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Upstarts
As I mentioned some chapters back, one of my jobs was to assign observers to
work with specific infantry units and to brief them on the situation before they went
forward; however, in this static situation, there wasn't much briefing to do, and the same
batteries were sending observers to the same infantry companies. So when they got a
replacement lieutenant, A Battery simply sent him up the first time with an experienced
FO to introduce and show him around, then sent him up on a regular rotation.
During the day he had adjusted some fire missions, including one rather close in
front of their position. Sometime in the night, noises were heard near the same place, and
he crawled forward to listen and locate. Then he called for fire at the same spot,
neglecting to mention that he was lying only about 25 yards away. A more experienced
man might not have had that much confidence in the accuracy of a 105 howitzer, which is
notoriously erratic. And between the two firings the weather, which affects the way a
shell moves through the air, had changed.
For whatever reason, at least one round of the volley fell short, and our observer
was killed by "friendly fire." After that, our fire direction center started asking more
questions before firing such close missions.
There seemed to be considerable leisure time in the S-2 business, and I did some
exploring in Gravelotte. Of course there wasn't much to explore: there were fewer than a
hundred buildings in town, all of them deserted except for a few American soldiers who
occasionally darted out from house to house. However, there were some surprising spots
of interest. The first, near the north end of town, was the museum. It was a small
museum, located in a two-story building the size of a house, and it contained trophies of
war.
Gravelotte, "Bloody" Gravelotte, it seemed, was famous as the scene of a great
battle of the Franco-Prussian War. There were pictures: photographs, paintings, and
lithographs of the battle and of personalities involved. There were articles of equipment
and armament used in that war. And a lot of dust. The present war had treated the
museum kindly; the building had taken little damage from the shelling except, of course,
that all windows were blown out and there was some cracked glass in the display cases.
Further down the street, across the east-west road, which one dashed across
because the fort sighted right along it, was the church. The steeple had been hit, and the
dislodged bell had fallen straight down and lay on the floor blocking the entrance to the
church proper. All the glass was broken out of the windows there, too, as I believe was
true of every building in town.
But the most marvelous place of all was down at the end of the street, the last
building in the village. I looked in through the broken window and beheld an astonishing
sight. It was the storeroom of a glazier's shop, and it was stuffed full of rack after rack of
pristine, unbroken window glass.
What a treasure trove! As soon as the war moved on so the people could return to
their shattered homes, the owner of all this glass would surely be the most important man
in Gravelotte!
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