HELD THE LINE FOR DAYS
In all the history of the Marine Corps there is no such battle as that
one in Belleau Wood. Fighting day and night without relief, without
sleep, often without water, and for days without hot rations, the
marines met and defeated the best divisions that Germany could throw
into the line.
The heroism and doggedness of that battle are unparalleled. Time after
time officers seeing their lines cut to pieces, seeing their men so
dog-tired that they even fell asleep under shellfire, hearing their
wounded calling for the water they were unable to supply, seeing men
fight on after they had been wounded and until they dropped unconscious;
time after time officers seeing these things, believing that the very
limit of human endurance had been reached, would send back messages to
their post command that their men were exhausted. But in answer to this
would come the word that the line must hold, and, if possible, those
lines must attack. And the lines obeyed. Without water, without food,
without rest, they went forward--and forward every time to victory.
Companies had been so torn and lacerated by losses that they were hardly
platoons, but they held their lines and advanced them. In more than one
case companies lost every officer, leaving a Sergeant and sometimes a
Corporal to command, and the advance continued.
After thirteen days in this inferno of fire a captured German officer
told with his dying breath of a fresh division of Germans that was about
to be thrown into the battle to attempt to wrest from the marines that
part of the wood they had gained.
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