Part 40

In Raulecourt there were several pro-Germans. The authorities allowed them to stay there to save the town. The Salvation Army people were warned that there were spies in the town and that they must on no account give out information. Just before the St. Mihiel drive a special warning was given, all civilians were ordered to leave town, and a Military Police knocked at the door and informed the woman in the hut that she must be careful what she said to anybody with the rank of a second lieutenant, as word had gone out there was a spy dressed in the uniform of an American second lieutenant.

That night at eleven o’clock the young woman was just about to retire when there came a knock at the canteen door. She happened to be alone in the building at the time and when she opened the door and found several strange officers standing outside she was a little frightened. Nor did it dispel her fears to have them begin to ask questions:

“Madam, how many troops are in this town? Where are they? Where can we get any billets?”

To all these questions she replied that she could not tell or did not know and advised them to get in touch with the town Major. The visitors grew impatient. Then three more men knocked at the door, also in uniform, and began to ask questions. When they could get no information one of them exclaimed indignantly:

“Well, I should like to know what kind of a town this is, anyway? I tried to find out something from a Military Police outside and he took me for a spy! Madam, we are from Field Hospital Number 12, and we want to find a place to rest.”

Then the frightened young woman became convinced that her visitors were not spies; all the same, they were not going to leave her any the wiser for any information she would give.

Several times men would come to the town and find no place to sleep. On such occasions the Salvation Army hut was turned over to them and they would sleep on the floor.

The St. Mihiel drive came on and the hut was turned over to the hospital. The supplies were taken to a dugout and the canteen kept up there. Then the military authorities insisted that the girls should leave town, but the girls refused to go, begging, “Don’t drive us away. We know we shall be needed!” The Staff-Captain came down and took some of the girls away, but left two in the canteen, and others in the hospital.

It rained for two weeks in Roulecourt. The soldiers slept in little dog tents in the woods.

The meetings held the boys at the throne of God each night, they were the power behind the doughnut, and the boys recognized it.

“One hesitated to ask them if they wanted prayers because we knew they did,” said one sweet woman back from the front, speaking about the time of the St. Mihiel drive. “We couldn’t say how many knelt at the altar because they all knelt. Some of them would walk five miles to attend a meeting.”

It poured torrents the night of the drive and nearly drowned out the soldiers in their little tents.

They came into the hut to shake hands and say goodbye to the girls; to leave their little trinklets and ask for prayers; and they had their meeting as always before a drive.

But this was an even more solemn time than usual, for the boys were going up to a point where the French had suffered the fearful loss of thirty thousand men trying to hold Mt. Sec for fifteen minutes. They did not expect to come back. They left sealed packages to be forwarded if they did not return.

One boy came to one of the Salvation Army men Officers and said: “Pray for me. I have given my heart to Jesus.”

Another, a Sergeant, who had lived a hard life, came to the Salvation Army Adjutant and said: “When I go back, if I ever go, I’m going to serve the Lord.”

After the meeting the girls closed the canteen and on the way to their room they passed a little sort of shed or barn. The door was standing open and a light streaming out, and there on a little straw pallet lay a soldier boy rolled up in his blanket reading his Testament. The girls breathed a prayer for the lad as they passed by and their hearts were lifted up with gladness to think how many of the American boys, fully two-thirds of them, carried their Testaments in the pockets over their hearts; yes, and read them, too, quite openly.

Two young Captains came one night to say good-bye to the girls before going up the line. The girls told them they would be praying for them and the elder of the two, a doctor, said how much he appreciated that, and then told them how he had promised his wife he would read a chapter in his Testament every day, and how he had never failed to keep his promise since he left home.

Then up spoke the other man:

“Well, I got converted one night on the road. The shells were falling pretty thick and I thought I would never reach my destination and I just promised the Lord if He would let me get safely there I would never fail to read a chapter, and I never have failed yet!” This young man seemed to think that—the whole plan of redemption was comprised in reading his Bible, but if he kept his promise the Spirit would guide him.

On the way back to the hut one morning the girls picked marguerites and forget-me-nots and put them in a vase on the table in the hut, making it look like a little oasis in a desert, and no doubt, many a soldier looked long at those blossoms who never thought he cared about flowers before.

Within thirty-six hours after the first gun was fired in the St. Mihiel drive seven Salvation Army huts were established on the territory.

Three days before the drive opened twenty Salvation Army girls reached Raulecourt, which was a little village half a mile from Montsec. They had been travelling for hours and hours and were very weary.

The Salvation Army hut had been turned over to the hospital, so they found another old building.

That night there was a gas alarm sounded and everybody came running out with their gas masks on. The officer who had them in charge was much worried about his lassies because some of them had a great deal of hair, and he was afraid that the heavy coils at the back of their heads would prevent the masks from fitting tightly and let in the deadly gas, but the lassies were level-headed girls, and they came calmly out with their masks on tight and their hair in long braids down their backs, much to the relief of their officer.

It had been raining for days and the men were wet to the skin, and many of them had no way to get dry except to roll up in their blankets and let the heat of their body dry their clothes while they slept. It was a great comfort to have the Salvation Army hut where they could go and get warm and dry once in awhile.

The night of the St. Mihiel drive was the blackest night ever seen. It was so dark that one could positively see nothing a foot ahead of him. The Salvation Army lassies stood in the door of the canteen and listened. All day long the heavy artillery had been going by, and now that night had come there was a sound of feet, tramping, tramping, thousands of feet, through the mud and slush as the soldiers went to the front. In groups they were singing softly as they went by. The first bunch were singing “Mother Machree.”

There’s a spot in me heart that no colleen may own, There’s a depth in me soul never sounded or known; There’s a place in me memory, me life, that you fill, No other can take it, no one ever will; Sure, I love the dear silver that shines in your hair, And the brow that’s all furrowed and wrinkled with care. I kiss the dear fingers, so toil-worn for me; O, God bless you and keep you! Mother Machree!