. Memories of the "411th" Telegraph Battalion in the World War here and "over there" .... and some machine-gun fire, while we gatlienMi in thestragglers of the many broken German the Meuse Canal. Our mo\emeiit was now becoming fan-shaped, with our rushing divi-sions on our left sjireading out into the sector of the French Fourth Army,and the divisions on our right gradually forming their front on the bankof the curving Meuse. Of course the oth, on the extreme right, was thefirst in position for a crossing. It had to pass over the Meuse Canalafter it hail passed over the rive
. Memories of the "411th" Telegraph Battalion in the World War here and "over there" .... and some machine-gun fire, while we gatlienMi in thestragglers of the many broken German the Meuse Canal. Our mo\emeiit was now becoming fan-shaped, with our rushing divi-sions on our left sjireading out into the sector of the French Fourth Army,and the divisions on our right gradually forming their front on the bankof the curving Meuse. Of course the oth, on the extreme right, was thefirst in position for a crossing. It had to pass over the Meuse Canalafter it hail passed over the river. By 1 a. m. of the .Srd a ])atrol wasacross the Meuse, but was checked at tlie canal by machine guns, whichalso stopped some engineers who were trying to liuild a footbridge over the river, but the artillery joined in witli tin ichine guns and forced them to dig in on the l)ank of the canal. However, the evening was yetyoung. Two footljridges were put oxer the canal before morning, butwhen small columns tried to rush across all their efforts were sweptback bv well-directed Enti-ance to Verdun. Verdun. Dead Mans Hill. 4. Barli Avire entanglements near Etain. .5. Front line dressing- station near Verdun. 6. Verdun—Signal Corps dump on left. .METSf^-ARGONXE 119 At nine-thirty the next morning the army sent word that the cross-ing must be effected, as the whole movement of the army depended uponit. Therefore it was not in order to wait on darkness. We must get towork immediately. We should try at many points, and at some pointswe were bound to succeed. At Clery-le-Petite we started to make a bridgeof pontoons, but the pontoons were smashed by shells almost as fast asthey were put in the water; and, although the bridge was made, therewas no crossing it against the hurricane of fire. A little later two bat-talions, attacking by sur])rise without artillery preparation, gained acrossing at Brieulles, and about the same time another battalion, the menused improvised rafts,
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