V. The Toul Sector Again When the German offensive was definitely checked in the Montdidier Sector, the First Division was transferred back to the Toul Sector and the Salvation Army moved with it. They had in the meantime maintained all the huts which had been established originally, and with the return of the First Division, they established additional huts between Font and Nancy. When the St. Mihiel drive came off, they followed the advancing troops, establishing huts in the devastated villages, keeping in as close contact with the extreme front as was possible, serving the troops day and night, always aiming to be at the point where the need was the greatest, and where they could be of the greatest service. The first Americans to pay the supreme sacrifice in the cause of liberty were buried in the Toul Sector. As it drew near to Decoration Day there came a message from over the sea from the Commander to her faithful band of workers, saying that she was sending American flags, one for every American soldier’s grave, and that she wanted the graves cared for and decorated; and at all the various locations of Salvation Army workers they prepared to do her bidding. The day before the thirtieth of May they took time from their other duties to clear away the mud, dead grass and fallen leaves from the graves, and heap up the mounds where they had been washed flat by the rains, making each one smooth, regular and tidy. At the head of each grave was a simple wooden cross bearing the name of the soldier who lay there, his rank, his regiment and the date of his death. Into the back of each cross they drove a staple for a flag, and they swept and garnished the place as best they could. One Salvation Army woman writing home told of the plans they had made in Treveray for Decoration Day; how Commander Booth was sending enough American flags to decorate every American grave in France, and how they meant to gather flowers and put with the flags, and have a little service of prayer over the graves. In the gray old French cemetery of Treveray five American boys lay buried. The flowers upon their graves were dry and dead, for their regiments had moved on and left them. The graves had been neglected and only the guarding wooden crosses remained above the rough earth to show that someone had cared and had stopped to put a mark above the places where they lay. It was these graves the Salvation Army woman now proposed to decorate on Memorial Day. The letter went to the Captain for censorship, and soon the Salvation Army woman had a call from him. “I understand by one of your letters that you are thinking of decorating the American graves,” he said. “We would like to help in that, if you don’t mind. I would like the company all to be present.” The day before Memorial Day this woman with two of the lassies from the hut went to the cemetery and prepared for the morrow.