And they thought we wouldn't fight Part 7

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE FIRST GLIMPSE OF FRANCE]

Another soldier standing near the stern rail had a different and more serious interrogation to make. He appeared rather blase about it as he leaned over the rail and, directing his voice toward a soldier on the dock, casually demanded:

"Say, where the h.e.l.l is all this trouble, anyhow?"

These two opening sorties produced a flood of others. The most common enquiry was: "What's the name of this place?" and "Is this France or England?" When answers were made to these questions, the recipients of the information, particularly if they happened to be "old-timers in the army," would respond by remarking, "Well, it's a d.a.m.n sight better than the Mexican border."

As our men came over the s.h.i.+p's side and down the runways, there was no great reception committee awaiting them. Among the most interested spectators of the event were a group of stolid German prisoners of war and the two French soldiers guarding them. The two Frenchmen talked volubly with a wealth of gesticulation, while the Germans maintained their characteristic glumness.

The German prisoners appeared to be anything but discouraged at the sight. Some of them even wore a smile that approached the supercilious.

With some of them that smile seemed to say: "You can't fool us. We know these troops are not Americans. They are either Canadians or Australians coming from England. Our German U-boats won't let Americans cross the ocean."

Some of those German prisoners happened to have been in America before the war. They spoke English and recognised the uniforms of our men.

Their silent smiles seemed to say: "Well, they don't look so good at that. We have seen better soldiers. And, besides, there is only a handful of them. Not enough can come to make any difference. Anyhow, it is too late now. The war will be over before any appreciable number can get here."

But the stream of khaki continued to pour out of the s.h.i.+p's side.

Company after company of our men, loaded down with packs and full field equipment, lined up on the dock and marched past the group of German prisoners.

"We're pa.s.sing in review for you, Fritzie," one irrepressible from our ranks shouted, as the marching line pa.s.sed within touching distance of the prisoner group. The Germans responded only with quizzical little smiles and silence.

Escorted by our own military bands, the regiments marched through the main street of the village. The bands played "Dixie"--a new air to France. The regiments as a whole did not present the snappy, marching appearance that they might have presented. There was a good reason for this. Sixty per cent. of them were recruits. It had been wisely decided to replace many of the old regular army men in the ranks with newly enlisted men, so that these old veterans could remain in America and train the new drafts.

However, that which impressed the French people was the individual appearance of these samples of American manhood. Our men were tall and broad and brawny. They were young and vigorous. Their eyes were keen and snappy. Their complexions ranged in shade from the swarthy sun-tanned cheeks of border veterans to the clear pink skins of city youngsters.

But most noticeable of all to the French people were the even white rows of teeth which our men displayed when they smiled. Good dentistry and clean mouths are essentially American.

The villagers of St. Nazaire, old men and women, girls and school children, lined the curbs as our men marched through the town. The line of march was over a broad esplanade that circled the sandy beach of the bay, and then wound upward into the higher ground back of the town. The road here was bordered on either side with ancient stone walls covered with vines and over the tops of the walls there extended fruit-laden branches to tempt our men with their ripe, red lusciousness. As they marched through the heat and dust of that June day, many succ.u.mbed to the temptations and paid for their appet.i.tes with inordinately violent colics that night.

A camp site had been partially prepared for their reception. It was located close to a French barracks. The French soldiers and gangs of German prisoners, who had been engaged in this work, had no knowledge of the fact that they were building the first American cantonment in France. They thought they were constructing simply an extension of the French encampment.

That first contingent, composed of United States Infantrymen and Marines, made its first camp in France with the smallest amount of confusion, considering the fact that almost three-quarters of them hadn't been in uniform a month. It was but several hours after arriving at the camp that the smoke was rising from the busy camp stoves and the aroma of American coffee, baked beans and broiled steaks was in the air.

On the afternoon of that first day some of the men were given permission to visit the town. They began to take their first lessons in French as they went from cafe to cafe in futile efforts to connect up with such unknown commodities as cherry pie or ham and egg sandwiches. Upon meeting one another in the streets, our men would invariably ask: "Have you come across any of these FROGS that talk American?"

There was nothing disrespectful about the terms Frogs or Froggies as applied to their French comrades in arms. American officers hastened to explain to French officers that the one piece of information concerning France most popularly known in America was that it was the place where people first learned to eat frog legs and snails.

The Frenchmen, on the other hand, were somewhat inclined to believe that these first Americans didn't live up to the European expectations of Americans. Those European expectations had been founded almost entirely upon the translations of dime novels and moving picture thrillers of the Wild West and comedy variety.

Although our men wore the high, broad-brimmed felt hats, they didn't seem sufficiently cowboyish. Although the French people waited expectantly, none of these Americans dashed through the main street of the village on bucking bronchos, holding their reins in their teeth and at the same time firing revolvers from either hand. Moreover, none of our men seemed to conclude their dinners in the expected American fas.h.i.+on of slapping one another in the face with custard pies.

There was to be seen on the streets of St. Nazaire that day some representative black Americans, who had also landed in that historical first contingent. There was a strange thing about these negroes.

It will be remembered that in the early stages of our partic.i.p.ation in the war it had been found that there was hardly sufficient khaki cloth to provide uniforms for all of our soldiers. That had been the case with these American negro soldiers.

But somewhere down in Was.h.i.+ngton, somehow or other, some one resurrected an old, large, heavy iron key and this, inserted into an ancient rusty lock, had opened some long forgotten doors in one of the Government a.r.s.enals. There were revealed old dust-covered bundles wrapped up in newspapers, yellow with age, and when these wrappings of the past were removed, there were seen the uniforms of old Union blue that had been laid away back in '65--uniforms that had been worn by men who fought and bled and died to free the first black American citizens.

And here on this foreign sh.o.r.e, on this day in June more than half a century later, the sons and the grandsons of those same freed slaves wore those same uniforms of Union blue as they landed in France to fight for a newer freedom.

Some of these negroes were stevedores from the lower Mississippi levees.

They sang as they worked in their white army unders.h.i.+rts, across the chest of which they had penciled in blue and red, strange mystic devices, religious phrases and hoodoo signs, calculated to contribute the charm of safety to the running of the submarine blockade.

Two of these American negroes, walking up the main street of St.

Nazaire, saw on the other side of the thoroughfare a brother of colour wearing the lighter blue uniform of a French soldier. This French negro was a Colonial black from the north of Africa and of course had spoken nothing but French from the day he was born.

One of the American negroes crossed the street and accosted him.

"Looka here, boy," he enquired good-naturedly, "what can you all tell me about this here wah?"

"Comment, monsieur?" responded the non-understanding French black, and followed the rejoinder with a torrent of excited French.

The American negro's mouth fell open. For a minute he looked startled, and then he bulged one large round white eye suspiciously at the French black, while he inwardly debated on the possibility that he had become suddenly colour blind. Having rea.s.sured himself, however, that his vision was not at fault, he made a sudden decision and started on a new tack.

"Now, never mind that high-faluting language," he said. "You all just tell me what you know about this here wah and quit you' putting on aihs."

The puzzled French negro could only reply with another explosion of French interrogations, coupled with vigorous gesticulations. The American negro tried to talk at the same time and both of them endeavouring to make the other understand, increased the volumes of their tones until they were standing there waving their arms and shouting into one another's faces. The American negro gave it up.

"My Gawd," he said, shaking his head as he recrossed the street and joined his comrades, "this is sh.o.r.e some funny country. They got the mos' ignorantest n.i.g.g.e.rs I ever saw."

Still, those American blacks were not alone in their difficulties over the difference in languages. I discussed the matter with one of our white regulars who professed great experience, having spent almost one entire day on mutual guard with a French sentry over a pile of baggage.

"You know," he said, "I don't believe these Frenchies ever will learn to speak English."

Our veterans from Mexico and the border campaigns found that their smattering of Spanish did not help them much. But still every one seemed to manage to get along all right. Our soldiers and the French soldiers in those early days couldn't understand each other's languages, but they could understand each other.

This strange paradox was a.n.a.lysed for me by a young American Lieutenant who said he had made a twelve-hour study of the remarkable camaraderie that had immediately sprung up between the fighting men of France and the fighting men of America. In explaining this relations.h.i.+p, he said:

"You see, we think the French are crazy," he said, "and the French know d.a.m.n well we are."

Those of our men who had not brought small French and English dictionaries with them, made hurried purchases of such handy articles and forthwith began to practice. The French people did likewise.

I saw one young American infantryman seated at a table in front of one of the sidewalk cafes on the village square. He was dividing his attention between a fervent admiration of the pretty French waitress, who stood smiling in front of him, and an intense interest in the pages of his small hand dictionary.

She had brought his gla.s.s of beer and he had paid for it, but there seemed to be a mutual urge for further conversation. The American would look first at her and then he would look through the pages of the book again. Finally he gave slow and painful enunciation of the following request:

"Mad-am-moy-sell, donnie moy oon baysa."

She laughed prettily as she caught his meaning almost immediately, and she replied:

"Doughboy, ware do you get zat stuff?"

"Aw, h.e.l.l," said the young Infantryman, as he closed the book with a snap. "I knew they'd let those sailors ash.o.r.e before us."

From the very first day of the landing we began to learn things from the French and they began to learn things from us. Some of our men learned that it was quite possible to sip an occasional gla.s.s of beer or light wine without feeling a sudden inclination to buy and consume all there remained in the cafe.

The French soldiers were intensely interested in the equipment of our land forces and in the uniforms of both our soldiers and sailors. They sought by questions to get an understanding of the various insignia by which the Americans designated their rank.

One thing that they noticed was a small, round white pasteboard tag suspended on a yellow cord from the upper left hand breast pocket of either the blue jackets of our sailors or the khaki s.h.i.+rts of our soldiers. So prevalent was this tag, which in reality marked the wearer as the owner of a package of popular tobacco, that the French almost accepted it as uniform equipment.

The att.i.tude of our first arriving American soldiers toward the German prisoners who worked in gangs on construction work in the camps and rough labour along the docks was a curious one. Not having yet encountered in battle the brothers of these same docile appearing captives, our men were even inclined to treat the prisoners with deference almost approaching admiration.