Chapter I: Preface

Special correspondents in great numbers have come from America into the European "zone of military activity," and in almost equal numbers have they gone out, to write their impressions, their descriptions, their histories, their romances and songs.

Other correspondents who are not "special," but who by the grace of the military authorities have been permitted to enter the forbidden territory, and by the favor of the censor have been allowed to tell what they saw there, have entered it again and again at regular intervals.

These are the "regular" correspondents, who lived in Europe before war was declared, and who during many idle hours speculated on what they would do with that great arm of their vocation--the cable--when the expected hour of conflict arrived.

Few of their plans worked out, and new ones were formed on the minute--on the second. For the Germans did not cut the cable, as some of the correspondents, in moments of despair, almost hoped they would do, and the great American public clamored insistently for the "news" with its breakfast.

It is a journalist's methods in covering the biggest, the hardest "story" that newspapers were ever compelled to handle, that this book attempts to describe.

Wythe Williams.

Paris, October, 1915.

AN ENDORSEMENT

By Georges Clemenceau

Former Premier of France.

"In the crowded picture which this American journalist has presented we recognize our men as they are. And he pronounces such judgment as to arouse our pride in our friends, our brothers and our children. Such a people are the French of to-day. They must also be the French of to-morrow. Through them France sees herself regenerate.

"Of our army, Mr. Wythe Williams says:

"'It seems to me to be invincible from the standpoints of power, intelligence and humanity.'

"Is there not in that something like a judgment pronounced upon France before the people of the world? Where I am particularly surprised, I admit, is that the eye of a foreigner should have been so penetrating, and that our friendly guest should have coupled the idea of an 'invincible' army with the supreme ethical consideration of its 'humanity.'

"Mr. Wythe Williams is right to proclaim this, even though it is something of a stroke of genius for a non-Frenchman to have discovered it."--(From an editorial in _L'Homme Enchainé_.)

LETTER TO THE AUTHOR FROM SENATOR LAFAYETTE YOUNG

_My Dear Williams_:

I am glad to know that you are going to write about the war in book
form. In doing this you are discharging a plain duty. You have been
in the war from the start. You have studied the soldier in the
trench, and out. You have witnessed every phase of battle. The war
is in your system. You are full of it. Therefore, you can write
concerning it with inspiration and fervor.

I remember our long marches in and near the trenches in Northern
France in April and May, last. I know how deeply you are interested;
therefore, I know how well you will write.

A thousand historians will write books concerning the present great
conflict, but the real historians will be the honest, independent
observers such as you have been.

Newspaper reports will be the basis of every battle's history.

Take the battle of the Marne, for instance. Who knows so well
concerning it as men like yourself, who were in Paris or near it
during the seven days' conflict?

The passing years may bring dignified historians who will compose
sentences which shall sound well, but none of them will be so full of
real history as your volume if you write your own experiences.

I never knew a man freer from prejudice, and at the same time fuller
of enthusiasm than yourself. I want you to write your book with the
same free hand you write for the _New York Times_. Forget for the
time that you are writing a book.

I am pleased to know that you have been with the army several times
since I parted company with you. This, with your experience as an
ambulance driver, when the first hostilities were on, has certainly
made you a military writer worth while.

I count you to be one of the three best and most truthful American
correspondents who have been in the war from the start.

I am hoping the time will come when these wars shall end, when bright
men like yourself shall return to the work of journalism in America.

With greatest affection, I subscribe myself,

Lafayette Young.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PAGE

Introduction by Myron T. Herrick xiii

PART ONE

THE HECTIC WEEK

CHAPTER PAGE

I The Day 1

II The Night 9

III Herrick 19

IV Les Américains 31

V War 39

PART TWO

THE GREATEST STORY

VI The Actuality 49

VII The Field of Glory 55

PART THREE

THE ARM OF MILITARY AUTHORITY

VIII The Field of Battle 73

(A) Sentries in the Dark

(B) The Wounded Who Could Walk

(C) A Lull in the Bombardment

IX "Detained" by the Colonel 94

X The Cherche Midi 110

XI Under the Croix Rouge 120

(A) Trevelyan

(B) The Rue Jeanne d'Arc

(C) Those from Quesnoy-sur-Somme

PART FOUR

WAR-CORRESPONDING DE LUXE

XII Out with Captain Blank 145

XIII Joffre 157

XIV The Man of the Marne and the Yser 172

XV The Battle of the Labyrinth 184

XVI "With the Honors of War" 193

XVII Sister Julie, Chevalier of the Legion of Honor 209

XVIII The Silent Cannon 226

XIX D'Artagnan and the Soul of France 230