d to let him know I was coming. I had fears, based
on the one look that I had obtained of his pain-distorted face, that he
had been mortally shot in the body.

And then the third one struck me. In order to keep as close to the
ground as possible, I had swung my chin to the right so that I was
pushing forward with my left cheek flat against the ground and in order
to accommodate this position of the head, I had moved my steel helmet
over so that it covered part of my face on the right.

Then there came a crash. It sounded to me like some one had dropped a
glass bottle into a porcelain bathtub. A barrel of whitewash tipped over
and it seemed that everything in the world turned white. That was the
sensation. I did not recognise it because I have often been led to
believe and often heard it said that when one receives a blow on the
head everything turns black.

Maybe I am contrarily constructed, but in my case everything became pure
white. I remember this distinctly because my years of newspaper training
had been in but one direction--to sense and remember. So it was that,
even without knowing it, my mind was making mental notes on every
impression that my senses registered.

I did not know yet where I had been hit or what the bullet had done. I
knew that I was still knowing things. I did not know whether I was alive
or dead but I did know that my mind was still working. I was still
mentally taking notes on every second.

The first recess in that note-taking came when I asked myself the
following question:

"Am I dead?"

I didn't laugh or didn't even smile when I asked myself the question
without putting it in words. I wanted to know. And wanting to know, I
undertook to find out. I am not aware now that there was any appreciable
passage of time during this mental progress. I feel certain, however,
that I never lost consciousness.

How was I to find out if I was dead? The shock had lifted my head off
the ground but I had immediately replaced it as close to the soil as
possible. My twice punctured left arm was lying alongside my body. I
decided to try and move my fingers on my left hand. I did so and they
moved. I next moved my left foot. Then I knew I was alive.

[Illustration: HELMET WORN BY FLOYD GIBBONS WHEN WOUNDED, SHOWING DAMAGE
CAUSED BY SHRAPNEL]

Then I brought my right hand up toward my face and placed it to the left
of my nose. My fingers rested on something soft and wet. I withdrew the
hand and looke