Page:History of the 305th field artillery (IA historyof305thfi01camp).pdf/244

214 The details went up on the morning of the 16th.

The movement of a detail was never a very dignified proceeding. Details went in for efliciency rather than appearance. The surrey was always an absurdity on a shell-toru road. There was never anything less military. But it carried a lot of stuff.

Doughboys used to grin at the group of very military appearing horsemen followed by a couple rambling cobs which drew this vchicle with its fringes flapping from a bent top. Underneatlı were piled switchboards, tele- phones, instruments of precision, and spare wire.

Everybody got to the farm, and pitched in. Officers and men of the battalion details, in spite of the fire, got an idea of where the lines ran, and how they were laid. They also appraised the task that lay ahead. These lines were continually shelled out. Some improvement could be made by relaying here and there, but at best it was going to be nasty work. I'or thc Iluns had so much artillery and ammunition that they didn't hesitate to suipe with 775 or Austrian 88s at a single man at work in the barren fields.

The detail men in such warfare have rather the worst of it. They work, as a rule, in pairs on the lines, or in an exposed observatory, or on the edge of woods, doing the careful work of a surveyor under the most distracting conditions. And it is always simpler to be brave in a crowd.

The yellow intelligence sheet for that day, too, informed us that the enemy was taking an increasing interest in Les Près and its neighboring positions. Things were noisy while we settled ourselves. The B position, which we had thought the best of the lot, got a pounding during the morning, The B men escaped, but the 16th had a number of casualties. Captain Ravenel reconnoitered a fresh position, and Major Easterday decided that he should move his first platoon there that night, and bring his second into action alongside of it.