The Aisne-Marne Battlefield. My GF fought in that battle ( Storytime)
My GF served with the 150th Machine Gun Battalion of the 42nd "Rainbow" division. The 42 was among the first and longest serving
America battle groups of WW1. GF participated in all the major battles. This battle is aka Chateau-Theirry or the second Marne.
GF always referred to it as the battle of the Ourcq as he remembered it. For what happened there is this. He was from a tiny Wisc. farm village when he volunteered for duty. He was an only child. From his hometown another only son whom I shall call Peter volunteered with him. As they were set to ship out from the train station, Peter's mother took GF aside and tearfully begged him to look after her child, made him promise to do so. I reckon Peter was a simple small town boy, it sounds to me like he had a variant Aspergers or something. His mother thought the army, the war or the world would eat him up. GF was known as a mature and serious lad so she hung her hopes on him
GF became on orderly and trench runner for the commanding officer of the unit. He was a leveled-headed country boy who could find his way thru the mayhem, I reckon. During the battle of the Ourcq things got hot after they crossed the river and his unit had to retreat. GF was sent with the order to fallback across the river. He went to his company to find that Peter was missing. in the attack he was wounded and his mates could not get to him before they left.
Now it was dark and GF was in a pickle: They were under orders to retreat but he made a vow to a tearful mother. To leave his mate out there and fall back would mean probable death. To go after him was failure to obey orders and possible death
Fortunately GF had an advantage: as orderly he knew the strength and disposition of the enemy to some extent, he had seen the maps and knew the lay of the land in his head. He also knew where the unit was falling back to and he asked the fellas with Peter about where they were. So he took off looking for his mate in the dark while the rest fell back across the Ourcq
He spent the night searching, found his comrade and got him back to their unit just before dawn. He didnt receive any citation for his bravery as they kept it secret from the officers for disobeying orders
These are Trump's losers and failures. They are in every American family
= new reply since forum marked as read
-Laelth
"first and longest serving American battle groups of WW1" - (Americans didn't really get on the ground until very late 1917, early 1918. To say it was a long-serving battle group roughly six months into deployment--they arrived in France in November 1917--is, well, it would make the British and French at least raise eyebrows).
That said...excellent story!
