Leader of Men

Leader of Men

By Lee Strong

Sixth Army (French) Headquarters, France

August 1917

Major General Jean Degoutte ignored the knock on his office door. America had entered the Great War five months ago. The German submarine blockade of the North Atlantic had been broken by Yankee disdain for the niceties of war. Fresh troops were pouring into France. Many of them were attached to his own French Sixth Army and it was his responsibility to plan their most efficient and effective use.

The knock returned. He frowned over the papers before him. Someone had no sense of the importance of his work.

The knock came again, this time very loudly. Irritated, he kept his eyes on his work, but shouted, “I am busy! I will attend to other affairs in the morning!”

The knocking ceased. He returned to his calculations as to how many divisions of Americans he could divert to rebuild French towns and railroads.

The door opened. Sacre bleu! The impertinence! He looked up.

It was young Captain Jacques Theriere, son of the famous Member of Parliament and Degoutte’s personal aide. He was accompanied by some Yankee gorilla in the uniform of a cavalry colonel. Degoutte’s face darkened, his mouth opened….

“Your pardon, Monsieur le General, but the honor of France will not permit a delay until morning. You must attend to this issue immediately.” Theriere’s handsome face was impassive but the brittle timbre of his voice conveyed deeply felt passion. “There are Allied soldiers trapped as a result of your orders. It is imperative that you personally direct their rescue.”

Degoutte’s eyes bulged. His face went red and white alternately. He dropped his pen in disbelief at young Theriere’s audacity and, worse, his nonsense. “’Personally direct their rescue’?!” he shouted. “I am a Major General in the Army of France! I direct an entire army of one hundred thousand men! I do not ‘personally direct’ the rescue of some lost patrol! That is a job for a captain! Or a lieutenant! Is that understood, Captain?!”

Theriere looked back impassively. He opened his mouth to speak….

The Yankee stepped forward.

“Alright, Jackie. We tried this the easy way. Hey, General. If the caliber of Jackie’s argument don’t impress you, how about the caliber of my argument?” He pointed a heavy revolver at Degoutte’s nose. The general’s spine turned to ice. The gun barrel appeared to be the size of a railroad tunnel. “Come with us. Now!” Theriere rolled his eyes heavenward but nodded his head in agreement.

“And who are you?” squeaked the outraged general.

“Colonel Billy Byrne, commander of the United States Subterrene Cavalry,” snarled the powerfully built cowboy. The gun barrel never wavered.

Degoutte blanched. The Wrecker of Berlin! Defiance vanished. He meekly followed orders to come with the intruders.

The pair marched Degoutte out of his office, downstairs and – surprisingly – into the basement of his own headquarters building. There, to his further astonishment, waited a cylindrical steel monster, a prospector in American English. A gaping hole in the basement wall revealed how the Americans had entered his well guarded headquarters. The machine’s powerful engines were already humming. More brown clad soldiers guarded the open hatch. Degoutte was marched thru. He noted in passing the name Abigail Prim engraved on the outer hull. Once inside, the soldiers pulled the hatch to and dogged it shut. Byrne motioned Degoutte to a jump seat in the rear of the control compartment. He barely had time to strap himself in before the drivers revved the purring motors. The war machine twisted on its axis and dived into the Earth. Byrne obviously didn’t care what damage the powerful machine might do to the building it left behind. Any crashing sounds were muted by the layers of earth behind them.

Underway, courage began seeping back into Degoutte’s liver. He drew himself up and looked at Byrne. The American colonel looked back, fire in his eyes. Degoutte quickly switched his attention to the young Frenchman, his handsome red and blue uniform incongruous among the Yankees clad in drab brown.

“Captain,” he began in French. “You are a party to kidnapping a superior….”

“Speak English,” ordered Byrne in that language. His gun was now holstered; his temper wasn’t. “My French ain’t great.”

Neither is his English, Degoutte silently agreed. He switched languages. “Colonel Byrne, you have kidnapped a superior officer. I demand to know why.” His voice was as firm and outraged as he dared make it.

The Yankee snorted.

“Yer mistook, sir. The Abbie is giving you a ride to the frontlines. Yer about to rescue a platoon of American soldiers that you abandoned to the Germans a few days ago.”

“What are you talking about?” contradicted Degoutte. “I have no idea what you are speaking of.”

Byrne snorted more loudly. He searched the French officer’s face. “Well, I’ll be….” He paused and started again. “Sir, if yer lying, yer doing a good job of it. After the war, maybe you can go into politics. Allow me to refresh yer memory. A couple of days ago, you personally ordered Major General Robert Lee Bullard to send out a patrol from the village of Fismes toward Fismette.” Byrne mangled the French names but Degoutte made out what he was saying. “A 150 man company was trapped on the wrong side of the Vesle river without food. They took refuge in a cave that yer engineers cut into a chalk hill before bad guy Colonel Bruchmueller ran yer guys out. General Bullard personally got them out of the trap the next night. You remember what happened next?”

Degoutte paled but said nothing.

Byrne resumed. “You, Major General Gene Degoutte, personally ordered Bullard to send them back. Back into a known trap that served no military purpose!” The Yankee’s voice was rising in suppressed rage. “Bullard followed yer orders and sent them back. He sent them back to die because an Army has to have discipline. If he hadn’t, you’d ah had him shot and then sent the men to die anyway!” He broke off, gripped by emotion. He took several deep breaths before resuming.

Degoutte opened his mouth to protest the unfairness of it all but Byrne cut him off. “Fortunately, the Germans waited a couple of days to improve their position before they attacked. Bullard had time to report to his boss, General John J. Pershing, and Pershing had time to pull Abbie and me out of the Marne-Aisle offensive. Bullard gave us all the details we needed. We tunneled in the back and pulled our guys out. They’re being transferred somewhere where they don’t have to fight their allies as well as their enemies.”

Byrne sniffed and continued. “By the way, General, Pershing also telegraphed his boss, the President of the Yewnited States of America, and insisted that American soldiers fight under American command from here on out. Yer boss, Field Marshal Foch agreed. Bullard, the Subterrene Cavalry and all other American units are now part of the First United States Army, not the French Sixth Army. Yer own personal contribution to the Allied war effort. Sir.” Byrne’s pronunciation of the honorific turned it into an insult.

Byrne lapsed into silence. For a time, the only conversation was the drivers talking to each other about dead reckoning and seismographic readings, soil resistance, and course corrections. The continuous crunching sound as the prospector drove swiftly thru French soil was muted by the walls of the machine itself.

Since the Yankees hadn’t killed him already – or worse – Degoutte ventured to ask, “What will happen now?”

The Yankee stretched himself before answering. “Well, a lot of guys wanted to just shoot you dead. Me, I thought that was too merciful. But Jackie here had a better idea.” He looked at the young French officer. After a moment, Degoutte did also.

Theriere looked back imperturbably. “Yes, Monsieur le General. It is only appropriate that you should demonstrate what General Bullard and Colonel Byrne should have done. We have located a second cave with conditions closely matching those of the first cave including the imminent approach of the Germans. This cave is currently occupied by a platoon of American volunteers. We are going there now. Once in the cave, you will take command of the detachment and extricate us from the resulting trap. Should you do so, it will refute the American belief that you left their colleagues to die as well as demonstrating your personal bravery, leadership and general élan. Actions speak louder than mere words. Monsieur.” Theriere’s pronunciation of the honorific was impeccably correct – and more wounding than Byrne’s snarls.

The Abigail Prim stopped somewhere under Europe. Soldiers unbuckled their seat belts. The hatch opened. Byrne, Degoutte, Theriere and 8 American soldiers stepped out into the dark recesses of a dimly lit chalk cave typical of the Champagne region. Degoutte sensed rather than saw multiple soldiers around him. Their body language confirmed that Theriere and he were the only Frenchmen present.

“Stand back, General, Colonel,” came another voice. “Abbie’s leaving.”

As he spoke, the prospector dived into the earth, leaving an impressive tunnel behind it. To Degoutte’s surprise, it circled in the solid mineral layer and returned. Its powerful drill moved back and forth. Chalk blocks rained down, filling the tunnel. The sounds of the drill, ear splittingly loud outside the machine itself, receded into the earth.

“General, this way to the front,” rasped Byrne. A powerful hand closed on Degoutte’s arm and guided – or forced – him towards the mouth of the cave. Several American doughboys kept watch from just inside the mouth of the cave. Outside, the false dawn somewhat lit the presently tranquil countryside. Degoutte could see the slope of a hill rolling down from the heights above and behind their position, shell holes marring the terrain. Downhill, a small stream glinted in the slowly brightening light.

Byrne cleared his throat.

“General Degoutte, you are now in command of this detachment. Our forces are a standard American platoon totaling 58 men and officers plus you, me, Captain Theriere and my command first sergeant as attachments. I will act as your executive officer. We know that a sizable force of Germans occupies a position behind the military crest of the hill above us. We know that they have superior numbers and we assume that they are a Sturmabteillung armed with light machine guns, trench mortars and flamethrowers in addition to the usual rifles and grenades. We believe that they will be here shortly after dawn and will be in a position to assault and occupy this cave shortly after that. My assessment is that we cannot defend this cave against a determined assault. That is the situation that we are in.

“Now, sir, what are your orders?” Byrne again lapsed into silence.

Degoutte sensed numerous eyes watching him in the depths of the cave. Numerous witnesses to anything that he said or did. Or failed to do.

He drew a deep breath and began to think. The answer came to him almost at once.

“Colonel Byrne, recall the prospector. We came in on the Abigail Prim and we can exit in the same way.”

“Sorry, sir. That’s not possible. The guys in the original trap had no way to communicate with the outside world and neither do we. They didn’t know that Abbie was coming to rescue them until she showed up.”

Byrne’s face was a blur in the early morning darkness but Degoutte sensed that he wasn’t bluffing or misstating the truth. The Yankee now seemed to be almost supernaturally calm. Well, many men did become calm when death was a certainty.

“And when will the Abigail Prim return for us?” Degoutte’s voice was icy.

“She won’t, sir. Lieutenant McCulloch had orders to report to General Pershing. My guess is that the General will send Abbie back to the Marne.”

Degoutte blew air to express his annoyance. “Very well, then. We shall exit via the tunnel thru which we entered. We can walk to safety.”

“Sorry, sir. That’s not possible either. The Abbie collapsed the tunnel behind her. It will take days of work by sappers or another prospector to reopen the tunnel. The guys in the original trap didn’t have equipment to tunnel their way out and neither do we.”

Degoutte huffed. “Confound it, Byrne. How are we supposed to get out of here?”

The assembled men stirred but their Colonel remained unmoved. “Sir, that is for the General to say. What are your orders?” Degoutte recognized Byrne’s ploy: dumb insolence. The Yankee cowboy was suddenly all professional courtesy but no help. The general again expelled a gust of air in frustration.

Time passed while Degoutte thought. Outside, the early morning light increased as dawn crept over Champagne.

“Ah!” exclaimed Degoutte excitedly. “Byrne, you said that Bullard personally extracted the lost patrol from the original situation. How did he do that?” The Frenchman’s teeth gleamed in a satanic smile.

“Sir, Major General Bullard entered the original cave under the cover of darkness. He timed the German machine gun bursts and led the men out between bursts. He turned the methodical nature of the German military against them.”

“Ah, hah! Very well then. We shall do the same thing.” Degoutte’s dimly lit face glowed with pride.

“Very good, sir. Will you lead the way? As Major General Bullard did?” inquired Byrne. The Yankee cowboy could be surprisingly suave when he tried.

Degoutte sniffed. “Certainly not. That is a job for a private soldier, perhaps commanded by a corporal or sergeant.”

Byrne volunteered, “I can lead the way, sir. Sergeant….”

“Certainly not, Colonel! I said a private or corporal or sergeant!” The general’s voice was louder than it needed to be.

Byrne quietly said, “Very well, sir. Sergeant Burton, you know the drill. Take your squad back to our lines. When you reach safety, fire two green Very shells. We’ll follow later.”

“Yes, sir,” responded the voice that had cautioned Degoutte about the Abigail Prim’s departure. “First squad, with me.”

Eight men glided past the officers and guards gathered around the commander and out into the French morning. They paused at the mouth of the cave to examine the valley and the heights above them in the gathering light. After a minute, they eased out of the trap and slowly down the valley. Slow motion is less likely to attract the human eye than rapid movements.

But stealth is not invisibility.

When the patrol reached a point about halfway down the slope, a shot rang out. One Yankee collapsed and lay still. The others leaped into a convenient shell hole. A barrage of rifle fire erupted. Degoutte saw the impacts around the shell hole.

“What happened?” shouted Byrne over the mounting racket.

“Sergeant Burton’s down, sir. He’s not moving, sir,” came a quavering voice.

“Case? That you? You stay down until we can get you boys out!” ordered Byrne. He swung around to face Degoutte. “Sir, what are your orders?

“Attack! Break out! We must escape this trap!” screeched Degoutte. Perhaps he intended to speak in an officer’s command voice. To Theriere, who was more familiar with French practice than the Americans, his tone sounded like a screech.

“Very well, sir.” Byrne turned to his men and began rapping out orders. One squad jumped forward, pivoted and began firing uphill to suppress the as yet unseen enemy. Two more squads exited the cave, one on each side, and formed step ladders with rifles and bodies. Two more squads climbed rapidly uphill on the ladders thus formed. The platoon, huge by French standards, had one more squad in the cave but Byrne seemed to be too absorbed in the developing battle to issue more orders.

There had been a moment of relative silence between the pinning down of Burton’s patrol and the second squad’s suppressing fire. That fire was answered by a ragged thunder of guns from above the men trapped in the shallow valley. Rifles barked, scores of them. Machine guns stuttered death. And then trench mortars began their thump of destruction. Explosions crashed down slope where Burton’s men waited for rescue. Screams rent the air. Dust thrown up by bombs masked the carnage.

Everywhere, brown clad bodies were falling to the ground, sliding down hill, jerking and then collapsing. The second squad disintegrated in a curtain of bullets and grenade explosions. A blast of light and hissing roar above the cave signaled use of a flamethrower. A pile of smoldering rags that had been a man crashed to the ground in front of Degoutte.

Before the general could absorb that horror, a shower of German stick grenades rained down nearby. Their explosions pushed him backwards. He tripped, fell heavily against a chalky wall, and slumped to the ground.

Another grenade bounced to the ground and rolled into his face. He squeezed his eyes shut.

After a minute, he opened them. The grenade lay quietly in front of him. A dud!

Before he could contemplate his good fortune, Byrne seized him by his shoulders and yanked him upright. “Sir! Are you alright? The counterattacks have been wiped out! Most of our guys are killed! And there’s a fresh column of Germans approaching to cut us off!” He spun Degoutte around, releasing him with one hand, and pointing.

Degoutte looked out to see a column of the enemy marching carefully over the crest of the heights into the valley before the cave. The Sun had not yet fully illuminated the scene but the grey of enemy uniforms was clear enough. They moved in parade formation, utterly confident that nothing would stop them. The brown uniforms lying on the valley floor were clear enough as well. Occasional gunfire still echoed but the worst was over.

“Sir, what are your orders?” demanded Byrne.

The general sighed. His head, shaken by explosions, sank to his chest. He whispered, “There is nothing else to do but surrender. It is the only way to save our lives.”

“Sir, yes sir. Please lead the way. We will follow you,” stated Byrne quietly. He turned to his troops. “Men, prepare to leave the cave.” Around him, the few remaining doughboys shook themselves into march formation.

Degoutte raised his hands and walked out of the trap. He walked quickly to the approaching German formation, avoiding the American bodies as he moved. There was no point in delaying the inevitable. The first officer that he saw was actually a noncommissioned Oberfeldwebel leading the column forward.

“Sergeant, I am Major General Jean Degoutte. I surrender myself and my men to you. I request the courtesies of war.”

The German stopped and looked at the French general curiously. Like many Europeans, he was multilingual. After a long moment of staring, he said, “Very funny, Pierre. Speak to the Major. Please excuse us.” He gestured toward the rear of the column and resumed his march down the sloping hillside.

Baffled by the German reaction, Degoutte looked around. The Boche were marching past, each turning to look at him disdainfully as they moved. A German major came into view accompanied by an American private, pistols in each hand. Degoutte realized that several Germans were carrying stretchers with wounded men, both American and German, on them.

“Major, what is going on here? I am attempting to surrender and have been directed to you by your sergeant.” His arms sagged as his battered brain struggled to understand the situation.

The German officer stopped in turn. “Very well, sir. If you wish to surrender, you must do so to this American private….”

“Acting Corporal, major,” interjected the rawboned Yankee with yet another of America’s strange accents. His insignia were those of an American private.

“Pardon me, Acting Corporal,” said the German to the American with exaggerated courtesy. He turned back to Degoutte. “If you wish to surrender, this Acting Corporal will take you into custody. He has promised us fair treatment and I believe that he will extend the same to you.” He paused. His eyebrow quirked upward. “Altho I was not aware that France and America were at odds.” His thin smile was very cruel.

“We’re not,” rasped Byrne’s voice from behind the Frenchman. “The general was having his little joke. You’ll get fair treatment, tho. Acting Corporal, is it?”

“Yessir, colonel. Acting Corporal Alvin York, 82^nd Division.” The lanky Tennessean smiled. “Scuse me for not saluting, sir, but I have to keep this fellow under guard.” He made a small gesture with one gun. The other remained centered on the major’s head.

“Understood, son,” grinned Byrne. “It looks like you captured the whole German army.”

“Nossir, I only have one hundred and thirty two.”

“Good job for a day’s work. Lieutenant Malloy and his platoon will take over your prisoners. You guide them to your brigadier so you get full credit for capturing them. Sawtelle, signal the men.”

“Yessir. Much obliged, sir,” York stated. “The major has been a real gentleman about this but I was a mite worried about his men getting a bit frisky.”

As they spoke, Byrne’s command sergeant shrilled a war whistle. Across the valley, “dead” bodies raised themselves up, dusted themselves off and assembled into platoon formation. An American lieutenant from the cave ran his eye quickly over the formation and signaled them to take up guard positions around the German column. With York guiding them, they began marching their prisoners to captivity.

Another American formation appeared from fighting positions dug into the hill above the cave. They began gathering up gear and preparing to move out. Another cowboy lieutenant reported to Byrne.

“Sir, it’ll take a few minutes to recover everything. What are your orders?”

“Good job, Pennington. The general thoroughly enjoyed the show. Didn’t you, sir?” Byrne’s grin was brighter than the morning sun.

The Frenchman’s arms were hanging loosely at his waist. So, it seemed, was his mouth, gaping in astonishment. As the Germans moved away, he recovered himself.

He began screaming at Byrne. The cool morning air blued with profanity in at least three languages. Byrne listened to the performance with a critical ear. It was a pleasure to hear a real expert at work. The muckers of Grand Avenue in Chicago used vividly colorful language every day but they were clearly amateurs compared to the aristocratic European.

When the general paused for breath, Byrne sighed. Business before pleasure as Mr. Hastings would say. “Shut up. Sir. Before I break yer jaw. It was all playacting and training rounds. Lieutenant Pennington’s from Hollywood where they make….”

The threat brought Degoutte back to Earth. “You tricked me! You said that the Germans would attack the cave! You should that we would be wiped out if I didn’t surrender! You said…!”

“Yer mistook, sir. I said that the Germans were camped nearby, that they were coming, and that they would be in a position to attack. I just left out the part about Corporal York having captured and disarmed them first. In the American Army, we train hard but we don’t waste lives just to prove political points.”

Degoutte swelled up like an inflating balloon. Byrne’s face darkened as well. Before either could explode, Captain Theriere held up his left hand for attention. He looked directly into the eyes of his general, ignoring the American colonel.

“Monsieur,” he began in his precise voice. “This training exercise was not some game or prank. We have established that you sent our allies into a trap for no reason except your own arrogance. And we have established that you had no solution to getting out of the trap except surrender to our mutual enemies. These facts completely validate the theory that you are unfit to be a general officer. The honor of France has been sullied by your incompetent actions, your insufferable vanity, your criminal stupidity…!

“More than 100 witnesses know that what I have said is true. Colonel Byrne and his men know it. I know it. Even those captured Germans know it. Most importantly, sir, you know it.

“The question now, sir, is what will you do about this situation?”

With his right hand, he drew a pistol from his belt. “Monsieur le General, this is a German Artillery Model Lugar. If you step into the cave and use it, you will be remembered as having died heroically while leading a rescue party that saved the lives of many Allied soldiers. I will personally attest to your gallantry and bravery. Colonel Byrne and his men have agreed to accept my story. And, should anyone disagree, the physical evidence will support my story.” He held the gun out to his commander.

Degoutte looked at Theriere, at the pistol, at the contemptuous faces surrounding him, at the morning Sun, and at the pistol again. He took it firmly in hand and considered it as if he had never seen such a thing before.

He looked at Byrne again and raised the weapon. “And what is to prevent me from using this gun on you? I will at least have the satisfaction of seeing you die first.”

All around the opponents, Americans raised their rifles, every barrel pointing towards Degoutte. Quickly, they shifted positions, clearing fields of fire. Fingers tightened on triggers….

Byrne ignored his men’s actions. He looked Degoutte in the eye. “I take a lot of killing.”

Degoutte sighed. “I must agree.” He lowered the pistol reluctantly. The dough-boys relaxed – somewhat. “If you gentlemen will excuse me, there is something that I left in the cave that I must recover. Vive le France.”

The circle parted and Major General Jean Degoutte walked back into the trap.

A single shot rang out.

Theriere removed his cap and whispered. “The honor of France has been restored.”

Byrne shook his head. “No, Degoutte paid the price for what he did. The honor of France was never in doubt.”

~Author’s Note~

In a universe where prospectors were never invented, events similar to those described above actually occurred in August and October 1918. In that universe, the outcome was quite different. □