Back Aa

Our Army at the Front

<h3>CHAPTER II "VIVE PAIR-SHANG!"</h3> THE Invicta came into Boulogne harbor in the early morning, to find that her attempts at a secret crossing had amounted to nothing at all. Everybody within sight and ear-shot was out to show how pleased he was, riotously and openly, indifferent alike to the hopes of spy or censor. The fishing-boats, the merchant coastwise fleet, the Channel ships and hordes of little privately owned sloops and yawls and motor-boats all plied chipperly around with "bannières étoilées" fore and aft. The sun was very bright and the water was very blue, and between them was that exhilarating air which always rises over the coasts of France, whenever and wherever you land on them, which not all the smoke and grime of the world's biggest war could deaden or destroy. The Invicta's own flags were run up at the harbor mouth. Again the lines of khaki-colored soldiers formed behind the deck-rails, and again the chieftain from overseas stood at the prow of his ship and waited the coming of a historic moment. When the Invicta was made fast and her gang-plank went over, there was a half-circle of space cleared in the quay in front of her by a detachment of grizzled French infantrymen, their horizon-blue uniforms filmed over with the yellow dust of a long march. Behind the infantrymen the good citizens of Boulogne were yelling their throats dry. When General Pershing stopped for an instant's survey at the head of the gang-plank, with his staff-officers close behind him, the roar of welcome swelled to thunder and resounded out to sea. When he marched down and stepped to the quay, there was a sudden, arresting silence. Every soldier was at salute, and every civilian, too. In that tense instant a new world was beginning, and though it was as formless as all beginnings, the unerringly dramatic and sensitive French paid the tribute of silence to its birth. The future was to say that in that instant the world allied on new bases, that men now fought together not because their lands lay neighboring, or were jointly menaced by some central foe, but because they would follow their own ideal to wherever it was in danger. An American general had brought his fighters three thousand miles because a principle of world order and world right needed the added strength of his arms. And never before had American soldiers come in their uniforms to do battle on the continent of Europe. The moment's silence ended as startlingly as it began. Bands and cheerers set in again on one beat. The officers who had come to make a formal welcome fell back and let the unprepared public uproar have way. General Pershing and his officers walked through aisles strenuously forced by the infantrymen, to where carriages waited to carry them through the Boulogne streets. It must have seemed to the little American contingent as if every Frenchman in France had come up to the coast for the celebration. From the carriages the crowds stretched solid in every direction. The streets were blanketed under uncountable flags. Every window held its capacity of laughing and cheering Frenchwomen. Children ran along the streets, shrilling "Vive l'Amérique!" and laughing hilariously when their flowers were caught by the grateful but embarrassed American officers. When the special train to Paris had started the officers mopped their faces and settled back for a modest time. But they reckoned without their French. Not a town along the way missed its chance to greet the Americans. The stations were packed, the cheers were incessant, the roses poured in deluges into the train-windows. But at the Gare du Nord, in Paris, the official French greeting was too magnificent to be pushed aside further by mere populace. There were cordons of soldiers drawn up in the station, stiff at attention, making aisles by which the French officials could get to the Americans. There were officers in brilliant uniform, covered with medals for heroic service. There were massed bands, led by the Garde Republicaine. "Papa Joffre" was there, with his co-missioner, Viviani; Painleve, then Minister of War, and presently to have a while as Premier; General Foch, Marne hero, now generalissimo, and Ambassador William G. Sharp. These, with General Pershing, Major Robert Bacon, a member of Pershing's staff and lately ambassador to France, and two or three other staff-officers, found open motor-cars waiting to drive them to the Hotel Crillon, on the Place de la Concorde, the temporary American headquarters. Dense crowds of soldiers patrolled the streets leading down to the Grand Boulevards, through which the distinguished little procession was to take its way, and other soldiers lined up at attention in the boulevards. Paris turned loose, with her heart in her mouth and her enthusiasm at red heat, is not easily forgotten. On this June day her raptures were immemorial. They were of a sort to call out the old-timers for standards of comparison. Every sentence now spoken in France begins either "Avant la guerre" or "Depuis la guerre." Nobody can ignore the fact that with August, 1914, the whole of life changed. To the old-timers who wanted to tell you what Paris was like the afternoon Pershing arrived, there were only two occasions possible, both "Depuis la guerre." The first great day was that following the order for general mobilization, when exaltation, defiance, threat, and frenzy packed the national spirit to suffocation, and when the streets flowed with unending streams of grim but undaunted people. Tragic days and relief days followed. But the next great time, when tragedy did not outweigh every other feeling, was that 14th of July, 1916, when the military parades were begun again, for the first time since the war, and in the line of march were detachments from the armies of all the Allies. The third great French war festival was for Pershing. The crowds were literally everywhere. The streets through which the motors passed were tightly blocked except for the little road cleared by the soldiers. The streets giving off these were jammed solid. American flags were in every window, on every lamp-post, on every taxicab, and in every wildly waving hand. <div class="figcenter"> <ANTIMG src="images/illpg_016_sml.jpg" width-obs="381" height-obs="600" alt="Copyright by the Committee on Public Information. General Pershing in Paris, July, 1917." title="General Pershing in Paris, July, 1917" /> Copyright by the Committee on Public Information. General Pershing in Paris, July, 1917. </div> Although the soldiers could force a way open before the motor-cars, no human agency could keep the way free behind them. The Parisians wanted not merely to see Pershing—they wanted to march with him. So they fell in, tramping the boulevards close behind the cars, cheering and singing to their marching step. Only when General Pershing disappeared under the arched doorway of the Hotel Crillon, and let it be known that he had other gear to tend, did the city in procession break apart and go about its several private celebrations. But all that afternoon and all that night, wherever men and women collected, or children were underfoot, it was "Vive l'Amérique" and "Vive le Generale Pair-shang" that echoed when the glasses rose. When General Pershing, after the tremendous experience of his European landing, asked for the quiet and shelter of his own quarters at the Crillon, his intention was that his retirement should be complete. He said flatly that a man who had just witnessed such a tribute to his country as Paris had made that afternoon was no better than he should be if he did not feel the need of solitude. But the inevitable aftermath of the great event the world over is the talking with the newspapers. And sure enough, no sooner was General Pershing safe in his retreat than the Paris reporters were knocking at the door. The American correspondents who had travelled over from London on the Invicta had had emphatic instructions to stay away, story or no story. But one distinguished Frenchman broke the rules, and to François de Jessen, of Le Temps, General Pershing did finally give a statement. How reluctantly one may see from the statement's contents. "I came to Europe to organize the participation of our army in this immense conflict of free nations against the enemies of liberty, and not to deliver fine speeches at banquets, or have them published in the newspapers," said General Pershing. "Besides, that is not my business, and, you know, we Americans, soldiers and civilians, like not only to appear, but to be, businesslike. However, since you offer me an opportunity to speak to France, I am glad to make you a short and simple confession. "As a man and as a soldier I am profoundly happy over, indeed proud of, the high mission with which I am charged. But all this is purely personal, and might appear out of proportion with the solemnity of the hour and the gravity of events now occurring. If I have thought it proper to indulge in this confidence, it is because I wish to express my admiration of the French soldier, and at the same time to express my pride in being at the side of the French and allied armies. "It is much more important, I think, to announce that we are the precursors of an army that is firmly resolved to do its part on the Continent for the cause the American nation has adopted as its own. We come conscious of the historic duty to be performed when our flag shows itself upon the battle-fields of the world. It is not my role to promise or to prophesy. Let it suffice to tell you that we know what we are doing, and what we want." Two rememberable experiences waited the next day for General Pershing. The first was his visit to des Invalides, the tomb of Napoleon; the second, his appearance in the French Chamber of Deputies. If he had known what it was to be the hero of all Paris at once, he was to learn how special groups regarded him, and what the French highest-in-command thought fitting for America's leader. At all of General Pershing's appearances in Paris in these first days a detachment of soldiers had to be constantly before him, widening a way for him through the crowds that waited his coming. On the morning of his visit to the tomb of Napoleon the broad Champs de Mars, in front of des Invalides, was impassable except by the soldiers' flying wedge. Shouts in French rang out steadily as he made his way toward des Invalides' entrances, and suddenly a man cried, in accented English: "Behind him there are ten million more." But once inside des Invalides General Pershing was alone with General Niox, who was in charge of the famous treasure building, and General Joffre. Between Pershing and Joffre there had begun one of those intense friendships that form too impetuously for ordinary explanation. It was full-grown at the end of their first meeting, a matter of seconds. And though at this time their friendly intercourse was halted sometimes by the fact that neither spoke the other's language, they were continually together. So it was General Joffre who walked beside him when General Pershing followed General Niox down to the entrance of the crypt, and stood before the door. All the world may go to this door, if its behavior is good, but only royal applicants may go beyond it. General Pershing was to go inside. General Niox handed him the great key, then turned away with Joffre, while Pershing, after a moment's hesitation, fitted the key and crossed the threshold. When he came out again he was taken to see the Napoleonic relics, which lay in rows in their glass cases. Two of them, the great sword and the Grand Cross cordon of the Legion of Honor, had never been touched since the time of Louis Philippe. As Pershing and Joffre bent over them General Niox came to a momentous decision. He opened the cases and handed the two to General Pershing. France could do no more. Pershing held them for a moment and nobody spoke. Then he handed back the cordon, kissed the sword-hilt and presented it, and in profound silence the three men left the treasure hall. Between this visit and that to the Chamber of Deputies there were many official calls, including one to President Poincaré at the Elysée Palace, which ended in a formal luncheon to Pershing by President and Madame Poincaré, with most of the important men of France as fellow guests. General Pershing was recognized as he entered the gallery of the Chamber of Deputies, and all other business except that of doing him honor was promptly put by. Full-throated cheering began and would not die down. Finally Premier Ribot commenced to speak, and the deputies stopped to listen. "The people of France fully understand the deep significance of the arrival of General Pershing in France," he said. "It is one of the greatest events in history that the people of the United States should come here to struggle, not in the spirit of ambition or conquest, but for the noble ideals of justice and liberty. The arrival of General Pershing is a new message from President Wilson which, if that is possible, surpasses in nobility all those preceding it." And Viviani said, a few minutes later: "President Wilson holds in his hand all the historic grandeur of America, which he now puts forth in this fraternal union extended to us by the Great Republic." These two speeches opened a flood-gate. Long after the cheering deputies had said their good-bys to General Pershing, the French writers, made articulate by the example of Ribot and Viviani, were busily preparing appreciations and commentaries of the Pershing arrival. The most picturesque of these was Maurice de Waleffe's, in Le Journal: "'There are no longer any Pyrenees,' said Louis XIV, when he married a Spanish princess. 'There is no longer an ocean,' General Pershing might say, with greater justice, as he is about to mingle with ours the democratic blood of his soldiers. The fusion of Europe and America is an enormous fact to note." A more powerful speech was that of Clemenceau, now Premier of France, but then an earnest private citizen, writing for his paper. "Paris has given its finest welcome to General Pershing," he wrote. "We are justified. We are justified in hoping that the acclamation of our fellow citizens, with whom are mingled crowds of soldiers home on leave, have shown him clearly, right at the start, in what spirit we are waging the bloodiest of wars; with what invincible determination, never to falter in any fibre of our nerves or muscles. Unless I misjudge America, General Pershing, fully conscious of the importance of his mission, has received from the cordial and joyous enthusiasm of the Parisians that kind of fraternal encouragement which is never superfluous, even when one needs it not. "Let him have no doubt that he, too, has brought encouragement to us, the whole of France, that followed with its eyes the whole of his passage along the boulevards; to all our hearts that salute his coming with joy at the supreme grandeur of America's might enrolled under the standard of right. "This idea M. Viviani, just back from America, splendidly developed in his eloquent speech to the Chamber of Deputies in the presence of General Pershing. "General Pershing himself, less dramatic, has given us, in three phrases devoid of artificiality, an impression of exceptionally virile force. It was no rhetoric but the pure simplicity of the soldier who is here to act, and who fears to promise more than he can perform. No bad sign, this, for those of us who have grown weary of pompous words, when we must pay so dearly for each failure of performance. "Not long ago the Germans laughed at the 'contemptible English Army,' and we hear now that they regard the American Army as 'too ridiculous for words.' Well, the British have taught even Hindenburg himself what virile force can do toward filling gaps in organization. Now the arrival of Pershing brings Hindenburg news that the Americans are setting to work in their turn—those Americans whose performance in the War of Secession showed them capable of such 'improvisation of war' as the world had never seen—and I think the Kaiser must be beginning to wonder whether he has not trusted rather blindly in his 'German tribal God.' He has loosed the lion from its cage, and now he finds that the lion has teeth and claws to rend him. "The Kaiser had given us but a few weeks in which to realize that the success of his submarine campaign would impose the silence of terror on the human conscience throughout the world. Well, painful as he must find it, Pershing's arrival, with its consequent military action, cannot fail to prove to him that, after all, the moral forces he ignored must always be taken into account in forecasting human probabilities. Those learned Boches have yet to understand that in the course of his intellectual evolution, man has achieved the setting of moral right above brute force; that might is taking its stand beside right, to accomplish the greatest revolution in the history of mankind. That is the lesson which Pershing's coming has taught us, and that is why we rejoice." But even while the commentators were at their task General Pershing had left off celebrating and got to work. The First Division was on the seas. A few very important persons in France and America knew where they were to land, and when, but nobody in the world knew just what was to be done for and with them once they landed, for the plans did not even exist. It was the business of the general and his staff to create them. And they say that the amount of work done in those first days in France was incredible even to them when they looked back on it. As a first step American headquarters were installed in 31 Rue Constantine, a broad, shaded street near the Hôtel des Invalides, overlooking the Champs de Mars. The house had belonged once to a prodigiously popular Paris actress, and it was correspondingly magnificent. But the magnificence, except that which was inalienably in space and structure, was banished by the busy Americans. In the hallway they stretched a plank railing, behind which American private soldiers asked and answered questions. Under the once sumptuous stairway there were stacks of army cots. The walls were bulletined and covered with directions carefully done in two languages. The chief of the Intelligence Section had the ex-dining-room, and the adjutant-general had the ballroom on the second floor. Even so, it was not long before this spaciousness was insufficient, and the headquarters brimmed over into No. 27 as well. It was in these two houses that the whole army organization was plotted out, and General Pershing made good his prediction that the Americans would not merely seem, but would be, businesslike. After ten days or so of beaver-like absorption in their jobs the American headquarters announced to the war correspondents that they must take a certain train at a certain hour, under the guidance of Major Frederick Palmer, press officer and censor, to a certain port in France. There, at a certain moment, they would see what they would see. <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

1 of 2

2 of 2

Update Required To play the media you will need to either update your browser to a recent version or update your Flash plugin.