war in their own way. Doubting,
yet hopeful, the Allied commanders gave consent. The Americans were
moved into position. There was no time for rest and they came forward
under forced draft, so to speak. Infantry, machine gun companies and
artillery swung into position and faced the enemy which aimed a blow at
the line where it was supported by the French on the left.

The Boche hordes swarmed across fields. The American gunners raked them
with hell's fire. The reputation of the Americans as sharpshooters and
marksmen was sustained. Under the most stressful circumstances and while
the French observers stood amazed, the Americans took careful aim and
shot as though at rifle practice. Every possible shot was made to tell.

The Germans wavered, then halted under the withering fire of machine
guns and rifle. On again they came, only to again be repulsed. The
ground was strewn with their dead and wounded. Then they began to break
and to crawl back to safer positions.

The enemy had been stopped but not driven. They had fallen back to
strong positions, the names of which must go down in history as scenes
of terrific fighting--Bouresches and Bois de Belleau--the latter a
wooded, rocky parcel of land on which German machine guns were
hidden--hundreds of them--while more than a thousand of the enemy's best
men were concealed in the thicket and underbrush and in the rocky
fissures.

The Americans drove into the wood and charged the stronghold. Sacrifice!
Yes, hundreds of brave young Americans died fighting, but not in vain.
American artillery swept the woods; little companies of men charged the
enemy machine-gun nests, silencing the guns and killing the operators or
taking them prisoners. There was no going forward in mass formation
under barrage or protecting curtain of fire, but out in the open the
Marines and infantrymen rushed on facing terrific fire.

Bois de Belleau was cleared of the Boche. Bouresches fell to the
Americans. The capture of the town was a repetition of the taking of the
first position. Machine guns protected the town everywhere. In cellar
windows, doorways and on roofs the Germans had set up their weapons. But
it was the old story--no hail of shot could stop the Americans. Almost
without sleep, unable to bring up supplies, the Americans had fought
four days with only canned foodstuffs to sustain them.

Stories of the fights are reminiscent of those in which American troops
engaged the Indians on the pla