Jasper County Democrat, Volume 21, Number 89, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 February 1919 — LETTERS FROM OUR SOLDIERS [ARTICLE]

LETTERS FROM OUR SOLDIERS

Another Interesting Letter From Onrnr Osborne. W. F. bsborne received an interesting letter a few days ago from his soo, O. O. Osborne, who Is with the 108th Engineers, now in Germany, which Omar requested his father to hand to The pemocrat fer publication* if desired: American Expeditionary Forces, January 0, 1919. My Dear Dad: —Would have written Booner but have been busy of late as you will note from the contents of this letter. 1 have a little time today and thought perhaps it might interest you to know of a little of what we have been doing since our arrival overseas so I will go into detail and giveyou the dope as best as f can remember It. We left Camp Logan, Houston, Texas, on April 23, 1918. and were on the road for five days arriving at Camp Merritt, New Jersey, on April 28, 1918. We rested up at this camp until May 6, getting fully equipped, etc. While at this camp we were given permission to visit New Yerk City, and of course, all the boys took advantage of seeing the Great Whit* Way. On May 6 we left camp and marched down to the Palisades where we boarded a ferry which took uh dowfl the Hudson and upto the piers. Here, after marching through several warehouses, to conceal our movements, we went on board the U. 8. 9. George Washington. We were on board ship until the Bth of May waiting for the embarkation of other troops and on that date <at 5:00 p. m., we pulled up the gang plank hnd said good-bye to the U. 8. and tha S'atue of Liberty. There were two oth6r transports in the convoy, the 8. 8. Lincoln and DeKalb, the former was sunk at Brest, France, on her return trip. We had an enjoyable trlip. but on the second day out frofa our destination we were attacked by the subs at 4:00 a. m. uur convoy, which consisted >»f six destroyers, were maneuvering all around us when we came on deck and there were rumors if torpedoes being dropped and depth bombs, but we didn’t see them nor did we hear them. We arrived at Brest, France, on May 18, all safe and sound. We then were assigned to barracks which were formerly occupied by Napoleon and they sure looked it. Our bed was the hard floor, the first tlnfe that I slept on, the floor since I’ve been in the army. Despite all my efforts to locate a soft board It could not be found. We stayed at th-is camp exactly one ewefek, during which time we were engaged ip the construction of a Y. M. C. A. and a waterworks. On May 25, we left I Brest, jind traveled by the way of side-door pullman’s to Poulainville, France, which Is located, just south of the cUy of Amiens, Vand on the British sector. Here the regiment was split up. the first Battalion being attached to Division Headquarters, and the second Battalion going up Into the line, attached to • the Australians. We I were supposed .to have been in training but when you find out what we were called on to do you * will realize that we were in action more ..than.' in training. The regiment was engaged in following out the drill schedule, in gas defense, bayonet fighting, building of trenches, machine-gun emplacements, strong points, etc., from May 26 until the middle of June. We then set out for ourselves, going on road work aoid constructing standard and narrow gauge railroads. The real work commenced on the night of July 1 3; w r hen we were /put In the line to work, as t corps engineers. Our I work was to cut barbed wire entanglements, ete., in order tha£ the infantry might get through after thq Hun. Our first “Over the

Top” stunt was on Independence Day, July 4, ?91S, and will always be remembered by us for it was our first crack at the Hun and it certainly was a big amd was the source of much credit and honor being conferred on the regiment and division. On August 8, we again went after the iHun, this time at Morlancourt. On tnis occasiom Fritz decided that he wanted to get rid of a quantity of his ammunition and he made us a present of it. He kept us om the jump for a while with his shrapnel, high ex(plosives, gas, etc., and for a time it looked as though we would get the worst of the deal, but that good old spirit of the Yanks proved to be true, you know that spirit, whfein y°u once sel out to get a fellow, get him, and it was this kind of a spfflt shat won out for us. We met stiff resistance, but succeeded in taking our objective, with very slight casualties. While up on the sector we were associated with the British, Canadians, Australians, atnd they are all fine soldiers and men to be proud of. The Yanks made quite a little impression on them with their carefree spirit, as shown by their recent successes. Before we were attached up on this salient, the Hun could break through anywhere he wished, but when they (the British) saw the resistance that the Americans offered they stiffened up a bit and certainly made wonderful success. August 23 the regiment assembled and we started on our trip over to the American front. In our march to the train, the Hun aviators * bombarded the city of Amieins and it looked for a while as if he would delay our trip, but we pulled away at midnight and , said farewell to the British. On our way we passed through the suburbs of Paris, came directly through Cha'teau-Thierry, Epernay hnd several large cirties. When we arrived nnp here we were put in rest billets where we remained until September 20, When we moved up the line. We arrived in the front line positions again,* oto September 24. and that night and the next night was spent in carrying bridge material from an engineer dump »> ~ U r

across No Man’s Land out to a place where a bridge was to *be constructed. This bridge was started at the minute the barrage opened, and 15 minutes was completed and the infantry passed .over same. In this connection wish to say that the work was anything but easy or pleasant. We were in water up to our necks most of the time, continually under shell-fire, machine gun fire and gas. We suffered a few casualities but nothing compared to those inflicted by us. The big stunt came off o>n October 8. Two days previous to this stunt,we were engaged in a reconnaissance of the country, carrying bridge material up to the place selected and then at midnight of the 7th, the real work began. We had our engineer dump at a town called Forges, but the only thing to show that the town used to lie there was a sign reading as follows: ‘ This used to be Forges.’ 1 The Germans had completely destroyed the whole towtn by their fire. We left this town Fith our material on our shoulders, walking in mud and water up to our knees, continually ducking when we heard those whizz-bang blues, or words the shriek of a shell; then when things quieted down resume our trip. We actually walked about one mile, but it took us from midnight to 4:30 a. m. to make the first trip. We, that is, •Company E, were assigneu the job of constructing the bridge and when we arrived at the river immediately commenced work. The remaining . companies were uSed as a carrying party - for us. The work of construction was carried on with speed atnd the bridge was constructed in good time the regiment received great credit for the work done on this stunt. The yiver we bridged was the Meuse river and the loction was Consevoy, which is directly in front of the city of Verdun. After these stunts we were taken out of this part of the line -atnd moved north to the town of St. Remy, France, where we remained until Dec. 6. We spent a pleasant Thanksgiving, having a fine dinner, plenty of entertainment and the boys enjoyed themselves as far as possible. , On November 11 the armistice was signed and this meant the withdrawal es all the enemy forces to a fixed location. It also meant that it would be necessary to have an army follow them to see that all the terms were properly fulfilled. The Divisions that were to take care of this were named, and the 33d Division was not amongst them. We were light of heart for a while for w'e wefre under the impression that this would give us a much bftter chance of getting back to the good old U- S. A. However, as I have already mentioned, on December 5 we received our orders, that we were included in the Army of Occupation and that we would move forward the next day. On December 6, we left camp and started on the biggest hike that this regiment ever made. We were on the road from th 6th until the 22d of the month, walking in all 175 kilometers, or close to 125 miles. This march was followed out to the letter, marching in all kinds' of weather, cold, rain, snow, etc., but the spirit and morale of the troops was 100 per cent, and the boys were all eager to get to Germany. We marched through France, Lorraine, Luxembourg, and at the time of this writing we are right on the German • border in tlie > town of Berdorf, Luxembourg. • The day .before yesterday I was over in Germany, that is I went over there just to be able to say that I put my foot om German soil, a soldier of the world’s greatest fighting machine. » It may be that we will an

opportunity to visit Germany officially soon, but I do not know. I much prefer to hear that I am soon to return to the U. 8., but that will probably be a long time coming. Perhaps six months', perhaps a year, and perhaps longer. No one knows definitely. Well, I must quit, now and get busy. Yours, OMAR.