by Phil Keith
The trenches at this section of the line, unlike any Bullard had seen before, were actually made of stone and interconnected, which allowed the linking of dozens of regiments at one time. These masonry works had another distinct advantage: a lack of the loathsome muck. The task of both the 170th and the 174th was simple: hold. They did—for nine straight days of unremitting bombardment, charges, counter charges, and for the first time in Gene’s experience, poison gas shells.
On March 1, Bullard’s company was ordered back to Vaux to restock their ammunition and exchange their fouled machine-gun barrels for new ones. They were able to grab a hot meal, fresh bread, a bath, and a cot. The following morning, they were to return to the trenches, but along the route they came under fire from the incessant German artillery. The entire company scattered, seeking any shelter available. Twenty, including Bullard, ran into the remains of a large old barn. Bullard grabbed an abandoned mattress and threw himself on the floor, on his back, and pulled the mattress over his body. Moments later, a shell smashed into the roof and exploded on impact, sending red-hot pieces of shrapnel flying everywhere. Four men were killed instantly and another eleven wounded, including Bullard.
A small piece of the shell tore through the mattress and the flat side of the projectile remnant smashed into Bullard’s jaw like a sledgehammer. The force of the impact knocked out many of the teeth on the right side of his mouth, top and bottom. Had the mattress not absorbed some of the impact, the wound would likely have been fatal.
Blood streaming from his mouth, and spitting out teeth, Bullard leaped up to see what had happened to his men. The scene was horrific. His lieutenant was missing, one man saying the frightened officer had run away. Despite his tremendous pain, Bullard raced off to get help. His captain was with the regimental commandant at their headquarters a few blocks away. Dodging the screaming shells and trying not to swallow blood, Bullard made his way there. As he dove for the front entrance, another shell exploded nearby which lifted him off his feet and tossed him into the conference room. It was a dramatic but very unceremonious entrance. Through swollen and bleeding gums and jagged remnants of his teeth, Bullard managed to relate the story of his men’s plight—and that of the missing lieutenant.
Captain Paleologue and Bullard rushed back to the smoldering barn, along with some stretcher bearers and medical aides to help the wounded. When they arrived the “missing” lieutenant had reappeared. The captain exploded in anger at the shirking young officer, accusing him of cowardice and abandoning his post. Paleologue drew his revolver and aimed it at the lieutenant’s head. He had every right to execute the man on the spot, as was French Army policy for desertion. Only Bullard’s firm grip on the captain’s arm kept him from firing.
The moment passed, and Paleologue stood down, actually thanking the wounded corporal for preventing the execution. The captain ordered the shell-shocked lieutenant to the rear, out of his sight, and out of the war.
For the next two days, the regiment was allowed to stand down, but on March 5 they were ordered up and into the line once more, nearer still to the massive fort. The shelling began again. Regiments charged and countercharged. Bullard’s mouth had been sewn back together and bits of the shattered teeth that remained were removed. He was in great pain and his entire face was swollen up like a balloon, but he was not going to let his comrades down. The tafia flowed freely, easing his discomfort. Bullard and his crew fought like demons until the machine gun became so fouled it was useless. The crew buried it in the mud and began to make their way back to get a new one.
As they dodged across the exploding landscape, Bullard heard one of the shells overhead mocking him. To him, it seemed to be calling, in a high-pitched whine, “Gene...een...een!” He swerved to his right and threw himself into a very deep shell hole. As he slid to the bottom, another figure jumped into the same hole. The man was not wearing French blue but German gray—and he was huge!
French machine gunners carried a short carbine as a backup weapon. It was longer than a pistol but shorter than a rifle. Without hesitation, or a word, Bullard shoved the carbine into the man’s back and fired, killing the German instantly. The man continued to roll down, landing on him. Wide dead eyes and a gaping mouth spooked Bullard.
He later recalled that “if anyone had seen me come out of that shell hole, he would have not recognized me because I was white. As soon as I was out of the hole, I began to feel kind of bad about having to kill even a Boche. You see, in spite of all the things I have been credited with doing in war and the medals I received for them, I must admit sincerely that I love people. I never in my life wanted to kill anyone. I only wanted to keep someone from killing me.”
Later that night, Bullard’s captain asked him to take on a very dangerous mission: the company was again in desperate need of resupply, for both food and ammunition. Despite his painful mouth, Bullard agreed. He took thirteen men and off they went, half a mile to the rear. The men zigzagged between shells and machine-gun fire the entire way, out and back. Only three of the fourteen returned unscathed. Five were killed. Bullard lugged a heavy ammunition crate and critical messages from the colonel for his captain. For leading the mission, and his bravery, Bullard’s captain recommended him for the Croix de Guerre.
The next day, as he was scampering through a trench, more shells came raining down. One landed very close by, and the force of the blast threw Bullard against a trench wall and knocked him unconscious. A hot sliver from the shell ripped into his left thigh, opening a gaping and nasty wound. The shrapnel had missed, by a millimeter, the femoral artery which, if severed, would have been Bullard’s death blow. He was quickly found by his comrades and crudely bandaged, but he could not be evacuated until the next morning. The Red Cross came up and loaded his moaning form into a Ford ambulance and drove him to a treatment area.
After his thigh was sutured with more than ninety stitches, clean dressings were applied and a French Army doctor made the determination that between his leg and his facial damage, the trench war was over for Eugene Bullard. On March 7, he and hundreds of other wounded troops were loaded aboard a Red Cross train and the entourage chugged away to the south. Bullard, still groggy from pain medications, was not sure where they were going, but if it was away from the trenches, and he was still alive, he would be fine with it.
* * *
The slow-moving train wound its way through the French countryside. After a day, the sounds of the artillery finally faded. The men who were conscious began to see the unfamiliar sight of green trees and fields of grain and grape vines. At each stop, women and young girls swarmed aboard the cars passing out candy, sweets, cognac, wine, cheese, fresh bread and other treats, while cheering on the men. Nurses changed bandages. Porters and trainmen discreetly removed any soldiers who had died since the last stop and buried them in quiet country cemeteries near the tracks.
The train’s final destination, after three days of travel, turned out to be Lyon. Bullard was billeted on an airy ward in the Hotel Dieu, a large, castle-like building that had been converted from tourist lodgings into a military hospital. Imagine his shock: after months under conditions that could only have been described as hellish, Bullard had sunshine, fresh air, open windows, and clean white sheets to sleep on.
He would spend three months at the Hotel Dieu, having his thigh wound treated and undergoing extensive reconstructive surgery to replace his missing teeth. Life was beginning to look up again for the brave, young soldier.
It got even better: at the end of the first three months of his rehabilitation, Bullard was picked, as one of only thirty-two recovering veterans, to be sent to a private clinic funded by a Madame Nesmes, the heiress to a family of wealthy silk and fabric makers in Lyon.
He would spend another three months at the Nesmes-funded clinic. These weeks would be a turning point in Bullard’s life. First and foremost, the excellent care, country air, good food, and a pair of sturdy crutches would allow
Bullard to regain his health, his strength, and his mobility. The one-mile walk from the Nesmes Clinic to the hospital, where he received most of his treatments and his dental surgery, would be undertaken nearly every day. Many of the good citizens of Lyon got to know the determined, smiling, crutch-wielding black soldier as he made his rounds.
He was a bit of an anomaly, and his cheeriness and distinctive countenance—plus the fact he was an American—got him invited into many a drawing room for tea and conversation. When the citizens learned during the summer that Bullard was to be decorated with the Croix de Guerre for his bravery at Verdun, he became even more of a celebrity.
The notoriety brought him to the attention of the American Consul in Lyon at the time, Dr. John Edward Jones, who happened to be a fellow Georgian. The consul even paid Bullard a visit at the Nesmes Clinic. Along for the meeting was a journalist by the name of Will Irwin who, at the time, was a war correspondent for the Saturday Evening Post magazine. The interviews he conducted, followed by more meetings at the consul’s office to discuss the war, resulted in several mentions of Eugene Bullard and his wartime experiences in the Post. The pieces were widely read back in the United States, but because of wartime security restrictions, Bullard was never fully identified other than as “Private Gene” or “Private So-and-So of the 170th Regiment.” Irwin did profile him as “a negroe,” but that fact ended up on the editing floor of the Post.
On Bastille Day, July 14, 1916, a decoration ceremony was held in Lyon’s grand town square. Corporal Eugene Bullard sat with his fellow wounded warriors in the front row of those to be honored with some of France’s highest military decorations. Bullard was pinned with the Croix de Guerre amid rousing speeches and wild acclaim from the thousands of citizens gathered for the occasion. It was a proud moment for a black man not quite twenty-one years old, far from home, and recognition he never could have received had he been on American soil.
Among the others to be honored was an officer Bullard had gotten to know while they both convalesced at Madame Nesmes’s Clinic. Air Commandant2 Ferrolino, wounded seriously in the right shoulder, was receiving the Medaille Militaire for his bravery in aerial combat. Prior to that day, he and Bullard had been discussing what they would be doing after their recoveries were complete. The commandant was going back to his squadron, then stationed in Brun. Bullard wanted to go back to the 170th, but the doctors told him he was no longer fit for—and would not be permitted to go into—the trenches where his old regiment was still serving.
Commandant Ferrolino mentioned that the Air Service was in need of aerial machine gunners. Bullard’s leg wound would not be a hindrance to machine gunning from the back seat of an airplane. Would he be interested? Bullard was determined not to be posted to a backwater desk among those called embusqués, or “slackers,” men desperately trying to avoid front line duties. Ferrolino told Bullard that, when the time came for him to be released from the hospital, he would seek a transfer to aviation for him. Brave men, decorated men, would always be welcome in the Air Service, Ferrolino encouraged. Bullard was thrilled with the prospect.
During this same period, he and the other convalescents could avail themselves of a few perquisites of their service and their status as wounded heroes. A Poilus’s pay at that time was a paltry single franc (about fifty cents) per day—barely enough to survive on, never mind sufficient for having a little fun. Hero soldiers were given cards good for free train fares, and many private citizens “adopted” soldiers, or sometimes several soldiers, which meant that they could eat and drink at the expense of their patrons. Corporal Bullard requested, and received, several passes to journey from Lyon to Paris on weekends. There he enjoyed his old haunts and joined friends and others who had survived the war so far.
Bullard’s closest circle of friends in Paris in 1916 included Moise Kisling, an ex-patriate Polish painter with whom he had served in the Foreign Legion; Gilbert White, an American painter and former student of James McNeil Whistler; and Jeff Dickson, recently arrived from Natchez, Mississippi, with aspirations to become a boxing promoter. It would have been hard to find a quartet more unique, and least likely to succeed as close friends; yet, somehow, they did.
The twenty-six-year-old Kisling had been born in Cracow, then part of Austria-Hungary, today part of Poland. He was raised in a Jewish family of modest means. As a young child, his extraordinary skill at drawing got noticed and at fifteen he was able to enroll in the Cracow Academy of Fine Arts. His principal professor, Jozef Pankiewicz, felt Kisling’s enormous potential would best be served in Paris, then the hub of the painting universe.
In 1910, Kisling arrived in Paris with letters of recommendation from Pankiewicz. A friend of Pankiewicz was able to get Kisling a sponsorship from a wealthy Russian patron which afforded him one hundred fifty francs a month. Not having to “starve” as was common among many of the Parisian artists of the day, Kisling had more freedom to paint, exhibit, and spend time in the cafés of Montmartre and Montparnasse. In those bars, he met and caroused with Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Max Jacob, Juan Gris, Kees van Dongen, and many other rising artistic stars.
In the summer of 1911, Kisling accepted an invitation from Picasso to join him, and several other artists, at a rambling artist’s conclave outside Paris called “Ceret in the Pyrenees.” Ceret was host to artist studios and spaces where Cubism, Fauvism, and Impressionism were being developed. Picasso had a huge studio and it served several of his artist pals, including Kisling, who stayed for about a year.
Kisling missed Paris, however, so he decided to return in 1912 and he rented a spacious apartment and studio atop 3 rue Joseph Bara. The windows were high and wide and allowed the space to absorb the beautiful light that danced across the rooftops of Paris. Kisling would live in this apartment for the next twenty-seven years. Neighbors included Modigliani and Jules Pascin. The local boulevards and cafés seethed with artistic life.
Maybe life “seethed” a bit too much: on June 12, 1914, Kisling and his fellow Polish artist Leopold Gottlieb fought a duel precipitated by a “breach of honor” between the two men (reportedly over a young woman). The duel was seconded by the Mexican artist Diego Rivera, so the fight had a good pedigree, indeed. The duelists paced off in front of a crowd of reporters and onlookers in a field outside of Paris. Neither one of the antagonists was a good shot, apparently, and the first rounds missed. Eventually, after a series of reloads, each man slightly wounded the other. Honor thus satisfied, the two painters shook hands and repaired to a Montparnasse café for drinks.
When World War I commenced, Kisling, like Bullard, wanted to fight for his adopted country, and his only choice was the Foreign Legion. The Jew from Cracow met the boxer from Columbus, Georgia, during their rigorous training together in the 3rd Marching Regiment. Kisling was gravely wounded in the chest during the Battle of Carrency in May 1915. He was pronounced “untreatable” by the harried doctors at the front and sorted out from the wounded and placed with the soon-to-be-dead. Defying the odds, he began to slowly recover. He spent months in a hospital but made a miraculous and full recovery. He was, however, invalided out of the army and awarded full French citizenship and a small pension. By early 1916, he had returned to his bright, airy studio apartment and was happily accepting visitors, especially friends such as his old Legion pal, Gene Bullard.
Jefferson Davis Dickson Jr., then only twenty, sported a great moniker if you were from Mississippi, the home state of your namesake, the president of the ill-fated Confederate States of America. Jeff Dickson grew up in a prosperous postbellum family from Natchez. As a young man, he gravitated to the sport of boxing, even giving it a go himself for a while. He soon determined, however, that promoting fights was much more conducive to a healthy and lucrative life than standing inside the ring.
Hoping to make a name for himself in boxing promotion, he headed for France, fell in love with the country, just as his fellow Southerner Gene Bullard, and elected to stay.
Dickson got to meet Bullard through following his matches and he made a pitch to become his promoter just before the war intervened. Bullard introduced Dickson to his comrade from the Foreign Legion, Moise Kisling.3
Gilbert White was, at thirty-eight, considerably older than the others in the group. He was a member of Kisling’s circle of painter friends. He had come to Paris to study under the renowned James McNeill Whistler. White had been exhibiting his paintings, mostly murals, at the annual Paris exhibitions since 1903. Born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, White had migrated to the East to study art at Columbia University before landing in Paris and Whistler’s studio.4
A poor black kid who had gotten only through second grade; a Polish Jew who painted with Picasso and Matisse; a white, Southern playboy and entrepreneur; and a Midwest muralist with an Ivy League education: this was the dynamic quartet brought together by the promise of Paris and the call to arms of the “war to end all wars.”
In early September 1916, the four friends were up to no good, dining and drinking at La Rotonde, where Kisling sometimes worked as a bouncer, when the subject came up of “What’s next for you, Gene?” Knowing that he had assurances from Commandant Ferrolino that he could transfer to aviation, he promptly announced that he was going to become a fighter pilot. It is not known if this was the wine upping the ante, or if Bullard had decided on his own to push for more than he had been promised.
Dickson quickly pointed out, “You know, there aren’t any Negroes in aviation.”
“Sure I do,” Bullard responded. “That’s why I want to get into it.”