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[Illustration: _La France Guerriere_]


[Illustration]


FRIENDS OF FRANCE

The Field Service of the American Ambulance described by its members.







Boston and New York
Houghton Mifflin Company,
The Riverside Press--Cambridge

Copyright, 1916, by Houghton Mifflin Company
All Rights Reserved




[Illustration]

  TO

  M{R} & M{RS}. ROBERT BACON

  In appreciation
  of all that their effort
  in America
  has accomplished for this
  Service in France




CONTENTS


  INTRODUCTION _A. Piatt Andrew_                                    xvii

  LETTER FROM SECTION LEADERS                                        xix

  I. THE ORGANIZATION OF THE SERVICE _Stephen Galatti_                 1

  II. AT THE BACK OF THE FRONT: DUNKIRK AND YPRES
      _Henry Sydnor Harrison_                                          6

  III. THE SECTION IN ALSACE RECONQUISE _Preston Lockwood_            21

  IV. LAST DAYS IN ALSACE _Everett Jackson_                           51

  V. THE SECTION IN LORRAINE _James R. McConnell_                     61
      With an introduction by Theodore Roosevelt

  VI. AN AMERICAN AMBULANCE IN THE VERDUN ATTACK
      _Frank Hoyt Gailor_                                             89

  VII. ONE OF THE SECTIONS AT VERDUN _Henry Sheahan_                 109

  VIII. THE SECTION IN FLANDERS _Joshua G. B. Campbell_              117

  IX. THE BEGINNINGS OF A NEW SECTION _George Rockwell_              131

  X. UN BLESSE A MONTAUVILLE _Emery Pottle_                          136

  XI. CHRISTMAS EVE, 1915 _Waldo Peirce_                             139

  XII. THE INSPECTOR'S LETTER BOX                                    148

      Our ambulances--How the cars reach Paris--_En route_ for the
      front--First impressions--The daily programme--Handling the
      wounded--The wounded--Night duty--Fitting into the
      life--_Paysages de guerre_--Soldier life--July 22 at
      Pont-a-Mousson--Incidents of a driver's life--_Three Croix de
      Guerre_--From day to day--From another diary--Further
      pages--A night trip--An attack--_Poilu_ hardships--Winter in
      Alsace--Weeks of quiet--Night--Morning--Stray thoughts--A
      gallant _blesse_--Perils of a blizzard--Poignant
      impressions--In the hospital--New quarters--The poetry of war.

      Champagne, 1914-1915                                           227

  XIII. FOUR LETTERS FROM VERDUN                                     232

  TRIBUTES AND CITATIONS                                             252

  MEMBERS OF THE FIELD SERVICE                                       337




  THE MEMBERS OF THE FIELD SERVICE

  DESIRE TO EXPRESS SINCERE GRATITUDE

  TO

  M. CHARLES HUARD

  AND TO

  M. BERNARD NAUDIN

  FOR

  THE INTEREST WHICH

  THEIR DISTINGUISHED TALENT

  HAS ADDED TO THIS BOOK




ILLUSTRATIONS


  _La France Guerriere_                                     Frontispiece

  _Dunkirk, May, 1915_                                                 6

  _An American Ambulance in Flanders_                                 10

  _An American Ambulance in Ypres_                                    12

  _Soldiers marching by American Ambulances in a Flemish Town_        14

  _Americans in their Gas-Masks_                                      16

  _The Col de Bussang--the Gate to Alsace Reconquise_                 22

  _Supplies for the Soldiers being carried on Mules over the Vosges
    Mountains_                                                        24

  _At a Valley "Poste" (Mittlach)_                                    24

  _American Drivers in Alsace_                                        28

  _A "Poste de Secours" in the Valley of the Fecht_                   30

  _Sharing Meals at a "Poste"_                                        30

  _La Terre Promise_                                                  36

  _The Harvard Club of Alsace Reconquise_                             42

  _Winter Days in Alsace_                                             54

  _Effect of German Shells in Alsace_ (_Thann_)                       58

  _On the Road to Hartmannsweilerkopf, December, 1915_                58

  _Shells breaking on the Cote-de-Mousson_                            70

  _Watching an Aeroplane Duel in Pont-a-Mousson_                      70

  _In Front of a "Poste de Secours"_                                  74

  _An American Ambulance Driver_                                      74

  _On the Road to Bois-le-Pretre_                                     78

  _Fontaine du Pere Hilarion, Bois-le-Pretre_                         78

  _Loading the Ambulance_                                             94

  _At a "Poste" at the Very Front_                                   104

  _Soldiers of France_                                               110

  _Americans in their Gas-Masks in front of the Bomb-proof
    Shelter outside of the Headquarters_                             118

  _A "Poste de Secours" in Flanders_                                 122

  _Waiting at a "Poste de Secours"_                                  122

  _A Winter Day in Flanders_                                         124

  _A Group of American Drivers in Northern France_                   128

  _The Cathedral in Nieuport, July, 1915_                            128

  _Some of the Members of Section IV_                                132

  _Approaching the High-Water Mark_                                  134

  _"Poilus" and Americans sharing their Lunch_                       134

  _Richard Hall_                                                     144

  _Richard Hall's Grave_                                             146

  _An Inspection Trip in Alsace_                                     152

  _Within Sight of the German Trenches_                              153

  _Stretchers slung between Two Wheels on their Way from the
    Trenches_                                                        156

  _Evacuating a Hospital_                                            158

  _Transferring the Wounded to the Train_                            158

  _The End of an Ambulance_                                          166

  _Decoration of Carey and Hale_                                     178

  _A Winter Morning_                                                 182

  _Alsatian Woods in Winter_                                         182

  _The "Poste de Secours" near Hartmannsweilerkopf_                  186

  _Winter in Alsace_                                                 194

  _What Night Trips without Lights sometimes mean_                   210

  _The Dangers of the Road_                                          210

  _Mule Convoy in Alsace_                                            214

  _The "Poste" near Hartmannsweilerkopf after a Bombardment_         214

  _One of our Cars in Trouble_                                       216

  _Coffins in Courtyard of Base Hospital in Alsace_                  216

  _Richard Hall's Car after Shell landed under it_                   218

  _A "Poste de Secours" at Montauville_                              222

  _Saucisse above Verdun_                                            232

  _At a Dressing-Station near Verdun_                                236

  _American Ambulance in Verdun_                                     241

  _American Ambulance at a Dressing-Station near Verdun_             246

  _A Corner of Verdun, July, 1916_                                   250

  _Headquarters of the American Ambulance Field Service, 21 Rue
    Raynouard, Paris_                                                276

  _Some of the Men of the American Ambulance Field Service at
    their Headquarters, 21 Rue Raynouard, Paris_                     278

  _The "Croix de Guerre"_                                            278

  _The "Medaille Militaire"_                                         330

  _"Vive la France!"_                                                346




PORTRAITS OF MEN "CITED"


  _Roger M. L. Balbiani_                                             281

  _Edward Bartlett_                                                  281

  _William Barber_                                                   330

  _Leslie Buswell_                                                   283

  _Joshua Campbell_                                                  283

  _Graham Carey_                                                     285

  _John Clark_                                                       285

  _Edmund J. Curley_                                                 287

  _Benjamin Dawson_                                                  287

  _David B. Douglass_                                                289

  _Luke C. Doyle_                                                    289

  _Brooke Leonard Edwards_                                           291

  _Powel Fenton_                                                     291

  _Stephen Galatti_                                                  293

  _Halcott Glover_                                                   293

  _Richard Hall_                                                     295

  _Dudley Hale_                                                      297

  _Sigurd Hansen_                                                    297

  _Lovering Hill_                                                    299

  _Lawrence Hitt_                                                    301

  _George Hollister_                                                 301

  _Everett Jackson_                                                  303

  _Philip Lewis_                                                     303

  _Walter Lovell_                                                    305

  _James R. McConnell_                                               305

  _Douglas MacMonagle_                                               307

  _William T. Martin_                                                307

  _Joseph Mellen_                                                    309

  _Francis Dashwood Ogilvie_                                         309

  _Waldo Peirce_                                                     311

  _Thomas Potter_                                                    311

  _Tracy J. Putnam_                                                  313

  _Beverly Rantoul_                                                  313

  _Durant Rice_                                                      315

  _George Roeder_                                                    315

  _Edward Salisbury_                                                 317

  _Roswell Sanders_                                                  330

  _Bernard Schroder_                                                 317

  _James Milton Sponagle_                                            319

  _Henry Suckley_                                                    319

  _John Taylor_                                                      321

  _Edward Tinkham_                                                   321

  _Donald M. Walden_                                                 323

  _J. Marquand Walker_                                               323

  _Victor White_                                                     325

  _Walter Wheeler_                                                   327

  _Harold Willis_                                                    327

  _William H. Woolverton_                                            329


[Illustration]




INTRODUCTION

     Les Etats-Unis d'Amerique n'ont pas oublies que la premiere page
     de l'histoire de leur independance a ete ecrite avec un peu de
     sang francais. (_General Joffre._)


THE following pages, written and edited in the course of active service
in France, tell, however imperfectly, something of the experiences of a
small group of young Americans who have not been inert onlookers during
the Great War.

Few in number and limited in their activities, this little band of
American ambulance drivers in France is of course insignificant when
compared with the tens of thousands of young Frenchmen who crossed the
ocean as soldiers and sailors to help America in 1777. To the valor and
devotion of these Frenchmen we owe our very existence as an independent
nation, and nothing that Americans have done for France during these
last hard years of trial can be thought of--without embarrassment--in
relation with what Frenchmen did for us in those unforgettable years of
our peril from 1777 to 1781.

The little group of Americans told of in this book who, during the past
two years, have dedicated valiant effort and, not unfrequently, risked
their lives in the service of France, can best be thought of as only
a symbol of millions of other Americans, men and women, who would
gladly have welcomed an opportunity to do what these men have done--or
more. For, notwithstanding official silence and the injunctions
of presidential prudence, the majority of Americans have come to
appreciate the meaning, not only to France, but to all the world, of
the issues that are to-day so desperately at stake, and their hearts
and hopes are all with France in her gigantic struggle. They share with
the world at large a feeling towards the French people of sympathy,
of admiration, and, indeed, of reverence, such as exists towards the
people of no other country; and millions of them, like these volunteers
of the American Ambulance, have been tortured by a longing to have some
share with the people of France in defending the ideals for which, as
they feel, America has always stood, and for which France is now making
such vast, such gallant, and such unflinching sacrifice.

The service to France of Americans, whether ambulance drivers,
surgeons, nurses, donors and distributors of relief, aviators, or
foreign _legionnaires_, when measured by the prodigious tasks with
which France has had to cope during the past two years, has indeed
been infinitesimally small; but their service to America itself has
been important. They have rendered this inestimable benefit to their
country. They have helped to keep alive in France the old feeling
of friendship and respect for us which has existed there since our
earliest days and which, otherwise, would probably have ceased to
exist. They have helped to demonstrate to the chivalrous people of
France that Americans, without hesitating to balance the personal
profit and loss, still respond to the great ideals that inspired the
founders of our Republic. They have helped France to penetrate official
reticence and re-discover America's surviving soul.

When all is said and done, however, the _ambulanciers_ themselves
have gained the most from the work in which they have taken part. It
is a privilege even in ordinary times to live in this "_doux pays de
France_," to move about among its gentle and finished landscapes, in
the presence of its beautiful architectural heritages and in daily
contact with its generous, sensitive, gifted, and highly intelligent
people. Life in France, even in ordinary times, means to those of
almost any other country daily suggestions of courtesy, refinement, and
thoughtful consideration for others. It means continual suggestions of
an intelligent perspective in the art of living and in the things that
give life dignity and worth.

The opportunity of living in France, as these Americans have lived
during the past two years of war, has meant all this and more. It has
meant memories of human nature exalted by love of country, shorn of
self, singing amidst hardships, smiling at pain, unmindful of death.
It has meant contact with the most gentle and the most intelligent
of modern peoples facing mortal peril--facing it with silent and
unshakable resolve, victoriously resisting it with modesty and with
never a vaunting word. It has meant imperishable visions of intrepidity
and of heroism as fine as any in the records of knight-errantry or in
the annals of Homeric days.

Nothing else, surely, can ever offer so much of noble inspiration as
these glimpses of the moral grandeur of unconquerable France.

          A. PIATT ANDREW
              _Inspector General of the Field Service_

[Illustration]




[Illustration: A la Francoise et Carrement]

THE publication of this book presents an opportunity of showing our
appreciation of the extraordinarily successful work of A. PIATT ANDREW
in reorganizing and furthering the work of the Field Service of the
American Ambulance.

Those of us who were in the service before his arrival and have
continued to work under him have been able to judge the effects of
his efforts, and to realize the amount of activity, patience