[Page]shelled and few shells came close at any time. It was a well wooded area, and we could move about and handle our supplies without being observed by the enemy. There was very little activity here. Our infantry occupied a defensive sector and did little but hold the lines and make a raid once in a while. We placed our rolling kitchens close to the companies, and all we had to do was to take the supplies up to them. In the evenings it was still necessary to show no light to prevent the enemy planes from locating us. One evening we hauled a raiding party to front lines in supply wagons. The raid was not a big success since the Germans were ready for our party, consequently we lost more prisoners than we took and sustained numerous other casualties.
A New Drive Planned. A narrow gauge railroad was laid along the main road toward front. Supplies and ammunition were brought in large quantities. A new Division moved in on our left. These preparations clearly indicated big doings approaching. We received orders to attack shortly in the direction of Metz, the mighty fortified city. On the 10th of November our orders came to attack on the morning of the 11th. After dark a German plane dropped bright flares in our neighborhood.[Page]We waited with dread for the unloading of his dreadful bombs but not none came. We had heard rumors of an impending armistice. Probably Fritz paid us a friendly call before knowing that the slaughter was about to end. We however had no such assurance but instead were ordered to attack in the morning. We went to sleep with the same dread of impending hardship and falling comrades as before all previous attacks.
Armistice. Early the morning of the eleventh Dilworth and I went over to Regimental Hq. for orders. It was about daybreak when we got there and the Adjutant announced that he had received an order declaring an armistice and hoped that this order would stick since several days before a rumor of an armistice proved unfounded. However, now he had the documentary evidence that all hostilities were to cease at 11 o'clock. But meanwhile all attack orders were to be carried out until that time. Consequently the 109th Inf. had already gone over the top to attack and at 9 A.M. the 110th was to leap frog them and continue the onslo[a]ught. Some how the 110th never succeeded in the leap frogging As the 11th hour approached cannonading increased rather than subsided. During[Page]the last ten minutes the 75's were going off with feverish rapid[ity]. It sounded like the barrage on the opening of the Argonne drive. They evidently were using their ammunition on hand. On the minute of eleven o'clock all was quiet--so quiet that it seemed as though death had overtaken everything. Somebody spoke. Yes, we were still alive. It did not seem real--this silence--after five months of continuous din. The wounded still kept on coming during the day. The dead had to be buried--the poor unfortunates who had gone through it until the last few hours ⟨of⟩ the conflict and then had to get theirs. Such a fate!
After. In the afternoon we found out from the Germans, who came over with watches and any trinkets theyhad [trying] [to] get food with them, that famine and revolution had broken out behind them. On the next day many Russian prisoners who had been set free by the Germans came across and had to be fed. Before many days some of our own men who had been captured came back with tales of disaster behind the German lines. On the evening of the eleventh we could hardly convince ourselves that now