ing Paris was similarly emplaced. The answering weapon which our ordnance department now proposed to build was to have the ability to travel from place to place to go to any position to which the railroad system of France could take it. To do this it would be necessary to build a mounting on a railroad car and to supply cars which could carry the crews, their sleeping quarters, their food and ammunition; to construct, indeed, a whole train for each separate gun. This equipment must be built in the United States, shipped over three thousand miles of ocean, landed at a French port, assembled there, and started on French railroads to the several destinations at the front. The Baldwin Locomotive Works accepted the contract for constructing these mountings and attendant cars; it began work February 13, 1918; two months afterward the first mount had been finished and the gun was being proved at Sandy Hook, New Jersey ; and by July all five guns had arrived at St. Nazaire and were being prepared to be sent forward to the scene of hostilities. The rapidity with which this work was completed furnished an illustration of American manufacturing genius at its best. Meanwhile, Admiral Plunkett had collected and trained his crews ; it speaks well for the moral of the Navy that, when news of this great operation was first noised about, more than 20,000 officers and men volunteered for the service.
At first the French, great as was their admiration for these guns and the astonishingly accurate marksmanship which they had displayed on their trials, believed that their railroad beds and their bridges could not sustain such a weight; the French engineers, indeed, declined at the beginning to approve our request for the use of their rails. The constant rain of German shells on Paris, however, modified this attitude; the situation was so urgent that such assistance as these American guns promised was welcome. One ugust morning, therefore, the first train started for Helles Mouchy, the point from which it was expected to silence the "Big Bertha." The progress of this train through France was a triumphant march. Our own confidence in the French >ad bed and bridges was not much greater than that of the French themselves; the train therefore went along slowly, climbed the grades at a snail's pace, and took the curves with the utmost caution. As they crossed certain of the bridges, the crews held their breath and sat tight, expecting almost
