I Remember The Last War

I was extraordinarily lucky. In this essay, I will tell our story and try to tell you something about the things that happened to us over there. Other writers have written war books; they have been better writers than me. They are better writers than me because they wrote more beautifully or wrote about events that were more cultivated and beautiful. But I don't believe that a book about America's participation in the war has been written by a man who spent days, weeks, and months on the front lines with the men who fought there as I did. My comrades and I experienced nothing but hardship from beginning to end. There is nothing beautiful or particularly glorious about my story; it is as vivid as I could make it, but it is hard for me to describe fully the conditions we encountered during the five worst days any unit of the American army experienced in France—the five days of our battle of Fismette. If you had been there, you would know what those five days were like. Never did a unit of men fight harder for their lives against an enemy who outgunned them two to one and was outflanking them constantly.