The Y.M.C.A. workers with the 37th Division were the first on the field. They were the farthest advanced; they had the largest stock of supplies and the most workers of any organization in that sector at the beginning of the drive. From this center a supply station was established at Avoncourt, where hot chocolate was served day and night to the men as they were going to and from the line of battle. Hot chocolate and supplies in large quantities were also furnished free to the field-hospitals.
All secretaries who could possibly be spared were dispatched with packs on their backs, bulging with chocolate and tobacco for the men actually on the firing line. As these secretaries trudged past the long lines of soldiers waiting to "go into action" they would be greeted with a chorus of "Three cheers for the 'Y'"--"You can't lose the Y Men," etc.
When in answer to the requests, "Can't you sell us a cake of chocolate or a pack of Camels?" it was explained, "We can't carry enough for all, and these are for the wounded and the men on the firing line," there came invariably the enthusiastic reply, "That's right--they need it more than we do."
Twenty years to make a soldier! Well, that depends upon the kind of a soldier you want. There were two kinds in the Argonne Forest from the latter part of September to November in that last year of the great war.
Four long dreadful years the Forest had been the impregnable stronghold of the Kaiser's minions. The last word in the perfection of trench warfare had been spoken by them. The most elaborate preparations for the housing of their men and officers had been made; dugouts of every description, from the temporary "hole in the ground" with a wooden door and a "cootie" bunk to the palatial suite sixty feet underground with cement stairs and floors, and with bathrooms, officers and lounging quarters, all electrically lighted and well heated.
[Illustration: MEMORY SKETCH OF A SECTOR OF THE BATTLE FIELD 1918]
Machine gun nests had been planted in every conceivable point of vantage from a camouflaged bush on the hillside to the concealed "lookout" in the tallest treetop. Cannon of every caliber had been placed throughout the woods and under the lea of each protecting hill or cliff. A system of narrow-gauge railroads sent its spurs into every part of the Forest, delivering ammunition to the guns and supplies to the men, even connecting by tunnel with some of the largest dugouts.