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About The Forest Grove express. (Forest Grove, Or.) 1916-1918 | View Entire Issue (July 18, 1918)
“ OVER THE TO P” By A n Am erican Arthur G uy Em pey Soldier W ho Went M achine G u n n er, Serving in France U ip r r lfk l 1917, b , Arthur Ou j C rop«/ EMPEY GOES “OVER THE TOP’' FOR THE FIRST TIME AND HAS DESPERATE HAND-TO-H/fND FIGHT Synopsis.— Kir oil by (ho sinking of the Lualtunla, with the Iona of American Uvea. Arthur (luy Empey, nn American living In Jersey City, «<><•« to England ami enllata aa a private In the Itrltlah army. After a short experience aa u recruiting officer In London, he la sent to train ing quarters In France, where he first henra the sound of big guns and makes the acquaintance of "cooties.** After a brief period of training Kmpey'a company Is sent Into the front-line trenches, where he takes hi* first turi. o. the fin» step while the bullets whl* overhead. Ktnpey learns, as comrade falls, that death lurks always In the trenches. CH A PTER X —Continued. We hud a sergeant In our bnttallon named Warren. He waa on duty with Ida platoon lit the tire trench one after noon when orders entne up from the rear that he hud been grunted seven days* leave for llllghty, and would be relieved at five o'clock to proceed to England. He was tickled to death at these welcome tidings and regaled his more or less envious mates beside him on the fire step with the good times In store for him. y e figured It out that In two dnys’ time he would arrive at Waterloo station, l^mdon, and then— seven days' bliss! At about five minutes to five he started to fidget with his rifle, and then suddenly springing up on the Are step with a muttered, "I’ll send over n couple of souvenirs to Frits so that he'll inlss me when I leave," he stuck his rifle over the top and fin'd two shots when "crock" went a bullet and he tumnled off the step, fell Into the mud at the bottom of the trench, nnd lay still In n huddled heap with a bullet hole In his forehead. At about the time he expected to ar rive of Waterloo station he was laid to rest In a little cemetery behind the lines. He had gone to llllghty. In the trenches one con never tell— It Is not safe to plan very fnr ahead. After “ stand down” the men sit on the fire step or repair to their respec tive dugouts nnd wait fnr the "rum Is sue” to materialize. Immediately fol lowing the rum conies brenkfast, brought up from the renr. Sleeping Is then In order unless some special work turns up. Around 12:30 dinner shows up. When this Is eaten the men try to amuse themselves until "tea" appears at about four o'clock, then "stand to" and they carry on us before. While In rest billets Tommy gets up nbout six In the morning, wnshes up. unswers roll call. Is Inspected by his platoon officer, nnd hns breakfast. At 8:45 he pnrndes (drills) with his com pany or goes on fatigue according to the orders which have been read out by the orderly sergeunt the night pre vious. Between 11:30 nnd noon he Is dis missed, hns his dinner nnd Is “ on his own” for the remainder of the day, unless he hns clicked for a digging or working party, ami so It goes on from day to «lay, always "looping the loop" nnd looking forward to peace and Blighty. Sometimes, while engaged In n "cootie” hunt, you think. Strnnge to say, but It Is n fact, while Tommy Is searching his shirt serious thoughts come to him. Many a time, when per forming this operation, I have tried to figure out the outcome of the war and what will hnppen to me. My thoughts generally rnn In this chunnel: Will I emerge safely from the next attack? If I do will I skin through the following one, and so on? While your mind Is wandering Into the future It Is likely to be rudely brought to earth by a Tommy Interrupting with, "What's good for rheumntlsm?” Then you have something else to think of. Will you come out of this war crippled and tied Into knots with rheumatism, caused by the wet nnd mud of trenches nnd dugouts? You give It Up ns a bad Job and generally saunter over to the nearest estninlnet to drown your moody forebodings In a glnss of sickening French beer or to try your luck nt the always present game of ‘‘house.” You can hear the sing-song voice of n Tommy droning out the numbers ns he extrncts the little squares of cardboard from the bng between his feet. CH A PTER XI. Over the Top. On my second trip to the trenches our officer was mnklng his rounds of Inspection, nnd we received the cheer ful news that nt four In the morning we were to go over the top and take the Oerman front-line trench. My heart turned to lend. Then the officer car ried on with his Instructions. To the best of my memory I recall them as follows: “ At eleven n wiring party will go out In front and cut lanes through our barbed wire for the passage of troops In the morning. At two o'clock our artillery will open Tip with nn In tense bombardment, which will last un til four. Upon the lifting of the bar rage the first of the three waves will go over." Then he left. Some o f the Tommies, first getting |MTiulsslon from the sergeant, went li to the machine gunners' dugout and wrote letters home, saying that In the morning they were going over the top, und also that If the letters reached their destination It would mean that the writer had been killed. These letters were turned over to the captnln with Instructions to mall name In the event of the writer’s being killed. Home of the men made out their wills In their pay books, under the caption, “ Will and Lust Testa ment." Then the nerve-racking wait com menced. Every now nnd then I would glance at the dial o f my wrist watch nnd was surprised to see how fast the minutes passed by. About five minutes to two I got nervous waiting for our guns to open up. I could not take my eye* from tuy watch. I crouched against the parapet and strained my muscle* In a deathlike grip upon my rifle. A* the hands on my watch showed two o'clock a blinding red flare lighted up the sky In our rear, then thunder. Intermixed with n sharp, whis tling sound In the air over our heads. The shells from our gun* were speed ing on thelrfwny toward the Oerman lines. With one accord the men sprang up on the fire step nnd looked over the top In the direction of the Oerman trenches. A line of bursting shells l i g h t e d up No Man's Land. The din was terrific and the ground trem bled. Then, high above our heads we could henr a sighing moan. Our big boys behind the line hud opened up and 9.2’* and 15-Inch shells commenced dropping Into the Oermun lines. The flash of the guns behind the lines, the scream of the shells through the air, und the flare of them, bursting, wus a sfH-ctacle thnt put I’nln’s greatest dis play Into the shade. The constant pup, pup, o f Oerman machine guns and un occasional rattle of rifle firing gave me the Impression of a huge audience upplnudlng the work o f the batteries. Our lH-poundcra were destroying the Oernuin barbed wire, while the heavier stuff was demolishing thel| trenches nnd bashing In dugouts or funk holes. 'ihen Fritz got busy. Their shells went screnmlng over head, aimed In the direction of the flares from our batteries. Trench mor tars started dropping “ Minnies” In our front line. We clicked several cas ualties. Then they suddenly ceased. Our artillery had taped or silenced them. During the bombardment you could nlmost rend n newspaper In our trench. Sometimes In the flare of a shell-burst a man's body would be silhouetted agnlnst the parados of the trench nnd It appeared like n huge monster. You could hardly hear yourself think. When nn order was to tie passed down the trench you had to yell It, using your hands ns n funnel Into the ear* of the man sitting next to you on the fire step. In about twenty minutes n generous rum Issue wns doled out. After drink ing the rum, which tnsted like vnrnlsh nnd sent n shudder through your frnme, you wondered why they mnde you wnlt until the lifting of the bar rage before going over. At ten min utes to four word wns passed down, "Ten minutes to g o !” Ten minutes to live I We were shivering all over. My legs felt ns If they were nsleep. Then word wns passed down: “ First wave get on and near the scaling lad ders." These were smt.ll wooden Indders which we hnd placed ngnlnst the para pet to ennble us to go over the top on the lifting of the barrage. “ Ladders of little Tommies were engnged with him. They looked like pigmies alongside of the I'ruNNlun. The Tommy on the left was gradually circling to the rear of his opponent. It wa* a funny sight to see them duck the swinging butt and try to Jab him at the same time. The Tommy nearest me received the butt of the German’s rifle In a smashing blow below the right temple. It smashed his head like an eggshell. He pitched forward on his side and a con vulsive shudder ran through his body. Meanwhile tne other Tommy had gained the rear of the Prussian. Sud denly about four Inches of bayonet protruded from the throat of the Prus sian soldier, who stnggered forward and fell. I will never forget the look of blank astonishment that came over hi* face. Then something bit me In the left shoulder and my left side went numb. It felt as If a hot poker was being driven through me. I felt no pain— Jest a sort of nervous shock. A bay onet had pierced me from the rear. I fell backward on the ground, but was not unconscious, because I could see dim objects moving nround me. Then a flush of light in front of my eyes and unconsciousness. Something had hit me on the head. I have never found out what It was. I dreamed I was being tossed about In an open boat on a heaving sea and opened my eyes. The moon was shin ing. I was on a stretcher being car ried down one o f our communication trenches. At the advanced first-aid post my wounds were dressed, and then I was put Into an ambulance and sent to one of the base hospitals. The wounds In my shoulder and head were not serious und In six weeks I had re joined ray company for service In the front line. ♦•♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦» r ♦+ STATE NEW S IN BRIEF. Following a abut down of more than a week aa a result of the fire July 7, the Hammond Lumber company’s mill at Aatoria resumed operation* Wed nesday. The loss from the fire, aside from closing down the plant, will total close to $100,000. July 16 was the formal opening of the new Klamath state bank at Klam ath Falls In a new pressed-brick block. The new Institution waa launched with a capital stock of $50,000 and a sur plus of $15,1)00. A savings department Is to be established at once. Cutting of fall grain is well under way now in Linn county. Considering the labor shortage, the work of cutting Is progressing rapidly. From all in dications fall grain will produce a fair yield. Owing to lack of rain, however, the spring grain gives very little promise. death” we called them, and veritably they were. Before a charge Tommy Is the po litest of men. There Is never any push ing or crowding to be first up these ladders. We crouched around the buse o f the ladders waiting for the word to go over. I was sick and faint, and was puffing away at an unllghted fag. Then came the word, “Three minutes to g o ; upon the lifting of the barrage It has come to light that Lieutenant and on the blast o f the whistles, 'Over Raymond E. Templeton, the Browns the top with the best o’ luck and give vllle aviator who met his death on a them hell.'" The famous phrase of flying field In Michigan, made a be the western front. The Jonah phrase quest for the good of his home town. of the western front. To Tommy It He has remembered the home of his means If you are lucky enough to come boyhood with a gift of $1004 and speci hack you will be minus an arm or a fied that the money be used to erect a drinking fountain for horses. leg. Tommy hatea to be wished the best o f luck; so, when peace Is de In the belief that every woman in clared, If It ever I*, and you meet a Klamath Falls under ordinary circum Tommy on the street. Just wish him the stances can devote at least three hours a week to the Red Cross work, a com best of luck and duck the brick that mittee wa* appointed at a meeting of follows. the Red Cross executive committee to I glanced aguln at my wrist watch. present a plan for securing greater co We all wore them nnd you could hnrdly operation at the work rooms. call us “ sissies” for doing so. It was a Official inspection of the Klamath minute to four. I could see the hand I Falls municipal railroad, now complet move to the twelve, then a dead si ed from Klamath Fall* east to Olene, lence. It hurt. Everyone looked up 10 miles, was made by the officials to see what had happened, but not for Tuesday, under the escort of the build long. Sharp whistle bluats rang out er, Robert E. Strahorn, and Chief En Empey joins the "Suicide along the trench, and with a cheer the gineer Bogue. The party went as far club." The thrilling details are men scrambled up the ladders, The as the road terminus at Dairy by auto told in the next Installment. and returned by train. bullets were cracking overhead, and occasionally a machine gun would rip Dr. Wr. G. Hughes, a member of the nnd tear the top of the sandbag para Milton council and well known resi (TO B E C O N T I N U E D » pet. How I got up that ladder I will dent of Milton for the past five years, never know. The first ten feet out In received a telegram from Washington, front was agony. Then we passed DEADLY WEAPON OF WARFARE 1 D. C., advising him to report for duty ■ in the dental army corps within the through lanes in our barbed wire. I knew I was running, but could feel no German Albatross Is Probably the next two weeks. Dr. Hughes expects Most Powerful Machine That Has to shape his affairs so that he can motion below the waist. Batches on : enter the service in accordance with Yet Been Developed. the ground seemed to float to the rear | the call. ns If I were on a trendralll and scen The tendency In airplanes has been Superintendent J. A. Churchill re- ery was rushing past me. The Ger mans had put a barrage of shrapnel to run to two extremes— for fighting, I turned to Salem Wednesday from the across No Man’s Land, and you could as small and fast us possible; and meeting of the National Education as henr the pieces slap the ground about for bombing, as large and powerful sociation at Pittsburg, where Be ap as possible. In a three-seated, one peared on the programme a number of you. passenger sits out In front mounted times. The sessions, he stated, were After I had passed our barbed wire In a machine-gun turret. The pilot almost entirely confined to questions and gotten Into No Mun's Land a comes next. Immediately behind the dealing with the schools in connection Tommy about fifteen feet to my right motor, while the second passenger sits with the war and how they may be front turned around and looking In my behind him mounted In another ma come a factor In developing citizenship and also in preparing youthful minds direction, put his hand to his mouth chine-gun turret. This airplane Is and yelled something which I could not capable o f carrying many bunded for the readjustments coming after the war. , make out on account of the noise from pounds of explosives nnd. being very The University of Oregon’s first | the bursting shells. Then he coughed, fast and heavily armed, generally ac summer military traiping camp will stumbled, pitched forward and lay stllL complishes Its mission. close Saturday, July 20, after the busi | Ills body seemed to float to the rear The German albatross Is capable of est week in the entire month of its i of me. I could henr sharp cracks In 1 a horizontal speed of 300 kilometers ! life. Applications for the second | the air about me. These were caused (about 187 miles) an hour. It Is a camp, in which the enrollment has by passing rifle bullets. Frequently, single seater and carries three ma | been limited to a maximum of 300 to my right nnd left, little spurts of chine guns, which, being controlled by men, are coming in large numbers. 1 dirt would rise Into the air and a rico- the motor, shoot automatically nnd si More than 50 applications have been • chet bullet would whine on Its way. multaneously through the propeller. received since it was definitely decid | If a Tommy should see one of these ed last Saturday to provide a second The sight of these weapons converges j course in officers' training. August 1 little spurts In front of him, he would nt approximately 50 yards In front of tell the nurse about It later. The the nlrplnne. mnklng the chance of to August 31. The applicants reside in all parts of the northwest. Enroll- crossing of No Man’s Land remains a hitting the opponent three times as | ment will not close until August 1. blank to me. , sure. The motor Is equipped with an The state tax commission has or Men on my right and left would electric self-starter. It hns also elec stumble and fall. Some would try to trical devices for keeping the water dered Secretary Goodin, of the board get up, while others remained huddled \ warm in the radiator while flying at of control, and Tax Commissioner Gal and motionless. Then smashed-up great heights: The wing surface is loway to secure estimates from all i state institutions and departments as barbed wire came Into view and less than 20 square yards.—Scribner's. to the probable cost of operation for seemed carried on a tide to the rear. the next biennium to determine how Suddenly, in front of me loomed a much of an increased levy should be Silkworms of the Sea. bnshed-ln trench about four feet wide. Plenty of worms live in the sea, placed before the people at the general Queer-looking forms like mud turtles and some of then» are very beautiful election in November. The commis were scrambling up Its wall. One of crentures. Which latter fnct ought to sion will meet again on August 15 to these forms seemed to slip nnd then be consoling to ourselves, inasmuch ns consider the estimates, most of which rolled to the bottom o f the trench. I there are naturalists who contend that will be in by then. It is also the plan leaped across this Intervening spaci. the earliest ancestor of the human race of the commission to hold hearings from time to time for organizations The man to my left seemed to pause In wns a marine worm. But the so-called that may have suggestions to make midair, then pitched head down into “silkworm of the sea” —the designation relative to the necessities of state ex the German trench. I laughed out loud being purely Uguratlve nnd poetical— penditures. In my delirium. Upon alighting on the Is a bivalve mollusk properly known The A. J. Wisdom sawmill near El other side of the trench I came to with as the “ pinna” and native to the Medi gin employs a girl high school gradu a sudden Jolt. Bight In front o f me terranean. It spins a silk so beautiful ate as a driver of the sawdust wagon, loomed a glnnt form with a rifle which thnt In ancient days the fiber was re the young man formerly on the Job looked nbout ten feet long, on the end served exclusively for the weaving of having enlisted. of which seemed seven bayonets. These royal garments. This silk is spun by La Grande is to have a liberty chor flashed In the air in front of me. Then the mollusk to furnish an anchor line us c f approximately 200 voices. More through my mind flushed the admoni by which It fastens Itself to a con than 100 already belong and it has tion of our bayonet Instructor back In venient rock. It is extremely fine nnd been decided to employ Professor Ed Blighty. He hnd said, “whenever you very strong. Cleaned, dried nnd passed wards, of Baker, as director. get In a charge nnd run your hnyonet through combs. It Is reduced to deli A break in the A line canal of the up to the hilt Into a German the Frits cate threads of a lustrous brownish- Umatilla project, near Hermiston, dur will fall. Perhaps your rifle will be yellow hue. which are woven Into ing the storm last week put the irriga wrenched from your grasp. Do not gloves, stockings and other articles. A tion system on the project out of com waste time. If the hnyonet Is fouled pair o f stockings of this material today mission for two or three days. In his equipment, by putting your foot costs —Philadelphia Ledger. Miss Ella Nelson was the first girl on his stomach nnd tugging at the rifle employed at the Baker mills to suffer to extricate the bayonet. Simply Pretty Bright Mule. injury, she losing the second finger press the trigger nnd the bullet will The farmer alleged n freight train and portion of the thumb of her right free It.” In m / present situation this of the defendant eonpany had hit one | hand Saturday by a saw at the box factory of the Baker White Pine Lum wns the logic, but for the life o f me of his mules. ber company. I could not remember how he had told “ Now, Mr. Jones, said the nttorney me to get my bayonet Into the Ger for the corporation to the aggrieved The Baker Commercial Club has ap man. To ipe this was the paramount party, who occupied the wltness'stand. pealed for assistance from the govern Issue. I closed my eyes and lunged “will you kindly tell the court whether ment through Representative Slnnott forward. My rifle wns torn from my or not your mule wns on the track, the I to revive the Sumpter Valley irriga hands. I must have gotten the Ger property of the defendant, when hit tion project, completion of which ! would water about 80,000 acres east man because he hnd disappeared. by the train?” of Baker. About twenty feet to my left front “ Well, sir,” replied Mr. Jones, “I With the labor shortage so serious wns a huge Prussian nearly six feet didn’t witness the occurrence, but I four Inches In height, n line specimen suppose things must hnve been about j that farmers cannot handle the hay o f physical mnnhood. The bayonet ns you say. This wns a pretty bright crop, young women have begun work in the fields in some parts of Linn from his rifle wns missing, but he mule nnd I reckon It that train had j county. From different communities clutched the barrel In both hands nnd took out after him In the woods which the past few days have come reports was swinging the butt around his head. fringe the trnck there where he waa of girls being seen in the fields pitch I could almost hear the swish o f the killed he would hnve got behind a ing hay. butt passing through the air. Three tree.”