The War Romance of the Salvation Army Part 9

Long before the hour announced for the service the soldier boys had crowded the hutment to its greatest capacity. Game and reading tables had been moved to the rear and extra benches brought in. The men stood three deep upon the tables and filled every seat and every inch of standing room. When there was no more room on the floor, they climbed to the roof and lined the rafters. There was no air and the Adjutant came to say there was too much light, but none of these things damped the enthusiasm.

With the aid of the regimental chaplain, the Staff-Captain had arranged a suitable program for the occasion, the regimental band furnishing the music.

When the General entered the hutment all of the men stood and uncovered and the band stopped abruptly in the middle of a strain. "That's the worst thing I ever did--stopping the music," he exclaimed ruefully. He refused to occupy the chair which had been prepared for him, saying: "No, I want to stand so that I can look at these men."

The records of the work in that hut would be precious reading for the fathers and mothers of those boys, for the Fighting Eighteenth Infantry are mostly gone, having laid their young lives on the altar with so many others. Here is a bit from one la.s.sie's letter, giving a picture of one of her days in the hut:

"Well, I must tell you how the days are spent. We open the hut at 7; it is cleaned by some of the boys; then at 8 we commence to serve cocoa and coffee and make pies and doughnuts, cup cakes and fry eggs and make all kinds of eats until it is all you see. Well, can you think of two women cooking in one day 2500 doughnuts, 8 dozen cup cakes, 50 pies, 800 pancakes and 225 gallons of cocoa, and one other girl serving it? That is a day's work in my last hut. Then meeting at night, and it lasts two hours."

A lieutenant came into the canteen to buy something and said to one of the girls: "Will you please tell me something? Don't you ever rest?" That is how both the men and officers appreciated the work of these tireless girls.

Men often walked miles to look at an American woman. Once acquainted with the Salvation Army la.s.sies they came to them with many and strange requests. Having picked a quart or so of wild berries and purchased from a farmer a pint of cream they would come to ask a girl to make a strawberry shortcake for them. They would buy a whole dozen of eggs apiece, and having begged a Salvation Army girl to fry them would eat the whole dozen at a sitting. They would ask the girls to write their love letters, or to write a.s.suring some mother or sweetheart that they were behaving themselves.

Soldiers going into action have left thousands of dollars in cash and in valuables in the care of Salvation Army officers to be forwarded to persons designated in case they are killed in action or taken prisoner. In such cases it is very seldom that a receipt is given for either money or valuables., so deeply do the soldiers trust the Salvation Army.

One of the girl Captains wears a plain silver ring, whose intrinsic value is about thirty cents, but whose moral value is beyond estimate. The ring is not the Captain's. It belongs to a soldier, who, before the war, had been a hard drinker and had continued his habits after enlisting. He came under the influence of the Salvation Army and swore that he would drink no more. But time after time he fell, each time becoming more desperate and more discouraged. Each time the young la.s.sie-Captain dealt with him. After the last of his failures, while she was encouraging him to make another try, he detached the ring from the cord from which it had dangled around his neck and thrust it at her.

"It was my mother's," he explained. "If you will wear it for me, I shall always think of it when the temptation comes to drink, and the fact that someone really cares enough about my worthless hide to take all of the trouble you have taken on my behalf, will help me to resist it."

"No one will misunderstand" he cried, seeing that the la.s.sie was about to decline, "not even me. I shall tell no one. And it would help."

"Very well," agreed the girl, looking steadily at him for a moment, "but the first time that you take a drink, off will come the ring! And you must promise that you will tell me if you do take that drink."

The soldier promised. The la.s.sie still wears the ring. The soldier is still sober. Also he has written to his wife for the first time in five years and she has expressed her delight at the good news.

On more than one occasion American aviators have flown from their camps many miles to villages where there were Salvation la.s.sies and have returned with a load of doughnuts. On one occasion a bird-man dropped a note down in front of the hut where two sisters were stationed, circling around at a low elevation until certain that the girls had picked up the note, which stated that he would return the following afternoon for a mess of doughnuts for his comrades. When he returned, the doughnuts were ready for him.

The Adjutant of the aerial forces attached to the American Fifth Army around Montfaucon on the edge of the Argonne Forest, before that forest was finally captured at the point of American bayonets, drove almost seventy miles to the Salvation Army Headquarters at Ligny for supplies for his men. He was given an automobile load of chocolate, candies, cakes, cookies, soap, toilet articles, and other comforts, without charge. He said that he _knew_ that the Salvation Army would have what he wanted.

The two la.s.sies who were in Bure had a desperate time of it. Things were most primitive. They had no store, just an old travelling field range, and for a canteen one end of Battery F's kitchen. They were then attached to the Sixth Field Artillery. This was the regiment that fired the first shot into Germany.

The smoke in that kitchen was awful and continuous from the old field range. The girls often made doughnuts out-of-doors, and they got chilblains from standing in the snow. All the company had chilblains, too, and it was a sorry crowd. Then the girls got the mumps. It was so cold here, especially at night, they often had to sleep with their clothes on.

There was only one way they could have meetings in that place and that was while the men were lined up for chow near to the canteen. They would start to sing in the gloomy, cold room, the men and girls all with their overcoats on, and fingers so cold that they could hardly play the concertina, for there was no fire in the big room save from the range at one end where they cooked. Then the girls would talk to them while they were eating. Perhaps they did not call these meetings, but they were a mighty happy time to the men, and they liked it.

A minister who had taken six months' leave of absence from his church to do Y.M.C.A. work in France asked one of the boys why he liked the Salvation Army girls and he said: "Because they always take time to cheer us up. It's true they do knock us mighty hard about our sins, but while it hurts they always show us a way out." The minister told some one that if he had his work to do over again he would plan it along the lines of the Salvation Army work.

You may hear it urged that one reason the boys liked the Salvation Army people so much was because they did not preach, but it is not so. They preached early and often, but the boys liked it because it was done so simply, so consistently and so unselfishly, that they did not recognize it as preaching.

In Menaucourt as Christmas was coming on some United States officers raised money to give the little refugee children a Christmas treat. There was to be a tree with presents, and good things to eat, and an entertainment with recitations from the children. The school-teacher was teaching the children their pieces, and there was a general air of delightful excitement everywhere. It was expected that the affair was to be held in the Catholic church at first, but the priest protested that this was unseemly, so they were at a loss what to do. The school-house was not large enough.

The Salvation Army Staff-Captain found this out and suggested to the officers that the Salvation Army hut was the very place for such a gathering. So the tree was set up, and the officers went to town and bought presents and decorations. They covered the old hut with boughs and flags and transformed it into a wonderland for the children. The officers were struggling helplessly with the decorations of the tree when the Salvation Army man happened in and they asked him to help.

"Why, sure!" he said heartily. "That's my regular work!" So they eagerly put it into his hands and departed. The Staff-Captain worked so hard at it and grew go interested in it that he forgot to go for his chow at lunch- time, and when supper-time came the hall was so crowded and there was so much still to be done that he could not get away to get his supper. But it was a grand and glorious time. The place was packed. There were two American Colonels, a French Colonel, and several French officers. The soldiers crowded in and they had to send them out again, poor fellows, to make room for the children, but they hung around the doors and windows eager to see it all.

The regimental band played, there were recitations in French and a good time generally.

The seats were facing the canteen where the supplies were all stocked neatly, boxes of candy and cakes and good things. The Colonel in charge of the regiment looked over to them wistfully and said to the Staff-Captain: "Are you going to sell all those things?" The Staff-Captain, with quick appreciation, said: "No, Colonel, Christmas comes but once a year and there's a present up there for you." And the Colonel seemed as pleased as the children when the Staff-Captain handed him a big box of candy all tied up in Christmas ribbons.

In the huts, phonographs are never silent as long as there is a single soldier in the place. One night two of the Salvation Army girls, who slept in the back room of a certain hut, had closed up for the night and retired. They were awakened by the sound of the phonograph, and wondered how anyone got into the hut and who it might happen to be. They were a little bit nervous, but went to investigate. They found that a soldier on guard had raised a window, and although this did not allow him room to enter the hut, he was able to reach the table where the phonograph stood.

He had turned the talking machine around so that it faced the window, and, placing a record in position, had started it going. He was leaning up against the outer wall of the hut, smoking a cigarette in the moonlight, and enjoying his concert. The girls returned to bed without disturbing the audience.

One of the most popular French confections sold in the huts was a variety of biscuits known under the trade name of "Boudoir Biscuits" One day a soldier entered a hut and said: "Say, miss, I want some of them there-them there--Dang me if I can remember them French names!--them there (suddenly a great light dawned)--some of them there bedroom cookies." And the la.s.sie got what he wanted.

The Salvation Army men who worked among the soldiers in advanced positions from which all women are barred are among the heroes of the war. Here during the day they labored in dugouts far below the sh.e.l.l-tortured earth, often going out at night to help bring in the wounded; always in danger from sh.e.l.ls and gas; some with the ammunition trains; others driving supply trucks; still others attached to units and accompanying the fighting men wherever they went, even to the active combat of the firing trench and the attack. These are unofficial chaplains. Such a one was "La Pet.i.t Major," as the soldiers called him, because of his smallness of stature.

The Little Major commenced his service in the field with the Twenty-sixth Infantry, First Division, at Menaucourt. Soon he was transferred to command the hut at Boviolles. At this place was the battalion of the Twenty-sixth Infantry, commanded by Major Theodore Roosevelt. His brother, Captain Archie Roosevelt, commanded a company in this battalion. He was for the greater part of the time alone in the work at Boviolles.

By his consistent life and character and his willingness to serve both men and officers, he won their esteem.

When they left the training area for the trenches the Major was requested to go with them. He turned the key in the canteen door and went off with them across France and never came back, establishing himself in the front- line trenches with the men and acting as unofficial chaplain to the battalion.

There is an interesting incident in connection with his introduction to Major Roosevelt's notice.

For some reason the Salvation Army had been made to feel that they were not welcome with that division. But the Little Major did not give up like that, and he lingered about feeling that somehow there was yet to be a work for him there.

A young private from a far Western state, a fellow who, according to all reports, had never been of any account at home, was convicted of a most horrible murder and condemned to die by hanging because the commanding officer said that shooting was too good for him.

He accepted his fate with sullen ugliness. He would not speak to anyone and he was so violent that they had to put him in chains. No one could do anything with him. He had to be watched day and night; and it was awful to see him die this way with his sin unconfessed. Many attempts were made to break through his silence, but all to no effect. Several chaplains visited him, but he would have nothing to do with them.

On the morning of his execution, to the surprise of everybody he said that he had heard that there was a Salvation Army man around, and he would like to see him. The authorities sent and searched everywhere for the Little Major, and some thought he must have left, but they found him at last and he came at once to the desperate man.

The criminal sat crouched on his hard bench, chained hand and foot. He did not look up. He was a dreadful sight, his brutal face haggard, unshaven, his eyes bloodshot, his whole appearance almost like some low animal.

Through the shadowy prison darkness the Little Major crept to those chains, those symbols of the man's degradation; and still the man did not look up.

"You must be in great trouble, brother. Can I help you any?" asked the Little Major with a wonderful Christ-like compa.s.sion in his voice.

The man lifted his bleared eyes under the shock of unkempt hair, and spoke, startled:

"You call me brother! You know what I'm here for and you call me brother!

Why?"

The Little Major's voice was steady and sweet as he replied without hesitation:

"Because I know a great deal about the suffering of Christ on the Cross, all because He loved you so! Because I know He said He was wounded for your transgressions, He was bruised for your iniquities! Because I know He said, 'Though your sins be as scarlet they shall be as white as snow, though they be red like crimson they shall be as wool!' So why shouldn't I call you brother?"

"Oh," said the man with a groan of agony and big tears rolling down his face. "Could I be made a better man?"

Then they went down on their knees together beside the hard bench, the man in chains and the man of G.o.d, and the Little Major prayed such a wonderful prayer, taking the poor soul right to the foot of the Throne; and in a few minutes the man was confessing his sin to G.o.d. Then he suddenly looked up and exclaimed:

"It's true, what you said! Christ has pardoned me! Now I can die like a man!"

With that great pardon written across his heart he actually went to his death with a smile upon his face. When the Chaplain asked him if he had anything to say he publicly thanked the military authorities and the Salvation Army for what they had done for him.

The Colonel, greatly surprised at the change in the man, sent to find out how it came about and later sent to thank the Little Major. Two days later Major Roosevelt came in person to thank him:

"I knew that someone who knew how to deal with men had got hold of him,"

he said, "but I almost doubted the evidence of my own eyes when I saw how cheerfully he went to his death, it all seemed too wonderful!"