1114 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



At the front, trenches and other defensive works called 

 for large numbers of props, barbed wire pickets, and 

 other round material. 



To bring- up the artillery quickly over the shell-torn 

 ground, it was necessary to build hasty roads with live- 

 inch plank. The amount of lumber consumed as road 

 ])lank was enormous. 



.Add to the foregoing an insistent demand for lumber 

 to make packing cases and for countless smaller uses, 

 and you will have some slight conception of wood as a 

 militarv necessitv. 



chief of the French transportation system, told us with 

 vivid emphasis that failure to send forestry troops 

 promptly would spell disaster. General Pershing was so 

 anxious about the situation that he personally dictated 

 an urgent cable asking the War Department to stop send- 

 ing fighting men until they had first sent forestry troops. 

 But, what will be the use of sending forestry troops 

 and sawmills unless there is enough standing timber? 

 The vital question then was, did France possess enough 

 standing timber to fill the indisjiensable requirements not 

 only of their own army and civil population, but of the 



A PORTION OF THE FIRST .^MF.RI^.\^■ FORESTRY C.-\MP, WITH OFFICE TENT AND Y. M. C. A HUT IN CENTER. I.OC.\TED AT 



BEI.LEVl'E, LANDES. FRANCE 



We had not been in France long before this necessity 

 for lumber faced us in terrible earnestness. Our Army 

 engineers had always found at hand whatever materials 

 they needed, and they drew up elaborate plans accord- 

 ingly. The Chief of Engineers of the A. E. I'", called 

 in Colonel Graves and made him responsible for furnish- 

 ing the lumber to carry out these plans. Accordingly 

 Colonel Graves and I went to work to procure it. We 

 knew that the tonnage shortage prevented our importing 

 it, but we understood that the French would fill our first 

 requirements. 



What was our dismay to learn that by funnshing us 

 lumber the French had simply meant they would furnish 

 us the trees standing in the forests. They had no ])iles, 

 and they had not enough lumber or ties for themselves. 

 Even worse, they had no labor. What were we to do? 

 The situation was critical. Our troops were on their 

 way over, and we had nothing built to receive them, nor 

 any materials with which to build. We must have for- 

 estry troops and sawmills at once. Mr. Claveille, the 



liritish army and the American army as well? The con- 

 struction i)rogram of the American engineers called for 

 lumber in quantities which staggered the French. 



Fortunately, France did have the forests. The situa- 

 tion was saved, the war .shortened by many long months. 

 And why did she have them? Because she had prac- 

 ticed forestry for generations. 



We must not imagine that she always practiced for- 

 estry. Like other countries, she began by destroying 

 her forests. Eventually, however, she saw the disas- 

 trous effects of her recklessness, and gradually turned 

 from destroying to restoring, and then to building up. 

 For example, 100 years ago the southwestern corner of 

 I-'rance, extending from Bordeaux to the Pyrenees 

 Mountains, was almost as treeless as the prairie, and 

 was fringed by sand dunes which were constantly in 

 movement, burying fields and houses and even whole 

 villages. Napoleon called in engineers and foresters. 

 These men succeeded in holding the dunes in place by 

 planting with maritime pine ; and then they planted up 



