[Page] On May 25th I took a detail of men to Blequin ten miles kilometers away. I came back by lorry. The next day I was sent to Senlecque to join Lieut. Dubs' third battalion supply detachment. We were located at Lottinghem for several weeks. We slept three to a pup tent under a tree. We took over English horses, wagons, carts, and lumbers. On the 27th I took half the detachment to the rifle range. We were required to get used to the English rifle by firing the range. It now looked as though indeed we were in the English army. Our rations were those of the English. I asked the English Supply Officer one day what the bread allowance per day was in dividing up rations. He replied "a pound per day per man, perhaps." The first bag of mail arrived May 31st. I greedily looked for letters addressed to me. I found six. These I read and re-read for several days. They were a month old but new all the same. I was laid up with an attack of grip⟨pe⟩ for a few days. The hard cold ground on which I lay made life most miserable, and after I thought I was better an attack of jaundice set me back. At this time we were ordered to move. We left Lottinghem on Sunday June 9th, we [and] moved our wagon train southward in successive stages three days. On the [Page]third night we bivouacked in a large forest near Hesdin. On Thursday we entrained loading horses, wagons and baggage on 40 and 8's (horse cars). We traveled for 24 hours southward and then eastward. We got a skyline view of Paris in passing. Eiffel tower was the prominent object. This was a most uncomfortable trip for me. We were croweded in the box cars, and I was still sick and I lay in the corner most of the time, trying to rest. I was often stepped on in the crowed of men. They could not help it and I was too tired and weak to protest. At Meaux we detrained and set out for our destination. This proved to be a long way off. Our wagon train moved steadily on and on into the darkness. Ten oclock, eleven, twelve and still on we went. At one oclock we found ourselves on a road which grew constantly narrower and rougher and finally landed us in a hay field. The guide had made a mistake. It was pitch dark. To move back would have been demoralizing to the worn out men and animals. So we unhitched, gave the horses some of the stacked hay and flopped down on the piles of hay for sleep. In the morning we found ourselves a mile away from the town of our destination, {St. Mesmes}.
With the French. The sudden shift from the British front[Page]to the French front, we now found out, was due to a German drive toward Paris. We were thrown in between Chateau Thierry and Paris. The drive had now largely spent itself at the Marne around Chateau Thierry. Many wounded and gassed Americans were coming back from the 1st and 2nd Divisions. We again turned in most of our English equipment, including the Enfield rifle, and were again given American rifles. Our service with the British was ended. We now trained to cooperate with the French. Our next important move was in a long semi-circle generally eastward, passed through Rebais and on the left side of Montmirail. We received our first pay in France. For some it also was the last. We were paid in francs. Several hundred of these looked like big money. The French shops in the villages did loud office business for a few days.
Within Range. On the 1st of July, we arrived at{Artouges} at noon. This was a very clean and pleasant village, but it was within easy range of German shells. We were immediately warned to keep under cover in day time and show no light, not even a watch, at night. This this warning was not to be taken lightly, was proven a few minutes after we arrived, when[Page]a German plane arrived and staged a spectacular show. He was flying very high. Just outside of the town a French sausage balloon was serenely hanging in the sky. The two observers came down by parachute at once but none too soon. A minute after they alighted, Fritz swooped down toward the bag and let go with his machine gun loaded with incendiary bullets, the next instant a big flame shot upward from the burning hydrogen. The burning silk came down and that was the end of this balloon, but Fritz was not through. Although anti air- craft shells were bursting all around him, he rose and flew directly on toward the next balloon about a mile away. We saw this one meet the same fate as the first one. On[?] the German flew to the third sausage and dispatched it in the same manner. Then hereturned victoriously towards his own lines, with sky all around him full of puffs of smoke from bursting shells. We now knew definitely that we were on the edge of a war. An occasional shell whined and exploded nearby, but none struck the village for the first few days. I slept in a hay field the first night but then moved into a deserted shanty and slept on