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September 6, 1915.
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WITH THE AMERICAN
AMBULANCE FIELD SERVICE
IN FRANCE
 

On arriving at Nancy I was met by Salisbury, our Section leader, and 
after a very good meal in the most beautiful little town you could hope to see (and 
where the Kaiser and ten thousand troops in dress parade were waiting on a
hill close by to enter in state last October), we started by motor for
Pont-ˆ-Mousson. Some fifteen kilometres farther on, our lights were put out
and we then entered the region under shell fire. It was a funny feeling
listening to my conductor talking about how this shell and that shell hit
here and there; and all along the route we passed torn-up trees, houses,and
roads. At last we came to Pont-ˆ-Mousson, a dear little village with about
eight thousand inhabitants, and felt our way, so to speak, in the darkness
and silence to the barracks which are now the Headquarters of the Ambulance.
I found that there were about twenty cars and twenty-two men here,the
latter all enthusiastic about their work and the help the Section were
giving the French. The day before I arrived a shell hit the house next door,
and on first sight one would think it was the barracks itself whichhad been
hit. These huge high-explosive shells are sent into the town every two or
three days, and everywhere one sees masses of brick and stone, all that
remains of houses struck. The Germans have bombarded the town over one
hundred and ten times....

After being introduced to the "boys," I went to my room which is someone
hundred and sixty metres up the road --- nearer the trenches, but safer for
all that. Here I found I was to share the house with another man, Schroeder
by name, a Hollander and a very nice fellow, who has already lost one
brother and has had another wounded in the French army. My bedroom is a
quite typical French peasant room, very comfortable, and I felt grateful to
know that I was to have a bed and not straw to sleep on. I went to sleep
there my first night in comparative quietness, only hearing now and then a
crack of a musket which in peace time one would think was merely aback-fire
of some motor. In the morning I woke at six and went to breakfast in our
barracks, which is always served at seven o'clock. Walking out of my front
door I came into the main street. To the left is the way to the town and the
barracks --- to the right the road goes straight on, an avenue of trees.My
friend or housemate pointed out, about five hundred metres away, what looked
like a fallen tree across the road. Imagine my feelings when he told me that
they were the French trenches. To the right and left of this avenue are
hills and on the left runs the River Moselle. On the ridge of hills on the
right, one sees a brown line --- these are the German trenches, and walking
down the road to breakfast, one gets the knowledge that a first-class rifle
shot could pick one off. After breakfast I was asked by one of the men,
Roeder, if I would like to look about the place, and I jumped at the
invitation. We got into a Ford Ambulance (no one can realize the excellence
of the Ford for this purpose until he has seen what they can do), and we
started on a tour, or "petit promenade," as an officer told us we were
doing....

Pont-ˆ-Mousson was in the hands of the Germans for five days and our
Headquarters were the German Officers' Headquarters. The French partially
blew up the bridge which crosses the Moselle at this most picturesque point,
and for the last five days the Germans have been bombarding it, attempting
in their turn to destroy it; many of the houses round it seem to have been
hit, and the two places where shells have taken most effect are on the
bridge the French have repaired with wood. The boys tell me it is a
wonderful sight to see the water rising like a geyser when the shells hit in
the river. To show how careless the few remaining peasants are, directly the
Germans have "apparently" ceased firing, they get into boats to pickup the
fish killed in hundreds by the concussion. We left the river (where we could
be clearly seen by the Germans entrenched some thousand metres away),and I
confess I sighed in relief --- for it is difficult to accustom one's self
immediately to the possibility of receiving a bullet in one's head or a
shell in one's stomach. We then went through the town, everywhere being told
stories of how, on such and such a day last week, five men were killed there
and three wounded here, etc. All the houses are left open, and one can walk
into any doorway that looks interesting and do a tour of inspection.We left
Pont-ˆ-Mousson and started up the hill to our first "place de secour"---
X------, ---you will see it on your map some three kilometres from
Pont-ˆ-Mousson. Roeder, as we sped on, carefully explained that I was never
to drive along this particular road, but was to take a back way, as the
Commandant had forbidden any one to use this route which was in full view of
the German artillery and trenches. If he could have realized how I felt, he
would have taken me by the back way that time too.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
On the other side of the hill on our right extended the famous
Bois-le-Pr*tre; but it is no longer a wood --- it is just a wilderness with
a few brown stumps sticking up. "Would you like to go into the Bois?" I was
asked. I felt I had been in as much danger as I was likely to get into, so I
said yes, and we turned to the left and mounted a steep hill and entered it.
Here the birds were singing and all was green and beautiful (it was a part
where the artillery had not been) but one could see trench after trench
deserted. Here was an officers' cemetery, a terribly sad sight, six hundred
officers' graves. Close by were also the graves of eighteen hundred
soldiers.

The little cemetery was quite impressive on the side of this lovely green
hill with the great trees all around and the little plain wood crosses at
each grave. As we waited a broken-down horse appeared with a cart-load of
what looked like old clothes --- "Les Morts." I had never seen a dead body
until that moment. It was a horrible awakening --- eight stiff,
semi-detached, armless, trunkless, headless bodies, --- all men like
ourselves with people loving them, --- somewhere, ---all gone this way, ---
because of --- what? I don't know, do you? A grave had been dug two metres
deep, large enough to hold sixteen, and then we were asked to group
ourselves around the car to be taken "pour souvenir." I managed to do it. I
stood there by those dead men and tried to look as if it were a natural
thing to do. I felt like being sick. Then one by one they were lowered into
the grave, and when they were all laid out the identification started to
take place --- the good boots were taken off --- and if a coat was not too
bloody or torn it was kept --- "Surely we must be going said. "No, no! not
before we have shown you the dead in the fosse there." "Good God," I cried,
"I can't do that now"; and I did n't. We returned to Pont-ˆ-Mousson for
lunch at twelve o'clock and I felt a very different person --- and wondered
how I could have felt faint the week before on merely seeing the photographs
of wounded in our Neuilly Hospital; --- one becomes "habitu*," they tell me.
I was then officially handed over the car I am to drive, and I began looking
over all the parts, as we have to do everything for ourselves here....

We soon left our friends and took our contagious case to the station. After
passing through wonderful valleys, hills, woods, and plains we returned home
pretty tired --- wondering how such atrocities could be taking place in such
a perfect country. We go regularly to X----- to get our "bless*s,"and for
two out of the six kilometres we are exposed to German view and the whole of
the way, of course, to shell fire. On my first arrival at this little
mountain village I was horrified to see two people lying dead in the road in
huge pools of blood. Six German "150's" had been suddenly launched into the
village which is full of soldiers, and killed six soldiers and wounded some
thirty. Three of the six shots had landed actually in the road itself.Two
of our ambulances were in the street at the time and only chance spared
them. I asked where the shells had struck, and my stretcher-bearer looked
around for a moment and then pointed under my own car, and there was a hole
some nine inches deep and two feet wide. It made me feel rather rotten,I
must say. Only five minutes before and it might happen again at any moment.
I took down three "couch*s," as the lying-down ones are called, and had to
pass in front of a battery of "75's " which fired as I passed and gave me a
shaky knee feeling, I can tell you. Then backward and forward for two hours
carrying more wounded, and to add to the excitement it rained so hard that I
was thankful I had bought myself two uniforms and could change. To-day is
Sunday, and after a rather uncomfortable night in my clothes and a snatchy
sleep, I have a day off....

Monday, the 28th.
Yesterday we heard from "Doc," who wired to say that he would arrive at ten
o'clock Sunday night. I have just seen him and he looked splendidly. I soon
retired to my room to read the mail which he brought: Letters from you and
H----- being the only American ones. Last night I was on duty all night at
X-----, and it was a great strain riding backward and forward in pitch
darkness up and down the very steep and narrow road. I had to go to Auberge
St. Pierre at about two o'clock this morning. This road is in full view of
the Germans and much bombarded, and shrapnel burst close by, which reminded
me that a lovely moonlight night with trees and hills and valleys dimly
shaping themselves can be other than romantic.
It was a sad trip for me --- a boy about nineteen had been hit in the chest
and half his side had gone, --- "tr*s press* " they told me, --- and as we
lifted him into the car, by a little brick house which was a mass of shell
holes, he raised his sad, tired eyes to mine and tried a brave smile. I went
down the hill as carefully as I could and very slowly, but when I arrived at
the hospital I found I had been driving a hearse and not an ambulance. It
made we feel very badly ---the memory of that faint smile which was to prove
the last effort of some dearly loved youth. All the poor fellows look at us
with the same expression of appreciation and thanks; and when they are
unloaded it is a common thing to see a soldier, probably suffering the pain
of the damned, make an effort to take the hand of the American helper.I
tell you tears are pretty near sometimes. I send you some photos taken by a
little camera I bought, as my large one is too big. All my love to you and
to those who make the memory of America so dear to me....

On Friday I again took down a German wounded ---this time a German of the
Kaiser's or Crown Prince's Bodyguard (the German Crown Prince is against us
here). He was dying. Picture to yourself a fine, truly magnificent man, ---
over six feet four --- wonderful strength, --- with a hole through both
lungs. He could not speak, and when I got to the hospital, I asked in German
if he wanted anything. He just looked at me and then chokingly murmured,
"Catholic." I asked a soldier to fetch the priest and then two brancardiers
(stretcher-bearers) and the doctor---the priest and I knelt down as he was
given extreme unction. That is a little picture I shall never forget--- all
race hatred was forgotten. Romanist and Anglican, we were in that hour just
all Catholics and a French priest was officiating for a dying German--- a
Boche. --- the race that has made Europe a living hell. I came back about
seven o'clock at night to the hospital with more wounded and asked if he
still lived. "Yes; would I care to see him? " I went in and although he
breathed his last within an hour after, his look showed recognition, and
that man died, I am sure, with no hatred for France....

I could tell you a multitude of stories --- stories so horrible I cannot
forget, so pathetic that tears are not rarely in my eyes. On Friday night, I
was on Montauville duty ---and a new regiment arrived --- "Bon camarade" to
me at once --- "How many wounded?" etc., --- they asked. I could not tell
them that they were going to a place where between their trench and the
German trench were hundreds of mangled forms, once their fellow-citizens,
--- arms, legs, heads, scattered disjointedly everywhere; and where all
night and all day every fiendish implement of murder falls by the hundred
---into their trenches or on to those ghastly forms, --- some half rotted,
some newly dead, some still warm, some semi-alive, stranded between foe and
friend, --- and hurls them yards into the air to fall again with a splash of
dust, as a rock falls into a lake. All this is not exaggerated. It is the
hideous truth, which thousands of men here have to witness day and night.
Saturday night they came back, some of those poor fellows I spoke a cheery
word to on Friday --- no arms --- no hands --- no feet --one leg ---no face
--- no eye --- One glorious fellow I took had his hand off, and although it
was a long trying drive to Dieulouard he never uttered a word. I touched his
forehead when I arrived and whispered, "Bon courage, mon brave!" He looked
at me a moment and answered, "Would God he had taken my life, my friend."
To-day I went to take three wounded officers to Toul, some thirty
kilometres, away, and before starting I went into the hospital to see if I
could do anything for any of those butchered by "civilization." I saw a
friend --- the man who had offered me a German bayonet. He beckoned me with
his eyes and then --- "Have they forgotten me? I have been here for five
hours and both my legs are shattered." It was true that every bed was full
of wounded waiting to be dressed, but I went straight up to the m*decin chef
and told him that a friend was over there with both legs broken and could he
be attended to? "Ah, we have been looking after the others first, as he must
die, but I will do what I can." I stood there and watched his two legs put
into a position that looked human and then I bade adieux to a new found
friend. I think I am glad he will die. I would prefer to die than to be
crippled for life, and if my turn comes I only hope I may not recover to be
helpless....

Monday.
I have just received the mail with lots of nice letters. It was so jolly
hearing from you all. I am glad to tell you that this Section is to be
mentioned by Order of the Army, and it will probably receive the
Croix-de-Guerre, which our Section Commander will wear, of course ---we may
all get some sort of medal some time as well, perhaps. If my letter seems
too horrible, just don't send it on to the friends who might otherwise care
to hear. My only object in writing so fully is that I do want you all to
realize the futility, the utter damnable wickedness and butchery of this
war.