University of South Carolina Libraries
GREAT AMERICAN ARMV WILL RE SENT TO FRANCE. ! (Continued from page 1, column 3.) j so that an immediate plan should be made in the United States for conducting war against its adversary, but we were coming into a war which had been going 011 for two and onehalf years, in which the greatest military experts, all the inventive genius, all of the industrial capacity of those greatest countries in the world had for two and one half years boen solving the problem of what hind of war it was to be and where it was 10 be waged. '"It was not a thing for us to denirln where rmr thpatrft of war Should be. The theatre of war was France. . It was not for us to decide our line of communications. Our line of communications was across 3,000 miles of ocean. It was not for us to decide whether we would have the manoeuvreing of large bodies of troops in the open. There lay the antagonists on opposite sides of No Man's Land in the trenches at death grapple . with one another. Our antagonist 1 was on the other side of that line 1 and our problem was to get over and , get him. "It was not the problem of doing , it our way and letting everybody else j take care of himself. In the first , place wre were going to fight in France not on our own soil and not on our adversaries' soil and therefore at the vprv ho^inninp- it was obvious that i the thing we had to do was not to map out an ideal plan of campaign, not to have the war college with its speculative studies of Napoleon and everybody else map out the theoretically best way to get at some other country, but it was the problem of studying the then existing situation and bringing the financial, the industrial and the military strength of the United States into cooperation with that of Great Britain and France in the most immediate and effective way. That problem could not be decided here. I fancy in this audienec there are men who have been in the trenches. The altogether unprecedented character of that problem is the thing which every returning visitor tells us can not be described in words, ^ cannot be put down m reports; it is t a thing so different from everything t else that ever went on in the world, f so vast in its desolation, so extraor- ( dinary in its uniqueness that it must t * Be seen and studied on the ground in order to be comprehended at all. ? Study From Beginning. t "So that from the very beginning e it was not a question of abstract spec- I ulation here but a question of study t there to find out where our shoulders to the wheel could best be put. s "They realized that. And so great t Britain sent over to us Mr. Balfour 1 and General Bridges and a staff of 1 experts. They came over here and s saw Mr. Balfour in the house of con- a gress and at the white house and at v public meetings, but the group of ex- i < perts whom they brought over with c them you did not see much of and yet they distributed themselves t through the war department and t their ordnance experts sat down with s General Crowder, their supply experts with General Sharpe and his c assistants; their strategists sat down r with the army war college and all ov- a er this city there were these confiden- r til groups exchanging information, i telling how the thing was over there, i what we could do, what they advised fc us to dc, what experience they had 1 had in developing this, that and the t other implement of supply, how cer- t tain plans which one might naturally i; have evolved out of the past experi- i ences of the world had been tried there and found not to work at all. I "They were exchanging informa- \ tion, giving us all that they thought ( was helpful. And then came Joffre, f with his wonderful reputation and his great and charming personality a and he made a great figure here and i we welcomed him. It was a tremen- \ dous inspiration to see the hero of s the Marne; but with him came his s were constantlv beina changed so that i men fresh from the front could be t here to advise with us, and in addition to that every one of them had 1 to be a university professor, going t out into the life of the community t and selecting men who had mechan- ( ical experience and knowledge and 1 trying and adding to his original 1 equipment the scientific training, that ] finishing touch which made him avail- ; able for use as a military scientist, j Trained Ordnance Officers. 1 "As a consequence this little group i which stayed here have built up the ; greatest special departments of the ; army. The ordnance department, ; starting, I think, with 93 or 90 officers has now grown as I recall the figures, to something like 3,000 officers. They have had to be trained, they have had to be specialized and that has had to go on contemporaneously with this tremendous response to the changing conditions on the other side. "In the meantime when we started into this war I think it was commonly thought throughout the country that our contribution at the outset might well be financial and industrial. The industries of the country were largely devoted at that time, the appropriate industries were largely devoted to the manufacture of war materials for our allies. "As I suggested this morning when we went into that market we found it largely occupied, so that our problem was not going to a shoe factory and saying 'make shoes for us,' but it was going to a factory which never made shoes because all the shoe factories are busy making shoes for people from whom we could not take them, and saying Team how to make shoes in order tnai you may mahe them for us.' "Now, of course, that is not true of shoes, but it is true of machine guns, it is true of other arms, it is true of ammunition, it is true of forging capacity, whch was the greatest defect in the country and all of this time we had not merely not to disturb the programme of allied manufacture in this country but we had to shut off the supplies of raw material to our allies and we had not to dusturb the industry of the country to such an extent that products upon which they depended for the success of their military operations would be interfered with both agricultural and commercial and industrial products. "At the outset the idea was that we would be a financial and industrial assistance to our allies during the rear, 1918, and I think I can probably read from the Metropolitan Mag"inp for Anerust a suggestion which svill show what the current expecta;ion of the country was. The editor pf the Metropolitan Magazine was protesting against what he believed ;o be the intention of the governnent at that time. This magazine ;ame out in August 1917, and this edtorial says: "Since it is our war, ve want to put everything into it ;o as to finish it in the shortest possible time; so that the world may )e restored. To our mind jthe whole plan of the war department has been lavored with a desire to hold off un;il the allies finish the war for us.' Met Expectations. "You see the editor was dealing vith what he supposed to be the in;ention of the war department at that ,ime: that we were holding off so :ar as actual military operations were 'AnnornoH and let.tine the allies do ;he fighting. "What he says we should have done in^I ask your particular attention o it, is this: 'We should have strainid every energy to have gotten from >0,000 to 100,000 men to France his year.' "That is, the year, 1917. I tell no lecret but it is perfectly well known o everybody in this group that we lave far exceeded what in August, .917, was regarded as a programme o ideal that the editor of this magizine refers to it as a thing which re ought to have strained every nerve n a vain but hopeless effort to acomplish. "And then the editor goes on. 'And >y next year, 1918, we could have tad 500,000 men which we could end.' "Now, instead of having 50,000 >r 100,000 men in France, we have uany more men than that in France ,nd instead of having a half million nen whom we could ship to France f we could find any way to do it u 191S, we will have more than onetalf million men in France early in .918 and we have available if the ransportation facilities are availaile to us (the prospect is not unpromsing) one and one-half million who n 1918 can be shipped to France. "I have here a statement from 'Meld Marshal von Hindenberg in rhich he is quoted as saying in a lerman newspaper in contemptuous ashion of us that we have advertisid our preparations for this war in in unworthy manner. If I may rely ipon the confidential information vhich we get from confidential sources, the German government is still mystified as to the number of nen we have in France or have had here at any time. "I am saying this now because you lave asked me why I have held back ;hese facts until now. I am saying so you that you could not get from Jreat Britain at this minute?I don't enow whether I could get the number of soldiers Great Britain has in Prance or at home. I could get an ipproximation; I could get whatever information might be deemed helpful to the immediate military object to be accomplished, but I could not get from Great Britain or France the actual number of troops they have at the front. "Tt may be that that precaution is unnecessary and yet that is the precaution which military men have observed, and 1 have no further point to make in the matter of the number of troops there than to show, as 1 was showing when 1 read that extract, that our original intention was to make our military effert in 1918; and in August, 1917, a zealous advocate of immediate activity laid down as the maximum obtainable programme a thins? which lias been multifold ex-' ; ceeded. | "Why did we decide to send so; many troops to France in 1917 is no j i secret. When Marshal J off re came I j to this country from France, when j | the British mission came they told jus of the situation which we had not up to that time fully appreciated. | There had been in France recently conducted before that an unsuccessful major offensive. The French people had suffered, oh, suffered in a way that not only our language is not adapted to describe, but our imagination cannot conceive. The war is in their country. This wolf has not only been at their door but lie has been gnawing for two years and a half at their vitals, and when this unsuccessful offensive in France had been met there was a spirit not of surrender but of fate about the French people, and this mighty military engine which they had seen prepared to overthrow them for 40 years was at them, and their attitude was that no matter whether every Frenchman died in his tracks, as they were willing to do, or not, that it was an irresistible thing, and so they said to us, 'Frankly, it will cheer us; it will cheer our people if you send over some of your troops.' "We did send some troops. Division Was Sent. "At that time we had a choice. We could send over as Great Britain did, our regular army and in a very short preparation have put it into action, and suffered exactly what Great Britain suffered with her 'contemptible little army,' as it was called by their adversaries. Our army would have given as good an account of itself as the British army did, but it would have been destroyed like the British army, and there would have been no nucleus on which to build this new army that was to come over a little later, and it was deemed wiser to send over a regular division, but not to send over our whole regular army at that time. * "Then what happened was that the regular division went over and the people of France kissed the hems of their garments as they marched up the streets of Paris; the old veterans wounded in this war, legless or armless, stumping along on crutches, perhaps, as they went up the streets of Paris with their arms around the necks of American soldiers. Not a single man in the division was unaccompanied by a veteran. American had gone to France and the French npnnip rosp with a sense of gratitude - - _ and hopefulness that had never been in them before. "Of course, they welcomed the British but their need was not so great when the British went. They welcomed the British but there were ties between them and us which there had not been between them and the British and so when our troops went there was an instant and spontaneous rise in the morale of the French, but an equally instant and spontaneous insistence that these soldiers who came from America should continue to come in an unbroken stream. "And, so we made the election. We decided not to send the regular army as a whole, but to send regular, divisions and National Guard divisions selected according to the state of their preparation and keep back here some part of our trained force in order that it might inoculate with its spirit and its training these raw levies which we were training, and one after another these divisions have gone ovej* until in France there is a fighting army, an army trained in the essentials and in the beginning of military discipline and practice, and trained seasoned fighters in this kind of a war on the actual battlefields where it is taking place. Army J behind Lines. "Early in this war, when Joffre was here aid when Balfour was here, they said to us 'it may take you some time to get over to us a great fighting army, but you are a great industrial country; our man power is fully engaged in our industries and military enterprises, send over armies and special engineering regiments and troops of technical character' and although it was not contemplated at the outset, and only a phrase in the emergency military legislation shows that the thing was thought of as a possibility, yet in a very short time we had organized engineering regiments of railroad men and sent them qi tiiopo a n rj ivprp rehii i 1 d in fir the V UUU '? V. V - u v lines of the British and French, the railways which were being carried forward with their advance, reconstructing their broken engines and cars, building new railroads, both back of the French and British lines and those regiments were of such quality that at the Canibrai assault, carried on by General Byng, when 1? ^ ~ ~ ?* <- ^ '1 lilt? UCI IJlUXlib mauc LiiKJii u;uiuti-m tack, our engineer regiments threw down their picks and shovels and carried their rifles into the battle and distinguished themselves by gallant action in the war itself. "Very early in this war Great Britain through Balfour and his assist ants and France, through .J off re. said to us: 'Send us nurses and doctors.' Why, when we were scarcely in the war, Americans organized in advance and anticipation by the Red Cross, which was taken over into the service of the United States through the surgeon general's office, were on the battlefields, and there are tens of thousands of men in England and France now who bless the mission of mercy upon which the first American appeared in France. uur surgeons nave sei up uuspitals immediately behind the lines. They have been made military in every sense of the word. They have been espcially fortunate in escaping attack from the air, and our early losses in this war, the losses of Red Cross nurses and doctors and orderlies and attendants in hospitals and ambulance drivers who were sent over to assist our allies in these necessary services, thus not only rendering assistance but acquiring skill and knowledge of the circumstances and surroundings, so that when our own troops came in large numbers they could render like service to our own forces." 75,000 Colored Men Called to Army. Eight per cent, of the 9,586,508 men registered under the selective service law are colored. Of these nearly 209,000 have been called and more than 75,000 have been certified for service. Out of every 100 colored men called, 36 were certified for service and 64 were rejected, exempted, or discharged, while out of every 100 white citizens called, 2o were certified for service. Slates and slate pencils at The Herald Book Store. Save paper by using a slate. FRUIT TREES I am offering Peach trees, one year old, at $10.00 per hundred; two year old, at $16.00 per hundred. Deliveries made on short notice. S. A. HAND BAMBERG, S. C. Representing the J. Van Lindley Nursery Co., Pomona, N. C. RILEY & COPELAND Successors to W. P. Riley. Fire, Life A J J J Acumens INSURANCE Office in J. D. Copeland's Store BAMBERG, S. 0. Free Flower Seed Hastings' Catalogue Tells You About It No matter whether you farm on a large scale or only plant vegetables or flowers in a s nail way, you need Hastings' 1918 Seed Catalogue. It's ready now and we have a copy for you absolutely free, if you write for it, mentioning the ncme of this paper. In addition to showing you about all the varieties of vegetables, farm grass, clover and flower seeds, our catalogue tells how you can get free five splendid varieties of easily grown, yet beautiful flowers, with which to beautify your home surroundings. Good seeds of almost every kind are scarce this season, and you can't afford to take chances in your seed supply. Hastings' Seeds are dependable seeds, the kind you can always depend on having "good luck" with. You are going to garden or farm this spring. Why not insure success so far as possible by starting with the right seed? Don't take chances that you do not have to in seeds. Write today for Hastings 1918 1 ~ T+'r. fr-na OT>r7 vill iinMl in villiliuguc;. 11 O 1J uuu >1 terest and help you to succeed in 1918. ?H. G. HASTINGS CO., Seedsmen, Atlanta, Ga.?Advt. ^ ^rdollars to you. H9| markable success with soluble and availal HH of the crop. If you are see how IPUNTEf FT DOUBU tiV! Planters Fertilizer has ilfli mlllS ^ou cannot a^orci tc mm brands, when you can $ rajgw Trade-Mark, stamped town for free advice, i rect. But don't dela\ certainty of deliver a< freight and trai lor Indigestion, Constipation or Biliousness A I> IITQFY ! Just try one 50-cent bottle of LAX-FOS /* U 1 iJLi 1 ( WITH PEPSIN. A Liquid Digestive Laxative pleasant to take. Made and LIFE INSURANCE recommended to the public by Paris Medicine Co., manufacturers of Laxative Bromo Bamberg, South Carolina ; Quinine and Grove's Tasteless chill Tonic. ; . Read The Herald, $1.50 per year. Read The Herald $1.50 the year. , M I J \f- - i; 4 | i Economize Wisely 1 ;! ?A Maxwell Car Will Help 1 ' Waste is often committed when the in- r tention is to economize. \\ A Maxwell car, famous for its economy, | will cost you only a few dollars a month to 1 operate and maintain. [ ' ?1 Which is the real economy: (1) To use the car and J save time, strength, and j mental vigor? (2) To do without the \ , 4 car, lose time in your business, lose the health gained : from motoring, and worry yourself into illness? \ Use of a Maxwell car will give yon self r confidence. 1 ! Your neighbors and associates will get \ mental inspiration from you. . P As wave'circles widen when a pebble hits \ 11 the water, so will your good example bene- ! I fit your entire community. ! m Save?yes; but do it sensibly, and let the Maxwell help. [ 4 ' ri \; Touring Car $745; Roadster $745; Coupe $1095 \ Berhne $1095; Sedan with Wire Wheels $1195 i : F. Q. B. Detroit ^ v*-' ^ I, BAMBERG AUTO CO. j Q. Frank Bambergi President D 1 o A oamoerg, o. ^ Southern Railway System PREMIER CARRIER OF THE SOUTH. PASSENGER TRAINS SCHEDULES EFFECEIVE SEPT. 17, 1910. All Trains Run Daily. No. Arrive Bamberg From No. Leave Bamberg Fop 24 Augusta and intermedi- 24 Branchville, Charlestoa ate stations 5:05 a. m. and intermediate sta- ^ ---- - - - tione 5:05a.m. 25 Charleston, tfrancnvins and intermediate sta- 25 Augusta and interme- | tions 6:25 a. m. diate stations 6:25 a. m. J 18 Augusta and intermedi- 18 Branchville,' Charleston ate stations 8:43 a. m. , and intermediate sta35 Charleston and inter- ^ m' mediate stations ...,10:57 a.m. 33 Augusta and intermed ate stations 10:57 a.m. 22 Augusta and intermedi- 22 Branchville, Charleston ate stations 6:37 p. m. an(j intermediate sta7 Charleston, Branchville, tions. .... 6:37p.m. and intermediate sta- 17 Augusta and intermeditions 8:17 p. m. ate stations 8:17 p. m. Trains Nos. 17 and 24?Through sleeping car service between Bamberg > and Atlanta. N. B.?Schedules published as information only. Not guaranteed. For information, tickets, etc., call on I j S. C. HOLLIFIELD, Agent, THE SOUTHERN SERVES THE SOUTH. { Z demand for cotton is urgent. What price it may eventually ^^^B ing is problematical. But it is vitally necessary that every B^^K ower make an extra effort to increase production?it means For many years, Planters Fertilizer has been used with re- ^^^B throughout the South. It enriches the soil, furnishes the plant ble food until maturity and improves the quality and quantity ^^^B i getting less than one to two bales to the acre?try Planters? fl i is romVlEii " I proven its worth, over and over again. 1 SB J ) experiment with unknown, untried j jet the genuine, with the Giant Lizard feTrf-rfP^. ^adb^gr^ ??^jgM i on each bag. See our agent in your rj