On June 5, the day of registration, 9,700,000 young men of all classes registered in their home districts throughout the country.  It was then decided to call approximately 650,000 men to the colors as the first national army.  The formal drawing of the serial numbers allotted to registrants occurred in Washington late in July.  District boards were appointed to examine the men drafted and receive applications for exemption, also appeal boards in every State.  The month of August was largely occupied in preparing the quotas from each district and meanwhile cantonments were made ready for the training of the new army, while thousands of prospective officers received intensive training in special camps at various points, east and west, and were commissioned in due course.  Orders were then issued for the men selected to report at the cantonments in three divisions of 200,000 men each, at intervals of fifteen days, beginning September 5.  The National Guards of the various States were also mobilized August 9, mustered into the Federal service, and ordered to special training camps, mostly situated in the South.  The work of assembling equipment and supplies for the new army was rushed and the whole country hummed with the task of preparation.

AMERICAN TROOPS IN FRANCE

France and Great Britain having joined in a request for the dispatch of an American expeditionary force to France at the earliest possible moment, the United States government on May 18 ordered 25,000 troops to France under the command of Major-General John J. Pershing.  A large force of marines was subsequently ordered to join them, bringing the strength of the expedition up to approximately 40,000 men.  General Pershing and his staff preceded the troops to Europe, reaching London June 8 and Paris June 13, and being enthusiastically welcomed in both the Allied capitals.

Convoyed by American warships, the first and second contingents of American troops crossed the Atlantic in safety, despite two submarine attacks on the transports in which at least one U-boat was sunk.  Without the loss of a ship or a man the troops were landed in France on June and 27, to be received with outbursts of joy by the French populace, who saw in their coming the assurance of final delivery from the German invaders.  Training camps awaited their coming and there, behind the French lines they spent the months of July and August in active preparation for service under the Stars and Stripes against the German enemy on the western front.

U.S.  WARSHIPS BUSY

America’s destroyer flotilla arrived in British waters in May and immediately co-operated with the British fleet in the patrol of its home waters and the hunt for German submarines.  The flotilla was commanded by Vice-Admiral Sims and did effective work from the very start.

On August 11 it was announced in Washington that Admiral Sims had sent to the Navy Department a series of reports detailing the work of the American ships and men under his command.  These were said to present a thrilling story of accomplishment, telling of many encounters with U-boats and also of the rescue of numerous crews of ships which had been destroyed by submarines off the coasts of England and Ireland.