By Elaine Rassel
This Thursday, Nov. 11, Americans will be celebrating Armistice Day now known as Veterans’ Day. When the Armistice was signed Nov. 11, 1918, there were many men from the Marcus and surrounding areas that were in World War I. Corporal Peter F. Grauer kept a diary of the time he was in the war. His daughter-in-law, Lulu Grauer, gave me part of what he wrote when the Armistice was signed.
Upon entering France, Captain Briggs and one of our American soldier’s who could speak French as translator, together would go to the French farmers and line up barns as we soldier’s would have a place to sleep with our bags on the hay and straw. I remember one night sleeping out on the rocky ground with the sky as the roof over me.
About three days before the Armistice, we had moved and were stationed approximately a mile or so east of Belfort, France where the field kitchen also had to be set up.
The night before the Armistice, some other buddies and I walked into Belfort. There was no light at all to be seen in the city; everything was dark. We walked around town and found this building that one of the boy’s knew of. It looked like a small garage; we opened the outside door, then the kitchen door in the rear of the building opened. We could see the light flash out from the kitchen opening but the light did not reach out into the streets. No light was to be seen in the city after dark.
We stayed in this building about an hour having lunch and coffee, then went out the same way we entered—out through the kitchen door closing it, and then out through the first door, closing it, back out into dark, city streets with the stars overhead as our only guide, and back to our beds in the barn.
In the morning we had breakfast as usual and were to eat dinner before we started marching again. Then it happened I could hear music coming through the trees. It was 11 o’clock. The music was coming from a cafe on the outskirts of Belfort where a juke-box was again turned on. All juke-boxes in France had stopped playing at the beginning of the war in 1914. I had heard some of the first music again that joyful hour.
We ate our dinner, then the sun came out, we got our packs ready; we were ready to march into Belfort. At this time the Army Chaplin was given a Motorcycle with a side seat and said, “Boys, the packs don’t seem so heavy now do they?”
As we marched toward Belfort, we got busy looking around to see cars, trucks and even horse-drawn buggies on the highway with people waving coats and flags and horns honking.
Now Belfort was the strongest city in France and on the east side of the city, we came to two mounds of dirt each rolled up to 50 to 70 feet high, so no one could march in and overtake them. These mounds had been put up perhaps a century before for protection.
The City Gates were positioned in these mounds and had to be opened to let us through. Just inside the gates were the French soldier’s living quarters (pots, tables, chairs, etc.). Those soldiers were in charge of these gates. It was their job to decide who could come through and enter their city.
The one thing that made a big impression on me this day, was that about 4 blocks (1/4 mile) through the gate, we came to this city itself. Then the first street we came to, we turned to the right and marched north about 4 or 5 blocks, and came to a stone wall about 60 to 75 feet high and turned left and marched along this wall about another 10 blocks. As we looked up, there were companies of French soldiers and their cannons looking down on us from the top of the wall. It was those fortifications that made Belfort so strong.
We continued marching another 6 blocks, made a left turn (south) and came to the business part of town, were called to a halt and at 1:00 p.m. had to stop and rested. The band of our Headquarters Company got their instruments out to play and lead the parade down the street of Belfort. About five to ten thousand people were in the streets, in balconies, doorways and windows of 8 to 10 story buildings, with people packed in them, throwing out newspapers, confetti, and waving flags, making shadows like a cloud. It was a sight to behold!! As we marched, the streets were so crowded we rubbed elbows with happy French people.
As the afternoon continued, we marched to the depot, in the south-west part of Belfort. Before we arrived at the depot, the sun was sinking in the west and shining on the south-east fortification city wall. As we looked back in that direction, we could see a large bronze lion made of cement and stone, elevated high against the southeast city wall. The sun shining on that lion made him look so majestic, that it made a great impression on us all. This lion signified the strength of Belfort.
At the depot, we were loaded into “40 & 8” French railroad cars. Forty stood for 40 men and their Army gear or 8 horses. The train took us to our winter quarters Gondrecourt (pronounced Gond-ray-core) where General Pershing first landed in 1917.
I never thought I’d see another “40 & 8”—what a nice surprise to be able to walk into one again in the summer of 1985, in August, at a War Museum in Newport News, Va. The museum had received it as a gift from the government of France in 1984.
(Peter Grauer served nine months of service in France that ended in 1919.)
This detailed account of this one soldier’s memorable day in history was told to me in Feb. 1986. Lulu Grauer—by Peter F. Grauer 94 years and 3 months.
The Britannica Encyclopedia states that Belfort, an ancient town, was fortified since
1600’s. The majestic Lion of Belfort is 22 m (72 ft.) long and 11 m (36 ft.) high, created by F.A. Bartholdi to commemorate the siege of 1870-71 during the Franco-German war. The Germans failed to capture Belfort during Franco-Prussian War of 1870. The fortress was besieged during the Thirty Year’s War and Napoleonic Wars.