History of the American Field Service in France "FRIENDS OF FRANCE" 1914-1917 TOLD BY ITS MEMBERS WITH ILLUSTRATIONS

TO OUR MOTHERS before whose silent Sacrifice, deep, hidden in their Hearts, our Part seems mere Adventure.

THE American Field Service, as a group of youths serving the French Army in the Great War, is a thing of the past. And this is its history. The reader must not assume, however, that the American Field Service no longer exists, or that there will never be occasion for record of its further accomplishment. Although the members when they enlisted in 1915, 1916, and 1917, only pledged themselves to the French Army for a limited period, it is within the truth to state that, whether or not they realized it at the time, they enlisted for life in the service of France.

Even before this record has gone to the press, and while the United States is still nominally at war, the peace plans of the Field Service are well under way ---plans for the perpetuation under its auspices of fraternal relations among French and American youth for generations to come. A series of American Field Service fellowships for American students in French Universities has already been established, and projects have been formulated which it is hoped will ultimately result in securing a permanent endowment for a Field Service fellowship in memory of each and every one of the one hundred and twenty-six Field Service men who gave their lives during the war --- either a fellowship for an American student in a French university, or a fellowship for a French student in an American university. These fellowships not only will furnish fitting memorials of the Field Service men whose lives were sacrificed to the Allied Cause, but will give living and enduring impulse to the advancement of understanding and friendship between France and the United States, which was ever the fundamental Field Service aim.

The section histories, diaries, letters, and sketches comprising these volumes, are entirely the contributions of men who were part of the American Field Service. Many of these were collected at the Paris headquarters during the early days, but it was not until the Service ceased to exist as a volunteer organization that any effort was made to compile them with a view to producing a complete record comprising all the activities of the Service. While the volume published under the name of Friends of France, in 1916, contained numerous accounts of the work of the early days ---many of them being here reprinted --- that volume was of necessity more or less provisional and incomplete. The aim of these volumes is to fill in the gaps and finish the story, to give the final record of all the sections, new as well as old, and of the work of the many hundreds of younger volunteers as well as of the pioneers of 1915 and 1916.

As in Friends of France the stories of the several sections have been composed in the main of excerpts from articles, diaries, and home letters of different members, a method of composition necessarily involving some duplication and incoherence. It is believed, however, that this is compensated for by the veracity of the first-hand material so presented, and that whatever the history may have lost in smoothness and unity is offset by a gain in sincerity, animation, and originality.

Among those to whom thanks are due for successively assisting in the compilation of this work are Dr. Raymond Weeks, of the Paris staff, Mr. Frank J. Taylor, of Section Ten, Mr. Theodore Stanton and Captain Arthur J. Putnam and Mr. Robert A. Donaldson, of Section Seventy. The final selection and revision of the material has been mainly the work of Lieutenant James W. D. Seymour, of Section Seventeen.

Grateful appreciation is owing to the French artists André Fraye, Charles Huard, and Bernard Naudin, and to the following men of the Field Service, Waldo Peirce, S.S.U. 3, C. Le Roy Baldridge, T.M.U., F. L. Sexton, S.S.U. 14, George W. Hall, S.S.U. 70, and Harry de Maine, who contributed the many drawings which decorate and brighten these pages.

To those men of the Service who have contributed articles, poems, and photographs, and to many parents and friends who have aided by forwarding material from home letters and diaries, thanks are also due.

THE AMERICAN FIELD SERVICE
April, 1920