[Sidenote:  Strong enemy counterattacks.]

[Sidenote:  First Corps takes Chatel-Chehery.]

[Sidenote:  Argonne Forest is cleared.]

On October 4 the attack was renewed all along our front.  The Third Corps tilting to the left followed the Brieulles-Cunel road; our Fifth Corps took Gesnes while the First Corps advanced for over 2 miles along the irregular valley of the Aire River and in the wooded hills of the Argonne that bordered the river, used by the enemy with all his art and weapons of defense.  This sort of fighting continued against an enemy striving to hold every foot of ground and whose very strong counterattacks challenged us at every point.  On the 7th the First Corps captured Chatel-Chehery and continued along the river to Cornay.  On the east of Meuse sector one of the two Divisions cooperating with the French captured Consenvoye and the Haumont Woods.  On the 9th the Fifth Corps, in its progress up the Aire, took Fleville, and the Third Corps which had continuous fighting against odds was working its way through Brieulles and Cunel.  On the 10th we had cleared the Argonne Forest of the enemy.

[Sidenote:  The Second Army is organized.]

It was now necessary to constitute a second army, and on October 9 the immediate command of the First Army was turned over to Lieutenant General Hunter Liggett.  The command of the Second Army, whose divisions occupied a sector in the Woevre, was given to Lieutenant General Robert L. Bullard, who had been commander of the First Division and then of the Third Corps.  Major General Dickman was transferred to the command of the First Corps, while the Fifth Corps was placed under Major General Charles P. Summerall, who had recently commanded the First Division.  Major General John L. Hines, who had gone rapidly up from regimental to division commander, was assigned to the Third Corps.  These four officers had been in France from the early days of the expedition and had learned their lessons in the school of practical warfare.

[Sidenote:  The Kriemhilde line is penetrated.]

Our constant pressure against the enemy brought day by day more prisoners, mostly survivors from machine-gun nests captured in fighting at close quarters.  On October 18 there was very fierce fighting in the Caures Woods east of the Meuse and in the Ormont Woods.  On the 14th the First Corps took St. Juvin, and the Fifth Corps, in hand-to-hand encounters, entered the formidable Kriemhilde line, where the enemy had hoped to check us indefinitely.  Later the Fifth Corps penetrated further the Kriemhilde line, and the First Corps took Champigneulles and the important town of Grandpre.  Our dogged offensive was wearing down the enemy, who continued desperately to throw his best troops against us, thus weakening his line in front of our Allies and making their advance less difficult.

[Sidenote:  Thirty-seventh and Ninety-first in Belgium.]