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BEING THE NARRATIVE OF BATTERY A OF THE 101st FIELD ARTILLERY

Page 92

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injure them in the least. The kitchen was about five hundred yards in the rear, close to a French 95 millimeter battery. As in the position at Rambucourt, the Boche soon proved to us that they knew our location exactly. At any time of day they were likely to swamp the crest with a deluge of 77's; at meal time especially they pounded away. It didn't pay to stray far from the emplacement unless one's ears were strained for the approaching whine and a convenient shell hole was close by. The route to the kitchen was always precarious and it was not infrequent for mess to be suddenly terminated by a wild scramble for the nearest dugout, while mess kits and food went clattering to the ground. However, our luck stayed with us. With the exception of Joe Zwinge, not a man was touched. He had the misfortune to be caught in a savage concentration of 150's while bringing a horse up to Battalion headquarters, and was fatally wounded by a shell splinter which struck him above the eye. He died on April 16, the Battery's first fatal casualty. Time and again our caissons with ammunition, or our limbers, would come up to the position, but not once did a shell come over. Just before or just afterwards

H. E.'s would be bursting everywhere, but they always missed the right time.

The Battery fired 604 rounds from this position. The targets included the railroad station at Apremont (the Registration point and Basic Deflection), several cross roads back of the German lines, and several German batteries. It gave everyone special delight to harrass the enemy batteries after the way they had pounded us. Our observation post, "O. T. 28," as it was

 

 

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