Produced by A. Langley
My Year Of The War
Including An Account Of Experiences
With The Troops In France, And The
Record Of A Visit To The Grand
Fleet, Which Is Here Given
For The First Time In
Its Complete Form
By Frederick Palmer
(Accredited American Correspondent at the British Front)
Contents
To The Reader
I. "Le Brave Belge!"
II. Mons And Paris
III. Paris Waits
IV. On The Heels Of Von Kluck
V. And Calais Waits
VI. In Germany
VII. How The Kaiser Leads
VIII. In Belgium Under The Germans
IX. Christmas In Belgium
X. The Future Of Belgium
XI. Winter In Lorraine
XII. Smiles Among Ruins
XIII. A Road Of War I Know
XIV. Trenches In Winter
XV. In Neuve Chapelle
XVI. Nearer The Germans
XVII. With The Guns
XVIII. Archibald The Archer
XIX. Trenches In Summer
XX. A School In Bombing
XXI. My Best Day At The Front
XXII. More Best Day
XXIII. Winning And Losing
XXIV. The Maple Leaf Folk
XXV. Many Pictures
XXVI. Finding The Grand Fleet
XXVII. On A Destroyer
XXVIII. Ships That Have Fought
XXIX. On The Inflexible
XXX. On The Fleet Flagship
XXXI. Simply Hard Work
XXII. Hunting The Submarine
XXXIII. The Fleet Puts To Sea
XXIV. British Problems
To the Reader
In 'The Last Shot', which appeared only a few months before the
Great War began, drawing from my experience in many wars, I
attempted to describe the character of a conflict between two great
European land-powers, such as France and Germany.
"You were wrong in some ways," a friend writes to me, "but in otherways it is almost as if you had written a play and they were followingyour script and stage business."
Wrong as to the duration of the struggle and its bitterness and theatrocious disregard of treaties and the laws of war by one side; rightabout the part which artillery would play; right in suggesting thestalemate of intrenchments when vast masses of troops occupied thelength of a frontier. Had the Germans not gone through Belgium andattacked on the shorter line of the Franco-German boundary, theparallel of fact with that of prediction would have been morecomplete. As for the ideal of 'The Last Shot', we must await theoutcome to see how far it shall be fulfilled by a lasting peace.
Then my friend asks, "How does it make you feel?" Not as a prophet;only as an eager observer, who finds that imagination pales besidereality. If sometimes an incident seemed a page out of my novel, Iwas reminded how much better I might have done that page from life;and from life I am writing now.
I have seen too much of the war and yet not enough to assume thepose of a military expert; which is easy when seated in a chair athome before maps and news dispatches, but becomes fantastic afterone has lived at the front. One waits on more information before heforms conclusions about campaigns. He is certain only that the Marnewas a decisive battle for civilization; that if England had not gone intothe war the Germanic Powers would have won in three months.
No words can exaggerate the heroism and sacrifice of the French orthe importance of the part which the British have played, which weshall not realize till the war is over. In England no newspapers weresuppressed; casualty lists were published; she gave publicity todissensions and mistakes which others concealed, in keep