BLOODY CHARGE OF THE TURCOS TROOPS.

GRAPHIC STORY OF BLOODY CHARGE OF THE TURCOS TROOPS.

Paris Sept 2, 1914

“It was like hell cut loose”, is the way a French Officer of zouaves described the charge of the Turcos France’s black troops at the Battle of Charleroi.

Telling of the terrific charges of the blacks, the officer declared, “they fought at such close quarters with the Germans that many of the men got hold of the noses of the enemy with their teeth.

“When the fighting was at the height our colonel suddenly ordered, “give the Turcos free rein,” said the officer.. Then the avalanche began , it was like hell was set loose., They tore along the Marseillais,” but no man could even hear the man next to him in the ranks, so terrible was the pounding of guns, infantry and artillery poured shot into them, and they fell by the dozens, but dashed on. When they  were within fifteen yards of the batteries, the Germans had to cease firing to avoid shooting their own guards. A bloody bayonet fight then followed. While a man was bayoneting a German and could not release his weapon at once, he would whip out his revolver and shoot another. In the meantime a companion, by his side would be attacking the bayoneting foe with the butt of his rifle. The soldiers of the Kaiser were giants,  but they fell like flies. Blood splashed everywhere, I must have shot a hundred with my revolver.

The remnant of the Germans command finally fled for their lives, but not many escaped.. When our survivors got back to Charleroi , we lost more than a score, when the Germans mounted a howitzers in the church steeple, despite the fact that the building was flying the Red Cross flag.”

FREIGHTFUL ATROCITES BY SENGALESE SOLDIERS

FREIGHTFUL ATROCITES BY SENGALESE SOLDIERS

LONDON SEPT. 7, 1914

The London Globe prints a gruesome story of the manner in which the French Senegalese soldiers have followed up victories over German troops. The account is contained in a letter from a reader of the Globe who claim to have witnessed the incidents.

“It is a wonder”, reads a letter to the Globe, “that the French and British troops have not retaliated on the Germans for the terrible atrocities committed by the latter. The Tucos and Senegalese, however are not so scrupulous.

“One Senegalese warrior is walking about Havre with a neck lass of German ears strong across his shoulders. Another carries at his waist the gory head of a Uhlan with a dented picklehaube set with a rakish tilt over one eye.

“ A wounded Turco was put into the carriage of a Red Cross train with four wounded Germans. At the first stop, a doctor came to the window and asked if they were all right. The Turco replied that the Germans were resting peacefully.

“It  was not until the train reached the destination that it was discovered how peaceful their rest was. The Turco had strangled all four of them.”

One can quite understand the French desire to gets at the Germans. The letter stated. “ I hear first hand stories, not third hand , “yarns”  that make the blood run cold. All boys whom they catch have their right arms  cut off sometimes at the wrist, sometimes at the elbow. Both boys and girls are mutilated in revolting fashion. Quite close in Arras a three weeks old child was torn from its mothers breast and hacked into bits before her eyes.”

CORPORAL JULES LUPIN BELGIAN HERO

Dead Belgium Soldiers

London September, 24 1914
Pottsville Miners Journal September 25, 1914

Eighteen year old Corporal Lupin who served in the Regiment of Major Jeanne of Liege, will here forth hold a place in Belgium history as high as that accorded any individual. Corp. Lupin gave his life to his country. The Germans to whom he gave his life paid for it with the annihilation field artillery, horses and men, and the decisive defeat of an attacking column of infantry. Major Jeanne, tells the following story of Corporal Lupin’s heroism. “We were on the right bank of the Meuse at Bellaire, in close touch with the German battery. The musketry on both sides was terrible. All at once the Germans adopted new tactics. They seemed to withdraw from their position and we could distinctly notice their ranks splitting as if in great confusion. It was only to bring up more artillery which had been rushing behind. The move was smartly executed, the ranks closed again, and for a time they seemed to have an advantage over us. “ But now again young Lupin had seen his chance looming, and what he did altogether changed the face of things. Like a flash the boy dashed off under cover of a ditch to the left of the German battery. At 300 meters distance he found shelter behind a wall. He took aim at the battery in enfilade and his Mauser brought down quick succession the chief officer, the under officers and the artillerymen. This time real confusion took place at the German battery, which was nearly silenced. The Germans thinking that a whole platoon was now attacking them directed their last piece of artillery on the wall, and with a terrific crash the wall came down, burying the brave Corporal Lupin. The boy’s bravery had weakened the German position, and it did not take us long to scatter them, and put another victory

AMERICAN HITS SENTRY ON THE HEAD WITH A PICK HANDLE AND ESCAPED FROM HUN PRISON CAMP.

Shenandoah Evening Herald
June 20, 1918

By Lowell Mellet, UPI Correspondent.


With the Americans on the Marne. James A. Dunahue of Newark N.J. felt around in the dark till he got hold of a broken pick. Then he hit his sleepy German guard over the head and two days later, yesterday he made the following report to the second division HQ on what it is like to be a prisoner in the German Army:
“I went down the woods (Belleau Wood) and joined my command, what there was left of it. They were all spit upon and mixed up. I heard a whistle blow and went forward. Every time that a flare would go up I would drop down. There was a lot of rifle firing. Just ahead I saw four or five men and thought they were our fellows. I ran right into them and when I got there one of them hit me on the head with something. When I came to they took me up before an officer. He said, “How many Americans are there over here” I said thirty two divisions of Americans and forty divisions of the French he said, “Ach Schwein, Schwein.!”

BOOTED AND KICKED

‘Then they booted me and shoved me away. Going out I got a couple more kicks. They took ,me down the road a piece. Detachments coming along would give me the once over and say: “Ach American! Schwein. I don’t know how long I walked but it was a long time. I didn’t sleep all that night.
“Next morning I got an axe about the size of this helmet handed me and without anything to eat they put me to work cutting with them. They had machine guns all through the woods. Then they took me across an open field and back into another woods and had me cut more brush. They were digging emplacements. They were digging and setting machine guns in it and try it turning all around and then move to another place and then camouflage that hoe with brush.
“That night I tried to sleep in an old covering. About the time I would get started sleeping they would come along and give me a boot and take me to another place. Then they took me on another march.

HUNS IN YANKEE UNIFORMS

That evening three men in American uniforms walked up to an officer and talked with him. Then they turned and walked back toward the line. The about seven French soldiers or men in French uniforms walked up and talked to this officer and then turned and walked toward the line.
“They would give me soup and black bread to eat. That was enough to drive a man crazy. Then they would sit in front of me and eat cheese and bread and drink something that looked like coffee to tantalize me. They kept me chopping all the time, they had about 15 or twenty me carrying away the brush while I chopped it. They were using to camouflage the ditches they had ammunition in them.

TOOK CHANCE TO ESCAPE


“I was there about seven or eight nights. I could not keep track of the days. So between shoving me around and kicking me around. I thought I would try to escape and take a chance of being shot. So when another sentry came on I watched him and he sits down by a tree and looked like he was sleeping. I moved a bit an no move out of the sentry. He just kept right on snoring. Away. I just rolled over and got a little closer and still no movement from him. I reached right around and gets hold of an old pick handle. So I hit him on the head with the pick handle and not a sound or grunt out of him. I slipped right away then. Then I ran across those Red Cross dogs of theirs. They have a little canteen on both sides of them. I went on a little piece and stayed in the woods for a while when the dogs were around, but there was not a whimper out of them. They were just running around.

TRAVELED BY NIGHT

“I would go on and when I would run close to a bunch I would drop down and stay still until they had gone away, and then I would go on further. I would travel by night and lay hid in the woods by day. It took me two days to get up here. Well I kept on coming and one day I found a bag with some old hard bread in it and little pieces of cheese. I came across a stream and soaked the bread and ate it.
“I kept on coming until I got up where the shells were dropping all around me and thought it was all up with me.
“I keep[t on going through and then I heard a sentry, yell “Halt” and I said: “Don’t shoot: I am an American I went up to him and asked where Headquarters was, then I got an M.P. and he took me up to A.P. M.

HUN CAVALRY MAKES A CHARGE ON AMERICANS AND ARE WIPED OUT.

Frank Taylor UPI Correspondent
July 21, 1918
From the Pottsville Miners Journal July 1918.

With the American Armies in France.
American troops facing their first cavalry charge of the war, utterly wiped out a formidable force of German horsemen east of Rheims and defeated what apparently was an ambitious attempt to cut the allies lines and reach Chalans. So far as is known this is the first time the enemy has employed cavalry since the counter offensive began.
Immediately afterward the same American unit broke up a combined attack of infantry and tanks.
The Americans held an important sector of on a slight rise behind a chalk colored hill, over which were the enemy front positions. When the German cavalry topped the hill and went down upon the Americans they ran into a unit which has a remarkable record for sharpshooting.
Opening up with machine gun automatic rifles and Enfield’s the Americans quickly dropped men and horses. The artillery quickly joined in adding to the slaughter. The cavalry dwindled and only a hand full remained. These galloped back over the hill to the German lines.

The Germans quickly reorganized for another attack. American observers spotted enemy tanks crawling over the chalk like hill accompanied by infantry in great strength.
American artillery cut loose and the first salvo struck several tanks crawling over the chalk hill squarely, splitting them wide open. Simultaneously the German infantry began melting away under the withering fire of American infantry and machine gunners. This effort was broken up almost as quickly as the previous one. And the Germans made no further attempts in this sector.
Reinforced by French infantry the Americans then attacked driving the Boches back beyond their original lines.
Tales of American exploits are numerous as doughboys wander back to the hospital and tell their comrades.
East of Château-Thierry three Americans captured a German boat and rowed across the Marne under cover of darkness before the German retreat. They his in bushes during the day, exploring the banks and discovering enemy machine guns. Then they re-entered the boat and pushed their exploration further,
The Boches discovered them and opened intense machine gun fire. The Americans escaped by diving over board and swimming half the time under the surface.
The next night they led a stronger patrol of their pals across and extended their investigations, obtaining valuable information concerning the disposition of the German units.
After cleaning the south bank of fugitives tonight. American units crossed the Marne and combed the woods n the north bank east of Chateau-Thierry capturing great numbers of prisoners. Once in a while they encountered Boches who refused to surrender, immediately these Germans didn’t get another chance.
An instance of great bravery occurred when an exploding shell buried a dough boy so that only his head protruded from the dirt. His struggles to extricate himself only exhausted him. Along came a pal, returning to a dressing station with a dangerous head wound. This doughboy stopped and began digging out the buried man. Finally his strength failed him and he fell unconscious. He then recovered somewhat and resumed his digging.
“You go on and get your wound dressed: it’s more serious than my trouble.” The buried doughboy declared. ”Someone will find me”
The other refused to go and fell unconscious again. His companion by super human strength managed to extricate himself at last. Although suffering a badly wounded arm he dragged his pal back to the dressing station. Twice on the way they were bowled over by exploding shells.
Regaining consciousness after treatment the two pals lay recounting their experience.
“Eddie I wonder what protected us and brought us through this alive?” said one.
Fumbling inside his pocket of his dirty blouse the other replied. “This” He pulled out a tiny soiled, Stars and Stripes.

A Marine At Belleau Wood. The Letter Home..

In Belleau Wood, Walter Spearing, of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, a University of Pennsylvania man, who had been one of the first Marines to "ship over," received the wounds which caused his death. His comrade in arms had been "Sol" Segal, of Alliance, Ohio, barely twenty years old. And when the grave had been filled, "Sol" sat beside it and, upon paper captured from a German dugout, wrote a letter of consolation to Spearing's mother that is destined to become a classic—in the Marine Corps, at least. A letter of an overwhelmed man it is, a man grieving for the "bunkie" who is gone, yet strengthening the mother who, he knows, grieves deeper than he:
At the Front, June 26, 1918


DEAR MRS. SPEARING:
THERE is grief in my heart and in the hearts of all of my comrades for the great sorrow that this war has brought to you and to us. We all unite to express our heartfelt sympathy and condolence to the mother and family of one who has fallen in a cause as imperishable as will be the names of those who have fallen to defend it. Should there be anything my comrades and I can do to mitigate your grief and to allay your sorrow — some little keepsake of Walt as a Marine, perhaps — but name it, dear lady, and it shall traverse the ocean to you.
Because you do not know me, please do not think it presumptuous for me to write. You are Walter's mother — I was his inseparable friend and comrade; that makes us two kindred souls in common grief for our nearest and dearest. Then, too, this letter fulfills a duty that I am bound by oath and will to perform. Many months ago, Walt and I promised each other, that, should the "God of Battles" call to one, the other would console the sorrowing mother. Now Walt has gone West to Home and to you forever, but his figure, his voice, his wonderful personality will always be living truths to me. I, myself, should the great call come, will go gladly, confident of a reunion and with faith in the eternal truth of that cause for which I die.
Beneath the green in Belleau Woods, forever connected with the "Honor of the Marines," lies Walt with two comrades, dead on the "Field of Honor." Above their graves the stately pines sway in their grandeur, an imperishable monument. But greatest of all epitaphs is that engraved within the hearts of his comrades. "A man, than whom there was no peer in kindliness, in understanding, in comradeship, beyond compare." Wre alone know what could have been had circumstances so willed it. Whatever befall, whatever sorrow fills us, one thing I swear to you, here hard by that lonely grave — the very paper that I write upon taken in a captured German dugout — I swear that Walt is well avenged, that he has not died in vain, for his spirit leads us on to ultimate victory. You are proud, I know, for you are the mother of a martyr — a martyr in a holy cause, Freedom and Liberty.
Dear lady, the very thought that you are in grief tears my heart. Do not sorrow; death, after all, is not so terrible, and here — why, here it is glorious.
Mother, hi the name of the Twenty-third Company, in the name of the Marines, I salute you, and all my comrades salute you.
Devotedly
SOL SEGAL

Taken From My Book, "Pennsylvanian Voices of The Great War" McFarland Publishing.

Phil Rader Tells How It Feels To Deliberately Kill Men

French Legionare WW1

This is a fascinating account of how a man feels when forced to kill.
Phil Rader was a member of the French Foreign Legion. This story was written on March 1, 1915.


Phil Rader tells how he shot and killed an unarmed German upon the command of his Lieutenant.
Was so excited he could hardly aim but finally got his man.

Written for the United Press, 1915
By Phil Rader

London March 1. How it feels to kill a man is something I cannot definitely describe.
There are some millions of men in Europe who have had this feeling during the past half year but I venture to say that not one of them could faithfully detail his emotions upon first taking a human life.
After you see your victim drop you first feel a sense of triumph... Then the ages in training in the Ten Commandments come to front and you feel like a murderer.
Then you want to run around among your mates and tell them circumstances of the killing and get them to tell you that you did the right thing.
My experience was like that. I was standing beside my lieutenant one day. He had fastened a small mirror to a twig and was looking at the German trenches, when suddenly he exclaimed. “Get your gun! A Boche has come out of his trench.” I ran down the trench and got gun and came back to the loop hole. I was so excited I could hardly aim. Through the hole I saw a German standing on the edge of his trench. He had been carrying a huge board and he had rested it against his back while he tried to light his pipe.
“Get him! Get him! , he said the lieutenant.
I fired and missed. The German struck another match and merely looked contemptuously at the spot in space where the bullet had whistled past him. He was only 45 feet away from me, but thorough the loop hole I could see only a part of his body and I wanted to hit him low if possible. I aimed again. He wheeled around and backed in a circle, like a drunken man trying to keep his balance. Then he threw up both hands and fell forward on his face.
I turned around to look at the lieutenant. He had moved a way. I was proud. Then a wave of remorse came over me; it was the “Thou shalt not kill” that is buried in every man’s mind and heart.
“I got a German” I shouted to a soldier nearby. I told him how the man had been standing there, holding a board.
“Did he have a rifle?” asked the soldier. “Why no “, I said. “And you shot an unarmed man?” “I had direct orders” I answered. I felt like a dog. It seemed to me that I must find some human being who would say that I had done the right thing.
I told another soldier about it. “Served him right, “said the soldier. “ He would have done the same thing to you.”
Those were splendid words for me. I had sloughed along the trench before I met him. After that I held up my head. But the two feelings the pride and remorse fought in my mind.
At last I told it all to an old Legion Soldier.
“My boy, “he said, “Its war. Could you have refused to shoot under the eye of the Lieutenant? War is killing and that’s all there is to it. Suppose every soldier in the French line were to obey his own instincts about killing. None of the enemy would die. The French have brought you here to kill. You are ordered to kill and you must kill whenever you can.”
Technically I had dome wrong because all war is wrong.


French Hotchkiss Machine Gun
“I sat behind a machine gun, one day soon after that and killed eleven Germans who had built a barricade in some nearby trees. They were shooting at us and I felt much better about killing them than I did about that single German.
And then later again on the bicycle seat of the machine gun, and, at the rate of 700 shots a minute, I fired at advancing columns of Germans in close formation and watched them drop and squirm. They were coming to kill us if they could. It was only fair to kill them, under the rules of the war game.
A terrific sense of power filled me; the rattle of the gun was sweeter and grander to me that the Hallelujah chorus. I knew what it meant to be drunk with killing. Other machine guns were going too, but I felt at the time that mine was the only one. The Germans turned and ran, their formation smashed; their dead and wounded strewing the hillside.


German Soldiers


But that night. After I had crawled into my mud hole to sleep. I didn’t dare to think of all the women and children whose hearts had been hit by that machine gun fire.
I had joined the French Foreign Legion expecting to be made a member of the flying corps. Instead I had found a way to the trenches where killing was our only job. brutal out and out killing. With little science and less chivalry.
When my chance came I got out of the 1,500 men I had started out with only 345 remained and we had been in the trenches only 47 days.
I quit because it was a living hell. Everybody else would have quit too, I know they would, I lived with them and talked with them and ate with them. And I know them all and they would have quit if they could. So would every other man in all the armies of the world.