by Kathleen Nielson

Never Retreat!

Looking through a musty box of family memorabilia, I recently came upon a brittle, browned letter dated September 24, 1918, sent to his parents by my grandfather, James Oliver Buswell Jr. Grandpa B’s years as president of Wheaton College and later as professor of theology at Covenant College and Seminary were well known to me, but I hadn’t heard a lot about his experience in World War I. Serving in France as chaplain of the 140thInfantry for the American Expeditionary Forces, he took part in the Meuse-Argonne offensive, the war’s largest western front offensive against the German army. That offensive began on September 26, 1918.

I discovered from his journals that Grandpa B wrote this letter somewhere near Verdun, France, at the close of a “cold, foggy day” during which he had baptized more than 100 men, in a pre-battle “revival” among those in his regiment. Those were the first baptisms young preacher Buswell (then 23) had ever performed. Musing in his journal about this overwhelming response to the gospel, he wrote: “The military situation, of course, has something to do with it, but they all seem very sincere about it. When the men respond the way they have lately it makes any possible effort on my part seem cheap in proportion to the reward.” For the new converts they built a little dam in a nearby stream, to make a pool where the men could be either immersed or sprinkled, according to their wishes. “I’m afraid it will be rather muddy,” Grandpa wrote, “but it’s the best we can do.”

The brief letter home is all about the coming military offensive, which turned out to be a great Allied success but in which thousands of their troops were killed. Grandpa B’s regiment, as he later wrote, was “all shot to pieces.” He was wounded in the leg by a fragment of high explosive shell.

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