it all out and put it back in again so it would run 

 and then we found that the engine he had bought 

 could barely turn its gigantic fly wheels and had no 

 power with which to drive the saw, 



Late in August the engine of the original mill wore 

 out completely and had to be discarded. Just at this 

 time a call came from the newly organized First Army 

 for some Forestry Engineers' to work at the front with 

 them, and as our mill was worn out and we had made 

 a good showing, we were selected by the higher offj- 

 cials to be the troops so attached. 



\Vc moved up to the Toul Sector a little over two 

 weeks before the First Army pulled their initial offen- 

 sive in wiping out the St. Mihiel salient. Our com- 

 pany headquarters were located at Toul and our men 

 were split up into a number of detachments of from 

 40 to 100 men each. New detachments were constant- 

 ly being formed and old ones deserted. Often it was 

 necessary to move a detachment when it became locat- 

 ed by Herman artillery. At the most I think we had 

 16 distinct operations working at one time. Not 

 enough officers were available to have one at each 

 detachment and often one officer would have as many 

 MS five or six detachments which he was technically 

 in charge of. The particular detachment that I have 

 personal knowledge of was located in the Forest of 

 Puvenelle, about two miles north and west of Pont a 

 Mouson on the Moselle river. This was on the ex- 

 treme right of the St. Mihiel salient, and at this point 

 the Americans made but a few kilometers advance. We 

 were perhaps 2VL> miles from the actual firing line. 



Rube Phillips was in charge of the operation, under 



7 



