The eleventh day was one to remember. At dusk we pulled into the little town of Maisongoutte. Since

we’d been on the road for almost two weeks, the regimental commander took pity on us and let us sleep in

houses. This proved to be a disastrous mistake.

            The Jumper called me in and told me I would have the honor of leading the regiment with my “point”

platoon. Whenever you’re told you have the honor of doing anything in the Army, it’s the equivalent of being

kissed by the Godfather on both cheeks.

            The “point” is probably the most dangerous job in the world. It’s also the easiest to understand. One

man with a rifle walks right down the white line in the middle of the road until he is shot at. He and the men immediately behind him are meant to draw enemy fire, thus exposing the German positions. The regiment

slowly builds up behind him in numbers until there are 5,000 men on the road.

            Gus Kyle had come to me first thing in the morning and told me that since everybody else had trench

foot, he would take the “point.” No volunteering, no by your leave, sir. Just “I’ll take the point.” I didn’t argue.

            As soon as we left the houses in the morning, an “88” shell fell just short of my platoon. I chased

the men out into the open field and the next shell landed on the near side of our platoon. I think we were the

only platoon in the regiment to have no casualties that morning. The shells walked right down the main street

of the town causing unbelievable havoc and casualties. We had two platoon sergeants killed that day —

Lawson Bynum and Mike Hawkins.

            It was obvious that the shelling wasn’t going to back up, so I followed the route chasing

stretcher-bearers out into the open to help. It was good for my ego because they paid attention to my

threats on their lives with an entrenching tool. Jack Scannell and Bill Hughes spotted the German artillery

forward observer in a nearby tower. They fired in unison and both received credit for the kill. I was told

later that the colonel’s orderly dug a foxhole near the 88.  He called artillery in, by radio, on his location.

The orderly survived, but the artillery wiped out the 88.

            After the initial fear of leading the regiment was over, I felt like King Kong—total freedom! Nobody

was going to challenge me for this “honor.” So, for the first time in my life, I became quite cheeky. The Jumper

would send the word up by word of mouth to “push the point faster.” I would send the word back,

“If you want it pushed faster, come up and push it yourself.” No takers!

            Our plan was that sergeants Mike Magera and Santos Garcia and myself would roll over with the

first shot, strip off our pack and get up running with only a rifle to try to outflank the snipers.

            By four in the afternoon, we’d been fired on six times without casualties. The three of us were pretty

tired from our sprints up the hill in addition to just walking 16 miles. Also the diarrhea was taking its toll

on us.  At about 4:10 we were fired on again.  After completing our sprint to the left of the road, I told

Magera and Garcia to keep going on the left and I would run across the road and try to surprise them from

the right side. Apparently the Germans didn’t see me cross the road because directly in front of me,

about 30 feet away, was a German looking around a tree up the road. I raised my sniper’s rifle without

the scope and pulled the trigger. The safety was on! I had never fired it before. After what seemed an

eternity, I got the safety off and pulled the trigger. It was very disconcerting to see the German still

standing and still looking up the road. I fired again and he still didn’t move. After the third time, he

 slowly walked away. Gus Kyle, our lead scout, said he found him later and I had apparently hit him

several times.