February 9, 1918 - A day of writing about the war

Don Martin diary entry for Saturday, February 9, 1918: 
Went to office at noon and did considerable writing. Went for long walk through Halborn section. Got letter from Dorothy. Dorothy is certainly getting to be a great girl. She writes fine letters. Met Robert Hanna a Canadian Lieutenant from Vancouver who told me how he won the Victoria Cross at Vimy Ridge. It is a wonderful story of how he saved practically a whole battalion. Went to office a short time tonight.

Weather very nice. Drizzle at night.

     Don Martin cabled a story about the American troops stationed at the St. Mihiel salient. It was published in the New York Herald on Sunday, February 10.

Some American Soldiers Captured by the Enemy Close to German Border

Berlin Announces Taking “a Number” of Prisoners at Xivray

FRONT OPPOSITE METZ CLOSE TO FRONTIER

General Pershing’s Men May Open Path to Rhine Between Meuse and the Vosges

[Special Cable to the Herald]

Herald Bureau, No. 130 Fleet Street, London, Saturday

     A Berlin official despatch published here this afternoon says that the Germans captures some American prisoners yesterday north of Xivray. The number was not stated, but the locality mentioned confirms previous authorized statements that General Pershing’s forces had taken over a sector northwest of Toul. Xivray is on the southern side of the St. Mihiel salient, near a little brook that runs into the Moselle above Pont-a-Mousson.

     In this sector the American troops are holding the post of honor closest to the enemy and will have the greatest opportunity of distinguishing themselves. Their line begins about fifteen miles northwest of Toul and extends east toward Pont-a-Mousson, which is about thirty miles northwest of the Rhine-Marne Canal, where some Americans were taken prisoner by the Germans last November.

Menace to Metz

     The great German fortress of Metz is only about twenty-five miles away from the American lines, and excellent railway communications radiate from this centre in all directions. One parallels the German frontier about ten miles back of it as far as the Rhine-Marne Canal, which it then follows eastward to Strasbourg, and another, only three or four miles back of the border, runs from Metz to Chateau Salins, where it turns east and joins the other road.

     The Americans between the Meuse and the Moselle are in an excellent position to strike at these lines of communication on the north and east, which form the nucleus of a network of strategic railways constructed by the Germans after they had wrested Lorraine from France in 1871. On the other hand, the Americans are well placed to resist any German drive, having behind them some of the best railways in France to Nancy, Toul and Bar-le-Duc, besides the line they have constructed themselves.

     The heights of the Meuse east of Verdun form the watershed of this region and extend like a wall as far as Les Eparges, whence broken masses rise until St. Mihiel is reached. Here the Germans in August 1914 pushed their way across the Meuse and occupied a small section of ground in a bend in the river, which they fortified and have held ever since despite their defeat on the Marne and subsequent attempts to dislodge them.

Scene of Severe Fighting

     Some of the severest fighting of the war occurred in this region, around Nancy, at the time of the battle of the Marne. The Germans, having invaded Lorraine in three directions, from Metz, Sarbruck and Strasbourg, attacked Nancy from the east, but were finally defeated on the heights north of the Rhine-Marne Canal, known as the Grande Couronne. Another division, coming up from Alsace, captured St. Die and Lunéville and threatened Nancy from the south, but a French counter offensive drove the Huns back to their present positions.

     There has been little fighting in this sector since 1914. Occasional attempts to narrow the St. Mihiel salient by attacks both on the north and south met only partial success. At one time the French were close to Pagny and were throwing shells into the outlying forts of Metz, but they again withdrew to Pont-a-Mousson on the Moselle. From this point to the Meuse heights the base of the salient is about twenty-two miles long.

     The ground along the southern edge from the Meuse to Pont-a-Mousson is hilly, the region occupied by the Americans forming a sort of gap between the heights around Verdun and the Vosges mountains on the southeast. Through this gap General Pershing may open a path to the Rhine. Through it the Germans poured in 1870, taking Metz and trapping Napoleon further north at Sedan.

     With 300,000 men General Pershing could hold nearly the whole southern edge of the St. Mihiel salient from its apex to Pont-a-Mousson, a distance of about twenty-three miles, reckoning the usual force of ten thousand men to the mile. But it is evident that the position held is much smaller than this, because the great majority of his force has not yet had sufficient training. All that has been officially stated so far is that the sector occupied by the Americans begins northwest of Toul and runs eastward  for a few miles.

     This of course is only a beginning. Of the 471 miles of the western front, the Belgians are holding sixteen miles, the British one hundred and three and the French three hundred and fifty three. As the American forces increase they doubtless will take over more of the French front, that being the most practical way of using General Pershing’s army most efficiently. There has been idle talk here that part of the new forces might be sent to Flanders or even to Italy, but most critics consider such a division of command inadvisable.