Black Sea.

When the insurrection occurred, Kerensky succeeded in escaping from
Petrograd, and persuaded about two thousand Cossacks, several hundred
Military Cadets, and a contingent of Artillery, to fight under his
banner. He advanced toward Petrograd, but his forces were greatly
outnumbered by the Bolsheviki. At Tsarskoe-Selo a battle took place, the
Kerensky troops met defeat, and its leader saved himself by flight.

At Moscow the entire city passed into the control of the Bolsheviki but
not without severe fighting in which more than three thousand people
were slain. On the collapse of the Kerensky government conditions
throughout Russia became chaotic. Ukraine declared its independence, and
Finland also severed its connection with Russia. General Kaledines
declared against the Bolsheviki, and organized an army to save the
country. Siberia, Bessarabia, Lithuania, the Caucasus and other
districts declared their complete independence of the Central
Government.

The Bolsheviki, in control at Petrograd, opened negotiations with the
Central Powers for an armistice along the entire front from the Baltic
to Asia Minor, and on December 17th, such an armistice went into effect.
Meanwhile they began negotiations for a treaty of peace. General
Dukholin, the Commander-in-Chief, on November 20th, was ordered by
Lenine to propose the armistice. To this request he made no reply, and
on November 21st, he was deposed and Ensign Krylenko was appointed the
new Commander-in-Chief. General Dukholin was subsequently murdered, by
being thrown from a train after the Bolsheviki seized the general
headquarters.

Trotzky sent a note to the representatives of neutral powers in
Petrograd, informing them of his proposal for an armistice, and stating
"The consummation of an immediate peace is demanded in all countries,
both belligerent and neutral. The Russian Government counts on the firm
support of workmen in all countries in this struggle for peace." Lenine,
however, declared that Russia did not contemplate a separate peace with
Germany, and that the Russian Government, before agreeing to an
armistice, would communicate with the Allies and make a certain proposal
to the imperialistic governments of France and England, rejection of
which would place them in open opposition to the wishes of their own
people.

A period of turmoil followed. In the meantime elections for the
Constituent Assembly were held. The result in Petrograd was announced as
272,000 votes for the Bolsheviki, 211,000 for the Constitutional
Democrats, and 116,000 for the Social Revolutionaries, showing that the
Bolsheviki failed to attain a majority. Notwithstanding the prevailing
chaos, the Lenine-Trotzky Government persisted in negotiations for an
armistice, and it was arranged that the first conference be held at the
German headquarters at Brest-Litovsk.

The Russian delegates were Kamenev, whose real name was Rosenfelt, a
well known Bolshevist leader; Sokolnikov, a sailor; Bithenko, a soldier,
and Mstislasky, who had formerly been librarian to the General Staff,
but who was now a strong Socialist. Representatives were present of
Germany, Austria-Hungary, Turkey and Bulgaria.

After many interchanges of opinion a suspension of hostilities for ten
days was authorized, to be utilized in bringing to a conclusion
negotiations for an armistice. On December 7th it was announced from
Petrograd that for the first time since the war not a shot was fired on
the Russian front. Foreign Secretary Trotzky, on the 6th of December,
notified the allied embassies in Petrograd of these negotiations and
added that the armistice would be signed only on condition that the
troops should not be transferred from one front to another. He announced
that negotiations had been suspended to afford the Allied Governments
opportunity to define their attitude toward the peace negotiation; that
is, their willingness or refusal to participate in negotiations for an
armistice and peace. In case of refusal they must declare clearly and
definitely before all mankind the aims for which the peoples of Europe
had been called to shed their blood during the fourth year of the war.

No official replies were made to this note. On December 7th, Generals
Kaledines and Kornilov raised the standard of revolt, but reports
indicated that the Bolsheviki were extending their control over all
Russia. A meeting of the Constituent Assembly took place on December
11th. Less than 50 of the 600 delegates attended. Meanwhile the
negotiations for an armistice continued. On December 16th an agreement
was reached and an armistice signed, to continue from December 17th to
January 14th, 1918.


[Illustration: Map: All of Europe and Asia, showing the Trans-Siberian
Railway and other railroads.]
  RUSSIA'S GREAT RAILWAY LINK BETWEEN VLADIVOSTOK AND THE ARCTIC OCEAN
  The Czecho-Slovaks took possession of long stretches of the
  Trans-Siberian Railroad. Japan lent her aid in the east, and American
  and Allied troops swept down from the Murman coast in the northwest.


Within the first month in which the Bolsheviki conducted the government
numerous edicts of a revolutionary character were issued. Class titles,
distinctions and privileges were abolished; the corporate property of
nobles, merchants and burgesses was to be handed over to the state, as
was all church property, lands, money and precious stones; and religious
instruction was to cease in the schools. Strikes were in progress
everywhere, and disorder was rampant.

Kornilov, Terestchenko and other associates of Kerensky, were imprisoned
in the Fortress of SS. Peter and Paul; the Cadet Party was outlawed by
decree and the houses of its leaders raided. On January 8, 1918, it was
announced that the Bolsheviki had determined that all loans and Treasury
bonds held by foreign subjects, abroad or in Russia, were repudiated.

During this period the Bolsheviki's Foreign Secretary astonished the
world by making public the secret treaties between Russia and foreign
governments in the early years of the war. These treaties dealt with the
proposed annexation by Russia of the Dardanelles, Constantinople and
certain areas in Asia Minor; with the French claim on Alsace-Lorraine
and the left bank of the Rhine; with offers to Greece, for the purpose
of inducing her to assist Serbia; with plans to alter her Western
boundaries, with the British and Russian control of Persia; and with
Italy's desire to annex certain Austrian territories. These treaties had
been seized upon the Bolsheviki assumption of power, and were now
repudiated by the new government.

During the period of the armistice Lenine began his move for a separate
peace, in spite of the formal protests of the Allied representatives at
Petrograd.

The first sitting took place on Saturday, December 22, 1917. Among the
delegates were Dr. Richard von Kuhlmann, Foreign Minister, and General
Hoffman, of Germany; Count Czernin, Foreign Minister of Austria-Hungary;
Minister Kopov, of Bulgaria; Nesimy Bey, former Foreign Minister of
Turkey, and a large delegation from Russia, composed of Bolshevist
leaders. Dr. von Kuhlmann was chosen as the presiding officer and made
the opening speech. The Russian peace demands and the German
counter-proposals were then read, and considered.

The German proposals proved unacceptable to Russia, and a second session
of the peace conference was held at Brest-Litovsk on January 10, 1918.
Trotzky himself attended this meeting as one of the representatives from
Russia, and there was also a representative from Ukraine, which had
declared its independence, and was allowed to join the conference.
General Hoffman protested strongly against the Russian endeavor to make
appeals of a revolutionary character to the German troops.


[Illustration: Map: Europe and Eastern Asia.]
  RUSSIA AS PARTITIONED BY THE BREST-LITOVSK TREATY


The armistice having expired, it was agreed it should be continued to
February 12th. After a long and acrimonious debate the Conference broke
up in a clash over the evacuation of the Russian provinces. On January
24th it was announced that the Russian delegates to the peace conference
had unanimously decided to reject the German terms. They stated that
when they asked Germany's final terms General Hoffman of the German
delegation had replied by opening a map and pointing out a line from the
shores of the Gulf of Finland to the east of the Moon Sound Islands, to
Valk, to the west of Minsk, to Brest-Litovsk, thus eliminating Courland
and all the Baltic provinces.

Asked the terms of the Central Powers in regard to the territory south
of Brest-Litovsk General Hoffman replied that was a question which they
would discuss only with Ukraine. M. Kaminev asked: "Supposing we do not
agree to such condition, what are you going to do?"

General Hoffman's answer was, "Within a week we would occupy Reval."

On January 27th, Trotzky made his report to the Soviets at Petrograd.
After a thorough explanation of the peace debates, he declared that the
Government of the Soviets could not sign such a peace. It was then
decided to demobilize the Russian army and withdraw from the war.


[Illustration: Map]
  GENERAL MAP OF THE BALTIC SEA
  With the collapse of Russia German forces advanced from Riga, along
  the Gulf of Finland occupying Reval and threatening Petrograd.

Final sessions of the peace congress were resumed at Brest-Litovsk
January 29th; a peace treaty was made between the Central Powers and the
Ukraine, and the Bolsheviki yielded to the German demands without
signing a treaty. Meanwhile the Russian Constituent Assembly which met
at Petrograd on January 19th, was dissolved on January 20th, by the
Bolsheviki Council.

Disorders continued throughout all Russia and counter-revolutionary
movements were started at many places. On February 18th, the day when
the armistice agreement between Russia and the Central Powers expired,
German forces began a new invasion of Russia. The next day the
Bolshevist Government issued a statement, announcing that Russia would
be compelled to sign a peace. The German advance went on rapidly, and
many important Russian cities were occupied. On February 24th, the
Bolshevist Government announced that peace terms had been accepted, and
a treaty was signed at Brest-Litovsk on March 3d.

On March 14th the All-Russia Council of Soviets voted to ratify the
treaty, after an all-night sitting. Lenine pronounced himself in favor
of accepting the German terms; Trotzky stood for war, but did not attend
the meetings of the Council. Lenine defended the step by pointing out
that the country was completely unable to offer resistance, and that
peace was indispensable for the completion of the social war in Russia.

The new treaty dispossessed Russia of territories amounting to nearly
one-quarter of the area of European Russia, and inhabited by one-third
of Russia's total population. Trotzky resigned on account of his
opposition to the treaty and was succeeded by M. Tchitcherin. He became
Chairman of the Petrograd Labor Commune. The treaty between Russia and
the Central Powers was formally denounced by the Premiers and Foreign
Ministers of Great Britain, France, and Italy, and was not recognized by
the Allied nations.

A final revocation of its provisions by both sides did not put an end to
the military operations of the Central Powers in Russia, nor did the
Russians cease to make feeble and sporadic attempts at resistance.
Germany was forced to keep large bodies of troops along the Russian
front, but formally Russia's part in the war had come to an end.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  THREE MESSENGERS OF DESTRUCTION FOR TRIESTE
  This remarkable photograph was taken from one French aeroplane just as
  another had released three aerial torpedoes in a combined bombing and
  observation raid on Trieste, the great Austrian naval base. The
  photograph itself, showing details of enemy activity on the
  waterfront, was of considerable value to the intelligence division of
  the Italian army.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright G. V. Buck, Washington. D. C.
  THE CARGO SUBMARINE "DEUTSCHLAND"
  Shortly before the United States entered the war, Germany sent over a
  merchant submarine with a cargo of dye stuffs and drugs, an implied
  threat which was later realized in the U-boat attacks on the American
  coast.



CHAPTER XXXII

GERMANY'S OBJECT LESSON TO THE UNITED STATES.

During the first two years of the war many Americans, especially those
in the West, observed the great events which were happening with great
interest, no doubt, but with a feeling of detachment. The war was a long
way off. The Atlantic Ocean separated Europe from America, and it seemed
almost absurd to think that the Great War could ever affect us.

In the year 1916, however, two events happened which seemed to bring the
war to our door. The first was the arrival at Baltimore, on July 9th, of
the Deutschland, a German submarine of great size, built entirely for
commercial purposes, and the second was the appearance, on the 7th of
October, of a German war submarine in the harbor at Newport, Rhode
Island, and its exploit on the following day when it sunk a number of
British and neutral vessels just outside the three-mile line on the
Atlantic coast.

The performances of these two vessels were equally suggestive, but the
popular feeling with regard to what they had done was very divergent.
The voyage of the Deutschland roused the widest admiration but the
action of the U-53 stirred up the deepest indignation. Yet the voyages
of each showed with equal clearness that, however much America might
consider herself separated from the Great War, the new scientific
invention, the submarine, had annihilated space, and America, too, was
now but a neighbor of the nations at war.

The voyage of the Deutschland was a romance in itself. It was commanded
by Captain Paul Koenig, a German officer of the old school. He had been
captain of the Schleswig of the North German Lloyd, and of other big
liners. When the power of the British fleet drove German commerce from
the seas, he had found himself without a job, and, as he phrased it,
"was drifting about the country like a derelict." One day, in September,
1915, he was asked to meet Herr Alfred Lohmann, an agent of the North
German Lloyd Line, and surprised by an offer to navigate a submarine
cargo ship from Germany to America. Captain Koenig, who seems to have
been in every way an admirable personage, at once consented. He has told
us the story of his trip in his interesting book called "The Voyage of
the Deutschland."

The Deutschland itself was three hundred feet long, thirty feet wide,
and carried one thousand tons of cargo and a crew of twenty-nine men. It
cost a half a million dollars, but paid for itself in the first trip.
According to Captain Koenig the voyage on the whole seems to have been
most enjoyable. He understood his boat well and had watched its
construction. Before setting out on his voyage he carefully trained his
crew, and experimented with the Deutschland until he was thoroughly
familiar with all its peculiarities. The cargo was composed of dye
stuffs, and the ship was well supplied with provisions and comforts. In
his description of the trip he lays most emphasis upon the discomfort
resulting from heavy weather and from storms. He was able to avoid all
danger from hostile ships by the very simple process of diving. No
English ship approached him closely as he was always able to see them
from a distance, usually observing their course by means of their smoke.

One of his liveliest adventures, however, occurred when attempting to
submerge suddenly during a heavy sea on the appearance of a destroyer.
The destroyer apparently never observed the Deutschland, but in the
endeavor to dive quickly the submarine practically stood on its head,
and dived down into the mud, where it found itself held fast. Captain
Koenig however was equal to the emergency, and by balancing and trimming
the tanks he finally restored the center of gravity and released his
boat.

A considerable portion of his trip was passed upon the surface as he
only submerged when there was suspicion of danger. According to his
story his men kept always in the highest spirits. They had plenty of
music, and doubtless appreciated the extraordinary nature of their
voyage.

An amusing incident during the trip was the attempt to camouflage his
ship by a frame work, made of canvas and so constructed as to give the
outline of a steamer. One day a hostile steamer appeared in the distance
and Captain Koenig proceeded to test his disguise.

After great difficulties, especially in connection with the production
of smoke, he finally had the whole construction fairly at work. The
steamer, which had been peacefully going its way, on seeing the new ship
suddenly changed her course and steered directly toward the Deutschland.
It evidently took the Deutschland for some kind of a wreck and was
hurrying to give it assistance. Captain Koenig at once pulled off his
super-structure and revealed himself as a submarine, and the strange
vessel veered about and hurried off as fast as it could.

On the arrival of the Deutschland in America Captain Koenig and his crew
found their difficulties over. All arrangements had been made by
representatives of the North German Lloyd for their safety and comfort.
As they ran up Chesapeake Bay they were greeted by the whistles of the
neutral steamers that they passed. The moving-picture companies
immortalized the crew and they were treated with the utmost hospitality.

The Allied governments protested that the Deutschland was really a war
vessel and on the 12th of July a commission of three American naval
officers was sent down from Washington to make an investigation. The
investigation showed the Deutschland was absolutely unarmed and the
American Government decided not to interfere.

The position of the Allies was that a submarine, even though without
guns or torpedoes, was practically a vessel of war from its very nature,
and for it to pretend to be a merchant vessel was as if some great
German man-of-war should dismount its guns and pass them over to some
tender and then undertake to visit an American port. They argued that if
the submarine would come out from harbor it might be easily fitted with
detachable torpedo tubes, and become as dangerous as any U-boat. Even
without arms it might easily sink an unarmed merchant vessel by ramming.
But the United States was not convinced, and American citizens rather
admired the genial captain.

His return was almost as uneventful as his voyage out. At the very
beginning he had trouble in not being able to rise after an experimental
dive. This misadventure was caused by a plug of mud which had stopped up
the opening of the manometer. But the difficulty was overcome, and he
was able to pass under water between the British ships which were on the
lookout. His return home was a triumph. Hundreds of thousands of people
gathered along the banks of the Weser, filled with the greatest
enthusiasm. Poems were written in his honor and his appearance was
everywhere greeted with enthusiastic applause. The Germans felt sure
that through the Deutschland and similar boats they had broken the
British blockade.

Captain Koenig made a second voyage, landing at New London, Connecticut,
on November 1st, where he took on a cargo of rubber, nickel and other
valuable commodities. On November 16th, in attempting to get away to
sea, he met with a collision with the tug T. A. Scott, Jr., and had to
return to New London for repairs. He concluded his voyage, however,
without difficulty. In spite of his success the Germans did not make any
very great attempt to develop a fleet of submarine cargo boats.

The other German act which brought home to Americans the possibilities
of the submarine, the visit of the U-53, was a very different sort of
matter. U-53 was a German submarine of the largest type. On October 7,
1916, it made a sudden appearance at Newport, and its captain,
Lieutenant-Captain Hans Rose, was entertained as if he were a welcome
guest. He sent a letter to the German Ambassador at Washington and
received visitors in his beautiful boat. The U-53 was a war submarine,
two hundred and thirteen feet long, with two deck guns and four torpedo
tubes. It had been engaged in the war against Allied commerce in the
Mediterranean. Captain Rose paid formal visits to Rear-Admiral Austin
Knight, Commander of the United States Second Naval District, stationed
at Newport, and Rear-Admiral Albert Gleaves, Commander of the American
destroyer flotilla at that place, and then set out secretly to his
destination.

On the next day the news came in that the U-53 had sunk five merchant
vessels. These were the Strathdene, which was torpedoed; the West Point,
a British freighter, also torpedoed; the Stephano, a passenger liner
between New York and Halifax, which the submarine attempted to sink by
opening its sea valves but was finally torpedoed; the Blommersdijk, a
Dutch freighter, and the Christian Knudsen, a Norwegian boat. The
American steamer Kansan was also stopped, but allowed to proceed. When
the submarine began its work wireless signals soon told what was
happening, and Admiral Knight, with the Newport destroyer flotilla,
hurried to the rescue. These destroyers picked up two hundred and
sixteen men and acted with such promptness that not a single life was
lost.

The action of the U-53 produced intense excitement in America. The
newspapers were filled with editorial denunciation, and the people were
roused to indignation. The American Government apparently took the
ground that the Germans were acting according to law and according to
their promise to America. They had given warning in each case and
allowed the crews of the vessels which they sunk to take to their boats.
This was believed to be a fulfilment of their pledge "not to sink
merchant vessels without warning and without saving human lives, unless
the ship attempts to escape or offers resistance."

The general feeling, however, of American public opinion was that it was
a brutal act. In the case of the Stephano there were ninety-four
passengers. These, together with the crew, were placed adrift in boats
at eight o'clock in the evening, in a rough sea sixty miles away from
the nearest land. If the American destroyer fleet had not rushed to the
rescue it is extremely likely that a great many of these boats would
never have reached land. The German Government did not save these human
lives. It was the American navy which did that. But, technicalities
aside, the pride of the American people was wounded. They could not
tolerate a situation in which American men-of-war should stand idly by
and watch a submarine in a leisurely manner sink ships engaged in
American trade whose passengers and crews contained many American
citizens.

It was another one of those foolish things that Germans were constantly
doing, which gave them no appreciable military advantage, but stirred up
against them the sentiment of the world. The Germans perhaps were
anxious to show the power of the submarines, and to give America an
object lesson in that power. They wished to make plain that they could
destroy overseas trade, and that if the United States should endeavor to
send troops across the water they would be able to sink those troops.

The Germans probably never seriously contemplated a blockade of the
American coast. The U-53 returned to its base and the danger was ended.
American commerce went peacefully on, and the net result of the German
audacity was in the increase of bitterness in the popular feeling toward
the German methods.



CHAPTER XXXIII

AMERICA TRANSFORMED BY WAR

When Germany threw down the gauge of battle to the civilized world, the
German High Command calculated that the long, rigorous and thorough
military training to which every male German had submitted, would make a
military force invincible in the field. The High Command believed that a
nation so trained would carve out victory after victory and would end
the World War before any nation could train its men sufficiently to
check the Teutonic rush.

To that theory was opposed the democratic conception that the free
nations of earth could train their young men intensively for six months
and send these vigorous free men into the field to win the final
decision over the hosts of autocracy.

These antagonistic theories were tried out to a finish in the World War
and the theory of democracy, developed in the training camps of America,
Canada, Australia, Britain, France and Italy, triumphed. Especially in
the training camps of America was the German theory disproved. There
within six months the best fighting troops on earth were developed and
trained in the most modern of war-time practices. Everything that
Germany could devise found its answer in American ingenuity, American
endurance and American skill.

The entrance of America into the tremendous conflict on April 6, 1917
was followed immediately by the mobilization of the entire nation.
Business and industry of every character were represented in the Council
of National Defense which acted as a great central functioning
organization for all industries and agencies connected with the
prosecution of the war. Executives of rare talent commanding high
salaries tendered their services freely to the government. These were
the "dollar a year men" whose productive genius was to bear fruit in the
clothing, arming, provisioning, munitioning and transportation of four
million men and the conquest of Germany by a veritable avalanche of war
material.

Out of the ranks of business and science came Hurley, Schwab, Piez,
Coonley to drive forward a record-breaking shipbuilding program,
Stettinius to speed up the manufacture of munitions, John W. Ryan to
coordinate and accelerate the manufacture of airplanes, Vance C.
McCormick and Dr. Alonzo E. Taylor to solve the problems of the War
Trade Board, Hoover to multiply food production, to conserve food
supplies and to place the army and citizenry of America upon food
rations while maintaining the morale of the Allies through scientific
food distribution and a host of other patriotic civilians who put the
resources of the nation behind the military and naval forces opposed to
Germany. Every available loom was put at work to make cloth for the army
and the navy, the leather market was drained of its supplies to shoe our
forces with wear adapted to the drastic requirements of modern warfare.

German capital invested in American plants was placed under the
jurisdiction of A. Mitchell Palmer as Alien Property Custodian. German
ships were seized and transformed into American transports. Physicians
over military age set a glorious example of patriotic devotion by their
enlistment in thousands. Lawyers and citizens generally in the same
category as to age entered the office of the Judge Advocate General or
the ranks of the Four Minute Men or the American Protective League which
rendered great service to the country in exposing German propaganda and
in placing would-be slackers in military service. Bankers led the mighty
Liberty Loan and War Savings Stamp drives and unselfishly placed the
resources of their institutions at the service of the government.

Women and children rallied to the flag with an intensity of purpose,
sacrifice and effort that demonstrated how completely was the heart of
America in the war. Work in shops, fields, hospitals, Red Cross work
rooms and elsewhere was cheerfully and enthusiastically performed and
the sacrifices of food rationing, higher prices, lightless nights,
gasolineless Sundays, diminished steam railway and trolley service were
accepted with a multitude of minor inconvenience without a murmur.
Congress had a free hand in making appropriations. The country approved
without a minute's hesitation bills for taxation that in other days
would have brought ruin to the political party proposing them. Billions
were voted to departments where hundreds of thousands had been the rule.


[Illustration: Map of the United States]
  THE UNITED STATES AN ARMED CAMP
  The map shows the location of the camps where the National Army and
  the National Guard were trained for war. Afterwards the entire forces
  were known as the United States Army


The true temper of the American people was carefully hidden from the
German people by the German newspapers acting under instructions from
the Imperial Government. Instead of the truth, false reports were
printed in the newspapers of Berlin and elsewhere that the passage of
the American conscription law had been followed by rioting and rebellion
in many places and that fully fifty per cent of the American people was
opposed to the declaration of war. The fact that the selective service
act passed in May, 1917, was accepted by everybody in this country as a
wholly equitable and satisfactory law did not permeate into Germany
until the first American Expeditionary Force had actually landed in
France.

America's fighting power was demonstrated conclusively to the Germanic
intellect at Seicheprey, Bouresches Wood, Belleau Wood, Chateau-Thierry,
and in the Forest of the Argonne. Especially was it demonstrated when it
came to fighting in small units, or in individual fighting. The highly
disciplined and highly trained German soldiers were absolutely unfitted
to cope with Americans, Canadians and Australians when it came to
matching individual against individual, or small group against small
group.

This was shown in the wild reaches of the Forest of the Argonne. There
the machine-gun nests of the Germans were isolated and demolished
speedily. Small parties of Germans were stalked and run down by the
relentless Americans. On the other hand, the Germans could make no
headway against the American troops operating in the Forest. The famous
"Lost Battalion" of the 308th United States Infantry penetrated so far
in advance of its supports that it was cut off for four days without
food, water or supplies of munitions in the Argonne. The enemy had cut
its line of communication and was enforced both in front and in the
rear. Yet the lost battalion, comprising two companies armed with rifles
and the French automatic rifle known as the Chauchat gun, called by the
doughboys "Sho Sho," held out against the best the overpowering forces
of the Germans could send against them, and were ultimately rescued from
their dangerous position.

The training of the Americans was also in modern efficiency that made
America prominent in the world of industry. The reduction of the German
salient at St. Mihiel was an object lesson to the Germans in American
methods.  General Pershing commanding that operation in person,
assembled the newspaper correspondents the day before the drive. Maps
were shown, giving the extent and locale of the attack. The
correspondents were invited to follow the American troops and a time
schedule for the advance was given to the various corps commanders.

In that operation, 152 square miles of territory and 72 villages were
captured outright. For the reduction of the German defenses and for the
creeping barrage preceding the American advance, more than 1,500,000
shells were fired by the artillery. Approximately 100,000 detail maps
and 40,000 photographs prepared largely from aerial observations, were
issued for the guidance of the artillery and the infantry. These maps
and photographs detailed all the natural and artificial defenses of the
entire salient. More than 5,000 miles of telephone wire was laid by
American engineers immediately preceding the attack, and as the
Americans advanced on the morning of the battle, September 12, 1918,
6,000 telephone instruments were connected with this wire. Ten thousand
men were engaged in operating the hastily constructed telephone system;
3,000 carrier pigeons supplemented this work.

During the battle American airplanes swept the skies clear of enemy
air-craft and signaled instructions to the artillery, besides attacking
the moving infantry, artillery and supply trains of the enemy. So sure
were the Americans of their success that moving-picture operators took
more than 10,000 feet of moving picture film showing the rout of the
Germans. Four thousand eight hundred trucks carried food, men and
munitions into the lines. Miles of American railroads, both of standard
and narrow gauge, carrying American-made equipment, assisted in the
transportation of men and supplies. Hospital facilities including 35
hospital trains, 16,000 beds in the advanced sector, and 55,000 other
beds back of the fighting line, were prepared. Less than ten per cent of
this hospital equipment was used.

As the direct consequence of this preparation, which far outstripped
anything that any other nation had attempted in a similar offensive, the
Americans with a remarkably small casualty list took 15,188 prisoners,
111 guns, many of them of large caliber, immense quantities of munitions
and other supplies, and inflicted heavy death losses upon the fleeing
Germans.

Two selective service laws operated as manhood conscription. The first
of these took men between the ages of twenty-one and thirty-one years
inclusive. June 5, 1917, was fixed as registration day. The total number
enrolled was 9,586,508. The first selective army drawn from this number
was 625,000 men.

The second selective service legislation embraced all citizens between
the ages of 18 and 45 inclusive, not included in the first draft. Over
13,000,000 men enrolled on September 12, 1918.

The grand total of registrants in both drafts was 23,456,021. Youths who
had not completed their 19th year were set apart in a group to be called
last and men between thirty-six and forty-five were also put in a
deferred class. The government's plan was to have approximately
5,000,000 men under arms before the summer of 1919. The German armistice
on November 11th found 4,000,000 men actually under arms and an
assignment of 250,000 made to the training camps.

A most important factor in the training plans of the United States was
that incorporated in the organization of the Students' Army Training
Corps, by which 359 American colleges and universities were taken over
by the government and 150,000 young men entered these institutions for
the purpose of becoming trained soldiers. The following are the
conditions under which the S. A. T. C. was organized:

The War Department undertook to furnish officers, uniforms, rifles, and
equipment, and to assign the students to military duty, after a few
months, either at an officers' training camp or in some technical
school, or in a regular army cantonment with troops as a private,
according to the degree of aptitude shown on the college campus.

At the same time a circular letter to the presidents of colleges
arranged for a contract under which the government became responsible
for the expense of the housing, subsistence, and instruction of the
students. The preliminary arrangement contained this provision, among
others:


The per diem rate of $1 for subsistence and housing is to govern
temporarily, pending examination of the conditions in the individual
institution and a careful working out of the costs involved. The amount
so fixed is calculated from the experience of this committee during the
last five months in contracting with over 100 collegiate institutions
for the housing and subsistence of over 100,000 soldiers in the National
Army Training Detachment. This experience indicates that the average
cost of housing is 15 to 20 cents per day; subsistence (army ration or
equivalent), 70 to 80 cents per day. The tuition charge is based on the
regular per diem tuition charge of the institution in the year 1917-18.


A permanent contract was arranged later under these governing principles:


The basis of payment will be reimbursement for actual and necessary
costs to the institutions for the services rendered to the government in
the maintenance and instruction of the soldiers with the stated
limitation as to cost of instruction. Contract price will be arrived at
by agreement after careful study of the conditions in each case, in
conference with authorities of the institution.

The War Department will have authority to specify and control the
courses of instruction to be given by the institution.

The entity and power for usefulness of the institutions will be
safeguarded so that when the contract ends the institutions shall be in
condition to resume their functions of general education.

The teaching force will be preserved so far as practicable, and this
matter so treated that its members shall feel that in changing to the
special intensive work desired by the government they are rendering a
vital and greatly needed service.

The government will ask from the institutions a specific service; that
is, the housing, subsistence, and instruction along specified lines of a
certain number of student soldiers. There will be no interference with
the freedom of the institution in conducting other courses in the usual
way.

The contract will be for a fixed term, probably nine months, subject to
renewal for a further period on reasonable notice, on terms to be agreed
upon and subject to cancellation on similar terms.

The story of the life of the American army behind the lines in France
would fill a volume. The hospitality of the French people had something
pathetic in it. They were expecting miracles of their new Allies. They
were war sick. Nearly all of them had lost some father, or brother, or
husband, and here came these big, hearty, joyous soldiers, full of ardor
and confident of victory. It put a new spirit into all France. Their
reception when they first landed was a scene of such fervor and
enthusiasm as had never been known before and probably will not be known
again. Soon the American soldier, in his khaki, with his wide-brimmed
soft hat, became a common sight.

The villagers put up bunting, calico signs, flags and had stocks of
American canned goods to show in their shop windows. The children, when
bold, played with the American soldiers, and the children that were more
shy ventured to go up and touch an American soldier's leg. Very old
peasant ladies put on their Sunday black, and went out walking, and in
some mysterious way talking with American soldiers. The village mayors
turned out and made speeches, utterly incomprehensible to the American
soldiers.

The engineering, building and machinery works the Americans put up were
astonishing. Gangs of workers went over in thousands; many of these were
college men. They dug and toiled as efficiently as any laborer. One
American major told with glee how a party of these young workers arrived
straight from America at 3.30 P. M. and started digging at 5 A. M. next
morning, "and they liked it, it tickled them to death." Many of these
draftees, in fact, were sick and tired of inaction in ports before their
departure from America, and they welcomed work in France as if it were
some great game.

Perhaps the biggest work of all the Americans performed was a certain
aviation camp and school. In a few months it was completed, and it was
the biggest of its kind in the world. The number of airplanes used
merely for training was in itself remarkable. The flying men--or
boys--who had, of course, already been broken-in in America, did an
additional course in France, and when they left the aviation camp they
were absolutely ready for air-fighting at the front. This was the
finishing school. The aviators went through eight distinct courses in
the school. They were perfected in flying, in observation, in bombing,
in machine-gun firing. On even a cloudy and windy day the air overhead
buzzed with these young American fliers, all getting into the pink of
condition to do their stunts at the front. They lived in the camp, and
it required moving heaven and earth for one of them to get leave to go
even to the nearest little quiet old town.

An impression of complete businesslike determination was what one got
when visiting the Americans in France. A discipline even stricter than
that which applied in British and French troops was in force. In towns,
officers, for instance, were not allowed out after 9 P. M. Some towns
where subalterns discovered the wine of the country were instantly put
"out of bounds." No officer, on any pretext whatsoever was allowed to go
to Paris except on official business.

The postal censors who read the letters of the American Expeditionary
Force were required to know forty-seven languages! Of these languages,
the two least used were Chinese and German.

The announcement of the organization of the first American Field Army was
contained in the following dispatch from France, August 11, 1918:

"The first American field army has been organized. It is under the
direct command of General John J. Pershing, Commander-in-Chief of the
American forces. The corps commanders thus far announced are
Major-Generals Liggett, Bullard, Bundy, Read, and Wright.


[Illustration: Chart]
  Key
  The state of German civilian morale.
  Variations in Germany's military position
  Decree of political unity in Germany.
  The Food situation In North Germany.
  Condition of Austria-Hungary.
  U-Boat sinkings. (Monthly reports of tonnage sunk.)
  SECRETARY OF WAR'S OFFICIAL CHART
  This reproduction of Secretary Baker's chart, which hung in his office
  at Washington, illustrates graphically Germany's success and failure
  in the war.


"The creation of the first field army is the first step toward the
coordination of all the American forces in France. This does not mean
the immediate withdrawal from the British and French commands of all
American units, and it is probable that divisions will be used on the
French and British fronts for weeks yet. It is understood, however, that
the policy of organizing other armies will be carried out steadily."

This announcement marked a milestone in the military effort of the
United States. When the American troops first arrived in France, they
were associated in small units with the French to get primary training.
Gradually regiments began to function under French division commanders.
Then American divisions were formed and trained under French corps
commanders. Next, American corps began to operate under French army
commanders. Finally, the first American army was created, because enough
divisions and corps had been graduated from the school of experience.

An American division numbers 30,000 men, and a corps consists of six
divisions, two of which play the part of reserves. With auxiliary
troops, air squadrons, tank sections, heavy artillery, and other
branches, a corps numbers from 225,000 to 250,000 men.


[Illustration: Chart]
  The main line in this graph--the heavy broken line--represents the
  state of civilian morale in Germany.

  German morale is arbitrarily regarded as standing at 100 % in August.
  1914.

  Zero, for the same line, is taken to be the point at which an
  effective majority of the German people will refuse longer to support
  the war.

  The degree of movement of this line is determined mainly by a
  consideration of the deflections of the secondary lines which
  represent the forces exerting the greatest influence on the German
  state of mind.

  SHOWING GERMANY'S ROAD TO DEFEAT

  Austria's fluctuations are indicated, as well as the morale, military
  position, political and food conditions and undersea enterprises of
  Germany.


The following were the general officers temporarily assigned to command
the first five corps:
First corps--Major-General Hunter Liggett.
Second corps--Major-General Robert L. Bullard
Third corps--Major-General William M. Wright.
Fourth corps--Major-General George W. Read.
Fifth corps--Major-General Omar Bundy.


Seven divisions and one separate regiment of American troops
participated in the counter-offensive between Chateau-Thierry and
Soissons and in resisting the German attack in the Champagne, it was
officially stated on July 20. The 42d, or "Rainbow" Division, composed
of National Guard troops from twenty-six states and the District of
Columbia, including the New York 69th Infantry, now designated as the
165th Infantry, took part in the fighting in the Champagne east of
Rheims. The six other divisions were associated with the French in the
counter-offensive between Chateau-Thierry and Soissons. These divisions
were the 1st, 2d, 3d and 4th of the Regular Army, the 26th National
Guard Division, composed of troops from the six New England States, and
the 28th, composed of the Pennsylvania National Guard. Marines were
included in this number. The separate regiment that fought in the
Champagne was a negro unit attached to the new 93d Division, composed
entirely of negro troops. It was also announced that the 77th Division
was "in the line near Luneville" and was "operating as a division,
complete under its own commander."

The 42d Division had the distinction, General March announced on August
3d, of defeating the 4th Division of the crack Prussian Guards,
professional soldiers of the German standing army, who had never before
failed. General March also disclosed the fact that another American
division had been sent into that part of the Rheims salient where the
Germans showed resistance. This was the 32d Division. "The American
divisions in the Rheims salient," General March said, "have now been put
in contiguously and are actually getting together as an American force.
Southeast of Fere-en-Tardenois our 1st Corps is operating, with General
Liggett in actual command."

The organization of twelve new divisions was announced by General March,
Chief of Staff, in statements made on July 24th and July 31st. These
divisions were numerically designated from 9 to 20, and organized at
Camps Devens, Meade, Sheridan, Custer, Funston, Lewis, Logan, Kearny,
Beauregard, Travis, Dodge, and Sevier. Each division had two infantry
regiments of the regular army as nucleus, the other elements being made
up of drafted men. The new divisions moved into the designated camps as
the divisions already trained there moved out.

The composition of an American division is as follows:

Two brigades of infantry, each consisting of two regiments of infantry
and one machine-gun battalion.

One brigade of artillery, consisting of three regiments of field
artillery, and one trench mortar battery.

One regiment of engineers.

One field signal battalion.

The following trains: Headquarters and military police, sanitary,
supply, engineer, and ammunition.

The following division units: Headquarters troop and one machine-gun
battalion.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright International Film Service.
  SAFE ON SHORE AT LAST
  Arrival of American troops in Liverpool after defying the perils of
  the submarine. Note the bulk of the packs carried by each soldier in
  heavy marching order.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright International Film Service.
  THE FIRST OF THE TIDAL WAVE OF KHAKI
  Beginning with the handful of American soldiers who landed in France
  on June 8, 1917, the flood of troops poured across the ocean in
  ever-increasing volume until at the end of the war more than two
  million soldiers had been transported to France.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright Committee on Public Information from Underwood and Underwood.
  AMERICANS ATTACKING A GERMAN TRENCH POSITION
  Company M and Company K of the 336th Infantry, 82d Division, advance
  on Germans entrenched at the edge of a woods. The 307th Engineers, 82d
  Division, clear the way by blowing up wire entanglements. The
  attacking companies can be seen rushing for the point where the breach
  in the wire obstacles has been made.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Photo by International Film Service.
  AMERICA GETS INTO THE WAR AT CANTIGNY
  On the morning of May 28, 1918, the 1st Division, A. E. F., launched
  its first attack, which took place at Cantigny. Within 45 minutes all
  objectives had been gained, serious losses inflicted on the enemy, and
  200 prisoners taken. General Pershing personally directed operations.
  This picture shows American troops going forward under support of
  tanks.


A general order of the War Department providing for the consolidation of
all branches of the army into one army to be known as the "United States
Army" was promulgated by General March on August 7th. The text of the
order read:


1. This country has but one army--the United States Army. It includes
all the land forces in the service of the United States. Those forces,
however raised, lose their identity in that of the United States Army.
Distinctive appellations, such as the Regular Army, Reserve Corps,
National Army, and National Guard, heretofore employed in administration
command, will be discontinued, and the single term, the United States
Army, will be exclusively used.

2. Orders having reference to the United States Army as divided in
separate and component forces of distinct origin, or assuming or
contemplating such a division, are to that extent revoked.

3. The insignia now prescribed for the Regular Army shall hereafter be
worn by the United States Army.

4. All effective commissions purporting to be, and described therein, as
commissions in the Regular Army, National Guard, National Army, or the
Reserve Corps, shall hereafter be held to be, and regarded as,
commissions in the United States Army--permanent, provisional, or
temporary, as fixed by the conditions of their issue; and all such
commissions are hereby amended accordingly. Hereafter during the period
of the existing emergency all commissions of officers shall be in the
United States Army and in staff corps, departments, and arms of the
service thereof, and shall, as the law may provide, be permanent, for a
term, or for the period of the emergency. And hereafter during the
period of the existing emergency provisional and temporary appointments
in the grade of second lieutenant and temporary promotions in the
Regular Army and appointments in the Reserve Corps will be discontinued.

5. While the number of commissions in each grade and each staff corps,
department, and arm of the service shall be kept within the limits fixed
by law, officers shall be assigned without reference to the term of
their commissions solely in the interest of the service; and officers
and enlisted men will be transferred from one organization to another as
the interests of the service may require.

6. Except as otherwise provided by law, promotion in the United States
Army shall be by selection. Permanent promotions in the Regular Army
will continue to be made as prescribed by law.



CHAPTER XXXIV

HOW FOOD WON THE WAR

Food won the war. Without the American farmer the Entente Allies must
have capitulated. Wheat, beef, corn, foods of every variety,
hermetically sealed in tins, were thrown into the scales on the side of
the Entente Allies in sufficient quantities to tip the balance toward
the side of civilization and against autocracy. Late in the fall of 1918
when victory was assured to America and the Allies, there was received
this message of appreciation from General Pershing to the farmers of
America, through Carl Vrooman, Assistant Secretary of Agriculture:


AMERICAN EXPEDITIONARY FORCES,
Office of the Commander-in-Chief, France,
October 16, 1918.
Honorable CARL VROOMAN, Assistant Secretary of Agriculture:
DEAR MR. VROOMAN:--Will you please convey to farmers of America our
profound appreciation of their patriotic services to the country and to
the Allied armies in the field. They have furnished their full quota of
fighting men; they have bought largely of Liberty Bonds; and they have
increased their production of food crops both last year and this by over
a thousand million bushels above normal production. Food is of vital
military necessity for us and for our Allies, and from the day of our
entry into the war America's armies of food producers have rendered
invaluable service to the Allied cause by supporting the soldiers at the
front through their devoted and splendidly successful work in the fields
and furrows at home.
Very sincerely,
JOHN J. PERSHING.

This tribute to the men and women on the farms of America from the head
of the American forces in France is fit recognition of the important
part played by American food producers in the war. It was early
recognized by all the belligerent powers that final victory was a
question of national morale and national endurance. Morale could not be
maintained without food. The bread lines in Petrograd gave birth to the
revolution, and Russian famine was the mother of Russian terrorism.
German men and women, starved of fats and sweets, deteriorated so
rapidly that the crime ratio both in towns and country districts mounted
appallingly. Conditions in Austria-Hungary were even worse. Acute
distress arising from threatening famine was instrumental in driving
Bulgaria out of the war. The whole of Central Europe indeed was in the
shadow of famine and the masses were crying out for peace at any price.

On the other hand, Germany's greatest reliance for a victorious decision
lay in the U-boat blockade of Great Britain, France and Italy. Though
some depredations came to these countries, the submarine blockade never
fully materialized and with its failure Germany's hopes faded and died.

The Entente Allies and the United States were fortunate in securing
Herbert C. Hoover to administer food distribution throughout their lands
and to stimulate food production by the farmers of the United States.
After his signal success in the administration of the Belgian Relief
Commission, Mr. Hoover became the unanimous choice of the Allies for the
victualing of the militant and civilian populations after America's
entrance into the World War. His work divided itself into three heads:

First, stimulation of food production.

Second, elimination of food wastage in the homes and public eating
places of the country.

Third, education of food dealers and the public in the use of such foods
as were substitutes for wheat, rye, pork, beef and sugar.

After long and acrimonious debates in Congress, Mr. Hoover, as Federal
Food Administrator, was clothed with extraordinary powers enabling him
to fulfil the purposes for which he was appointed. The ability with
which he and his associates performed their work was demonstrated in the
complete debacle of Bulgaria, Turkey, Austria-Hungary and Germany. These
countries were starved out quite as truly as they were fought out. The
concrete evidence of the Food Administration's success is shown in the
subjoined table which indicates the increase over normal in exporting of
foodstuffs by the United States since it became the food reservoir for
the world on account of the war.

TOTAL EXPORTS
    3-year          1916-17      1917-18      July, 1917 to    July,1918 to
    pre-war         fiscal       fiscal
    average.        year.        year.        Sept. 30,1917.  Sept. 30,1918
Total beef products, lbs..
    186,375,372    405,427,417    565,462,445     93,962,477    171,986,147
Total pork products, lbs..
    996,930,627  1,498,302,713  1,691,437,435    196,256.750    540,946,324
Total dairy products, lbs..
     26,037,790    351,958,336    590,798,274    130,071,165    161,245,029
Total vegetable oils, lbs..
    332,430,537    206,708,490    151,029,893     27,719,553     26,026,701
Total grains, bushels...
    183,777,331    395,140,238   *349,123,235     66,383,084    121,668,823
Total sugar, pounds..
    621,745.507  3,084,390,281  2,149,787,050  1,108.559,519  1,065,398,247

* Wheat harvest 1917-18 was 200,217,333 bushels below the average of the
three previous years.


Upon the same subject Mr. Hoover himself after the harvest of 1918 said:


It is now possible to summarize the shipments of foodstuffs from the
United States to the allied countries during the fiscal year just
closed--practically the last harvest year. These amounts include all
shipments to allied countries for their and our armies, the civilian
population, the Belgium relief, and the Red Cross. The figures indicate
the measure of effort of the American people in support of allied food
supplies.

The total value of these food shipments, which were in the main
purchased through, or with the collaboration of the Food Administration,
amounted to, roundly, $1,400,000,000 during the fiscal year.

The shipments of meats and fats (including meat products, dairy
products, vegetable oils, etc.) to allied destinations were as follows:

    POUNDS
  Fiscal year 1916-17   2,166,500,000
  Fiscal year 1917-18   3,011,100,000
                      -----------------
  Increase                844,600,000

Our slaughterable animals at the beginning of the last fiscal year were
not appreciably larger in number than the year before; and particularly
in hogs, there were probably less. The increase in shipments is due to
conservation and the extra weight of animals added by our farmers.

The full effect of these efforts began to bear their best results in the
last half of the fiscal year, when the exports to the Allies were
2,133,100,000 pounds, as against 1,266,500,000 pounds in the same period
of the year before. This compares with an average of 801,000,000 pounds
of total exports for the same half years of the three-year pre-war
period.

In cereals and cereal products reduced to terms of cereal bushels, our
shipments to allied destinations have been:

    BUSHELS
  Fiscal year 1916-17   259,900,000
  Fiscal year 1917-18   340,800,000
                       ------------
  Increase               80,900,000

Of these cereals our shipments of the prime breadstuffs in the fiscal
year 1917-18 to allied destinations were: Wheat, 131,000,000 bushels and
rye 13,900,000 bushels, a total of 144,900,000 bushels.

The exports to allied destinations during the fiscal year 1916-17 were:
Wheat, 135,100,000 bushels and rye, 2,300,000 bushels, a total of
137,400,000 bushels. In addition, some 10,000,000 bushels of 1917 wheat
are now in port for allied destinations or en route thereto. The total
shipments to allied countries from our last harvest of wheat will be,
therefore, about 141,000,000 bushels, or a total of 154,900,000 bushels
of prime breadstuffs.

In addition to this we have shipped some 10,000,000 bushels to neutrals
dependent upon us and we have received some imports from other quarters.
A large part of the other cereals exported has also gone into war bread.

It is interesting to note that since the urgent request of the Allied
Food Controllers early in the year for a further shipment of 75,000,000
bushels from our 1917 wheat than originally planned, we shall have
shipped to Europe, or have en route, nearly 85,000,000 bushels. At the
time of this request our surplus was already more than exhausted.

This accomplishment of our people in this matter stands out even more
clearly if we bear in mind that we had available in the fiscal year
1916-17 from net carryover and a surplus over our normal consumption
about 200,000,000 bushels of wheat which we were able to export that
year without trenching on our home loaf. This last year, however, owing
to the large failure of the 1917 wheat crop we had available from net
carry over and production and imports only just about our normal
consumption. Therefore our wheat shipments to allied destinations
represent approximately savings from our own wheat bread.

These figures, however, do not fully convey the volume of the effort and
sacrifice made during the past year by the whole American people.
Despite the magnificent effort of our agricultural population in
planting a much increased acreage in 1917, not only was there a very
large failure in wheat, but also the corn failed to mature properly, and
corn is our dominant crop.

We calculate that the total nutritional production of the country for
the fiscal year just closed was between seven per cent and nine per cent
below the average of the three previous years, our nutritional surplus
for export in those years being about the same amount as the shrinkage
last year. Therefore the consumption and waste in food have greatly
reduced in every direction during the year.

I am sure that the millions of our people, agricultural as well as
urban, who have contributed to these results, should feel a very
definite satisfaction that, in a year of universal food shortage in the
Northern Hemisphere, all of these people joined together against Germany
have come through into sight of the coming harvest not only with health
and strength fully maintained, but with only temporary periods of
hardship. The European Allies have been compelled to sacrifice more than
our own people, but we have not failed to load every steamer since the
delays of the storm months of last winter.

Our contributions to this end could not have been accomplished without
effort and sacrifice, and it is a matter for further satisfaction, that
it had been accomplished voluntarily and individually. It is difficult
to distinguish between various sections of our people--the homes, public
eating places, food trades, urban or agricultural populations--in
assessing credit for these results, but no one will deny the dominant
part of the American woman.


But the work of the Food Administration did not come to an end with the
close of the war. Insistent cries for food came from the members of the
defeated Teutonic alliance, as well as from the suffering Allied and
neutral nations. To meet those demands, Mr. Hoover sailed for Europe to
organize the food relief of the needy nations. The State Department,
explaining his mission, stated that as the first measure of assistance
to Belgium it was necessary to increase immediately the volume of
foodstuffs formerly supplied, so as to physically rehabilitate this
under-nourished population. The relief commission during the four years
of war sent to the 10,000,000 people in the occupied area over 600
cargoes of food, comprising 120,000,000 bushels of breadstuffs and over
3,000,000,000 pounds of other foodstuffs besides 20,000,000 garments,
the whole representing an expenditure of nearly $600,000,000. The
support of the commission came from the Belgian, British, French and
American governments, together with public charity. In addition to this
some $350,000,000 worth of native produce was financed internally in
Belgium by the relief organization.

The second portion of Mr. Hoover's mission was to organize and determine
the need of foodstuffs to the liberated populations in Southern
Europe--the Czecho-Slovaks, the Jugo-Slavs, and Serbians, Roumanians and
others.

To meet the conditions in Europe following the armistice of November 11,
1918, the employment service of the United States set to work laying
far-reaching plans for meeting the problem of world food shortage. The
demands after the war were greater than they had been during the
conflict but the nation that had fed the allies of civilization in war
time performed the task of feeding the world, friend and foe alike, when
peace at length came upon the earth.



CHAPTER XXXV

THE UNITED STATES NAVY IN THE WAR

Long before war was declared the United States Government had been
engaged in preparation. It had realized that unrestricted submarine
warfare was sure to lead to war, and though for a time it was preserving
what it was pleased to call "an armed neutrality" the President
doubtless was well aware what such an "armed neutrality" would lead to.
Merchant ships were being armed for protection against the submarine,
and crews from the Navy assigned to work the guns. The first collision
was sure to mean an active state of war. The Naval Department,
therefore, was working at full speed, getting the Navy ready for active
service as soon as war should be declared.

Secretary Daniels made every effort to obtain the crews that were
necessary to man the new ships which were being fully commissioned with
the greatest possible speed and called upon newspapers all through the
country to do their utmost to stimulate enlistment.

On March 26th President Wilson issued an order increasing the enlisted
strength of the United States Marine Corps to 17,400 men, the limit
allowed under the law. On March 29th a hundred and three ensigns were
graduated from the Naval Academy three months ahead of their time, and
on April 6th, as soon as war was declared, the Navy was mobilized.

Within a few minutes after Secretary Daniels had signed the order for
this purpose one hundred code messages were sent out from the office of
Admiral W. S. Benson, Chief of Naval Operations, which placed the Navy
on a war basis, and put into the control of the Navy Department the
naval militia of all the states as well as the Naval Reserves and the
Coast Guard Service. In the Naval Militia were about 584 officers, and
7,933 men. These were at once assembled and assigned to coast patrol
service. All of the ships that were in active commission in the Navy
were already ready for duty. But there were reserve battleships and
reserve destroyers, besides ships which had been out of commission which
had to be manned as quickly as possible.

At the beginning of the war there were 361 vessels ready for service,
including twelve first-line battleships, twenty-five second-line
battleships, nine armored cruisers, twenty-four other cruisers, seven
monitors, fifty destroyers, sixteen coast torpedo vessels, seventeen
torpedo boats, forty-four submarines, eight tenders to torpedo boats,
twenty-eight gunboats, four transports, four supply ships, one hospital
ship, twenty-one fuel ships, fourteen converted yachts, forty-nine tugs,
and twenty-eight minor vessels. There were about seventy thousand
regularly enlisted men, besides eight thousand five hundred members of
the naval militia. Many yachts together with their volunteer crews had
been offered to the government by patriotic citizens.

For the complete mobilization of the Navy, as it then stood, 99,809
regularly enlisted men and 45,870 reserves were necessary. About
twenty-seven thousand of these were needed for coast defense, and twelve
thousand at the various shore stations. Retired officers were called
out, and assigned to duty which would permit officers on the active list
to be employed in sea duty. The Navy therefore still lacked thirty-five
thousand men to bring it up to its full authorized strength at the
beginning, but after the declaration of war an active recruiting
campaign brought volunteers by thousands. The service was a popular one
and recruits were easily obtained.

One of the first phases of the mobilization was the organization of a
large fleet of mosquito craft to patrol the Atlantic Coast, and keep on
the watch for submarines. Many of these boats had been private yachts,
and hundreds of young men volunteered from the colleges and schools of
the country for this work. Many boat builders submitted proposals to
construct small boats for this kind of patrol duty, and on March 31st a
coast patrol fleet was organized by the government under the command of
Captain Henry B. Wilson.

The Navy took possession immediately on the declaration of war of all
wireless stations in the United States dismantling all that could not be
useful to the government. War zones were established along the whole
coast line of the United States, making a series of local barred zones
extending from the larger harbors in American waters all along the line.
These harbors were barred at night to entering vessels in order to guard
against surprise by German submarines. Contracts were awarded for the
construction of twenty-four destroyers even before war was declared, and
many more were already under construction.


[Illustration: Map]
  MAP OF THE UNITED STATES SHOWING THE IMMENSE LENGTH OF COAST-LINE TO
  BE DEFENDED


The growth of the Navy in one year may give some idea of the efficiency
of the Navy Department. In April, 1917, the regular Navy contained 4,366
officers and 64,680 men. In April, 1918, it contained 7,798 officers and
192,385 men. In the Marine Corps in 1917 there were 426 officers and
13,266 men. In one year this was increased to 1,389 officers and 38,629
men. In the organization of the Naval Reserves, naval volunteers and
coast guards there were in 1917, 24,569 men, in 1918, 98,319 men, and
11,477 officers.

While personnel of the Navy was thus expanding the United States battle
fleet had grown to more than twice the size of the fleet before the war.
When war was declared there were under construction 123 new naval
vessels. These were completed and contracts made for 949 new vessels.
Among the ships completed are fifteen battleships, six battle cruisers,
seven scout cruisers, twenty-seven destroyers, and sixty-one submarines.
About eight hundred craft were taken over and converted into transports,
patrol service boats, submarine chasers, mine sweepers and mine layers.

The government also seized 109 German ships which had been interned in
American ports. The Germans had attempted to damage these ships so that
they would be useless, but they were all repaired, and carried American
troops and supplies in great quantities to France.

As the fleet grew the training of the necessary officers and crews was
conducted on a grand scale. Naval camps were established at various
points. The main ones were those at Philadelphia, (League Island);
Newport, Rhode Island; Cape May, New Jersey; Charleston, South Carolina;
Pensacola, Florida; Key West, Florida; Mare Island, California; Puget
Sound, Washington; Hingham, Massachusetts; Norfolk, Virginia; New
Orleans, San Diego, New York Navy Yard; Great Lakes, Illinois; Pelham,
New York; Hampton Roads, Virginia; and Gulfport, Mississippi. Schools in
gunnery and engineering were established and thousands of gunners and
engineers were trained, not only for the Navy but for the armed merchant
vessels.

The training of gun crews by target practice was a feature of this work.
Long before the war began systematic training of this kind had been
done, but mainly in connection with the big guns, and great efficiency
had been obtained by the steady practice. With the introduction of the
submarine, it became necessary to pay special attention to the training
of the crews of guns of smaller caliber, and it was not long before the
officers of our Navy were congratulating themselves on the efficiency of
their men. It is not easy to hit so small a mark as the periscope of a
submarine, but it could be done and many times was done.

Twenty-eight days after the declaration of war a fleet of United States
destroyers under the command of Admiral William S. Sims reported for
service at a British port.

The American destroyer squadron arrived at Queenstown after a voyage
without incident. The water front was lined with an excited crowd
carrying small American flags, which cheered the destroyers from the
time they were first seen until they reached the dock. They cheered
again when Admiral Sims went ashore to greet the British senior officer
who had come to welcome the Americans. It was a most informal function.
After the usual handshakes the British commander congratulated the
Americans on their safe voyage and then asked:

"When will you be ready for business?"

"We can start at once," was the prompt reply of Admiral Sims.

This rather took the breath away from the British commander and he said
he had not expected the Americans to begin work so soon after their long
voyage. Later after a short tour of the destroyers he admitted that the
American tars looked prepared.

"Yes," said the American commander, "we made preparations on the way
over. That is why we are ready."

Everything on board the destroyers was in excellent condition. The only
thing lacking was heavier clothing. The American uniforms were too light
for the cool weather which is common in the English waters. This
condition, however, was quickly remedied, and the American ships at once
put out to sea all in splendid condition and filled with the same
enthusiasm that the Marines showed later at Chateau-Thierry.

"They are certainly a fine body of men, and what's more, their craft
looked just as fit," declared the British commander.

One of the American destroyers, even before the American fleet had
arrived at Queenstown, had begun war duty. It had picked up and escorted
through the danger zone one of the largest of the Atlantic liners. The
passengers on board the liner sent the commander of the destroyer the
following message:


British passengers on board a steamer, bound for a British port, under
the protection of an American destroyer, send their hearty greetings to
her commander and her officers and crew, and desire to express their
keen appreciation of this practical co-operation between the government
and people of the United States and the British Empire, who are now
fighting together for the freedom of the seas.


Moving pictures were taken by the official British Government
photographer as the American flotilla came into the harbor, and sailors
who received shore leave were plied with English hospitality. The
streets of Queenstown were decorated with the Stars and Stripes. As soon
as American residents in England learned that American warships were to
cross the Atlantic they held a conference to provide recreation
buildings, containing sleeping, eating, and recreation accommodations
for the comfort of the American sailors. The destroyer flotilla was the
first contribution of American military power to the Entente Alliance
against Germany.

Admiral Sims is one of the most energetic and efficient of American
naval officers and to him as much as to any other man is due the
efficiency of the American Navy. During the period just before the
Spanish-American War Lieutenant Sims was Naval Attache at Paris, and
rendered invaluable services in buying ships and supplies for the Navy.
In 1900 he was assigned to duty on the battleship Kentucky, then
stationed in the Orient. In 1902 he was ordered to the Navy Department
and placed in charge of the Office of Naval Practice, where he remained
for seven years and devoted his attention to the improvement of the Navy
in gunnery. During that time he made constant trips to England to
consult with English experts in gunnery and ordnance, and became
intimately acquainted with Sir Percy Scott, who had been knighted and
made Rear-Admiral for the improvements he had introduced in connection
with the gunnery of the British warships. In 1909 he was made commander
of the battleship Minnesota, and in 1911 was a member of the college
staff at the Naval War College. In 1913 he was made commander of the
torpedo flotilla of the Atlantic fleet and in 1905 assigned to command
the Dreadnaught Nevada. In 1916 he was President of the Naval War
College. He was made Rear-Admiral in 1916 and Vice-Admiral in 1917 and
assigned to the command of all American war vessels abroad.

Immediately upon their arrival the American vessels began operation in
the submarine zone. Admiral Beatty then addressed the following message
to Admiral Henry T. Mayo of the United States Atlantic Fleet:


The Grand Fleet rejoices that the Atlantic fleet will now share in
preserving the liberties of the world and in maintaining the chivalry of
the sea.


Admiral Mayo replied:


The United States Atlantic Fleet appreciates the message from the
British fleet and welcomes opportunities for work with the British fleet
for the freedom of the seas.


It may also be noted, as a fact which is not without significance, that
the losses by submarine which had reached their highest mark in the last
week in April began from that time steadily to diminish.

One of the main duties of the Navy was to convoy transports and supplies
across the Atlantic. This was done with the assistance of Allied vessels
with remarkable success. For a long period it seemed as if the U-boats
would not be able to penetrate through the Allied convoy, but during
1918 four transports were torpedoed. The first was the Tuscania which
was sunk in February off the north coast of Ireland, with 1,912 officers
and men of the Michigan and Wisconsin guardsmen, of whom 204 were lost.
The Oronsa, which was torpedoed in April, contained 250 men and all were
saved except three of the crew. The Moldavia came next with five hundred
troops, of whom fifty-five were lost. On September 6th the troopship
Persic with 2,800 American soldiers was torpedoed but American
destroyers rescued all on board, and the Persic, which was prevented
from sinking by its water-tight bulkheads, was afterwards beached.

Several American ships, including the troop transport Mount Vernon, were
torpedoed on return trips and a number of the men of their crews were
lost, and several naval vessels were lost, including the destroyer Jacob
Jones, and the patrol vessel Alcedo. The Cassin was torpedoed, but
reached port under its own steam and later returned to service.

In September and October three more American transports were added to
the list of American losses. On September 26th the United States steamer
Tampa was torpedoed and sank with all on board, losing 118 men. On
September 30th the Ticonderoga was also torpedoed, eleven naval officers
and 102 enlisted men being lost.

In addition to these submarine losses several ships and a number of men
were lost through collision. The United States steamer Westgate was sunk
in a collision with the steamer American on October 7th, with the loss
of seven men. On October 9th the United States destroyer Shaw lost
fifteen men in a collision, though she later succeeded in reaching port.
On October 11th the American steamer Otranto was sunk in a collision
with the British liner Cashmere. Of seven hundred American soldiers who
were on board 365 were lost. At this time about three thousand
anti-submarine craft were in operation day and night around the British
Isles, and about five thousand working in the open sea. This was what
made it possible for the Allies to win the war.

Inasmuch as the illegal use of the submarine by Germany brought America
into the war it was extremely appropriate that she should take an active
part in the suppression of the submarine menace. The methods which were
used in fighting the submarines differed much in different cases. The
action of the government in arming merchantmen and in providing them
with trained gun crews did much to lower the number of such ships sunk
by the U-boats.

The submarine, which had formerly been able to stop the unarmed
merchantman and sink him at leisure, after a few combats with an armed
merchantman began to be very wary and to depend almost entirely upon his
torpedoes. It was not always easy for the submarine to get in a position
where her torpedo would be effective, and the merchantman was carefully
directed, if attacked, to pursue a ziz-zag irregular course, and at the
same time endeavor to hamper the submarine by shooting as near her
periscope as possible.

Along the sea coasts and at certain points in the English Channel great
nets were used effectively. Submarines, however, toward the end of the
war were made sufficiently large to be able to force their way through
these nets, and net-cutting devices were also used by them with
considerable effect. The best way to destroy the submarines seemed to be
in a direct attack by flotillas of destroyers.

By the end of the war the whole process of sinking or destroying
submarines had been thoroughly organized. Practically every portion of
the seas near Great Britain and France was carefully watched and the
appearance of a submarine immediately reported. As the submarine would
only travel at a certain well-understood speed during a given time, it
was possible to calculate, after the locality of one was known, about
how far from that point it would be found at any later period.
Destroyers were therefore sent circling around the point where the
submarine had been discovered, enlarging their distance from the center
every hour. In the course of time the submarine would be compelled to
come up for air, and then, if luck were with the destroyer, it might
find its foe before it was seen itself. Having discovered the submarine
the destroyer immediately endeavored to ram, dropping depth bombs at the
point where they supposed the enemy to be.

These bombs were so constructed that at a certain depth in the water
they would explode, and the force of the explosion was so great that
even if they did not strike the submarine they would be sure to damage
it seriously, sometimes throwing the submarine to the surface partly out
of water, and at other times driving her to come to the surface herself
ready to surrender.

In many cases it was not necessary to use the depth bomb at all. The
gunners on board the destroyers had become extraordinarily expert, and
though a shot might destroy the periscope of a submarine without doing
much damage, most submarines carrying extra periscopes to use if
necessary, yet it was soon found that it was possible by the use of
plunging shells to do effective damage. Plunging shells are somewhat
similar in their operation to bombs. Such a shell falling just short of
a periscope and fused to burst both on contact and at a certain depth
was extremely likely to do damage.

In the pursuit of the U-boat the airplane was also extremely effective.
These were sent out to patrol large districts near the Allied coast, and
also, in some cases, from ships themselves. It is possible in certain
weather conditions for the observer on an airplane to detect a submarine
even when it is submerged and the airplane can not only attack the
submarine by dropping depth bombs, but it can signal at once the
location of the enemy to the hurrying destroyers. Indeed, as the
submarine warfare proceeded the main difficulty of the Allies was to
locate the submarines. Many ingenious devices were used for this
purpose, and many of the English vessels had listening attachments under
water which were intended to make it possible to hear a submarine as it
moved. These, however, do not seem to have been very effective. The
submarine itself seems at times to have been fitted out in a similar way
and to have thus been able to hear the sound of an approaching ship.

Many thrilling reports of naval actions against German submarines were
given out officially by the British admiralty from time to time. In most
of these cases the submarine was both rammed and attacked by depth
bombs. In nearly all of them the only proof of success was the oil and
air bubbles which came to the surface.

One interesting encounter was that in which a British submarine sighted
a German U-boat, while both were on the surface. The British submarine
dived and later was able to pick up the enemy through the periscope and
discharge a torpedo in such a way as to destroy the German vessel. When
the British submarine arose it found a patch of oil in which Germans
were swimming.

Ordinarily, however, a submarine was of little service in a fight
against another for the radius of sight from a periscope is so short
that it is practically blind so far as another periscope is concerned.
This blindness of the submarine was taken advantage of by the Allies in
every possible way.

Merchant ships were camouflaged, that is painted in such a way that they
could not be easily distinguished at a distance. In the great convoys
ships were often hidden by great masses of smoke to prevent a submarine
from finding an easy mark. At night all lights were put out or else so
shaded as not to be seen by the enemy. The result of these methods was
the gradual destruction of the U-boat menace.

In the summer of 1918, while occasionally some ship was lost, the
production of new ships was much greater than those that were sunk.
During the month of June it was announced that the completion of new
tonnage by the Allies had outstripped the losses  by thousands of tons.
During this period the United States had attained its full stride in
building ships, airplanes and ordnance.


[Illustration: Painting]
  "HAIL COLUMBIA"
  England greets the first American destroyer squadron to arrive in
  European waters after the United States entered the war. The British
  admiral asked Admiral Sims, who was in command, how long he needed to
  refit and get ready for action. He replied "We are ready now."


[Illustration: Painting]
  THE DAY'S WORK OF UNCLE SAM'S DESTROYERS
  More than 2,000,000 men were safely landed in France guarded by the
  destroyers, ready day or night whenever an enemy submarine threatened
  a convoy, as was the case here in a trip over of the Adriatic loaded
  with troops. In the foreground is the periscope of the attacking
  submarine trying to submerge before she is hit.


Archibald Hurd, the English naval expert, said: "When the war is over
the nation will form some conception of the debt which we owe the
American Navy for the manner in which it has co-operated, not only in
connection with the convoy system, but in fighting the submarines. If
the naval position is improving today, as it is, it is due to the fact
that the British and American fleets are working in closest accord,
supported by an immense body of skilled workers on both sides of the
Atlantic, who are turning out destroyers and other craft for dealing
with the submarine, as well as mines and bombs. Some of the finest
battleships of the United States Navy are now associated with the
British Grand fleet. They are not only splendid fighting ships but they
are well officered and manned."

On May 13, 1918, in appreciation of some remarks which had been made by
Sir Eric Geddes, First Lord of the British Admiralty, Josephus Daniels,
the American Secretary of the Navy, addressed a letter to him in the
following terms:


"Your reference to the splendid spirit of co-operation between the
navies of our countries, and your warm praise of the officers and men of
our navy, have been most grateful to me and to all Americans. The
brightest spot in the tragedy of this war is this mutual appreciation of
the men in the naval service. Our officers who have returned confirm the
statements of Admiral Sims of the courtesies and kindness shown in every
way by the admiralty and the officers of the British fleet. I had hoped
to have the pleasure of visiting Great Britain and of personally
expressing this feeling of mutual working together, but the task here of
making ready more and more units for the fleet is a very serious one,
and my duty chains me here. The order in all the Navy is 'Full speed
ahead' in the construction of destroyers and other craft, and the whole
service is keyed up to press this program forward. Therefore I shall not
have the pleasure, until this program shall materialize, of a personal
acquaintance and a conference which would be of such interest and
value."


Sir Eric Geddes replied: "I am exceedingly grateful for your letter. As
you know we, all of us here, have great admiration for your officers and
men, and for the splendid help they are giving in European waters.
Further, we find Admiral Sims invaluable in council and in co-operation.
I fully appreciate how onerous your office must be and much though I
regret that you do not see your way to visiting this country in the near
future, I hope we may some day have the pleasure of welcoming you here."

Sir Eric afterward himself visited the United States and his visit was
made the occasion of a general expression of the high regard which the
United States felt for the splendid assistance which the great British
Navy had rendered in convoying its armies across the seas.

Secretary Daniels, in his report of December, 1918, said that American
sea forces in European waters comprised 338 vessels, with 75,000 men and
officers--a force larger than the entire Navy was before the war began.

From August, 1914, to September, 1918, German submarines sank 7,151,088
deadweight tons of shipping in excess of the tonnage turned out in that
period by the allied and neutral nations. That total does not represent
the depletion of the fleets at the command of the allied and neutral
nations, however, as 3,795,000 deadweight tons of enemy ships were
seized in the meantime. Actually, the allied and neutral nations on
September 1, 1918, had only 3,362,088 less tons of shipping in operation
than in August, 1914.

These details of the shipping situation were issued by the United States
Shipping Board along with figures to show that, with American and allied
yards under full headway, Europe's danger of being starved by the German
submarine was apparently at an end. The United States took the lead of
all nations in shipbuilding.

In all, the allied and neutral nations lost 21,404,913 deadweight tons
of shipping since the beginning of the war, showing that Germany
maintained an average destruction of about 445,000 deadweight tons
monthly. During the latter months, however, the sinkings fell
considerably below the average, and allied construction passed
destruction for the first time in May, 1918.

The losses of the allied and neutral shipping in August, 1918, amounted
to 327,676 gross tonnage, of which 176,401 was British and 151,275
allied and neutral, as compared with the adjusted figures for July of
323,772, and 182,524 and 141,248, respectively. British losses from all
causes during August were 10,887 tons higher than in June, which was the
lowest month since the introduction of unrestricted submarine warfare.

An official statement of the United States Shipping Board, issued
September 21, 1918, set forth the following facts:


STATUS OF WORLD TONNAGE, SEPTEMBER 1, 1918
(Germany and Austria excluded)
                                     Deadweight
                                                           Tons
Total losses (allied and neutral)
                August, 1914-September 1, 1918           21,404,913

Total construction (allied and neutral)
                August, 1914-September 1, 1918           14,247,825

Total enemy tonnage captured (to end of 1917)             3,795,000

Excess of losses over gains                               3,362,088

Estimated normal increase in world's tonnage
if war had not occurred
(based on rate of increase, 1905-1914)                   14,700,000

Net deficit due to war                                   18,062,088


In August, deliveries to the Shipping Board and other seagoing
construction in the United States for private parties passed allied and
neutral destruction for that month. The figures:


                                       Gross (Actual) Tone
Deliveries to the Shipping Board              244,121
Other construction over 1,000 gross            16,918
Total  261,039
Losses (allied and neutral)                   259,400
America alone surpassed losses for month by     1,630


NOTE.--World's merchant tonnage, as of June 30, 1914, totaled 49,089,552
gross tons, or, roughly, 73,634,328 deadweight tons. (Lloyd's Register.)


The climax to Germany's piratical submarine adventure took place a few
days after the armistice, when a mournful procession of
shamefaced-looking U-boats sailed between lines of English cruisers to
be handed over to the tender mercies of the Allied governments.



CHAPTER XXXVI

CHINA JOINS THE FIGHTING DEMOCRACIES

The circumstances connected with the entrance of the Republic of China
into the World War were as follows: On February 4, 1917, the American
Minister, Dr. Reinsch, requested the Chinese Government to follow the
United States in protesting against the German use of the submarine
against neutral ships. On February 9th Pekin made such a protest to
Germany, and declared its intention of severing diplomatic relations if
the protest were ineffectual. The immediate answer of Germany was to
torpedo the French ship Atlas in the Mediterranean on which were over
seven hundred Chinese laborers. On March 10th the Chinese Parliament
empowered the government to break with Germany. On the same afternoon a
reply was received from the German Government to the Chinese protest, of
a very mild character. The reply produced a great deal of surprise in
China.

A Chinese statesman made this comment on the German change of attitude:
"The troops under Count Waldersee leaving Germany for the relief of
Pekin were instructed by the War Lord to grant no quarter to the
Chinese. On the other hand, the latter were to be so disciplined that
they would never dare look a German in the face again. The whirligig of
time brings its own revenge, and today, after the lapse of scarcely
seventeen years, we hear the Vossiche Zeitung commenting on the
diplomatic rupture between China and Germany, lamenting that even so
weak a state as the Far Eastern Republic dares look defiantly at the
German nation."

The breaking off of relations with Germany led to trouble between the
President of the Republic and the Premier. The Premier desired to break
off relations without consulting Parliament. The President insisted that
Parliament should be consulted, which was actually done. The next move
was to declare war, but here the Chinese statesmen hesitated, and their
hesitation arose through their feeling toward Japan.

They sympathized with the Allies, but to Chinese eyes Japan has stood
for all that Germany, as depicted by its worst enemies, stood for. The
Japanese Government was professing friendliness to China, but that
profession the Chinese could not reconcile with Japan's action in the
Chino-Japanese War, and on many other occasions since that war. In
Chinese hearts there was a strong feeling of distrust, fear and hatred
for their Japanese neighbor. There were other reasons also why they
hesitated to declare war. Indeed the devotion to peace, which is
deep-rooted in the nation, would be a sufficient reason in itself.

Moreover, China, like other neutral nations, was a strong center for
German propaganda. German consuls and diplomatic officers, who were
scholars in Chinese literature and philosophy, and who also had
sufficient funds to entertain Chinese officials as they liked to be
entertained, were actively endeavoring to influence Chinese statesmen.

The Chinese Government, however, was determined to declare war, and to
secure support the Chinese Premier summoned a council of military
governors to consider the question. The majority of the conference
agreed with the Premier, but a vigorous opposition began to develop. On
May 7th the President sent a formal request to Parliament to approve of
a declaration of war. Parliament delayed and was threatened by a mob.
The Premier was accused of having instigated the riot and support began
to gather for Parliament, and an attack was made on the Premier as being
willing to sell China.

Day by day the differences between the militants and democrats became
more bitter. The question of war was almost lost in the differences of
opinion as to the comparative powers of Parliament and the Executive. A
demand was made that the Premier resign. He refused to resign and was
dismissed from office by the President, who was supported in his action
by the Parliament. This was practically a success of the Parliamentary
party, when suddenly several of the northern generals and governors
declared their independence, and the movement gradually developed into a
revolution in favor of the restoration of the Manchu Dynasty. This
revolution was finally suppressed.

The Japanese declared themselves, not the enemies, but the protectors of
China in terms that suggested the appearance of a Monroe Doctrine for
Asia. They pledged themselves not to violate the political independence
or territorial integrity of China, and declared strongly in favor of the
principle of the open door and equal opportunity.

On August 14th China formally joined the Allies and declared war on
Austria and Germany. She took no great part in the war, except to invade
the German and Austrian settlements in Tientsin and Hankow, which were
taken over by the Chinese authorities. The Chinese officials also seized
the Deutsche Asiatiche Bank which had been the financing agent in China
for the German Government, and fourteen German vessels which had been
interned in Chinese ports. Thousands of Chinese coolies were sent to
Europe to work in the Allied interests behind the battle lines, and
China has in all respects been faithful to her pledges.

The official war proclamation of China which was signed by President
Feng-kuo-chang reviewed China's efforts to induce Germany to modify her
submarine policy. It declared that China had been forced to sever
relations with Germany and with Austro-Hungary to protect the lives and
property of Chinese citizens. It promised that China would respect the
Hague Convention, regarding the humane conduct of the war, and asserted
that China's object was to hasten peace.

On July 22d Siam officially entered the war and all German and Austrian
subjects were interned and German ships seized. The Prince of Songkla,
brother of the reigning monarch, declared that natural necessity and
moral pressure forced Siam into the war on the side of the Entente.
Neutrality had become increasingly difficult, and it had become apparent
that freedom and justice in states which were not strong from a military
standpoint were not to be secured through the policy of the Central
Powers. Sympathy for Belgium and the popular aversion to Teutonic
methods had left no doubt as to the duty of Siam. The motive of Siam had
a curious fitness, though there was a certain quaintness in her
expression of a desire to make, "the world safe for democracy."

The native name of Siam is Muang-Thai, which means the Kingdom of the
Free. Siam is about as large as France, and has a population of about
eight millions. Its people, who are of many shades of yellowish-brown,
have descended into this corner of Asia from the highlands north of
Burma and east of Tibet. The tradition among these people was that the
further south they descended the shorter they would grow, that when they
reached the southern plains they would be no larger than rabbits, and
that when they came to the sea they would vanish altogether. As a fact
the northern tribes are much taller than the southern.

The original population of the Siamese peninsula was a race of black
dwarfs, remnants of whom still dwell in caves and nests of palm leaves,
so shy that it is almost impossible to catch a glimpse of them. The
literary and religious culture of Siam comes mainly from southern India.
Buddhism is the dominant religion, but there are many Mohammedans also.

The accession of Siam to the ranks of the Allies did not make any great
difference from a military point of view, but it was another evidence of
the general world feeling with regard to the Germans and their
encroachments in all parts of the world. Germany had tried its best to
keep these nations from participation in the war, but not only had her
propaganda failed but the feeling of these Oriental peoples was strongly
anti-German. Much of this feeling, it is readily seen from their
statements and their private letters, comes from a personal resentment
of the boorish attitude of the individual German. By the end of 1918 the
Teuton influence in the Orient had completely disappeared.



CHAPTER XXXVII

THE DEFEAT AND RECOVERY OF ITALY

None of the surprises of the World War brought such sudden and stunning
dismay to the Entente Allies as the news of the Italian disaster
beginning October 24, 1917, and terminating in mid-November. It is a
story in which propaganda was an important factor. It taught the Allies
the dangers lying in fraternization between opposing armies.

During the summer of 1917 the second Italian army was confronted by
Austrian regiments composed largely of war-weary Socialists. During that
summer skilful German propagandists operating from Spain had sown the
seeds of pacificism throughout Italy. This was made easy by the distress
then existing particularly in the villages where food was scanty and
complaints against the conduct of the war were numerous. The propaganda
extended from the civilian population to the army, and its channel was
directed mainly toward the second army encamped along the Isonzo River.

As a consequence of the pacifists' preachments both by word of mouth and
document, the second army was ready for the friendly approaches that
came from the front lines of the Austrians only a few hundred yards
away. Daily communication was established and at night the opposing
soldiers fraternized generally. The Russian doctrine that an end of the
fighting would come if the soldiers agreed to do no more shooting,
spread throughout the Italian trenches.

This was all part of a plan carefully mapped out by the German High
Command. When the infection had spread, the fraternizing Austrian troops
were withdrawn from the front trenches and German shock troops took
their places.

On October 24th these troops attacked in force. The Italians in the
front line, mistaking them for the friendly Austrians, waved a greeting.
German machine guns and rifles replied with a deadly fire, and the great
flanking movement commenced. So well had the Germans played their game
the Italians lost more than 250,000 prisoners and 2,300 guns in the
first week. The attack began in the Julian Alps and continued along the
Isonzo southwestward into the plain of Venice. The Italian positions at
Tolmino and Plezzo were captured and the whole Italian force was
compelled to retreat along a seventy-mile front from the Carnic Alps to
the sea. The most important point gained by the enemy in its early
assault was the village of Caporetto on the Upper Isonzo where General
Cadorna held a great series of dams which could have drained the Isonzo
River dry within twelve hours.


[Illustration: Map]
  AREA OF THE FLOW AND EBB OF ITALY'S MILITARY SUCCESS FROM THE CARSO
  PLATEAU TO THE PIAVE LINE.


The Italian retreat at places degenerated into a rout and it was not
until the Italians, reinforced by French and British, reached the Piave
River, that a stand was finally made. The defeat cost Cadorna his
command, and he was succeeded by General Armando Diaz, whose brilliant
strategy during the remainder of the war marked him as a national hero
and one of the outstanding military geniuses of the war.

The order for a general retreat was issued on October 27th. Poison gas
shells rained blindness and death upon the retreating Italians and upon
the heroic rear-guards. The city of Udine and its environs were emptied
of their inhabitants; and Goritzia, which had been wrested after a
desperate effort from the Austrians, was retaken on October 28th.

That the entire Italian army escaped the fate that had come to the
Russians at the Masurian Lakes was due mainly to the third army
commanded by the Duke of Aosta. During the long running fight, it faced
about from time to time and drove the Germans back in bloody encounters.

By November 10th the Italian forces had come to the hastily prepared
entrenchments on the west bank of the Piave River. The Austrians and the
Germans dug in on the east bank from the village of Susegana in the
Alpine foothills to the Adriatic Sea.

Here a long-drawn-out battle was fought, resulting in enormous losses to
the Germans and Austrians. By this time reinforcements had come up from
the French front and every attempt by the enemy to gain ground met a
bloody check. The hardest fighting was on the Asiago Plateau. There,
although the Italians were greatly outnumbered, the concentration of
their artillery in the hills overlooking the great field completely
dominated the situation.

A factor that was of the utmost value in checking the Austrians was the
system of lagoon defenses running from the lower Piave to the Gulf of
Venice.

From November 13th, when the Austrians in crossing the lower Piave in
their headlong rush to Venice were suddenly checked by the Italian
lagoon defenses, the entire Gulf of Venice, with its endless canals and
marshes, with islands disappearing and reappearing with the tide, was
the scene of a continuous battle. A correspondent described the fighting
as absolutely without precedent. The Teutons were desperately trying to
turn the Italian right wing by working their way around the northern
limits of the Venetian Gulf. The Italians inundated the region and
sealed all the entrances into the gulf by mine fields. The gulf,
therefore, was converted into an isolated sea. Over this inland waterway
the conflict raged bitterly. The Italians had a "lagoon fleet" ranging
from the swiftest of motor boats, armed with machine guns, small cannon,
and torpedo tubes, to huge, cumbersome, flat-bottomed British monitors,
mounting the biggest guns.

The Italian vessels navigated secret channels dug in the bottom of the
shallow lagoons. Only the Italian war pilots knew these courses. Even
gondolas straying out of the channels were instantly and hopelessly
stranded. Not only this, but as the muddy flats and marshy islands did
not permit of artillery emplacements the Italians developed an immense
fleet of floating batteries. The guns ranged from three-inch fieldpieces
to great fifteen-inch monsters. Each was camouflaged to represent a tiny
island, a garden patch, or a houseboat. Floating on the glasslike
surface of the lagoons, the guns fired a few shots and then changed
position, making it utterly impossible for the enemy to locate them. The
entire auxiliary service of supplying this floating army was adapted to
meet the lagoon warfare. Munition dumps were on boats, constantly moved
about to prevent the enemy spotting them. Gondolas and motor boats
replaced the automobile supply lorries customary in land warfare.
Instead of motor ambulances, motor boats carried off the dead and
wounded. Hydro-airplanes replaced ordinary fighting aircraft.

Along the northern limit of the Venetian Gulf, where the Austrians,
having filtered into the Piave Delta, sought to cross both the Sile and
the Piave, the enemy each night hooked up pontoons. At daybreak every
morning one end of a huge pontoon structure was anchored to the east
bank of the Piave and the other flung out to the strong current, which
soon stretched the makeshift bridge across.

The moment this happened, the enemy infantry madly dashed across.
Simultaneously the Italian floating batteries opened a terrific fire.
Practically every morning the Austrians tried the trick, and every
morning they failed, with heavy losses, to effect a crossing. At last
they gave up the attempt as hopeless, and the armies remained locked on
the Piave for several months.



CHAPTER XXXVIII

REDEMPTION OF THE HOLY LAND

From the beginning of the war the German General Staff and the British
War Office planned the occupation of Palestine and Macedonia. Germany
wanted domination of that territory because through it lay the open road
to Egypt and British prestige in the East. Turkey was the cat's paw of
the Hun in this enterprise. German officers and German guns were
supplied to the Turks, but the terrible privations necessary in a long
campaign that must be spent largely in the desert, and the inevitable
great loss in human life, were both demanded from Turkey.

Great Britain made no such demands upon any of its Allies. Unflinchingly
England faced virtually alone the rigors, the disease and the deaths
consequent upon an expedition having as its object the redemption of the
Holy Land from the unspeakable Turk.

Volunteers for the expedition came by the thousands. Canada, the United
States, Australia and other countries furnished whole regiments of
Jewish youths eager for the campaign. The inspiration and the devotion
radiating from Palestine, and particularly from Jerusalem and Bethlehem,
drew Jew and Gentile, hardy adventurer and zealous churchman, into
Allenby's great army.

It was a long campaign. On February 26, 1917, Kut-el-Amara was
recaptured from the Turks by the British expedition under command of
General Sir Stanley Maude, and on March 11th following General Maude
captured Bagdad. From that time forward pressure upon the Turks was
continuous. On September 29, 1917, the Turkish Mesopotamian army
commanded by Ahmad Bey was routed by the British, and historic Beersheba
in Palestine was occupied on October 31st. The untimely death of General
Maude, the hero of Mesopotamia, on November 18, 1917, temporarily cast
gloom over the Allied forces but it had no deterrent effect upon their
successful operations. Siege was laid to Jerusalem and its environs late
in November, and on December 8, 1917, the Holy City which had been held
by the Turks for six hundred and seventy-three years surrendered to
General Allenby and his British army. Thus ended a struggle for
possession of the holiest of shrines both of the Old and New Testaments,
that had cost millions of lives during fruitless crusades and had been
the center of religious aspirations for ages.


[Illustration: Map: The Jordan river from the Sea of Galilee to the Dead
Sea.]
  HOW THE TWO WINGS OF THE BRITISH ARMY TRAPPED THE TURKS.


General Allenby's official report follows:


"I entered the city officially at noon December 11th with a few of my
staff, the commanders of the French and Italian detachments, the heads
of the political missions, and the military attaches of France, England,
and America.

"The procession was all afoot, and at Jaffa gate I was received by the
guards representing England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales, Australia, New
Zealand, India, France and Italy. The population received me well.

"Guards have been placed over the holy places. My military governor is
in contact with the acting custodians and the Latin and Greek
representatives. The governor has detailed an officer to supervise the
holy places. The Mosque of Omar and the area around it have been placed
under Moslem control, and a military cordon of Mohammedan officers and
soldiers has been established around the mosque. Orders have been issued
that no non-Moslem is to pass within the cordon without permission of
the military governor and the Moslem in charge."


A proclamation in Arabic, Hebrew, English, French, Italian Greek and
Russian was posted in the citadel, and on all the walls proclaiming
martial law and intimating that all the holy places would be maintained
and protected according to the customs and beliefs of those to whose
faith they were sacred. The proclamation read:


PROCLAMATION

To the Inhabitants of Jerusalem the Blessed and the People Dwelling in
Its Vicinity.

The defeat inflicted upon the Turks by the troops under my command has
resulted in the occupation of your city by my forces. I, therefore,
proclaim it to be under martial law, under which form of administration
it will remain so long as military consideration makes necessary.

However, lest any of you be alarmed by reason of your experience at the
hands of the enemy who has retired, I hereby inform you that it is my
desire that every person should pursue his lawful business without fear
of interruption.

Furthermore, since your city is regarded with affection by the adherents
of three of the great religions of mankind and its soil has been
consecrated by the prayers and pilgrimages of multitudes of devout
people of these three religions for many centuries, therefore, do I make
it known to you that every sacred building, monument, holy spot, shrine,
traditional site, endowment, pious bequest, or customary place of prayer
of whatsoever form of the three religions will be maintained and
protected according to the existing customs and beliefs of those to
whose faith they are sacred.

Guardians have been established at Bethlehem and on Rachel's Tomb. The
tomb at Hebron has been placed under exclusive Moslem control.

The hereditary custodians at the gates of the Holy Sepulchre have been
requested to take up their accustomed duties in remembrance of the
magnanimous act of the Caliph Omar, who protected that church.


Jerusalem was now made the center of the British operations against the
Turks in  Palestine. Mohammed V, the Sultan of Turkey, died July 3,
1918, and many superstitious Turks looked upon that event as forecasting
the end of the Turkish Empire. The Turkish army in Palestine was left
largely to its fate by Germany and Austria, and although it was
numerically a formidable opponent for General Allenby's forces, that
distinguished strategist fairly outmaneuvered the Turkish High Command
in every encounter. The beginning of the end for Turkish misrule in
Palestine came on September 20th when the ancient town of Nazareth was
captured by the British.

A military net was thereupon closed upon the Turkish army. The fortified
towns of Beisan and Afule followed the fate of Nazareth. In one day's
fighting 18,000 Turkish prisoners, 120 guns, four airplanes, a number of
locomotives and cars, and a great quantity of military and food supplies
were bagged by the victorious British. So well did Allenby plan that the
British losses were far the smallest suffered in any large operation of
the entire war. It was the swiftest and most decisive victory of any
scored by the Allies. It ended the grandiose dream of Germany for an
invasion of Egypt in stark disaster, and swept the Holy Land clear of
the Turks.

This great battle on the Biblical field of Armageddon was remarkable in
that it was virtually the only engagement during the entire war offering
the freest scope to cavalry operations. British cavalry commands
operated over a radius of sixty miles between the Jordan and the
Mediterranean, sweeping the Turks before them.

By September 25th the total bag of Turkish prisoners exceeded 40,000.
Munition depots covering acres of ground were taken. Whole companies of
Turkish soldiers were found sitting on their white flags waiting for the
British to accept their terms. Two hundred sixty-five pieces of
artillery were captured.

Damascus was captured on Tuesday, October 1st, after an advance of 130
miles by General Allenby since September 1st, the day of his surprise
attack north of Jerusalem. During that period a total of 73,000
prisoners was captured.

Palestine's delivery from the Turks was complete. Official announcement
was made by the British War Office that the total casualties from all
sources in this final campaign was less than 4,000.

Plans for the government of the people of Palestine were announced
immediately. Their general scope was outlined in an agreement made
between the British, French and Russian governments in 1916. Under that
arrangement Republican France was charged with the preparation of a
scheme of self-government. The town of Alexandretta was fixed upon as a
free port of entry for the new nation.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright Underwood and Underwood, N. Y.   British Official Photo.
  JERUSALEM DELIVERED
  On December 11, 1917, the Holy City was entered by the British forces.
  Following the custom of the Crusaders, General Allenby, commander of
  the British and Allied forces, made his entry, with his staff and
  Allied officers, through the Jaffa Gate, on foot.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  British Official Photograph.
  ANCIENT AND MODERN WARFARE MINGLE IN THE HOLY LAND
  The distinctly modern British soldier uses the camel, that extremely
  ancient beast of burden, to get him over the desert in Palestine. The
  Imperial Camel Corps gave valuable service in the campaign that led to
  the capture of Jerusalem.



CHAPTER XXXIX

AMERICA'S TRANSPORTATION PROBLEMS

When America entered the war there was a very great increase in the
volume of business of the railroads of the country. The roads were
already so crowded by what the Allies had done in purchasing war
supplies, that a great deal of confusion had resulted. The Allies had
expended more than three billion dollars in the United States, and as
nearly all of their purchases had to be sent to a few definite points
for shipment to Europe, the congestion at those points had become a
serious difficulty. Thousands of loaded cars had to stand for long
periods awaiting the transfer of their contents to ships. This meant
that thousands of cars which had been taken from lines in other parts of
the country would be in a traffic blockade for weeks at a time. The main
difficulty appeared to be that of getting trains unloaded promptly.

The declaration of war by the United States made the situation very much
worse. Not only did the railroads have to handle the freight destined
for the Allies, but there was a very large addition to the passenger
movement on account of the thousands of men that were being sent to the
various training camps, and the immense masses of supplies that had to
be sent to these camps. This included not only the ordinary supplies to
the men but thousands of carloads of lumber. Moreover, all over the
country mills and factories were now being handed over to the government
for war work; and to them, too, great quantities of raw material had to
be sent, and the finished product removed to its destination.

A vigorous endeavor to meet the new difficulties was instituted by the
railroads themselves. They themselves named a war board, which was to
co-operate with the government and which was to have absolute authority.
But this arrangement soon proved unsatisfactory. Each government
official would do his best to obtain preference for what his department
required, and to obtain that preference a system of priority tags was
established which became a great abuse. The result was that priority
freight soon began to crowd out the freight which the railroads could
handle according to their own discretion, thus seriously interfering
with business all over the country.

Naturally, the railroad executives and the government authorities
studied the question with the greatest care, but they could not reach an
understanding among themselves, nor with the Administration. At last the
President settled the matter by announcing his decision to have the
government take over complete control of the roads. The President
derived his power from an Act of Congress dated August 29, 1916, which
reads as follows:


The President in time of war is empowered, through the Secretary of War,
to take possession and assume control of any system or systems of
transportation, or any part thereof, and to utilize the same to the
exclusion, as far as may be necessary, of all other traffic thereon, for
the transfer or transportation of troops, war material and equipment, or
for such other purposes connected with the emergency as may be needful
or desirable.


The proclamation went into effect on December 28, 1917, and the
President declared that it applied to "each and every system of
transportation and the appurtenances thereof, located, wholly or in
part, within the boundaries of the Continental United States, and
consisting of railroads and owned or controlled systems of coastwise and
inland transportation, engaged in general transportation, whether
operated by steam, or by electric power, including also terminals,
terminal companies, and terminal associations, sleeping and parlor cars,
private cars, and private car lines, elevators, warehouses, telegraph
and telephone lines, and all other equipment and appurtenances commonly
used upon or operated as a part of such rail or combined rail and water
systems of transportation.... That the possession, control, operation,
and utilization of such transportation systems shall be exercised by and
through William G. McAdoo, who is hereby appointed, and designated
Director General of Railroads. Said Director may perform the duties
imposed upon him so long and to such an extent as he shall determine
through the boards of directors, receivers, officers and employees, of
said system of transportation." President Wilson issued an explanation
with this proclamation in which he said:


This is a war of resources no less than of men, perhaps even more than
of men, and it is necessary for the complete mobilization of our
resources that the transportation systems of the country should be
organized and employed under a single authority and to simplify methods
for coordination which have not proved possible under private management
and control. A committee of railway executives who have been cooperating
with the government in this all-important matter, have done the utmost
that it was possible for them to do, but there were differences that
they could neither escape nor neutralize. Complete unity of
administration in the present circumstances involves upon occasion, and
at many points, a serious dislocation of earnings, and the committee
was, of course, without power or authority to rearrange charges or
effect proper compensations in adjustments of earnings. Several roads
which were willingly and with admirable public spirit accepting the
orders of the committee, have already suffered from these circumstances,
and should not be required to suffer further. In mere fairness to them,
the full authority of the government must be substituted. The public
interest must be first served, and in addition the financial interests
of the government, and the financial interests of the railways, must be
brought under a common direction. The financial operations of the
railway need not, then, interfere with the borrowings of the government,
and they themselves can be conducted at a great advantage. Investors in
railway securities may rest assured that their rights and interests will
be as scrupulously looked after by the government as they could be by
the directors of the several railway systems. Immediately upon the
reassembling of Congress I shall recommend that these different
guarantees be given. The Secretary of War and I are agreed that, all the
circumstances being taken into consideration, the best results can be
obtained under the immediate executive direction of the Honorable
William G. McAdoo, whose practical experience peculiarly fits him for
the service, and whose authority as Secretary of the Treasury will
enable him to coordinate, as no other man could, the many financial
interests which will be involved, and which might, unless systematically
directed, suffer very embarrassing entanglements.


President Wilson's proclamation stirred up great excitement on the stock
market. Speculators rushed to buy back railroad stocks which they had
previously sold short, and the market value of such stocks was raised
more than three hundred and fifty million dollars as a result. The
Federal Government's assumption of control of the railroads was
generally recognized as the proper act under existing circumstances, and
the guarantee of pre-war earnings made them a good investment.

The railroad system in the United States consists of 260,000 miles of
railroad, owned by 441 distinct corporations, with about 650,000
shareholders. It employs 1,600,000 men and represents a property
investment of $17,500,000,000. The outstanding capital in round numbers
is $16,000,000,000, $9,000,000,000 of which is represented by a funded
debt. The rolling stock comprises 61,000 locomotives, 2,250,000 freight
cars, 52,000 passenger cars and 95,000 service cars. All this was now
under the charge of William G. McAdoo. On January 4, 1918, President
Wilson explained his plan to Congress, and recommended legislation to
put the new system of control into effect, and to guarantee to the
holders of railroad stocks and bonds a net annual income equal to the
average net income for the three years ending June 30, 1917.

The wise recommendations of President Wilson were at once approved by
Congress; provision was made for guaranteeing the railroads the income
which he recommended, and for financing the roads. The railroads' war
board was abolished and Mr. McAdoo appointed an advisory board to assist
him. This board consisted of John Skelton Williams, Controller of the
Currency; Hale Holden, President of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy
Railroad; Henry Walters, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the
Atlantic Coast Line; Edward Chambers, Vice-President of the Santa Fe
Railroad and head of the transportation division of the United States
Food Administration; Walter D. Hines, Chairman of the Executive
Committee of the Santa Fe. Specific duties were assigned to the various
members of this committee. Mr. Williams was to deal with the financial
problem; Mr. Holden to assume direction of committees and
sub-committees, and other phases of the work were allotted to other
members. Mr. Walter D. Hines was made assistant to the Director General.

Mr. McAdoo's first order was to pool all terminals, ports, locomotives,
rolling stock and other transportation facilities. Another order had as
its object to end the congestion of traffic in New York City and
Chicago. It gave all lines entering these centers equal rights in
trackage and water terminal facilities. This wiped out the identity of
the great Pennsylvania Terminal Station in New York, and gave all
railroads the use of the Pennsylvania tubes under the Hudson River.

The effect of government control of the railroads was felt from the very
first. Coal was given the right of way, giving great relief to such
sections as were suffering from fuel shortage. Many passenger trains
were taken off, more than two hundred and fifty of such trains being
dropped from the schedules of the eastern roads. This permitted a great
increase in the freight traffic. Orders were also given that all empty
box cars were to be sent to wheat-producing centers, so that wheat could
be moved to the Atlantic sea coasts for shipment to England and France.
These orders preceded the adoption of the railroad control bill, which
was not passed by Congress until March 14th. A feature of the bill is
the proviso that government control of the railroads shall not continue
more than twenty-one months after the war. After the passing of the
bill plans were made to make contracts with each railroad company for
government compensation on the basis provided in the bill.

The action of the government in thus assuming control of the railroads
very naturally led to wide differences of opinion, some of which were
sharply expressed in the Congress of the United States. On the whole,
however, public opinion decided that the government acted wisely.
Certain inconveniences to the traveling public were easily excused when
it was realized that the movement of troops throughout the country to
the camps, or from the camps to the ports which were to take them across
the sea, from "Texas to Toul," was being accomplished with great
success; that the movement of war material was now possible, and that
the gigantic railroad system was working without a hitch.

Many details, in connection with the railroad management, were not at
once worked out, and many months passed without complete agreements
regarding the railway operating contracts. But this was a matter of
greater interest to the owners than it was to patriotic citizens,
anxious for the winning of the war. Governmental control of the
railroads, was only a beginning. On July 16th President Wilson took
control, for the period of the war, of all telegraph, telephone, cable
and radio lines, signing a bill on that day passed by Congress
authorizing such action.

The transportation of the American army across the ocean was the
greatest military feat of its kind ever accomplished in history. The
transportation of English troops during the Boer War meant a longer
journey, but the number of troops sent on that journey was but a small
fraction of America's army.

The railroads in existence were not sufficient. The ships that were
necessary could not be found in America's navy. It was necessary to
build new roads, new docks, new terminals, new bases of supplies in
America, and to send abroad thousands of trained workmen and experienced
railroad engineers to build similar necessities in France. To convey the
millions of men across the water England had to come to the rescue, and
though hundreds of American ships were built with a speed that was
almost miraculous, they were in constant need of the assistance of the
Allies. But wonderful men were put in charge of the work, wonderful
organizers with wonderful assistants, and the great task was
accomplished.

As soon as the army was trained it was sent across--first by thousands,
then by tens of thousands, then by hundreds of thousands, until before
the war was over more than two million men had made the great trip "over
there." And throughout that whole trip they were watched over as
carefully as if they were at home. Every want was supplied; food,
clothing, munitions were all where they were needed. Even their leisure
hours were looked after, their health attended to. Books, games,
theaters, classes for those who cared to study, all were there.

It was a wonderful performance, and the whole movement was conducted
with clock-like precision. On such a day at such an hour the trained
soldier would start. At such an hour he would report in some Atlantic
port. At such an hour and such a minute he would board ship, and with
equal precision that ship would sail upon the appointed moment. Perhaps
on the journey over some submarine might delay the ship, but the
destroyers were there on the alert, and the submarine was but an amusing
episode. On the other side the process was carried on with equal
efficiency. Before the American doughboy could realize that he was in
France he was in his quarters, just like home, in the base camps behind
the fighting line and it was this miracle of transportation that won the
war.

A study of transportation construction in other countries showed that
actual construction of railroads had been suspended in some cases, and
in others retarded, but in not a few instances hastened by the war.
Brazil experienced a more nearly complete suspension of railroad
building than any of the other countries, but preparation was made for
prompt resumption of construction, with the return of more normal
conditions.

The Chinese building program also had been affected unfavorably by the
war. Nevertheless, there were important additions made, aggregating
approximately 800 miles during the war. Of the lines completed in 1917,
two are of especial significance. One of these, a 140-mile section of
the Canton-Hankow line, a link in the route between South China and
Peking. The other is a 60-mile feeder of the Trans-Siberian Railway in
Manchuria. A line was extended from South Manchuria into Mongolia, the
first railroad to penetrate this territory. Financial arrangements were
made for the early construction of a line across Southern Manchuria and
for another connecting the Peking-Hankow and Tientsin-Pukow lines.

Construction in Siberia proceeded rapidly. The completion, in 1915, of
the Amur River division of the Trans-Siberian in the east, together with
the extension in 1913 of the Ekaterinburg-Tiumen line to Omsk in the
west, gave virtually a double track from European Russia to Vladivostok.

The notable achievement in Africa was the continuation of the southern
rail link in the Cape-to-Cairo route. This line was completed to Bukama
on the navigable Congo, 2,600 miles from Capetown. The railway in German
East Africa, was extended to Lake Tanganyika on the eve of the war,
making a rail-water line across the center of the continent. The
railroad from Lobito Bay was extended eastward to Katanga, a rich
mineral region of the Belgian Congo, and, with the road already reaching
the Indian Ocean at Beira, gave a second east and west transcontinental
line. A permanent standard gauge railroad was laid by the British
Expeditionary Forces from Egypt into Palestine.

Despite the magnitude of the Australian contribution to the Allied
military and naval forces, the east and west transcontinental railway,
begun in 1912, was completed in 1917. In all, more than 3,500 miles of
track were built in the commonwealth in the years 1915-17.

In Canada, the work of providing two transcontinental railroads was
completed; feeders were added, and a line from La Pas to Hudson Bay was
under construction. From 1912 to 1916 more than 10,000 miles of track
were put in operation, nearly 7,000 of which were added in the first two
years of the war.



CHAPTER XL

SHIPS AND THE MEN WHO MADE THEM.

When the United States of America entered the World War she was
confronted at once by a serious question. The great Allied nations were
struggling against the attempt of the Germans, through the piratical use
of submarines, to blockade the coast of the Allied countries. It was
this German action which had led America to take part in the war. It is
true that America had other motives. Few wars ever take place among
democratic nations as a result of the calculation of the nation's
leaders. The people must be interested, and the people must sympathize
with the cause for which they are going to fight. The people of America
had sympathized with Belgium, and had become indignant at the brutal
treatment of that inoffensive nation. They had sympathized with France
in its gallant endeavor to protect its soil from the inroads of the Hun.
This feeling had become a personal one as they reviewed the lists of
Americans lost in the sinking of the Lusitania, and this sympathy had
gradually grown into indignation when the Germans, after having promised
to conduct submarine warfare according to international law, again and
again violated that promise. When, then, the Germans declared that they
would no longer even pretend to treat neutral shipping according to the
laws of maritime warfare the people with one accord approved the action
of the President of the United States in declaring war. The Germans at
this time were making a desperate effort to starve England, by
destroying its commerce, and it was in the endeavor to accomplish this
purpose that they thought it necessary to attack American ships.

The first effort of Americans, therefore, was naturally to use every
power of the navy to destroy the lurking submarines, and in the second
place to use every means in their power to supply the Allies with food.
But America had for many years neglected to give encouragement to her
merchant fleets. Her commerce was very largely carried in foreign
bottoms.

Ships were needed, and needed urgently, and one of the very first acts
of the American Government was to authorize their production. Congress
therefore appropriated for this purpose what was then the extraordinary
sum of $1,135,000,000 and General Goethals, recently returned from his
work in building the Panama Canal, was appointed manager of the
Emergency Fleet Corporation and entrusted with the execution of the
government's ship-building program.

The Emergency Fleet Corporation, however, was then independent of the
United States Shipping Board, of which Mr. William Denman was made
chairman, and friction between General Goethals and Mr. Denman at the
very start caused long delay. The difference of opinion between them
arose over the comparative merits of wooden and steel ships. The matter
was finally laid before President Wilson and ended in the resignation of
both men and the complete reorganization of the board and the Fleet
Corporation, in which reorganization the Fleet Corporation was made
subordinate to the Shipping Board but given entire control of
construction.

Rear-Admiral Capps succeeded General Goethals, but was compelled to
resign on account of ill health. Rear-Admiral Harris, who had been chief
of the Navy's Bureau of Yards and Docks, then had the job for two weeks,
but resigned because in his opinion he had not enough authority. Then
came Mr. Charles Piez, who held the position for a longer period. Mr.
Edward N. Hurley had been made chairman of the United States Shipping
Board, and under the direction of these two men much progress was made.

In the spring of 1918 the boards themselves were not satisfied with
their progress, and on April 16, 1918, Mr. Charles M. Schwab, chairman
of the Board of Directors of the Bethlehem Steel Corporation, was made
Director General of the Emergency Fleet Corporation. Mr. Schwab was one
of the most prominent business men in the United States and one of the
best known, and his appointment was received all over the country with
the greatest satisfaction. His wonderful work in building up the
Bethlehem steel plant not only showed his great ability, but especially
fitted him for a task in which the steel industry bore such a vital
part. The official statement issued from the White House read as
follows:


Edward N. Hurley, Charles M. Schwab, Bainbridge Colby and Charles Piez
were received by the President at the White House today. It was stated
that the subject discussed was the progress and condition of a national
ship-building program. The carrying forward of the construction work in
the one hundred and thirty shipyards now in operation is so vast that it
requires a reinforcement of the ship-building organization throughout
the country. Later in the day Chairman Hurley of the Shipping Board
announced that a new office with wide powers had been created by the
Trustees of the Emergency Fleet Corporation. The new position is that of
Director General and Mr. Schwab has been asked, and has agreed, to
accept this position in answer to the call of the nation. Charles Piez,
Vice-President of the Emergency Fleet Corporation, recommended that the
post of General Manager of the corporation be at once abolished, so that
Mr. Schwab as Director General should be wholly unhampered in carrying
on the large task entrusted to him. Mr. Piez, since the retirement of
Admiral Harris, has been filling both the position of Vice-President and
that of General Manager. Mr. Schwab will have complete supervision and
direction of the work of ship-building. He agreed to take up the work at
the sacrifice of his personal wishes in the matter. His services were
virtually commandeered. His great experience as a steel maker and
builder of ships has been drafted for the nation.


Although the fact that production during the month of March had not been
as great as had been hoped probably brought about this change, it should
also be said that those who had been responsible deserved much credit
for what had actually been done. They had been handicapped constantly by
poor transportation and shortage of materials, but had worked faithfully
and with what under ordinary circumstances would be regarded as
remarkable success. The call upon Mr. Schwab was simply an effort to
draft into the service of the country its very highest executive
ability. Mr. Schwab's name had been mentioned before for more than one
government post, and it was thought that here was the place where his
talents could have the fullest play. It was stated in Washington that he
would receive a salary of one dollar a year.

Mr. Schwab at once proceeded to "speed up" the shipping-program. It took
him just one day to arrange his own business affairs and then he began
his work. His first day was spent in going over the details of his task
with Chairman Hurley and Mr. Piez. He then received newspaper men,
beginning the campaign of publicity which turned out to be so
successful. He was full of compliments for the work which had already
been done. "It is prodigious, splendid, magnificent!" he said. "It is
far greater than any man who hasn't seen the inside of things can
appreciate. The foundation is laid. That task is well done. We are going
to get the results which are needed and I should be proud if I could
have any part in the accomplishment. All I can say for myself is that I
am filled with enthusiasm, energy and confidence. Mr. Hurley and I are
in full accord on everything, and we are going to work shoulder to
shoulder to make the work a success, but the large burden must fall upon
the people at the yards, and they are entitled to any credit for
success. I do not want to have any man in the shipyards working for me.
I want them all working with me. Nothing is going to be worth while
unless we win this war, and everyone must do the task to which he is
called."

One of the first steps that Mr. Schwab took to speed up ship production
was to establish his headquarters in Philadelphia, as the center of the
ship-building region. Chairman Hurley remained at Washington, and the
operating department, which included agencies such as the Inter-Allied
Ship Control Committee, was removed to New York City. It was stated that
nearly fifty per cent of the work in progress was within a short radius
of Philadelphia.

The year before the war the total output of the United States shipyards
was only two hundred and fifty thousand tons. The program of the
shipping board contemplated the construction of one thousand one hundred
and forty-five steel ships, with a tonnage of eight million one hundred
and sixty-four thousand five hundred and eight, and four hundred and
ninety wooden ships, with a tonnage of one million seven hundred and
fifteen thousand. These of course could not be built in the shipyards
then in existence. New shipyards had to be built in various parts of the
country.

In the first year after the shipping board took control, one hundred and
eighty-eight ships were put in the water and through requisition and by
building, one hundred and three more were added to the American merchant
fleet. By April, 1918, the government had at its service 2,762,605 tons
of shipping. During the month of May, the first month after Mr. Schwab
began his work, the record of production had mounted from 160,286 tons
to 263,571. American shipyards had completed and delivered during that
month forty-three steel ships and one wooden ship. Mr. Hurley, in an
address on June 10th, said:


On June 1st, we had increased the American built tonnage to over
3,500,000 dead-weight tons of shipping. This gives us a total of more
than one thousand four hundred ships with an approximate total
deadweight tonnage of 7,000,000 now under the control of the United
States Shipping Board. In round numbers and from all sources we have
added to the American flag since our war against Germany began, nearly
4,500,000 tons of shipping. Our program calls for the building of 1,856
passenger, cargo and refrigerator ships and tankers, ranging from five
thousand to twelve thousand tons each, with an aggregate dead-weight of
thirteen million. Exclusive of these we have two hundred and forty-five
commandeered vessels, taken over from foreign and domestic owners which
are being completed by the Emergency Fleet Corporation. These will
aggregate a total dead-weight tonnage of 1,715,000. This makes a total
of two thousand one hundred and one vessels, exclusive of tugs and
barges which are being built and will be put on the seas in the course
of carrying out the present program, with an aggregate dead-weight
tonnage of 14,715,000. Five billion dollars will be required to finish
our program, but the expenditure of this enormous sum will give to the
American people the greatest merchant fleet ever assembled in the
history of the world. American workmen have made the expansion of recent
months possible, and they will make possible the successful conclusion
of the whole program.


In the wonderful work that followed his appointment Mr. Schwab
constantly came before the public, mainly through his addresses to the
working men of the different yards. His main endeavor was to stimulate
enthusiasm and rivalry among the men. A ten-thousand-dollar prize was
offered to the yard producing the largest surplus above its program, and
he traveled throughout the country urging the employees at all the great
yards to break their records. The result of his work was that it was not
long before it was announced that the monthly tonnage of ships completed
by the Allies exceeded the tonnage of those sunk by the German
submarine. The menace of the submarine, which had seemed so formidable,
had disappeared.

The most important of the great shipyards which were producing the
American cargo ships was at Hog Island in the southwest part of
Philadelphia. This shipyard may indeed be called the greatest shipyard
in the world. Before Mr. Schwab became Director General much criticism
had been launched at the work that was going on there, and an
investigation had been made which resulted in a favorable report. On
August 5th the new shipyard launched its first ship, the 7,500 ton
freight steamer, Quistconck, in the presence of a distinguished throng
among whom were the President of the United States and Mrs. Woodrow
Wilson. The ship was christened by Mrs. Wilson, and the President swung
his hat and led the cheers as the great ship glided down the ways. The
name "Quistconck" is the ancient Indian name of Hog Island. The crowd
numbered more than sixty thousand people, and special trains from
Washington and New York brought many notable guests. President and Mrs.
Wilson were escorted by Mr. Hurley and Mr. Schwab, and apparently
thoroughly enjoyed the occasion. An enormous bouquet was presented to
Mrs. Wilson by Foreman McMillan, who had driven the first rivet in the
Quistconck's keel.

Shortly after the armistice it was announced that the Hog Island plant
would be acquired by the United States Government. The real estate,
valued at $1,760,000, was owned by the American International Ship
Building Company, and the government had invested about $60,000,000 in
equipping the plant. At the time the war ended thirty-five thousand
persons were at work and a hundred and eighty ships were in various
stages of completion.

An interesting feature in connection with the endeavor to "speed up" was
the competition in riveting. Early in the year in yard after yard expert
riveters were reported as making extraordinary records, and prizes were
offered to the winners of such records. Later, however, such contests
were discouraged by Chairman Hurley and by others. The best record was
made by John Omir, who drove twelve thousand two hundred and nine rivets
in nine hours at the Belfast Yards of Workman and Clark. In the
accomplishment of this feat on two occasions he passed the mark of one
thousand four hundred rivets an hour. In his best minute he drove
twenty-six rivets.

The ships constructed by the Shipping Board were of steel, of wood and
of concrete, and at times considerable difference of opinion existed
with regard to which form of ship should receive the most attention. The
policy of the government seemed finally to favor the steel as it was
claimed that the wooden type was not only more expensive, but that it
was less efficient. However until the very end wooden ships in great
numbers were being built.

On May 31st the steamship Agawam, described as the first fabricated ship
in the world, was launched in the yards of the Submarine Boat
Corporation at Newark. This was essentially a standardized steel cargo
ship. "Fabricated" is the technical term applied to ships built from
numbered shapes made from patterns.

President Carse, of the Submarine Boat Corporation, said that the Agawam
was the first of a hundred and fifty vessels of that type which would be
constructed in the yard. The parts were made, he said, in bridge and
tank shops throughout the country and were assembled at the yard.
"Ninety-five per cent of the work in forming the parts entering into the
hull of this vessel, and punching rivet holes, is done at shops widely
separated, from drawings furnished by this company, and these drawings
have been of such exactitude, and the work has been so carefully
performed by the different bridge shops that when they are brought
together at this yard they fit perfectly and the ship as you see is
absolutely fair. The construction of the hull of this vessel requires
the driving of over four hundred thousand rivets, and by our method more
then one quarter of these rivets are driven at the distant shops, the
different parts being brought to the yard in sections as large as can be
transported on the railroad. Each part is numbered and lettered and as
they are shaped perfectly all that is necessary is to place them in
position, bolt them, and finally fasten them with rivets."

Officials of the company said that they expected to launch in the course
of time two such vessels in each week. A standard ship of this type has
a dead-weight carrying capacity of five thousand five hundred tons. It
is three hundred and forty-three feet long and forty-six feet wide and
is expected to show an average speed of ten and a half knots. Fuel oil
is used to generate steam, to drive a turbine operating three thousand,
six hundred revolutions a minute. The oil is carried in compartments of
the double bottom of the ship in sufficient quantity for more than a
round trip to Europe. Twenty-seven steel mills, fifty-six fabricating
plants, and two hundred foundries and equipment shops were drawn upon to
construct the ship.

In addition to the steel and wood vessels the Emergency Fleet
Corporation also constructed a number of concrete ships. The first step
in this direction was taken on April 3d, when the construction of four
7,500-ton concrete ships at a Pacific coast shipyard was authorized.
This action was taken as a result of a report on the trials made with
the concrete ship, Faith, which was built in San Francisco by private
capital. The test of this ship had been satisfactory and Mr. R. J. Wig,
an agent of the Emergency Fleet Corporation, who had made a careful
inspection of the Faith and watched the tests, reported his confidence
in the new cargo carrier. The successful trial trip of the Faith led, on
the 17th of May, to the government order that fifty-eight mere such
ships be constructed. Sites for yards were leased and contracts awarded.
The concrete ship turned out to be a great success.

The extraordinary success of the American ship-building program during
the World War was due to the enthusiasm of the workmen employed at the
government plants, and that same enthusiasm was found in connection with
their work in every industry on which the Government made demands.
American labor was thoroughly loyal. It recognized that in the war for
democracy against autocracy it had a vital concern. The attitude of the
great American labor unions must however be sharply distinguished from
that of the extreme socialists who refused to take any part in helping
to win the war.

From the very beginning, the American Federation of Labor took a
patriotic stand. Its leader was Mr. Samuel Gompers, and it was fortunate
for America that the leadership of this great organization was in such
patriotic hands. Mr. Gompers had been for many years president of this
great labor organization, and was so often called in consultation by the
President of the United States in connection with labor affairs that he
might almost be called an unofficial member of the President's cabinet.
Mr. Gompers was by birth an Englishman, but he had left his home when
still a boy and was thoroughly filled with true American patriotism.
From the beginning he devoted himself with the greatest enthusiasm not
only to the protection of the interests of which he was in charge, but
to the prosecution of a successful war. He had to contend, as labor
leaders in other countries had been compelled to contend, with
socialistic and anarchistic organizations.

During the period of America's participation in the war there were
certain disturbances caused by the I. W. W., but from such movements the
American Federation of Labor held itself aloof. Occasional strikes, on
account of special conditions, were easily settled. The governmental
assumption of control over railroads and other essential industries had
much to do with the peaceful attitude of the workmen. The very high
wages which were offered to the workmen at munitions works,
ship-building plants and other governmental enterprises enabled the
workmen there to live in reasonable comfort, though it caused a great
deal of trouble in private industry, and compelled an increase in pay to
labor all over the land.

In the latter part of the war Mr. Gompers traveled abroad, as a
representative of American labor, and was greeted everywhere with the
utmost enthusiasm, while his influence was strongly felt in favor of
moderate and sane views as to labor's rights.

The American situation with regard to labor was made much simpler by the
organization of the United States Employment Service. This was made an
arm of the Department of Labor, with branch offices in nearly all the
large cities of every state. It had a large corps of traveling
examiners, men skilled in determining the fitness of workers for
particular jobs, and it undertook to recruit labor for the various war
industries in which they were needed. During the last year of the war
from a hundred and fifty thousand to two hundred thousand workers of all
kinds were given work each month. In addition to this the Employment
Service was a clearing house of information for manufacturers. The
Director General of this service was Mr. John B. Densmore.

Labor throughout the country, except when influenced by men of foreign
birth who were not in touch with the spirit of America, was universally
loyal, and its share in the winning of the war will always remain a
matter for pride.



[Illustration: Photograph]
  THE GREATEST SHIPYARD IN THE WORLD
  View of Hog Island shipyard near Philadelphia, showing the forest of
  derricks rising from its fifty shipways. At the time the war ended,
  35,000 persons were at work and 180 ships were in course of
  completion.


[Illustration: Painting]
  THE LARGEST SHIP IN THE WORLD AS A U. S. TRANSPORT
  Among the German ships taken over by the United States at the outbreak
  of the war was the "Vaterland," the largest ship ever built. She was
  renamed the "Leviathan" and used as a transport, carrying 12,000
  American soldiers past the submarines on each trip. She is shown here
  entering a French harbor at the end of a passage.



CHAPTER XLI

GERMANY'S DYING DESPERATE EFFORT

In the spring of 1918 it must have been plain to the German High Command
that if the war was to be won it must be won at once. In spite of all
their leaders said of the impossibility of bringing an American army to
France they must have been well informed of what the Americans were
doing. They knew that there were already more than two million men in
active training in the American army, and while at that time only a
small proportion of them were available on the battle front, yet every
day that proportion was growing greater and by the middle of the summer
the little American army would have become a tremendous fighting force.

Their own armies on their western front had been enormously increased in
size by the removal to that front of troops from Russia. Hundreds of
thousands of their best regiments were now withdrawn from the east and
incorporated under the command of their great Generals, Hindenburg and
Ludendorf, in the armies of the west. They must, therefore, take
advantage of this increased force and win the war before the Americans
could come.

The problem of the Allies was also simple. It was not necessary for them
to plan a great offensive. All they had to do was to hold out until,
through the American aid which was coming now in such numbers, their
armies would be so increased that German resistance would be futile.
Under such circumstances began the last great offensive of the German
army.

At that time it seems probable that the armies of Great Britain and
France numbered about three million five hundred thousand men, and that,
of these, six hundred and seventy thousand were on the front lines when
the German attack began, leaving an army of reserve of about two million
eight hundred and fifty thousand men. A considerable number of these
were probably in England on leave. The number of French soldiers must
have been between four and five million, of whom about one million five
hundred thousand were on the front line. Adding to these the American,
Belgian, Portuguese, Russian and Polish troops the Allied forces could
not have been short of eight million five hundred thousand men.


[Illustration: Map: Lens on the North, St. Quentin on the East, Soissons
on the South, Amiens on the West.]
  HOW GERMANY ATTEMPTED TO DIVIDE THE ALLIED ARMIES
  The map shows the ground covered by the Germans in the terrific
  Picardy drive of March, 1918, which had for its object the capture of
  Amiens and the push forward along the Somme to the channel, thus
  dividing the British army in the north from the French and Americans
  in the south.


The strength of the Germans on the western front before the Russian
Revolution was probably about four million five hundred thousand men,
and the withdrawal of Russia from the war had added to that number
probably as many as one million five hundred thousand men, making an
army of six million men to oppose that of the Allies. The Allies,
therefore, must have considerably outnumbered the Germans.

In spite of this fact in nearly all the engagements in the early part of
the great offensive the Allied forces were outnumbered in a ratio
varying from three to one to five to three. This was possible, first,
because in any offensive the attacking side naturally concentrates as
many troops as it can gather at the point from which the offense is to
begin, and second, since the Allies were not under one command it was
with great difficulty that arrangements could be made by which the
forces of one nation could reinforce the armies of another.

The first difficulty of course could not be obviated, but the solution
of the second difficulty was the appointment of General Foch as
Commander-in-Chief of all the Allied forces.

The appointment was made on March 28th and all the influence of the
United States had been exerted in its favor. General Pershing at once
offered to General Foch the unrestricted use of the American force in
France and it was agreed that a large part of the American army should
be brigaded with the Allied troops wherever there were weak spots.

Foch was already famous as the greatest strategist in Europe. He comes
of a Basque family and was born in the town of Tarbes, in the Department
of the Hautes-Pyrenees, which is on the border of Spain, on October 2,
1851. Foch served as a subaltern in the Franco-Prussian War and at
twenty-six was made captain in the artillery. Later he became Professor
of Tactics in the Ecole de Guerre, where he remained for five years. He
then returned to regimental work and won steady promotion until he
became brigadier-general. He was sent back to the War College as
Director and wrote two books, "The Principles of War" and "Conduct of
War," which have been translated into English, German and Italian and
are considered standard works. He was now recognized as a man of unusual
ability and was appointed to the command first, of the Thirteenth
division, then of the Eighth corps at Bourges, and then to the command
of the Twentieth corps at Nancy.

Unlike Marshal Joffre who was cool, careful, slow moving, Marshal Foch
is full of daring and impetuosity. Everything is calculated
scientifically but his strategy is full of dash. Many of his sayings
have been passed from mouth to mouth among the Allies.

"Find out the weak point of your enemy and deliver your blow there," he
said once at a staff banquet.

"But suppose, General," said an officer, "that the enemy has no weak
point?" "If the enemy has no weak point," replied the Commander, "make
one."

It was he who telegraphed to Joffre during the first battle of the
Marne: "The enemy is attacking my flank. My rear is threatened. I am
therefore attacking in front."

Foch is a great student, an especial admirer of Napoleon, whose
campaigns he had thoroughly studied. Even the campaigns of Caesar he had
found valuable and had gathered from them practical suggestions for his
own campaigns. He is the hero of the Marne, the man who on September 9th
marched his army between Von Bulow and Von Hausen's Saxons, drove the
Prussian Guards into the marshes of St. Gond and forced both Prussians
and Saxons into their first great retreat. Later his armies fought on
the Yser while the British were battling at Ypres. During the battle of
the Somme he was on the English right pressing to Peronne.

For a time he became Chief of the French Staff, until he was called into
the field again to his great command. Foch was one of those French
officers who had felt that war was sure to come, and had constantly
urged that France should be kept in a state of preparedness. The
appointment of General Foch to the Supreme Command was largely the
result of American urgency.

General March, the American Chief of Staff, in one of his weekly
announcements, stated: "One of the most striking things noticeable in
the situation as it is shown on the western front is the supreme
importance of having a single command. The acceptance of the principle
of having a single command, which was advocated by the President of the
United States and carried through under his constant pressure, is one of
the most important single military things that has been done as far as
the Allies are concerned. The unity of command which Germany has had
from the start of the war has been a very important military asset, and
we already see the supreme value of having that central command which
now has been concentrated in General Foch."

General March, who had earlier been appointed Chief of Staff of the
United States army, was sending a steady stream of American troops to
Europe, a fact whose importance was well understood by the new
Commander-in-Chief. On General March's promotion General Foch sent him
the following message:


I hear with deep satisfaction of your promotion to the rank of General.
I associate myself to the just pride which you must feel in evoking the
names of your glorious predecessors, Grant and Sheridan. I convey to you
my sincere congratulations and I am happy to see you assume permanently
the huge task of Chief of Staff of the United States army which you are
already performing in so brilliant a way.


General March replied:


Your message of congratulation upon my promotion to the grade of General
Chief of Staff, United States army, was personally conveyed to me by
General Vignal, French Military Attache. I appreciate deeply your most
kindly greetings and in expressing my most sincere thanks, avail myself
of the opportunity to assure you of every assistance and constant
support which may lie in my power to aid you in the furtherance and
successful accomplishment of your great task.


General Foch took command at a very critical time. The Germans had
prepared the most formidable drive in the history of the war. They had
gathered immense masses of munitions and supplies. Their great armies
had been refitted and they were in hopes of a victory which would end
the war. Their great offensive had many phases. It resulted in the
development of three great salients, the first in Picardy and in the
direction of Amiens along the Somme, which was launched on March 21st;
the second on the Lys, which was launched on April 9th; and the third
which is called the Oise-Marne salient, launched on May 27th.

Between the attacks which developed these salients there were also some
unsuccessful attacks of almost equal power. On March 28th there was a
desperate struggle to capture Arras, preceded by a bombardment as great
as any during the whole offensive, but this attack was defeated with
enormous losses to the German troops. A fourth phase of the German
offensive took place on June 9th, on a front of twenty miles between
Noyon and Montdidier, which gained a few miles at an enormous cost.


[Illustration: Map: Belgium and Eastern France, show the front from
Ypres south to Rheims.]
  THE LAST DESPERATE DRIVES OF THE GERMANS


On July 15th came the last of the great offensives. It was a smash on a
sixty-mile line from Chateau-Thierry up the Marne, around Rheims, and
then east to a few miles west of the Argonne forest. This offensive at
the start made a penetration of from three to five miles, but was held
firmly and much of the gain lost, through the counter-attacks of the
Allies. It was at this point that the American troops first began to be
seriously felt, and it was at this point that General Foch took up the
story, and began the great series of Allied drives which were to crush
the German power. But there had been many days of great anxiety before
the turn of the tide.

The objects of the German drives were doubtless more or less dependent
upon their success. The first drive in Picardy, in the direction of
Amiens had apparently as its object to drive a wedge between the French
and British and the object was so nearly attained that only the heroic
work of General Carey saved the Allies from disaster.

The Fifth British army, which had borne the brunt of the German attack,
had found itself almost crushed by the sheer weight of numbers. The
whole line was broken up and it seemed as if the road was open to
Amiens. French reinforcements could not come up in time; bridges could
not be blown up because the engineers were all killed. Orders came to
General Carey at two o'clock in the morning, March 26th, to hold the
gap. He at once proceeded to gather an extemporized army.

Every available man was rounded up, among others a body of American
engineers. Laborers, sappers, raw recruits as well as soldiers of every
arm. There were plenty of machine guns, but few men knew how to handle
them. With this scratch army in temporary trenches, he lay for six days,
and as Lloyd George said, "They held the German army and closed that gap
on the way to Amiens."

During this fight General Carey rode along the lines shouting
encouraging words to his hard-pressed men. He did not know whether he
would get supplies of ammunition and provisions or not, but he stuck to
it. Later on the regular troops arrived. The American engineers, who had
been fighting, immediately returned to their base, and resumed work
laying out trenches. General Rawlinson, Commander of the British army at
that point, sent the commanding officer of the Americans engaged, the
following letter:


The army Commander wishes to record officially his appreciation of the
excellent work your regiment has done in assisting the British army to
resist the enemy's powerful offensive during the last ten days. I fully
realize that it has been largely due to your assistance that the enemy
has been checked, and I rely on you to assist us still further during
the few days that are still to come before I shall be able to relieve
you in the line. I consider your work in the line to be greatly enhanced
by the fact that for six weeks previous to your taking your place in the
front line your men had been working at such high pressure erecting
heavy bridges on the Somme. My best congratulations and warm thanks to
all.
RAWLINSON.


The demoralization of General Gough's Fifth army, which had thus left an
eight-mile gap on the left, and which had been saved at that point by
General Carey, permitted also the opening of another gap between its
right wing and the Sixth French army. Here General Fayolle did with
organized troops what Carey had done with his volunteers further north.
The reason for the success of both Carey and Fayolle appears to have
been that the German armies had been so thoroughly battered that they
were unable to take advantage of the situation. Their regiments had been
mixed up, their officers had been separated from their men in the rush
of the attack, and before they could recover the opportunity was lost.

The first days of April saw the end of the drive toward Amiens. The
Germans claimed the capture of ninety thousand prisoners and one
thousand three hundred guns. They had penetrated into the Allies'
territory in some points a distance of thirty-five miles. Their new line
extended southwest from Arras beyond Albert to the west of Moreuil,
which is about nine miles south of Amiens, and then went on west of
Pierrepont and Montdidier, curving out at Noyon to the region of the
Oise.

The first part of April was a comparative calm, when suddenly there
developed the second drive of the German offensive. This drive was not
so extensive as the first one, and its object appeared to be to break
through the British forces in Flanders and reach the Channel ports. It
resulted in a salient embracing an area about three hundred and twenty
square miles, and the Germans claimed the capture of twenty thousand
prisoners and two hundred guns. It was at this point that General Haig
issued his famous order in which he described the British armies as
standing with their "backs to the wall." It reads as follows:


Three weeks ago today the enemy began his terrific attacks against us on
a fifty-mile front. Its objects are to separate us from the French, to
take the Channel ports, and to destroy the British army. In spite of
throwing already one hundred and six divisions into the battle and
enduring the most reckless sacrifice of human life, he has yet made
little progress toward his goals. We owe this to the determined fighting
and self-sacrifice of our troops. Words fail me to express the
admiration which I feel for the splendid resistance offered by all ranks
of our army under the most trying circumstances. Many among us now are
tired. To those I would say that victory will belong to the side which
holds out the longest. The French army is moving rapidly and in great
force to our support. There is no other course open to us but to fight
it out. Every position must be held to the last man. There must be no
retiring. With our backs to the wall and believing in the justice of our
cause each one of us must fight to the end. The safety of our homes, and
the freedom of mankind depend alike upon the conduct of each one of us
at this critical moment.


The British commander's order made the situation clear to the British
people and to the world. The Germans had given up for the moment their
attempt to divide the British and French armies, and were now attempting
to seize the Channel ports, and the British were fighting with true
British pluck with their "backs to the wall."

One can imagine the anxiety in the villages of Flanders where they
watched the German advance and heard the terrible bombardment which was
destroying their beautiful little cities, and threatening to put them
under the dominion of the brutal conquerors of Belgium. Town after town
fell to the enemy until at last the German attack began to weaken.

Counter-attacks on April 17th recaptured the villages of Wytschaete and
Meteren. At other points German attacks were repulsed, and the attack on
the Lys had reached its limits. It had not only failed to reach the
coast but it had not even reached so far as to force the evacuation of
Ypres or to endanger Arras. On the contrary the Germans had paid for
their advance by such terrible losses that the ground that they had
gained meant almost nothing. They then made, on April 30th, a vigorous
endeavor to broaden the Amiens salient in the region of Hangard and
Noyon. This attack also failed.

On May 27th Ludendorf made his next move. This was in the south, and was
preceded by the most elaborate preparations over a forty-mile front. At
first it met with great success. German troops from a point northwest of
Rheims to Montdidier were moving apparently with the purpose of breaking
the French lines and clearing the way for a drive to Paris.
Consternation reigned among Allied observers as the Germans carried,
apparently with ease, first the formidable Chemin des Dames, which was
believed invulnerable, and then the south bank of the Aisne, with its
great fortifications at Soissons.

Criticism began to appear of General Foch, who was thought at first to
have been taken by surprise. The Germans were using four hundred
thousand of their best troops, and the greatest force of tanks, machine
guns and poison-gas projectors which they had ever gathered. They
captured over forty-five thousand prisoners and took four hundred guns.
They penetrated thirty miles and gained six hundred and fifty square
miles of territory, but they were held on the River Marne.

It is now apparent that General Foch knew exactly what he was about. He
might easily, by sending in reinforcements, have put up the same
desperate resistance to the German offensive which they were now meeting
in other sectors. But he preferred to retreat and lead the enemy on to a
position which would make them vulnerable to the great counter-attack he
was preparing for them on their flank. The Germans reached the Marne,
but they paid for it in the terrible losses which they incurred.

The German line now from Montdidier, the extreme point of the Amiens
salient, to Chateau-Thierry, the point of the new Marne salient, was in
the form of a bow, and on June 9th General Ludendorf attempted to
straighten out the line. His new attack was made on a twenty-mile front
between Montdidier and Noyon in the direction of Compiegne. This was
another terrific drive and at first gained about seven miles. French
counter-attacks, however, not only held him in a vise but regained a
distance of about one mile. This battle was probably the most disastrous
one fought by the Germans during their whole offensive. Nearly four
hundred thousand men were completely used up, without gaining the
slightest strategic success.

Then followed a period without battles of major importance, during which
General Foch by periodic assaults on the Lys, the Somme, on the flanks
of Montdidier and Soissons, on the Chateau-Thierry sector and southwest
of Rheims, captured many important positions and kept the enemy in
constant anxiety.

During the great German offensives the Germans had lost at least five
hundred thousand men, while the casualties of the Allies were barely one
hundred and fifty thousand. The Germans also were beginning to lose
their morale. They were finding that however great might be their
efforts, however terrible might be their losses, they were still being
constantly held. Their troops were now apparently made of inferior
material, and included boys, old men and even convicts.

The system of making attacks by means of shock troops was producing the
inevitable result. The shock regiments were composed of selected men,
picked here and there, from the regular troops. Their selection had
naturally weakened the regiments from which they were taken. After three
months of great offensives these shock troops were now in great part
destroyed, and the German lines were being held mainly by the inferior
troops which had been left. Moreover, in other parts of the world, the
allies of Germany were being beaten. In Italy and Albania and Macedonia
there was danger.

The Germans prepared for one more effort. On June 18th they had made a
costly attempt to carry Rheims. On July 15th they made their last drive.
Ludendorf took almost a month for preparation. He gathered together
seventy divisions and great masses of munitions, and then drove in from
Chateau-Thierry on a sixty-mile line up on the Marne, and then east to
the Argonne forests. His line made a sort of semicircle around Rheims
and then pushed south to the east and west of that fortress.

Once again he had temporary success. West of Rheims he penetrated a
distance of five miles, and on the first day, had crossed the Marne at
Dormans, but was held sharply by the Americans east of Chateau-Thierry.
On the second day he made further gains, but with appalling losses. On
the 17th he was still struggling on with minor successes but on July
18th the French and Americans launched the great counter-offensive from
Chateau-Thierry along a twenty-five mile front, between the Marne and
the Aisne. The Germans everywhere began their retreat and the war tide
had turned.

The German attack east of Rheims had been a failure from the start. The
Allied forces retired about two miles and then held firm. The country
there is flat and sandy and gave little shelter to the attacking forces
which lost terribly. In this sector, too, there were many American
troops, who behaved with distinguished bravery.

By this time nearly seven hundred thousand men of the American army were
on the battle line. They had been fighting here and there among the
French and English but on June 22d General March made the announcement
that five divisions of these troops had been transferred to the direct
command of General Pershing as a nucleus for an American army.

In glancing back at the great German drives which have now been
described, one is impressed by the terrific character of the fighting.
This struggle undoubtedly was the greatest exertion of military power in
the history of the world. Never before had such masses of munitions been
used; never before had scientific knowledge been so drawn on in the
service of war. Thousands of airplanes were patrolling the air,
sometimes scouting, sometimes dropping bombs on hostile troops or on
hostile stores, sometimes flying low, firing their machine guns into the
faces of marching troops. Thousands upon thousands of great guns were
sending enormous projectiles, which made great pits wherever they fell.
Swarms of machine guns were pouring their bullets like water from a hose
upon the charging soldiers.

One of the most noticeable artillery developments was the long-range gun
which off and on during this period was bombarding Paris. This
bombardment began on March 23d, when the nearest German line was more
than sixty-two miles away. For a time the story was regarded as pure
fiction, but it was soon established that the great nine-inch shells
which were dropping into the city every twenty minutes came from the
forests of St. Gobain, seven miles back of the French trenches near
Laon, and about seventy-five miles from Paris. This was another of those
futile bits of frightfulness in which the Germans reveled. Military
advantage gained by such a gun was almost nothing, and the expense of
every shot was out of all proportion to the damage inflicted. It only
roused intense indignation and stirred the Allies to greater
determination. The first day's casualties in Paris were ten killed and
fifteen wounded. By the next day one would not have been able to tell
from the Paris streets that such a bombardment was going on at all. The
subway and surface cars were running, the streets were thronged and
traffic was going on as usual. About two dozen shells were thrown into
Paris every day, mainly in the Montmartre district, in a radius of about
a mile. This seemed to show that the gun was immovable.

On March 29th, however, a shell struck the church of St. Gervais during
the Good Friday service, killing seventy-five persons and wounding
ninety. Fifty-four of those killed were women. The church had been
struck at the moment of the Elevation of the Host. This outrage aroused
special indignation, and Pope Benedict sent a protest to Berlin.

An examination of exploded shells indicated that the new German gun was
less than nine inches in caliber, and that the projectiles, which
weighed about two hundred pounds, contained two charges, in two chambers
connected by a fuse which often exploded more than a minute apart. It
took three minutes for each shell to travel to Paris and it was
estimated that such a shell rose to a height of twenty miles from the
earth. Three of these guns were used. One of these guns exploded on
March 29th, killing a German lieutenant and nine men. The Kaiser was
present when the gun was first used. It was said by American scientists
that seismographs in the United States felt the shock of each discharge.
On April 9th French aviators discovered the location of the new guns,
and French artillery began to drop enormous shells weighing half a ton
each near the German monsters. A few days later a French shell fell on
the barrel of one of these guns and put it out of commission. Great
craters were made around the other, interfering with its use, and toward
the end of the period it was only occasionally that the remaining gun
was fired, and no great damage resulted.

Another feature of the great German drives was the tremendous
destruction that accompanied them. Not only were churches, public
buildings, and private houses throughout almost the whole district
turned into ruins, but the very ground itself was plowed up into craters
and shell holes, and the trees smashed into mere splinters. During the
whole campaign poison gas of various kinds was used in immense
quantities, and it was constantly necessary for the troops to wear gas
masks. Sometimes after a town had been evacuated by the enemy it was so
filled with gas that it was impossible for victorious troops to enter.
One of the fiercest bombardments was that directed against the
Portuguese during the fighting along the Lys. The enemy made a special
attempt to crush the Portuguese contingent which behaved with the utmost
gallantry.

It was the season of the year when the orchards were covered with
blossoms and the fields with flowers, but the horrors of war destroyed
the beauty of the spring. In these battles men fought until they were
completely exhausted and one could see troops staggering as they walked
and leaning on each other from pure exhaustion.

These were days when wonders were performed by the Medical Departments
of the Allied armies, and the work of the Red Cross was almost as
important as the work of the soldiers. Relief for the wounded had to be
undertaken and carried on a mammoth scale. Many of the doctors, nurses,
orderlies and ambulance men lost their lives while making efforts to
rescue the wounded.

These were days when the German leaders were filled with the pride of
victory. They were talking now about a hard German peace. On June 17th
the German Kaiser celebrated the thirtieth anniversary of his accession
to the throne. He talked no more of a war of self-defense, but declared
the war to be the struggle of two world views wrestling with each other.
"Either German principles of right, freedom, honor and morality must be
upheld, or Anglo-Saxon principles with their idolatry of Mammon must be
victorious." He sent congratulations to Field Marshal von Hindenburg, to
General Ludendorf and to the Crown Prince. Von Hindenburg assured the
Kaiser of the unswerving loyalty until death of Germany's sons at the
front, and concluded "May our old motto 'Forward with God for King and
Fatherland, for Kaiser and Empire' result in many years of peace being
granted to your Majesty after our victorious return home."

But the terrific attacks which the German commanders directed upon the
Americans at Chateau-Thierry and at other points upon the southern lines
show well that they knew that there was another danger rising to
confront them; that during their great drives a million and a half
American soldiers had been learning the art of war, and that every
moment of delay meant a new danger. By the end of this period the
Americans had arrived.



CHAPTER XLII

CHATEAU-THIERRY, FIELD OF GLORY

Nowhere in American history may be found a more glorious record than
that which crowned with laurel the American arms at Chateau-Thierry.
Here the American Marines and divisions comprising both volunteers and
selected soldiers, were thrown before the German tide of invasion like a
huge khaki-colored breakwater. Germany knew that a test of its empire
had come. To break the wall of American might it threw into the van of
the attack the Prussian Guard backed by the most formidable troops of
the German and Austrian empires. The object was to put the fear of the
Hun into the hearts of the Yankees, to overwhelm them, to drive straight
through them as the prow of a battleship shears through a heavy sea. If
America could be defeated, Germany's way to a speedy victory was at
hand. If America held--well, that way lay disaster.

And the Americans held. Not only did they hold but they counter-attacked
with such bloody consequences to the German army that Marshal Foch,
seizing the psychological moment for his carefully prepared
counter-offensive, gave the word for a general attack.

With Chateau-Thierry and the Marne as a hinge, the clamp of the Allies
closed upon the defeated Germans. From Switzerland to the North Sea the
drive went forward, operating as huge pincers cutting like chilled steel
through the Hindenburg and the Kriemhild lines. It was the beginning of
autocracy's end, the end of Der Tag of which Germany had dreamed.

The matchless Marines and the other American troops suffered a loss that
staggered America. It was a loss, however, that was well worth while.
The heroic young Americans who held the might of Germany helpless and
finally rolled them back defeated from the field of battle, and who paid
for that victory with their lives, made certain the speedy end of the
world's bloodiest war.

The story of the American army's effective operations in France from
Cantigny to the reduction of the St. Mihiel salient, is one long record
of victories. To the glory of American arms must be recorded the fact
that at no time and at no place in the World War did the American forces
retreat before the German hosts.

In the latter days of May, 1918, the Allied forces in France seemed near
defeat. The Germans were steadily driving toward Paris. They had swept
over the Chemin des Dames and the papers from day to day were
chronicling wonderful successes. The Chemin des Dames had been regarded
as impregnable, but the Germans passed it apparently without the
slightest difficulty. They were advancing on a forty-mile front and on
May 28th had reached the Aisne, with the French and British steadily
falling back. The anxiety of the Allies throughout the world was
indescribable. This was the great German "Victory Drive" and each day
registered a new Allied defeat. Newspaper headlines were almost
despairing.

On May 29th, however, in quiet type, under great headlines announcing a
German gain of ten miles in which the Germans had taken twenty-five
thousand prisoners and crossed two rivers, had captured Soissons, and
were threatening Rheims, there appeared in American papers a quiet
little despatch from General Pershing. It read as follows:

"This morning in Picardy our troops attacked on a front of one and
one-fourth miles, advanced our lines, and captured the village of
Cantigny. We took two hundred prisoners, and inflicted on the enemy
severe losses in killed and wounded. Our casualties were relatively
small. Hostile counter-attacks broke down under our fire." This was the
first American offensive.

The American troops had now been in Europe almost a year. At first but a
small force, they had been greeted in Paris and in London with
tremendous enthusiasm. Up to this point they had done little or nothing,
but the small force which passed through Paris in the summer of 1917 had
been growing steadily. By this time the American army numbered more than
eight hundred thousand men. They had been getting ready; in camps far
behind the lines they had been trained, not only by their own officers,
but by some of the greatest experts in the French and the British
armies. Thousands of officers and men who, but a few months before, had
been busily engaged in civilian pursuits, had now learned something of
the art of war. They had been supplied with a splendid equipment, with
great guns and with all the modern requirements of an up-to-date army.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright Committee on Public Information.
  From Underwood and Underwood, N. Y.
  CHATEAU-THIERRY; WHERE AMERICA INFLICTED A SECOND GETTYSBURG ON
  GERMANY
  Poilus and Yanks in the foreground looking over the roofs of
  Chateau-Thierry, where, in the middle of July in the last year of the
  war, the Americans at a crucial moment stopped the German advance in
  the second battle of the Marne. After that Germany never went forward
  on any field of battle again.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  French Official Photograph by International Film Service.
  WIPING OUT THE ST. MIHIEL SALIENT
  The first major exploit carried out independently by the American army
  was the obliteration of the St. Mihiel salient, which had been in
  German hands since 1914, a spectacular achievement, carried out in two
  days with great brilliance and precision. The picture shows U. S.
  troops following the Germans through Thiaucourt, one of the towns on
  the salient.


For some months, here and there, on the French and British lines small
detachments of American troops flanked on both sides by the Allied
forces, had been learning the art of war. Here and there they had been
under fire. At Cantigny itself they had resisted attack. On May 27th
General Pershing had reported "In Picardy, after violent artillery
preparations, hostile infantry detachments succeeded in penetrating our
advance positions in two points. Our troops counter-attacked, completely
expelling the enemy and entering his lines." They had also been fighting
that day in the Woevre sector where a raiding party had been repulsed.
There had been other skirmishes, too, in which many Americans had won
honors both from Great Britain and France. But the attack at Cantigny
was the first distinct American advance.

The Americans penetrated the German positions to the depth of nearly a
mile. Their artillery completely smothered the Germans, and its whirr
could be heard for many miles in the rear. Twelve French tanks supported
the American infantry. The artillery preparation lasted for one hour,
and then the lines of Americans went over the top. A strong unit of
flame throwers and engineers aided the Americans. The American barrage
moved forward a hundred yards in two minutes and then a hundred yards in
four minutes. The infantry followed with clock-like precision. Fierce
hand-to-hand fighting occurred in Cantigny, which contained a large
tunnel and a number of caves. The Americans hurled hand grenades like
baseballs into these shelters.

The attack had been carefully planned and was rehearsed by the infantry
with the tanks. In every detail it was under the direction of the
Superior French Command, to whom much of the credit for its success was
due. The news of the American success created general satisfaction among
the French and English troops. The operation, of course, was not one of
the very greatest importance. It was a sort of an experiment, but coming
as it did, in the middle of the great German Drive, it was ominous.
America had arrived.

On May 30th General Pershing announced the complete repulse of further
enemy attacks from the new American positions near Cantigny. This time
he says: "there was considerable shelling with gas, but the results
obtained were very small. The attempt was a complete failure. Our
casualties were very light. We have consolidated our positions."

The London Evening News commenting on this fact says: "Bravo the young
Americans! Nothing in today's battle narrative from the front is more
exhilarating than the account of their fight at Cantigny. It was clean
cut from beginning to end, like one of their countrymen's short stories,
and the short story of Cantigny is going to expand into a full-length
novel which will write the doom of the Kaiser and Kaiserism. Cantigny
will one day be repeated a thousand fold."

The Germans, in reporting this fight, avoided mention of the fact that
the operation had been conducted by American troops. This seemed to
indicate that they feared the moral effect of such an admission in
Germany. Up to this time, with the exception of small brigades, the
American army had been held as a reserve. After the Cantigny fight they
were hurried to the front. The main point to which they were sent at
first was Chateau-Thierry, north of the Marne, the nearest point to
Paris reached by the enemy. There, at the very critical point of the
great German Drive, they not only checked the enemy but, by a dashing
attack, threw him back.

This may be said to be the turning point in the whole war. It not only
stopped the German Drive at this point, but it gave new courage to the
Allies and took the heart out of the Germans. The troops were rushed to
the battle front at Thierry, arriving on Saturday, June 1st. They
entered the battle enthusiastically, almost immediately after they had
arrived. A despatch from Picardy says: "On their way to the battle lines
they were cheered by the crowds in the villages through which they
passed; their victorious stand with their gallant French Allies, so soon
after entering the line, has electrified all France."

General Pershing's terse account of what happened reads as follows: "In
the fighting northwest of Chateau-Thierry our troops broke up an attempt
of the enemy to advance to the south through Veuilly Woods, and by a
counter-attack drove him back to the north of the woods."

The American troops had gone, into the action only an hour or so after
their arrival on the banks of the River Marne. Scarcely had they
alighted from their motor trucks when they were ordered into
Chateau-Thierry with a battalion of French-Colonial troops. The enemy
were launching a savage drive, and at first succeeded in driving the
Americans out of the woods of Veuilly-la-Poterie. But the Americans at
once counter-attacked, driving their opponents from their position, and
regaining possession of the woods.  On the same day the Germans launched
an attack of shock troops, attempting to gain a passage across the Marne
at Jaulgonne. They obtained a footing on the southern bank but another
American counter-attack forced them back across the river. The American
soldiers were fighting with wonderful spirit, and the French papers were
filled with praise of their work. As they came up to go into the line
they were singing, and they charged, cheering.


[Illustration: Map: Paris is in Southwest corner. Amiens in the
Northwest corner and Rheims is on the East side.]
  WHERE THE "YANKS" FOUGHT THE SECOND BATTLE OF THE MARNE


On June 6th came a climax of the American fighting. It was the attack of
the American Marines in the direction of Torcy. This gained more than
two miles over a two and a half mile front. On the next day the advance
continued over a front of nearly six miles, and during the night the
Americans captured Bouresches and entered Torcy.

The fighting at Torcy was characteristically American; the Marines
advanced yelling like Indians, using bayonet and rifle. From Torcy the
Marines set forward and took strong ground on either side of Belleau
Wood. They had reached all the objectives and pushed beyond them. The
Germans were on the run, and surrendering right and left to the
Americans. The attack by the Marines forestalled an attack by the enemy.
German reports now noticed the Americans. Their report on June 9th
referring to this attack, says: "Americans who attempted to attack
northwest of Chateau-Thierry were driven back beyond their positions of
departure with heavy losses and prisoners were captured." The Americans
had lost heavily, and the hospitals were filled with their wounded, but
the thorough American organization was giving the wounded every care,
and the Americans were still moving forward.

On June the 10th, another attack was made on the German lines in the
Belleau Wood, which penetrated for about two-thirds of a mile, leaving
the Germans in possession of only the northern fringe of the Wood. On
June 11th the official statement of the French War Office declared:
"South of the Ourcq River the American troops this morning brilliantly
captured Belleau Wood, and took three hundred prisoners."

Belleau Wood had been considered an almost impregnable position, but the
valiant fighting of the American Marines had carried them past it.
Fighting here was not merely a series of exciting engagements, but an
important action, which may have turned, and very probably did turn, the
whole tide of battle. The Americans put three German divisions out of
business, and caused a change in the German plans, by preventing an
extending movement to Meaux, which was the German objective.

From this time on the confidence shown in all reports from the Allies in
France was strengthened. They had found that the Americans were all that
they had hoped for, and they were sure now that they could hold on until
the full American strength could be brought to bear. General Pershing
himself was full of optimism and his fine example stimulated his troops.
From this time on all dispatches show that the Americans were more and
more getting in the game. Repeated German attacks against their forces,
on the Belleau-Bouresches line were repulsed, in spite of the fact that
crack German divisions, who had been picked especially to punish them,
had been found on their front. It was later found that these divisions
had been suddenly ordered to that point "in order to prevent at all
costs the Americans being able to achieve success." The German High
Command was apparently anxious to prevent American success from
stimulating the morale of the Allied army.

During the rest of the summer the Americans took an active part in
Foch's great offensive which ultimately crushed the German army. They
were heard from at widely divergent points: in Alsace, about
Chateau-Thierry, at Montdidier, and in the British lines.

Most of the fighting during June indicated a slow advance at
Chateau-Thierry. On June 19th the Americans crossed the Marne, near that
city. But Chateau-Thierry itself was not captured until the middle of
July. On June 29th they participated in a raid near Montdidier and on
July 2d captured Vaux. In the week of July 4th news came of American
success in the Vosges. On July 18th they advanced close to Soissons. On
August 3d the Americans captured Fismes, and then for nearly a month
made little actual progress, though bitter fighting went on in the
country around Fismes and near Soissons. On August 29th after a furious
battle they captured the plain of Juvigny, north of Soissons.

In all these battles the Americans were doing their part at difficult
points, during the great French drive which was clearing out the Marne
salient.

On the 12th of September, the first American army, assisted by certain
French units, and under the direct command of General Pershing, launched
an attack against the St. Mihiel salient. This was the most important
operation of the American troops in the Great War. It was a complete
success. September 12th was the fourth anniversary of the establishment
of the salient, which reached out from the German line in the direction
of Verdun.

The attack was fighting on a grand scale, and that such an operation
should be intrusted to the American army indicated an entirely new phase
of America's participation in the war. It was preceded by a barrage
lasting four hours. The German troops, though probably suspecting that
such an attack was coming, were nevertheless surprised. The American
attack was on the southern leg of the salient along a distance of twelve
miles. The French attacked on the western side from a front of eight
miles. Each attack was eminently successful. On the southern front the
Americans reached their first objectives at some points an hour ahead of
schedule time. Thiaucourt was captured early in the drive; later the
Americans gained possession of Nonsard, Pannes, and Bouillonville.


[Illustration: Map: Verdun in the Northwest corner, St. Mihiel in
Southwest, Metz in the Northeast]
  THE GREAT ST. MIHIEL SALIENT ESTABLISHED IN 1914 WAS OBLITERATED BY
  THE AMERICANS IN SEPTEMBER, 1918

At first the resistance of the Germans, without being tame, was not
actually stiff, and the doughboys were able to sweep toward the second
line of any position without difficulty. There, however, the Germans
began to defend themselves sharply, which delayed, but did not stop the
American advance. The attack was made in two waves and carried the
American forces a distance of about five miles.

The next day the attack continued, and General Pershing's dispatch
stated: "In the St. Mihiel sector we have achieved further successes.
The junction of our troops advancing from the south of the sector with
those advancing from the west has given us possession of the whole
salient to points twelve miles northeast of St. Mihiel, and has resulted
in the capture of many prisoners. Forced back by our steady advance the
enemy is retiring, and is destroying large quantities of material as he
goes. The number of prisoners counted has risen to 13,300. Our line now
includes Herbeville, Thillet, Hattonville, St. Benoit, Xammes, Jaulny,
Thiaucourt and Vieville."

The salient was wiped out, and the St. Mihiel front reduced from forty
to twenty miles. Secretary Newton D. Baker, accompanied by Generals
Pershing and Petain, visited St. Mihiel a few hours after its capture.
They walked through the streets of the city, and heard many stories of
the long German occupation.

As the attack proceeded it became more and more evident that the German
defense had lost heart. Thousands of them surrendered, declaring they
did not care to fight any more. It was also noted that a surprisingly
large number of officers were among those captured. The only serious
resistance was to the attack south of Fresnes, which was obviously for
the purpose of protecting the German retreat.

The first American regiment stationed in the St. Mihiel sector was the
370th Infantry, formerly the Eighth Illinois, a Negro regiment officered
entirely by soldiers of that race. This regiment was one of the three
that occupied a sector at Verdun when a penetration there by the Germans
would have been disastrous to the Allied cause.

The St. Mihiel salient had no great military value to the Germans, and
was probably held by them from a sentimental motive. It represented the
desperate efforts made by the Crown Prince in his early drive against
Verdun. Its destruction, however, was of great importance to the French.
It was not only a removal of a menace to the French citizens of Verdun,
but it released the French armies at that point for active offensive
operation. It also liberated the railway line from Verdun to Nancy,
which was of the utmost value to General Pershing and the French armies
to his left. It also later developed that the French command regarded
the reduction of the St. Mihiel salient as the corner stone of a great
encircling movement aimed at the German fortress of Metz. The moral
effect of its reduction was also notable as it was one more sign of the
weakening of the Germans.


[Illustration: Map: Verdun in the Northwest corner, St. Mihiel in
Southwest, Metz in the Northeast]
  HOW THE ST. MIHIEL SALIENT LOOKED SHORTLY AFTER THE ASSAULT BEGAN
  The map indicates the beginning of the great American drive, assisted
  by the French, in 1918, which resulted in the wiping out of the huge
  salient. The Americans attacked on the south, the French in the north;
  dotted lines indicate the advance in the first five hours.


History usually concerns itself with the deeds of humanity in the mass
and with the leaders of these masses. It is eminently fitting, however,
that this history should record the impressions made upon the mind of an
American soldier by a modern battle. The United States Government
singled out of all the letters received from the front, that written by
Major Robert L. Denig, of Philadelphia, to his wife. The letter is now
part of the archives of the War Department, and occupies the highest
place of literary honor in the records of the Marines. It describes the
operation against the Germans on the Marne on July 18th, 1918. This was
the counter-attack led by the Marines which broke the back of the German
invasion. Major Denig wrote:


The day before we left for this big push we had a most interesting fight
between a fleet of German planes and a French observation balloon, right
over our heads. We saw five planes circle over our town, then put on,
what we thought afterwards, a sham fight. One of them, after many fancy
stunts, headed right for the balloon. They were all painted with our
colors except one. This one went near the balloon. One kept right on.
The other four shot the balloon up with incendiary bullets. The
observers jumped into their parachutes just as the outfit went up in a
mass of flame.

The next day we took our positions at various places to wait for camions
that were to take us somewhere in France, when or for what purpose we
did not know. Wass passed me at the head of his company--we made a date
for a party on our next leave. He was looking fine and was as happy as
could be. Then Hunt, Keyser and a heap of others went by. I have the
battalion and Holcomb the regiment. Our turn to en-buss did not come
until near midnight.

We at last got under way after a few big "sea bags" had hit nearby.
Wilmer and I led in a touring car. We went at a good clip and nearly got
ditched in a couple of new shell holes. Shells were falling fast by now,
and as the tenth truck went under the bridge a big one landed near with
a crash, and wounded the two drivers, killed two marines and wounded
five more. We did not know it at the time, and did not notice anything
wrong till we came to a crossroad when we found we had only eleven cars
all told. We found the rest of the convoy after a hunt, but even then
were not told of the loss, and did not find it out until the next day.

We were finally, after twelve hours' ride, dumped in a big field and
after a few hours' rest started our march. It was hot as Hades and we
had had nothing to eat since the day before. We at last entered a
forest; troops seemed to converge on it from all points. We marched some
six miles in the forest, a finer one I have never seen--deer would
scamper ahead and we could have eaten one raw. At 10 that night without
food, we lay down in a pouring rain to sleep. Troops of all kinds passed
us in the night--a shadowy stream, over a half-million men. Some French
officers told us that they had never seen such concentration since
Verdun, if then.

The next day, the 18th of July, we marched ahead through a jam of
troops, trucks, etc., and came at last to a ration dump where we fell to
and ate our heads off for the first time in nearly two days. When we
left there, the men had bread stuck on their bayonets. I lugged a ham.
All were loaded down.

Here I passed one of Wass' lieutenants with his hand wounded. He was
pleased as Punch and told us the drive was on, the first we knew of it.
I then passed a few men of Hunt's company, bringing prisoners to the
rear. They had a colonel and his staff. They were well dressed, cleaned
and polished, but mighty glum looking.

We finally stopped at the far end of the forest near a dressing station,
where Holcomb again took command. This station had been a big fine stone
farm but was now a complete ruin--wounded and dead lay all about. Joe
Murray came by with his head all done up--his helmet had saved him. The
lines had gone on ahead so we were quite safe. Had a fine aero battle
right over us. The stunts that those planes did cannot be described by
me.

Late in the afternoon we advanced again. Our route lay over an open
field covered with dead.

We lay down on a hillside for the night near some captured German guns,
and until dark I watched the cavalry--some four thousand, come up and
take positions.

At 3.30 the next morning Sitz woke me up and said we were to attack. The
regiment was soon under way and we picked our way under cover of a gas
infested valley to a town where we got our final instructions and left
our packs. I wished Sumner good luck and parted.

We formed up in a sunken road on two sides of a valley that was
perpendicular to the enemy's front; Hughes right, Holcomb left, Sibley
support. We now began to get a few wounded; one man with ashen face came
charging to the rear with shell shock. He shook all over, foamed at the
mouth, could not speak. I put him under a tent, and he acted as if he
had a fit.

I heard Overton call to one of his friends to send a certain pin to his
mother if he should get hit.

At 8.30 we jumped off with a line of tanks in the lead. For two "kilos"
the four lines of Marines were as straight as a die, and their advance
over the open plain in the bright sunlight was a picture I shall never
forget. The fire got hotter and hotter, men fell, bullets sung, shells
whizzed-banged and the dust of battle got thick. Overton was hit by a
big piece of shell and fell. Afterwards I heard he was hit in the heart,
so his death was without pain. He was buried that night and the pin
found.

A man near me was cut in two. Others when hit would stand, it seemed, an
hour, then fall in a heap. I yelled to Wilmer that each gun in the
barrage worked from right to left, then a rabbit ran ahead and I watched
him wondering if he would get hit. Good rabbit--it took my mind off the
carnage. Looked for Hughes way over to the right; told Wilmer that I had
a hundred dollars and be sure to get it. You think all kinds of things.

About sixty Germans jumped out of a trench and tried to surrender, but
their machine guns opened up, we fired back, they ran and our left
company after them. That made a gap that had to be filled, so Sibley
advanced one of his to do the job, then a shell lit in a machine-gun
crew of ours and cleaned it out completely.

At 10.30 we dug in--the attack just died out. I found a hole or old
trench and when I was flat on my back I got some protection. Holcomb was
next to me; Wilmer some way off. We then tried to get reports. Two
companies we never could get in touch with. Lloyd came in and reported
he was holding some trenches near a mill with six men. Cates, with his
trousers blown off, said he had sixteen men of various companies;
another officer on the right reported he had and could see forty men,
all told. That, with the headquarters, was all we could find out about
the battalion of nearly 800. Of the twenty company officers who went in,
three came out, and one, Cates, was slightly wounded.

From then on to about 8 P. M. life was a chance and mighty
uncomfortable. It was hot as a furnace, no water, and they had our range
to a "T." Three men lying in a shallow trench near me were blown to
bits.

I went to the left of the line and found eight wounded men in a shell
hole. I went back to Cates' hole and three shells landed near them. We
thought they were killed, but they were not hit. You could hear men
calling for help in the wheat fields. Their cries would get weaker and
weaker and die out. The German planes were thick in the air; they were
in groups of from three to twenty. They would look us over and then we
would get a pounding. One of our planes got shot down; he fell about a
thousand feet, like an arrow, and hit in the field back of us. The tank
exploded and nothing was left.

We had a machine gun officer with us and at six a runner came up and
reported that Sumner was killed. He commanded the machine-gun company
with us. He was hit early in the fight by a bullet, I hear; I can get no
details. At the start he remarked: "This looks easy--they do not seem to
have much art." Hughes' headquarters were all shot up. Turner lost a
leg.

Well, we just lay there all through the hot afternoon.

It was great--a shell would land near by and you would bounce in your
hole.

As twilight came, we sent out water parties for the relief of the
wounded. Then we wondered if we would get relieved. At 9 o'clock we got
a message congratulating us and saying the Algerians would take over at
midnight. We then began to collect our wounded. Some had been evacuated
during the day, but at that, we soon had about twenty on the field near
us. A man who had been blinded wanted me to hold his hand. Another,
wounded in the back, wanted his head patted, and so it went; one man got
up on his hands and knees. I asked him what he wanted. He said, "Look at
the full moon," then fell dead. I had him buried, and all the rest I
could find. All the time bullets sung and we prayed that shelling would
not start until we had our wounded on top.

The Algerians came up at midnight and we pushed out. They went over at
daybreak and got all shot up. We made the relief under German flares and
the light from a burning town.

We went out as we came, through the gulley and town, the latter by now
all in ruins. The place was full of gas, so we had to wear our masks. We
pushed on to the forest and fell down in our tracks and slept all day.
That afternoon a German plane got a balloon and the observer jumped and
landed in a high tree. It was some job getting him down. The wind came
up and we had to dodge falling trees and branches. As it was, we lost--
two killed and one wounded from that cause.

That night the Germans shelled us and got three killed and seventeen
wounded. We moved a bit further back to the crossroad and after burying
a few Germans, some of whom showed signs of having been wounded before,
we settled down to a short stay.

It looked like rain, and so Wilmer and I went to an old dressing station
to salvage some cover. We collected a lot of bloody shelter halves and
ponchos that had been tied to poles to make stretchers, and were about
to go, when we stopped to look at a new grave. A rude cross made of two
slats from a box had written on it:

"Lester S. Wass, Captain U. S. Marines, July 18, 1918"

The old crowd at St. Nazaire and Bordeaux, Wass and Sumner killed,
Baston and Hunt wounded, the latter on the 18th, a clean wound, I hear,
through the left shoulder. We then moved further to the rear and camped
for the night. Dunlap came to look us over. His car was driven by a
sailor who got out to talk to a few of the marines, when one of the
latter yelled out, "Hey, fellows! Anyone want to see a real live gob,
right this way." The gob held a regular reception. A carrier pigeon
perched on a tree with a message. We decided to shoot him. It was then
quite dark, so the shot missed. I then heard the following as I tried to
sleep: "Hell; he only turned around;" "Send up a flare;" "Call for a
barrage," etc. The next day further to the rear still, a Ford was towed
by with its front wheels on a truck.

We are now back in a town for some rest and to lick our wounds.

As I rode down the battalion, where once companies 250 strong used to
march, now you see fifty men, with a kid second lieutenant in command;
one company commander is not yet twenty-one.

After the last attack I cashed in the gold you gave me and sent it home
along with my back pay. I have no idea of being "bumped off" with money
on my person, as if you fall into the enemy's hands you are first robbed
then buried perhaps, but the first is sure.

Baston, the lieutenant that went to Quantico with father and myself, and
of whom father took some pictures, was wounded in both legs in the Bois
de Belleau. He nearly lost his legs, I am told, but is coming out O. K.
Hunt was wounded in the last attack, got his wounds fixed up and went
back again till he had to be sent out. Coffenburg was hit in the
hand,--all near him were killed. Talbot was hit twice, but is about
again. That accounts for all the officers in the company that I brought
over. In the first fight 103 of the men in that outfit were killed or
wounded. The second fight must have about cleaned out the old crowd.

The tanks, as they crushed their way through the wet, gray forest looked
to me like beasts of the pre-stone age.

In the afternoon as I lay on my back in a hole that I dug deeper, the
dark gray German planes with their sinister black crosses, looked like
Death hovering above. They were for many. Sumner, for one. He was always
saying, "Denig, let's go ashore!" Then here was Wass, whom I usually
took dinner with--dead, too. Sumner, Wass, Baston and Hunt--the old
crowd that stuck together; two dead, one may never be any good any more;
Hunt, I hope, will be as good as ever.

The officers mentioned in Major Denig's letter, with their addresses and
next of kin, are:

Lieutenant Colonel Berton W. Sibley; Harriet E. Sibley, mother; Essex
Junction, Vt.

First Lieutenant Clifton B. Cates; Mrs. Willis J. Cates, mother;
Tiptonville. Tenn.

First Lieutenant Horace Talbot, no next of kin; Woonsocket, R.I.

Captain Arthur H. Turner; Charles S. Turner, father, 188 West River St.,
Wilkes-Barre, Pa.

Captain Bailey Metcalf Coffenberg; Mrs. Elizabeth Coffenberg, 30 Jackson
St., Staten Island, N. Y.

Captain Albert Preston Baston; Mrs. Ora Z. Baston, mother; Pleasant
Avenue, St. Louis Park, Minn.

Captain Lester Sherwood Wass; L. A. Wass, father. Gloucester, Mass.

Captain Allen M. Sumner; Mrs. Mary M. Sumner, wife; 1824 S Street, N.
W., Washington, D. C.

Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Holcomb; Mrs. Thomas Holcomb, wife, 1535 New
Hampshire Avenue, Washington, D. C.

Second Lieutenant John Laury Hunt; Etta Newman, sister; Gillet, Texas.

Captain Walter H. Sitz; Emil H. Sitz, father; Davenport, Iowa.

First Lieutenant John W. Overton, son of J. M. Overton, 901 Stahlman
Building, Nashville, Tenn.

Major Egbert T. Lloyd; Mrs. E. T. Lloyd, wife; 4900 Cedar Avenue,
Philadelphia, Pa.

Major Ralph S. Keyser; Charles E. Keyser, father; Thoroughfare, Va.

Captain Pere Wilmer; Mrs. Alice Emory Wilmer, mother; Centreville, Md.

Lieutenant Colonel John A. Hughes; Mrs. A. J. Hughes, wife, care of
Rear-Admiral William Parks, Post Office Building, Philadelphia, Pa.

Lieutenant Overton was the famous Yale athlete, the intercollegiate
one-mile champion.



CHAPTER XLIII

ENGLAND AND FRANCE STRIKE IN THE NORTH

Up to July 18, 1918, the Allied armies in France had been steadily on
the defensive, but on that date the tide turned. General Foch, who had
been yielding territory for several months in the great German drives,
now assumed the offensive himself and began the series of great drives
which was to crush the German power and drive the enemy in defeat
headlong from France.

The first of these great blows was the one which began with the
appearance of the Americans at Chateau-Thierry. The Germans had formed a
huge salient whose eastern extremity lay near Rheims, and its western
extremity west of Soissons. It was like a great pocket reaching down in
the direction of Paris from those two points. Against this salient the
French and Americans had directed a tremendous thrust. The Germans
resisted with desperation. It was the turning point of the war, but they
were compelled to yield. Town after town was regained by the French and
American troops, until, by August 5th, the Crown Prince had been driven
from the Marne to the Vesle, and the salient obliterated.

On August 7th General Foch delivered his second blow. During the
fighting on the Marne it had often been wondered by those who were
observing the great French general's strategy, why the British seemed to
make no move. Occasionally there had been reports of minor assaults,
either on the Lys salient, far north, or on the Somme and Montdidier
sectors, lying between. It had not been noticed that in these minor
assaults the English had been obtaining positions of strategic
importance, and that they were steadily getting ready for an English
offensive.

But their time had now come, and on August 7th the armies of Sir Douglas
Haig began an attack against the armies of Prince Rupprecht on the Lys
salient. This was followed, on August 8th, by another still greater
Allied advance in Picardy, between Albert and Montdidier.

Both of these attacks met with notable success. On the Lys salient the
English penetrated a distance of one thousand yards over a four-mile
front, and followed up this advance by persistent attacks which led to
the reoccupation, on August 19th, of Merville, and on August 31st, of
Mont Kemmel. On this front the Germans had weakened their strength by
withdrawing troops to aid other parts of their front, and the British
were constantly taking advantage of this weakening.

The Germans had found this salient a failure. It had failed to attain
its objective, the flanking of the Lens line south. They therefore were
steadily retreating without any intention other than to extricate
themselves from positions of no value, in the most economical manner.
The quick operations of the British, however, led to the capture of many
prisoners and guns.

The English offensive in Picardy was a more serious matter, and from
some points of view was the greatest offensive in the war. The Allied
front had been prepared for offensive operations by minor attacks which
had secured for the Allied troops dominating positions. The attack was a
surprise attack. The Germans were expecting local attacks but not a
movement of this magnitude. The surprise was increased because it was
made through a heavy mist which prevented observation. It was preceded
by tremendous artillery fire which lasted for four minutes, and which
was followed by the charge of infantry and tanks. The German artillery
hardly replied at all, and only the resistance of a few rifles and
machine guns fired vaguely through the fog met the charging troops.

The attack was on a twenty-five-mile front and on the first day gained
seven miles, captured seven thousand men and a hundred guns. On the
following day there was an advance of about five miles and seventeen
thousand more prisoners were captured.

The Germans were now retiring in great haste, blowing up ammunition
dumps and abandoning an enormous quantity of stores of all kinds. The
English were using cavalry and airplanes, which were flying low over the
field and throwing the German troops into confusion. Over three hundred
guns, including many of heavy caliber, were captured. The ground had
been plowed up by shells and thousands of bodies of men and horses were
found lying where they fell. A feature of the attack was the swift
whippet tanks which advanced far ahead of the infantry lines.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright Western Newspaper Union
  British Official Photo
  FORWARD WITH THE TANKS AGAINST BAPAUME
  This picture gives an excellent idea of the method of combined tank
  and infantry attack. Behind a low ridge among artillery positions they
  are forming their line. A company falls in behind one of the waddling
  monsters that will break a way for it through all obstacles, while on
  both sides of the road other detachments await the arrival of the tank
  they are to accompany.


[Illustration: Photograph: Line of marching soldiers stretching back to
the horizon. Several men resting in the foreground.]
  Canadian Official Photograph.
  From Underwood and Underwood, N. Y.
  CANADIANS IN THE GREAT CAMBRAI DRIVE
  One of the busy scenes just preceding the victorious attack by the
  Canadians upon Cambrai. In the center can be seen captured Germans
  carrying in one of their wounded comrades.


In the French official report occurred the following statement:

"The brilliant operation which we, in concert with British troops,
executed yesterday has been a surprise for the enemy. As occurred in the
offensive of July 18th the soldiers of General Debeney have captured
enemy soldiers engaged in the peaceful pursuit of harvesting the fields
behind the German lines."

By August 10th the Germans had fallen back to a line running through
Chaulnes and Roye. Montdidier had been captured, and eleven German
divisions had been smashed. By August 12th the number of prisoners was
40,000, and by the 18th the Allied front was almost in the same line as
it was in the summer of 1916, before the battle of the Somme.

The next step was to capture Bapaume and Peronne. The French, on August
19th, captured the Lassigny Massif, and continued to press on their
attack. Noyon fell on the 29th, Roye on the 27th, Chaulnes on the 29th.
Further north the British had captured Albert, and on the 29th occupied
Bapaume. On September 1st they took Peronne with two thousand prisoners.

The advance still continued, and the German weakness was becoming more
and more apparent. On September 6th the whole Allied line swept forward,
with an average penetration of eight miles. Chauny was captured and the
fortress of Ham. On September 17th the British were close to St. Quentin
and the French in their own old intrenchments before La Fere. On
September 18th a surprise advance over a twenty-two-mile front crossed
the Hindenburg line at two points north of St. Quentin, Villeret and
from Pontru to Hollom.

The first and third British armies, a little further to the north, were
moving toward Cambrai and Douai, threatening not only them, but to get
in the rear of Lens. This force proceeded up the Albert-Bapaume highway,
and on August 27th captured a considerable portion of the Hindenburg
line. On the 30th they reached Bullecourt and on September 2d crossed
the Drocourt-Queant line on a six-mile-front. This was the famous switch
line, meant to supplement the Hindenburg line and its capture meant the
complete overthrow of the German intrenched positions at this point.


[Illustration: MAP: Arras in the Southwest corner, Douai in the
Northeast.]
  THE FAMOUS HINDENBURG LINE THAT CRUMBLED IN 1918.


The Germans retreated hastily to the Canal du Nord, and on September 3d
Queant was captured by an advance on a twenty mile front, along with ten
thousand prisoners. The Allied forces were moving steadily forward. On
September 18th the British reached the defenses of Cambrai and were
encircling the city of St. Quentin. On October 3d the advance upon
Cambrai forced the Germans to evacuate the Lens coal fields, and on
October 9th another advance over a thirty-mile front enabled the Allies
to occupy Cambrai and St. Quentin. On the 11th they had reached the
suburbs of Douai. By this time the whole of the Picardy salient had been
wiped out.

The preceding summary of this great movement gives little idea of the
tremendous struggle which had gone on during these two critical months,
and hardly does more than suggest the tremendous importance of the
British operations. The Hindenburg line was like a great fortification,
and for more than a year had been regarded as impregnable. At Bullecourt
there were two main lines. One hundred and twenty-five yards in front of
the first line was a belt of wire twenty-five feet broad, so thick that
it could not be seen through. The line itself contained double
machine-gun emplacements of ferro-concrete, one hundred and twenty-five
yards apart, with lesser emplacements between them. More belts of wire
protected the support line. Here a continuous tunnel had been
constructed at a depth of over forty feet. Every thirty-five yards there
were exits with flights of forty-five steps. The tunnels were roofed
and lined and bottomed with heavy timber, and numerous rooms branched
off. They were lighted by electricity. Large nine-inch trench mortars
stood at the traverses and strong machine-gun positions covered the line
from behind.

The Hindenburg line was really only one of a series of twenty lines,
each connected with the others by communicating trenches. The main lines
were solid concrete, separated by an unending vista of wire
entanglements. At points this barrier barbed wire extended in solid
formation for ten miles. This tremendous system of defenses was
originally called by the Germans the Siegfried line, and in the spring
of 1917 they found it wise, at points where a strong offensive was
expected, to fall back to it for protection. It had been their hope that
it would prove an impassable barrier to the Allied troops, but now it
had been broken, and the moral effect of the British success was even
greater than the material.

One of the most noticeable results of the British advance had been the
capture of Lens. It had been captured without a fight, because of the
British threat upon its rear, but its capture was of tremendous
importance. Lens had been the scene of bitter fighting in the latter
part of August, 1917, when the Canadians had specially distinguished
themselves. This city had been heavily fortified by the Germans who had
recognized its importance as being the center of the great Lens coal
fields, and they had never given it up. It had sometimes been described
as the strongest single position that had ever confronted the Allies on
the western front. It had been made a sort of citadel of reinforced
concrete. Even the courage and power of the Canadians had only given
them possession of some of its suburbs. Between these suburbs and the
concrete citadel were the coal pits, with their fathomless depths of
ages and the mysteries of kultural strategy. The struggle became a
succession of avalanches of gas, burning oil, rifle and machine-gun
fire. Both sides lost terrifically, but the Germans had held the town.
Now it was given up without a blow and its great coal fields were once
more in possession of the French. Before retreating the Germans showed
their usual destructive energy and the mines were found flooded as a
result of consistent and scientific use of dynamite.

The recapture of Lens was cheering news in Paris. Not the least of the
many sufferings of the French during the last two years of the war was
that which came from the scarcity of coal. Indeed, more than once during
those two winters coal could not be obtained at any price. These periods
unfortunately came in the latter part of the winter, and it happened
they were unusual periods of intense cold. Thousands of people stayed in
bed all day in order to keep warm. The capture of Lens, therefore, had
been anxiously desired. Nearly the whole of the French coal supply had
come from Lens and the adjacent Bethune coal fields. The Bethune field,
although steadily working, had never produced enough coal for even the
pressing necessities of the French munition works.

The news that Bapaume had fallen on August 29th brought back, especially
to the British, memories not only of the previous year and of the great
forward movement which, on March 17th, had swept them over Bapaume and
Peronne, but also bitter memories of the retreat in the previous March,
which had carried them back under the overwhelming German pressure. The
capture therefore was balm to their spirits, and an English
correspondent, Mr. Philip Gibbs, who had accompanied the British on
their previous advance, found officers and men full of laughter and full
of memories.

On all sides were the battle-fields of 1916 and 1917; Mametz Wood,
Belleville Wood, Usna Hill, Ginchy, Morval, Guillemont. The fields were
covered with battle debris, and yet to the English it was sacred ground
from the graves of the men who fell there. Those graves still remained.
The British shell fire had not touched them, but as the English advanced
there were many bodies of gray-clad men on the roads and fields, and
dead horses, and a litter of barbed wire, and deep shelters dug under
banks, and shell craters, and helmets, gas masks, and rifles thrown here
and there by the enemy as they fled. Now it was the Germans that were
fleeing, and fleeing hopelessly, sullen, bitter at their officers,
impatient of discipline.

One of the great differences between the attacks of the Allies in their
last year of the war and those of preceding years, was the increased use
and the improved character of the tanks. The tanks were a development of
the war. Before the war, however, the development of the caterpillar
tractor had suggested to a few farsighted people the possibility of
evolving from this invention a machine capable of offensive use over
rough country in close warfare. Experiments were made in behalf of the
English War Office for some time without practical results.

At last, after these experiments had resulted in various failures, a
type of tractor was finally designed which produced satisfactory
results. It was a caterpillar tractor, with an endless self-laid track,
over which internal driving wheels could be propelled by the engines. It
was not until July, 1916, that the first consignment of these new
engines of warfare arrived at the secret maneuver ground.

There were two kinds. One called the male was armed with two Hotchkiss
quick-fire guns, as well as with an armament of machine guns. The other
type, called the female, was armed only with machine guns. The male tank
was designed for dealing with the concrete emplacements for the German
machine guns. The other was more suitable for dealing with machine-gun
personnel and riflemen. Some time was taken in training men to use these
tanks, for the crew of a tank must suffer a great deal of hardship on
account of the noise of the engine every command had to be made by
signs, and the motion of the tank being like that of a ship on a heavy
sea, was likely to produce seasickness.

The tanks were painted with weird colors for the purpose of concealment,
and when they first appeared caused a great deal of wonder and
amusement. They were first used in battle on September 15, 1916, in a
continuation of the battle of the Somme, and proved a great surprise to
the Germans. The Germans directed all available rifle and machine-gun
fire upon them without success. A correspondent narrates that: "As the
'Creme de Menthe' moved on its way, the bullets fell from its sides
harmlessly. It advanced upon a broken wall, leaned up against it
heavily, until it fell with a crash of bricks, and then rose on to the
bricks and passed over them and walked straight into the midst of
factory ruins." They were an immense success and had come to stay.



CHAPTER XLIV

BELGIUM'S GALLANT EFFORT

For more than four years Belgium suffered under the iron heel of the
German invaders. One little corner in the far west was occupied by her
gallant army, fighting with the utmost courage and a patriotism which
has won the admiration of the world under its great King Albert, whose
heroic leadership had turned the little commercial nation into a nation
of heroes. Conditions of life in the Belgian cities were almost
intolerable. The great Belgian Relief Commission, under the direction of
Mr. Hoover, had kept the people from starvation, but it could not secure
them their rights. They lived in the midst of brutality and injustice.

On Belgian Independence Day at London, Arthur J. Balfour, the British
Foreign Minister, made an address in which he commented upon the German
treatment of Belgium. In the course of his address he said: "Bitter must
be the thought in every Belgian heart of what Belgians in Belgium are
now suffering. Let them however, take courage. Let their spirits rise in
a mood of profound cheerfulness, for these dark days are not going to
last forever, and when they come to a conclusion, when again peace dawns
upon this much tormented and cruelly tried world, when Belgium is again
free and prosperous, then Belgians, whether they have spent these
unhappy years in exile, or, an even harder fate, have spent them in
their own country, they will be able to look back upon this time of
cruel and unexampled trial, and they will say to themselves, to their
children and to their descendants, that Belgium, though her existence as
a political entity is less than a century, has within that period shown
an example of courage, constancy and virtue to mankind for which all the
world should be grateful."

The English Foreign Minister was perhaps not prophesying. He knew
something of what was coming. The Great Offensive which was to free
Belgium of her German oppressor was already under way. The first move,
however, was not upon land, but upon the sea. In the autumn of 1914 the
little Belgian port of Zeebrugge, with the neighboring port of Ostend,
was captured by the Germans. The Germans, who had already seized the
shipbuilding plants at Antwerp, then began to build submarines, and sent
them down the canals through Bruges to Zeebrugge and Ostend. From these
ports they proceeded to attack the English commerce.

In the spring of 1918 submarine attacks on English shipping were so
serious that England was using every possible effort to destroy these
piratical craft, and it was determined to make an attempt to block the
entrances to the canals at Zeebrugge and at Ostend, by sinking old ships
in the channels.

The expedition took place during the night of April 22d, under the
command of Vice-Admiral Sir Roger Keyes. Six obsolete British cruisers
took part in the expedition. These were the Brilliant, Iphigenia,
Sirius, Intrepid, Thetis and Vindictive. The Vindictive carried storming
parties to destroy the stone mole at Zeebrugge; the remaining five
cruisers were filled with concrete, and it was intended that they should
be sunk in the entrances of the two ports. A large force of monitors and
small fast craft accompanied the expedition. An observer thus describes
the heroic exploit:

The night was overcast and there was a drifting haze. Down the coast a
great searchlight swung its beam to and fro in the small wind and short
sea. From the Vindictive's bridge, as she headed in toward the mole,
there was scarcely a glimmer of light to be seen shoreward. Ahead as she
drove through the water rolled the smoke screen, her cloak of
invisibility, wrapped about her by small craft. This was the device of
Wing-Commander Brock, without which, acknowledged the Admiral in
command, the operation could not have been conducted. A northeast wind
moved the volume of it shoreward ahead of the ships. Beyond it was the
distant town, its defenders unsuspicious.

It was not until the Vindictive, with bluejackets and marines standing
ready for landing, was close upon the mole, that the wind lulled and
came away again from the southeast, sweeping back the smoke screen and
laying her bare to eyes that looked seaward, There was a moment
immediately afterward when it seemed to those on the ships as if the dim
harbor exploded into light. A star shell soared aloft, then a score of
star shells. Wavering beams of the searchlights swung around and settled
into a glare. A wild fire of gun flashes leaped against the sky; strings
of luminous green beads shot aloft, hung and sank. The darkness of the
night was supplemented by a nightmare daylight of battle-fired guns, and
machine guns along the mole. The batteries ashore woke to life.

It was in a gale of shelling that the Vindictive laid her nose against
the thirty-foot-high concrete side of the mole, let go her anchor, and
signaled to the Daffodil to shove her stern in. The Iris went ahead and
endeavored to get alongside likewise.

The fire was intense while the ships plunged and rolled beside the mole
in the seas, the Vindictive, with her greater draft, jarring against the
foundations of the mole with every lunge. They were swept diagonally by
machine-gun fire from both ends of the mole and by the heavy batteries
on shore. Captain Carpenter conned the Vindictive from the open bridge
until her stern was laid in, when he took up his position in the flame
thrower hut on the port side. It is marvelous that any occupant should
have survived a minute in this hut, so riddled and shattered was it.

The officer of the Iris, which was in trouble ahead of the Vindictive,
described Captain Carpenter as handling her like a picket boat. The
Vindictive was fitted along her port side with a high, false deck, from
which ran eighteen brows, or gangways, by which the storming and
demolition parties were to land. The men gathered in readiness on the
main lower decks, while Colonel Elliott, who was to lead the marines,
waited on the false deck just abaft the bridge. Captain Hallahan, who
commanded the bluejackets, was amidships. The word for the assault had
not yet been given when both leaders were killed.

The mere landing on the mole was a perilous business. It involved a
passage across the crashing and splintering gangways, a drop over the
parapet into the field of fire of the German machine-guns which swept
its length, and a further drop of some sixteen feet to the surface of
the mole itself. Many were killed and more wounded as they crowded up
the gangways, but nothing hindered the orderly and speedy landing by
every gangway. The lower deck was a shambles, as the commander made the
round of the ship, yet the wounded and dying raised themselves to cheer
as he made his tour.

The Iris had trouble of her own. Her first attempts to make fast to the
mole ahead of the Vindictive failed, as her grapnels were not large
enough to span the parapet. Two officers, Lieutenant-Commander Bradford,
and Lieutenant Hawkins, climbed ashore and sat astride the parapet
trying to make the grapnels fast, till each was killed, and fell down
between the ship and the wall. Commander Valentine Gibbs had both legs
shot away, and died next morning. Lieutenant Spencer though wounded,
took command and refused to be relieved.


[Illustration: Layout of harbor; North sea at top, with lighthouse, quay
and wireless station. Foreground shows harbor facilities and submarine
pens.]
  ZEEBRUGGE HARBOR, BLOCKED BY BRITISH


The Iris was obliged at last to change her position and fall in astern
of the Vindictive, which suffered very heavily from fire. Her total
casualties were eight officers and sixty-nine men killed, and three
officers and 103 men wounded.

The storming parties upon the mole met with no resistance from the
Germans other than an intense and unremitting fire. One after another
buildings burst into flames, or split and crumbled as dynamite went off.
A bombing party working up toward the mole in search of the enemy
destroyed several machine gun emplacements but not a single prisoner
awarded them. It appears that upon the approach of the ships and with
the opening of fire the enemy simply retired and contented themselves
with bringing machine guns to the short end of the mole.

The object of the fighting on the mole was in large part to divert the
enemy's attention while the work of blocking the canals was being
accomplished.

Of this operation the official narrative says: "The Thetis came first
steaming into a tornado of shells from great batteries ashore. All her
crew save a remnant who remained to steam her in and sink her, already
had been taken off her by a ubiquitous motor launch. The remnant spared
hands enough to keep her four guns going. It was hers to show the road
to the Intrepid and Iphigenia which followed. She cleared a string of
armed barges, which defends the channel from the tip of the mole, but
had the ill-fortune to foul one of her propellers upon a net defense
which flanks it on the shore side. The propeller gathered in the net and
it rendered her practically unmanageable. Shore batteries found her and
pounded her unremittingly. She bumped into the bank, edged off and found
herself in the channel again, still some hundreds of yards from the
mouth of the canal in practically a sinking condition. As she lay she
signaled invaluable directions to others, and her commander blew charges
and sank it. Motor launches took off her crew. The Intrepid, smoking
like a volcano, and with all her guns blazing, followed. Her motor
launch had failed to get alongside, outside the harbor, and she had men
enough for anything. Straight into the canal she steered, her smoke
blowing back from her into the Iphigenia's eyes so that the latter was
blinded, and going a little wild, ran into the dredger, with her barge
moored beside it, which lay at the western arm of the canal. She was not
clear though, and entered the canal, pushing the barge before her.

"It was then that a shell hit the steam connections of her whistle and
the escape of steam which followed drove off some of the smoke, and let
her see what she was doing. Lieutenant Carter, commanding the Intrepid,
placed the nose of his ship neatly on the mud of the western bank,
ordered his crew away, and blew up his ship by switches in the chart
room. Lieutenant Leake, commanding the Iphigenia, beached her according
to arrangement on the eastern side, blew her up, saw her drop nicely
across the canal, and left her with her engines still going to hold her
in position till she should have bedded well down on the bottom.
According to the latest reports from air observation the two old ships,
with their holds full of concrete, are lying across the canal in a
V-position, and it is probable that the work they set out to do has been
accomplished and that the canal is effectively blocked."

At Ostend an attempt was also made to block the canal on the same night,
but it was unsuccessful owing to a shift of wind which blew away the
smoke screen behind which the British craft were acting, and enabled the
German gun fire to destroy the flares which had been lit to mark the
entrance to the harbor. The cruisers tried to act by guess work, and one
of the block ships was sunk, but it was not in a position to obstruct
the canal.

On May 9th another attempt was made, and the Vindictive, filled with
concrete was sunk in the Ostend channel.


This daring exploit of the English fleet, though it had destroyed the
value of Zeebrugge and Ostend as submarine bases, had left the Germans
in possession. In September, however, General Foch determined that the
time had come to throw his armies against the German forces in the
distracted little country. He planned two widely separated thrusts. On
the south he sent Pershing against the Germans between the Argonne and
the Meuse. They made rapid progress, capturing Montfaucon, Varennes and
driving on until they had destroyed the German control of the
Paris-Chalons-Verdun Railroad.

This was a serious blow to the Germans, for a further push northward
would cut the vital lateral railway connecting the German armies in
Belgium and France with those in Alsace-Lorraine. Ludendorf hastened
reserves to this front, and the American operation was slowed down.
Meanwhile at the other end of the line the Belgians, with General
Plumer's Second British Army, suddenly attacked on a front which
extended all the way from the canal at Dixmude to the Lys, swept the
Germans out of all the famous fighting ground of the Ypres salient,
pushed across the Passchendaele Ridge and down into the Flanders plain
below.

The situation of the Germans in the Lille regions of the south and also
along the Belgian coast became at once dangerous. Once more Ludendorf
was compelled to send reserves, and this thrust began to slow up but it
was not checked permanently, and the Belgian armies were to move on.
While this advance was being conducted the British fleet were bombarding
the coastal defenses. The Belgian army, fighting with the utmost spirit
under command of King Albert, made a penetration of five miles and
captured four thousand prisoners and an immense amount of supplies.

On September 30th they captured the city of Roulers. For ten days there
was a consolidation of position by the Allies, but on October 14th they
made a furious attack in the general direction of Ghent and Courtrai.
Thousands of prisoners and several complete batteries of guns were
captured. In this attack British, Belgian and French troops took part,
and the troops of the three nations went over the top without
preliminary bombardment, taking the enemy by surprise.

On October 15th the news from Flanders showed that the victory was
growing in extent, the Allied armies were advancing on a front of about
twenty-five miles, and in some places had penetrated the enemy's
positions six or seven miles. The Belgians had captured seven thousand
prisoners and the British and French about four thousand. In French
Flanders the British advanced to a point about three miles west of
Lille.

The battle was carried on in a heavy rain which turned the battle-fields
into seas of mud; while this hampered the Allied troops it hindered even
more the Germans in trying to move away their material through the mired
ground of the Flanders Lowland.

On the next day dispatches indicated that a retreat on a tremendous
scale in northern Belgium was under way. The Germans were retreating so
fast that the Allies lost touch with the enemy. The gallant little
Belgian army, assisted by crack British and French troops, had driven
the despoilers of its country from a large section which the Germans had
occupied since the early days of the war, and had gained positions of
such importance as to make it probable that the Germans would have to
abandon the entire coast of Belgium.

Moreover, on the south, the city of Lille, with the great mining and
manufacturing districts around it, was being left in a salient which was
growing deeper every hour and which the enemy could not hope to hold. At
certain points the resistance of the Germans was extraordinarily fierce.
This was especially true in the region of Thouret. The battle here was
from street to street and from house to house. The Germans had placed
machine-guns in the windows of houses and cellars and fired murderous
streams of bullets into the advancing Belgians but were unable to stop
them.

The Belgians fought with a dogged determination such as only troops
fighting to regain their outraged country could display. Nothing could
stop them. At other points, especially in the northern part of the
battle area, the Germans surrendered freely. Many civilians were rescued
from the towns and districts captured, and little processions of these
were straggling rearward out of range of the guns, and out of the way of
the fighting troops. At times liberated Belgian women could see their
sons, brothers or husbands going forward into battle. On October 17th
the German retreat in Flanders became a rout. The enemy were fleeing
rapidly on their entire front. The British entered Lille.

The Germans fled from Ostend and British naval forces were landed there.
The Belgian infantry were sweeping up the coast, and Belgian patrols
entered Bruges. In the afternoon of the day King Albert of Belgium, and
Queen Elizabeth entered Ostend. The splendid fighting of the Belgian
troops and their magnificent victory was now attracting universal
attention. It was one of the revelations of the war. They were bearing
the giant's share of the work of the Allied armies in their own country,
and had already liberated territory which more than doubled the area of
that part of Belgium which had been in their possession.

With the Belgian coast cleared of invaders it became open to British
transports which would afford relief to the whole Allied armies from the
resultant decrease in the congestion of the channel ports. On October
19th the progress continued. Zeebrugge was occupied by the Allies, the
last Belgian port remaining in German hands.

The Belgian advance continued along the whole line. King Albert entered
Bruges. Day after day the advance continued. The reception of the King
and Queen of Belgium in the recovered towns was something to remember.
In Bruges they rode in amid the tumultuous cheering of the frenzied
population. On the central square they were received by the burgomaster
with an escort of a solitary gendarme, who had refused to give up his
uniform and old-fashioned rifle to the enemy; though fined and
imprisoned he had kept their hiding place secret. As he stood there
alone with fixed bayonet the King and the Queen shook him by the hand
and congratulated him. Greatly moved, he stammered, "It is too great an
honor, too great an honor."

And with all this happiness came the happiness arising from the return
of the soldiers to the homes from which they had been absent so long,
the reunions of husband and wife, of parents and children. Belgium was
now to reap the reward for her heroism.



CHAPTER XLV

ITALY'S TERRIFIC DRIVE

For many months after the great Italian stand on the Piave there was
inactivity on both fronts in Italy. The Italians had been reinforced by
troops from France and Great Britain and their own army was now larger
than it had been at any other time. On June 15th, about the time when
the Germans were being driven back on the Marne and the Oise, the
Austrians, urged to action by the Germans, suddenly undertook a great
offensive on a front from the Asiago Plateau to the sea, a distance of
ninety-seven miles.

From the very start it was plain that the Italians were resisting
magnificently. The offensive was not unexpected, either in time or
locality, and had been openly discussed in the Italian press. The
Italians therefore were not taken by surprise, and moreover since the
disaster of Caparetto the Italians had learned by a patient campaign of
education what they were fighting for.

On the second day of the battle the Austrian troops made a desperate
effort to break through the Italian lines, particularly in the eastern
sector of the Asiago Plateau, and crossed the Piave River at two places.
They also attacked the French positions between Osteria di Monfenera and
Maranzine, but were driven back with heavy loss. At every point where
the Austrians were able to advance the Italians initiated vigorous
counter-attacks. The order to Italy's army was, "Hold at any cost."

On the third day of the battle the Austrian offensive was being strongly
checked. They had established three bridgeheads on the Piave, but had
not been able to advance. The most notable of these crossings was that
in the Montello sector. Montello is of particular importance, because it
is the hinge between the mountains and the Piave sectors of the Italian
front. If it could be held the Austrians would be in a position to
dominate from the flank and rear all the Italian positions defending the
line of the Piave in the dead flat plain to the south.


[Illustration: Painting]
  STORMING THE MOLE AT ZEEBRUGGE
  One of the most brilliant and spectacular feats in naval history was
  the British blocking of the submarine harbor at Zeebrugge. The picture
  shows one of the detachments of marines that braved the terrific
  German defense fire and swarmed up the mole that protects the harbor,
  planting explosives that made a great breach and let the tides in.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  ITALIAN TROOPS TREKKING THE SNOW-FIELDS OF THE ALPS
  The Alpine troops of the Italian army have for years developed a
  military technique peculiar to the regions they must cover. Here a
  battalion of Alpini is seen on skis, the best method for traveling
  over the frozen snow crusts of the mountain region.


On the Lower Piave the Austrians had made gains and had captured Capo
Sile. The Austrians were using a million men and were using liquid fire
and gas bombs, but their every move was resisted strongly. Vienna was
claiming the capture of 30,000 men, but the Italian reports claimed that
the Austrian losses were stupendous. Thousands of dead were heaped
before the Italian line in the mountain sectors, blocking the mule paths
and choking the defiles. No fewer than nine desperate onslaughts upon
Monte Grappa, always with fresh reserves, were broken upon Grappa
heights, with terrific losses.

On July 19th the dispatches from Rome were emphasizing the Italian
counter-attacks. Not only were the Italians preventing the enemy from
making further gains, but they were beginning to crowd him back at the
points where he had crossed the river, and were raining bombs and
machine-gun bullets upon the Austrian troops at the bridgehead. They
were also taking the initiative in the fighting in the mountain sectors.

By June 20th the Austrian defeat was clear. Their forces were backed
against the flooded Piave, which had carried away their bridges and left
them to the mercy of the Italians. Thousands were being killed and other
thousands captured. Czecho-Slovak troops, it was reported, had joined in
the fighting, and had given their first tribute of blood to the generous
principles of freedom and independence for which they were in arms. In
the Piave delta the Italians had regained Capo Sile, which had been
captured early in the drive, and it was reported that all along the
Piave line they had won complete control of the air, not a single
Austrian machine being still aloft. The spirits of the Austrian troops
had been definitely weakened. They were war wearied, and evidence began
to accumulate that Austria's drive was a "hunger offensive."

As the battle continued reports began to arrive of the gallant deeds of
American airmen, who were helping in the fighting along the front. The
airmen were assisting in destroying the bridges that the Austrians were
trying to throw across the river. The Piave was now a vast cataract and
the bridges which it had not washed down were constantly destroyed by
the aviators. The Austrians on the western bank were finding it
difficult to obtain supplies and were resorting to hydroplanes for that
purpose. On June 24th the Austrian attack had definitely failed and they
were fleeing in disorder across the Piave. One hundred and eighty
thousand men had already been lost and forty thousand were hemmed in on
the western side of the river. The Austrian communications were
emphasizing the difficulties they were meeting with through the heavy
rains.

The victory of the Italians, which was now apparent, was received all
over Italy with great public rejoicing. Italy had been repenting in
sackcloth and ashes her defeat of the previous fall. Now they had made
amends and were showing what the Italian soldier could really do. In
America, and among the Allied Powers, there was great enthusiasm, and
Secretary of War Baker sent this congratulatory message to the Italian
Minister of War:


Your Excellency: The people of the United States are watching with
enthusiasm and admiration the splendid exploits of the great army of
Italy in resisting and driving back the enemy forces which recently
undertook a major offensive on the Italian front. I take great pleasure
in tendering my own hearty congratulations, and would be most happy to
have a message of greeting and congratulation transmitted to General
Diaz and his brave soldiers.
NEWTON D. BAKER,
Secretary of War of the United States.


In announcing to his victorious army the repulse of the Austrians
General Diaz, the Italian Commander-in-Chief, said:


"The enemy who, with furious impetuosity, used all means to penetrate
our territory has been repulsed at all points. His losses are very
heavy. His pride is broken. Glory to all commands, all soldiers, all
sailors."


On the 26th of June the Italian troops, having forced the last rear
guard of the retreating Austrians to surrender and completely occupied
the west bank of the Piave, began an offensive on the mountain front in
the Monte Grappa sector. They gained more than 3,000 prisoners, and
considerable territory. On the southern part of the Piave front they
were carrying on a vigorous offensive against the Austrian positions
within the Piave delta. The Austrian troops, at that point, were being
prevented from retreat by the high water, and suffered terrible losses.
On July 6th the Italians drove the last of the enemy from the delta.

The campaign in Italy now languished, until, on October 27th, Italy
began her last terrible drive. The great Italian offensive was made not
only by their own forces and the French and British troops, which had
assisted them the previous June, but during the intervening period a
large force of Americans had arrived in Italy. On June 27th Secretary
Baker had made the announcement that General Pershing had been
instructed to send into Italy a regiment that was then in training in
France. The regiment thus sent was augmented considerably later. The
purpose of sending troops to Italy, Mr. Baker explained, was rather
political than military. It was desired to demonstrate again that the
Allied nations and the United States were one in their purposes on all
fronts, and to extend the intercourse between the troops of all the
powers at war with Germany.

On the second day of the Italian offensive their success increased. More
than nine thousand Austrians were taken prisoners and fifty-one guns
were captured. The Piave River had been crossed, and the Italians had
advanced four miles to its east. The attacks in the mountain region were
being more bitterly contested, and counter-attacks had enabled the enemy
to regain some of their lost positions.

On October 30th the Italian advance was continuing. The Austrian front
appeared to be breaking under the heavy blows of the Allied troops.
Dispatches indicated striking successes, not only on the Italian front
but at the points where the British and the French were holding the
line. The Americans were being held in reserve, but American airplanes
were actively participating in the work at the front. By this time the
last lines of the Austro-Hungarian resistance on the central positions
along the Piave River had been broken, and more than fifteen thousand
prisoners been taken. The Austrians, however, had been desperately
resisting, and their artillery fire at many points was very effective,
especially that which had been directed at the pontoon bridges thrown
across the Piave.

King Victor Emanuel had been present in person during the crossing, and
was often under the fire of the Austrian guns. On October 30th, 33,000
Austrians had been captured and the Italians had reached Vittorio.
Americans had now joined in the fighting.

The Austrian retreat reached the proportion of a rout. They were still
fighting, especially in the mountain region, but in the plains east of
the Piave they were in full flight. Taking into consideration the
numbers of troops in the Austrian lines and their apparently plentiful
supplies, it began to seem probable that their break was due more to
political maneuvers than to military force. The Austrians at this time
were making a great peace drive, and the dissatisfaction at home had
affected the morale of the troops at the front. The conditions in Italy
were in close resemblance to those in Bulgaria just before Bulgaria
applied for an armistice.

On the 1st of November the Austrians were completely routed, and were
streaming in confusion down the valleys of the Alpine foothills, and
fleeing northward from the Piave. Reports from Austria indicated riots
at Vienna and Budapest. In Vienna people were parading the streets,
shouting "Down with the Hapsburgs!" On October 29th, the Austrians asked
for an armistice. Their announcement read as follows:


The High Command of the armies, early Tuesday, by means of a
Parliamentaire, established communication with the Italian army command.
Every effort is to be made for the avoidance of further useless
sacrifice of blood, for the cessation of hostilities, and the conclusion
of an armistice. Toward this step which is animated by the best
intentions the Italian High Command at first assumed an attitude of
unmistakable refusal, and it was only on the evening of Wednesday that,
in accord with the Italian High Command, General Weber, accompanied by a
deputation, was permitted to cross the fighting line for preliminary
pourparlers.


General Diaz, the Italian Commander, had referred the Austrian request
to the Versailles Conference, and had acted in accordance with their
direction. In proposing the armistice the Austrians had also expressed
their resolve to bring about peace and to evacuate the occupied
territory of Italy. This was the beginning of the end.

The northern part of Italy is bounded by the Alps, and between those
lofty ranges and the deep valleys there had been constant fighting. In
this fighting, both on mountain and in valley, there were the most
extraordinary deeds of individual heroism, constantly exhibited.

The Alpine regiments, known in Italy as the Alpini, were men of
extraordinary physical powers, accustomed to mountain climbing, and
filled with courage and patriotism. Owing to the nature of the territory
in such contests, only a limited number of men could be used at one
time, and the fighting went on over masses of snow or solid rock. Guns
were hauled up precipices and dugouts excavated in the rock itself. The
Italian troops, clothed in white overalls to prevent their being seen,
moved with great rapidity from point to point, and forced their enemy to
keep constantly on the alert. In the great Italian drive just described
the most bitter fighting was that which occurred in these mountainous
regions.

The work of the Italian aviators is also worthy of special attention.
They not only secured entire command of the air, but by flying low they
often threw into confusion with their machine guns the Austrian
infantry. Their wonderful work in bringing in military information, and
in bombing expeditions, was not excelled, if it was equaled, by the
airmen of any other country. The Italian airplanes themselves were
engineering triumphs. The inventive genius so notable in these days in
Italy found expression in their development. Some of their machines were
the biggest made during the whole war, and the long journeys made by
such machines deserve special mention. The most interesting feat of this
kind was performed on August 9th by the famous poet, Captain Gabrielle
D'Annunzio. Accompanied by eight Italian machines, he flew to the city
of Vienna, a total distance of 620 miles, and dropped copies of an
Allied manifesto over the city. They crossed the Alps in a great wind
storm at a height of ten thousand feet, and all but one returned safely.
The manifesto, which was written by D'Annunzio reads as follows:


People of Vienna, you are fated to know the Italians. We are flying over
Vienna and could drop tons of bombs. On the contrary we leave a
salutation and the flag with its colors of liberty. We Italians do not
make war on children, the aged and women. We make war on your
government, which is the enemy of the liberty of nations,--on your
blind, wanton, cruel government, which gives you neither peace nor
bread, and nurtures you on hatred and delusions. People of Vienna, you
have the reputation of being intelligent, why then do you wear the
Prussian uniform? Now you see the entire world is against you, do you
wish to continue the war? Keep on, then, but it will be your suicide.
What can you hope from the victory promised to you by the Prussian
generals? Their decisive victory is like the bread of the Ukraine,--one
dies while awaiting it. People of Vienna, think of your dear ones,
awake! Long live Italy, Liberty and the Entente!


It was said that copies of this proclamation in Vienna had a value of
fifty dollars a copy. D'Annunzio's great fame had seized upon the
popular imagination. His career in the war would have been interesting
in itself, but when one recognizes that he was already a world figure,
the greatest modern Italian dramatist and novelist, his life seems
almost like a fairy story. Before the war began he made addresses all
over his country, urging Italy's participation in the war, and when war
was declared, to him, as much as to any other man, was due the credit.
He entered the navy, and has written some fascinating descriptions of
his life on board ship. Later he joined the airplane corps, and now was
showering down upon the gaping populace of Vienna appeals to rise
against its Hapsburg masters. D'Annunzio was extraordinary in his
literary career. He had been the poet of passion, a writer of novels and
plays, which, although artistic in the highest degree, showed him to be
an egotist and a decadent. But long before the war he had tired of his
erotic productions and had begun to write the praises of Nature and of
heroes. He had been singing the praises of his country. "La Nave"
symbolizes the glory of Venice. He had become more wholesome. War was
making him not only a man but a hero.

Of course D'Annunzio was not the only great literary man who had left
the study for the battle-field. AEschylus fought at Marathon and
Salamis; Ariosto put down a rebellion for his prince between composition
of cantos of Orlando Furioso; Sir Philip Sydney was scholar, poet and
soldier, and many a soldier when his wars were over has turned to the
labors of the pen. Yet it is not without surprise that one sees
D'Annunzio join this distinguished company, and one's admiration grows
as it becomes plain that he was not a mere poseur. He was a poet, but he
was a soldier too. Not every great poet could drive an airplane to
Vienna.



CHAPTER XLVI

BULGARIA DESERTS GERMANY

During the year 1916 there was little movement in the Balkans. The
Allies had settled down at Saloniki and intrenched themselves so
strongly that their positions were practically impregnable. These
intrenchments were on slopes facing north, heavily wired and with seven
miles of swamp before them, over which an attacking army would have to
pass. It was obviously inadvisable to withdraw entirely the armies at
Saloniki. So long as they were there it was possible at any time to make
an attack on Bulgaria in case Russia or Roumania should need such
assistance. And moreover, it was evident that it was only the presence
of the Saloniki army that kept Greece neutral. During the year there
were a few fights which were little more than skirmishes; almost all of
the German soldiers had been withdrawn, and it was chiefly the Bulgarian
army that was facing the Allies. On May 26th Bulgarian forces advanced
into Greece and occupied Fort Rupel, with the acquiescence of the Greek
Government.

The Greeks were in a difficult position. It was not unnatural that King
Constantine and the Greek General Staff believed that the Allies had
small chance of victory. Moreover, they had no special ambitions which
could be satisfied by a war against the Central Powers. On the other
hand, Turkey was an hereditary enemy, and the big sea coast would put
them at the mercy of the British navy in case they should join their
fortunes to those of Austro-Germany. To an impartial observer their
policy of neutrality, if not heroic, was at least wise. The Greek
Government, therefore, did its best to preserve neutrality. The
surrender of Fort Rupel was not, however, a neutral act and roused in
Greece a strong popular protest.

Venizelos, who at all times was strongly friendly to the Allies and who
was the one great Greek statesman who not only believed in their
ultimate victory but who saw that the true interests of Greece were in
Anatolia and the Islands of the AEgean, was strongly opposed to King
Constantine's action. The Allies showed their resentment by a pacific
blockade, to prevent the export of coal to Greece, with the object of
preventing supplies from reaching the enemy. This led to a certain
amount of excitement and the Allied embassies in Athens were insulted by
mobs. The governments, therefore, presented an ultimatum commanding the
demobilization of the Greek army, the appointment of a neutral Ministry,
and the calling of a new election for the Greek Chamber of Deputies, as
well as the proper punishment of those who were guilty of the disorder.

In substance, the Greeks yielded to the Allied demand, but before a new
election could be held an attack by the Bulgarians on the 17th of August
changed the situation. The Bulgarian armies entered deep in Greek
territory in the eastern provinces and captured the city of Kavalla
without resistance from the armies of Greece. A portion of the Greek
army at Kavalla surrendered and was taken to Germany as "guests" of the
German Government.

This action of the Greek army led to a Greek revolution which broke out
at Saloniki on the 30th of August. The King pursued a tortuous policy,
professing neutrality and yet constantly bringing himself under
suspicion. The Revolutionists organized an army and finally M.
Venizelos, after strong efforts to induce the King to act, became the
head of the Provisional Government of the Revolutionists. The Allies
pursued a policy almost as tortuous as that of King Constantine. They
could not agree among themselves as to the proper policy, and took no
decided course. King Constantine apparently had the support of Russia
and of Italy.

Meantime the fighting against Bulgaria was still proceeding. The main
force of the Allies was directed against the city of Monastir, which,
after considerable fighting, was captured on November 19th. This gave
the Serbians possession of an important point in their own country and
naturally proved a great stimulus to the Serbian armies.

From that time on, and during the year 1917, little was done. Minor
offensives were undertaken, some of which, like the Allied attack upon
Doiran, deserve mention, but on the whole the fighting was a stalemate.
Meanwhile the action of the Greek Government had become so
unsatisfactory that it was finally determined to demand the abdication
of King Constantine, and on June 11th he found himself compelled to
yield. In his proclamation he said:


Obeying necessity of fulfilling my duty toward Greece, I am departing
from my beloved country accompanied by the heir to the crown, and I
leave my son Alexander on the throne. I beg you to accept my decision
with calm.


Early the next morning the King and his family set sail for Italy on his
way to Switzerland, where he became another "King in exile." His son
Alexander accepted the throne and issued the following proclamation:


At the moment when my august father, making a supreme sacrifice to our
dear country, entrusted to me the heavy duties of the Hellenic throne I
express but one single wish--that God, hearing his prayer, will protect
Greece, that He will permit us to see her again united and powerful. In
my grief at being separated in circumstances so critical from my
well-beloved father I have a single consolation: to carry out his sacred
mandate which I will endeavor to realize with all my power, following
the lines of his brilliant reign, with the help of the people upon whose
love the Greek dynasty is supported. I am convinced that in obeying the
wishes of my father the people by their submission will do their part in
enabling us together to rescue our dear country from the terrible
situation in which it finds itself.


The whole country to all appearances received the abdication with
satisfaction. On June 21st, M. Venizelos came to Athens and the Greek
Chamber, which was illegally dissolved in 1915, was convoked and
Venizelos once again became Prime Minister. At last he had succeeded,
and he proceeded at once to join the whole of the Grecian forces to the
cause of the Allies. Of all the statesmen prominent in the Great War,
there was none more wise, more consistent or more loyal than the great
Greek statesman.

For more than a year the Allied armies facing Bulgaria remained upon the
defensive, when, suddenly, on the 16th of September, 1918, in the midst
of the wonderful movements that were forcing back the German armies in
France, a dispatch was received from the Allied forces in Macedonia. The
Serbian army, in co-operation with French and English forces, had
attacked the Bulgarian positions on a ten-mile front, had stormed those
positions and progressed more than five miles. On the next day news was
received that the advance was continuing; that the Allies had occupied
an important series of ridges, and had pierced the Bulgarian front; that
more than three thousand prisoners had been captured and twenty-four
guns. The movement took place about twelve miles east of Monastir and
the ridge of Sokol, and the town of Gradeshnitsa were captured by the
Allied troops.

It soon became evident that one of the most important movements in the
whole war was being carried on. The Bulgarian armies were crumbling, and
the German troops sent to aid them had been put to flight. The Allied
troops had advanced on an average of ten miles and were continuing to
advance. The Serbs, fighting at last near their own homes, were showing
their real military strength. Four thousand prisoners had been taken,
with an enormous quantity of war supplies. The Bulgarian positions which
had yielded so easily were positions which they had been fortifying for
three years, and had been previously thought to be impregnable.

On September 23d it became evident that the retreat of the Bulgarians
had turned into a rout. Notwithstanding reinforcements of Germans and
Bulgars rushed down in a frantic effort to check them, the Allied armies
were advancing on an eighty-five mile front, crushing all resistance.
The Italian army, on the west, was meeting with equal success, and the
news dispatches reported that the first Bulgarian army in the region of
Prilep had been cut off. A dispatch received by the British War Office
reported "As the result of attacks and continual heavy pressure by
British and Greek troops, in conjunction with the French and Serbian
advance farther west, the enemy has evacuated his whole line from Doiran
to the west of the Vardar." As it retreated the Bulgarian army was
burning supplies and destroying ammunition dumps, burning railway
stations and ravaging the country.

By this time it was felt throughout the Allied world that the Bulgarian
defeat would have important political consequences. It was remembered
that a short time before King Ferdinand had paid a visit to Germany, and
after long conferences with the German War Lord, had hastily returned to
Bulgaria. It was recalled that there had been many signs of serious
disorder in Bulgaria, where the Socialist party had been in close touch
with the advance parties in the Ukrainian Republic. It seemed possible
that the Bulgarian defeats had been brought about by Bulgarian
dissension and it was also evident that Germany was in no position to
offer effective support to its Bulgarian accomplice.

As the days passed by the news from this front became more and more
favorable. At all points the Bulgarian armies were retreating in the
most disorderly manner, closely pursued by the Serbians, French,
English, Italians, and Greeks. Bulgarian troops were deserting in
thousands, and thousands of others were surrendering without resistance.

On September 26th it was announced that the Bulgar front had
disappeared; that the armies had been cut into a number of groups and
were fleeing before the Allied troops. Town after town was being
captured, with enormous quantities of stores. On Friday, September 27th,
it was announced that Bulgaria had asked the Allies for an armistice of
forty-eight hours, with a view to making peace.

The situation was now causing intense excitement. The Germans tried to
minimize the Bulgarian surrender. A dispatch from Berlin declared that
Premier Malinoff's offer of an armistice was made without the support of
other members of the Cabinet or of King Ferdinand, and that Germany
would make a solemn protest against it. German newspapers were demanding
that Malinoff be dismissed immediately and court-martialed for high
treason. The Berlin message asserted that the Premier's offer had
created great dissatisfaction in Bulgaria and that strong military
measures had been taken to support the Bulgarian front. According to
statements from Sofia it was added a counter-movement against the action
of the Premier had already been set on foot. It was declared in Germany
that the Premier's act was the result of Germany's refusal to send
sufficient reinforcements to Bulgaria. Secretary Lansing made the
announcement that the United States Government had received a proposal
for an armistice.

It appeared that Bulgaria had been maneuvering toward peace for some
time. The Bulgarians had foreseen their inability to meet the expected
Allied attack, and had made every effort to obtain German
reinforcements. Moreover, they were highly dissatisfied with the
treatment they had received from Germany in connection with Bulgaria's
dispute with Turkey as to territorial dispositions to be made after the
war. Probably the most important reason, however, for the Bulgarian
overthrow was that by this time they were sick of the war. They had not,
in the first place, gone into it with any enthusiasm, and though they
could fight bravely enough against their Serbian foe, no true Bulgarian
could ever feel himself in a natural position facing his old-time
Russian friend.

Bulgaria had come to the end. Malinoff, the Premier, had from the
beginning been opposed to the war. Mobs in Sofia were demanding
surrender. Ferdinand was compelled to give way to the wishes of his
Cabinet and his people, and in spite of the fact that he had promised
the Kaiser to remain faithful to the Alliance, he gave his consent to
the movement for unconditional surrender.

An official Bulgarian statement read as follows: "In view of the
conjunction of circumstances which have recently arisen, and after the
position had been jointly discussed with all competent authorities, the
Bulgarian Government, desiring to put an end to the bloodshed, has
authorized the Commander-in-Chief of the army to propose to the
Generalissimo of the armies of the Entente at Saloniki, a cessation of
hostilities, and the entering into of negotiations for obtaining an
armistice and peace. The members of the Bulgarian delegation left
yesterday evening in order to get into touch with the Plenipotentiaries
of the Entente belligerents." This statement was dated September 24th.

When the Bulgarian officers entrusted with the proposal for an armistice
presented themselves at Saloniki, General d'Esperey gave the following
reply: "My response cannot be, by reason of the military situation,
other than the following. I can accord neither an armistice nor a
suspension of hostilities tending to interrupt the operations in course.
On the other hand, I will receive with all due courtesy the delegates
duly qualified of the Royal Bulgarian Government." The Bulgarian
delegates were General Lonkhoff, commander of the Bulgarian Second Army,
M. Liapcheff, Finance Minister, and M. Radeff, a former member of the
Bulgarian Cabinet.

On the evening of the 29th an armistice was signed. The terms of the
surrender were approved by the Entente governments, and hostilities
ceased at noon September 30th. The terms of the armistice were as
follows:


Bulgaria agrees to evacuate all the territory she now occupies in Greece
and Serbia; to demobilize her army immediately and surrender all means
of transport to the Allies. Bulgaria also will surrender her boats and
control of navigation on the Danube, and concede to the Allies free
passage through Bulgaria for the development of military operations. All
Bulgarian arms and ammunition are to be stored under the control of the
Allies, to whom is conceded the right to occupy all important strategic
points. The military occupation of Bulgaria will be entrusted to
British, French and Italian forces, and the evacuated portions of Greece
and Serbia, respectively, to Greek and Serbian troops.


This armistice meant a complete military surrender, and Bulgaria ceased
to be a belligerent. All questions of territorial rearrangement in the
Balkans were purposely omitted from the Convention. The Allies made no
stipulation concerning King Ferdinand, his position being considered an
internal matter, one for the Bulgarians themselves to deal with. The
armistice was to remain in operation until the final general peace was
concluded.

The request of Bulgaria for an armistice and peace, stunned Germany,
which at that time was living in an atmosphere of political crisis and
military misfortune. The German papers laid much of the blame on the
desperate economic conditions in Bulgaria, which had been made worse by
political strife.

After the Bulgarian collapse the Serbians, with the other Allied troops
who had just captured Uskub, swept northward to drive the remaining
Germans and Austrians out of Serbia and beyond the Danube. On October
13th they captured Nish, thus cutting the famous Orient railroad from
Berlin to Constantinople. German authorities announced that henceforth
trains on this line would run only to the Serbian border.

On October 4th King Ferdinand abdicated his throne in favor of his son
Crown Prince Boris, and left Sofia the same night for Vienna. Before
leaving he issued the following manifesto renouncing the Bulgarian
crown:


By reason of the succession of events which have occurred in my kingdom,
and which demand a sacrifice from each citizen, even to the surrendering
of oneself for the well being of all, I desire to give as the first
example the sacrifice of myself. Despite the sacred ties, which for
thirty-two years have bound me so firmly to this country, for whose
prosperity and greatness I have given all my powers, I have decided to
renounce the royal Bulgarian crown in favor of my eldest son, His
Highness the Prince Royal Boris of Tirnovo. I call upon all faithful
subjects and true patriots to unite as one man about the throne of King
Boris, to lift the country from its difficult situation, and to elevate
new Bulgaria to the height to which it is predestined.


Before signing his declaration of abdication he had consulted with the
party leaders and received their approval. King Ferdinand had lost his
popularity ever since it became apparent that he had made a mistake in
siding with the Teutonic Powers. He was undoubtedly in fear that a
revolution might upset the whole dynasty. Premier Malinoff announced the
abdication to the Bulgarian Parliament, and the accession of Prince
Boris to the throne was received with much enthusiasm. The church bells
were rung, and great crowds gathered in the streets.

Speaking from the steps of the Palace the new King said; "I thank you
for your manifestation of patriotic sentiments. I have faith in the good
star of Bulgaria, and I believe that the Bulgar people, by their good
qualities and co-operation, are directed to a brilliant future." King
Ferdinand, it was given out, had renounced politics and was intending in
the future to devote himself to his favorite pursuits, chiefly to
botany.

The surrender of Bulgaria was at once recognized as the overthrow of
Germany's "Mittel-Europa" threat, which had apparently been carried into
effect when Turkey and Bulgaria joined the Central Powers. It had for a
long time been one of Germany's most coveted aims. After the
Franco-Prussian war the German people had grown enormously in wealth and
in numbers. It had become one of the greatest manufacturing powers in
the world. Its ships were transporting its commerce on every sea, but it
was not satisfied. The German leaders, most of whom were young men at
the time of the war with France, and had been deeply impressed by a
sense of the German power, were full of the idea that Germany was the
greatest of nations, and that she should impress her will on all the
world.

They might have done this peacefully, for the seas were free, but German
self-esteem was not satisfied with peaceful progress. They felt that it
was necessary to reach out in the world for colonies. They seized a
province in China. They meddled with affairs in Morocco. They annexed
colonies in Africa, but none of these projects were wholly satisfactory.
They provided no great outlet for the products of their workshops, nor
for their overflow population, which largely went to North and South
America and became citizens of these foreign nations.

Their eyes finally turned to the great East. There in China and India
and the neighboring countries were three hundred millions of men whose
trade would be a worthy prize for even Germany's ambition. Then began
the development of what is sometimes called Germany's Mittel-Europa
dream. Her scholars encouraged it; her travelers brought reports which
stimulated the interest, and soon she began practically to carry it into
effect. It meant the building of a great railroad down to the Persian
Gulf; a railroad to be controlled by nations where her influence would
be all-powerful. She needed Austria, she needed Serbia, she needed
Bulgaria and Turkey.


[Illustration: Map: Most of Asia, Africa and Australia, showing
Germany's hoped for rail and ship routes from the North Sea to Australia,
South Africa and China.]
  HOW THE PAN-GERMANS PLANNED TO EXTEND THEIR "MITTEL-EUROPA" DREAM


At first the project was carried out peacefully. Friendly relations were
stimulated with Turkey and the other necessary powers; permits were
obtained to build the railroad. But Germany was not the only power that
had dreamed this dream. Alexander the Great had done it. Napoleon had
done it, and England had carried it out. From the days of Queen
Elizabeth the English control of India was one of its greatest assets.

Through most of the nineteenth century the English power in the East was
threatened, not by Germany, but by Russia. It was because of this threat
that England had always protected Turkey. Turkey and Constantinople were
her barrier against Russia. The literature of England in the last days
of the nineteenth century shows clearly her fear of Russian intrigues in
India. Kipling's Indian stories are full of it. But now that fear had
passed. It was no longer the imaginary danger which might come from the
great Slavic Empire, but a trade weapon in the grasp of the most
efficient military power ever developed that was threatening. Against
this threat England had been doing her best. Here and there near the
Persian Gulf she had been extending her influence. Here and there, as
German Consuls obtained concessions, they would find them later
withdrawn, because England had stepped in. Yet just before the war
England, anxious for peace, had come to an agreement with Germany
practically admitting the German plans to be carried out as far as
Bagdad.

It looked as though it were only a question of time, but when the Balkan
wars established Serbia as the greatest of the Balkan powers, and gave
Russia a preponderating influence among the Balkan nations, and when it
began to look as if some great Balkan state might be established which
should be friendly to Russia and consequently a hindrance to the German
scheme, then it was that it was necessary that war should come. The
Germans had been wonderfully successful. For a time they controlled
Austria, Bulgaria, Serbia and Turkey, but with Bulgaria's fall the end
had come. They were compelled to awake from their Mittel-Europa dream.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright Press Illustrating Service
  BULGARIANS CELEBRATE PEACE
  The first peace picture. The Bulgarian army is holding a solemn
  thanksgiving mass on the battlefield just after the signing of the
  armistice which ended their participation in the war.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright Underwood and Underwood, N. Y.
  French Official Photograph
  AMERICAN COLORED SOLDIERS IN ALSACE
  Inspection of arms before going into action. Colored troops were in
  battles with the Germans many times and succeeded in beating the enemy
  in every instance.



CHAPTER XLVII

THE CENTRAL EMPIRES WHINE FOR PEACE

The Allied victories in France during the months of August and September
of 1918, led to a new peace offensive among the Central Powers. It was
very plain to the German High Command, as well as to the Allied leaders,
that Germany's great ambitions had now been definitely thwarted. It
seems clear that, in spite of the hopeful and encouraging words which
they addressed to their own armies, the expert soldiers, who were
controlling the destinies of Germany, understood well the conditions
they were facing. Putting aside all sentiment, therefore, they
deliberately set out to obtain a peace which would leave them an
opportunity to gain by diplomacy what they were sure that they were
about to lose on the field of battle. They had made pleas for peace
before, but their pleas had been rejected.

The Allied leaders were fighting for a principle. They could not be
satisfied with a draw. They could not be satisfied if Germany were left
in a position which would enable her after a rest of a few years to
renew her effort to impose her will upon the world. It was unanimously
recognized that the war must be carried on to the very end. The Allies
took this position when the fortunes of war seemed to have gone against
them, when Russia was defeated, Roumania and Serbia crushed, and the
German lines in France were approaching the capital. It was unlikely
that now, when Germany was suffering defeat and every day was yielding
the Allied armies encouraging gains, there should be any change in the
strong determination of the Allied leaders. Nevertheless, it was
necessary to make the attempt.

On September 15th, the Austro-Hungarian Government addressed a
communication to the Allied Powers and to the Holy See suggesting a
meeting for a confidential and non-binding discussion of war aims, with
a view to the possible calling of a peace conference.

The official communication from the Austro-Hungarian Government was
handed to Secretary of State Lansing in Washington at 6.20 o'clock on
September 16th.

At 6.45 the following abbreviated reply of the United States Government
was made public, by the Secretary of State:


I am authorized by the President to state that the following will be the
reply of this government to the Austro-Hungarian note proposing an
unofficial conference of belligerents. "The Government of the United
States feels that there is only one reply which it can make to the
suggestion of the Austro-Hungarian Government. It has repeatedly and
with entire candor stated the terms upon which the United States would
consider peace, and can and will entertain no proposal for a conference
upon the matter concerning which it has made its position and purpose so
plain."


Arthur J. Balfour, the British Foreign Secretary, in a statement made
September 16th said: "It is incredible that anything can come of this
proposal.... This cynical proposal of the Austrian Government is not a
genuine attempt to obtain peace. It is an attempt to divide the Allies."
Premier Clemenceau in France took similar grounds, and stated in the
French Senate: "We will fight until the hour when the enemy comes to
understand that bargaining between crime and right is no longer
possible. We want a just and a strong peace, protecting the future
against the abominations of the past." Italy joined with her Allies and
declared that a negotiated peace was impossible.

The refusal on the part of the Allies to respond to the Austrian peace
proposal evidently greatly disturbed the German leaders. The continued
German reverses, and the surrender of Bulgaria had taken away all hope.
They were anxious to conclude some kind of peace before meeting
irretrievable disaster. They therefore determined to appoint as
Chancellor of the Empire some statesman who might be represented as a
supporter of an honest peace, and Count von Hertling, whose previous
utterances might put under suspicion any peace move coming from him, was
removed and Prince Maximilian of Baden appointed as his successor on
September 30th.

Prince Maximilian was put forward as a Moderate, in accordance with the
evident purpose of the government to continue peace proposals. He was
the heir apparent to the Grand Ducal throne of Baden, and was the first
man in public life in Germany to declare that the Empire could not
conquer by the sword alone. He did this in an address to the Upper
Chamber in Baden, of which he was President, on December 15, 1917.
"Power alone can never secure our position," he said, "and our sword
alone will never be able to tear down the opposition to us."

At the same time he made an attack upon the ideals set up by President
Wilson. "President Wilson," he continued, "after three years of war
gathers together all the outworn slogans of the Entente of 1914, and
denounces Germany as the disturber of the peace, proclaiming a crusade
for humanity, liberty and the rights of small nations." Then, forgetting
that the United States had entered the war nearly a month after the
abdication of the Czar of Russia, he added: "President Wilson has no
right to speak in the name of democracy and liberty, for he was the
mighty war ally of Russian Czardom, but he had deaf ears when the
Russian democracy appealed to him to allow it to discuss peace
conditions." The Baden address created a great sensation all over
Germany, which was increased when, in an interview in January, he
declared that all ideas of conquest must be abandoned, and that Germany
must serve as a bulwark to prevent the spread of Bolshevism among the
western nations.

There can be no doubt that the appointment of Prince Maximilian was a
definite attempt to seek peace. It was thought that he would be
recognized by the Allied leaders as an honest friend of peace, and that
any effort he would make would be treated with respect. He was, however,
a vigorous supporter of the Kaiser and of German autocracy, and while
his appointment might mean that Germany was desirous of peace it did not
mean that she had changed her ways. Three days before the appointment of
Prince Maximilian, President Wilson, in an address delivered in the
Metropolitan Opera House in New York, had restated the issues of the
war, declaring (1) for impartial justice, (2) settlement to be made in
the common interests of all, (3) no leagues within the common family of
the league of nations, (4) no selfish economic combination within that
league, and (5) all international agreements and treaties of every kind
must be made known in their entirety to the rest of the world.

Prince Maximilian, coming into power undoubtedly for the purpose of
arranging a peace, proceeded at once to make a new peace offer. He based
his action on President Wilson's speech and on October 4th sent to
President Wilson, through the Swiss Government, the following note:


The German Government requests the President of the United States to
take in hand the restoration of peace, acquaint all the belligerent
states with this request, and invite them to send plenipotentiaries for
the purpose of opening negotiations. It accepts the program set forth by
the President of the United States in his message to Congress on January
8th, and in his later pronouncements, especially his speech of September
27th, as a basis for peace negotiations. With a view to avoiding further
bloodshed the German Government requests the immediate conclusion of an
armistice on land and on water and in the air.


He followed this note on October 5th with an address before the German
Reichstag, of which the following are the most important points:


In accordance with the Imperial decree of September 30th, the German
Empire has undergone a basic alteration of its politic leadership. As
successor to Count George F. von Hertling, whose services in behalf of
the Fatherland deserve the highest acknowledgment, I have been summoned
by the Emperor to lead the new government. In accordance with the
governmental method now introduced I submit to the Reichstag, publicly
and without delay, the principles by which I propose to conduct the
grave responsibilities of the office. These principles were firmly
established by the agreement of the federated governments and the
leaders of the majority parties in this honorable House before I decided
to assume the duties of Chancellor. They contain therefore not only my
own confession of political faith, but that of an overwhelming portion
of the German people's representatives--that is, of the German
nation--which has constituted the Reichstag on the basis of a general,
equal, and secret franchise and according to their will.

Only the fact that I know the conviction and will of the majority of the
people are back of me, has given me strength to take upon myself conduct
of the Empire's affairs in this hard and earnest time in which we are
living. One man's shoulders would be too weak to carry alone the
tremendous responsibility which falls upon the government at present.
Only if the people take active part in the broader sense of the word in
deciding their destinies, in other words, if responsibility also extends
to the majority of their freely elected political leaders, can the
leading statesman confidently assume his part of the responsibility in
the service of folk and Fatherland.

My resolve to this has been especially lightened for me by the fact that
prominent leaders of the laboring class have found a way in the new
government to the highest offices of the Empire. I see therein a sure
guarantee that the new government will be supported by the confidence of
the broad masses of the people, without whose true support the whole
undertaking would be compelled to failure in advance. Hence what I say
today is not only in my own name, and those of my official helpers, but
in the name of the German people.

The program of the majority parties, upon which I take my stand,
contains first, an acceptance of the answer of the former Imperial
Government to Pope Benedict's note of August 1, 1916, and an
unconditional acceptance of the Reichstag resolution of July 19th, the
same year. It further declares willingness to join the general league of
nations based on the foundation of equal rights for all, both strong and
weak. It considers the solution of the Belgian question to lie in the
complete rehabilitation of Belgium, particularly of its independence and
territorial integrity. An effort shall also be made to reach an
understanding on the question of indemnity. The program will not permit
the peace treaties hitherto concluded to be a hindrance to the
conclusion of the general peace. Its particular aim is that popular
representative bodies shall be formed immediately on a broad basis in
the Baltic provinces, in Lithuania and Poland. We will promote the
realization of necessary preliminary conditions therefore without delay
by the introduction of civilian rule. All these lands shall regulate
their constitutions and their relations with neighboring peoples without
external interference.


He went on to point out the progressive political developments in
Prussia and declared that the "message of the King of Prussia promising
the democratic franchise must be fulfilled quickly and completely."

President Wilson did not find Prince Maximilian's proposal wholly
satisfactory, and on October 8th, he inquired of the Imperial Chancellor
whether the meaning of the proposal was that the German Government
accepted the terms laid down in his address to the Congress of the
United States and in subsequent addresses; and whether its object in
entering into discussions would be only to agree upon the practical
details of their application. He also suggested that so long as the
armies of the Central Powers were upon the soil of the governments with
which the United States was associated, he would not feel at liberty to
propose a cessation of arms to those governments. He also inquired
whether the Imperial Chancellor was speaking merely for the constituted
authorities of the Empire, who had so far conducted the war.

President Wilson's reply aroused much difference of opinion among the
Allies, but on the whole was regarded as a clever diplomatic move.

The German Government responded to these questions of the President on
October 12th, by a message signed by Dr. W. S. Solf, who had just been
appointed Imperial Foreign Secretary. In this reply the German
Government declared that it did accept President Wilson's terms; that it
was ready to comply with the suggestion of the President and withdraw
its troops from Allied territory, and that the German Government was
representing in all its actions the will of the great majority of the
German people.

Germany had, indeed, made enormous concessions, and the German people
appeared to have taken for granted that such an offer would be accepted.
An Amsterdam despatch declared: "People in Berlin are kissing one
another in the street, though they are perfect strangers and shouting
peace congratulations to each other. The only words heard anywhere in
Germany are 'Peace at last'."

The President however, had been struck by the news coming in from day to
day of new atrocities in France, and of new cases of submarine murders,
and in his reply of October 14th, he declared that while he was ready to
refer the question of an armistice to the judgment and advice of
military advisers of the government of the United States and the Allied
governments, he felt sure that none of those governments would consent
to consider an armistice as long as the armed forces of Germany
continued the illegal and inhuman practices which they were persisting
in. He also emphasized the fact that no armistice would be accepted that
would not provide absolutely satisfactory safeguards and guarantees of
the maintenance of the military supremacy of the armies of the United
States and of the Allies in the field. The President also called the
attention of the Government of Germany to that clause of his address on
the Fourth of July in which he had demanded "the destruction of every
arbitrary power that can separately, secretly and of its single choice
disturb the peace of the world, or, if it cannot be presently destroyed,
at least its reduction to virtual impotency." He declared that the power
which had hitherto controlled the German nation was of the sort thus
described, and that its alteration actually constituted a condition
precedent to peace.

This answer of the President was greeted with approval in the United
States and everywhere in the Allied countries. It meant that the
Imperial Power of Germany was not to be allowed to hide itself behind a
so-called reorganization done under its own direction. As one of the
Senators of the United States expressed it: "It is an unequivocal demand
that the Hohenzollerns shall get out."

During these negotiations the Allied armies under Marshal Foch had been
driving the enemy before them. When Baron Burian was making his peace
offer on behalf of Austria-Hungary the Americans were engaged in
pinching off the St. Mihiel salient, and about that date the British
were launching their great attack on the St. Quentin defenses. The
reports of the great Allied drive indicated a constant succession of
Allied victories.

On September 19th, the British advanced into the Hindenburg line,
northwest of St. Quentin, and on September 20th, while the American guns
were shelling Metz, the British were advancing steadily near Cambrai and
La Bassee.

Day by day the advance proceeded. On September 26th, the first American
army smashed through the Hindenburg line for an average gain of seven
miles, between the Meuse and the Aisne rivers on a twenty-mile front. On
September 27th, the French gained five miles in an advance east of
Rheims, and the British were attacking in the Cambrai sector on a
fourteen-mile front, crossing the Canal du Nord and piercing the
Hindenburg line at several points. On September 28th, the Americans
reached the Kriemhilde line, while the British were close in on Cambrai.
On September 30th, the British took Messines Ridge, while the French
were still advancing between the Aisne and Vesle Rivers. On October 1st,
the French troops entered St. Quentin and the British took the northern
and western suburbs of Cambrai. During the next week an enveloping
movement was instituted north and south of Lille. On October 5th, the
Germans evacuated Lille, on October 9th the British took Cambrai.

In these drives the American colored troops played a conspicuous part.
The entire Three hundred and sixty-fifth regiment, composed wholly of
colored troops, was later awarded the coveted Croix de Guerre, or War
Cross, by the French Government. It was a well-deserved honor, for the
boys of the Three hundred and sixty-fifth bore themselves with great
gallantry in the September and October offensive in the Champagne sector
and suffered heavy losses. In conferring the Croix de Guerre, the
citation dealt in considerable detail with the valor of particular
officers and praised the courage and tenacity of the whole regiment.

The Germans were retreating in Belgium day by day, under the attacks of
the Belgian and French armies. On October 11th the Germans evacuated the
Chemin des Dames. On October 16th the Germans began the evacuation of
the Belgian coast region and each day increased the number of Belgian
towns once more in Allied control.



CHAPTER XLVIII

BATTLES IN THE AIR

He who conquers the fear of death is master of his fate. Upon this
philosophy fifty thousand young men of the warring nations went forth to
do battle among the clouds. The story of these battles is the real
romance of the World War. In 1914 no one had ever known and history had
never recorded a struggle to the death in the air. When the war ended a
new literature of adventure had been created, a literature emblazoned
with superb heroisms, with God-like daring, and with such utter disdain
of death that they were raised out of the olden ranks of mere
earth-crawling mankind and became supermen of the air.

Some of these heroic names became household words during the war. These
were the aces of the French, American and German air-forces. The British
adopted a policy in news concerning their airmen similar to that
governing their publication of submarine sinkings. They argued that the
naming of British, Canadian and Australian aces would direct the attacks
of German aviators against the most useful men in the British forces.
They also felt that publicity would tend toward the swagger which in
English slang was "swank" and toward a deterioration in discipline.

Raoul Lufberry, Quentin Roosevelt, son of ex-President Roosevelt, and
Edward Rickenbacher were names that figured extensively in news of the
American air forces.

Lufberry and Roosevelt were killed in action. Rickenbacher, after dozens
of hair-raising escapes from death, came through the war without
injury. The pioneer of American aviators in the war was William Thaw of
Yale, who formed the original Lafayette Escadrille.

Besides these men, America produced a number of other brilliant aces, an
ace being one who brought down five enemy planes, each victory being
attested by at least three witnesses.

The French had as their outstanding aces Georges Guynemer and Rene
Fonck. Guynemer went into the flying game as a mechanician. He became
the most formidable human fighting machine on the western front before
he was sent to death in a blazing airplane.

Lieut. Rene Fonck ended the war with a total of seventy-five official
aerial victories. He had an additional forty Huns to his credit but not
officially confirmed. His greatest day was when he brought down six
planes. His quickest work was the shooting down of three Germans in
twenty seconds.

He fought three distinct battles in the air when, on May 8, 1918, he
brought down six German airplanes in one day. All three engagements were
fought within two hours. In all, Fonck fired only fifty-six shots, an
average of little more than nine bullets for each enemy brought down--an
extraordinary record, in view of the fact that aviators often fired
hundreds of rounds without crippling their opponent.

The first fight, in which Lieutenant Fonck brought down three German
machines, lasted only a minute and a half, and the young Frenchman fired
only twenty-two shots. Fonck was leading two other companions on a
patrol in the Moreuil-Montdidier sector on May 8th, when the French
squadron met three German two-seater airplanes coming toward them in
arrow formation. Signaling to his companions, Lieutenant Fonck dived at
the leading German plane and, with a few shots sent it down in flames.
Fonck turned to the left, and the second enemy flier followed in an
effort to attack him from behind, but the Frenchman made a quick turn
above him and, with five shots, sent the second German to death. Ten
seconds had barely elapsed between the two victories.

The third enemy pilot headed for home, but when Lieutenant Fonck
apparently gave up the chase and turned back toward the French lines the
German went after him, and was flying parallel and a little below, when
Fonck made a quick turn, drove straight at him and sent him down within
half a mile of the spot where his two comrades hit the earth.

The German heroes were the celebrated Captain Boelke, and the no less
famous inventor of the "flying circus," Count von Richthofen. Captain
Boelke caused a great many Allied "crashes" by hiding in clouds and
diving straight at planes flying beneath him. As he came within range,
he opened up with a stream of machine-gun bullets. If he failed to get
his prey, his rush carried him past his opponent into safety. He rarely
re-attacked. Count von Richthofen was responsible for many airplane
squadron tactics that later were used on both sides. The planes under
his command were gaily painted for easy identification during the thick
of a fight. Their usual method was to cut off single planes or small
groups of Allied planes, and to circle around them in the method
employed by Admiral Dewey for the reduction of the Spanish forts and
ships in the Battle of Manila Bay.

The dangers of aerial warfare were instrumental in producing high
chivalry in all the encampments of air men. Graves of fallen aviators
were marked and decorated by their former foes, and captured aviators
received exceptionally good treatment, where foemen aviators could
procure such treatment for them.

Until the advent of America into the war, neither side had a marked
advantage in aircraft. At first Germany had a slight advantage; then the
balance swung to the Allied side; but at no time was the scale tipped
very much. American quantity production of airplanes, however, gave to
the Entente Allies an overwhelming advantage. Final standardization of
tools and design for the "Soul of the American Airplane" was not
accomplished until February, 1918. Yet within eight months more than
15,000 Liberty engines, each of them fully tested and of the highest
quality, were delivered.

The United States did not follow European types of engines, but in a
wonderfully short time developed an engine standardized in the most
recent efficiency of American industries.

According to Secretary of War Baker, an inspiring feature of this work
was the aid rendered by consulting engineers and motor manufacturers,
who gave up their trade secrets under the emergency of war needs.
Realizing that the new design would be a government design and no firm
or individual would reap selfish benefit because of its making, the
motor manufacturers, nevertheless, patriotically revealed their trade
secrets and made available trade processes of great commercial value.
These industries also contributed the services of approximately two
hundred of their best draftsmen. Parts of the first engine were turned
out at twelve different factories, located all the way from Connecticut
to California. When the parts were assembled the adjustment was perfect
and the performance of the engine was wonderfully gratifying.

Thirty days after the assembling of the first engine preliminary tests
justified the government in formally accepting the engine as the best
aircraft engine produced in any country. The final tests confirmed the
faith in the new motor.

British and French machines as a rule were not adapted to American
manufacturing methods. They were highly specialized machines, requiring
much hand work from mechanics, who were, in fact, artisans.

The standardized United States aviation engine, produced under
government supervision, said Secretary of War Baker, was expected "to
solve the problem of building first-class, powerful and yet
comparatively delicate aviation engines by American machine methods--the
same standardized methods which revolutionized the automobile industry
in this country."

The manufacture of De Haviland airplanes equipped with Liberty motors
was a factor in the war. One of these De Havilands without tuning up,
made a non-stop trip on November 11, 1918, from Dayton, Ohio, to
Washington, D. C., a distance of 430 miles, in three hours and fifty
minutes. Great battle squadrons of these De Haviland planes equipped
with Liberty motors made bombing raids over the German lines in the
Verdun sector. Others operated as scouting and reconnaissance planes and
as spotters for American artillery.

In the period from September 12th to 11 o'clock on the morning on
November 11th, the American aviators brought down 473 German machines.
Of this number, 353 were confirmed officially. Day bombing groups, from
the time they began operations, dropped a total of 116,818 kilograms of
bombs within the German lines.

Bombing operations were begun in August by the 96th Squadron, which in
five flying days dropped 18,080 kilograms of bombs. The first day
bombardment group began work in September, the group including the 96th,
the 20th and 11th Squadrons. The 166th Squadron joined the group in
November.

In twelve flying days in September the bombers dropped 3,466 kilograms
of bombs; in fifteen flying days in October, 46,133 kilograms, and in
four flying days in November, 17,979 kilograms.

On November 11th, the day of the signing of the armistice, there were
actually engaged on the front 740 American planes, 744 pilots, 457
observers and 23 aerial gunners.

Of the total number of planes, 329 were of the pursuit type, 296 were
for observation and 115 were bombers. In addition, several hundred
planes of various types were being used at the instruction camps when
the war ended.

America, although the last of the great nations to embark upon a great
aircraft production program, was the birthplace of the airplane, the
Wright Brothers being the undisputed inventors of the modern type.

Wilbur and Orville Wright made their first experiments in flying at
Kittyhawk, N. C. Their first attempts were of a gliding nature and were
accomplished by starting from the top of a dune or sand hill, the
operator lying full length, face downward, on the under plane of the
machine. During these experiments they succeeded in flying six hundred
feet.

Their first flight with an airplane driven by a motor was on December
17, 1903, when they succeeded in flying about two hundred and seventy
yards in fifty-nine seconds. This machine was driven by a
sixteen-horse-power motor.

Santos Dumont was one of the early pioneers in aeronautical experiments.
After showing a marked talent with balloons, he turned his attention to
heavier-than-air machines, and in 1906 created a world's record in a
flight of 230 yards at a speed of twenty-five miles an hour.

In 1907 Henry Farnum made a half circular flight in a Voisin biplane,
using a fifty-horse-power motor, returning to his starting point. About
this time a flight of nine minutes and fifteen seconds was recorded by
Delagrande on a Voisin constructed biplane.

The first previously announced public flight was made on July 4, 1908,
by Glenn H. Curtiss at Hammondsport, N. Y., and was witnessed by a
number of New Yorkers who had gone to Hammondsport to see the flight.

In the winter of 1913-14 Mr. Rodman Wanamaker gave Glenn H. Curtiss a
commission to build a flying boat which would fly across the Atlantic.
Commander Porte was brought from England, and he, with Mr. Curtiss,
worked out the designs for a flying boat much larger than any previously
built, and fitted with two motors instead of one. As entirely separate
power plants would be used, one motor would naturally run somewhat
faster than the other, and it was freely predicted that the machine
could not be handled. The first trial, however, proved that it would not
only fly, but that after it was once in the air, one motor could be
slowed down and even stopped and the machine continue to fly. This
machine was the forerunner of the seaplane, used by the American,
British and other navies in the war, although somewhat changed in
detail. The beginning of the war stopped the transatlantic experiments
and this machine found its way into the British navy. It was christened
the "America," and the larger flying boats or seaplanes which are now
being built and used by the British and American navies are still known
as the "America" or super-American type.

At first fighting operations were carried out by individual aviators or
comparatively small squadrons, but the battles of March, 1918, witnessed
the definite development of larger squadrons, maneuvering as effectively
as bodies of cavalry, and in massed formation attacking infantry
columns. The possibilities of the new aerial arm were further
demonstrated in the creation of a barrage, as effective as that of heavy
artillery, for the purpose of holding back advancing bodies of infantry.

In the first days of the German offensive there took place an aerial
battle which up to that time was unique in the annals of warfare. It was
a battle not merely for the purpose of gaining the mastery of the air,
but to aid Allied infantry and artillery in stemming the tide of the
German advance, and when the drive finally slowed down and came to a
halt in Picardy, the Allied airmen had undoubtedly contributed largely
to the result.

During March 21 and 22, 1918--the opening days of the great German
drive--there was comparatively little aerial activity. The aviators of
both sides were preparing for the impending battle, which actually began
on the morning of March 23d and lasted all that day and the day
following.

The story of the air battle of March 23d-24th reads like one of the most
extraordinary adventure tales ever imagined. The struggle began with
squadrons of airplanes ascending and maneuvering as perfectly as
cavalry. They rose to dizzy heights, and, descending, swept the air
close to the ground. The individual pilots of the opposing sides then
began executing all manner of movements, climbing, diving, turning in
every direction, and seeking to get into the best position to pour
machine-gun fire into enemy airplanes. Every few minutes a machine
belonging to an Allied or German squadron crashed to the ground, often
in flames. At the end of the first day's fighting wrecked airplanes and
the mangled bodies of aviators lay strewn all over the battle-field.

All next day, March 24th, the struggle in the air went on with unabated
fury. The Allied air squadrons were now on the offensive and penetrated
far inside the German lines. The German aviators counter-attacked
whenever they could, and more than once succeeded in crossing the French
lines. But at the close of the second day victory rested with the Allied
airmen, and during the next five scarcely a German airplane took the
air.

The sudden termination of the war caused speculation throughout the
world concerning the future of the airplane. When rumor declared that
America's newly-won pre-eminence in aviation would disappear, Captain
Roy N. Francis, of the Division of Military Aeronautics, made this
statement.


America cannot afford to junk the airplane fleet which has cost her so
many millions of dollars. I do not believe that any other nation will do
so. Even if the peace congress should decide on universal disarmament,
there are still any number of uses to which airplanes can be put in time
of peace.

Take the air mail service, for instance. This is now only in its
infancy, but it is destined to become as common as the railway mail
service. It will employ hundreds of airplanes and aviators all over the
country.

Then there is the possibility of our machines being used for seacoast
patrol work, a valuable addition to our coast-guard forces which save
many ocean vessels from disaster every year.

They will be largely used for army dispatch work. Instead of sending
official messages from post to post by the present methods, airplanes
will be used after the war as they are now being used at the front.

On the Great Lakes, airplanes can be used for coast-guard work, as on
the seacoast, and they can also be used for patrolling the lakes
themselves. Think how many wrecked lake vessels might have been saved in
the past had there been an airplane nearby to carry its message of
distress and guide rescue ships to the scene.

Forest patrol is still another opening for the use of expert aviators.
Every year, almost, our great forest fires in the northwest demonstrate
that our present methods of prevention of forest fires are faulty;
chiefly because the fires are not discovered while they are still
smoldering. Constant airplane patrol over our great forests would make
forest fires a thing of the past.

Then there are any number of commercial uses to which airplanes can be
put. Instead of a cargo of bombs, a commercial airplane could carry a
cargo of small package freight for which immediate delivery is
necessary.

The use of the airplane for passenger carrying is now being developed.
The huge Caproni and Handley-Page machines will be used for this purpose
in the future. Thousands of persons will want to fly just for the
novelty, and the possibility of accidents will be reduced to the
minimum.

Again, there is the need for scientific research and improvement of the
airplane, which will keep scores of men and machines busy for years.

It will not be necessary, of course, to maintain the numerous government
training fields for aviators after the war, but some of the best of them
should be retained. I do not believe it will be necessary to discharge a
single pilot or observer from the army or to junk a single undamaged
airplane after the war.


Henry Woodhouse, Governor of the Aero Club of America and a world-wide
authority on aeronautics, made the following forecast:


Aircraft capable of lifting fifteen tons, with a speed of one hundred
miles an hour, are now in actual production. The first of the
American-built Caproni planes, equipped with four Liberty motors and
developing 1,750 horse-power has just been successfully tested. This
giant plane has a total lifting capacity of 40,000 pounds, or twenty
tons. The super-Handley-Page or the Caproni could easily carry fifty
bags, or more than a ton of mail. This means 100,000 letters. Judging
the future development of aircraft by what has taken place in the last
two years, we may look for the building of a 5,000-horse-power airplane,
possibly within a year.

If the people of the various cities along the eight great air-ways
already proposed insist on it, at least a dozen additional aerial mail
lines can be established within twelve months. This can be done by
utilizing only machines not needed by the army or navy. That means it
will be possible to send by postplane at least 50,000,000 of the
100,000,000 day and night letters, and at least 25,000,000 of the
50,000,000 special delivery letters that are sent each year in the
United States.

Postoffice officials estimate that the average cost of telegraphic day
and night letters now going over the wires is close to one dollar each.
Special delivery letters average about thirteen cents apiece.

This makes a total of more than fifty million dollars' worth of
potential aerial mail business that is simply waiting for the
establishment of aerial mail routes which can easily be established
within the next twelve months.

Four hundred miles is the distance over which postplane day mail is most
effective. Aerial mail letters are effective over any distance, since,
with proper stations, light signals and guides for night postplane
flying, the air mail can be carried more than one thousand miles between
the hours of 6 P. M. and 8 A. M.

The cost of aerial mail night and day letters will be less than that of
wire communication. The cost of an aerial mail letter is sixteen cents
for two ounces. For this price there can be sent a message that would
cost five dollars to send by telegraph.

The estimate of $50,000,000 of potential postplane business takes no
account of the possibilities of transporting parcel post aerial mail.
One of the Caproni 2,100-horse-power machines now in operation could
easily transport 2,500 pounds of mail. At least $25,000,000 worth of
parcel post could be sent by airplane.

Enthusiasts who look forward to the transatlantic transportation of
aerial mail as certain to come within the next twelve-month assert that
there is another twenty-five million dollars' worth of transatlantic
mail waiting for an aerial mail service. They point out that Uncle Sam
now pays eighty cents a pound to American steamships to carry
transatlantic mail and that a charge of one dollar per letter across the
Atlantic would be a paying proposition.


[Illustration: Painting]
  Copyright Illustrated London News.
  PICKING ONE "OFF THE TAIL"
  The German Albatross airplane going down in flames was in pursuit of
  the light British "Quick" machine seen on the left, when suddenly a
  British Nieuport (at the right) dived through the clouds. The
  Albatross nose-dived, the British following with his guns working, and
  soon the German burst into flames and crashed to earth, his pursuer
  straightening out his course.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  CARRYING THE WAR INTO GERMANY
  Mechanics "tuning up" one of the giant British bombing machines
  developed in 1918 that raided Germany. The size is shown by comparison
  with the human figures. Note the forward gunner, the pilot, the rear
  gunner and the window of the commodious cock-pit within which the
  airmen could stand upright.


Charges of mismanagement and graft were investigated by the United
States Senate and by the Department of Justice. Former Justice of the
United States Supreme Court Charles E. Hughes was named by President
Wilson to conduct the latter inquiry. Waste was found, due largely to
the emergency nature of the contract. Justice Hughes recommended that
Col. Edward Deeds, of the United States Signal Corps, be tried by court
martial for his connection with certain contracts, and recommended that
several other persons be tried in the United States courts. Justice
Hughes and the Senate Investigation Committee gave their unqualified
approval to the management of America's aircraft production by John D.
Ryan. Mr. Ryan resigned his charge as head of the Aircraft Production
Board in November, 1918. His last public announcement was of the
invention of an aerial telephone, by which the commander of a squadron
standing on the ground could communicate with-aviators flying in battle
formation.



CHAPTER XLIX

HEALTH AND HAPPINESS OF THE AMERICAN FORCES

Since the fateful day when Cain slew Abel, thereby setting a precedent
for human warfare, no fighter has been so well protected from disease
and discomfort of mind and body, so speedily cured of his wounds, as the
American soldier and sailor during the World War.

The basis of this remarkable achievement was sanitary education preached
first by competent physicians and sociologists; then by newspapers to
the civilian population; and ultimately by the soldiers and sailors
themselves, each man acting as an evangel of personal and community
health and sanitation. In 1914, before war was declared, the words
"venereal diseases" were relegated to the advertisements of quacks and
patent medicines. When the war ended, virtually every young and old man
and woman knew the meaning of the words and the miseries that come in
their train. So it was with other details of the care of the human body,
with sewage problems, with the grave community question of pure water,
with the use of intoxicating beverages, and with other problems
inter-woven with the health and happiness of humanity.

Among the leaders in this wide-flung campaign of education was the
American Red Cross. Starting with a mere nominal membership before the
war, its roster rose to the mighty total of more than 28,000,000
American men, women and children when the war ended. More than
$300,000,000 was poured into the American Red Cross treasury. In
addition to these contributions of money, came the free services of
millions of Americans, mostly women. Red Cross workshops dotted the
land, and from these came bandages, sweaters, comfort-kits, trench
necessities, clothing for homeless refugees, and a vast quantity of
material aid in every conceivable form. American Red Cross workers
during the war knitted 14,089,000 garments for the army and navy. In
addition, the workers turned out 253,196,000 surgical dressings,
22,255,000 hospital garments and 1,464,000 refugee garments.  Sewing
chapters repaired old clothing and sent it overseas to the orphaned and
the widowed, and millions of Americans learned the sublime lesson of
sacrifice through the Red Cross--a lesson that left its imprint upon
America for generations.

The work of the American Red Cross extended through many lands. It
followed the flags of the Entente Allies into Palestine, Mesopotamia,
India, South Africa, and other battle-grounds. Its work on the western
front was a miracle of achievement. In Russia through the Red Terror of
the Revolution the workers of the American Red Cross went serenely about
their tasks of mercy, relieving the hungry, aiding the sick, and
clothing the ragged peasants.

Henry P. Davidson left the firm of J. P. Morgan & Company to devote his
administrative genius to the affairs of the American Red Cross. Other
men and women of rare executive ability joined in the free tender of
their services to the work of the Red Cross.

While the organization strove mightily against famines, wounds and
disease overseas, it was suddenly confronted during the period from
September 8th to November 9th, 1918, with the severest epidemic America
had experienced in generations. Returning American troops brought the
germs of the malady known as "Spanish influenza" into New York and
Boston. Thence it spread throughout the country. During its brief career
the epidemic claimed a total of 82,306 deaths in forty-six American
cities, having a combined population of 23,000,000. Philadelphia, a
great center of war industry, with the Philadelphia Navy Yard harboring
thousands of sailors and marines, showed the highest mortality in
proportion to population, 7.4 per 1,000; Baltimore with 6.7 per 1,000
showed the next greatest mortality.

The record of the Red Cross in this epidemic was one of instant service.
Hundreds of thousands of masks were made in Red Cross workrooms, and
these were worn by nurses and by members of families in afflicted homes.

On May 1, 1917, just before the appointment of the War Council, the
American Red Cross had 486,194 members working through 562 chapters. On
July 31, 1918, the organization numbered 20,648,103 annual members,
besides 8,000,000 members of the Junior Red Cross--a total enrollment of
over one-fourth the population of the United States. These members
carried on their Red Cross work through 3,854 chapters, which again
divided themselves into some 30,000 branches and auxiliaries.

The total actual collections from the first war fund amounted to more
than $115,000,000. The subscriptions to the second war fund amounted to
upward of $176,000,000. From membership dues the collections
approximated $24,500,000.

The Home Service of the Red Cross with its more than 40,000 workers,
extended its ministrations of sympathy and counsel each month to upward
of 100,000 families left behind by soldiers at the front.

Supplementing, but not duplicating, the work of the American Red Cross,
were the services of the Y. M. C. A., Y. W. C. A., Knights of Columbus,
Jewish Welfare Association, Salvation Army, American Library Association
and other bodies.

These operated under the general supervision of the War and Navy
departments: Commissions on Training Camp Activities. Raymond B. Fosdick
was the chairman of both these bodies. Concerning these commissions,
President Wilson declared:


I do not believe it an exaggeration to say that no army ever before
assembled has had more conscientious and painstaking thought given to
the protection and stimulation of its mental, moral and physical
manhood. Every endeavor has been made to surround the men, both here and
abroad, with the kind of environment which a democracy owes to those who
fight in its behalf. In this work the Commissions on Training Camp
Activities have represented the government and the government's
solicitude that the moral and spiritual resources of the nation should
be mobilized behind the troops. The country is to be congratulated upon
the fine spirit with which organizations and groups of many kinds, some
of them of national standing, have harnessed themselves together under
the leadership of the government's agency in a common ministry to the
men of the army and navy.


Afloat and ashore the organizations operating under the supervision of
the two commissions gave to the men of the American forces home care,
suitable recreation, and constant protection. The club life of the army
and navy, both in the training camps and after the men went into the
service, was most capably directed by the Y. M. C. A., Knights of
Columbus, and the Jewish Welfare Association. Non-sectarianism was the
rule in all of the huts and clubs conducted by these organizations.
Catholic, Protestant and Jewish chaplains mingled with workers of the
Salvation Army, with professional prize-fighters who became athletic
instructors, with actors and actresses who contributed their talents
freely to the entertainment of soldiers and sailors. Moving-picture
shows, boxing contests, continuation schools, canteens where women
workers served American-made dishes--these were some of the activities
following the men. The Y. M. C. A. and Knights of Columbus bore the
largest share of this work. More than $300,000,000 was contributed by
the people of America to the maintenance of these activities.

The other organizations rounded out the work of the first two
organizations and filled in with special attention to needs on which the
others did not specialize.

The larger organization, the Y. M. C. A., was chosen by the government
to carry out a portion of the government program--the conducting of the
canteens.

The Knights of Columbus specialized in comforts less considered by other
war relief organizations.

Nothing gave greater relaxation to the fighting man, coming from the
trenches, or the battle line caked with mud and blood and weary with
long hours, than a shower bath, and generous facilities were provided
close to the fighting front.

Back of the lines in the rest billets and concentration camps,
provisions were less generous than at the front until the Knights of
Columbus took up the task of seeing that the men who were temporarily
away from the active fighting had these facilities for bathing. It was
but one of the many activities of the Knights of Columbus, but one of
the most appreciated.

One of the first requisitions made by Rev. John B. De Valles, one of the
first chaplains sent over by the Knights of Columbus, was for a shower
bath and he set it up in connection with his headquarters in a little
French town and it was overworked from the first. From this spread the
movement for establishing shower baths in club houses being opened
behind the lines and in villages.

There was no preaching in a Knights of Columbus hall or club room, but
there was clean moral environment and healthy recreation and amusement,
for this was proven the thing to keep up the morale of fighting men.

The Y. M. C. A. built 1,500 huts in Europe costing from $2,000 to
$20,000 each, equipped with canteen, reading and writing and
recreational facilities to soldiers. It operated twenty-eight different
leave areas with hotels that had a total of 35,000 beds. In addition, in
Paris, port towns, and several big centers in the war zone there were
"Y" hotels for transient soldiers where one could get a clean bed and a
good meal at about half the price charged by French hotels. Over 3,000
movie and theatrical shows a week were provided free, and 300 "Y"
athletic directors had charge of the sports in the American army,
operating 836 athletic fields. Enormous quantities of cookies and
chocolate and cigarettes were supplied.

A hundred of the best known educators from America directed educational
work. The staff consisted of Professor Erskine of Columbia University,
Professor Daly of Harvard, Professor Coleman of Chicago University,
Professor Appleton of the University of Kansas and Frank Spaulding,
superintendent of the Cleveland public schools.

Seconding the work of the Y. M. C. A., its sister organization, the Y.
W. C. A., extended its activities from the training camps of America to
the battle-fields of Europe.

At the close of its first year of America's participation in the war,
the Y. W. C. A. had six established lines of work in France:

Hostess Houses, clubs for French working women and business girls, clubs
for nurses with the American army, clubs for women of the signal corps,
clubs for British women (Waac's) working with the American army, and
recreation work for all women employed in any way by the American
Expeditionary Force. In one year its activities spread to twenty-five
cities, and it had forty-three units.

The Hostess Houses were at Paris and Tours. The Hotel Petrograd, on the
Rue Caumartin, was leased in Paris and turned out to be one of the most
interesting centers of American life in France. It was run on the most
liberal lines, in a thoroughly democratic way. The meals were good and
in the big dining-room men were admitted on the same footing as women.
There were two of these Hostess Houses at Tours.

For the girls of the signal corps twenty-two homes were opened and there
were huts for the Waacs at Bourges and Tours. Y. W. C. A. secretaries
were attached to twenty base hospital units and opened fourteen clubs
for nurses.

The most interesting and unique work of the Y. W. C. A. was that of its
foyers for French working women and business girls. There were thirteen
of these in Lyons, Rouen, Bourges, Tours, Ste. Etienne, Paris and Mont
Lucon.

The Salvation Army erected hotels at the various large training camps in
America, and its workers made American doughnuts for the soldiers close
to the battle-lines in France. The work done by the men and women of the
Salvation Army aided materially in bringing the heart of America into
France.

The Jewish Welfare Association not only performed notable service in
following the men from training camps into actual service, but it also
planned and executed a great reconstruction program under the direction
of Felix M. Warburg, chairman of the Joint Distribution Committee.

The American Library Association solved the grave problem of providing
the soldiers and sailors with suitable reading matter. Each of the
cantonments had its special library building in charge of a trained
librarian, and interesting literature followed the men into the field
through the services of this organization.

Some idea of the work of these various organizations is gained by
reading the following order received by Raymond B. Fosdick at his
headquarters in Washington after the steamship Kansas carrying supplies
for the various huts at American field quarters, was sunk:


Send 20 tons plain soap, 20 tons condensed milk, 10 tons chocolate, 5
tons cocoa, 2 tons tea, 5 tons coffee, 5 tons vanilla wafers, 50 tons
sugar, 20 tons flour, 2 tons fruit essences, 2 tons lemonade powder,
120,000 Testaments, 120,000 hymn-books, tons of magazines and other
literature, 30 tons writing-paper and envelopes, 50,000 folding chairs,
500 camp cots, 2,000 blankets, 20 typewriters, 60 tents, 75
moving-picture machines, 200 phonographs, 5,000 records, 1 ton ink
blotters, $75,000 worth athletic goods, 30 automobiles and trucks.


The order was filled at once.

Besides the associations above enumerated, other volunteer organizations
contributed to the health and happiness of American soldiers and
sailors. The Emergency Aid of Pennsylvania established two clubs, one in
Paris, the other in Tours, both of which performed notable services in
feeding and restoring the spirits of American soldiers and sailors. The
club in Paris was under the direction of the Rev. Frederick W. Beekman,
and that at Tours was directed by Amos Tuck French. Mrs. Barclay
Warburton of Philadelphia was designated by Governor Brumbaugh as
Commissioner-General of Overseas Work for the Emergency Aid. Other
states had similar organizations looking after the comfort of the men.

But it was upon the professional doctors, nurses and sanitarians that
the bulk of the task devolved. This task included the prevention as well
as the cure of maladies menacing the American forces. It reached out
into years after the war into the problems of re-education and
re-habilitation of the shell-shocked and the wounded. Major-General
William C. Gorgas, former Surgeon General of the Army, stated this
concept when he said:

"The whole conception of governmental and national responsibility for
caring for the wounded has undergone radical change during the months of
study given the subject by experts serving with the Medical Officers'
Reserve Corps and others consulting with them. Instead of the old idea
that responsibility ended with the return of the soldier to private life
with his wounds healed and such pension as he might be given, it is now
considered that it is the duty of the government to equip and re-educate
the wounded man, after healing his wounds, and to return him to civil
life ready to be as useful to himself and his country as possible."

To carry out this idea reconstruction hospitals were established in
large centers of population. Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore,
Washington, Buffalo, Cincinnati, Chicago, St. Paul, Seattle, San
Francisco, Los Angeles, Denver, Kansas City, St. Louis, Memphis,
Richmond, Atlanta and New Orleans were sites of these institutions. Each
was planned as a 500-bed hospital but with provision for enlargement to
1,000 beds if needed.

These hospitals were not the last step in the return of the wounded
soldiers to civil life. When the soldiers were able to take up
industrial training, further provision was ready.

Arrangements were made by the Department of Military Orthopedics to care
for soldiers, so far as orthopedics (the prevention of deformity) was
concerned, continuously until they were returned to civil life.
Orthopedic surgeons were attached to the medical force near the firing
line and to the different hospitals back to the base orthopedic hospital
which was established within one hundred miles of the firing line. In
this hospital, in addition to orthopedic surgical care, there was
equipment for surgical reconstruction work and "curative workshops" in
which men acquired ability to use injured members while doing work
interesting and useful in itself. This method supplanted the old and
tiresome one of prescribing a set of motions for a man to go through
with no other purpose than to re-acquire use of his injured part.

Instructors and examiners for all the troops were furnished by the
Department of Military Orthopedic Surgery. A number of older and more
experienced surgeons acted as instructors and supervisors for each of
the groups into which the army was divided.

A peculiar condition arising from the use of heavy artillery in the war
was that called "shell-shock."

The most pathetic wrecks of war were soldiers suffering from shattered
nerves. Paris had many of them. They appeared to be normal. But they
were human wrecks.

Shell-shock or the aftermath of illness from wounds left them in
weakened health, subject to violent heart attacks. Most of them lacked
energy and perseverance. They became awkward, like big children. If
employment was found for them--for many had large families to
support--they quickly lost their jobs through apathy or collapse.

A society in Paris did everything possible to relieve the sufferings of
these victims of the war. It operated with the authorization of the
French Government under the name "L'Assistance aux Blesses Nerveux de
la Guerre."

American hospitals after the war contained many of these cases. Some of
the victims became incurably insane.

Besides the noble work done by the great army of American physicians,
surgeons and nurses, in caring for soldiers and sailors, a service of
scarcely less magnitude was rendered to the civilian populations of
France, Belgium and Italy. Tuberculosis in France was a real plague,
taking a toll of 80,000 lives every year. American physicians and nurses
preached the doctrine of fresh air, care of the teeth and proper food
for children. Almost immediately this campaign of sanitation had its
effect in a decreasing death-rate from tuberculosis.

European nations generally were benefited by the stay of the American
army overseas. The straightforward manner in which the social evil was
attacked had direct benefits. The important detail of dental care also
received an interest through the advent of the American soldier. The
London Daily Mail made this comment on that question:

"One thing about the American soldiers and sailors must strike English
people when they see these gallant fighters, and that is the soundness
and general whiteness of their teeth. From childhood the 'Yank' is
taught to take care of his teeth. He has 'tooth drill' thrice daily and
visits his dentist at fixed periods, say, every three or four months. If
by chance a tooth does decay, the rot is at once arrested by gold or
platinum filling. American dentists never extract a tooth. No matter how
badly decayed it may be, they save the molar by crowning it with gold.

"The United States soldiers have set us a splendid example in this
matter. They fairly shame the ordinary 'Tommy' by the brilliance of
their molars, but they will do so no longer if young English mothers
will only wake up to the fact that bad teeth cause bad health, and that
doctors' and dentists' bills will be saved by the regular use of the
tooth-brush."



CHAPTER L

THE PIRATES OF THE UNDER-SEAS

Germany relied upon the submarine to win the war. This in a nut-shell
explains the main reason why the United States was drawn into the World
War. Von Tirpitz, the German Admiral, obsessed with the theory that no
effective answer could be made to the submarine, convinced the German
High Command and the Kaiser that only through unrestricted submarine
warfare could England be starved and the war brought to an end with
victory for Germany. Since August, 1914, the theory held by von Tirpitz
and his party of extremists had been combated by Prince Maximilian of
Baden and by Chancellor von Bethmann-Hollweg and by others high in the
council of the Kaiser. These men pointed out that, leaving out such
questions as piracy on the high seas, the drowning of women and
children, the destruction of the property of neutrals, there still
remained the question of expediency. America, they asserted, was certain
to enter the war if unrestricted submarine warfare was decreed. These
men were denounced as cowards and von Tirpitz finally triumphed.

The submarine employed by the Germans was of the type designed by Simon
Lake, an American. The Germans bought two submarines built by Mr. Lake
at Kronstadt for the Russians during the Russian-Japanese war. Various
improvements upon the Diesel engine and special training for submarine
crews enabled the German navy to strike terrible blows during the early
part of the war.

Little by little, however, the Allies discovered the answer to the
submarine menace. One of these was the convoy: fleets of merchant
vessels surrounded by fast destroyers made life a misery for the
submarine crews. In the early days vessels of all character fled from
the approach of the submarine. The destroyers of the convoys, however,
adopted a different method. They rushed at the periscopes in efforts to
ram the submarine, and as they raced over the spot where the submarine
had been at the rate of twenty-two knots or more an hour, they dropped
huge containers, dubbed "ash cans", containing depth charges of
trinitrotoluol.

Sea planes carrying bombs, small dirigible balloons known as "blimps,"
observation balloons moored on the decks of warships, steel nets, and
especially devised anti-submarine mines, were also factors in the
general work of submarine destruction.

In addition to all these, every ship, both cargo carrier and war vessel,
had its well-trained gun crew, and hundreds of thousands of keen-eyed
mariners daily and nightly swept the seas with binoculars watching for
anything that resembled a periscope.

As a consequence of this combination of destructive agencies the British
Admiralty was enabled to announce at the close of the war that more than
150 German submarines had been destroyed.

The names of the commanding officers of the German submarines which had
been disposed of were given out by the government in order to
substantiate to the world the statement made by the Prime Minister in
the House of Commons on August 7th, and denied in the German papers,
that "at least 150 of these ocean pests had been destroyed." The
statement included no officers commanding the Austrian submarines, of
which a number had been destroyed, and did not exhaust the list of
German submarines put out of action.

The fate of the officers was given, and of these the majority (116) were
dead; twenty-seven were prisoners of war, six were interned in neutral
countries where they took refuge, and one succeeded in returning to
Germany.

Further light on the subject of German submarines was given on September
18, 1918, by Senator William H. Thompson of Kansas in a speech in which
he told the Senate:


The submarine is no longer a serious menace to transportation across the
seas. It is, of course, an annoyance and a great hindrance, and as long
as there is a single submarine in the waters of the sea every effort
must be made by the allied powers to destroy it, for it is an outlaw and
must not exist. The truth is that Germany never had more than 320
submarines all told, including all construction before and since the
war.

We have positive knowledge of the destruction of more than one-half of
these submarines, and we also know that it is practically impossible for
Germany to keep in operation more than 10 per cent of those remaining.
It is therefore reduced to a negligible quantity so far as its ultimate
effect upon the result of the war is concerned.

1 saw a reliable statement in France to the effect that there is one
ship of some character leaving the eastern shores of America for the war
zone every six minutes, and it is only a few vessels which are ever
torpedoed, estimated at about one per cent. This is less than the loss
by storm and accident in the earlier days of transportation and is not
much greater than such loss now. We must bear in mind that we read only
of the ships which have been torpedoed and see but little account of the
hundreds of ships which pass over the ocean safely and undisturbed.
Three hundred thousand soldiers are conveyed across the Atlantic every
thirty days, and an average of about 500,000 tons of freight carried to
the French coast. There are warehouses in only one of the many ports of
France with a capacity of over 2,000,000 tons.

It is to the navy that the credit for the destruction of this outlaw
seagoing craft is due. The navy is and has been the backbone of this
war, the same as it has been of almost every great war in history.
Without the allied navy the submarine would have perhaps accomplished
its nefarious purpose in starving the European allies and in preventing
them from securing the necessary munitions of war to defend themselves.
It has utterly failed in this respect. The Allies are amply supplied
with food, and there are provisions enough on hand now, if every ship
should be sunk, to last the Allies and armies for months. The destroyer
is the ship which has brought Germany to her knees in submarine warfare
and will keep her there. We have not enough destroyers, and it is for
this reason we are obliged in this great transportation problem to run
risks which would not be taken under ordinary conditions. If every ship
was escorted by a sufficient number of destroyers I doubt if there would
be a single ship of any consequence sunk, except by the merest accident.


Upon the same subject, Sir Eric Geddes, First Lord of the British
Admiralty, on October 14th, reviewing the British effort in the war said
that during 1918 the casualties of the British on the western front
equaled those of all the Allies combined. The British navy, he said,
since the beginning of the war had lost in fighting ships of all classes
a total of 230, more than twice the losses in war vessels of all the
Allies.

In addition to these, Great Britain had lost 450 auxiliary craft, such
as mine-sweepers and trawlers, making a total of 680. He revealed the
fact that the effective warship barrage, which had been drawn between
the Orkneys and Norway against German submarines and surface craft, was,
during the later months of the war, maintained largely by ships of the
United States.

The British merchant ships lost since 1914 exceeded 2,400, representing
a gross tonnage of 7,750,000, nearly three times the aggregate loss of
all other allied and neutral countries.

In his statement on the submarine situation he said:


In February, 1917, the ruthless submarine warfare confronted us, whilst
the armies in France at that time were feeling a sense of superiority
over the enemy which was illustrated by the successes of the battle of
Arras, the taking of Vimy Ridge, the advance between the Ancre and the
Somme, the offensive in Champagne, Chemin des Dames, Messines and
Passchendaele Ridges. Thus we felt, and rightly felt, that the weakest
front at that time was the sea--not on the surface, but under water.

The whole of the available energies of the Allies were consequently
thrown into overcoming the submarine and the menace which threatened to
destroy the lines of communication of the Alliance. The reduced sinkings
which have been published since that period show how we gradually
overcame that menace--and today most men say that the submarine menace
is a thing of the past.

That it is a thing of the past in so far as it can never win the war for
the enemy or enable the enemy to prevent us from winning the war,
provided we do not underrate the danger but take adequate steps against
it, I affirm now as the opinion of the British Admiralty; but it is a
menace that comes and goes.


The end of the great submarine menace came on November 20th, when twenty
German submarines were officially surrendered to Rear-Admiral Tyrwhitt
of the British Navy, thirty miles off Harwich, England. Within the
following week more than eighty other German submarines and a number of
Austrian craft were also surrendered to the British. The spectacle of
the surrender was most impressive.

After steaming some twenty miles across the North Sea, the Harwich
forces, which consisted of five light cruisers and twenty destroyers,
were sighted. The flagship of Admiral Tyrwhitt, the commander, was the
Curacao. High above about the squadron hung a big observation balloon.

The squadron, headed by the flagship, then steamed toward the Dutch
coast, followed by the Coventry, Dragoon, Danal and Centaur. Other ships
followed in line with their navigation lights showing. The picture was a
noble one as the great vessels, with the moon still shining, plowed
their way to take part in the surrender of the German U-boats.

Soon after the British squadron started the "paravanes" were dropped
overboard. These devices are shaped like tops and divert any mines which
may be encountered, for the vessels were now entering a mine field.

Almost everyone on board donned a life belt and just as the red sun
appeared above the horizon the first German submarine appeared in sight.

Soon after seven o'clock twenty submarines were seen in line,
accompanied by two German destroyers, the Tibania and the Sierra
Ventana, which were to take the submarine crews back to Germany after
the transfer.

All the submarines were on the surface with their hatches open and their
crews standing on deck. The vessels were flying no flags whatever and
their guns were trained fore and aft, in accordance with the terms of
surrender.

A bugle sounded on the Curacao and all the gun crews took up their
stations, ready for any possible treachery.

The leading destroyer, in response to a signal from the admiral, turned
and led the way towards England and the submarines were ordered to
follow. They immediately did so. The surrender had been accomplished.

Each cruiser turned, and, keeping a careful lookout, steamed toward
Harwich. On the deck of one of the largest of the submarines, which
carried two 5.9 guns, twenty-three officers and men were counted. The
craft was estimated to be nearly 300 feet in length. Its number had been
painted out.

Near the Ship Wash lightship three large British seaplanes, followed by
an airship, were observed. One of the submarines was seen to send up a
couple of carrier pigeons and at once a signal was flashed from the
admiral that it had no right to do this.

When the ships had cleared the mine field and entered the war channel
the "paravanes" were hauled aboard. On reaching a point some twenty
miles off Harwich the ships dropped anchor and Captain Addison went out
on the warship Maidstone.

British crews were then put on board the submarines to take them into
harbor. With the exception of the engine staffs all the German sailors
remained on deck. The submarines were then taken through the gates of
the harbor and the German crews were transferred to the transports and
taken back to Germany.

As the boats went through the gates a white signal was run up on each of
them with the German flag underneath.

Each German submarine commander at the transfer was required to sign a
declaration to the effect that his vessel was in running order, that its
periscope was intact, that its torpedoes were unloaded and that its
torpedo heads were safe.

Orders had been issued forbidding any demonstration and these
instructions were obeyed to the letter. There was complete silence as
the submarines surrendered and as the crews were transferred.

On November 21st, the German High Seas fleet that had been protected by
the submarines surrendered to the combined fleet consisting of British,
American and French battleships. The British admiralty's terse statement
concerning the historic spectacle follows:


The commander-in-chief of the Grand Fleet has reported that at 9.30
o'clock this morning he met the first and main installment of the German
high seas fleet, which is surrendering for internment. Admiral Sir David
Beatty is Commander-in-chief of the Grand Fleet.


On the same day another flotilla of German U-boats also was surrendered
to a British squadron. There were nineteen submarines in all; the
twentieth broke down on the way.

The Grand Fleet, accompanied by five American battleships and three
French cruisers, steamed out at 3 o'clock on the morning of November
21st, from its Scottish base to accept the surrender. The vessels moved
in two long columns.

The German fleet which surrendered consisted of nine battleships, five
cruisers, seven light cruisers and fifty destroyers, Seventy-one vessels
in all. There remained to be surrendered two battleships, which were
under repair, and fifty modern torpedo-boat destroyers.

One German destroyer while on its way across the North Sea with the
other ships of the German High Seas fleet to surrender struck a mine. It
was so badly damaged that it sank.

Describing the surrender of the German warships to Sir David Beatty, the
Commander-in-Chief of the grand fleet, correspondents said that after
all the German ships had been taken over, the British admiral went
through the line on the Queen Elizabeth, every Allied vessel being
manned and greeting the admiral and the flagship with loud and ringing
cheers.


[Illustration: Painting]
  GERMAN PIRACY ON THE HIGH SEAS
  After torpedoing their ship the submarine shelled the lifeboats and
  jeered at the struggles of the helpless crew.


[Illustration: Painting]
  Courtesy of Joseph A. Steinmetz, Phila.
  THE EYE OF THE SUBMARINE
  Diagram of a periscope, showing how, when its tip is lifted out of
  water, a picture of the sea's surface is reflected downward from a
  prism, through lenses, and then a lower prism, hence to the officer's
  eye. It turns in any direction.


The British grand fleet put to sea in two single lines six miles apart,
and so formed as to enable the surrendering fleet to come up the center.
The leading ship of the German line was sighted between 9 and 10 o'clock
in the morning. It was the Seydlitz, flying the German naval ensign.

A telegram received in Amsterdam from Berlin gave this list of
surrendered warships, which includes one more battleship than later
reports showed:

Battleships--Kaiser, 24,113 tons; Kaiserin, 24,113 tons; Koenig Albert,
24,113 tons; Kronprinz Wilhelm, 25,000 tons; Prinzregent Luitpold,
24,113 tons; Markgraf, 25,293 tons; Grosser Kurfuerst, 25,293 tons;
Bayern, 28,000 tons; Koenig, 25,293 tons, and Friedrich der Grosse,
24,113.

Battle Cruisers--Hindenburg, 27,000 tons; Derflinger, 28,000 tons;
Seydlitz, 25,000 tons; Moltke, 23,000 tons, and Van Der Tann, 18,800
tons.

Light Cruisers--Bremen, 4,000 tons; Brummer, 4,000 tons; Frankfurt,
5,400 tons; Koeln, tonnage uncertain; Dresden, tonnage uncertain, and
Emden, 5,400 tons.



CHAPTER LI

APPROACHING THE FINAL STAGE

The might and pride of Germany were smashed and humbled by Foch in
frontal attacks divided roughly into three great sectors. The first of
these attacks was delivered by the French and Americans in the southern
sector which included Verdun and the Argonne. The second smash was
delivered by British, French and Americans in the Cambrai sector. The
third was delivered by British, Belgians, French and Americans in the
Belgian sector on the north of the great battle line.

The Cambrai operation had as its first objectives the possession of the
strategic railways both of which ran from Valenciennes, one to the huge
distribution center at Douai; the other to Cambrai itself. To reach
these objectives the Allies were obliged to cross the Sensee and the
Escaut canals under infantry and artillery fire. Besides these natural
obstacles, there was the famous Hunding line of fortifications erected
by the Germans between the Scarpe and the Oise River.

The attack was opened in force on September 18, 1918, by the Fourth
British army under General Rawlinson and the First French army under
General Debeney. The assault was successful northwest of St. Quentin and
determined German counter-attacks were broken down by French and British
artillery fire.

The Third British army under General Byng and the Thirtieth American
division co-operating with the First British army under Sir Henry
Horne, attacked furiously over a fourteen-mile front toward Cambrai. The
net result of this operation was the possession of the Canal du Nord,
the taking of several villages, and 6,000 prisoners. This was on
September 27th. The following day the same forces captured
Fontaine-Notre Dame, Marcoing, Noyelles, and Cantaing. More than 200
guns were captured and 10,000 prisoners. On September 29th the Americans
took Bellecourt and Nauroy, and invested the suburbs of Cambrai. The
British crossed the Escaut canal and the Canadians penetrated some of
the environs of Cambrai.

The resolution and ferocity of the attack thoroughly dismayed the
Germans, and the salient produced by the smash forced the Teutons to
evacuate the greatly prized Lens coal fields on October 3d. Horne and
Byng continued their advance, the former occupying Biache-St. Vaast
southwest of Douai, and the latter reaching a position five miles
northwest of Cambrai.

Caught between the jaws of the pincers, the German forces occupying
Cambrai made haste to escape outright capture. The city that had been
the objective of British hopes and thrusts for two years, fell into the
hands of the Allies. The German retreat extended over a thirty-mile
front and included both St. Quentin and Cambrai. Simultaneously the
German forces between Arras and St. Quentin fell steadily backward. Le
Cateau and Zazeuel fell into the hands of the British October 17th,
three thousand prisoners and a quantity of war material being included
in the bag.

In the meantime General Mangin attacking in the Laon sector, drove the
Germans from the strategic Chemin des Dames and with General Berthelot
captured Berry-au-Bac, the St. Gobain massif and completed contact with
Generals Pershing and Gouraud on the right and with Generals Rawlinson
and Debeney on the left.

The Allied advance now became a huge steel broom, sweeping the Germans
irresistibly before it. The operation extended from the Oise southeast
to the Aisne, broadening thence until it included the entire front. The
Hindenburg line, the Somme battle-field, the Hunding line, were all
quickly overrun. The fortress of Maubeuge, fifty miles northeast of St.
Quentin, which was connected with that city by a triple railway
connection, was evacuated as a direct result of this operation.

When St. Quentin itself fell into the hands of Debeney, it was found
that the Germans had deported the entire civilian population of 50,000.

This was the crux of the operations by Foch. Germans were given no rest;
night and day the pressure continued. Every clash showed the increasing
superiority of the Allies both in men and material and the corresponding
deterioration of the German forces. This demoralization of the Germans
extended from the High Command to the private soldier.  Prisoners poured
into the hands of  the Allies. Evacuation of Lille was commenced on
October 2d and Roubaix and Turcoing also fell.

It was the beginning of Germany's military debacle. The time was ripe
for the coup-de-grace soon to be delivered by Americans co-operating
with the Allies on a seventy-one mile front.

The Kaiser, Ludendorf and von Hindenburg abandoned hope. The command
went forth from the German general headquarters to retreat, retreat,
retreat, while Prince Maximilian of Baden appealed to America for an
armistice. The sword in Germany's hand was broken. Autocracy, defeated
in the eyes of its deluded subjects and discredited in the eyes of the
world, was in headlong flight. Its only concern was to save as much as
possible from the ruins of the ostentatious temple it had reared.



CHAPTER LII

LAST DAYS OF THE WAR

From November 1st until November 11th, the day when the armistice
granting terms to Germany was signed, the collapse of the German
defensive was complete. The army that under von Hindenburg and Ludendorf
had smashed its way over Poland, Roumania, Serbia, Belgium, and into the
heart of France, was now a military machine in full retreat. It is only
justice to that machine to say that the great retreat at no place
degenerated into a rout. Von Hindenburg and the German General Staff had
planned a series of rear-guard actions that were effective in protecting
the main bodies of infantry and artillery. Machine-gun nests and
airplane attacks were the main reliance of the Germans in these
maneuvers of delay, but the German field artillery also did its share.

Immense quantities of material and many thousands of prisoners were
captured by the British, Canadians and Australians in the north, and by
the French and Americans in the south. Simultaneously with this wide and
savage drive upon the Germans along the Belgian and French fronts, came
the heaviest Italian attack of the war. Before it the Austrians were
swept in a torrent that was irresistible. French, English and American
troops co-operated in this thrust that extended from the plains of the
Piave into Trentino. The immediate effect of the Italian offensive was
to force Austria to her knees in abject surrender. An armistice,
humiliating in its terms, was signed by the Austrian representatives,
and the back door to Germany was opened to the Allies.

Germany's frantic plea for an armistice followed. There were those in
the Allied countries who maintained that nothing short of unconditional
surrender should be permitted. Cooler counsel prevailed, and an
armistice was offered to the German High Command through General Foch,
the terms of which far exceeded in severity those granted to Turkey and
Austria. These were read for the first time by Germany's representatives
on Friday, November 8th. General Foch, when he gave the document to the
German delegation, declared that Germany's decision must be made within
seventy-two hours. Eleven o'clock on Monday, November 11th, was the time
limit permitted to Germany. The armistice was signed by General Foch and
the German representatives on the morning of November 11th, but fighting
did not actually cease until eleven o'clock, several hours after the
terms had been agreed to. This was in accordance with arrangement made
between the signers.

Sedan, where Marshals McMahon and Bazaine, commanding the armies of
Napoleon III, surrendered to the King of Prussia in 1870, marked the
last notable victory of the American forces in France. The Sedan of 1870
marked the birth of German militarism. The Sedan of 1918 marked its
death.

Preceding the advance of the Americans upon Sedan, came a cloud of
aviators in pursuit and bombing planes, headed by the famous aces of the
American forces. The First and Second divisions of the First army led
the way. In the van of the Second division were the Marines, whose
heroism in Belleau Wood marked the beginning of Germany's end. The
famous Rainbow division made the most savage thrust of the action,
pursuing the foe for ten miles and sweeping the Freya Hills clear of
machine nests and German artillery.

The last action of the war for the Americans followed immediately on the
heels of the battle of Sedan. It was the taking of the town of Stenay.
The engagement was deliberately planned by the Americans as a sort of
battle celebration of the end of the war. The order fixing eleven
o'clock as the time for the conclusion of hostilities, had been sent
from end to end of the American lines. Its text follows:


1. You are informed that hostilities will cease along the whole front at
11 o'clock A. M., November 11, 1918, Paris time.

2. No Allied troops will pass the line reached by them at that hour in
date until further orders.

3. Division commanders will immediately sketch the location of their
line. This sketch will be returned to headquarters by the courier
bearing these orders.

4. All communication with the enemy, both before and after the
termination of hostilities, is absolutely forbidden. In case of
violation of this order severest disciplinary measures will be
immediately taken. Any officer offending will be sent to headquarters
under guard.

5. Every emphasis will be laid on the fact that the arrangement is an
armistice only and not a peace.

6. There must not be the slightest relaxation of vigilance. Troops must
be prepared at any moment for further operations.

7. Special steps will be taken by all commanders to insure strictest
discipline and that all troops be held in readiness fully prepared for
any eventuality.

8. Division and brigade commanders will personally communicate these
orders to all organizations.


Signal corps wires, telephones and runners were used in carrying the
orders and so well did the big machine work that even patrol commanders
had received the orders well in advance of the hour. Apparently the
Germans also had been equally diligent in getting the orders to the
front line. Notwithstanding the hard fighting they did Sunday to hold
back the Americans, the Germans were able to bring the firing to an
abrupt end at the scheduled hour.

The staff and field officers of the American army were disposed early in
the day to approach the hour of eleven with lessened activity. The day
began with less firing and doubtless the fighting would have ended
according to plan, had there not been a sharp resumption on the part of
German batteries. The Americans looked upon this as wantonly useless. It
was then that orders were sent to the battery commanders for increased
fire.

Although there was no reason for it, German ruthlessness was still
rampant Sunday, stirring the American artillery in the region of
Dun-sur-Meuse and Mouzay to greater activity. Six hundred aged men and
women and children were in Mouzay when the Germans attacked it with gas.
There was only a small detachment of American troops there and the town
no longer was of strategical value. However, it was made the direct
target of shells filled with phosgene. Every street reeked with gas.

Poorly clad and showing plainly evidences of malnutrition, the
inhabitants crowded about the Americans, kissing their hands and hailing
them as deliverers. They declared they had had no meat for six weeks.
They virtually had been prisoners of war for four years and were
overwhelmed with joy when they learned that an armistice was probable.

The last French town to fall into American hands before the armistice
went into effect was Stenay. Patrols reported they had found it empty
not more than a quarter of an hour before eleven o'clock. American
troops rushed through the town and in a few minutes Allied flags were
beginning to appear from the windows. As the church bell solemnly tolled
the hour of eleven, troops from the Ninetieth division were pouring into
the town.

The inhabitants told the usual stories of German treatment. They were
forced to work at all sorts of tasks from seven in the morning until six
at night. In return they received paper bills with which they were
unable to purchase milk and similar necessities. The majority, however,
were so overjoyed at their deliverance that they were almost incoherent
in discussing the enemy occupation.

The inhabitants of Stenay remained hiding in their cellars even after
the Americans had entered the town. They came out hesitatingly and in
small groups.

Hostilities along the American front ended with a crash of cannon.

The early forenoon had been marked by a falling off in fire all along
the line, but an increasing bombardment from the retreating Germans at
certain points stimulated the Americans to a quick retort. From their
positions north of Stenay to southeast of the town the Americans began
to bombard fixed targets. The firing reached a volume at times almost
equivalent to a barrage.

Two minutes before eleven o'clock the firing dwindled, the last shells
shrieking over No Man's Land precisely on time.

There was little celebration on the front line, where American routine
was scarcely disturbed over the cessation of fighting. In the areas
behind the battle zone there were celebrations on all sides. Here and
there there were little outbursts of cheering, but even those instances
were not on the immediate front.

Many of the French soldiers went about singing.

"Well, I don't know," drawled a lieutenant from Texas while the
artillery was sending its last challenge to the Germans, "but somehow I
can't help wondering if we have licked them enough."

The Germans were manifestly so glad over the cessation of hostilities
that they could not conceal their pleasure. Prisoners taken at Stenay
grinned with satisfaction. Their demeanor was in sharp contrast to that
of the American doughboys who took the matter philosophically and went
about their appointed tasks.

In the front line it was the same. The Americans were happy, but quiet.
They made no demonstrations. The Germans, on the other hand, were in a
regular hysteria of joy. They waited only until nightfall to set off
every rocket in their possession. In the evening the sky was ablaze with
red, green, blue and yellow flares all along the line.

Flags appeared like magic over the shell-torn buildings of Verdun,
French and American colors flying side by side.

In every village, even those from which the Germans had been driven,
there were flags and decorations which were brought up to the front by
the soldiers. In the villages back of the line there were impromptu
celebrations and the civilians in holiday spirit saluted the Americans,
shouting "the war is finished."

Northeast of Verdun, just before 11 o'clock, American artillery-men in
loading a six-inch howitzer, wrote "good-luck" on a ninety-pound shell
and "let 'er go." The shot was aimed at the crossroad at Ornas, just
ahead of the American lines.

While the bells of the ancient Verdun Cathedral were ringing the news of
peace the fortress city was illuminated and a military procession headed
by the drum corps of the Twenty-sixth American division swung along the
crowded streets accompanied by a French detachment of buglers
representing the famed defenders of Verdun.

Only a half hour before the Germans had thrown large shells within the
city walls, apparently as a reminder that Verdun was still within the
range of their guns to the hills to the northeast.

Monday afternoon and night virtually was the first time that Verdun had
not been shelled in many hours almost since the war began.



CHAPTER LIII

THE DRASTIC TERMS OF SURRENDER

The end of the war came with almost the dramatic suddenness of its
beginning. Bulgaria, hemmed in by armies through which no relief could
penetrate, asked for terms. The reply came in two words, "Unconditional
Surrender."

Turkey, witnessing the rout of her army in Palestine by the great
strategist, General Allenby, and a British army, asked for an armistice.
The Porte signed without hesitation an agreement comprising twenty-five
severe requirements.

The surrender of Bulgaria and Turkey forced Austria's hand. The terms
under which it was permitted to capitulate were even harder than those
granted to Turkey. They comprised eighteen requirements divided into
military and naval clauses.

Germany, proud, imperial Germany, met the greatest humiliation of all
the Teutonic allies when the Kaiser and the German High Command were
brought to their knees. Thirty-five clauses, the most severe and drastic
ever demanded from a great power, were included in the armistice
agreement. Only the imminent menace of an invasion of Germany would have
sufficed to compel the German representatives to sign such a document.
Following are the drafts of the Turkish, Austrian and German armistice
agreements.


THE TURKISH AGREEMENT

1. The opening of the Dardanelles and the Bosporus and access to the
Black Sea. Allied occupation of the Dardanelles and Bosporus forts.

2. The positions of all mine fields, torpedo tubes and other
obstructions in Turkish waters are to be indicated, and assistance given
to sweep or remove them, as may be required.

3. All available information concerning mines in the Black Sea is to be
communicated.

4. All Allied prisoners of war and Armenian interned persons and
prisoners are to be collected in Constantinople and handed over
unconditionally to the Allies.

5. Immediate demobilization of the Turkish army, except such troops as
are required for surveillance on the frontiers and for the maintenance
of internal order. The number of effectives and their disposition to be
determined later by the Allies.

6. The surrender of all war vessels in Turkish waters or waters occupied
by Turkey. These ships will be interned in such Turkish port or ports as
may be directed, except such small vessels as are required for police
and similar purposes in Turkish territorial waters.

7. The Allies to have the right to occupy any strategic points in the
event of any situation arising which threatens the security of the
Allies.

8. Use by Allied ships of all ports and anchorages now in Turkish
occupation and denial of their use by the enemy. Similar conditions are
to apply to Turkish mercantile shipping in Turkish waters for the
purposes of trade and the demobilization of the army.

9. Allied occupation of the Taurus Tunnel system.

10. Immediate withdrawal of Turkish troops from Northern Persia to
behind the pre-war frontier already has been ordered and will be
carried out.

11. A part of Transcaucasia already has been ordered to be evacuated by
Turkish troops. The remainder to be evacuated, if required by the
Allies, after they have studied the situation.

12. Wireless, telegraph and cable stations to be controlled by the
Allies. Turkish Government messages to be excepted.

13. Prohibition against the destruction of any naval, military or
commercial material.

14. Facilities are to be given for the purchase of coal, oil, fuel and
naval material from Turkish sources, after the requirements of the
country have been met. None of the above materials are to be exported.

15. The surrender of all Turkish offices in Tripolitania and Cyrenaica
to the nearest Italian garrison. Turkey agrees to stop supplies and
communication with these officers if they do not obey the order to
surrender.

16. The surrender of all garrisons in Hedjaz, Assir, Yemen, Syria and
Mesopotamia to the nearest Allied commander, and withdrawal of Turkish
troops from Cilicia, except those necessary to maintain order, as will
be determined under Clause 6.

17. The use of all ships and repair facilities at all Turkish ports and
arsenals.

18. The surrender of all ports occupied in Tripolitania and Cyrenaica,
including Mizurata, to the nearest Allied garrison.

19. All Germans and Austrians, naval, military or civilian, to be
evacuated within one month from Turkish dominions, and those in remote
districts as soon after that time as may be possible.

20. Compliance with such orders as may be conveyed for the disposal of
equipment, arms and ammunition, including the transport of that portion
of the Turkish army which is demobilized under Clause 5.

21. An Allied representative to be attached to the Turkish Ministry of
Supplies in order to safeguard Allied interests. This representative to
be furnished with all aid necessary for this purpose.

22. Turkish prisoners are to be kept at the disposal of the Allied
Powers. The release of Turkish civilian prisoners and prisoners over
military age is to be considered.

23. An obligation on the part of Turkey to cease all relations with the
Central Powers.

24. In case of disorder in the six Armenian vilayets the Allies reserve
to themselves the right to occupy any part of them.

25. Hostilities between the Allies and Turkey shall cease from noon,
local time, Thursday, the 31st of October, 1918.


THE AUSTRIAN AGREEMENT
Military Clauses

1. The immediate cessation of hostilities by land, sea and air.

2. Total demobilization of the Austro-Hungarian army and immediate
withdrawal of all Austro-Hungarian forces operating on the front from
the North Sea to Switzerland. Within Austro-Hungarian territory, limited
as in Clause 3 below, there shall only be maintained as an organized
military force reduced to pre-war effectiveness. Half the divisional,
corps and army artillery and equipment shall be collected at points to
be indicated by the Allies and United States of America for delivery to
them, beginning with all such material as exists in the territories to
be evacuated by the Austro-Hungarian forces.

3. Evacuation of all territories invaded by Austro-Hungary since the
beginning of the war. Withdrawal within such periods as shall be
determined by the commander-in-chief of the Allied forces on each front
of the Austro-Hungarian armies behind a line fixed as follows:--

From Pic Umbrail to the north of the Stelivo it will follow the crest of
the Rhetian Alps up to the sources of the Adige and the Eisaeh, passing
thence by Mounts Reschen and Brenner and the heights of Oetz and
Zoaller. The line thence turns south, crossing Mount Toblach and meeting
the present frontier Carnic Alps. It follows this frontier up to Mount
Tarvis and after Mount Tarvis the watershed of the Julian Alps by the
Col of Predil, Mount Mangart, the Terglou and the watershed of the Cols
di Podberdo, Podlaniscam and Idria. From this point the line turns
southeast towards the Schneeberg, excludes the whole basin of the Save
and its tributaries. From Schneeberg it goes down towards the coast in
such a way as to include Castua, Mattuglia and Volosca in the evacuated
territories.

It will also follow the administrative limits of the present province of
Dalmatia, including the north Lisarica and Trivania and, to the south,
territory limited by a line from the Semigrand of Cape Planca to the
summits of the watersheds eastwards, so as to include in the evacuated
area all the valleys and water course flowing towards Sebenaco, such as
the Cicola, Kerka, Butisnica and their tributaries. It will also include
all the islands in the north and west of Dalmatia from Premuda, Selve,
Ulbo, Scherda, Maon, Paga and Puntadura in the north up to Meleda in the
south, embracing Santandrea, Busi, Lisa, Lesina, Tercola, Curzola, Cazza
and Lagosta, as well as the neighboring rocks and islets and passages,
only excepting the islands of Great and Small Zirona, Bua, Solta and
Brazza. All territory thus evacuated shall be occupied by the forces of
the Allies and of the United States of America.

All military and railway equipment of all kinds, including coal
belonging or within those territories, to be left in situ and
surrendered to the Allies, according to special orders given by the
commander-in-chief of the forces of the associated Powers on the
different fronts. No new destruction, pillage or requisition to be done
by enemy troops in the territories to be evacuated by them and occupied
by the forces of the associated Powers.

4. The Allies shall have the right of free movement over all road and
rail and waterways in Austro-Hungarian territory and of the use of the
necessary Austrian and Hungarian means of transportation. The armies of
the associated Powers shall occupy such strategic points in
Austria-Hungary at times as they may deem necessary to enable them to
conduct military operations or to maintain order. They shall have the
right of requisition on payment for the troops of the associated Powers
whatever they may be.

5. Complete evacuation of all German troops within fifteen days not only
from the Italian and Balkan fronts, but from all Austro-Hungarian
territory. Internment of all German troops which have not left
Austro-Hungary within the date.

6. The administration of the evacuated territories of Austria-Hungary
will be entrusted to the local authorities under the control of the
Allied and associated armies of occupation.

7. The immediate repatriation without reciprocity of all Allied
prisoners of war and internal subjects and of civil populations
evacuated from their homes on conditions to be laid down by the
commander-in-chief of the forces of the associated Powers on the various
fronts. Sick and wounded who cannot be removed from evacuated territory
will be cared for by Austria-Hungary personnel, who will be left on the
spot with the medical material required.


Naval Clauses

1. Immediate cessation of all hostilities at sea and definite
information to be given as to the location and movements of all
Austro-Hungarian ships. Notification to be made to neutrals that freedom
of navigation in all territorial waters is given to the naval and
mercantile marine of the Allied and associated Powers, all questions of
neutrality being waived.

2. Surrender to Allies and the United States of fifteen Austro-Hungarian
submarines completed between the years 1910 and 1918 and of all German
submarines which are in or may hereafter enter Austro-Hungarian
territorial waters. All other Austro-Hungarian submarines to be paid off
and completely disarmed and to remain under the supervision of the
Allies and United States.

3. Surrender to Allies and United States with their complete armament
and equipment of three battleships, three light cruisers, nine
destroyers, twelve torpedo boats, one mine layer, six Danube monitors,
to be designated by the Allies and United States of America. All other
surface warships, including river craft, are to be concentrated in
Austro-Hungarian naval bases to be designated by the Allies and United
States of America and are to be paid off and completely disarmed and
placed under the supervision of Allies and United States of America.

4. Freedom of navigation to all warships and merchant ships of Allied
and associated Powers to be given in the Adriatic and up the River
Danube and its tributaries in the territorial waters and territory of
Austria-Hungary. The Allies and associated Powers shall have the right
to sweep up all mine fields and obstructions, and the positions of these
are to be indicated. In order to insure the freedom of navigation on the
Danube, the Allies and the United States of America shall be empowered
to occupy or to dismantle all fortifications or defense work.

5. The existing blockade conditions set up by the Allied and associated
Powers are to remain unchanged and all Austro-Hungarian merchant ships
found at sea are to remain liable to capture, save exceptions may be
made by a commission nominated by the Allies and the United States of
America.

6. All naval aircraft are to be concentrated and impactionized in
Austro-Hungarian bases to be designated by the Allies and United States
of America.

7. Evacuation of all the Italian coasts and of all ports occupied by
Austria-Hungary outside their national territory and the abandonment of
all floating craft, naval materials, equipment and materials for inland
navigation of all kinds.

8. Occupation by the Allies and the United States of America of the land
and sea fortifications and the islands which form the defenses and of
the dockyards and arsenal at Pola.

9. All merchant vessels held by Austria-Hungary belonging to the Allies
and associated Powers to be returned.

10. No destruction of ships or of materials to be permitted before
evacuation, surrender or restoration.

11. All naval and mercantile marine prisoners of the Allied and
associated Powers in Austro-Hungarian hands to be returned without
reciprocity.


THE GERMAN AGREEMENT

1. Cessation of operations by land and in the air six hours after the
signature of the armistice.

2. Immediate evacuation of invaded countries: Belgium, France,
Alsace-Lorraine, Luxemburg, so ordered as to be completed within
fourteen days from the signature of the armistice. German troops which
have not left the above-mentioned territories within the period fixed
will become prisoners of war. Occupation by the Allied and United States
forces jointly will keep pace with evacuation in these areas. All
movements of evacuation and occupation will be regulated in accordance
with a note annexed to the stated terms.

3. Repatriation beginning at once and to be completed within fifteen
days of all inhabitants of the countries above mentioned, including
hostages and persons under trial or convicted.

4. Surrender in good condition by the German armies of the following
equipment: Five thousand guns (two thousand five hundred heavy, two
thousand five hundred field), twenty-five thousand machine guns, three
thousand minenwerfers, seventeen hundred airplanes. The above to be
delivered in situ to the Allies and the United States troops in
accordance with the detailed conditions laid down in the annexed note.

5. Evacuation by the German armies of the countries on the left bank of
the Rhine. These countries on the left bank of the Rhine shall be
administered by the local troops of occupation under the control of the
Allied and United States armies of occupation. The occupation of these
territories will be carried out by Allied and United States garrisons
holding the principal crossings of the Rhine, Mayence, Coblenz, Cologne,
together with bridgeheads at these points in thirty kilometer radius on
the right bank and by garrisons similarly holding the strategic points
of the regions.

A neutral zone shall be reserved on the right of the Rhine between the
stream and a line drawn parallel to it forty kilometers (twenty-six
miles) to the east from the frontier of Holland to the parallel of
Gernsheim and as far as practicable a distance of thirty kilometers
(twenty miles) from the east of stream from this parallel upon Swiss
frontier. Evacuation by the enemy of the Rhine lands shall be so ordered
as to be completed within a further period of sixteen days, in all
thirty-one days after the signature of the armistice. All movements of
evacuation and occupation will be regulated according to the note
annexed.

6. In all territory evacuated by the enemy there shall be no evacuation
of inhabitants; no damage or harm shall be done to the persons or
property of the inhabitants. No destruction of any kind to be committed.
Military establishments of all kinds shall be delivered as well as
military stores of food, munitions, equipment not removed during the
periods fixed for evacuation. Stores of food of all kinds for the civil
population, cattle, etc., shall be left in situ. Industrial
establishments shall not be impaired in any way and their personnel
shall not be moved. Roads and means of communication of every kind,
railroad, waterways, main roads, bridges, telegraphs, telephones, shall
be in no manner impaired. No person shall be prosecuted for offenses of
participation in war measures prior to the signing of the armistice.

7. All civil and military personnel at present employed on them shall
remain. Five thousand locomotives, one hundred fifty thousand wagons and
five thousand motor lorries in good working order with all necessary
spare parts and fittings shall be delivered to the associated Powers
within the period fixed for the evacuation of Belgium and Luxemburg. The
railways of Alsace-Lorraine shall be handed over within thirty-six days,
together with all pre-war personnel and material. Further material
necessary for the working of railways in the country on the left bank of
the Rhine shall be left in situ. All stores of coal and material for the
upkeep of permanent ways, signals and repair shops left entire in situ
and kept in an efficient state by Germany during the whole period of
armistice. All barges taken from the Allies shall be restored to them.
All civil and military personnel at present employed on such means of
communication and transporting including waterways shall remain.

8. The German command shall be responsible for revealing within
forty-eight hours all mines or delay acting fuses disposed on territory
evacuated by the German troops and shall assist in their discovery and
destruction. The German command shall also reveal all destructive
measures that may have been taken (such as poisoning or polluting of
springs, wells, etc.) under penalty of reprisals.

9. The right of requisition shall be exercised by the Allies and the
United States armies in all occupied territory, "subject to regulation
of accounts with those whom it may concern." The upkeep of the troops of
occupation in the Rhine land (excluding Alsace-Lorraine) shall be
charged to the German Government.

10. An immediate repatriation without reciprocity according to detailed
conditions which shall be fixed, of all Allied and United States
prisoners of war. The Allied Powers and the United States shall be able
to dispose of these prisoners as they wish. This condition annuls the
previous conventions on the subject of the exchange of prisoners of war,
including the one of July, 1918, in course of ratification. However, the
repatriation of German prisoners of war interned in Holland and in
Switzerland shall continue as before. The repatriation of German
prisoners of war shall be regulated at the conclusion of the
preliminaries of peace.

11. Sick and wounded, who cannot be removed from evacuated territory
will be cared for by German personnel who will be left on the spot with
the medical material required.

12. All German troops at present in any territory which before the war
belonged to Roumania, Turkey or Austria-Hungary shall immediately
withdraw within the frontiers of Germany as they existed on August 1,
1914. German troops now in Russian territory shall withdraw within the
frontiers of Germany, as soon as the Allies, taking into account the
internal situation of those territories, shall decide that the time for
this has come.

13. Evacuation by German troops to begin at once and all German
instructors, prisoners and civilian as well as military agents now on
the territory of Russia (as defined before 1914) to be recalled.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  French Official Photograph.
  DRAFTING THE DRASTIC TERMS OF SURRENDER
  The above French official photograph is the first received in this
  country showing the statesmen of the Allied Powers at Versailles
  drafting the armistice terms, which later were accepted by the German
  plenipotentiaries, and virtually brought the World War to an end. The
  men in the photograph are: Left side of table, left to right--General
  di Robilant of Italy; Baron Sidney Sonnino, Italian Foreign Minister;
  Vittorio Orlando, Italian Premier; Colonel E. M. House, representative
  of President Wilson; General Tasker H. Bliss, U. S. A.; (next man
  unknown); Eleutherios Venizelos, Greek Premier; Vesnitch, Serbian
  Premier. Right, side of table, left to right--Admiral Wemyss, R. N.
  (with back turned); General Sir Henry Wilson; Field Marshal Sir
  Douglas Haig; General Sackville-West; Andrew Bonar Law, British
  Chancellor of the Exchequer; David Lloyd George, British Premier;
  Georges Clemenceau, French Premier; Stephen Pichon, French Foreign
  Minister.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright Press Illustrating Service.
  GERMANS FLEEING BEFORE ALLIED ADVANCE
  To speed their retreat the German engineers built a temporary bridge
  using a British tank as a foundation.


[Illustration:  Photograph]
  Copyright Press Illustrating Service.
  THE GERMAN GOOSE-STEP
  The Kaiser reviews his troops marching with the goose-step. This
  photograph shows the pick of the German army. Most of these men were
  killed by the end of the first year of the war.


14. German troops to cease at once all requisitions and seizures and any
other undertakings with a view to obtaining supplies intended for
Germany in Roumania and Russia (as defined on August 1, 1914).

15. Renunciation of the treaties of Bucharest and Brest-Litovsk and of
the supplementary treaties.

16. The Allies shall have free access to the territories evacuated by
the Germans on their eastern frontier either through Danzig or by the
Vistula in order to convey supplies to the populations of those
territories and for the purpose of maintaining order.

17. Evacuation by all German forces operating in East Africa within a
period to be fixed by the Allies.

18. Repatriation, without reciprocity, within maximum period of one
month, in accordance with detailed conditions hereafter to be fixed, of
all civilians interned or deported who may be citizens of other Allied
or associated states than those mentioned in clause three, paragraph
nineteen.

19. The following financial conditions are required: Reparation for
damage done. While such armistice lasts no public securities shall be
removed by the enemy which can serve as a pledge to the Allies for the
recovery or repatriation of the cash deposit, in the National Bank of
Belgium, and in general immediate return of all documents, specie,
stocks, shares, paper money together with plant for the issue thereof,
touching public or private interests in the invaded countries.
Restitution of the Russian and Roumanian gold yielded to Germany or
taken by that Power. This gold to be delivered in trust to the Allies
until the signature of peace.

20. Immediate cessation of all hostilities at sea and definite
information to be given as to the location and movements of all German
ships. Notification to be given to neutrals that freedom of navigation
in all territorial waters is given to the naval and merchant marines of
the Allied and associate Powers, all questions of neutrality being
waived.

21. All naval and mercantile marine prisoners of war of the Allied and
associated Powers in German hands to be returned without reciprocity.

22. Surrender to the Allies and the United States of America of all
German submarines now existing (including all submarine cruisers and
mine-laying submarines), with their complete armament and equipment, in
ports which will be specified by the Allies and the United States of
America. Those which cannot take the sea shall be disarmed of the
material and personnel and shall remain under the supervision of the
Allies and the United States. All the conditions of the article shall be
carried into effect within fourteen days. Submarines ready for sea shall
be prepared to leave German ports immediately upon orders by wireless,
and the remainder at the earliest possible moment.

23. The following German surface warships which shall be designated by
the Allies and the United States of America shall forthwith be disarmed
and thereafter interned in neutral ports, to be designated by the Allies
and the United States of America and placed under the surveillance of
the Allies and the United States of America, only caretakers being left
on board, namely:

Six battle cruisers, ten battleships, eight light cruisers, including
two mine layers, fifty destroyers of the most modern type. All other
surface warships (including river craft) are to be concentrated in naval
bases to be designated by the Allies and the United States of America,
and are to be paid off and completely disarmed and placed under the
supervision of the Allies and the United States of America. All vessels
of the auxiliary fleet (trawlers, motor vessels, etc.) are to [be]
disarmed. Vessels designated for internment, shall be ready to leave
German ports within seven days upon directions by wireless, and the
military armament of all vessels of the auxiliary fleet shall be put on
shore.

24. The Allies and the United States of America shall have the right to
sweep all mine fields and obstructions laid by Germany outside German
territorial waters, and the positions of these are to be indicated.

25. Freedom of access to and from the Baltic to be given to the naval
and mercantile marine of the Allied and associated Powers. To secure
this Allies and the United States of America shall be empowered to
occupy all German forts, fortifications, batteries and defense works of
all kinds in all the entrances from the Cattegat into the Baltic, and to
sweep up all mines and obstructions within and without German
territorial waters without any question of neutrality being raised, and
the positions of all such mines and obstructions are to be indicated.

26. The existing blockade conditions set up by the Allies and associated
Powers are to remain unchanged and all German merchant ships found at
sea are to remain liable to capture. The Allies and the United States
shall give consideration to the provisioning of Germany during the
armistice to the extent recognized as necessary.

27. All naval aircraft are to be concentrated and immobilized in German
bases to be specified by the Allies and the United States.

28. In evacuating the Belgian coasts and ports, Germany shall abandon
all merchant ships, tugs, lighters, cranes and all other harbor
materials, all materials for inland navigation, all aircraft and all
materials and stores, all arms and armaments, and all stores and
apparatus of all kinds.

29. All Black Sea ports are to be evacuated by Germany, all Russian war
vessels of all descriptions seized by Germany in the Black Sea are to be
handed over to the Allies and the United States of America; all neutral
merchant vessels seized are to be released; all warlike and other
materials of all kinds seized in those parts are to be returned and
German materials as specified in clause twenty-eight are to be
abandoned.

30. All merchant vessels in German hands belonging to the Allied and
associated Powers are to be restored in ports to be specified by the
Allies and the United States of America without reciprocity.

31. No destruction of ships or materials to be permitted before
evacuation, surrender or restoration.

32. The German Government will notify neutral governments of the world,
and particularly the governments of Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Holland,
that all restrictions placed on the trading of their vessels with the
Allied and associated countries, whether by the German Government or by
private German interests, and whether in return for specific concessions
such as the export of shipbuilding materials or not, are immediately
canceled.

33. No transfers of German merchant shipping of any description to any
neutral flag are to take place after signature of the armistice.

34. The duration of the armistice is to be thirty days, with option to
extend. During this period, on failure of execution of any of the above
clauses, the armistice may be denounced by one of the contracting
parties on forty-eight hours' previous notice. It is understood that the
execution of Articles 3 and 18 shall not warrant the denunciation of the
armistice on the ground of insufficient execution within a period fixed,
except in the case of bad faith in carrying them into execution. In
order to assume the execution of this convention under the best
conditions, the principle of a Permanent International Armistice
Commission is admitted. This commission shall act under authority of the
Allied military and naval commanders-in-chief.

35. This armistice to be accepted or refused by Germany within
seventy-two hours of notification.



CHAPTER LIV

PEACE AT LAST

War came upon the world in August, 1914, with a suddenness and an impact
that dazed the world. When it seemed, in 1918, that mankind had
habituated himself to war and that the bloody struggle would continue
until the actual exhaustion and extinction of the nations involved,
peace suddenly appeared. The debacle of the Teutonic alliance was both
dramatic and unexpected, except to those who knew how desperate were the
conditions in the nations that were battling for autocracy. Bulgaria was
first to crumble, then Turkey fell, and Austria-Hungary deserted
Germany. The Kaiser and his military advisers, left alone, appealed to
the Allies through President Wilson, for an armistice during which peace
terms might be negotiated. Prince Maximilian of Baden, a statesman whose
liberal ideas were rumored rather than demonstrated, was chosen to open
negotiations. President Wilson, acting in concert with the Allies,
referred Prince Maximilian to Marshal Foch.

While negotiations were pending, a cabled message was received on
November 7th to the effect that the armistice had been signed and that
all soldiers would cease fighting on two o'clock of that afternoon. It
was a false report, but it spread with incredible speed throughout the
country. Celebrations which included virtually every American, made the
country a gala place for twenty-four hours. The American people with
characteristic good nature laughed at the hoax next day and settled down
in patience to await the inevitable declaration of an armistice.

The true report arrived about three o'clock, Eastern time, in the
morning of November 11th. Shrieks of whistles, the booming of cannon,
and the clangor of bells, awoke millions of sleeping persons, many of
whom trooped into the streets to mingle their rejoicings with those of
their neighbors. For a day there was high carnival in town and country
throughout the land, then the nation settled down to face the imminent
problems of reconstruction.

One of these had to do with the immediate reduction of governmental
expenditures during the approaching year. President Wilson had appealed
to the voters to elect a Democratic Congress as an evidence of approval
for his administration. The reply was a Republican House of
Representatives and a Republican Senate.

The Congress that had been in continuous session since America entered
the war, ended its labors in mid-November.

For length, bulk of appropriations for the war and the number and
importance of legislative measures passed, the session was
unprecedented.

Appropriations passed aggregated $36,298,000,000, making the total for
this Congress more than $45,000,000,000, of which $19,412,000,000 was
appropriated at the first (an extra) session, at which war was declared
on Germany.

Legislation passed included bills authorizing billions of Liberty bonds;
creation of the War Finance Corporation; government control of
telegraphs, telephones and cables; executive reorganization of
government agencies, and extensions of the espionage act and the army
draft law by which men between eighteen and forty-five years of age were
required to register.

Prohibition and woman suffrage furnished sharp controversies throughout
the session. The war-time "dry" measure was completed, but after the
woman suffrage constitutional amendment resolution had been adopted,
January 10th, by the House, it was defeated in the Senate by two votes.

Every man, woman and child in the belligerent nations owed almost seven
times as much money when peace came as he did at the beginning of the
war.

Figures of the war's cost to the world compiled by the Federal Reserve
Board were summarized in the statement that the approximate public debt
per capita had increased from $60 before the war to almost $400 at the
end of July, 1918. To this was added the cost since July, which is at
the highest rate of the entire period.

The direct cost of the war was calculated by the board at somewhere
between $170,000,000,000 and $180,000,000,000, not taking into account
the authorization of the debt or the cost of indemnities.

Four-fifths of the huge burden fell upon the shoulders of the future,
only Great Britain and America absorbing a considerable amount by
taxation.

The total debt of the seven principal belligerents before the war did
not exceed $25,000,000,000.

The board contrasted these figures with the total value of the gold and
silver extracted from the earth since the beginning of the world, which,
it said, hardly exceeded $30,000,000,000.

The belligerent nations, therefore, owed about six times the amount of
all the gold and silver produced in all time.

Prices rose to three times the average of what they were at the
beginning of the war.

Great Britain's debt increased almost ten times over in the period of
the war, or from $3,580,000,000 to $32,450,000,000 down to June, 1918.
These figures do not include the debts of Australia, Canada, New Zealand
and South Africa, British colonies.

France's debt was quadrupled by the beginning of 1918, increasing from
$6,833,000,000 to $25,410,000,000.

Italy's debt rose from $2,929,000,000 to $6,918,000,000.

Figures for Russia were brought up only to September, 1917, but they
showed that at that time she owed $26,287,000,000, as compared with
$5,234,000,000 at the beginning of the war.

The public debt of the United States was calculated to January 1, 1918,
in order to be in line with those of other countries, increasing by that
date to over $8,000,000,000 from a pre-war figure of a billion and a
quarter. Since that time $11,500,000,000 have been subscribed to the
Liberty Loans, thus increasing the national debt about sixteen fold.

The most extraordinary increase of all was that of Germany, rising from
$1,208,000,000 to $26,332,000,000.

Austria owed $2,736,000,000 at the beginning of the war, which was
increased by June, 1917, to $11,573,000,000.

Hungary increased her debt from $1,392,000,000 to $5,910,000,000 by
December, 1917.

The neutrals, Denmark, Spain, Holland, Norway, Sweden and Switzerland
together owed $2,871,000,000 when war began and increased their debts
only to $3,710,000,000.

Existing war obligations of the United States at the close of 1918
matured as follows:

First Liberty Loan, $2,000,000,000, redeemable at the option of the
Treasury after 1932 and payable not later than 1947; Second Liberty
Loan, $3,808,000,000, redeemable after 1927, payable in 1942; Third
Liberty Loan, $4,176,000,000, redeemable and payable without option in
1928; Fourth Liberty Loan, $6,989,047,000, redeemable after 1933,
payable in 1938; War Savings, $879,300,000 up to November, 1918, payable
in 1923.

With this program of maturity, the Treasury by exercising its option
could call in the nation's war debt for redemption in installments every
five years until 1947.

Secretary of the Treasury, William Gibbs McAdoo, who was also Director
General of Transportation, created a sensation when he resigned both
offices in November, 1918, the resignation to take effect January 1,
1919. Coming upon the eve of the peace conference in Paris and the
announcement that President Wilson intended to head the American
delegates to the conference, the resignation caused widespread surprise.
The reasons given by Mr. McAdoo were ill-health and a serious
depreciation of his private fortune during his incumbency of
governmental positions.

Following the armistice, steps were immediately taken for the
repatriation of a considerable portion of the American forces in France
and the return to their homes of the men in American training camps. The
Third Army of the United States, commanded by General Dickman, was
ordered to the western shore of the Rhine, there to co-operate with the
troops of the Allies until the conclusion of peace negotiations.

The country was amazed on November 23d when General March announced that
the casualties of the American forces which had been anticipated as
being less than 100,000, had in reality exceeded 236,000. Explanation
for this lay in the fierce on-rush of the American forces during the
last month of the war.

A forecast that many thousands of American boys would remain in France
was given by Andre Tardieu, General Commissioner for Franco-American
affairs, when addressing the Association of Foreign Correspondents in
New York City, after the armistice had been signed.

M. Tardieu appealed for permission to retain American soldiers in
France. He said:

"We want first an immediate assistance in the matter of labor. We hope
that, during the preparation and the carrying out of the transportation
of your troops back to America your technical units as well as other
units with their equipment will be able to co-operate in that effort. We
soon will have to carry out a colossal work of transportation in view of
the supplying of the regions evacuated by the enemy, of the recovering
of the railroads in Northern and Eastern France and in Alsace-Lorraine.
We will have to clean the reconquered ground of the ruins accumulated by
the German hordes. Your army will help us in this work while our
population will restore her cities and villages.

"Again in reference, not to all purchases--as a large part of our needs
will be supplied outside of the United States--but in reference to those
purchases which will be made in America, we are in need of credits in
dollars covering about fifty per cent of our total purchases for
reconstruction. The assurance of that financial help will bring to every
one in France, government and private enterprise, the courage and faith
necessary to apply to peace reconstruction the energy and the spirit of
enterprise she has so prominently shown during the war.

"We will exact from Germany the restitution of each part of the material
taken away from us as can be recovered. But, besides that restitution,
we must bear in mind that speed is a primary condition in the
reconstruction of France, and that America, on account of her immense
capacities for production, ought to give us the first help. We need
ships, chartered ships as well as ships transferred to our flag; the
speedy reconstruction of the country is strictly depending on the
revival of our mercantile fleet.

"The colossal effort put up by the United States in the building of her
fleet for war purposes will not be diverted from this sacred end if it,
in part, helps France to recover on the seas, for the revival of her
forces in peace, the means of transportation which were lost to her on
account of the war.

"In reference to these four items--labor; credit, raw materials,
ships--I have explained in detail our needs to your administration, by
whose welcome I have been deeply moved. What I told them, what I asked
for, I am telling it to you again, because a policy of secrecy does not
befit our day.

"We have lost two million and a half men; some are dead, some maimed,
some have returned sick and incapacitated from German prisons. Whether
they be lost altogether, or whether their working capacity be
permanently reduced, they will not participate in this reconstruction.
The fifteenth part of our people is missing at the very time we need all
our material and moral forces in order to build up our life again. The
younger part, yea, the stronger part of our nation, the flower of
France, has died away on the battle-fields. Our country has been bereft
of its most precious resources.

"Our war expenses, on the other side, 120,000,000,000 francs, are
weighing heavily on our shoulders. To payoff this debt there are at hand
only such limited resources as invasion has left us. The territories
which have been under German occupation for four years were the
wealthiest part of France. Their area did not exceed six per cent of the
whole country. They paid, however, twenty-five per cent of the sum total
of our taxes.

"These territories which have been, for the last three months, occupied
again by us at the cost of our own blood and of the blood of our allies,
are now in a state of ruin even worse than we had anticipated. Of the
cities and villages nothing remains but ruins; 350,000 homes have been
destroyed. To build them up again--I am referring to the building
proper, without the furnishings--600 million days' of work will be
necessary, involving, together with building material, an outlay of
10,000,000,000 francs. As regards personal property of every description
either destroyed by battle, or stolen by the Germans, there stands an
additional loss of at least 4,000,000,000 francs.

"This valuation of lost personal property does not include--as definite
figures are lacking as yet--the countless war contributions and fines by
the enemy, amounting also to billions. I need hardly say that, in those
wealthy lands, practically no agricultural resources are left.

"The losses in horses and in cattle, bovine and ovine species, hogs,
goats, amount to 1,510,000 head--in agricultural equipment to 454,000
machines or carts--the two items worth together 6,000,000,000 francs.

"Now as regards industries, the disaster is even more complete. These
districts occupied by the Germans and whose machinery has been
methodically destroyed or taken away by the enemy, were, industrially
speaking, the very heart of France. They were the very backbone of our
production, as shown in the following startling figures:

"In 1913 the wool output of our invaded regions amounted to 94 per cent
of the total. French production and corresponding figures were: For flax
from the spinning mills, 90 per cent; iron ore, 90 per cent; pig iron,
83 per cent; steel, 70 per cent; sugar, 70 per cent; cotton, 60 per
cent; coal 55 per cent; electric power, 45 per cent. Of all that,
plants, machinery, mines, nothing is left. Everything has been carried
away or destroyed by the enemy. So complete is the destruction that, in
the case of our great coal mines in the north, two years of work will be
needed before a single ton of coal can be extracted and ten years before
the output is brought back to the figures of 1913.

"All that must be rebuilt, and to carry out that kind of reconstruction
only, there will be a need of over 2,000,000 tons of pig iron, nearly
4,000,000 tons of steel--not to mention the replenishing of stocks and
of raw materials which must of necessity be supplied to the plants
during the first year of resumed activity. If we take into account these
different items we reach as regards industrial needs a total of
25,000,000,000 francs.

"To resurrect these regions, to reconstruct these factories, raw
materials are not now sufficient; we need means of transportation. Now
the enemy has destroyed our railroad tracks, our railroad equipment, and
our rolling stock, which in the first month of the war, in 1914, was
reduced by 50,000 cars, has undergone the wear and tear of fifty months
of war.

"Our merchant fleet, on the other hand, has lost more than a million
tons through submarine warfare. Our shipyards during the last four years
have not built any ships. For they have produced for us and for our
allies cannon, ammunition, and tanks. Here, again, for this item alone
of means of transportation we must figure on an expense of 2,500,000,000
francs.

"This makes, if I sum up these different items, a need of raw material
which represents in cost, at the present rate of prices in France, not
less than 50,000,000,000 francs.

"And this formidable figure, gentlemen, does not cover everything. I
have not taken into account the loss represented for the future
production of France by the transformation of so many factories which
for four years were exclusively devoted to war munitions. I have not
taken into account foreign markets lost to us as a result of the
destruction of one-fourth of our productive capital and the almost total
collapse of our trade. I have not taken into account the economic
weakening that we will suffer tomorrow owing to that loss, to which I
referred a while ago, of 2,500,000 young an vigorous men."

This was one of the great by-products of the war. Thousands of young
Americans, vigorous evangels of democratic thought, remained in Europe
to bring American ideals and American force into the affairs of the old
world.

Those who returned were formidable factors in re-shaping the affairs of
the nation. Grave injustices were done in some instances to young men
who had volunteered in the early days of the war through patriotic
motives and who returned to find their places in industry taken by
others. In the main, however, the process of absorption went forward
steadily and without serious incident.

One factor making for satisfactory adjustment was the insurance system
put into effect by the United States Government, affecting its war
forces. Immediately following the armistice, the following announcement
was made:


Preparations by the government for re-insuring the lives of soldiers and
sailors on their return have been hastened by the signing of the
armistice. Although regulations have not yet been fully drafted, it is
certain that each of the 4,250,000 men in the military or naval service
now holding voluntary government insurance will be permitted within five
years after peace is declared to convert it without further medical
examination into ordinary life, twenty-pay life, endowment maturing at
the age of sixty-two, or other prescribed forms of insurance.

This insurance will be arranged by the government, not by private
companies, and the cost is expected to be at least one-fourth less than
similar forms offered by private agencies. The low cost will result from
the fact that the government will pay all overhead administration
expenses, which, for private companies, amount to about seventeen per
cent of premium receipts; will save the usual solicitation fees and, in
addition, bear the risk resulting from the wounding or weakening of men
while in the service. Private companies would not write insurance on
many wounded men, or their rates would be unusually high.

The government will arrange to collect premiums monthly, if men wish to
pay that way, or for longer periods in advance. This may be done through
post-offices. The minimum amount of insurance to be issued probably will
be $1,000, and the maximum $10,000, with any amount between those sums
in multiple of $500. There will be provision for payments in case of
disability as well as death, according to the tentative plan.

Thus will be created out of the government's emergency war insurance
bureau the greatest life insurance institution in the world for peace
times, with more policyholders and greater aggregate risks than a half
dozen of the world's biggest private companies combined. Out of the
experience gained may eventually develop expansion of government
insurance to old age, industrial and other forms of insurance, in the
opinion of officials who have studied the subject.

Regulations for reinsuring returning soldiers and sailors are being
framed by an advisory board to the military and naval section of the war
risk bureau, consisting of Arthur Hunter, actuary of the New York Life
Insurance Company; W. A. Fraser, Omaha, of the Woodmen of the World, and
F. Robertson Jones, of the Workmen's Compensation Publicity Bureau, New
York.

Plans also are under consideration for allowing beneficiaries of men who
have died or been killed in the service to choose between taking monthly
payments over a period of twenty years or to commute these payments in a
lump sum.



CHAPTER LV

AMERICA'S POSITION IN WAR AND PEACE

By common consent of the Entente Allies, President Wilson was made the
spokesman for the democracy of the world. As Lloyd George, Premier
Clemenceau of France, Premier Orlando of Italy, and other Europeans
recognized, his utterances most clearly and cogently expressed the
principles for which civilization was battling against the Hun. More
than that, these statesmen and the peoples they represented recognized
that back of President Wilson were the high ideals of an America pledged
to the redemption of a war-weary world.

The war produced a sterility in literature. Out of the great mass that
was written, however, two productions stood out in their nobility of
thought and in their classic directness of expression. These were the
address before Congress by President Wilson on the night of April 2,
1917, when, recognizing fully the dread responsibility of his action, he
pronounced the words which led America into the World War, and the
speech made by him on Monday, November 11, 1918, when addressing
Congress he announced the end of the war. Other declarations of the
President that will be treasured as long as democracy survives, are
those enunciating the fourteen points upon which America would make
peace, and two later declarations as to America's purposes.

His address of April 2d was delivered before the most distinguished
assemblage ever gathered within the hall of the House of
Representatives. The Supreme Court of the United States, headed by the
Chief Justice, every member of the embassies then resident in
Washington, the entire membership of the House and Senate, and a host of
the most distinguished men and women that could crowd themselves into
the great hall, listened to what was virtually America's Declaration of
War.

The air was still and tragic suspense was upon every face as the
President began his address. At first he was pale as the marble rostrum
against which he leaned. As he read from small sheets typewritten with
his own hand, his voice grew firmer and the flush of indignation and of
resolution overspread his countenance. He said:


GENTLEMEN OF THE CONGRESS:

I have called the Congress into extraordinary session because there are
serious, very serious, choices of policy to be made, and made
immediately, which it was neither right nor constitutionally permissible
that I should assume the responsibility of making.

On the third of February last I officially laid before you the
extraordinary announcement of the Imperial German Government that on and
after the first day of February it was its purpose to put aside all
restraints of law or of humanity and use its submarines to sink every
vessel that sought to approach either the ports of Great Britain and
Ireland on the western coasts of Europe or any of the ports controlled
by the enemies of Germany within the Mediterranean. That had seemed to
be the object of the German submarine warfare earlier in the war, but
since April of last year the Imperial Government had somewhat restrained
the commanders of its undersea craft in conformity with its promise then
given to us that passenger boats should not be sunk and that due warning
would be given to all other vessels which its submarines might seek to
destroy, when no resistance was offered or escape attempted, and care
taken that their crews were given at least a fair chance to save their
lives in their open boats. The precautions taken were meager and
haphazard enough, as was proved in distressing instance after instance
in the progress of the cruel and unmanly business, but a certain degree
of restraint was observed. The new policy has swept every restriction
aside. Vessels of every kind, whatever their flag, their character,
their cargo, their destination, their errand, have been ruthlessly sent
to the bottom without warning and without thought of help or mercy for
those on board, the vessels of friendly neutrals along with those of
belligerents. Even hospital ships and ships carrying relief to the
sorely bereaved and stricken people of Belgium, though the latter were
provided with safe conduct through the proscribed areas by the German
Government itself and were distinguished by unmistakable marks of
identity, have been sunk with the same reckless lack of compassion or of
principle.

I was for a little while unable to believe that such things would in
fact be done by any government that had hitherto subscribed to the
humane practices of civilized nations. International law had its origin
in the attempt to set up some law which would be respected and observed
upon the seas, where no nation had right of dominion and where lay the
free highways of the world. By painful stage after stage has that law
been built up, with meager enough results, indeed, after all was
accomplished that could be accomplished, but always with a clear view,
at least, of what the heart and conscience of mankind demanded.  This
minimum of right the German Government has swept aside under the plea of
retaliation and necessity and because it had no weapons which it could
use at sea except these which it is impossible to employ as it is
employing them without throwing to the winds all scruples of humanity or
of respect for the understandings that were supposed to underlie the
intercourse of the world. I am not now thinking of the loss of property
involved, immense and serious as that is, but only of the wanton and
wholesale destruction of the lives of noncombatants, men, women, and
children, engaged in pursuits which have always, even in the darkest
periods of modern history, been deemed innocent and legitimate. Property
can be paid for; the lives of peaceful and innocent people can not be.
The present German submarine warfare against commerce is a warfare
against mankind.

It is a war against all nations: American ships have been sunk, American
lives taken, in ways which it has stirred us very deeply to learn of,
but the ships and people of other neutral and friendly nations have been
sunk and overwhelmed in the waters in the same way. There has been no
discrimination. The challenge is to all mankind. Each nation must decide
for itself how it will meet it. The choice we make for ourselves must be
made with a moderation of counsel and a temperateness of judgment
befitting our character and our motives as a nation. We must put excited
feeling away. Our motive will not be revenge or the victorious assertion
of the physical might of the nation, but only the vindication of right,
of human right, of which we are only a single champion.

When I addressed the Congress on the twenty-sixth of February last I
thought that it would suffice to assert our neutral rights with arms,
our right to use the seas against unlawful interference, our right to
keep our people safe against unlawful violence. But armed neutrality, it
now appears, is impracticable. Because submarines are in effect outlaws
when used as the German submarines have been used against merchant
shipping, it is impossible to defend ships against their attacks as the
law of nations has assumed that merchantmen would defend themselves
against privateers or cruisers, visible craft giving chase upon the open
sea. It is common prudence in such circumstances, grim necessity indeed,
to endeavor to destroy them before they have shown their own intention.
They must be dealt with upon sight, if dealt with at all. The German
Government denies the right of neutrals to use arms at all within the
areas of the sea which it has proscribed, even in the defense of rights
which no modern publicist has ever before questioned their right to
defend. The intimation is conveyed that the armed guards which we have
placed on our merchant ships will be treated as beyond the pale of law
and subject to be dealt with as pirates would be. Armed neutrality is
ineffectual enough at best; in such circumstances and in the face of
such pretensions it is worse than ineffectual: it is likely only to
produce what it was meant to prevent; it is practically certain to draw
us into the war without either the rights or the effectiveness of
belligerents. There is one choice we can not make, we are incapable of
making; we will not choose the path of submission and suffer the most
sacred rights of our nation and our people to be ignored or violated.
The wrongs against which we now array ourselves are no common wrongs;
they cut to the very roots of human life.

With a profound sense of the solemn and even tragical character of the
step I am taking and of the grave responsibilities which it involves,
but in unhesitating obedience to what I deem my constitutional duty, I
advise that the Congress declare the recent course of the Imperial
German Government to be in fact nothing less than war against the
government and people of the United States; that it formally accept the
status of belligerent which has thus been thrust upon it; and that it
take immediate steps not only to put the country in a more thorough
state of defense but also to exert all its power and employ all its
resources to bring the Government of the German Empire to terms and end
the war.

What this will involve is clear. It will involve the utmost practicable
co-operation in counsel and action with the governments now at war with
Germany, and, as incident to that, the extension to those governments of
the most liberal financial credits, in order that our resources may so
far as possible be added to theirs. It will involve the organization and
mobilization of all the material resources of the country to supply the
materials of war and serve the incidental needs of the nation in the
most abundant and yet the most economical and efficient way possible. It
will involve the immediate full equipment of the navy in all respects
but particularly in supplying it with the best means of dealing with the
enemy's submarines. It will involve the immediate addition to the armed
forces of the United States already provided for by law in case of war
at least five hundred thousand men, who should, in my opinion, be chosen
upon the principle of universal liability to service, and also the
authorization of subsequent additional increments of equal force so soon
as they may be needed and can be handled in training. It will involve
also, of course, the granting of adequate credits to the Government,
sustained, I hope, so far as they can equitably be sustained by the
present generation, by well conceived taxation.

I say sustained so far as may be equitable by taxation because it seems
to me that it would be most unwise to base the credits which will now be
necessary entirely on money borrowed. It is our duty, I most
respectfully urge, to protect our people so far as we may against the
very serious hardships and evils which would be likely to arise out of
the inflation which would be produced by vast loans.

In carrying out the measures by which these things are to be
accomplished we should keep constantly in mind the wisdom of interfering
as little as possible in our own preparation and in the equipment of our
own military forces with the duty--for it will be a very practical
duty--of supplying the nations already at war with Germany with the
materials which they can obtain only from us or by our assistance. They
are in the field and we should help them in every way to be effective
there.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  British Official Photograph
  BELGIAN SOVEREIGNS RE-ENTER BRUGES
  King Albert and Queen Elizabeth of Belgium saluting the Allied colors,
  on their triumphal entry into Bruges at the head of their victorious
  army, October 23, 1918.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright International Film Service.
  SURRENDER OF THE GERMAN HIGH SEAS FLEET
  Actual photograph showing the greatest naval surrender in history--the
  German fleet arriving to surrender. Below, The commanders of the
  British and American fleets, Admirals Beatty and Rodman, the King of
  England and the Prince of Wales viewing the surrender.


I shall take the liberty of suggesting, through the several executive
departments of the Government, for the consideration of your committees,
measures for the accomplishment of the several objects I have mentioned.
I hope that it will be your pleasure to deal with them as having been
framed after very careful thought by the branch of the Government upon
which the responsibility of conducting the war and safeguarding the
nation will most directly fall.

While we do these things, these deeply momentous things, let us be very
clear, and make very clear to all the world what our motives and our
objects are. My own thought has not been driven from its habitual and
normal course by the unhappy events of the last two months, and I do not
believe that the thought of the nation has been altered or clouded by
them. I have exactly the same things in mind now that I had in mind when
I addressed the Senate on the 22d of January last; the same that I had
in mind when I addressed the Congress on the 3d of February and on the
26th of February. Our object now, as then, is to vindicate the
principles of peace and justice in the life of the world as against
selfish and autocratic power and to set up amongst the really free and
self-governed peoples of the world such a concert of purpose and of
action as will henceforth ensure the observance of those principles.
Neutrality is no longer feasible or desirable where the peace of the
world is involved and the freedom of its peoples, and the menace to that
peace and freedom lies in the existence of autocratic governments backed
by organized force which is controlled wholly by their will, not by the
will of their people. We have seen the last of neutrality in such
circumstances. We are at the beginning of an age in which it will be
insisted that the same standards of conduct and of responsibility for
wrong done shall be observed among nations and their governments that
are observed among the individual citizens of civilized states.

We have no quarrel with the German people. We have no feeling towards
them but one of sympathy and friendship. It was not upon their impulse
that their government acted in entering this war. It was not with their
previous knowledge or approval. It was a war determined upon as wars
used to be determined upon in the old, unhappy days when peoples were
nowhere consulted by their rulers and wars were provoked and waged in
the interest of dynasties or of little groups of ambitious men who were
accustomed to use their fellow men as pawns and tools. Self-governed
nations do not fill their neighbor states with spies or set the course
of intrigue to bring about some critical posture of affairs which will
give them an opportunity to strike and make conquest. Such designs can
be successfully worked out only under cover and where no one has the
right to ask questions. Cunningly contrived plans of deception or
aggression, carried, it may be, from generation to generation, can be
worked out and kept from the light only within the privacy of courts or
behind the carefully guarded confidences of a narrow and privileged
class. They are happily impossible where public opinion commands and
insists upon full information concerning all the nation's affairs.

A steadfast concert for peace can never be maintained except by a
partnership of democratic nations. No autocratic government could be
trusted to keep faith within it or observe its covenants. It must be a
league of honor, a partnership of opinion. Intrigue would eat its vitals
away; the plottings of inner circles who could plan what they would and
render account to no one would be a corruption seated at its very heart.
Only free peoples can hold their purpose and their honor steady to a
common end and prefer the interests of mankind to any narrow interest of
their own.

Does not every American feel that assurance has been added to our hope
for the future peace of the world by the wonderful and heartening things
that have been happening within the last few weeks in Russia? Russia was
known by those who knew it best to have been always in fact democratic
at heart, in all the vital habits of her thoughts, in all the intimate
relationships of her people that spoke their natural instinct, their
habitual attitude towards life. The autocracy that crowned the summit of
her political structure, long as it had stood and terrible as was the
reality of its power, was not in fact Russian in origin, character, or
purpose; and now it has been shaken off and the great, generous Russian
people have been added in all their native majesty and might to the
forces that are fighting for freedom in the world, for justice, and for
peace. Here is a fit partner for a League of Honor.

One of the things that has served to convince us that the Prussian
autocracy was not and could never be our friend is that from the very
outset of the present war it has filled our unsuspecting communities and
even our offices of government with spies and set criminal intrigues
everywhere afoot against our national unity of counsel, our peace within
and without, our industries and our commerce. Indeed it is now evident
that its spies were here even before the war began; and it is unhappily
not a matter of conjecture but a fact proved in our courts of justice
that the intrigues which have more than once come perilously near to
disturbing the peace and dislocating the industries of the country have
been carried on at the instigation, with the support, and even under the
personal direction of official agents of the Imperial Government
accredited to the Government of the United States. Even in checking
these things and trying to extirpate them we have sought to put the most
generous interpretation possible upon them because we knew that their
source lay, not in any hostile feeling or purpose of the German people
towards us (who were, no doubt as ignorant of them as we ourselves
were), but only in the selfish designs of a government that did what it
pleased and told its people nothing. But they have played their part in
serving to convince us at last that that government entertains no real
friendship for us and means to act against our peace and security at its
convenience. That it means to stir up enemies against us at our very
doors the intercepted note to the German Minister at Mexico City is
eloquent evidence.

We are accepting this challenge of hostile purpose because we know that
in such a government, following such methods, we can never have a
friend; and that in the presence of its organized power, always lying in
wait to accomplish we know not what purpose, there can be no assured
security for the democratic governments of the world. We are now about
to accept gauge of battle with this natural foe to liberty and shall, if
necessary, spend the whole force of the nation to check and nullify its
pretensions and its power. We are glad, now that we see the facts with
no veil of false pretense about them, to fight thus for the ultimate
peace of the world and for the liberation of its peoples, the German
peoples included: for the rights of nations great and small and the
privilege of men everywhere to choose their way of life and of
obedience. The world must be made safe for democracy. Its peace must be
planted upon the tested foundations of political liberty. We have no
selfish ends to serve. We desire no conquest, no dominion. We seek no
indemnities for ourselves, no material compensation for the sacrifices
we shall freely make. We are but one of the champions of the rights of
mankind. We shall be satisfied when those rights have been made as
secure as the faith and the freedom of nations can make them.

Just because we fight without rancor and without selfish object, seeking
nothing for ourselves but what we shall wish to share with all free
peoples, we shall, I feel confident, conduct our operations as
belligerents without passion, and ourselves observe with proud punctilio
the principles of right and of fair play we profess to be fighting for.

I have said nothing of the governments allied with the Imperial
Government of Germany because they have not made war upon us or
challenged us to defend our right and our honor. The Austro-Hungarian
Government has, indeed, avowed its unqualified endorsement and
acceptance of the reckless and lawless submarine warfare adopted now
without disguise by the Imperial German Government, and it has therefore
not been possible for this government to receive Count Tarnowski, the
Ambassador recently accredited to this government by the Imperial and
Royal Government of Austria-Hungary; but that government has not
actually engaged in warfare against citizens of the United States on the
seas, and I take the liberty, for the present at least, of postponing a
discussion of our relations with the authorities at Vienna. We enter
this war only where we are clearly forced into it because there are no
other means of defending our rights.

It will be all the easier for us to conduct ourselves as belligerents in
a high spirit of right and fairness because we act without animus, not
in enmity towards a people or with the desire to bring any injury or
disadvantage upon them, but only in armed opposition to an irresponsible
government which has thrown aside all considerations of humanity and of
right and is running amuck. We are, let me say again, the sincere
friends of the German people, and shall desire nothing so much as the
early re-establishment of intimate relations of mutual advantage between
us--however hard it may be for them, for the time being, to believe that
this is spoken from our hearts. We have borne with their present
government through all these bitter months because of that
friendship--exercising a patience and forbearance which would otherwise
have been impossible. We shall, happily, still have an opportunity to
prove that friendship in our daily attitude and actions towards the
millions of men and women of German birth and native sympathy who live
amongst us and share our life, and we shall be proud to prove it towards
all who are in fact loyal to their neighbors and to the government in
the hour of test. They are, most of them, as true and loyal Americans as
if they had never known any other fealty or allegiance. They will be
prompt to stand with us in rebuking and restraining the few who may be
of a different mind and purpose. If there should be disloyalty, it will
be dealt with with a firm hand of stern repression; but, if it lifts its
head at all, it will lift it only here and there and without countenance
except from a lawless and malignant few.

It is a distressing and oppressive duty, Gentlemen of the Congress,
which I have performed in thus addressing you. There are, it may be,
many months of fiery trial and sacrifice ahead of us. It is a fearful
thing to lead this great peaceful people into war, into the most
terrible and disastrous of all wars, civilization itself seeming to be
in the balance. But the right is more precious than peace, and we shall
fight for the things which we have always carried nearest our
hearts--for democracy, for the right of those who submit to authority to
have a voice in their own governments, for the rights and liberties of
small nations, for a universal dominion of right by such a concert of
free peoples as shall bring peace and safety to all nations and make the
world itself at last free. To such a task we can dedicate our lives and
our fortunes, everything that we are and everything that we have, with
the pride of those who know that the day has come when America is
privileged to spend her blood and her might for the principles that gave
her birth and happiness and the peace which she has treasured. God
helping her, she can do no other.


His address to Congress on November 11, 1918, while all the Allied
Nations were celebrating with exultant hearts the victory that had come
to them, was no less dramatic than the speech that had marked the
beginning of the war. He prefaced it by reading the drastic terms of the
armistice granted to Germany. Continuing he said:


The war thus comes to an end; for, having accepted these terms of
armistice, it will be impossible for the German command to renew it.

It is not now possible to assess the consequences of this great
consummation. We know only that this tragical war, whose consuming
flames swept from one nation to another until all the world was on fire,
is at an end and that it was the privilege of our own people to enter it
at its most critical juncture in such fashion and in such force as to
contribute, in a way of which we are all deeply proud, to the great
result. We know, too, that the object of the war is attained; the object
upon which all free men had set their hearts; and attained with a
sweeping completeness which even now we do not realize. Armed
imperialism such as the men conceived who were but yesterday the masters
of Germany is at an end, its illicit ambitions engulfed in black
disaster. Who will now seek to revive it?

The arbitrary power of the military caste of Germany which once could
secretly and of its own single choice disturb the peace of the world is
discredited and destroyed. And more than that--much more than that--has
been accomplished. The great nations which associated themselves to
destroy it have now definitely united in the common purpose to set up
such a peace as will satisfy the longing of the whole world for
disinterested justice, embodied in settlements which are based upon
something much better and more lasting than the selfish competitive
interests of powerful states. There is no longer conjecture as to the
objects the victors have in mind. They have a mind in the matter, not
only, but a heart also. Their avowed and concerted purpose is to satisfy
and protect the weak as well as to accord their just rights to the
strong.

The humane temper and intention of the victorious governments have
already been manifested in a very practical way. Their representatives
in the Supreme War Council at Versailles have by unanimous resolution
assured the peoples of the Central Empires that everything that is
possible in the circumstances will be done to supply them with food and
relieve the distressing want that is in so many places threatening their
very lives; and steps are to be taken immediately to organize these
efforts at relief in the same systematic manner that they were organized
in the case of Belgium. By the use of the idle tonnage of the Central
Empires it ought presently to be possible to lift the fear of utter
misery from their oppressed populations and set their minds and energies
free for the great and hazardous tasks of political reconstruction which
now face them on every hand. Hunger does not breed reform; it breeds
madness and all the ugly distempers that make an ordered life
impossible.

For with the fall of the ancient governments, which rested like an
incubus on the peoples of the Central Empires, has come political change
not merely, but revolution; and revolution which seems as yet to assume
no final and ordered form, but to run from one fluid change to another,
until thoughtful men are forced to ask themselves, with what governments
and of what sort are we about to deal in the making of the covenants of
peace? With what authority will they meet us, and with what assurance
that their authority will abide and sustain securely the international
arrangements into which we are about to enter? There is here matter for
no small anxiety and misgiving. When peace is made, upon whose promises
and engagements besides our own is it to rest?

Let us be perfectly frank with ourselves and admit that these questions
cannot be satisfactorily answered now or at once. But the moral is not
that there is little hope of an early answer that will suffice. It is
only that we must be patient and helpful and mindful above all of the
great hope and confidence that lie at the heart of what is taking place.
Excesses accomplish nothing. Unhappy Russia has furnished abundant
recent proof of that. Disorder immediately defeats itself. If excesses
should occur, if disorder should for a time raise its head, a sober
second thought will follow and a day of constructive action, if we help
and do not hinder.

The present and all that it holds belongs to the nations and the peoples
who preserve their self-control and the orderly processes of their
governments; the future to those who prove themselves the true friends
of mankind. To conquer with arms is to make only a temporary conquest;
to conquer the world by earning its esteem is to make permanent
conquest. I am confident that the nations that have learned the
discipline of freedom and that have settled with self-possession to its
ordered practice are now about to make conquest of the world by the
sheer power of example and of friendly helpfulness.

The peoples who have but just come out from under the yoke of arbitrary
government and who are now coming at last into their freedom will never
find the treasures of liberty they are in search of if they look for
them by the light of the torch. They will find that every pathway that
is stained with the blood of their own brothers leads to the wilderness,
not to the seat of their hope. They are now face to face with their
initial test. We must hold the light steady until they find themselves.
And in the meantime, if it be possible, we must establish a peace that
will justly define their place among the nations, remove all fear of
their neighbors and of their former masters, and enable them to live in
security and contentment when they have set their own affairs in order.
I, for one, do not doubt their purpose or their capacity. There are some
happy signs that they know and will choose the way of self-control and
peaceful accommodation. If they do, we shall put our aid at their
disposal in every way that we can. If they do not, we must await with
patience and sympathy the awakening and recovery that will assuredly
come at last.


FOURTEEN PRINCIPLES OF PEACE

On Tuesday, January 8, 1918, President Wilson placed the peace terms of
the United States Government before both houses of Congress, in joint
session. The fourteen principles were:

1. Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, after which there shall
be no private international understanding of any kind, but diplomacy
shall proceed always frankly and in the public view.

2. Absolute freedom of navigation upon the seas, outside territorial
waters, alike in peace and war, except as the seas may be closed in
whole or in part by international action for the enforcement of
international covenants.

3. The removal, so far as possible, of all economic barriers and the
establishment of an equality of trade conditions among all the nations
consenting to the peace and associating themselves for its maintenance.

4. Adequate guarantees given and taken that national armaments will be
reduced to the lowest point consistent with domestic safety.

5. A free, open-minded and absolutely impartial adjustment of all
Colonial claims based upon a strict observance of the principle that in
determining all such questions of sovereignty, the interests of the
populations concerned must have equal weight with the equitable claims
of the government whose title is to be determined.

6. The evacuation of all Russian territory and such a settlement of all
questions affecting Russia as will secure the best and freest
co-operation of the other nations of the world in obtaining for her an
unhampered and unembarrassed opportunity for the independent
determination of her own political development and national policy, and
assure her of a sincere welcome into the society of free nations under
institutions of her own choosing; and, more than a welcome, assistance
also of every kind that she may need and may herself desire. The
treatment accorded Russia by her sister nations in the months to come
will be the acid test of their good will, of their comprehension of her
needs, as distinguished from their own interests, and of their
intelligent and unselfish sympathy.

7. Belgium, the whole world will agree, must be evacuated and restored,
without any attempt to limit the sovereignty which she enjoys in common
with all other free nations. No other single act will serve as this will
serve to restore confidence among the nations in the laws which they
have themselves set and determined for the government of their relations
with one another. Without this healing act the whole structure and
validity of international law is forever impaired.

8. All French territory should be freed and the invaded portions
restored, and the wrong done to France by Prussia in 1871, in the matter
of Alsace-Lorraine, which has unsettled the peace of the world for
nearly fifty years, should be righted, in order that peace may once more
be made secure in the interests of all.

9. A readjustment of the frontiers of Italy should be effected along
clearly recognized lines of nationality.

10. The peoples of Austria-Hungary, whose place among the nations we
wish to see safeguarded and restored, should be accorded the freest
opportunity of autonomous development.

11. Roumania, Serbia and Montenegro should be evacuated, occupied
territories restored; Serbia accorded free and secure access to the sea,
and the relations of the several Balkan States to one another determined
by friendly counsel along historically established lines of allegiance
and nationality; and international guarantees of the political and
economic independence and territorial integrity, of the several Balkan
States, should be entered into.

12. The Turkish portion of the present Ottoman Empire should be assured
a secure sovereignty, but the other nationalities which are now under
Turkish rule, should be assured an undoubted security of life and an
absolutely unmolested opportunity of autonomous development, and the
Dardanelles should be permanently opened as a free passage to the ships
and commerce of all nations under international guarantees.

13. An independent Polish State should be erected which should include
the territories inhabited by indisputably Polish populations, which
should be assured a free and secure access to the sea, and whose
political and economic independence and territorial integrity should be
guaranteed by international covenants.

14. General association of nations must be formed under specific
covenants for the purpose of affording mutual guarantees of political
independence and territorial integrity to great and small states alike.


President Wilson in his address to Congress on February 11, 1918,
presented these four principles which are to be applied in arranging
world peace:


1. That each part of the final settlement must be based upon the
essential justice of that particular case and upon such adjustments, as
are most likely to bring a peace that will be permanent.

2. That peoples and provinces are not to be bartered about from
sovereignty to sovereignty as if they were mere chattels and pawns in a
game, even the great game now forever discredited, of the balance of
power; but that

3: Every territorial settlement must be made in the interest and for the
benefit of the populations concerned, and not as part of any mere
adjustment or compromise of claims amongst rival states; and,

4. That all well-defined national aspirations shall be accorded the
utmost satisfaction that can be accorded them without introducing new or
perpetuating old elements of discord and antagonism that would be likely
in time to break the peace of Europe and consequently of the world.


President Wilson, in his Liberty Loan address in New York on September
27th, thus stated this government's interpretation of its duty with
regard to peace:

1. The impartial justice meted out must involve no discrimination
between those to whom we wish to be just and those to whom we do not
wish to be just. It must be a justice that plays no favorites and knows
no standard but the equal rights of the several peoples concerned;

2. No special or separate interest of any single nation or any group of
nations can be made the basis of any part of the settlement which is not
consistent with the common interests of all;

3. There can be no leagues or alliances or special covenants and
understandings within the general and common family of the League of
Nations;

4. And more specifically, there can be no special, selfish economic
combinations within the league and no employment of any form of economic
boycott or exclusion except as the power of economic penalty by
exclusion from the markets of the world may be vested in the League of
Nations itself as a means of discipline and control.

5. All international agreements and treaties of every kind must be made
known in their entirety to the rest of the world.


[Illustration: Map: Europe, North Africa, East Asia.]
  THE WAR ZONE ESTABLISHED BY GERMANY, FEBRUARY, 1917, THAT BROUGHT
  AMERICA INTO THE WAR.



CHAPTER LVI

THE WAR BY YEARS

Germany's military strength developed during forty years of preparation,
and the offensive plans of the German High Command developed in
connection with an extraordinary spy service in France, Belgium, Russia,
England and the United States, culminated in a simultaneous campaign on
land and by sea, affecting these five nations.

AUGUST 1, 1914-AUGUST 1, 1915

Belgium and Northern France were overrun by a German invading force
under General von Kluck. The heroic effort of the French army under
General Joffre and a supreme strategic thrust at the German center by
General Foch turned back the German tide at the battle of the Marne. The
scientific diabolism of the German High Command was revealed when poison
gas was projected against the Canadians at Ypres, torturing, blinding
and killing thousands.

German terrorism on the high seas culminated in the sinking of the
Cunard liner Lusitania by a German submarine off the Irish coast. Men,
women and children to the number of 1,152 lost their lives. Of these 102
were Americans.

German colonies in South Africa were invaded by British South African
troops under General Louis Botha, who during the Boer War commanded a
division against the British. The German holdings at Tsing-Tau and in
the Marshall Islands were seized by Japan.

German cruisers that had raided sea-going commerce were destroyed. The
most noted of these was the Emden, which was defeated and destroyed by
the Australian cruiser Sydney off the Cocos Islands.

German sea power was further humiliated in a running fight off Helgoland
in which the battle cruiser Blucher was sunk and in a battle off the
Falkland Islands in which three German cruisers were destroyed.

Italy entered the war on May 23,1915, and invaded Austria on a
sixty-mile front. Russian forces, after early successes, were defeated
at Tannenburg by von Hindenburg, the outstanding military genius on the
German side.

The development of aircraft as an aid to artillery and as a destructive
force on its own account, was rapid, and the use of machine guns and
hand grenades in trench operations became general.


AUGUST 1, 1915-AUGUST 1, 1916

The tragic sea and land operations at the Dardanelles and Gallipoli
marked this year with red in British history. Sir Douglas Haig succeeded
Sir John French as Commander-in-Chief of British forces in France. The
outstanding operation of the British forces on the western front was the
bloody battle of the Somme, beginning July 1st, and continuing until the
fall of 1915. The losses on both sides in that titanic struggle
staggered two continents. Especially heroic were the attacks of the
Canadians in that great battle and especially heavy were the losses in
killed and wounded of the Canadian regiments. They ranked in magnitude
with the depletion that came to the Australian and New Zealand armies in
the fatal Gallipoli campaign.

This year will be glorious forever in the annals of France because of
the heroic defense at Verdun. That battle tested to the limit the
offensive strength of the German machine and it was found lacking in
power to pierce the superhuman defense of the heroic French forces under
Petain and Nivelle.

Bulgaria entered the war on October 14, 1915, with a declaration of war
against helpless Serbia. Greece, torn by internal dissensions, inclined
first to one side, then to the other. The occupation of Saloniki by
French and British expeditionary forces finally swung the archipelago to
the Allies.

A British Mesopotamian force under General Townshend, poorly equipped
and unsupported, was cut off in Kut-el-Amara, and surrendered to the
Turks on April 29, 1916.

The Italian forces under General Cadorna made a sensational advance
terminating in the capture of Gorizia. Portugal entered the war on the
side of the Allies after it had refused to give up to Germany several
German ships interned in Portuguese ports.

An object lesson in German submarine possibilities was given America
when the Deutschland, a super-submarine cargo vessel, arrived in
Baltimore, Maryland, on July 9, 1916. The Deutschland later was
converted into a naval submarine and re-visited American shores, sinking
a number of merchant vessels. It was one of the German submarine fleet
surrendered to the Allies in November, 1918.

Russia proved itself to be a military ineffective. German armies under
von Mackensen and von Hindenburg occupied Warsaw, Brest-Litovsk, Lutsk,
and Grodno. Grand Duke Nicholas was removed from the command of the
Russian armies and Czar Nicholas assumed command.

Germany's pretensions to sea power ended with the battle of Jutland, May
31, 1916, when its High Seas fleet fled after a running fight with
British cruisers and destroyers. Never, thereafter, during the war did
the German ships venture out of the Bight of Helgoland.


AUGUST 1, 1916-AUGUST 1, 1917

This year was marked by two dramatic episodes. The first of these was
the sudden entrance and the equally sudden exit of Roumania as a factor
in the World War.

The second was the appearance of the United States which became the
deciding factor in the war.

Roumania created enthusiasm in Allied countries when it declared war on
Austria-Hungary August 27th. A sudden descent by a Roumanian army into
Transylvania on August 30th was hailed as the harbinger of further
successes. These hopes were turned to ashes when von Mackensen headed an
irresistible German and Austrian rush which fairly inundated Roumania.
The retreat from Transylvania by the Roumanians was turned into a rout.
Bulgarian forces invaded the Dobrudja region of Roumania and on November
28th the seat of the Roumanian Government was transferred from
Bucharest, the capital, to Jassy. Roumania ceased to be a factor in the
war on December 6th, when Bucharest fell to von Mackensen. Emperor Franz
Josef of Austria-Hungary died on November 22d, while Austrian hopes were
at their highest.

America's appearance as a belligerent was forecast on January 31, 1917,
when Germany announced its intention of sinking all vessels in a
blockade zone around the British Isles. Count von Bernstorff was handed
his passports on February 3d, and on April 2d President Wilson, in a
remarkable address to Congress, advised a declaration of war by the
United States against Germany. This was consummated by a formal vote of
Congress declaring war on April 6th.

This action by America was followed by the organization of a Council of
National Defense. Under this body the resources of the nation were
mobilized. The council was later virtually abandoned as an organizing
factor, its functions going to the War Industries Board, presided over
by Bernard Baruch; the Fuel Administration, under Dr. Harry A. Garfield;
the War Trade Board, with Vance C. McCormick at its head; and other
governmental bodies. George Creel headed the Committee on Public
Information.

Conscription was decided upon as the foundation of America's war-making
policy, and the training of officers and privates in great training
camps was commenced. Great shipping and aircraft programs were
formulated and the nation as a whole was placed upon a war footing.

The Russian revolution beginning in bread riots in Petrograd, spread
throughout that country, with the result that Russia disappeared as one
of the Entente Allies.


FROM AUGUST 1, 1917-NOVEMBER 11, 1918

America's might and efficiency were revealed in the speed and
thoroughness with which her military, naval and civilian resources were
mobilized and thrown into the conflict. Under the supervision of the
Chief of Staff, two million American soldiers received the final touches
in their military training and were transported safely overseas. They
became the decisive factor in the war during the summer and fall of
1918. To their glory be it recorded they never retreated.
Chateau-Thierry, St. Mihiel, Siecheprey, Boureches Wood, Cantigny,
Belleau Wood, the Argonne, Sedan and Stenay are names that will rank in
American history with Yorktown, New Orleans and Gettysburg. The "land of
dollars" became over night the "land of high ideals" to the civilized
world. Lightless nights in cities, restriction of the use of gasoline on
Sundays and daylight-saving legislation linked civilians to soldiers in
war effort.

Italy suffered a severe reverse beginning October 24, 1917, when the
German forces rushed through a portion of the Italian army that had been
honey-combed with pro-German Socialistic propaganda.

Canada again emblazoned its name in history through the heroic capture
of Passchendaele on November 6, 1917.

The Russian revolution turned to the Bolsheviki when Lenine and Trotsky
at the head of the Reds seized Petrograd on November 7th and deposed
Alexander Kerensky, leader of the Moderate Socialists. The Czar Nicholas
was executed by the victorious Bolsheviki and the Imperial family made
captives.

The British Mesopotamian forces advanced into Palestine and Mesopotamia,
destroying the Turkish army under Ahmed Bey in a battle terminating
September 29, 1917. General Stanley Maude, the leader of the expedition,
died in Mesopotamia November 18, 1917.

General Allenby commanding British and Arabian forces, routed and
destroyed three Turkish armies in Palestine, capturing Jerusalem which
had been held by the Turks for six hundred and seventy three years.

The turning point of the war came on March 29, 1918, when General Foch
was chosen Commander-in-Chief of all the Allied forces. This followed
Germany's great drive on a fifty-mile front from Arras to La Fere.
Successive German thrusts were halted by the Allied forces now strongly
reinforced by Americans.

Foch, patiently biding his time, elected to halt the German drive with
Americans. The Marines of the United States forces were given the post
of honor, and at Chateau-Thierry the counter-thrust of Foch was
commenced by a complete defeat of the Prussian Guard and other crack
German regiments, by the untried soldiers of America.

From Chateau-Thierry to the armistice which went into effect at eleven
o'clock on November 11th was only a short span of time, but in it was
compressed the humiliation of arrogant Teutonic imperialism, the
destruction of militaristic autocracy, and the liberation of the world.



CHAPTER LVII

BEHIND AMERICA'S BATTLE LINE

GENERAL MARCH'S OWN STORY OF THE WORK OF THE MILITARY INTELLIGENCE
DIVISION--OF THE WAR PLANS DIVISION--OF THE PURCHASE AND TRAFFIC
DIVISION--HOW MEN, MUNITIONS AND SUPPLIES REACHED THE WESTERN FRONT.

It is important that a general summary of America's military
preparations, a detailed description of the operations behind the battle
line and a detailed chronology of America's principal military
operations in France during the year 1918 should be presented to the
reader. Such a summary is afforded by the report of General Peyton C.
March, Chief of Staff, United States Army, for the last year of the war.
Addressing the Secretary of War, General March wrote in part:


The signing of the armistice on November 11, 1918, has brought to a
successful conclusion the most remarkable achievement in the history of
all warfare.

The entry of the United States into the war on April 6, 1917, found the
Nation about as thoroughly unprepared for the great task which was
confronting it as any great nation which had ever engaged in war.
Starting from a minimum of organized strength, within this short period
of sixteen months the entire resources of the country in men, money, and
munitions have been placed under central control, and at the end of this
period the Nation was in its full stride and had accomplished, from a
military standpoint, what our enemy regarded as the impossible. The most
important single thing, perhaps, in this record of accomplishment, was
the immediate passage by Congress of the draft law, without which it
would have been impossible to have raised the men necessary for victory.
In organizing, training, and supplying the vast numbers of men made
available by the draft law very many changes have been made necessary in
the organization of the War Department and in the methods existing
therein which were inherited from the times of profound peace.

Shortly after my installation as Chief of Staff I adopted the principle
of interchange of the personnel of the various staff corps of the War
Department with men who had training in France, and in the application
of this principle placed as the heads of various bureaus officers
selected on account of their ability and experience in the system of
warfare as conducted in France.

At this time, also, I found that the divisions organized in our armies
were still regarded as separate units, designated by different titles in
accordance with their origin. This made three different kinds of
divisions in the United States army--the Regular army, the National
Guard, and National army divisions. All these distinctions were
abolished and the entire army consolidated into a United States army,
without regard to the source from which drawn. The source of supply of
all replacements for the various elements of the army, without regard to
their origin, was drafted men; and the titles had no significance
whatever and were a source of possible disturbance from the standpoint
of military efficiency. There was, in fact, no actual difference between
these divisions with respect to efficiency--all have done high-grade
work from whatever source drawn. All have shown courage and capacity for
quick absorption of the fundamentals of modern military training and
irresistible dash and force in actual fighting.

When I returned from France on March 1, 1918, I came back with the
belief that the most fundamental necessity, both for the American
Expeditionary Force and for the success of the allies, was that the
shipment of troops to France should be vastly increased and should have
priority over everything else; and as this policy became effective a
study was instituted looking to our putting in France, if that was
possible, enough men to bring the war to a conclusion in the shortest
period possible. After a study of the entire situation, including as
accurate an estimate of the potential strength of our allies on the
western front and of the probable German strength as was possible, I
came to the conclusion that the war might be brought to an end in 1919,
provided we were able to land in France by June 30th of that year eighty
American divisions of a strength of 3,360,000 men. On July 18, 1918, I
submitted to you a formal memorandum, accompanied by a study of methods
by which the men could be obtained, the supplies procured, and an
analysis of the shipping which must be obtained in order to accomplish
this very large military program. This was accompanied by an estimate of
the cost of the proposed program.

In this study I recommended to you the adoption, as the American
program, of eighty divisions in France and eighteen at home by June 30,
1919, based on a total strength of the American army of 4,850,000 men.
This was approved by you and by the President of the United States and
adopted as our formal military program. To carry this program into
effect required the adoption by Congress of a change in the draft ages
so as to include men between the ages of eighteen and forty-five years,
and also created a deficiency over the enormous appropriations already
made by Congress of some $7,000,000,000. The presentation of the program
to Congress, accompanied by the statement that this increase in the
army, if laws were passed by Congress which would make it effective,
would lead to success in 1919, produced prompt and favorable
consideration by that body. Up to the signing of the armistice troops
were being transported to France monthly in accordance with that
program. The results speak for themselves....


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Photo by International Film Service.
  THE SALVATION ARMY ON THE WESTERN FRONT
  A shell-proof dugout used as a rest room for soldiers.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright Press Illustrating Service.
  THE Y. M. C. A. IN THE FRONT LINE TRENCHES
  The Y. M. C. A. sign beside the trench points the way to a dugout,
  instead of the usual hut, in which soldiers found the comforts which
  made the sign of the triangle famous.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Photo from Underwood and Underwood. N.Y.
  A LETTER FROM HOME
  In thousands of France's little stone houses this scene has been
  duplicated. In the towns and villages soldiers were assigned or
  "billeted" to the houses of the inhabitants with the result that a
  deep mutual respect grew up between the two nationalities.


During the year, the most important in the history of the country both
from a military and civil standpoint, there have been four heads of the
General Staff: Major-General Hugh L. Scott, from the outbreak of the war
until his retirement, September 22, 1917; General Tasker H. Bliss, from
that date until May 19, 1918; Major-General John Biddle, Acting Chief of
Staff at periods during the absence of General Bliss in France, from
October 29, 1917, to December 16, 1917, and from January 9, 1918, to
March 3, 1918. I assumed the duties of Acting Chief of Staff on March 4,
1918, became Chief of Staff May 20, 1918, and have continued on that
duty since.

It was evident, as the war progressed, that the General Staff was acting
under an organization and in accordance with regulations which were not
only unsuited to the duties and responsibilities confronting it, but
were wholly out of date and were not suited to any General Staff
organization. Successive revisions of the orders under which the General
Staff was acting were made as events demanded, until the experience of
the year crystallized the organization of the General Staff into that
set forth in General Order No. 80 of the War Department. This order
divides the work of the General Staff into four primary divisions: 1.
Operations; 2. Purchase, Storage, and Traffic; 3. Military Intelligence;
4. War Plans. Each of these divisions is under the direction of a
director; who is Assistant Chief of Staff and is a general officer.


OPERATIONS DIVISION

The Operations Division is under the charge of Major-General Henry
Jervey, United States army, as Director of Operations and Assistant
Chief of Staff. This division is a consolidation of the former
Operations Committee and Equipment Committee, which pertained to the War
College under the previous organization. The Operations Division has had
charge of the increase in the personnel of the army during the year. On
June 30, 1917, the Regular army consisted of 250,357 officers and
enlisted men. On August 5,1917, 379,323 officers and men of the National
Guard were drafted into the Federal service. There were a few special
drafts of small numbers of National Guardsmen into the Federal service
after August 5, 1917. During the period covered by this report this
division handled the calls into service of men obtained under the draft,
the organization of these men into divisions and units necessary for the
army, and turned over for shipment overseas up to November 8, 1918,
2,047,667 men. The grand total of men in the army from returns for the
period ending October 15th is 3,624,774. This force was organized into
divisions, the proper proportion of corps, army, and service of supply
troops, and of replacement camps and training centers for Infantry,
Field Artillery, and Machine Guns in the United States. Central
officers' training schools were organized at each of the replacement
camps. Replacement camps and training centers for the various staff
departments were also organized. Development battalions were organized
at all division camps and large posts and camps for the purpose of
developing men of poor physique and the instruction of illiterates and
non-English-speaking men of the draft. During the fiscal year 5,377,468
officers and men were moved by railroad to and from the camps.

The Operations Division has during the year also handled all matters
connected with the adoption of new types of equipment, fixing allowances
for various units, the preparation of tables of equipment for them, and
the distribution and issue of equipment, and the determination of
priorities of such issue.

It has supervised and studied the needs of camps and construction work
therein, and this work in general has been characterized by marked
ability and devotion to duty.


PURCHASE, STORAGE AND TRAFFIC DIVISION

The Division of Purchase, Storage and Traffic is under the charge of
Major-General George W. Goethals, United States army, as Assistant Chief
of Staff and Director of Purchase, Storage and Traffic. This division
was organized by merging divisions previously created, and which had
been called "Storage and Traffic" and "Purchase and Supply." The new
division thus organized was subdivided into Embarkation Service,
Storage, Inland Traffic Service, and Purchase and Supply Branch.

Embarkation.--At the outbreak of the war the Quartermaster's Department
had charge of the transportation of troops and supplies and continued to
exercise these functions until August 4, 1917, when they were
transferred to a separate division of the General Staff, specially
created for the purpose, and designated as the Embarkation Service. As
already noted, this was subsequently merged with the Storage and Traffic
Division.

Two primary ports of embarkation were established, one with headquarters
at Hoboken, N. J., and the other at Newport News, Va., each under the
command of a general officer.

The Quartermaster's Department was operating a service to Panama from
New York, but with the shipment of troops to France a new condition
arose which was met only in part by taking over the Hoboken piers,
formerly owned by the Hamburg-American and North German Lloyd steamship
companies, and the magnitude of the undertaking necessitated additional
facilities. The situation at New York is complicated by the large amount
of general shipping using the port, the diversified interests, even
those of the government, and the complicated jurisdiction. An effort was
made to bring about such a consolidation and unification as to secure
greater co-operation with increased efficiency. To this end the War
Board for the Port of New York was established in November, 1917. It was
vested with full power and authority to make rules and regulations for
operating the facilities of the port, to determine priorities, and to do
what was necessary to provide for the prompt and economical dispatch of
the business of the government in and about the port. Mr. Irving T. Bush
was selected as the board's representative, with the title of chief
executive officer. In addition to representing the board he was to
arrange for the co-operative use of piers, warehouses, lighterage,
terminals, railroads, trucking, and all other transportation facilities
in and about the port.

In addition the need was felt for having a shipping expert closely
associated with the Embarkation Service, familiar with the facilities at
various ports, so that he could properly assign ships, select ships for
the cargo to be moved, and arrange for their loading. Mr. Joseph T.
Lilly was selected for this work and appointed director of embarkation.

In February, 1918, the available cargo ships were not sufficient to
carry the supplies needed for maintaining the troops overseas. To secure
the requisite additional tonnage necessitated taking ships from the
existing trade routes and determining from what imports and exports they
could best be spared without interference with those which were
absolutely necessary. This brought about a new situation which could be
handled only by those having a knowledge of the trades as well as the
characteristics of various ships serving them, since some of them were
suitable for War Department needs and some were not. It had happened
that an advantageous exchange of ships could have been made with the
Allies by which valuable time could have been saved in getting over
cargo, but there was lack of knowledge as well as lack of authority. The
whole situation was gone over at a conference between the Secretary of
War and the chairman of the Shipping Board, as a result of which the
Shipping Control Committee was created, consisting of Mr. P. A. S.
Franklin, chairman; Mr. H. H. Raymond; and Sir Connop Guthrie,
representative of the Allies' shipping interests. The allocation and
distribution of available tonnage, as well as questions of exchange of
ships, was vested in this committee. So far as the work of the War
Department was concerned the committee was charged with the loading and
unloading cargo, coaling, supplies, repairs, and, except where vessels
are commanded by the navy, of inspection and manning. They also have
charge of the management and operation of docks, piers, slips, loading
and discharging facilities under the control of the department, or of
any board, officers, or agency operating such facilities, together with
the direction and management of minor craft to be used in connection
with the handling of steamers and their cargoes in port. The amount of
cargo shipped overseas, the efficiency of the loading, and the reduction
of the time of stay in the ports attest to the efficient manner in which
the committee has operated, and it is not too much to say that they are
to be largely credited with the results that have been accomplished.

Expeditionary depots were operated at Boston, Mass., Philadelphia, Pa.,
and Baltimore, Md., primarily for the movement of freight. When cargo
ships having accommodations for troops were loaded at these ports troops
for the available space were sent from the camps under the direction of
the commanding general at Hoboken; similarly shipments of troops were
made from Montreal, Canada, and Halifax, Nova Scotia, when practicable.
Cargo shipments were also made from other ports on the Atlantic and Gulf
coasts.

On May 25, 1918, the water transport branch of the Quartermaster's
Department was transferred and made a part of the Embarkation Service.

In April conditions abroad necessitated the speeding up shipments of
troops, and brought to the service such transports as the British
Government could spare for the purpose, which have been continued in
use. The army transports are officered and manned by the navy, as is the
greater number of the cargo ships. The arrangements for transferring
ships to naval control as well as for convoys for troop and cargo ships
are handled through the Chief of Operations of the navy, who has given
every assistance. The way in which the work has been handled by the navy
is shown by the loss of no troop ships which were under their protection
on the eastbound trips.

Inland Traffic.--The inland traffic service was established on January
10, 1918. As the government had taken over all of the railroads, the
necessity for working in harmony with the organization that was placed
in charge was apparent, and the Railroad Administration was requested to
recommend a competent traffic man to handle the work. This resulted in
the selection and assignment of Mr. H. M. Adams as chief of the section.
He in turn secured his expert assistants through the Railroad
Administration.

At the time the section was formed approximately 15,000 carloads of War
Department property held in cars were congesting various Atlantic ports.
Steps were taken which relieved this condition and brought about an
orderly movement of the traffic when and in the quantities desired. The
value of the inland traffic service was soon demonstrated and led to a
reorganization, with authority to take over the transportation
organizations of the various bureaus of the War Department, both at
Washington and throughout the country, so that as now organized the
chief of the inland traffic service exercises direct control of the
transportation of troops, of the supplies of and for the various bureaus
of the War Department, and for the contractors working for the several
bureaus. This control extends over the entire country through the medium
of representatives stationed at various traffic centers.

Working in conjunction with the Railroad Administration has resulted in
minimizing the burdens of the carriers. The work has been performed most
efficiently. More than 5,000,000 troops have been moved from their
homes, from one camp to another, and from camps to the points of
embarkation within the period covered by this report.

Arrangements have been made by which this branch will take charge of all
express movements for the War Department, as well as the tracing of the
movements of all War Department property, including the contractors and
others for the various bureaus.

Purchase and Supply.--The Purchase and Supply Branch is organized into
the following subsections: Supply Program, Purchase, Production,
Finance, and Emergency.


MILITARY INTELLIGENCE DIVISION

The Military Intelligence Division has as director Brigadier-General
Marlborough Churchill, United States army, Assistant Chief of Staff.
This division, which had been a branch, first of the War Plans Division
and then of the Executive Division of the General Staff, was separated
completely and made an independent division by general orders which
reorganized the General Staff, thus putting the Military Intelligence
Division on a par with similar services of general staffs of other
nations of the world.

The duties of the Military Intelligence Division consist, in general, in
the organization of the intelligence service, positive and negative,
including the collection and coordination of military information; the
supervision of the department intelligence officers and intelligence
officers at posts, stations, camps, and with commands in the field, in
matters relating to military intelligence; the direction of
counter-espionage work; the preparation of instruction in military
intelligence work for the use of our forces; the consideration of
questions of policy promulgated by the General Staff in all matters of
military intelligence; the co-operation with intelligence branches of
the general staffs of other countries; the supervision of the training
of officers for intelligence duty, the obtaining and issuing of maps:
and the disbursement of and accounting for intelligence funds.

One of the important functions of the Director of the Military
Intelligence Division is that of coordinating the work of this service
with other intelligence agencies. Possible duplications of work and
investigation by the State Department, Treasury Department, Department
of Justice, Navy Department, War Trade Board, and the War Department are
avoided or adjusted at weekly conferences held at the Department of
Justice and attended by representatives of these departments who
consider matters of common interest. For a similar purpose, the Director
of Military Intelligence is a member of the Fire Prevention Committee,
the War Industries Board, and the National Research Council.

For the purpose of securing close co-operation between the military
intelligence services of the nations associated in the war, the British
and French Governments were requested by the United States to send
officers to this country for liaison duty. These officers have been of
great assistance in accomplishing this end, because of their knowledge
of the details of intelligence work in Europe.

For the performance of the service for which the Military Intelligence
Division was developed, eight sections have been established, each
dealing with its peculiar problems, and working in close liaison with
its fellows....

It may not be amiss to call attention to the enthusiastic co-operation
which this division has consistently received from the various other
intelligence agencies, civilian and others. The American Protective
League, the Department of Justice, the Office of Naval Intelligence, the
Customs, the War Trade Intelligence have all co-operated in the
heartiest manner with each and every effort of the Military Intelligence
Division. Indeed, it is hardly saying too much to state that the success
of the Military Intelligence Division has in a very large measure been
due to the loyal assistance which it has received at all times from the
various agencies whose functions are similar to its own.


WAR PLANS DIVISION

The War Plans Division of the General Staff is under the direction of
Brigadier-General Lytle Brown, as Director and Assistant Chief of
Staff. A very large volume of work has been accomplished by this
division during the year. Exclusive of subjects pertaining to the
historical branch, the inventions section, and routine matters, 9,287
cases were handled by the division during the year.

These included studies as to policies for defense and the organization
of the military forces in general as published in Tables of
Organization, completed studies on the policy and plans for training the
army in general, training replacement troops, training cadres, training
centers, training schools, schools for senior and staff officers, and
plans for physical reconstruction and vocational training of wounded
soldiers.

In addition, through the Training Section, the War Plans Division has
supervision of training in general and has kept in touch by inspections
by its officers with methods used and progress made.

The Legislative, Regulations, and Rules Branch of the War Plans Division
has handled numerous changes in Army Regulations and War Department
orders made necessary by the present emergency, and has considered bills
before Congress pertaining to the army.

The Historical Branch of the General Staff was organized March 5, 1918,
to collect and compile the records pertaining to the war under the
approved policy, and satisfactory progress is being made. To June 30,
1918, 67,022 photographs and 2,590 feet of motion-picture film had been
received.

The Inventions Section was organized April 16, 1918. This section has
taken over from the different agencies of the government the preliminary
consideration of inventions and ideas of inventions of a military
nature, with a view to placing before the proper bureaus of the War
Department those having sufficient military value to warrant test and
development at the expense of the government. From April 16, 1918, to
June 30, 1918, 4,645 cases were handled, a number of which were of
exceptional merit and have already been put to use....

The Chief of Staff has as his principal assistant Major-General Frank
McIntyre, United States army, who acts as executive officer for the
General Staff and also for the Chief of Staff in his absence.

Beside the General Staff divisions which have been referred to in the
foregoing, there has been established in the General Staff a Morale
Section, under charge of Brigadier-General E. L. Munson, United States
army, which has for its object primarily the stimulation of morale
throughout the army, and maintaining a close connection and liaison with
similar activities in civil life. This section had only gotten fairly
into operation before the signing of the armistice, but had already
shown its value as a military asset.

Another important addition to the organization of the General Staff has
been the establishment of a Personnel Section, under charge of
Brigadier-General P. P. Bishop, United States army. In this section has
been consolidated the handling of appointments, promotions, and
commissions of the entire official personnel of the United States army.
This section has proved to be of the greatest value and has come to
stay.

The signing of the armistice has interrupted the conclusion of the
organization now under way for the consolidation of Procurement and
Storage under the Director of Purchase, Storage, and Traffic, but the
principle is sound from the standpoint of organization and extremely
economical in its results.

The supply of officers for the very large military program has been
throughout one of the most important problems which confronted the
General Staff. I have already indicated in the statement of the
functions of the Operations Division of the General Staff the
organization of central training camps for officers throughout the
United States. When, however, we embarked upon the final program of
placing eighty divisions in France and eighteen at home by June 30,
1919, which involved an army of approximately 4,800,000, the problem of
the supply of officers became so serious that an understanding was
obtained with the great mass of educational institutions throughout the
United States, resulting in the development of the Student Army Training
Corps. This scheme absorbed for military purposes the academic plants of
some 518 colleges and universities throughout the country, and for
vocational training in the army embraced some eighty more. This corps
was put under the charge of Brigadier-General Robert I. Rees, United
States army, and in its development we have had the energetic
cooperation of college presidents and responsible college authorities
throughout the entire United States. At the same time, in order to
increase the supply of officers, the course at West Point was cut down
to one year's intensive training, with the idea of placing at the
disposal of the government 1,000 officers a year graduated from that
extremely efficient plant rather than the graduation of about 200, which
had been the case previously throughout the war.

The separation of the Air Service from the Signal Corps, under the
provisions of the Overman bill, and the establishment of a Bureau of
Military Aeronautics, under Major-General William L. Kenly, United
States army, and of a Bureau of Aircraft Production, under Mr. John D.
Ryan, marked an extremely important step forward in the development of
this portion of the Military Establishment. The armistice closes out
this matter with the two branches of the Air Service in a state of
marked efficiency and establishes unquestionably the necessity for the
permanent separation of the Air Service from the Signal Corps in the
reorganization of the army.

During this period another new agency created in the War Department by
Executive order was the office of the Chief of Field Artillery. This
office has been filled by Major-General William J. Snow, United States
army. This establishment was accompanied by the creation in the American
Expeditionary Force in France of the office of Chief of Artillery on
General Pershing's staff, having similar relation to all the artillery
of the Expeditionary Force which the Chief of Field Artillery has toward
the mobile artillery at home. The work of this office has been
accompanied by a marked increase in the efficiency of the training
system in the various Field Artillery camps, and the office itself has
proved to be of distinct value.

I have directed the divisions of the General Staff concerned to study
and submit for your consideration a plan for the reorganization of our
army, which will take advantage of our experience in this war, which has
brought about many changes in organization of all arms of the service,
and has developed new arms not known when the war started. The Air
Service, the Tank Corps, the development of heavy mobile artillery, the
proper organization of divisions, corps, and armies, all will be set
forth in the scheme which will be submitted to you with the
recommendation that it be transmitted for the consideration of Congress.


The conduct of the American troops in France, their progressive
development in military experience and ability, the fine staff work, and
the modesty and gallantry of the individual soldier is a matter of pride
to all Americans. General Pershing and his command have earned the
thanks of the American people.

The work of General Tasker H. Bliss as military representative of the
War Department with the American Section of the Supreme War Council at
Versailles has been of the greatest value to the War Department.

I cannot close this report without making of record the appreciation of
the War Department of the work of the many trained and patriotic
officers of the army whom the destiny of war did not call to France.
These officers, forced to remain behind in the United States by the
imperative necessity of having trained men to keep the machine moving,
have kept up their work with such intelligence, zeal, and devotion to
duty as to show a high order of patriotism. The officers and men who
have not been able on account of the armistice to be transported to
France deserve also, with their comrades in France, the thanks of the
American people.



CHAPTER LVIII

GENERAL PERSHING'S OWN STORY
[Footnote: From General Pershing's official report to the Secretary of
War. November 20, 1918]

Immediately upon receiving my orders I selected a small staff and
proceeded to Europe in order to become familiar with conditions at the
earliest possible moment.

The warmth of our reception in England and France was only equaled by
the readiness of the commanders-in-chief of the veteran armies of the
Allies and their staffs to place their experience at our disposal. In
consultation with them the most effective means of co-operation of
effort was considered. With French and British armies at their maximum
strength, and all efforts to dispossess the enemy from his firmly
intrenched positions in Belgium and France failed, it was necessary to
plan for an American force adequate to turn the scale in favor of the
Allies. Taking account of the strength of the central powers at that
time, the immensity of the problem which confronted us could hardly be
overestimated. The first requisite being an organization that could give
intelligent direction to effort, the formation of a General Staff
occupied my early attention.


GENERAL STAFF

A well-organized General Staff through which the commander exercises his
functions is essential to a successful modern army. However capable our
division, our battalion, and our companies as such, success would be
impossible without thoroughly coordinated endeavor. A General Staff
broadly organized and trained for war had not hitherto existed in our
army. Under the Commander-in-Chief, this staff must carry out the policy
and direct the details of administration, supply, preparation, and
operations of the army as a whole, with all special branches and bureaus
subject to its control. As models to aid us we had the veteran French
General Staff and the experience of the British who had similarly formed
an organization to meet the demands of a great army. By selecting from
each the features best adapted to our basic organization, and fortified
by our own early experience in the war, the development of our great
General Staff system was completed.

The General Staff is naturally divided into five groups, each with its
chief who is an assistant to the Chief of the General Staff. G. 1 is in
charge of organization and equipment of troops, replacements, tonnage,
priority of overseas shipment, the auxiliary welfare association and
cognate subjects; G. 2 has censorship, enemy intelligence, gathering and
disseminating information, preparation of maps, and all similar
subjects; G. 3 is charged with all strategic studies and plans, movement
of troops, and the supervision of combat operations; G. 4 coordinates
important questions of supply, construction, transport arrangements for
combat, and of the operations of the service of supply, and of
hospitalization and the evacuation of the sick and wounded; G. 5
supervises the various schools and has general direction and
coordination of education and training.

The first Chief of Staff was Col. (now Maj.-Gen.) James G. Harbord, who
was succeeded in March, 1918, by Maj.-Gen. James W. McAndrew. To these
officers, to the deputy chief of staff, and to the assistant chiefs of
staff, who, as heads of sections, aided them, great credit is due for
the results obtained not only in perfecting the General Staff
organization but in applying correct principles to the multiplicity of
problems that have arisen.


ORGANIZATION AND TRAINING

After a thorough consideration of allied organizations it was decided
that our combat division should consist of four regiments of infantry of
3,000 men, with three battalions to regiment and four companies of 250
men each to a battalion, and of an artillery brigade of three regiments,
a machine-gun battalion, an engineer regiment, a trench-mortar battery,
a signal battalion, wagon trains, and the headquarters staffs and
military police. These, with medical and other units, made a total of
over 28,000 men, or practically double the size of a French or German
division. Each corps would normally consist of six divisions--four
combat and one depot and one replacement division--and also two
regiments of cavalry, and each army of from three to five corps.  With
four divisions fully trained, a corps could take over an American sector
with two divisions in line and two in reserve, with the depot and
replacement divisions prepared to fill the gaps in the ranks.

Our purpose was to prepare an integral American force, which should be
able to take the offensive in every respect. Accordingly, the
development of a self-reliant infantry by thorough drill in the use of
the rifle and in the tactics of open warfare was always uppermost. The
plan of training after arrival in France allowed a division one month
for acclimatization and instruction in small units from battalions down,
a second month in quiet trench sectors by battalion, and a third month
after it came out of the trenches when it should be trained as a
complete division in war of movement....


ARTILLERY, AIRPLANES, AND TANKS

Our entry into the war found us with few of the auxiliaries necessary
for its conduct in the modern sense. Among our most important
deficiencies in material were artillery, aviation, and tanks. In order
to meet our requirements as rapidly as possible, we accepted the offer
of the French Government to provide us with the necessary artillery
equipment of seventy-fives, one fifty-five millimeter howitzers, and one
fifty-five G P F guns from their own factories for thirty divisions. The
wisdom of this course is fully demonstrated by the fact that, although
we soon began the manufacture of these classes of guns at home, there
were no guns of the calibers mentioned manufactured in America on our
front at the date the armistice was signed. The only guns of these types
produced at home thus far received in France are 109 seventy-five
millimeter guns.

In aviation we were in the same situation, and here again the French
Government came to our aid until our own aviation program should be
under way. We obtained from the French the necessary planes for training
our personnel, and they have provided us with a total of 2,676 pursuit,
observation, and bombing planes. The first airplanes received from home
arrived in May, and altogether we have received 1,379. The first
American squadron completely equipped by American production, including
airplanes, crossed the German lines on August 7, 1918. As to tanks, we
were also compelled to rely upon the French. Here, however, we were less
fortunate, for the reason that the French production could barely meet
the requirements of their own armies.

It should be fully realized that the French Government has always taken
a most liberal attitude and has been most anxious to give us every
possible assistance in meeting our deficiencies in these as well as in
other respects. Our dependence upon France for artillery, aviation, and
tanks was, of course, due to the fact that our industries had not been
exclusively devoted to military production. All credit is due our own
manufacturers for their efforts to meet our requirements, as at the time
the armistice was signed we were able to look forward to the early
supply of practically all our necessities from our own factories.

The welfare of the troops touches my responsibility, as
Commander-in-Chief to the mothers and fathers and kindred of the men who
came to France in the impressionable period of youth. They could not
have the privilege accorded European soldiers during their periods of
leave of visiting their families and renewing their home ties. Fully
realizing that the standard of conduct that should be established for
them must have a permanent influence in their lives and on the character
of their future citizenship, the Red Cross, the Young Men's Christian
Association, Knights of Columbus, the Salvation Army, and the Jewish
Welfare Board, as auxiliaries in this work, were encouraged in every
possible way. The fact that our soldiers, in a land of different customs
and language, have borne themselves in a manner in keeping with the
cause for which they fought, is due not only to the efforts in their
behalf but much more to other high ideals, their discipline, and their
innate sense of self-respect. It should be recorded, however, that the
members of these welfare societies have been untiring in their desire to
be of real service to our officers and men. The patriotic devotion of
these representative men and women has given a new significance to the
Golden Rule, and we owe to them a debt of gratitude that can never be
repaid.


COMBAT OPERATIONS

During our periods of training in the trenches some of our divisions had
engaged the enemy in local combats, the most important of which was
Seicheprey by the Twenty-sixth on April 20th, in the Toul sector, but
none had participated in action as a unit. The First Division, which had
passed through the preliminary stages of training, had gone to the
trenches for its first period of instruction at the end of October and
by March 21st, when the German offensive in Picardy began, we had four
divisions with experience in the trenches, all of which were equal to
any demands of battle action. The crisis which this offensive developed
was such that our occupation of an American sector must be postponed.

On March 28th I placed at the disposal of Marshal Foch, who had been
agreed upon as Commander-in-Chief of the Allied armies, all of our
forces to be used as he might decide. At his request the First division
was transferred from the Toul sector to a position in reserve at
Chaumont en Vexin. As German superiority in numbers required prompt
action, an agreement was reached at the Abbeville conference of the
Allied premiers and commanders and myself on May 2d by which British
shipping was to transport ten American divisions to the British army
area, where they were to be trained and equipped, and additional British
shipping was to be provided for as many divisions as possible for use
elsewhere.

On April 26th the First Division had gone into the line in the
Montdidier salient on the Picardy battle front. Tactics had been
suddenly revolutionized to those of open warfare, and our men, confident
of the results of their training, were eager for the test. On the
morning of May 28th this division attacked the commanding German
position in its front, taking with splendid dash the town of Cantigny
and all other objectives, which were organized and held steadfastly
against vicious counter-attacks and galling artillery fire. Although
local, this brilliant action had an electrical effect, as it
demonstrated our fighting qualities under extreme battle conditions, and
also that the enemy's troops were not altogether invincible.

The Germans' Aisne offensive, which began on May 27th, had advanced
rapidly toward the River Marne and Paris, and the Allies faced a crisis
equally as grave as that of the Picardy offensive in March. Again every
available man was placed at Marshal Foch's disposal, and the Third
Division, which had just come from its preliminary training in the
trenches, was hurried to the Marne. Its motorized machine-gun battalion
preceded the other units and successfully held the bridge-head at the
Marne, opposite Chateau-Thierry.  The Second Division, in reserve near
Montdidier, was sent by motor trucks and other available transport to
check the progress of the enemy toward Paris. The division attacked and
retook the town and railroad station at Bouresches and sturdily held its
ground against the enemy's best guard divisions. In the battle of
Belleau Wood, which followed, our men proved their superiority and
gained a strong tactical position, with far greater loss to the enemy
than to ourselves. On July 1st, before the Second was relieved, it
captured the village of Vaux with most splendid precision.

Meanwhile our Second Corps, under Maj.-Gen. George W. Read, had been
organized for the command of our divisions with the British, which were
held back in training areas or assigned to second-line defenses. Five of
the ten divisions were withdrawn from the British area in June, three to
relieve divisions in Lorraine and the Vosges and two to the Paris area
to join the group of American divisions which stood between the city and
any farther advance of the enemy in that direction.

The great June-July troop movement from the States was well under way,
and, although these troops were to be given some preliminary training
before being put into action, their very presence warranted the use of
all the older divisions in the confidence that we did not lack reserves.
Elements of the Forty-second Division were in the line east of Rheims
against the German offensive of July 15th, and held their ground
unflinchingly. On the right flank of this offensive four companies of
the Twenty-eighth Division were in position in face of the advancing
waves of the German infantry. The Third Division was holding the bank of
the Marne from the bend east of the mouth of the Surmelin to the west of
Mezy, opposite Chateau-Thierry, where a large force of German infantry
sought to force a passage under support of powerful artillery
concentrations and under cover of smoke screens. A single regiment of
the Third wrote one of the most brilliant pages in our military annals
on this occasion. It prevented the crossing at certain points on its
front while, on either flank, the Germans, who had gained a footing,
pressed forward. Our men, firing in three directions, met the German
attacks with counter-attacks at critical points and succeeded in
throwing two German divisions into complete confusion, capturing 600
prisoners.

The great force of the German Chateau-Thierry offensive established the
deep Marne salient, but the enemy was taking chances, and the
vulnerability of this pocket to attack might be turned to his
disadvantage. Seizing this opportunity to support my conviction, every
division with any sort of training was made available for use in a
counter-offensive. The place of honor in the thrust toward Soissons on
July 18th was given to our First and Second divisions in company with
chosen French divisions. Without the usual brief warning of a
preliminary bombardment, the massed French and American artillery,
firing by the map, laid down its rolling barrage at dawn while the
infantry began its charge. The tactical handling of our troops under
these trying conditions was excellent throughout the action. The enemy
brought up large numbers of reserves and made a stubborn defense both
with machine guns and artillery, but through five days' fighting the
First Division continued to advance until it had gained the heights
above Soissons and captured the village of Berzy-le-sec. The Second
Division took Beau Repaire farm and Vierzy in a very rapid advance and
reached a position in front of Tigny at the end of its second day. These
two divisions captured 7,000 prisoners and over 100 pieces of artillery.

The Twenty-sixth Division, which, with a French division, was under
command of our First Corps, acted as a pivot of the movement toward
Soissons. On the 18th it took the village of Torcy while the Third
Division was crossing the Marne in pursuit of the retiring enemy. The
Twenty-sixth attacked again on the 21st, and the enemy withdrew past the
Chateau-Thierry-Soissons road. The Third Division, continuing its
progress, took the heights of Mont St. Pere and the villages of
Charteves and Jaulgonne in the face of both machine-gun and artillery
fire.

On the 24th, after the Germans had fallen back from Trugny and Epieds,
our Forty-second Division, which had been brought over from the
Champagne, relieved the Twenty-sixth and, fighting its way through the
Foret de Fere, overwhelmed the nest of machine guns in its path. By the
27th it had reached the Ourcq, whence the Third and Fourth divisions
were already advancing, while the French divisions with which we were
co-operating were moving forward at other points.

The Third Division had made its advance into Roncheres Wood on the 29th
and was relieved for rest by a brigade of the Thirty-second. The
Forty-second and Thirty-second undertook the task of conquering the
heights beyond Cierges, the Forty-second capturing Sergy and the
Thirty-second capturing Hill 230, both American divisions joining in the
pursuit of the enemy to the Vesle, and thus the operation of reducing
the salient was finished. Meanwhile the Forty-second was relieved by the
Fourth at Chery-Chartreuve, and the Thirty-second by the Twenty-eighth,
while the Seventy-seventh Division took up a position on the Vesle. The
operations of these divisions on the Vesle were under the Third Corps,
Maj.-Gen. Robert L. Bullard, commanding.


BATTLE OF ST. MIHIEL

With the reduction of the Marne salient we could look forward to the
concentration of our divisions in our own zone. In view of the
forthcoming operation against the St. Mihiel salient, which had long
been planned as our first offensive action on a large scale, the First
Army was organized on August 10th under my personal command. While
American units had held different divisional and corps sectors along the
western front, there had not been up to this time, for obvious reasons,
a distinct American sector; but, in view of the important parts the
American forces were now to play, it was necessary to take over a
permanent portion of the line. Accordingly, on August 30th, the line
beginning at Port sur Seille, east of the Moselle and extending to the
west through St. Mihiel, thence north to a point opposite Verdun, was
placed under my command. The American sector was afterwards extended
across the Meuse to the western edge of the Argonne Forest, and included
the Second Colonial French, which held the point of the salient, and the
Seventeenth French Corps, which occupied the heights above Verdun.

The preparation for a complicated operation against the formidable
defenses in front of us included the assembling of divisions and of
corps and army artillery, transport, aircraft, tanks, ambulances, the
location of hospitals, and the molding together of all of the elements
of a great modern army with its own railheads, supplied directly by our
own Service of Supply. The concentration for this operation, which was
to be a surprise, involved the movement, mostly at night, of
approximately 600,000 troops, and required for its success the most
careful attention to every detail.



[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright Committee on Public Information.
  THE AMERICAN COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF IN THE FIELD
  Photograph of General John J. Pershing just after he had been
  decorated with the Star and Ribbon of the Legion of Honor of France,
  the highest decoration ever awarded an American soldier. General
  Pershing was raised to a full generalship soon after his arrival in
  France, an honor which has previously been held only by Washington,
  Grant, Sherman and Sheridan.


[Illustration: Photograph]
  NOTED AMERICAN GENERALS
  General March is chief of staff of the American Army,
  Lieutenant-Generals Liggett and Bullard commanded the First and Second
  Armies respectively, and Major-Generals Wright and Read are corps
  commanders.


The French were generous in giving us assistance in corps and army
artillery, with its personnel, and we were confident from the start of
our superiority over the enemy in guns of all calibers. Our heavy guns
were able to reach Metz and to interfere seriously with German rail
movements. The French Independent Air Force was placed under my command
which, together with the British bombing squadrons and our air forces,
gave us the largest assembly of aviation that had ever been engaged in
one operation on the western front.

From Les Eparges around the nose of the salient at St. Mihiel to the
Moselle River the line was roughly forty miles long and situated on
commanding ground greatly strengthened by artificial defenses. Our First
Corps (Eighty-second, Ninetieth, Fifth, and Second divisions) under
command of Major-General Hunter Liggett, restrung its right on
Pont-a-Mousson, with its left joining our Third Corps (the Eighty-ninth,
Forty-second, and First divisions), under Major-General Joseph T.
Dickman, in line to Xivray, were to swing in toward Vigneulles on the
pivot of the Moselle River for the initial assault. From Xivray to
Mouilly the Second Colonial French Corps was in line in the center and
our Fifth Corps, under command of Major-General George H. Cameron, with
our Twenty-sixth Division and a French division at the western base of
the salient, were to attack three difficult hills--Les Eparges, Combres,
and Amaramthe. Our First Corps had in reserve the Seventy-eighth
Division, our Fourth Corps the Third Division, and our First Army the
Thirty-fifth and Ninety-first Divisions, with the Eightieth and
Thirty-third available. It should be understood that our corps
organizations are very elastic, and that we have at no time had
permanent assignments of divisions to corps.

After four hours' artillery preparation, the seven American divisions in
the front line advanced at 5 A. M., on September 12th, assisted by a
limited number of tanks manned partly by Americans and partly by the
French. These divisions, accompanied by groups of wire cutters and
others armed with bangalore torpedoes, went through the successive bands
of barbed wire that protected the enemy's front line and support
trenches, in irresistible waves on schedule time, breaking down all
defense of an enemy demoralized by the great volume of our artillery
fire and our sudden approach out of the fog.

Our First Corps advanced to Thiaucourt, while our Fourth Corps curved
back to the southwest through Nonsard. The Second Colonial French Corps
made the slight advance required of it on very difficult ground, and the
Fifth Corps took its three ridges and repulsed a counter-attack. A rapid
march brought reserve regiments of a division of the Fifth Corps into
Vigneulles in the early morning, where it linked up with patrols of our
Fourth Corps, closing the salient and forming a new line west of
Thiaucourt to Vigneulles and beyond Fresnes-en-Woevre. At the cost of
only 7,000 casualties, mostly light, we had taken 16,000 prisoners and
443 guns, a great quantity of material, released the inhabitants of many
villages from enemy domination, and established our lines in a position
to threaten Metz. This signal success of the American First Army in its
first offensive was of prime importance. The Allies found they had a
formidable army to aid them, and the enemy learned finally that he had
one to reckon with.


MEUSE-ARGONNE OFFENSIVE, FIRST PHASE

On the day after we had taken the St. Mihiel salient, much of our corps
and army artillery which had operated at St. Mihiel, and our divisions
in reserve at other points, were already on the move toward the area
back of the line between the Meuse River and the western edge of the
forest of Argonne. With the exception of St. Mihiel, the old German
front line from Switzerland to the east of Rheims was still intact. In
the general attack all along the line, the operation assigned the
American army as the hinge of this Allied offensive was directed toward
the important railroad communications of the German armies through
Mezieres and Sedan. The enemy must hold fast to this part of his lines
or the withdrawal of his forces with four years' accumulation of plants
and material would be dangerously imperiled.

The German army had as yet shown no demoralization and, while the mass
of its troops had suffered in morale, its first-class divisions, and
notably its machine-gun defense, were exhibiting remarkable tactical
efficiency as well as courage. The German General Staff was fully aware
of the consequences of a success on the Meuse-Argonne line. Certain that
he would do everything in his power to oppose us, the action was planned
with as much secrecy as possible and was undertaken with the
determination to use all our divisions in forcing decision. We expected
to draw the best German divisions to our front and to consume them while
the enemy was held under grave apprehension lest our attack should break
his line, which it was our firm purpose to do.

Our right flank was protected by the Meuse, while our left embraced the
Argonne Forest whose ravines, hills, and elaborate defense screened by
dense thickets had been generally considered impregnable. Our order of
battle from right to left was the Third Corps from the Meuse to
Malancourt, with the Thirty-third, Eightieth, and Fourth divisions in
line, and the Third Division as corps reserve; the Fifth Corps from
Malancourt to Vauquois, with Seventy-ninth, Eighty-seventh, and
Ninety-first divisions in line, and the Thirty-second in corps reserve;
and the First Corps, from Vauquois to Vienne le Chateau, with
Thirty-fifth, Twenty-eighth, and Seventy-seventh divisions in line, and
the Ninety-second in corps reserve. The army reserve consisted of the
First, Twenty-ninth, and Eighty-second divisions.

On the night of September 25th our troops quietly took the place of the
French who thinly held the line in this sector which had long been
inactive. In the attack which began on the 26th we drove through the
barbed wire entanglements and the sea of shell craters across No Man's
Land, mastering the first-line defenses. Continuing on the 27th and
28th, against machine guns and artillery of an increasing number of
enemy reserve divisions, we penetrated to a depth of from three to seven
miles, and took the village of Montfaucon and its commanding hill and
Exermont, Gercourt, Cuisy, Septsarges, Malancourt, Ivoiry, Epinonville,
Charpentry, Very, and other villages. East of the Meuse one of our
divisions, which was with the Second Colonial French Corps, captured
Marcheville and Rieville, giving further protection to the flank of our
main body. We had taken 10,000 prisoners, we had gained our point of
forcing the battle into the open and were prepared for the enemy's
reaction, which was bound to come as he had good roads and ample
railroad facilities for bringing up his artillery and reserves.

In the chill rain of dark nights our engineers had to build new roads
across spongy, shell-torn areas, repair broken roads beyond No Man's
Land, and build bridges. Our gunners, with no thought of sleep, put
their shoulders to wheels and dragropes to bring their guns through the
mire in support of the infantry, now under the increasing fire of the
enemy's artillery. Our attack had taken the enemy by surprise, but,
quickly recovering himself, he began to fire counter-attacks in strong
force, supported by heavy bombardments, with large quantities of gas.
From September 28th until October 4th we maintained the offensive
against patches of woods defended by snipers and continuous lines of
machine guns, and pushed forward our guns and transport, seizing
strategical points in preparation for further attacks.


OTHER UNITS WITH ALLIES

Other divisions attached to the Allied armies were doing their part. It
was the fortune of our Second Corps, composed of the Twenty-seventh and
Thirtieth divisions, which had remained with the British, to have a
place of honor in co-operation with the Australian Corps, on September
29th and October 1st, in the assault on the Hindenburg line where the
St. Quentin Canal passes through a tunnel under a ridge. The Thirtieth
Division speedily broke through the main line of defense for all its
objectives, while the Twenty-seventh pushed on impetuously through the
main line until some of its elements reached Gouy. In the midst of the
maze of trenches and shell craters and under cross-fire from machine
guns the other elements fought desperately against odds. In this and in
later actions, from October 6th to October 19th, our Second Corps
captured over 6,000 prisoners and advanced over thirteen miles. The
spirit and aggressiveness of these divisions have been highly praised by
the British army commander under whom they served.

On October 2d to 9th our Second and Thirty-sixth divisions were sent to
assist the French in an important attack against the old German
positions before Rheims. The Second conquered the complicated defense
works on their front against a persistent defense worthy of the grimmest
period of trench warfare and attacked the strongly held wooded hill of
Blanc Mont, which they captured in a second assault, sweeping over it
with consummate dash and skill. This division then repulsed strong
counter-attacks before the village and cemetery of Ste. Etienne and took
the town, forcing the Germans to fall back from before Rheims and yield
positions they had held since September, 1914. On October 9th the
Thirty-sixth Division relieved the Second and, in its first experience
under fire, withstood very severe artillery bombardment and rapidly took
up the pursuit of the enemy, now retiring behind the Aisne.


MEUSE-ARGONNE OFFENSIVE, SECOND PHASE

The Allied progress elsewhere cheered the efforts of our men in this
crucial contest as the German command threw in more and more first-class
troops to stop our advance. We made steady headway in the almost
impenetrable and strongly held Argonne Forest, for, despite this
reinforcement, it was our army that was doing the driving. Our aircraft
was increasing in skill and numbers and forcing the issue, and our
infantry and artillery were improving rapidly with each new experience.
The replacements fresh from home were put into exhausted divisions with
little time for training, but they had the advantage of serving beside
men who knew their business and who had almost become veterans over
night. The enemy had taken every advantage of the terrain, which
especially favored the defense, by a prodigal use of machine guns manned
by highly-trained veterans and by using his artillery at short ranges.
In the face of such strong frontal positions we should have been unable
to accomplish any progress according to previously accepted standards,
but I had every confidence in our aggressive tactics and the courage of
our troops.

On October 4th the attack was renewed all along our front. The Third
Corps tilting to the left followed the Brieulles-Cunel road; our Fifth
Corps took Gesnes while the First Corps advanced for over two miles
along the irregular valley of the Aire River and in the wooded hills of
the Argonne that bordered the river, used by the enemy with all his art
and weapons of defense. This sort of fighting continued against an enemy
striving to hold every foot of ground and whose very strong
counter-attacks challenged us at every point. On the 7th the First Corps
captured Chatel-Chehery and continued along the river to Cornay. On the
east of Meuse sector one of the two divisions co-operating with the
French captured Consenvoye and the Haumont Woods. On the 9th the Fifth
Corps, in its progress up the Aire, took Fleville, and the Third Corps,
which had continuous fighting against odds, was working its way through
Brieulles and Cunel. On the 10th we had cleared the Argonne Forest of
the enemy.

It was now necessary to constitute a second army, and on October 9th the
immediate command of the First Army was turned over to
Lieutenant-General Hunter Liggett. The command of the Second Army, whose
divisions occupied a sector in the Woevre, was given to
Lieutenant-General Robert L. Bullard, who had been commander of the
First Division and then of the Third Corps. Major-General Dickman was
transferred to the command of the First Corps, while the Fifth Corps was
placed under Major-General Charles P. Summerall, who had recently
commanded the First Division. Major-General John L. Hines, who had gone
rapidly up from regimental to division commander, was assigned to the
Third Corps. These four officers had been in France from the early days
of the expedition and had learned their lessons in the school of
practical warfare.

Our constant pressure against the enemy brought day by day more
prisoners, mostly survivors from machine-gun nests captured in fighting
at close quarters. On October 18th there was very fierce fighting in the
Caures Woods east of the Meuse and in the Ormont Woods. On the 14th the
First Corps took St. Juvin, and the Fifth Corps, in hand-to-hand
encounters, entered the formidable Kriemhilde line, where the enemy had
hoped to check us indefinitely. Later the Fifth Corps penetrated further
the Kriemhilde line, and the First Corps took Champigneulles and the
important town of Grandpre. Our dogged offensive was wearing down the
enemy, who continued desperately to throw his best troops against us,
thus weakening his line in front of our Allies and making their advance
less difficult.


DIVISIONS IN BELGIUM

Meanwhile we were not only able to continue the battle, but our
Thirty-seventh and Ninety-first divisions were hastily withdrawn from
our front and dispatched to help the French army in Belgium. Detraining
in the neighborhood of Ypres, these divisions advanced by rapid stages
to the fighting line and were assigned to adjacent French corps. On
October 31st, in continuation of the Flanders offensive, they attacked
and methodically broke down all enemy resistance. On November 3d the
Thirty-seventh had completed its mission in dividing the enemy across
the Escaut River and firmly established itself along the east bank
included in the division zone of action. By a clever flanking movement
troops of the Ninety-first Division captured Spitaals Bosschen, a
difficult wood extending across the central part of the division sector,
reached the Escaut, and penetrated into the town of Audenarde. These
divisions received high commendation from their corps commanders for
their dash and energy.


MEUSE ARGONNE--LAST PHASE

On the 23d the Third and Fifth corps pushed northward to the level of
Bantheville. While we continued to press forward and throw back the
enemy's violent counter-attacks with great loss to him, a regrouping of
our forces was under way for the final assault. Evidences of loss of
morale by the enemy gave our men more confidence in attack and more
fortitude in enduring the fatigue of incessant effort and the hardships
of very inclement weather.

With comparatively well-rested divisions, the final advance in the
Meuse-Argonne front was begun on November 1st. Our increased artillery
force acquitted itself magnificently in support of the advance, and the
enemy broke before the determined infantry, which, by its persistent
fighting of the past weeks and the dash of this attack, had overcome his
will to resist. The Third Corps took Aincreville, Doulcon, and
Andevanne, and the Fifth Corps took Landres et St. Georges and pressed
through successive lines of resistance to Bayonville and Chennery. On
the 2d the First Corps joined in the movement, which now became an
impetuous onslaught that could not be stayed.

On the 3d advance troops surged forward in pursuit, some by motor
trucks, while the artillery pressed along the country roads close
behind. The First Corps reached Authe and Chatillon-Sur-Bar, the Fifth
Corps, Fosse and Nouart, and the Third Corps Halles, penetrating the
enemy's line to a depth of twelve miles. Our large caliber guns had
advanced and were skillfully brought into position to fire upon the
important lines at Montmedy, Longuyon, and Conflans. Our Third Corps
crossed the Meuse on the 5th and the other corps, in the full confidence
that the day was theirs, eagerly cleared the way of machine guns as they
swept northward, maintaining complete coordination throughout. On the
6th, a division of the First Corps reached a point on the Meuse opposite
Sedan, twenty-five miles from our line of departure. The strategical
goal which was our highest hope was gained. We had cut the enemy's main
line of communications, and nothing but surrender or an armistice could
save his army from complete disaster.

In all forty enemy divisions had been used against us in the
Meuse-Argonne battle. Between September 26th and November 6th we took
26,059 prisoners and 468 guns on this front. Our divisions engaged were
the First, Second, Third, Fourth, Fifth, Twenty-sixth, Twenty-eighth,
Twenty-ninth, Thirty-second, Thirty-third, Thirty-fifth, Thirty-seventh,
Forty-second, Seventy-seventh, Seventy-eighth, Seventy-ninth,
Eightieth, Eighty-second, Eighty-ninth, Ninetieth, and Ninety-first.
Many of our divisions remained in line for a length of time that
required nerves of steel, while others were sent in again after only a
few days of rest. The First, Fifth, Twenty-sixth, Forty-second,
Seventy-seventh, Eightieth, Eighty-ninth, and Ninetieth were in the line
twice. Although some of the divisions were fighting their first battle,
they soon became equal to the best.


OPERATIONS EAST OF THE MEUSE

On the three days preceding November 10th, the Third, the Second
Colonial, and the Seventeenth French corps fought a difficult struggle
through the Meuse Hills south of Stenay and forced the enemy into the
plain. Meanwhile, my plans for further use of the American forces
contemplated an advance between the Meuse and the Moselle in the
direction of Longwy by the First Army, while, at the same time, the
Second Army should assure the offensive toward the rich coal fields of
Briey. These operations were to be followed by an offensive toward
Chateau-Salins east of the Moselle, thus isolating Metz. Accordingly,
attacks on the American front had been ordered and that of the Second
Army was in progress on the morning of November 11th, when instructions
were received that hostilities should cease at 11 o'clock A. M.

At this moment the line of the American sector, from right to left,
began at Port-Sur-Seille, thence across the Moselle to Vandieres and
through the Woevre to Bezonvaux in the foothills of the Meuse, thence
along to the foothills and through the northern edge of the Woevre
forests to the Meuse at Mouzay, thence along the Meuse connecting with
the French under Sedan....

There are in Europe altogether, including a regiment and some sanitary
units with the Italian army and the organizations at Murmansk, also
including those en route from the States, approximately 2,053,347 men,
less our losses. Of this total there are in France 1,338,169 combatant
troops. Forty divisions have arrived, of which the infantry personnel of
ten have been used as replacements, leaving thirty divisions now in
France organized into three armies of three corps each.

The losses of the Americans up to November 18th are: Killed and wounded,
36,145; died of disease, 14,811; deaths unclassified, 2,204; wounded,
179,625; prisoners, 2,163; missing, 1,160. We have captured about 41,000
prisoners and 1,400 guns, howitzers and trench mortars....

Finally, I pay the supreme tribute to our officers and soldiers of the
line. When I think of their heroism, their patience under hardships,
their unflinching spirit of offensive action, I am filled with emotion
which I am unable to express. Their deeds are immortal, and they have
earned the eternal gratitude of our country.



CHAPTER LIX

PRESIDENT WILSON'S REVIEW OF THE WAR

On December 2, 1918, just prior to sailing for Europe to take part in
the Peace Conference, President Wilson addressed Congress, reviewing the
work of the American people, soldiers, sailors and civilians, in the
World War which had been brought to a successful conclusion on November
11th. His speech, in part, follows:

"The year that has elapsed since I last stood before you to fulfil my
constitutional duty to give to the Congress from time to time
information on the state of the Union has been so crowded with great
events, great processes and great results that I cannot hope to give you
an adequate picture of its transactions or of the far-reaching changes
which have been wrought in the life of our Nation and of the world. You
have yourselves witnessed these things, as I have. It is too soon to
assess them; and we who stand in the midst of them and are part of them
are less qualified than men of another generation will be to say what
they mean or even what they have been. But some great outstanding facts
are unmistakable and constitute in a sense part of the public business
with which it is our duty to deal. To state them is to set the stage for
the legislative and executive action which must grow out of them and
which we have yet to shape and determine.

"A year ago we had sent 145,918 men overseas. Since then we have sent
1,950,513, an average of 162,542 each month, the number in fact rising
in May last to 245,951, in June to 278,760, in July to 307,182 and
continuing to reach similar figures in August and September--in August
289,570 and in September 257,438. No such movement of troops ever took
place before, across 3,000 miles of sea, followed by adequate equipment
and supplies, and carried safely through extraordinary dangers of
attack, dangers which were alike strange and infinitely difficult to
guard against. In all this movement only 758 men were lost by enemy
attacks, 630 of whom were upon a single English transport which was sunk
near the Orkney Islands.

"I need not tell you what lay back of this great movement of men and
material. It is not invidious to say that back of it lay a supporting
organization of the industries of the country and of all its productive
activities more complete, more thorough in method and effective in
results, more spirited and unanimous in purpose and effort than any
other great belligerent had ever been able to effect. We profited
greatly by the experience of the nations which had already been engaged
for nearly three years in the exigent and exacting business, their every
resource and every proficiency taxed to the utmost. We were the pupils.
But we learned quickly and acted with a promptness and a readiness of
co-operation that justify our great pride that we were able to serve the
world with unparalleled energy and quick accomplishment.

"But it is not the physical scale and executive efficiency of
preparation, supply, equipment and dispatch that I would dwell upon, but
the mettle and quality of the officers and men we sent over and of the
sailors who kept the seas, and the spirit of the Nation that stood
behind them. No soldiers, or sailors, ever proved themselves more
quickly ready for the test of battle or acquitted themselves with more
splendid courage and achievement when put to the test. Those of us who
played some part in directing the great processes by which the war was
pushed irresistibly forward to the final triumph may now forget all that
and delight our thoughts with the story of what our men did. Their
officers understood the grim and exacting task they had undertaken and
performed with audacity, efficiency and unhesitating courage that touch
the story of convoy and battle with imperishable distinction at every
turn, whether the enterprise were great or small--from their chiefs,
Pershing and Sims, down to the youngest lieutenant; and their men were
worthy of them--such men as hardly need to be commanded, and go to their
terrible adventure blithely and with the quick intelligence of those who
know just what it is they would accomplish. I am proud to be the
fellow-countryman of men of such stuff and valor. Those of us who stayed
at home did our duty: the war could not have been won or the gallant men
who fought it given their opportunity to win it otherwise; but for many
a long day we shall think ourselves 'accursed we were not there, and
hold our manhoods cheap while any speaks that fought' with these at St.
Mihiel or Thierry. The memory of those days of triumphant battle will go
with these fortunate men to their graves; and each will have his
favorite memory. 'Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot, but he'll
remember with advantages what feats he did that day!'

"What we all thank God for with deepest gratitude is that our men went
in force into the line of battle just at the critical moment, and threw
their fresh strength into the ranks of freedom in time to turn the whole
tide and sweep of the fateful struggle--turn it once for all, so that
henceforth it was back, back, back for their enemies, always back, never
again forward! After that it was only a scant four months before the
commanders of the central empires knew themselves beaten, and now their
very empires are in liquidation!

"And throughout it all how fine the spirit of the Nation was; what unity
of purpose, what untiring zeal! What elevation of purpose ran through
all its splendid display of strength, its untiring accomplishment. I
have said that those of us who stayed at home to do the work of
organization and supply will always wish that we had been with the men
whom we sustained by our labor; but we can never be ashamed. It has been
an inspiring thing to be here in the midst of fine men who had turned
aside from every private interest of their own and devoted the whole of
their trained capacity to the tasks that supplied the sinews of the
whole great undertaking! The patriotism, the unselfishness, the
thoroughgoing devotion and distinguished capacity that marked their
toilsome labors, day after day, month after month, have made them fit
mates and comrades of the men in the trenches and on the sea. And not
the men here in Washington only. They have but directed the vast
achievement. Throughout innumerable factories, upon innumerable farms,
in the depths of coal mines and iron mines and copper mines, wherever
the stuffs of industry were to be obtained and prepared, in the
shipyards, on the railways, at the docks, on the sea, in every labor
that was needed to sustain the battle lines men have vied with each
other to do their part and do it well. They can look any man-at-arms in
the face, and say, we also strove to win and gave the best that was in
us to make our fleets and armies sure of their triumph!

"And what shall we say of the women--of their instant intelligence,
quickening every task that they touched; their capacity for organization
and co-operation, which gave their action discipline and enhanced the
effectiveness of everything they attempted; their aptitude at tasks to
which they had never before set their hands; their utter
self-sacrificing alike in what they did and in what they gave? Their
contribution to the great result is beyond appraisal. They have added a
new luster to the annals of American womanhood.

"The least tribute we can pay them is to make them the equals of men in
political rights as they have proved themselves their equals in every
field of practical work they have entered, whether for themselves or for
their country. These great days of completed achievement would be sadly
marred were we to omit that act of justice. Besides the immense
practical services they have rendered, the women of the country have
been the moving spirits in the systematic economies by which our people
have voluntarily assisted to supply the suffering peoples of the world
and the armies upon every front with food and everything else that we
had that might serve the common cause. The details of such a story can
never be fully written, but we carry them at our hearts and thank God
that we can say we are the kinsmen of such.

"And now we are sure of the great triumph for which every sacrifice was
made. It has come, come in its completeness, and with the pride and
inspiration of these days of achievement quick within us we turn to the
tasks of peace again--a peace secure against the violence of
irresponsible monarchs and ambitious military coteries and made ready
for a new order, for new foundations of justice and fair dealing.

"We are about to give order and organization to this peace, not only for
ourselves, but for the other peoples of the world as well, so far as
they will suffer us to serve them. It is international justice that we
seek, not domestic safety merely.

"So far as our domestic affairs are concerned the problem of our return
to peace is a problem of economic and industrial readjustment. That
problem is less serious for us than it may turn out to be for the
nations which have suffered the disarrangements and the losses of war
longer than we. Our people, moreover, do not wait to be coached and led.
They know their own business, are quick and resourceful at every
readjustment, definite in purpose and self-reliant in action. Any
leading strings we might seek to put them in would speedily become
hopelessly tangled because they would pay no attention to them and go
their own way. All that we can do as their legislative and executive
servants is to mediate the process of change here, there and elsewhere
as we may. I have heard much counsel as to the plans that should be
formed and personally conducted to a happy consummation, but from no
quarter have I seen any general scheme of reconstruction emerge which I
thought it likely we could force our spirited businessmen and
self-reliant laborers to accept with due pliancy and obedience.

"While the war lasted we set up many agencies by which to direct the
industries of the country in the services it was necessary for them to
render, by which to make sure of an abundant supply of the materials
needed, by which to check undertakings that could for the time be
dispensed with and stimulate those that were most serviceable in war, by
which to gain for the purchasing departments of the government a certain
control over the prices of essential articles and materials, by which to
restrain trade with alien enemies, make the most of the available
shipping and systematize financial transactions, both public and
private, so that there would be no unnecessary conflict or confusion--by
which, in short, to put every material energy of the country in harness
to draw the common load and make of us one team in accomplishment of a
great task.

"But the moment we knew the armistice to have been signed we took the
harness off. Raw materials upon which the government had kept its hand
for fear there should not be enough for the industries that supplied the
armies have been released, and put into the general market again. Great
industrial plants whose whole output and machinery had been taken over
for the uses of the government have been set free to return to the uses
to which they were put before the war. It has not been possible to
remove so readily or so quickly the control of foodstuffs and of
shipping, because the world has still to be fed from our granaries and
the ships are still needed to send supplies to our men oversea and to
bring the men back as fast as the disturbed conditions on the other side
of the water permit; but even there restraints are being relaxed as much
as possible, and more and more as the weeks go by.

"Never before have there been agencies in existence in this country
which knew so much of the field of supply of labor, and of industry as
the War Industries Board, the War Trade Board, the Labor Department, the
Food Administration and the Fuel Administration have known since their
labors became thoroughly systematized; and they have not been isolated
agencies; they have been directed by men which represented the permanent
departments of the government and so have been the centers of unified
and co-operative action. It has been the policy of the Executive,
therefore, since the armistice was assured (which is in effect a
complete submission of the enemy) to put the knowledge of these bodies
at the disposal of the businessmen of the country and to offer their
intelligent mediation at every point and in every matter where it was
desired. It is surprising how fast the process of return to a peace
footing has moved in the three weeks since the fighting stopped. It
promises to outrun any inquiry that may be instituted and any aid that
may be offered. It will not be easy to direct it any better than it will
direct itself. The American business man is of quick initiative....

"I welcome this occasion to announce to the Congress my purpose to join
in Paris the representatives of the governments with which we have been
associated in the war against the Central Empires for the purpose of
discussing with them the main features of the treaty of peace. I realize
the great inconveniences that will attend my leaving the country,
particularly at this time, but the conclusion that it was my paramount
duty to go has been forced upon me by considerations which I hope will
seem as conclusive to you as they have seemed to me.

"The Allied governments have accepted the bases of peace which I
outlined to the Congress on the 8th of January last, as the Central
Empires also have, and very reasonably desire my personal counsel in
their interpretation and application, and it is highly desirable that I
should give it, in order that the sincere desire of our government to
contribute without selfish purpose of any kind to settlements that will
be of common benefit to all the nations concerned may be made fully
manifest. The peace settlements which are now to be agreed upon are of
transcendent importance both to us and to the rest of the world, and I
know of no business or interest which should take precedence of them.
The gallant men of our armed forces on land and sea have consciously
fought for the ideals which they knew to be the ideals of their country;
I have sought to express those ideals; they have accepted my statements
of them as the substance of their own thought and purpose, as the
associated governments have accepted them; I owe it to them to see to
it, so far as in me lies, that no false or mistaken interpretation is
put upon them, and no possible effort omitted to realize them. It is now
my duty to play my full part in making good what they offered their
life's blood to obtain. I can think of no call to service which could
transcend this....

"May I not hope, gentlemen of the Congress, that in the delicate tasks I
shall have to perform on the other side of the sea in my efforts truly
and faithfully to interpret the principles and purposes of the country
we love, I may have the encouragement and the added strength of your
united support? I realize the magnitude and difficulty of the duty I am
undertaking. I am poignantly aware of its grave responsibilities. I am
the servant of the Nation. I can have no private thought or purpose of
my own in performing such an errand. I go to give the best that is in me
to the common settlements which I must now assist in arriving at in
conference with the other working heads of the associated governments. I
shall count upon your friendly countenance and encouragement. I shall
not be inaccessible. The cables and the wireless will render me
available for any counselor service you may desire of me, and I shall be
happy in the thought that I am constantly in touch with the weighty
matters of domestic policy with which we shall have to deal. I shall
make my absence as brief as possible and shall hope to return with the
happy assurance that it has been possible to translate into action the
great ideals for which America has striven."


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright Harris and Ewing.
  WOODROW WILSON
  President of the United States during the whole course of the war and
  Commander in-Chief of its army and navy. On November 11, 1918, he
  signalized the end of the war in a proclamation in which he said:--"My
  Fellow-Countrymen:--The armistice was signed this morning. Everything
  for which America fought has been accomplished."


[Illustration: Photograph]
  Copyright International Film Service.
  WHEN IT WAS OVER "OVER THERE"
  Victorious American troops arriving at New York after the signing of
  the armistice.



Summarized Chronology of the War

1914

June

28.--Assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand, heir to throne of
Austria-Hungary, and his wife at Sarajevo, Bosnia.

July

28.--Austria-Hungary declares war on Serbia.

29.--Russian mobilization ordered.

August

1.--Germany declares war on Russia.

1.--France orders mobilization.

2.--Germany demands free passage through Belgium.

3.--Germany declares war on France.

3.--Belgium rejects Germany's demand.

4.--Germany at war with Belgium. Troops under Gen. Von Kluck cross
border. Halted at Liege.

4.--Great Britain at war with Germany. Kitchener becomes Secretary of
War.

5.--President Wilson tenders good offices of United States in interests
of peace.

6.--Austria-Hungary at war with Russia.

7.--French forces invade Alsace. Gen. Joffre in supreme command of
French army.

7.--Montenegro at war with Austria.

7.--Great Britain's Expeditionary Force lands at Ostend, Calais and
Dunkirk.

8.--British seize German Togoland.

8.--Serbia at war with Germany.

8.--Portugal announces readiness to stand by alliance with England.

11.--German cruisers Goeben and Breslau enter Dardanelles and are
purchased by Turkey.

12.--Great Britain at war with Austria-Hungary.

12.--Montenegro at war with Germany.

17.--Belgian capital removed from Brussels to Antwerp.

19.--Canadian Parliament authorizes raising expeditionary force.

20.--Germans occupy Brussels.

23.--Japan at war with Germany. Begins attack on Tsingtau.

24.--Germans enter France near Lille.

25.--Austria at war with Japan.

26.--Louvain sacked and burned by Germans. Viviani becomes premier of
France.

28.--British fleet sinks three German cruisers and two destroyers off
Heligoland.

28.--Austria declares war on Belgium.

29.--Russians invest Konigsberg, East Prussia. New Zealanders seize
German Samoa.

30.--Amiens occupied by Germans.

31.--Russian army of invasion in East Prussia defeated at Tannenberg by
Germans under Von Hindenburg.

31.--St. Petersburg changed to Petrograd by imperial decree.


September

3.--Paris placed in state of siege; government transferred to Bordeaux.

3.--Lemberg, Gallicia, occupied by Russians.

4.--Germans occupy Rheims.

6-10.--Battle of Marne. Von Kluck is beaten by Gen. Joffre, and the
German army retreats from Paris to the Soissons-Rheims line.

10.--Emden, German cruiser, carries out raids in Bay of Bengal.

14.--French reoccupy Amiens and Rheims.

19.--British forces begin operations in Southwest Africa.

20.--Rheims cathedral shelled by Germans.

24.--Allies occupy Peronne.

25.--Australians seize German New Guinea.

28.--Anglo-French forces invade German colony of Kamerun.

29.--Antwerp bombardment begins.


October

2.--British Admiralty announces intention to mine North Sea areas.

6.--Japan seizes Marshall Islands in Pacific.

9.--Antwerp surrenders to Germans. Government removed to Ostend.

13.--British occupy Ypres.

14.--Canadian Expeditionary Force of 32,000 men lands at Plymouth.

15.--Germans occupy Ostend. Belgian government removed to Havre, France.


November

1.--Monmouth and Good Hope, British cruisers, are sunk by German
squadron off Chile under command of Admiral Von Spee.

5.--Great Britain and France declare war on Turkey.

5.--Cyprus annexed by Great Britain.

7.--German garrison of Tsingtau surrenders to Japanese.

9.--Emden, German cruiser, which had carried out raiding operations for
two months, is destroyed by Australian cruiser Sydney off the Cocos
Islands, southwest of Java.

16.--Prohibition of sale of intoxicants in Russia enforced.

27.--Czernowitz, capital of Bukowina, captured by Russians.


December

2.--Belgrade occupied by Austrians.

3.--Cracow bombarded by Russians.

8.--Off the Falkland Isles, British squadron under command of
Rear-Admiral Sturdee, sinks three of the German cruisers which had
destroyed the Good Hope and Monmouth on Nov. 1. The Dresden escapes.

14.--Austrians evacuate Belgrade.

16.--German squadron bombards Hartlepool, Scarborough and Whitby on east
coast of England.

23.--Siege of Cracow raised. Russians retire.


1915

January

24.--British fleet puts to flight a German squadron in North Sea and
sinks the battle cruiser Blucher.

28.--American bark, William P. Frye, sunk by German cruiser in South
Atlantic.


February

10.--Russians defeated by Germans in Battle of Masurian Lakes.

18.--German submarine "blockade" of British Isles begins.

25.--Allied fleet destroys outer forts of Dardanelles.


March

2.--Allied troops land at Kum-Kale, on Asiatic side of Dardanelles.

10.--British take Neuve Chapelle in Flanders battle.

14.--Dresden, German raiding cruiser, is sunk by British squadron off
the Chilean coast.

22.--Austrian fortress of Przmysl surrenders to Russians.


April

22.--Poison gas first used by Germans in attack on Canadians at Ypres,
Belgium.


May

1.--American steamer Gulflight torpedoed off Scilly Isles by German
submarine; 3 lives lost.

2.--British South Africa troops under General Botha capture Otymbingue,
German Southwest Africa.

7.--Germans capture Libau, Russian Baltic port.

7.--Lusitania, Cunard liner, sunk by German submarine off Kinsale Head,
Irish coast, with loss of 1152 lives; 102 Americans.

23.--Italy declares war on Austria-Hungary and begins invasion on a
60-mile front.

24.--American steamer Nebraskan torpedoed by German submarine off Irish
coast, but reaches Liverpool in safety.

31.--German Zeppelins bombard suburbs of London.


June

1.--Germany apologizes for attack on Gulflight and offers reparation.

3.--Austrians recapture Przmysl.

3.--British forces operating on Tigris capture Kut-el-Amara.

4-6.--German aircraft bombs English towns.

7.--Bryan, U. S. Secretary of State, resigns.

15.--Allied aircraft bombs Karlsruhe, Baden, in retaliation.

22.--Lemberg recaptured by Austrians.

26.--Montenegrins enter Scutari, Albania.


July

9.--German Southwest Africa surrenders to British South African troops
under Gen. Botha.

25.--American steamer, Leelanaw, Archangel to Belfast with flax,
torpedoed off Scotland.

31.--Baden bombarded by French aircraft.


August

5.--Warsaw captured by Germans.

6.--Ivangorod occupied by Austrians.

6.--Gallipoli Peninsula campaign enters a second stage with the
debarkation of a new force of British troops in Suvla Bay, on the west
of the peninsula.

8.--Russians defeat German fleet of 9 battleships and 12 cruisers at
entrance of Gulf of Riga.

19.--Arabic, White Star liner, sunk by submarine off Fastnet; 44 lives
lost; 2 Americans.

25.--Brest-Litovsk, Russian fortress, captured by Austro-Germans.

28.--Italians reach Cima Cista, northeast of Trent.

30.--British submarine attacks Constantinople and damages the Galata
Bridge.

31.--Lutsk, Russian fortress, captured by Austrians.


September

2.--Grodno, Russian fortress, occupied by Germans.

6.--Czar Nicholas of Russia assumes command of Russian armies. Grand
Duke Nicholas is transferred to the Caucasus.

15.--Pinsk occupied by Germans.

18.--Vilna evacuated by Russia.

24.--Lutsk recaptured by Russians.

25.--Allies open offensive on western front and occupy Lens.

27.--Lutsk again falls to Germans.


October

5.--Greece becomes political storm center. Franco-British force lands at
Salonika and Greek ministry resigns.

9.--Belgrade again occupied by Austro-Germans.

11.--Zaimis, new Greek premier, announces policy of armed neutrality.

12.--Edith Cavell, English nurse, shot by Germans for aiding British
prisoners to escape from Belgium.

13.--London bombarded by Zeppelins; 55 persons killed; 114 injured.

14.--Bulgaria at war with Serbia.

14.--Italians capture Pregasina, on the Trentino frontier.

15.--Great Britain declares war on Bulgaria.

17.--France at war with Bulgaria.

18.--Bulgarians cut the Nish-Sulonika railroad at Vranja.

19.--Italy and Russia at war with Bulgaria.

22.--Uskub occupied by Bulgarians.

28.--Pirot captured by Bulgarians.

29.--Briand becomes premier of France, succeeding Viviani.


November

5.--Nish, Serbian war capital, captured by Bulgarians.

9.--Ancona, Italian liner, torpedoed in Mediterranean.

17.--Anglo-French war council holds first meeting in Paris.

20.--Novibazar occupied by German troops.

22.--Ctesiphon, near Bagdad, captured by British forces in Asia Minor.

23.--Italians drive Austrians from positions on Carso Plateau.

24.--Serbian government transferred to Scutari, Albania.


December

1.--British Mesopotamian forces retire to Kut-el-Amara.

2.--Monastir evacuated by Serbians.

4.--Henry Ford, with large party of peace advocates, sails for Europe on
chartered steamer Oscar II, with the object of ending the war.

13.--Serbia in hands of enemy, Allied forces abandoning last positions
and retiring across Greek frontier.

15.--Gen. Sir Douglas Haig succeeds Field Marshal Sir John French as
Commander-in-Chief of British forces in France.

20.--Dardanelles expedition ends; British troops begin withdrawal from
positions on Suvla Bay and Gallipoli Peninsula.

22.--Henry Ford leaves his peace party at Christiania and returns to the
United States.


1916

January

11.--Greek island of Corfu occupied by French.

13.--Cettinje, capital of Montenegro, occupied by Austrians.

23.--Scutari, Albania, taken by Austrians.

29-31.--German Zeppelins bomb Paris and towns in England.


February

1.--Appam, British liner, is brought into Norfolk, Va., by German prize
crew.

10.--British conscription law goes into effect.

16.--Erzerum, in Turkish Armenia, captured by Russians under Grand Duke
Nicholas.

19.--Kamerun, German colony in Africa, conquered by British forces.

21.--Battle of Verdun begins. Germans take Haumont.

25.--Fort Douaumont falls to Germans in Verdun battle.

27.--Durazzo, Albania, occupied by Austrians.


March

5.--Moewe, German raider, reaches home port after a cruise of several
months.

9.--Germany declares war on Portugal on the latter's refusal to give up
seized ships.

15.--Austria-Hungary at war with Portugal.

24.--Sussex, French cross-channel steamer, with many Americans aboard,
sunk by submarine off Dieppe. No Americans lost.

31.--Melancourt taken by Germans in Verdun Battle.


April

18.--Trebizond, Turkish Black Sea port, captured by Russians.

19.--President Wilson publicly warns Germany not to pursue submarine
policy.

20.--Russian troops landed at Marseilles for service on French front.

24.--Irish rebellion begins in Dublin. Republic declared. Patrick Pearse
announced as first president.

29.--British force of 9000 men, under Gen. Townshend, besieged in
Kut-el-Amara, surrenders to Turks.

30.--Irish rebellion ends with unconditional surrender of Pearse and
other leaders, who are tried by court-martial and executed.


May

8.--Cymric, White Star liner, torpedoed off Irish coast.

14.--Italian positions penetrated by Austrians.

15.--Vimy Ridge gained by British.

26.--Bulgarians invade Greece and occupy forts on the Struma.

31.--Jutland naval battle; British and German fleets engaged; heavy
losses on both sides.


June

5.--Kitchener, British Secretary of War, loses his life when the cruiser
Hampshire, on which he was voyaging to Russia, is sunk off the Orkney
Islands, Scotland.

6.--Germans capture Fort Vaux in Verdun attack.

8.--Lutsk, Russian fortress, recaptured from Germans.

17.--Czernowitz, capital of Bukowina, occupied by Russians.

21.--Allies demand Greek demobilization.

27.--King Constantine orders demobilization of Greek army.

28.--Italians storm Monte Trappola, in the Trentino district.


July

1.--British and French attack north and south of the Somme.

9.--Deutschland, German submarine freight boat, lands at Baltimore, Md.

14.--British penetrate German second line, using cavalry.

15.--Longueval captured by British.

25.--Pozieres occupied by British.

30.--British and French advance between Delville Wood and the Somme.


August

3.--French recapture Fleury.

9.--Italians enter Goritzia.

10.--Stanislau occupied by Russians.

25.--Kavala, Greek seaport town, taken by Bulgarians.

27.--Roumania declares war on Austria-Hungary.

28.--Italy at war with Germany.

28.--Germany at war with Roumania.

30.--Roumanians advance into Transylvania.

31.--Bulgaria at war with Roumania. Turkey at war with Roumania.


September

2.--Bulgarian forces invade Roumania along the Dobrudja frontier.

13.--Italians defeat Austrians on the Carso.

15.--British capture Flers, Courcelette, and other German positions on
western front, using 'tanks.'

26.--Combles and Thiepval captured by British and French.

29.--Roumanians begin retreat from Transylvania.


October

24.--Fort Douaumont recaptured by French.


November

1.--Deutschland, German merchant submarine, arrives at New London,
Conn., on second voyage.

2.--Fort Vaux evacuated by Germans.

7.--Woodrow Wilson re-elected President of the United States.

13.--British advance along the Ancre.

19.--Monastir evacuated by Bulgarians and Germans.

21.--Britannic, mammoth British hospital ship, sunk by mine in Aegean
Sea.

22.--Emperor Franz Josef of Austria-Hungary, dies. Succeeded by Charles I.

23.--German warships bombard English coast.

28.--Roumanian government is transferred to Jassy.

29.--Minnewaska, Atlantic transport liner, sunk by mine in
Mediterranean.


December

1.--Allied troops enter Athens to insist upon surrender of Greek arms
and munitions.

6.--Bucharest, capital of Roumania, captured by Austro-Germans.

7.--David Lloyd George succeeds Asquith as premier of England.

15.--French complete recapture of ground taken by Germans in Verdun
battle.

18.--President Wilson makes peace overtures to belligerents.

26.--Germany replies to President's note and suggests a peace
conference.

30.--French government on behalf of Entente Allies replies to President
Wilson's note and refuses to discuss peace till Germany agrees to give
'restitution, reparation and guarantees.'


1917

January

1.--Turkey declares its independence of  suzerainty of European powers.

1.--Ivernia, Cunard liner, is sunk in Mediterranean.

22.--President Wilson suggests to the belligerents a 'peace without
victory.'

31.--Germany announces intention of sinking all vessels in war zone
around British Isles.


February

3.--United States severs diplomatic relations with Germany. Count Von
Bernstorff is handed his passports.

7.--California, Anchor liner, is sunk off Irish coast.

13.--Afric, White Star liner, sunk by submarine.

17.--British troops on the Ancre capture German positions.

25.--Laconia, Cunard liner, sunk off Irish coast.

26.--Kut-el-Amara recaptured from Turks by new British Mesopotamian
expedition under command of Gen. Sir Stanley Maude.

28.--United States government makes public a communication from Germany
to Mexico proposing an alliance, and offering as a reward the return of
Mexico's lost territory in Texas, New Mexico and Arizona.

28.--Submarine campaign of Germans results in the sinking of 134 vessels
during February.


March

3.--British advance on Bapaume.

3.--Mexico denies having received an offer from Germany suggesting an
alliance.

8.--Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin dies.

10.--Russian Czar suspends sittings of the Duma.

11.--Bagdad captured by British forces under Gen. Maude.

11.--Revolutionary movement starts in Petrograd.

14.--China breaks with Germany.

15.--Czar Nicholas abdicates. Prince Lvoff heads new cabinet.

17.--Bapaume falls to British. Roye and Lassigny occupied by French.

18.--Peronne, Chaulnes, Nesle and Noyon evacuated by Germans, who retire
on an 85-mile front.

18.--City of Memphis, Illinois, and Vigilancia, American ships,
torpedoed.

19.--Alexander Ribot becomes French premier, succeeding Briand.

21.--Healdton, American ship, bound from Philadelphia to Rotterdam, sunk
without warning; 21 men lost.

26-31.--British advance on Cambrai.


April

1.--Aztec, American armed ship, sunk in submarine zone.

5.--Missourian, American steamer, sunk in Mediterranean.

6.--United States declares war on Germany.

7.--Cuba and Panama at war with Germany.

8.--Austria-Hungary breaks with United States.

9.--Germans retreat before British on long front.

9.--Bolivia breaks with Germany.

13.--Vimy, Givenchy, Bailleul and positions about Lens taken by
Canadians.

20.--Turkey breaks with United States.


May

9.--Liberia breaks with Germany.

11.--Russian Council of Workmen's and Soldiers' Delegates demands peace
conference.

15.--Gen. Petain succeeds Gen. Nivelle as Commander-in-Chief of French
armies. Gen. Foch is appointed Chief of Staff.

16.--Bullecourt captured by British in the Arras battles.

17.--Honduras breaks with Germany.

18.--Conscription bill signed by President Wilson.

19.--Nicaragua breaks with Germany.

22-26.--Italians advance on the Carso.


June

4.--Senator Root arrives in Russia at head of commission appointed by
President.

5.--Registration day for new draft army in United States.

7.--Messines-Wytschaete ridge in English hands.

8.--Gen. Pershing, Commander-in-Chief of American expeditionary force,
arrives in England en route to France.

18.--Haiti breaks with Germany.


July

1.--Russians begin offensive in Gallicia, Kerensky, minister of war,
leading in person.

3.--American expeditionary force arrives in France.

6.--Canadian House of Commons passes Compulsory Military Service Bill.

12.--King Constantine of Greece abdicates in favor of his second son,
Alexander.

14.--Bethmann--Hollweg, German Chancellor, resigns; succeeded by Dr.
Georg Michaelis.

16--23.--Retreat of Russians on a front of 155 miles.

20.--Alexander Kerensky becomes Russian premier, succeeding Lvoff.

20.--Drawing of draft numbers for American conscript army begins.

22.--Siam at war with Germany and Austria.

24.--Austro-Germans retake Stanislau.

31.--Franco-British attack penetrates German lines on a 20-mile front.


August

1.--Pope Benedict XV makes plea for peace on a basis of no annexation,
no indemnity.

3.--Czernowitz captured by Austro-Germans.

7.--Liberia at war with Germany.

8.--Canadian Conscription Bill passes its third reading in Senate.

14.--China at war with Germany and Austria-Hungary.

15.--St. Quentin Cathedral destroyed by Germans.

15.--Canadian troops capture Hill 70, dominating Lens.

19.--Italians cross the Isonzo and take Austrian positions.

28.--Pope Benedict's peace plea rejected by President Wilson.


September

3.--Riga captured by Germans.

5.--New American National Army begins to assemble in the different
cantonments.

7.--Minnehaha, Atlantic Transport liner, sunk off Irish coast.

12.--Argentina dismisses Von Luxburg German minister, on charges of
improper conduct made public by United States government.

14.--Paul Painleve becomes French premier, succeeding Ribot.

16.--Russia proclaimed a republic by Kerensky.

20.--Costa Rica breaks with Germany.

21.--Gen. Tasker H. Bliss named Chief of Staff of the United States
Army.

25.--Guynemer, famous French flier, killed.

26.--Zonnebeke, Polygon Wood and Tower Hamlets, east of Ypres, taken by
British.

28.--William D. Haywood, secretary, and 100 members of the Industrial
Workers of the World arrested for sedition.

29.--Turkish Mesopotamian army, under Ahmed Bey, captured by British.


October

6.--Peru and Uruguay break with Germany.

9.--Poelcapelle and other German positions captured in Franco-British
attack.

12-16.--Oesel and Dago, Russian islands in Gulf of Riga, captured by
Germans.

17.--Antilles, American transport, westbound from France, sunk by
submarine; 67 lost.

18.--Moon Island, in the Gulf of Riga, taken by Germans.

23.--American troops in France fire their first shot in trench warfare.

23.--French advance northeast of Soissons.

24.--Austro-Germans begin great offensive on Italian positions.

25.--Italians retreat across the Isonzo and evacuate the Bainsizza
Plateau.

26.--Brazil at war with Germany.

27.--Goritzia recaptured by Austro-Germans.

30.--Michaelis, German Chancellor, resigns; succeeded by Count George F.
von Hertling.

31.--Italians retreat to the Tagliamento.

31.--Beersheba, in Palestine, occupied by British.


November

1.--Germans abandon position on Chemin des Dames.

3.--Americans in trenches suffer 20 casualties in German attacks.

5.--Italians abandon Tagliamento line and retire on a 93-mile front in
the Carnic Alps.

6.--Passchendaele captured by Canadians.

6.--British Mesopotamian forces reach Tekrit, 100 miles northwest of
Bagdad.

7.--The Russian Bolsheviki, led by Lenine and Trotzsky, seize Petrograd
and depose Kerensky.

8.--Gen. Diaz succeeds Gen. Cadorna as Commander-in-Chief of Italian
armies.

9.--Italians retreat to the Piave.

10.--Lenine becomes Premier of Russia, succeeding Kerensky.

15.--Georges Clemenceau becomes Premier of France, succeeding Painleve.

18.--Major General Maude, captor of Bagdad, dies in Mesopotamia.

21.--Ribecourt, Flesquieres, Havrincourt, Marcoing and other German
positions captured by British.

23.--Italians repulse Germans on the whole front from the Asiago Plateau
to the Brenta River.

24.--Cambrai menaced by British, who approach within three miles,
capturing Bourlon Wood.


December

1.--German East Africa reported completely conquered.

1.--Allies' Supreme War Council, representing the United States, France,
Great Britain and Italy, holds first meeting at Versailles.

3.--Russian Bolsheviki arrange armistice with Germans.

5.--British retire from Bourlon Wood, Graincourt and other positions
west of Cambrai.

6.--Jacob Jones, American destroyer, sunk by submarine in European
waters.

6.--Steamer Mont Blanc, loaded with munitions, explodes in collision
with the Imo in Halifax harbor: 1500 persons are killed.

7.--Finland declares independence.

8.--Jerusalem, held by the Turks for 673 years, surrenders to British,
under Gen. Allenby.

8.--Ecuador breaks with Germany.

10.--Panama at war with Austria-Hungary.

11.--United States at war with Austria-Hungary.

15.--Armistice signed between Germany and Russia at Brest-Litovsk.

17.--Coalition government of Sir Robert Borden is returned and
conscription confirmed in Canada.


1918

January

14.--Premier Clemenceau orders arrest of former Premier Caillaux on high
treason charge.

19.--American troops take over sector northwest of Toul.

29.--Italians capture Monte di val Belle.


February

1.--Argentine Minister of  War recalls military attaches from Berlin and
Vienna.

6.--Tuscania, American transport, torpedoed off coast of Ireland: 101
lost.

22.--American troops in Chemin des Dames sector.

26.--British hospital ship, Glenart Castle, torpedoed.

27.--Japan proposes joint military operations with Allies in Siberia.


March

1.--Americans gain signal victory in salient north of Toul.

3.--Peace treaty between Bolshevik government of Russia and the Central
Powers signed at Brest-Litovsk.

4.--Treaty signed between Germany and Finland.

5.--Rumania signs preliminary treaty of peace with Central Powers.

9.--Russian capital moved from Petrograd to Moscow.

14.--Russo-German peace treaty ratified by All-Russian Congress of
Soviets at Moscow.

20.--President Wilson orders all Holland ships in American ports taken
over.

21.--Germans begin great drive on 50-mile front from Arras to La Fere.
Bombardment of Paris by German long-range gun from a distance of 76
miles.

24.--Peronne, Ham and Chauny evacuated by Allies.

25.--Bapaume and Nesle occupied by Germans.

29.--General Foch chosen Commander-in-Chief of all Allied forces.


April

5.--Japanese forces landed at Vladivostok.

9.--Second German drive begun in Flanders.

10.--First German drive halted before Amiens after maximum advance of 35
miles.

14.--United States Senator Stone, of Missouri, chairman of Committee on
Foreign Relations, dies.

15.--Second German drive halted before Ypres, after maximum advance of
10 miles.

16.--Bolo Pasha, Levantine resident in Paris executed for treason.

21.--Guatemala at War with Germany.

22.--Baron Von Richthofen, premier German flier, killed.

23.--British naval forces raid Zeebrugge in Belgium, German submarine
base, and block channel.


May

7.--Nicaragua at war with Germany and her allies.

19.--Major Raoul Lufberry, famous American aviator, killed.

24.--Costa Rica at war with Germany and Austria-Hungary.

27.--Third German drive begins or Aisne-Marne front of 30 miles between
Soissons and Rheims.

28.--Germans sweep on beyond the Chemin des Dames and cross the Vesle at
Fismes.

28.--Cantigny taken by Americans in local attack.

29.--Soissons evacuated by French.

31.--Marne River crossed by Germans, who reach Chateau Thierry, 40 miles
from Paris.

31.--President Lincoln, American transport, sunk.


June

2.--Schooner Edward H .Cole torpedoed by submarine off American coast.

3-6.--American marines and regulars check advance of Germans at Chateau
Thierry and Neuilly after maximum advance of Germans of 32 miles.
Beginning of American co-operation on major scale.

9-14.--German drive on Noyon-Montdidier front. Maximum advance, 5 miles.


15-24.--Austrian drive on Italian front ends in complete failure.

30.--American troops in France, in all departments of service, number
1,019,115.


July

1.--Vaux taken by Americans.

3.--Mohammed V, Sultan of Turkey, dies.

10.--Czecho-Slovaks, aided by Allies, take control of a long stretch of
the Trans-Siberian Railway.

12.--Berat, Austrian base in Albania, captured by Italians.

15.--Haiti at war with Germany.

15.--Stonewall defense of Chateau Thierry blocks new German drive on
Paris.

16.--Nicholas Romanoff, ex-Czar of Russia, executed at Yekaterinburg.

17.--Lieut. Quentin Roosevelt, youngest son of ex-President Roosevelt,
killed in aerial battle near Chateau Thierry.

18.--French and Americans begin counter offensive on Marne-Aisne front.

19.--San Diego, United States cruiser, sunk off Fire Island.

20.--Carpathia, Cunard liner, used as transport torpedoed off Irish
coast. It was the Carpathia that saved most of the survivors of the
Titanic in April, 1912.

20.--Justicia, giant liner used as troopship, is sunk off Irish coast.

21.--German submarine sinks three barges off Cape Cod.

23.--French take Oulchy-le-Chateau and drive the Germans back ten miles
between the Aisne and the Marne.

30.--Allies astride the Ourcq; Germans in full retreat to the Vesle.


August

1.--Sergeant Joyce Kilmer. American poet and critic, aged 31, dies in
battle.

2.--French troops recapture Soissons.

3.--President Wilson announces new policy regarding Russia and agrees to
cooperate with Great Britain, France and Japan in sending forces to
Murmansk, Archangel and Vladivostok.

3.--Allies sweep on between Soissons and Rheims, driving the enemy from
his base at Fismes and capturing the entire Aisne-Vesle front.

7.--Franco-American troops cross the Vesle.

8.--New Allied drive begun by Field Marshal Haig in Picardy, penetrating
enemy front 14 miles.

10.--Montdidier recaptured.

13.--Lassigny massif taken by French.

15.--Canadians capture Damery and Parvillers, northwest of Roye.

29.--Noyon and Bapaume fall in new Allied advance.


September

1.--Australians take Peronne.

1.--Americans fight for the first time on Belgian soil and capture
Voormezeele.

11.--Germans are driven back to the Hindenburg line which they held in
November, 1917.

12.--Registration day for new draft army of men between 18 and 45 in the
United States.

13.--Americans begin vigorous offense in St. Mihiel Sector on 40-mile
front.

14.--St. Mihiel recaptured from Germans. General Pershing announces
entire St. Mihiel salient erased, liberating more than 150 square miles
of French territory which had been in German hands since 1914.

20.--Nazareth occupied by British forces in Palestine under Gen.
Allenby.

23.--Bulgarian armies flee before combined attacks of British, Greek,
Serbian, Italian and French.

25.--British take 40,000 prisoners in Palestine offensive.

26.--Strumnitza, Bulgaria, occupied by Allies.

27.--Franco-Americans in drive from Rheims to Verdun take 30,000
prisoners.

28.--Belgians attack enemy from Ypres to North Sea, gaining four miles.

29.--Bulgaria surrenders to General d'Esperey, the Allied commander.

30.--British-Belgian advance reaches Roulers.


October

1.--St. Quentin, cornerstone of Hindenburg line, captured.

1.--Damascus occupied by British in Palestine campaign.

2.--Lens evacuated by Germans.

3.--Albania cleared of Austrians by Italians.

4.--Ferdinand, king of Bulgaria, abdicates; Boris succeeds

5.--Prince Maximilian new German Chancellor, pleads with President
Wilson to ask Allies for armistice.

7.--Berry-au-Bac taken by French.

8.--President Wilson asks whether German Chancellor speaks for people or
war lords.

9.--Cambrai in Allied hands.

10.--Leinster, passenger steamer, sunk in Irish Channel by submarine;
480 lives lost; final German atrocity at sea.

11.--Americans advance through Argonne forest.

12.--German foreign secretary, Solf, says plea for armistice is made in
name of German people; agrees to evacuate all foreign soil.

12.--Nish, in Serbia, occupied by Allies.

13.--Laon and La Fere abandoned by Germans.

13.--Grandpre captured by Americans after four days' battle.

14.--President Wilson refers Germans to General Foch for armistice
terms.

16.--Lille entered by British patrols.

17.--Ostend, German submarine base, taken by land and sea forces.

17.--Douai falls to Allies.

19.--Bruges and Zeebrugge taken by Belgians and British.

25.--Beginning of terrific Italian drive which nets 50,000 prisoners in
five days.

31.--Turkey surrenders; armistice takes effect at noon; conditions
include free passage of Dardanelles.


November

1.--Clery-le-Grand captured by American troops of First Army.

3.--Americans sweep ahead on 50-mile front above Verdun; enemy in full
retreat.

3.--Official reports announce capture of 362,350 Germans since July 15.

3.--Austria surrenders, signing armistice with Italy at 3 P. M. after
500,000 prisoners had been taken.

4.--Americans advance beyond Stenay and strike at Sedan.

7.--American Rainbow Division and parts of First Division enter suburbs
of Sedan.

8.--Heights south of Sedan seized by Americans.

9.--Maubeuge captured by Allies.

10.--Canadians take Mons in irresistible advance.

11.--Germany surrenders; armistice takes effect at 11 A. M. American
flag hoisted on Sedan front.