Page:History of the 305th field artillery (IA historyof305thfi01camp).pdf/297

Rh plish. The First Battalion got one of these at its command post near Blanzy on September 15th.

For days shells of all calibers had fallen about the place without accomplishing any more damage than tearing up the soil. Then this one arrived. It fell at the picket line. The horses stood in a row. Private Almer M. Aasgard groomed a horse near the end of the line. Near him sat a group of telephone men, winding wire on makeshift reels-a necessary diversion of the telephonc detail when there was nothing else to do. The men heard the whine of the approaching shell and realized from their acquired judgment that it would fall very near. They called out a warning and ducked. Aasgard wasn't quick enough. A tiny fragment cut into his neck, severing the jugular vein. Dr. Cronin hurried to the doomed man. Aasgard died within a few minutes.

The same shell caught Corporal Leonard Cook of the telephone detail in the knee, disabling him and putting him out of the war. An ambitious telephone man, he was evacuated grumblingly, and was never returned to the regiment. Other fragments cost the detail eight more of its vanishing horses.

But these serious moments were the exception. Life north of the Vesle was far less complicated than it had been about Les Près. There were, of course, minor casualties.

First Class Private McGranaghan gave Sergeant Hickey an opportunity to distinguish himself. McGrahaghan was hit while working on the Serval line. Hickey, who had been on duty in the observatory, picked him up and carried him over a crest exposed to machine gun fire to the first aid station.

These individual instances of courage were innumerable. Men, however, don't say much about what they do themselves. Unless someone happened to see their bravery it