CHAPTER XVII The World’s Greatest Battle

CONSIDERING the numbers engaged, the severity of the defense, the difficulty of dislodging a foe entrenched with nature’s aid, and the dash, energy and destructive work of the offensive, the fight for the Argonne has no equal in the records of mankind. This has been the verdict of many witnesses; not alone those with the desire to give praise to their fellow Americans, but alien critics also have affirmed it.

History has recorded many bloody encounters of modern times. Waterloo, the Bloody Angle, Pickett’s charge—these are but a few instances of the pluck and bravery that men will show when facing an equally determined enemy. The greatest war has furnished innumerable evidences that men are no less courageous than in former times.

As we have seen, it was a trick of the Germans, practiced over and over again, to vacate a position under pressure and at night, when the victors had paused to reinforce and count results, to come back again, occupying much of the ground they had vacated during the day. But the Americans soon discovered this ruse and looked for it; they also followed the Huns more closely and held all of the ground taken from them.

Greater dash, a more complete disregard for danger which amounted in many cases to individual foolhardiness, causing at the same time the enemy to feel that he was up against foemen that outclassed him in that sort of thing, had much to do with the winning streak that the Yanks maintained. The Germans fooled themselves into thinking that they were above defeat where the great forest, its ravines and hills, afforded them such protection, but this was the sort of thing that the Americans—many of them hunters, sportsmen, woodsmen, mountaineers, or with vacation experiences in such places and having the hereditary instincts of ancestors who were pioneers—now welcomed.

This manner of fighting took from the Germans their natural inclinations following their training as a body of men who depended upon the spirit of comradeship and who were only at their best when fighting shoulder to shoulder. But it was exactly according to the American standards and training, showing clearly the superiority of the latter method of making each man depend on himself. Moreover, it was what is known as open fighting, differing from trench warfare and though the opposing forces often fortified themselves behind natural rock masses and within thickets and groves, they were not as fixed as in the elaborate dugouts and fortresses beneath the surface of the ground. In some instances, however, over officers had erected cabins or stone huts.

The fighting in the Argonne occurred mostly in the daytime and except where some few night raids were carried out with slight gain either way, the opposing forces were content to lie in wait until early morning hours, when they again leaped at each other’s throats, the Yanks doing most of the jumping and the Huns getting the larger part of the throttling. Then, until the fall of darkness again, the battle went on uninterruptedly.

Naturally, slow progress was made in the forest. Between the Aire River, which skirts the Argonne region on the east, and the Meuse, an average of twelve miles away, the attacking Americans got on much faster, taking village after village and compelling the Germans to fall back continually. Units of other divisions cleared the immediate valley of the Aire of Huns, but before all this was done the now famous 77th Division had penetrated into the very center of the forest and was still going strong. After pausing to make good the ground and re-form, the drive was resumed in the early morning of October 4th, the sounds thereof conveying the glad fact to Herbert Whitcomb, Don Richards and their brave little company.

The open farming section to the west of the Argonne was vacated by the Germans after the St. Mihiel battle and the severe fighting on the Vesle. The Huns knew they could not hold this section against the combined French and Americans; therefore, they retired to within the forest proper, believing that nothing could dislodge them there and it became the job of the Americans alone to prove them wrong.

Where a successful offensive is conducted, even against open formations or ordinary trenches, the attacking force necessarily outnumbers the defenders and this was the case in the Argonne battle, but the differences were not by any means as great as might have been expected, considering the terrain and the decisiveness of the defeat.

In many separate actions, or what might be termed somewhat isolated fights, where bodies of Americans were separated from their fellows, though the Germans managed generally to keep in touch with each other, the defenders also decisively beaten at these points, often greatly outnumbered the attacking forces. Sheer inability to recognize the possibility of being beaten or even seriously repulsed carried the Yanks on to victory, compelling the foe to give way before their terrific onslaughts.

This sort of fighting while it lasted did not surprise the American commanders, but the English, French and Italian officers detailed to visit the American command viewed with astonishment the result of the battle. Never before had they seen such persistent energy and cool determination shown by an army of such large numbers. Only the Canadians and Australians, on certain smaller occasions, demonstrated the more hardy purpose and tenacity of men from less densely settled countries where the pioneer spirit still prevails.

May it be that, however advanced our country becomes in the niceties and needs of civilization, however earnestly we come to adhere to those finer traits of national integrity and purer manliness, we still retain much of that pioneer spirit which made of our forefathers the kind of men to gain the greatest nation on earth.