WITH SERGEANT YORK IN THE ARGONNE FOREST 1918

We had crossed the Meuse River and entered the Argonne Forest at sunup on Oct 8, 1918.  Sergeant Bernard Early was in command with Sergeant Harry Parsons second in command.  We were part of an effort to sweep along both sides of the Meuse, to strain any Germans out of the Argonne Forest on the west side of the river and most importantly to capture the Decauville Railroad which was situated behind a hill in the Argonne with the map designation of  "hill 223."

There were seventeen of us when we entered the Argonne.  It was slow going and required a lot of effort to stumble through the dense foliage and underbrush but we finally exited the forest and entered a large field covered with tall grass that was four feet tall on average and five feet tall in many places.  Not one tree could be seen in that meadow.  Hill 223 lay directly in front of us.  We soon would take control of the railroad that lay behind that hill, destroy it and head back toward the Meuse River and join up with our main battalion.

Pushcar Marin and I had been buddies in this man's army for the past two years.  Pushcar was from The Bronx, New York.  He worked as a plumber before the war and had to ride a subway and then take a cab to his job destinations.  He said it was normal to push people back into the subway car really hard in order to find space to stand – hence the nickname Pushcar.  His real name was Ralph Hubbard, and we had each other's back.

We were all just regular fellas trying to do the right thing for America and Mom's Apple Pie but, there was this one fellow who was known for his quiet ways.  Never said much to anyone and had a habit of continually looking all around.  And, when his head was stationary while walking, ya just knew his eyes were continuously moving left and right.  His name was Corporal Alvin York.  Word was that he was a conscientious objector and some said he couldn't be trusted to hold his own if the fat was in the fire.  Fact was though that he had been promoted to Corporal and he did carry a rifle and a pistol so, the higher-ups evidently were satisfied with his behavior.  Still, it was a bit concerning the part about being a conscientious objector.  This Corporal York fella stayed up pretty close to Sergeant Parsons. 

We were spread out far apart in a long line when we entered the big meadow.  The grass was almost as tall as we were.  Then suddenly the staccato sound of a machine gun was heard and the tops of the grass far to the front of us was being mowed down by the bullets.   The Germans were on the hill to our front and they had us dead cold in that field with nothing to get behind.  A second machine gun opened up and the bullets cut the tops off the grass closer to our line and then the sickening sounds of  ka-thunk was repeated over and over as the bullets struck flesh.  Nine of our boys were struck down instantly.  The rest of us fell flat on the ground and stayed there.  Pushcar lay beside me and I said to him that "I guess we're in it now!"  He didn't answer and I looked over at him to see him staring back with stone cold eyes.  Pushcar was gone.  I felt infuriated and helpless at the same time.  I needed to kill something – anything but, the German machine guns would not let up.  And, that sound ka-thunk could still be heard. 

All of a sudden a rifle shot could be heard.  Then another and another.  Soon the German gun to our front was quiet.  The one to the left was the only one that sounded active.  Still our man continued to slowly fire his rifle from somewhere to our left front.  Then he stopped firing and the grass moved before us and "don't shoot, its Corporal York" was heard and the Corporal flopped down beside Me.  He wanted the remaining nine of us to circle to the right and come up behind that machine gun and destroy it.  He said he would go to the left and put that gun out of commission.  Sergeant Early was one of the first killed when the Germans opened up and Sergeant Parsons was in charge.  It was Parsons who ordered York to silence the guns anyway he thought he could.  In fact, Corporal York sent us to silence the machine gun to our right because he knew it was already silenced and that we would find safety there. Imagine that.  He had already shot every German in that machine gun nest from his position in the meadow.  He now went to silence the other gun single-handedly while keeping us safe.  This was a selfless thing to do.  His life was in the hands of God, as he later stated.

York silenced that gun and the Germans surrendered their entire force to him thinking there were many more of us than there was.  We were only 9 men but York was the one who did all the shooting.  The German dead were counted up to be 20.  They all were killed singlehandedly by York himself.   We accepted the surrender of 132 German soldiers from that hill and marched them back to the battalion at the Meuse River.  York maintained his quiet, unexcited demeanor during the entire ordeal and did an amazing job for being an objector.  They promoted him to Sergeant when we got back with the prisoners.  Sergeant Alvin York from Pall Mall, Tennessee.  Bet he'll be remembered for a long time.