night and the pin
found, which he had asked to have sent to his wife.

"A man near me was cut in two. Others when hit would stand, it seemed,
an hour, then fall in a heap. I yelled to Wilmer that each gun in the
barrage worked from right to left, then a rabbit ran ahead and I watched
him, wondering if he would get hit. Good rabbit--it took my mind off the
carnage.

"About sixty Germans jumped up out of a trench and tried to surrender,
but their machine guns opened up, we fired back, they ran and our left
company after them. That made a gap that had to be filled, so Sibley
advanced one of his to do the job, then a shell lit in a machine gun
crew of ours and cleaned it out completely.

DIGGING IN

"At 10:30 we dug in--the attack just died out, I found a hole or old
trench and when I was flat on my back I got some protection Holcomb
was next me; Wilmer some way off. We then tried to get reports. Two
companies we never could get in touch with. Lloyd came in and reported
he was holding some trenches near a mill with six men.

"Gates, with his trousers blown off, said he had sixteen men of various
companies; another officer on the right reported he had and could see
some forty men, all told. That, with the headquarters, was all we could
find out about the battalion of nearly 800. Of the twenty company
officers who went in, three came out, and one, Cates, was slightly
wounded.

THE SHELLS COME FAST

"From then on to about 8 p. m. life was a chance and mighty
uncomfortable. It was hot as a furnace, no water, and they had our range
to a 'T.' Three men lying in a shallow trench near me were blown to
bits.

"You could hear men calling for help in the wheat fields. Their cries
would get weaker and weaker and die out. The German planes were thick in
the air; they were in groups of from three to twenty. They would look us
over and then we would get a pounding.

"We had a machine gun officer with us, and at 6 o'clock a runner came
up and reported that Sumner was killed. He commanded the machine gun
company with us. He was hit early in the fight, by a bullet, I hear. At
the start he remarked: 'This looks easy; they do not seem to have much
art.'

"Well, we just lay there all through the hot afternoon.

"It was great--a shell would land near by and you would bounce in your
hole.

"As twilight came we sent out water parties for the relief of the
wounded. At 9 o'clock we got a message congratulating us, and saying the
A