he afternoon of July 16. The weird beauty of his funeral
the following evening left a deep impression on the men who were at the
regimental horse-lines at the time. After a drizzling rain early in the
evening, the sky cleared, and the moonlight sifted down through the
trees, glittering on the wet leaves, as the procession marched slowly
through the woods to the band's solemn music of Chopin's "Funeral
March". The call of "Taps" through the dead of night, the final rifle
volleys, brought the keener anguish at the thought that our first loss
at the enemy's hands had been a comrade with whom we would have parted
last.

On Friday, July 19, came orders to move. All ammunition was carried into
the trench and camouflaged. When darkness came the flat-tops were taken
down, and everything packed. The limbers were up early, and at 10
o'clock the battery pulled out. Our way was through Dompierre and into a
woods, where we camped during the next day. Next night, leaving at 9:45,
the regiment made a wide detour around Chalons, which was receiving
heavy bombing by dark, and arrived at Vitry-la-Ville about 7:30 a. m.
That night we entrained, bound for the west, where the Allies were
pushing back the Chateau Thierry salient. Our destination was not far by
direct route, but the presence of the enemy in the valley of the Marne
about Dormans cut us off. So we traveled in a circuitous course,
southward to Brevonne, then westerly through Troyes, Rumilly-sur-Seine,
Longueville and Gretz, to the environs of Paris, and east again down the
valley of the Marne, through Meaux, to La Ferte-sous-Jouarre, where we
detrained at midnight, July 22.

[Illustration: Lieutenant "Kelly" Ennis]

[Illustration: Home Life in a Dug-Out]

[Illustration: En Route to the O. P.]

[Illustration: Lieutenant Adams at the O. P.]

CHAPTER V

CLEARING THE CHATEAU THIERRY SALIENT

At our encampment near Montreuil-aux-Bois, whither we hiked from La
Ferte-sous-Jouarre on the morning of July 23, we found traces of the
horse-lines of the artillery of the 26th Division, in the shape of
trampled picket lines, bunks of woven branches, and abandoned equipment
of all kinds. Stories of heavy losses, of nights and days without sleep
or rest, as the New England batteries tried to catch up with their
infantry in the wake of the rapidly retreating Germans, of extraordinary
advances by the American forces, of hardships and lack of supplies due
to the inability of sup