Pvt. W.T. Beasley Write of His Experiences Just Before Armistice Was Signed, April 25, 1919

From The Independent, Elizabeth City, N.C., April 25, 1919

A Columbia, N.C., Boy Saw Real Fighting. . . Private W.T. Beasley was in Thick of It When the Armistice Was Signed

I have been thinking for some time of writing a letter to you. I am a Columbia, N.C. boy and have lots of friends there and I cannot write to them all so I take this method of letting them hear from me if it doesn’t take too much space in your paper.

I will tell of the last days of battle. I have been over here about eight months and have been up against some pretty tough scraps. We were in the front line trenches on the Vosges mountains the last of September. We left from there and came to the Verdun front, one of the most famous fronts of the world war. We marched through town after town that was torn and ruins by the Huns. We marched through the shell-torn city of St. Mihiel, the place where just a month or two before the Yankee boys showed the Huns what they were. We finally reached Verdun where we spent a few days in the largest dugout I ever saw. One of them would hold over 500 men. We were in support of the 322^nd Infantry and on the evening of the 9^th of November we left our position and went up and relieve the 322^nd in their front lines in an old field, through an awful artillery fire. Our platoon leader was wounded and several of the men were killed and wounded that night in our company. We spent the night of November 10^th in the old German front line trenches and at 6 o’clock on the morning of the 11^th we went over the top.

Just after we left the trenches the Germans laid an awful barrage. I was in the front wave and as soon as we were through the artillery barrage the Boche opened up on us with machine guns. We were in an awful position.

The heavy barrage was slowly creeping up on us from the rear and the machine guns in front of us so there was only one thing for us to do and that was to continue our advance, for it would mean death to stop or go back through the barrage. We advanced about a mile and at 11 o’clock when things were looking pretty bad for some one we were in a hundred yards of the German reserve line trench.

In 30 minutes we would have taken the trench, but about that time the good news reached us that Germany had got enough and had signed the armistice. Believe me, we were a happy bunch of boys. 

We stayed there for a few days and then marched back to Nesle, France, where we are now. We were on the hike 17 days. We are now at Nesle and looking forward to the happy days when we will reach the grand old U.S.A. and home.

Wishing my country many happy years of peace and prosperity, I am,

Pvt. W.T. Beasley

Co. A, 321^st Infantry, 81^st Division