May 30, igiB Land & Water 13 
"The South" Entrenched: By Herman Whitaker 
YOUareawriter," 
said the "run- 
ner," as we 
walked along. 
"I've read a lot 
of this war stuff, but I've 
never seen that correctly 
described. How would you 
go about to do it?" " T/iai " happened to be the whistling 
rush of a minieicurfcr shell high overhead. While listening 
till it merged in a distant 
This narrative of American troops in the firing line, 
related by Mr. Herman Whitaker^ describes a visit to 
a section of trenches in France, now held by troops 
from the Southern States in America, men who arc the 
descendants of those who fought bravely for the 
South in the War of Secession five arid fifty years ago. 
The Author 
explosion, I also realised that 
it had never been described — 
for a cogent reason ; it can't 
be done. When I say that it 
is a .cross between a whinny, 
a whine, and a whistle — I'm 
as far from the mark as the 
best of them. The note of a 
high-explosive shell that fol- 
lowed was shriller and cleaner 
cut, but equally indescriba'ble. 
When it plugged a big hole 
like one sees in the battle 
pictures close to our road, I 
got my first real war thrill ; 
one that was keener, perhaps, 
^^ because I really had no business 
Hijfc^ aH to be there. 
^^^^^, ^H You see G.H.Q. is more 
^^^^^H '^1 careful of its correspondents 
wKttKmmm^mrm^mJKk i^^Ti their own mothers could 
possibly be. Both for their 
sakes and that of the troops 
upon whom German fire might 
be drawn, we are restrained from unnecessary movements 
along the front. Very politely, but most positively, I had 
been informed that an "observation post "—usually a fpw 
kilometres behind the front trenches — would be abouf^he 
best G.H.Q. could do for me. Thanks, however, to a lucky 
combination of low visibility, produced by a misty rain, 
and a complaisant southern major whom I found with his 
staff burrowed under the ruins of a village, here was I march- 
ing along a camouflaged- road to the music of bursting shells 
to spend the night in a front-line trench. 
Through shell-pocked fields and past shattered farmsteads, 
the "runner" led on into a wet wood. Now than a weeping 
wood in winter, one can hardly imagine anything more 
comfortless ; and the prospect was not improved by zigzag 
lines of clayey trenches fenced with belts of rusted wire that' 
criss-crossed it everywhere. But, perhaps because of a faint 
resemblance to their own southern "piney woods," the 
troops that held it appeared quite at home. Though it was 
just past five, supper was in full swing. Blue smoke from 
half a hundred shacks and dug-outs hung low on the wet 
air, mingling with satisfying odours. Introduced by the 
"runner" at "Dclmonico's," a real Bairnsfather shack, 
I joined a brace of lieutenants in soldiers' chow of steak and 
potatoes, bread and coffee, topped off with rice and syrup. 
It was still light when we finished, and, viewed through a 
thin haze of tobacco smoke from the changed view-point 
induced by comfortable repletion, the shacks and dug-outs, 
clayey trenches, rusted wire tangles, even the weeping wood 
appeared, if not home-like, at least hveable. One could 
understand how a man 
can get so accustomed to 
shrapnel helmets, trench 
coats, mud boots, gas 
masks, and other impedi- 
menta' as to feel uncom- 
fortable without them. 
Through the open door 
way I could see men pass- 
ing to and fro along the 
duckboards that led from 
post to post. They were 
strong southern types — 
mouths thin-lipped and 
firm ; eyes steady ; brows 
broad, but sloping quickly 
to short, sharp chins. The 
faces, quiet almost to the 
point of suUenness, bore 
in hard print the whole story 
of the south— mountain ven- 
dettas, family feuds, moon- 
sliining, the Klu Klux Klan, 
race wars, all of that dread 
atmosphere which Mark 
Twain caught so wonderfully 
in Huckleberry Finn. 
"They're shuah natural soldiers." The elder lieutenant 
confirmed my impression in a slow, southern drawl. "All 
have twenty generations of private wa'h behind them. Very 
few of their ancestors, s'eh, ever died in their beds ; and 
even yet a revenue officer isn't what you could call a good 
insurance risk in the back counties. Instead of a rattle, 
their mothers gave them a gun to play with in the cradle. 
At five they'd be knocked head over heels by the recoil of 
pop's shot gun. At ten, they'd be trailing deer in the 
mountains. Shuah, they're sullen fighters, and thar' goes a 
fine specimen." 
In the face of the man who passed, just then, was concen- 
trated all the hardness, almost vindictive reserve, undiluted 
by the softer qualities that toned it in the others. Carrying 
his rifle in the hollow of his arm, he lounged along in a 
swinging hunter stride quite unmilitary. One glance at him 
supplemented the lieutenant's short biography. 
"He was a Tennessee 'moonshiner,' and simply can't 
stand discipline. But he's the 
finest shot we've - got ; can 
pick the eye our of a Boche at 
three hundred yards. ' To get 
the best out of him, we just 
gave him a pass, good any- 
where along the lines, and let 
him go to it. So every day he 
go6s on his lonely to stalk 
Bochcs through No Man's 
Land. When he draws a bead 
on one, it's ' Good night, 
nurse ! ' for he never lets loose 
till he's certain. Some day 
Fritz will get him, I suppose ; 
but not before he's paid an 
awful price in lives." 
" And he's not the only one," 
the other lieutenant put in. 
"We have a dozen snipers 
that go out hke that — not to 
mention the raids we pull off 
alihost every night. Fritz, 
over thar, tho'ght he was going 
to have a cinch with us raw 
Americans. But he's found 
our chaps so nasty, I believe 
he'd just about as soon change back to the French." 
"They so keen for it," the other continued, "we have an 
embarr'sing choice of volunteers for the raids. ' All to-day 
they've been sidling up to me in ones and twos and threes — 
' Any chance to-night s'eh ? ' When I say no, they look 
glum as a pack of girls that have been done out of a dance ; 
but if I'd taken all that offered, we shuah have had to attack 
in fo'ce. If you want some action for yu' money, s'eh," he 
soncluded, "you had better come along ? " 
" Better come along ? " I, whose ambition had been to 
"go over the top" ever since the beginning of the war 1 
Lives there a correspond- 
ent who would not have 
jumped at the chance ! I 
saw myself putting one 
over on our dear grand- 
mother, the G.H.Q. ; and 
1 took him up at once. 
It was then only half- 
past five. The patrol 
would not go out till nine, 
and I spent the remainder 
of the daylight following a 
"runner" through the 
wicker-lined trenches from 
one to ano.hcr of the (Com- 
pany's four posts. The 
more I saw of them, the 
more I wondered that 
troops could ever be got to 
Section of Trench on 
American Front 
Relief Mustering for Duty in American Trenches 
