Читать книгу Over There with the Marines at Chateau Thierry онлайн

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The cannonading from the German big guns during the night did little damage to the Americans, for most of the shells dropped far to the rear. Moreover, the Yankee field artillery replied with much better marksmanship than that of the boches, as was reported in the morning by scout aviators and balloon observers. But it was not necessary to wait for these reports to get an idea of the devastation effected by the Americans’ cannonading. The timber that had shielded the enemy forces, whose attack had been camouflaged by a spitting of machine guns “at the stars,” was now a scene of arboreal ruin. The boys decided that they had never seen quite so abundant an assortment of splintered kindling wood in their lives.

In the course of the day the American lines were advanced to the farther edge of the belt of timber in which the battle of the night had been fought. It seemed that this belt had been entirely cleared of the enemy. Beyond the waste of splintered and contorted forestry was a narrow open stretch of lowland, and beyond this was another woods undoubtedly peopled with outpost of sharpshooters and machine-gun nests. The Yanks did not have to wait long for a verification of this suspicion. Scarcely had they taken up their positions near the edge of the area of green kindling wood when there came a vicious spitting of machine guns and sharpshooters’ rifles.