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Accordingly, on August 30, the line beginning at Port sur Seille, east of the Moselle and extending to the west through St. Mihiel, thence north to a point opposite Verdun, was placed under my command.

In the face of a murderous fire from concentrated machine guns, which contested every foot of their advance, the United States marines moved forward until the severity of their casualties necessitated that they dig in and hold the positions they had gained. Here, again, their valor called forth official praise. Then came the battle for the St. Mihiel salient.

Mihiel, at Arras, in a thousand places, were desperate conflicts, in which the line swayed, trenches were captured and recaptured, men died, and the Kaiser's troops frantically struggled to break their way through the cordon stretched before them.

Mihiel, and our divisions in reserve at other points, were already on the move toward the area back of the line between the Meuse River and the western edge of the forest of Argonne. With the exception of St. Mihiel, the old German front line from Switzerland to the east of Rheims was still intact.

Mihiel, twenty miles to the south, where the Germans had broken through the Meuse Hills and reached the river. The German attack came south along the crest of this ridge because the German heavy artillery could not be brought over the Woevre.

Possibly, he adds, a more seasoned army the American troops had only had six months' experience in the fighting line! might have turned the effects of a successful action to greater military advantage than was the case at St. Mihiel.

He fell into the dugout and while the Major worked over him, the Major himself was gassed and had to be removed to the rear and undergo hospital treatment. For this service he was awarded a wound stripe. During the St. Mihiel offensive he was appointed in the Toul Sector and followed up the advancing soldiers, and later was active in the Argonne.

The Allies found they had a formidable army to aid them, and the enemy learned finally that he had one to reckon with. On the day after we had taken the St. Mihiel salient, much of our corps and army artillery which had operated at St.

Mihiel, carried out by American troops, with our own Massachusetts boys among them, and that the first regiment to be decorated as a regiment for conspicuous service and gallantry in our Army in France was the 104th, formerly of the old Massachusetts National Guard. Such is our record and it cannot be forgotten.

Mihiel, Chateau Thierry, Grand Pre, Soissons, Vouziers, LaFere, LeCateau, Juniville, Craonne, and Machault were reoccupied. Valenciennes fell to the British. Reims and Verdun were freed, after four years' artillery domination. The St. Mihiel salient was wiped out by Pershing's American army, the great St.