Granddad blogging: First Germans

Last week in Granddad blogging, my grandfather is sent to the front in France. This week he joins his new company as a replacement and sees his first Germans.

Next morning we woke up and we were wet from our shoulders down. But they did tell us that we were going to be assigned to a company now. There was two of us and we asked ‘em how we get to the company. And they say – “You see that wire there.” And of course we did - and they said “You pick that wire up and follow that wire and you’ll wind up with your company.”

So we took off, we walked all day and never did get to the company. It was getting dark and we found a hole and crawled in that hole and spent the night there. Next morning, we got up – by the way – one shell came in. I never did know when nor where nor why – no more – next morning we got up and got hold of that wire and went on toward our company.

We got there about– close to dark in the afternoon – course the days were very short by then. This was in November and that far north they were pretty short then. When we got to the company they said get over there in that hole and we got there and we looked up and we saw some Germans. And I thought they were Germans fixin’ to attack us, and this boy and I – I’ve forgotten who he was, we got excited about that. Somebody said “Oh, shut up that’s some prisoners they’ve captured and bringing in. So get in that hole and stay there.”

Well, there’d been a rumor out forever that these boys that we were joining were going to get relief and sure enough about 8 or 9 o’clock they came around and said “Ok, we’re pulling out. We’re gonna get relief.”

And the way you pulled out, there was another wire from where this was to back where we were going. And you started lining up and the man up in front had a hold of the wire and you had to hold the belt of the man in front of you. And the man behind you held your belt and you started falling out through the woods in the snow and the slush, going back to wherever this relief area was.

There was another group coming in to take the place on the front. where this company had been and we slipped and fell and had to pass word backwards and forwards to hold up , tie up, move out. I guess all night long we covered, maybe three miles, I don’t know how far.

Before we had gone on the front we’d thrown away our extra pair of shoes some of our tent stuff and tent pegs and a whole lot of stuff but we still had a lot of things in a knapsack on our backs that we were still carrying. We got to where these people were – they’d been guarding this line for a hundred and eight days – I believe they said. They had a rifle and a blanket – that’s all they had and we had, I guess about 50 pounds of stuff. Well, we left that right there.

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