Foreword
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sual experiences in the thrilling scenesof 1918 which marked a momentous andnotable journey by twelve newspapermen under most favorable auspices andthe escort of the British Government, the, €3 writer does not attempt to dignify hisproduction by calling it a book or himself an author. Norhas he the vanity to predict for it general circulation orcurrency. Not for one moment does he harbor the thoughtthat untold thousands avidly await its appearance, antici-pating that it is to contain wonderful World War secretsor will seek to solve the many vexatious problems arisingout of that great conflict. On the contrary, it is a tale toldby a newspaper publisher whose arm ts to collect a few of theoutstanding things he saw and wrote about while abroad,and talked of when he returned home. Primarily, kith andkin were first and foremost in his mind, and wf the recordof his experiences and observations in the terrific, crashingdays which brought an end to the most cruel and awful warin history, interests or enlightens those for whom itscompilation is intended, he will feel himself fully justifiedfor time taken in writing his humble effort, ** All of whichhe saw and a part of which he was.”When events herein recorded were occurring Germany wascharged with monstrous outrages, with vandalism andbrutalities; and Allies and Allied sympathizers sought towreak vengeance upon her unfortunate head. Time maysoften, and history correct, reports made in the heat andbitterness of war at its zenith, when such aspersions wereuttered. Three and a half years have elapsed since hostilities ceased, but solemn pledges made by Americans and theAllies, that never again would they buy anything made inGermany, have been broken, and every country is nowseeking eagerly to re-establish former trade relations.In his own way, too, the writer will tell the part, as heobserved it, which American boys played in a great world |fight under west European skies, where their deeds of heroism —were almost as countless as the stars themselves, and where,as one chronicler of that day wrote: “* Millions of men have |stood tmmovable or have pushed forward with couragewhich is greater than that required to face death. Deathis merely a part of the hideousness of war—the part which |has made a cemetery of each hillside in Eastern France.” |Q‘** The thing ts unimaginable—the sights that shock thebrain, the scent of poisonous gases, the thin, sharp sound of |flying fragments of steel, the whistle of shells, increasing |rapidly in volume, until with deafening noise there comesthe explosion—all tend to tear down the will to withstand,and to destroy the will to advance.” ‘** Under such conditions men do not pause to make smallcalculations; they act by virtue of that which is eitherinbred or inherent. Their fears are terrific, and yet theypush these aside, trample over them and attain the heightsof ideal courage.” In all. history can be found no other three months so |epochal, so fraught with mighty happenings. Never before _was it vouchsafed to a little band of civilian observers likeours to be at the very storm center of events in the most |crucial period of a war, the greatest of all wars. On our |arrival in Liverpool, news came that United States troops —had taken St. Mihiel; French and Americans had attackedin the Argonne; Bulgaria had signed an armistice and |surrendered, while soon afterward Kaiser Wilhelm with- —drew from battle fronts, where in desperation he had gone |to rally in person his retreating army, and returning to —Berlin, “ sulked in his tent.’ There were rumors that he — refused to leave Berlin and that death to him was preferableto surrender. Also, there were hints at suicide. In theinterim of our arrival in Liverpool and return to Londonon the night of November 10, fighting had been the mostterrific,the most awful in the history of a world which had stoodaghast. But the mighty hordes of Germany, with the vaunted,impenetrable Hindenburg line, began to yield, the shell ofCentral Europe tottered and crumbled, and on November 9the Kaiser abdicated and the day following fled to Hol-land. Next day the Armistice was signed. So the newspaper group had seen the battle fronts fromBelgium down through Eastern France, a long, black stripof ruin from one to forty miles wide, had seen war in itsfiercest activities and in its cataclysmic finish. When in New York in late November, their mission ful-filled, the little band of Editorial pilgrims bade each othera fond adieu, with a God-be-with-you-till-we-meet-again, it ended THE GREAT ADVENTURE—which,in the writer's life, remains the supreme event or experrencewhose friendships and glories are destined to enrich,brighten and gladden his memory down to the day when thesummons shall come for him to pass on.
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