The American Expeditionary Forces in the Great War by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: HISTORY / Military / World War I
ISBN: 9781526714473
Publisher: Pen & Sword Books
Published: 2017-10-30T00:00:00+00:00

German occupation of Montfaucon, circa 1916. (Author’s collection)

American ambulances on their way to a base hospital. (Author’s collection)

The next stage in the attack involved the liberation of Nantillois and Beuge Wood. These assaults were executed the next day, 28 September; whilst the wood and the village were taken, German resistance was such that the 79th Division was not able to advance beyond them. The objective for 29 September was the capture of Ogons Wood, part of the Giselher Line. Despite numerous attacks, the Americans failed to reach their goal that day. Next day, On the 29th, they continued to attack the wood but once again failed to break German resistance. Time and again well directed German artillery fire proved to be decisive in halting American attempts to move forward. Many of the attackers were gassed (by this stage in the war the use of gas shells by the artillery of both sides had increased to a significant proportion of the ordnance fired) or wounded by shelling.

On 30 September the 79th Division was relieved by the 3rd Division. It was taken out of the line and sent out of the battle zone and moved east of the Meuse to a quiet sector to refit and reorganise. It returned to the Meuse Argonne at the end of October.

Thomas Barber wrote an outstanding, if short, memoir, Along the Front, published in 1924. He commanded a pioneer company, tasked with repairing and maintaining sections of roads. At the opening of the battle he and his company soon found themselves north of Malancourt, on the road to Cuisy, with Montfaucon some two thousand five hundred metres away to the north west. The excerpt here illustrates the effects of the fighting on this inexperienced division. Barber opens his entry for 1 October 1918:

‘Breakfast was late – about seven. A great many more stragglers appeared and I had to put a guard on the mess line to keep them from sneaking in… When I first arrived in this position thirty six hours before, I had noticed two long piles of American packs stacked like cordwood and evidently left by two companies before they went on to the firing line. Just after breakfast two little bedraggled columns under non-commissioned officers marched up in good order and began to ransack these piles. I went over and asked them what they were doing. The leaders said that they were all that were left of the companies that had stacked them there and were now on their way to the rear. I counted them. One column consisted of a sergeant and twenty eight men; the other of a corporal and thirty men. I asked where the rest were.

“Dead, I guess,” the sergeant said gloomily. He must have been wrong, for that division had become so disorganised that many must have run and many more strayed away and got lost. I asked him about his officers. He seemed to know they were dead. At any rate, those two detachments were the only

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