Front matter
Reading edition
NEW YORK
HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY
1920
Copyright, 1920
By
HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY
TO
PAT
GATTS
BRADY
SNOW
NEDDY
BILL
NICK
HARRY
JERRY
and
THE REST
THIS BOOK
is
DEDICATED
TABLE OF CONTENTS
I. BOURMONT—COMPANY A
II. GONCOURT—THE DOUGHBOYS
III. RATTENTOUT—THE FRONT
IV. GONDRECOURT—THE ARTILLERY
V. ABAINVILLE—THE ENGINEERS
VI. MAUVAGES—THE ORDNANCE
VII. VERDUN—THE FRENCH
VIII. CONFLANS—PIONEERS, M. P.’s AND OTHERS
FOREWORD
To M. D. M. and M. H. M:
My dears,
These letters were all written for you; scratched down on odds and ends of writing paper, in a rare spare moment at the canteen; at night, at my billet, by candle-light; in the mornings, perched in front of Madame’s fireplace with my toes tucked up on an ornamental chaufrette foot-warmer. Why were they never sent? Simply because all letters mailed from France in those days, must of course pass under the eyes of the Censor. And as the Censor was likely to be a young man who sat opposite you at the mess-table, it meant that one mustn’t say the things one could, and one couldn’t say the things one would. So, after my first fortnight over there I decided to write my letters to you just as I would at home, putting down everything I saw and thought and did, quite brazenly and shamelessly, and then keep them,—under lock and key if need be,—until I could give them to you in person.
Written with the thought of you in my mind, these letters are first of all for you, and after that for whoever they may concern, being a true record of one girl’s experience with the A. E. F. in France during the Great War.