FORESTERS TO THE FRONT 



457 



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l'i«sr Lt. Risden T. Allen Secmnd Lt. il. R. Condon 



He is a member of the Allen-Medley Who was employed in the forestry 



Lumber Company, of Devereanx. department rjf the Pennsylvania 



Georgia. Railroad. 



struction on their own forests, with bridges, lookout 

 towers, ranger stations, and telephone lines. The 

 materials of construction for these were taken right 

 out of the woods on the ground. 



The French timber will be taken out of forests of 

 oak, beech, hornbeam, with some stands of pine; most 

 of it is small — not over a foot in diameter. Since the 

 forests are more nearly equivalent to the woodlot type 

 of the Eastern states, it has been the aim of the re- 

 cruiting officer to get the forces from the East rather 

 than from the West, where woods workers are ac- 

 customed to handling larger stuff. 



The men who will work this timber will be woods- 

 men. The officers are trained in forestry and lumber- 

 ing and their task will be to see that the timber is 

 efficiently manufactured and utilized. At the same 

 time they are to make sure that there shall be no un- 

 necessary destruction so that the forests will be left 

 in the best possible shape for the future. The French 

 forests have been painstakingly cared for, over many 

 years, and French forestry has been an example to 

 American foresters. Gifford Pinchot himself got part 

 of his forestry training at Nancy, where the forest 

 school has actually been under fire. 



The men for the ranks are coming fast. Everard, 

 back from New Orleans, his old home, reports plenty 

 of applicants for positions as interpreters from the 

 French population of that city. John Cobbs has been 

 in the mountains of North Carolina ; Kiefer in the big 

 lumber camps of Michigan and Wisconsin; Reynolds 

 is up in the Adirondacks, where he studied the fires of 

 1903, getting the plans explained to the lumberjacks 

 there. Clifford Pettis, New York's state forester and 

 one of the listing officers for the regiment, has been 

 surprised and delighted with the type of men who 



f 11 



Second Lt. Stanley II. Hodgman 

 Logging camp foreman of the Pot- 

 latch Lumber Company of Potlatch. 

 Idaho. 



Second Lt. John W. Seltzer 

 Forester of the New Jersey Zinc 

 Company of Franklin, New Jersey. 



have applied for the rank and file — successful small 

 mill operators and woods foremen, — men of ability in 

 their fields of work and of standing in their com- 

 munities. 



Thus the enlisted men are picked woodsmen, and 

 especial care has been exercised to get those needed 

 for specific tasks. Ax-men, sawyers, tie-backs, skid- 

 ders, teamsters, and blacksmiths have come in ; mill- 

 wrights, sawmill operators, engineers, filers, farriers, 

 cooks and carpenters. 



Reports now are that there will be six additional 

 forestry regiments. This will give men like Coert 

 DuBois and Redington, who have all along wanted to 

 come in, the chance they have been looking for. All 

 of the regiments, including this first one, will be under 

 the direction of regular engineer officers, the "tie- 

 hacking tenth," or the "fighting foresters," being or- 

 ganized and commanded by Colonel James A. Wood- 

 ruff, Engineer Corps, U. S. A. 



The foregoing, then, is a discursive sketch of the 

 beginnings of the forest regiment. It does not give 

 much in detail, and it leaves out many things that 

 might go in. It mainly explains why Captain El- 

 dredge, chigger-infested but cheerful, spent hot July 

 days getting ready for a big undertaking and a most 

 serious and necessary job, which will be attended with 

 real risks, and will have its share of fire. The regi- 

 ment is organized on military lines for military service, 

 to be much in the thick of things, for that is where 

 it is needed. Some of the fellows known to that great 

 fellowship of foresters will not come back ; but that is 

 a hazard of war. At least, says Captain Eldredge, 

 who claims to have read up on the subject, there are 

 no chiggers in France, — which is his cheerful way of 

 looking at the future. 



We see them go where barricades 

 Are builded of the trees they fell ; 



Leaf -screens against the air-craft raids 

 And log redoubts 'gainst screaming shell. 



Where France's forests bleed for France 

 They toil with hand and heart and brain 



To help the Starry Flag advance, 

 God send them safely back again ! 



