HISTORY
of
THE 306th Field Artillery
The 306th Field Association
Artillerymen As School Teachers
Regimental Fun and Frolic
THE pioneer
association of American soldiers' friends and relatives
was that formed by the 306th Field Artillery. The
recreation committee of non-commissioned officers
prepared announcements and invitations in February, 1918,
for a mass meeting of those interested.
This meeting was held in the Washington Irving High
School on March 12th. The chaplain presided and
introduced a program of entertainment by the men of the
regiment, which was followed by a talk by the adjutant,
Captain E. E. Nelson, who represented the Colonel and
outlined the possibilities of an organization. The
chaplain then announced the plans for action and invited
a general discussion after which all all those present
were registered and it was decided that the soldiers
committee should be empowered to select a civilian
committee.
The outcome was the existence of an organization that
rendered to the regiment a service of inestimable value
throughout our campaign; a band of enthusiastic people
who held mass meetings, raised money, extended messages
of sympathy to families of our honored dead, and in every
possible way served as a clearing house for information
and a rallying point for patriotism and regimental
loyalty.
Our Thanksgiving dinner and New Year's dinner were
transformed into feasts by two gifts of five hundred
dollars and one thousand dollars respectively, received
in November and December. Funds were also raised at a
Hippodrome performance for a big children's party in New
York at Christmas time, 1919.
The sentimental
significance of this definite link between the fighters
of the regiment and their homes grew greater and greater
during our stay in France. The work done by Mr. Hollister
V. Schenck, president, Miss Olga Schulhof and Miss Anna
Ackerman, secretaries, and the other members of the
executive committee was something for which the regiment
will always be grateful.
The last undertaking of the Civilians Association was the
thorough preparation made for our joyous welcome home,
every detail of which was planned in advance. The
development of the various battery and company veterans'
associations was due in great measure to the battery and
company sections of our home association.
In all of America's
varied kinds of home service during the great war there
was no finer example of what it means to "Keep the
Home Fires Burning, " than that rendered by the
306th Field Artillery Association.
THE educational classes held in the 306th Field Artillery
came at three different epochs in our history. First
there were the Camp Upton classes in French and English,
with enrollment of three hundred divided into twenty
different classes. The Roberts system of instruction in
elementary English was employed and a schedule of daily
lessons was given during drill periods to those "
whose knowledge of English was so deficient as to hinder
them in the performance of military duties." Great
progress was made in many individual cases and suitable
certificates were granted at the close of the twelve
weeks course. The interest in French grew greater as our
time for overseas service approached.
The French courses were continued at Camp de Souge when
the need for a knowledge of French became more keenly
evident. After a period of several months' education in
the art of dodging shells, academic work was again
resumed with the added purpose of killing time while
waiting for a transport. Gradually the entire A. E. F.
became transformed into more or less of a great
educational institution and our "university"
kept pace with the development. At Dancevoir there were
three classes with fifty enrolled and at Noyen there were
nine classes in English, Arithmetic, French, Shorthand,
Business Law, and Finance, with 162 enrolled. The
interest in these classes was so great that the schedule
was twice changed to allow for more time to be spent on
the work.
Sergeant Frank Mantinband of the Depot Brigade at Camp
Upton, one of the best friends our regiment ever had, was
the originator of our scholastic achievement. The Y. M.
C. A. has always acted as administrator and has furnished
equipment. Some 306th Field Artillery men who have served
as "professors" are Morris, Arthur, Goggin,
Barry, Wyman, Prender-gast, Routh, Lippner, Field, Adler,
Popper, Hirschkopf, Krause, Sanchez, Hamann, Kay,
Spencer, Brennecke, Flynn, Goerlich, Schum. Miss Marion
Dean, a " Y " girl, was an instructor who made
the English class popular at Noyen and Captain Gordon and
Lieutenant Priest lectured on Business Law.
We were proud to
have fifteen of our men selected to study in British and
French universities from March to July, 1919. This was a
much larger number than from any other organization in
the Division.
PARAGRAPH 461/2 Army Regulations avers that a committee
of non-commissioned officers, one representing each
organization in a regiment, may be appointed to serve
under the direction of the regimental chaplain, in
supervising recreation and amusements. In accordance with
that idea such a committee was organized in October,
1917, and was active throughout the regimental career.
Its members were elected by popular vote or appointed by
battery councils. The following men have served on it:
Battery A-Sergeant Franklin, Corporal Feldman; B-Sergeant
Dyson, Corporal Weil; C-Sergeant Dann, Sergeant Sheehan;
D--Corporal Reisenbach, Corporal Ives; E-Sergeant
Sheridan, Sergeant Le Voy (killed in action August 18,
1918), Sergeant Hewitt; F-Sergeant McElroy, Headquarters
Company-Sergeant Willis, Corporal Bartanek, Sergeant
Levi, Corporal Hermann; Sup-ply Company-Sergeant
Phillips, Corporal Flynn; Medical Detachment-Sergeant
Derby, Sergeant Black.
Weekly meetings were held while activities were being
organized, and after that meetings were held at frequent
intervals whenever need arose. Many open meetings have
been held, attended by larger groups of leaders in
athletics and entertainments.
At the outset managers were appointed in each
organization for each branch of sport or entertainment,
so that at times there have been as many as fifteen
different managers in one battery and as many as seventy
managers throughout the regiment promoting twenty
different activities such as boxing, wrestling, baseball,
basketball, soccer, track, football, glee club,
orchestra, dramatics and vaudeville, regimental
newspaper, pool and billiards, chess and checkers, volley
ball, etc.
The rugby football managers were first in action for our
regiment formed in football time. Only enough clothes
could be obtained for a regimental team but we were well
represented at Camp Upton in a few contests with other
regiments. Lieutenant Bomeisler of Yale fame was our
coach. More than a year later, in December 1918, when we
were at Dancevoir, France, another call for football men
was issued for the 77th Division team. We were proud to
have three men on the squad of the divi-sional team which
won many games throughout the A. E. F.
Our regimental basketball league, started in January,
1918, was one of the best at Camp Upton. After a long
schedule of spirited contests played on the Y. M. C. A.
and K. of C. courts, Headquarters Company won the trophy
in a thrilling finish by winning the final game on April
1, 1918.
A regimental team, captained by Corporal Romano, played a
few games at Upton and also in the Y. M. C. A. gymnasium
at Latracey, France. As a rule, however, basketball
courts were unknown in France and a schedule of games was
out of the question.
A boxing trophy was presented by the officers of the
regiment in March, 1918, and won by Battery F. Shortly
after, Private Schroeder of Headquarters Company and
Sergeant Blake of Battery E represented us in the
divisional tournament, Schroeder winning the divisional
featherweight championship.
Battery E won the
cup at Souge, France in June, 1918, and Headquarters
Company won it at Dance-voir, France, in January, 1919.
In the Le Mans area, just before our home going, we were
represented in several bouts at the 77th Division
tournament. Blake of E and Murphy and Gatyds of B won
championships of the brigade in their weights. Three out
of the six brigade champions were 306th Field Artillery
men.
The first track and field meet in which our regiment
contested was the Camp Upton meet held under the auspices
of the New York Athletic Club on Wednesday, December 5th.
We won third place, out of fifteen. Our winners were
Wallis of F, Hauschild of B, Manson of D, Dwyer of C. In
January, 1918, Panzer and De Brunner of F scored at the
Millrose Athletic Association meet in Madison Square
Garden. Dwyer, McCarthy, Schmidt and Heiz were point
winners in the divisional cross-country run on February
16, 19 18, and on almost every Sunday Dwyer was winning
races for the Mohawk Athletic Club.
At Camp de Souge, France, a regimental inter-battery
track meet was held won by Battery C, and on Memorial Day
and Fourth of July at Bordeaux our regiment had a large
share in the victories won by Camp de Souge over all the
other camps of that base section of France. Dolan of
Battery D won the shotput and Hyder of D, Golden of E and
Dwyer of C and Taggart of Supply Company also carried
away ribbons and medals.
The exploits of our track athletes had a splendid finish
when the artillery won the divisional championship and
the 77th Division won the American embarkation center
championship late in March, 1919. Dolan, Younger, Romano,
Roodenberg, Mc-Carthy and Dwyer were point winners on
March 15th at Parce and McCarthy and Dwyer and Younger at
Le Mans on March 27th, 28th and 29th.
Our famous "Race Horse Mike" Dwyer finished his
military track career by overcoming a tremendous lead and
winning the medley relay for our regimental team on March
15th and by winning the premier event, the eight mile run
at Le Mans.
The severe winter and late spring of 1918 delayed the
baseball season and then when our regimental schedule was
arranged, and about to operate, the rumors and false
starts for France delayed and confused everything. In the
opening game Headquarters Company beat Supply Company
27-8, but the championship never was decided. Battery C
had a team of above average quality and won many informal
games, notably the one from the Depot Brigade by coming
from behind with nine runs in the last two innings. In
Souge there was only one ball ground for the use of ten
thousand men and therefore a regimental team was the only
baseball possibility for us. At Noyen, France, while
waiting for the long delayed transport, many
inter-battery games were played in which Headquarters
Company and Battery F made the best showing. Our
regimental team was also active in that area and won ten
out of fourteen games played.
The entertainment and vaudeville managers of the regiment
were organized in November, 1917. Special programs were
presented at the Artillery Y. M. C. A. and almost every
battery soon had informal shows at least once a week in
the barracks. At the " Brigade Celebration " in
the Upton auditorium each battery and company presented
two special features and the following regimental song
and cheer were introduced:
(Tune: Good-bye Broadway)
We are there with six-inch guns
Sixteen hundred strong,
We will petrify the Huns,
Our howitzers can't shoot wrong.
Hindenburg and three-o-six
Is a cocktail hard to mix,
We'll crash and roar both night and day,-
The shells Of 306 F. A.
(Locomotive yell-starts slow, goes faster and faster to
finish)
3-0-6-F-A, 3-0-6-F-A,
3-0-6-F-A, 3-0-6-F-A, 3--0-6-F-A
Wheest-Boom (imitation of shell)
Howitzer-howitzer-howitzer!
The "Hero Land" show at the Grand Central
Palace and the first mass meeting of the 306th Field
Artillery Friends and Relatives Association, held in
Washington Irving High School auditorium, afforded other
opportunities for our singers and entertainers to show
their worth. Some of the leading entertainers were
Rudolfi, Brower, " Buddy " Childs, Gottlieb,
Witmer, Bob Cohen, Coleman, and Schon.
On board the Leviathan the demand for their services was
so great that they were kept busy continually, especially
for the benefit of the naval officers and the nurses. A
battalion show was put on every week at Camp de Souge in
addition to three regimental vaudeville shows. Rudolfi's
voice seemed fairly to exult in the balmy air of southern
France and he and our band were tremendously popular in
Bordeaux during May and June, 1918.
The band was always most helpful at regimental
entertainments but at the front the chaplain's organ had
to serve as the entire orchestra for our occasional
informal entertainments. At Loromontzey in Lorraine on
August 5th and at La Harazee in the Argonne Forest on
October 25th, two big out-of-door shows were put on for
the whole regiment.
Our band won fame early in our history when it introduced
the 306th Field Artillery March written especially for us
by John Philip Sousa, the world's greatest march
composer. Lieutenant Friedlander's initiative as band
officer was responsible for that honor coming to us.
Lieutenant Sousa waived all compensation connected
therewith. He said that if his effort would enhance the
morale of the regiment and stimulate it to its best
efforts, he felt that it would make him happy and would
be the only compensation needed. The regiment hopes that
its fighting record justifies Sousa's faith in it.
Mr. James E. Kelly, the eminent sculptor, made the cover
design for the published sheet music edition of our
march. It shows a howitzer battery carrying a guidon in
the foreground. The guidon has the regimental " 306
" on it and the whole thing is very effective. Mr.
Kelly is perhaps best known to New Yorkers by his bronze
bas-relief of Washington at Valley Forge on the
Sub-Treasury building on Wall Street.
The music of this
march is built around the old artillery song which goes
as follows:
Over hill over dale, as we hit the dusty trail
And those caissons go rolling along
Up and down, in and out, counter march and left about
And those caissons go rolling along
For it's hi hi hee, the Field Artilleree,
Shout out your numbers loud and strong (3-0-6) (spoken),
Wherever we go, you will always know
That those caissons go rolling along-keep 'em rolling
That those caissons go rolling along.
Battery Ho!
Another regimental song, to the French tune
Madelon:
Three-O-Six, your howitzers won the war.
Three O-Six, we've followed you thru hell.
Argonne wood reechoes back no more
To the crash of six-inch shell.
Now the Vesle is but a memory,
But your fame has gone across the sea
For you blazed the trail to victory.
You're the pride of the artillery!
When the fighting stopped, athletics and the show
business superseded everything else in popular interest.
Beginning at the Y. M. C. A. in Mareq in November, 1918,
up to the time of our demobilization, our entertainers
were busy. It became evident early in December at
Dancevoir that to meet the demand for entertainment some
sort of organization was necessary and so, before
Christmas, the now famous 306th Field Artillery Stock
Company was organized. At that time the idea was a new
one among the combat divisions of the A. E. F., and the
" Liberty Players" were immediately in great
demand. Costumes were bought and borrowed from French
civilians, scenery was rapidly built and painted. Manager
Callahan made a mysterious visit to Paris and brought
back most of the Folies Bergeres material and from then
on each new performance added to our regiment's glory.
The New York Herald and Stars and Stripes began to
publish stories about the show. General Headquarters of
the A. E. F. demanded a performance. The Le Mans
entertainment bureau announced that it was far ahead of
any other show ever given in that area, and the famous
Trianon Theater at Tours turned away crowds daily for a
week while our players were there.
The line up of From Whizz Bang to Footlights, A Musical
Barage in Three Elevations, was as follows: Mitchell,
Rosenberg, Spencer, Dyson, Kinney, Jacalow, Gallagher,
Crone, Seeger, Wardwell, Moch, Ast, Doherty, Plimpton,
McElroy, Cohen, Panzer and Eineman. The production was
staged by Sam Mitchell; orchestra under the direction of
Angelo Russo; scenery by Salvator Gillis; musical
arrangements by Robert Pollock; business manager, Edward
Callahan; stage director, John Crone; stage carpenters,
Murray Popper and Jack Wise; property man, Stanley
Rosecrans; electrician, Aage Christenson. Chaplain
Thomas, Captain Gordon, and Lieutenant Brown acted
successively as officer-supervisors.
These players have been ready at all times and under the
most trying circumstances to produce joy for their
comrades. They have always been cheerfully on call for
battery and company entertainments, especially on
Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year's day.
The gigantic task of entertaining and cheering up the men
of the 306th Field Artillery could not have been
accomplished without the never-to-be-forgotten work of
the Welfare Societies. We will never realize how much
they have done for us because we have taken so much of
their help as a matter of course.
The "Artillery Y" was the center of our
recreational life at Camp Upton. Jimmy Clark was the most
enthusiastic sport promoter our regiment ever had; and
what he was to athletics, so were Hainer, Hedrick,
Moment, Brinkerhoff, and others to enter-tainment of all
sorts. The work of Secretaries Moran and McGrath at the
K. of C. building, the hostesses at the Y. M. C. A.
Hostess House, and Secretary Hyman of the J. W. B. were
also appreciated. On board the Leviathan and at
Pontanezen the " Y" furnished a profuse amount
of games, books, magazines, writing material, and
athletic material in addition to splendid moneychanging
facilities.
Camp de Souge was as dreary as a desert until the
Lakeside Y. M. C. A. opened up the best equipped
recreation building we ever enjoyed. Messrs. Cook and
Kendall, Mrs. Gereison and Mrs. Kendall worked day and
night in our behalf. The Bordeaux Y. M. C. A. filled our
weekend leaves with many typically American pleasures.
In the Baccarat sector of the front Y. M. C. A. huts at
five villages served over half our units and when we left
for the Vesle sector Mr. Roy Rawlings, a business man
from Kansas City, was assigned as Y. M. C. A. secretary
for our regiment. He proved himself to be a splendid
campaigner and well able to accompany soldiers on active
field service. His genial cordiality and interest in our
welfare have made him well-known and respected by all.
About forty thousand francs' worth of stores per month
were sold during his period of service either directly to
individuals or through their battalion ration drivers and
mess sergeants. Thirty thousand francs' worth of money
orders were sent to the United States per month. During
our four months at the front about thirty different
parties of Y. M. C. A. enter-tainers, singers, speakers,
etc., appeared before some portions of the men of our
regiment.
All of the above is exclusive of goods sold through the
Y. M. C. A. huts at Rondchamp in the Argonne Forest and
Chery-Chartreuve on the Vesle. The latter was kept open
for business until closed by military order, at least
fifteen men having been killed and thirty wounded while
patronizing it. The above is also exclusive of stores
distributed and service rendered to us by secretaries of
other regiments serving nearby, one of these from the
304th Field Artillery being wounded at Bazoches.
About the only bright spots in the mud of Mareq and
Dancevoir were the Y. M. C. A. huts which were far too
small for us. When we reached Noyen for the " last
long wait " we found a well-equipped Y. M. C. A.
theater, tent and canteen building, but better than all
else two American girls, Miss Marian Dean and Miss Lucile
Watters, who made the whole regiment happy by their
gracious hospitality. They were joined later by Miss
Adele Winston of the J. W. B. who cooperated most
heartily and efficiently with the whole " Y "
program.
There was a Salvation Army hut at Baccarat where
doughnuts and lemonade were sold and preaching services
held on alternate nights. A Salvation Army hut at St.
Juvin was visited by some of our men from Marcq about the
time of the Armistice.
In the Baccarat sector, Secretary Bundschu of the K. of
C. made the rounds of the batteries twice with magazines
and cigarettes. In the Vesle sector he and "Uncle
Joe " Kiernan followed the division with their hot
chocolate wagon. On the night of September 15th they met
Batteries C, D, E, and F coming out of the lines and
served hot chocolate. In the Argonne Forest, at La
Harazee, Batteries C and D were again fortunate enough to
be located near the same wagon for several days.
The Red Cross man with the division, Captain Popham, sent
us cigarettes and chocolates and maga-ines on several
occasions. Other good things were supplied by the Red
Cross huts at Chery-Chartreuve, Bazoches, and to a few of
our men who visited Grand Pre after the Armistice.
The American Library Association sent us over eight
hundred volumes from their Paris office while we were in
France and at Upton its library was open a month before
we left.
We are sure that in
the years to come although we will be again accustomed to
the luxuries of civil life and the hardships of the war
will be only memories, yet we can never cease being
grateful to all who tried to bring us enjoyment while we
were wearing the olive drab.