To Conquer Hell

[MartinWills]

To Conquer Hell

The Meuse-Argonne 1918

Edward G Lengel

Henry Holt & Company New York

www.henryholt.com

ISBN: 0-8050-7931-9

At this time of the year readers are probably awaiting the pile of books that invariably arrives at Christmas. At the same time you may have a book token or a small contribution towards a volume of your choice.

This book will narrowly miss Christmas, being scheduled for publication around 8th January. It will be a good opportunity to use those tokens or similar contributions from Great Aunt Maud or whoever.

Ed Lengel takes a refreshingly honest view of this offensive and takes us through the fighting doughboys efforts on the Meuse-Argonne. The narrative is based on the published ABMC summary of operations series but fleshes the picture out with numerous first hand accounts drawn from published material and individuals personal papers in numerous archives. It reads as an American text might, full of tremedous artillery bombardments and veritable hails of machine gun fire, but under all that it gives the reader a good account of what is a relative poorly understood offensive in late 1918. There is no doubt that the doughboys were poorly equipped and indifferently trained (with some exceptions) and had not had the chance to learn tactics on the battlefield. Neither is there any doubting the bravery of many who fought forward against all odds. Readers will almost certainly come away with a new respect for the American soldier in the field.

A fuller review should follow once it is published - in the mean time look out for it appearing at the start of January.

I hope it will achieve a wide audience; it deserves to as it provides a very readable and honest account of the offensive.

[dewey]

Look forward to reading this one. I have read Professor Lengel's other books, includig his excellent WWI Memories, a bibliography. I'm sure he incorporates several of these into his story of the campaign as he has a respect for the view of the World War I soldier.

[paul guthrie]

This is by far the best account of this battle. He does at least as good a job as my late friend Paul Braim or Robert Ferrell describing operations and adds terrific personal accounts.

He is quite critical of Pershing and his ignoring four years of war and thinking American riflemen could win the war despite artillery and machine guns believing European soldiers were inadequate and trench bound ignoring why the trenches existed in the first place. He was proven completely wrong.

Lengel does make some puzzling mistakes. He says the April 1917 French offensive was their last of the war! A few pages later hid discusses the July 18 1918 Foch offensive near Soissons believing I think it was American because two US Divisions were in the forefront. It was nonetheless largely French.

He says in March 1918 British and French forces " Quickly fell to pieces". Nonsense.

He states unquestioningly the discredited story about a German machine gunner chained to his gun which never happened.

He has walked the battlefields but states Varennes is " in a bowl shaped valley stradling the Aire River." It does straddle the river but much of the town is on a bluff high above it including the Pennsylvania Memorial to 28th Division which he spends much time discussing.

He says Exermont was systematically destroyed by German shelling but has two pictures of the village in the Argonne which show a barn with a big hole in it. The barn exists today with a large metal patch showing it as it was then but patched and never destroyed.

Really good book though and I'm nitpicking.

[paul guthrie]

I have heard from Dr Lengel, he says the story of the chained machine gunner was told, he was not there, he repeats it as part of the history without taking a position just as he did MacArthur saying he survivied a one man artillery barrage whether or not it's true. Fair enough.

he's justifiably proud of the maps which he had drawn for this book. Very well done.

[MartinWills]

I can confirm that Paul's points are minor and that this si one of the most engaging and honest accounts I have read of American forces in WW1. As such I would commend it to all. The use of personal accounts to flesh out the story is very well done. In the first chapter or so there are some generalised comments about the war and certain commanders that you have to take with a pinch of salt but once you are into the heart of it is as a superbly honest account. I think if there was one aspect that grated with me a little is was that most actions seemed to involve "a hail of machine gun fire" or torrential artillery fire, but again that is probably how it seemed or actually was - my niggle is that a wider variety of adjectives may have helped. These are truly minor points however, and I would recommend the volume to anyone who wants one volume to give them a very readable feel for the Americans in 1918.

[paul guthrie]

Martin, the point he made to me after my nit picking criticisms - which I hope pale compared the my enthusiastic endorsement of this book probably applies the the hail of fire stuff too, that's the way the men described things.

[Robert Dunlop]

I have enjoyed reading this book. The Boy's Own style is not to my liking but this does not detract from the content, and the way in which Dr Lengel has sequenced the events. Nice mix of anecdotes too. It is a very good overview from the American perspective. The German perspective is extremely limited. This is not a criticism, merely a reflection on the significant change that has been prompted by the works of Jack Sheldon and others.

Robert

[4thGordons]

The Boy's Own style is not to my liking

This was EXACTLY my response! Some great new materials and account and a worthwhile addition.

Chris

[trenchtrotter]

Bought a copy yesterday. Look forward to reading and adding my comments.

TT

[trenchtrotter]

Well so far so good. Good read and one of the few books covering this battle. My big critisism is the lack of maps and the text mentions hill this or valley that and no maps to help the reader. With more and greater detailed maps it would be even better. Nevertheless recommended and having visited the meuse Argonne about ten years ago this will inspire me to return.

TT

[Martin Bennitt]

Just found this in the American Library in Paris. Next on my list. Will report back. A quick flick through brought up the view that Patton was insane. Seems promising.

cheers Martin B

[Robert Dunlop]

My big critisism is the lack of maps and the text mentions hill this or valley that and no maps to help the reader.

TT, this is not correct. I put bookmarks in each of the pages with a map. It was then possible to quickly reference them while reading the text, particularly given that the author described events from the right side of the battlefield moving across the left. By this means, it was possible to follow the geography in the context of the attacks.

Robert

[trenchtrotter]

Robert,

I will re check but numerous woods and hills are mentioned that are not on the maps, including references to ravines etc. I have had to dig out my serie bleue maps for the area to fully orientate myself! Perhaps I get too stuck in detail? Anyhow Its my critisim but that does not mean I am not enjoying it immensely. I would recommend it still.

And for me the more maps the better and the more detail the better.

TT

[Robert Dunlop]

TT, I totally agree. That's why I use the 'American Armies and Battlefields in Europe' maps for the level of detail you are seeking (not the CD version though, as the middle part of the Meuse-Argonne map appears to be missing). It's great when a book like this has all the detail, but I don't expect it. Typically makes the book much more expensive, and I don't think the level of written content warrants the extra expense.

Robert

[MartinWills]

Can I endose Robert's comments about 'American Armies and Battlefields in Europe'. It's a valuable and excellent source and can still be found for a relatively reasonable price.

[trenchtrotter]

I too have a copy and recommend. Foolishly I threw the cardboard box mine came in...idiot that I am!!!!!!!!

TT

[Martin Bennitt]

Wel, I've just about finished this book and I woukd also recommend it highly. It certainly taught me a lot (everything) I didn't know about this campaign.

It's written graphically and clearly, with a lot of quotes by participants, and doesn't pretend that the Americans walked in and taught Europe how to beat the Germans. In fact the depth of American ignorance of what they were going into is astounding, as is their unwillingness to learn from the French and British.

A few niggles already mentioned by pals -- the maps could be a bit clearer, and I'd have preferred them all together at the back or front of the book, and the style grated at times. Agree not much on the Germans either.

A few errors -- he confuses the SMLE and the US Enfield, and I wasn't aware that the Paris Gun had also shelled the Argonne. The cover picture, if I'm not mistaken, comes from Belleau Wood, not the Meuse-Argonne.

But some very interesting critical comments, especially on the high command, notably Pershing and Billy Mitchell. He reckons that the French could not have sustained a battle like M-A, but the British could have, and with fewer casualties

cheers Martin B

[trenchtrotter]

I have just finished it now. I did enjoy and the last chapter on the veterans in the aftermath was moving. It is nice to see an American book that offers a balanced view of what America actually achieved, the failings at various levels, a critique of Pershing etc.

If you want to know about the M/A then I recommend it to all.

TT

[Robert Dunlop]

If you want to know about the M/A...

... from the American perspective. Just a minor note but there is very limited information about the involvement of the French forces. More importantly, the German perspective has still be written. Neither of these notes should detract from TT's recommendation.

Robert

[paul guthrie]

He's speaking at US Branch WFA national meeting this fall at Carlisle Barracks Pennsylvania.

[4thGordons]

Can I endose Robert's comments about 'American Armies and Battlefields in Europe'. It's a valuable and excellent source and can still be found for a relatively reasonable price.

FYI - if you can deal with a CD rather than the book itself

IT is still available HERE direct from the USGov Publishers

CD also contains lots and lots of other documents......and an order of battle which I find very useful. Unfortunatley I got this lot on paper at many times the cost before I found this!

Chris

[MartinWills]

I have both a paper copy and the CD and I have to say I much prefer the printed version - the illustrations are far better and the maps easier to use.

[Pete1052]

Reviewed by Samuel M. Baker

Army magazine

August 2008

To Conquer Hell: The Meuse-Argonne, 1918. Edward G. Lengel. Henry Holt and Company. 493 pages; black-and-white photographs; maps; index; $32.50.

With only one American veteran of World War I remaining, and only a handful of any nationality throughout the world, the passing of the 90th anniversary of the armistice ending World War I this autumn may go largely unnoticed. Considered at the time to be "the war to end all wars," World War I was soon eclipsed by an even bloodier, total and far-reaching conflict barely a generation later.

Nevertheless, the final push by the United States and its allies, which ultimately ended the war, remains, in human terms, the largest and most costly single battle our nation has ever fought. With more than 1.2 million men and women in the combat zone and more than 26,000 dead and 95,700 wounded by the time of the armistice, figures from the Meuse-Argonne offensive easily surpass those of other more well-known battles.

Symptomatic of this lack of recognition of America's main contribution to the Allied war effort against imperial Germany is the astounding dearth of comprehensive accounts and scholarly examinations of the subject. Although a flurry of memoirs and other firsthand accounts of World War I and the Meuse-Argonne were published immediately following the war, very little has been written on the subject since the 1920s. The result is that today most people's only exposure to the war comes from Erich Maria Remarque's classic All Quiet on the Western Front--a semiautobiographical account by a German soldier.

Thus, Edward G. Lengel's To Conquer Hell: The Meuse-Argonne, 1918 is a much anticipated and extremely welcome work on the subject. Using primary source material--including military records, diaries, letters and little-known memoirs written immediately following the war--To Conquer Hell is exhaustively researched. The level of detail is remarkable as Lengel moves beyond following American action on a broad scale and frequently describes the fighting on the company and battalion levels. Although this does occasionally result in confusion over the different units, it serves to put the battle on a more human scale. In the end, much of the fighting on the Western Front was done on just such a scale, by small groups of men fighting crater to crater, capturing one machine-gun nest or artillery emplacement at a time.

Frequently, Lengel goes into even closer detail and focuses on individual soldiers. It's here that To Conquer Hell is at its best. In recounting not just the exploits of famous veterans of the Meuse-Argonne, of which there are many, but also the actions of Medal of Honor recipients and other soldiers, Lengel gives the battle a human face and drives home the courage and heroism that were commonplace.

Throughout To Conquer Hell, Lengel never wavers in his admiration and praise of the typical Doughboy and how he progressed from an undertrained raw recruit to a hard-bitten fighter in just a few short weeks of fighting. The American military leadership, however, doesn't enjoy such immunity from criticism. Lengel is critical of almost every American general officer, but is especially scathing regarding Generals Pershing, Summerall and Bullard. He asserts that the American strategy of relentless frontal attack and an emphasis on the individual rifleman instead of machine guns, artillery and hand grenades led to unnecessary casualties. He describes Pershing as a "mediocre" battlefield general who was eventually replaced by the more deliberate and capable Lt. Gen. Hunter Liggett.

Although not entirely without merit, Lengel's criticism of Pershing and other American generals is excessive. The battle did last much longer than Pershing and his staff initially projected, but there were multiple factors outside of his control affecting the outcome. Most notably, severe rain and inclement weather slowed the American advance. Furthermore, although the battle was won at a heavy cost, a comparison of American and German casualty levels reveals that the Doughboys gave almost as good as they got from an entrenched and battle-hardened enemy. The very fact that the United States could better absorb such losses and continue a relentless attack helped force Germany's surrender. In the end, To Conquer Hell is a superb account with appeal to both amateur and professional historians. Decades overdue, Lengel's work fills a significant gap in American military history.

Copyright, Association of the United States Army, Aug 2008

[Waddell]

I finished reading this book recently and wanted to add that I think it is a very good book.

This book is my first foray into the “Doughboy” story and I think the strength of this book is that you can pick it up without any prior knowledge and it will take you through their story of the war. The use of personal accounts is numerous and they paint a very vivid picture of what these guys went through.

There are also some sad stories in this book and you really have to feel for what these men went through- hunger, lack of training, lack of maps in some instances and those carefully placed and well-manned German machine gunners. And these were only the obstacles in front of them.

I was surprised to read that Major Charles Whittlesey played himself in a movie version of “The Lost Battalion” in 1919. Alvin York turned down a similar offer.

The stories of these two well known men are told very clearly in this book.

The author mentions that the Doughboys slipped quickly from the American imagination and makes a comparison between the current high prices paid for American Civil War and German Second World War militaria compared to AEF militaria in the introduction. He also mentions the lack of interest by the American public in Doughboy memoirs produced in the 1920's.

I’ve got to say that from an Australians point of view it is difficult to understand why these guys are forgotten. I'll be looking for a few of the personal accounts used in the book.

Scott.

[CROONAERT]

A few basic factual errors and niggles, especially early on in this book (pretty understandable when considering the location of the majority of sources used...Dr.Lengel is pretty open about this and so , I suppose, these errors are quite acceptable) which would normally force me to read the remainder of the book with some scepticism or even give up on it. However...this superb book is certainly an exception as the style in which it is written and the facts contained within certainly make it worthwhile pursuing. A real eye-opener even to those of us who have or have had an interest in this campaign, I think.

IMO , this is the most interesting (modern) book on a WW1 subject that I've read in quite some time... it's almost got the capabilities of turning me into a WW1 obsessive again!

dave.