Lieutenant Colonel George S. Patton in front of a FT Renault Tank in France, 1918. The same year, Patton would write a poem inspired by his experiences leading these early tanks into combat. BILL
Bill, he kept racin’ the motor,
For fear that the damned thing would die.
While I fiddled ‘round the breech block
And wished for a piece of your pie. It’s funny the way it affects you,
When you’re waitin’ for the signal to go.
There’s none of the high moral feeling
About which the newspapers blow. For myself, I always is hungry,
While Bill thought his spark plugs was foul.
Some guys talks o’ sprees they has been on,
And one kid, what’s croaked, thought of school. At last, I seen Number One signal;
I beat on the back o’Bill’s neck.
He slipped her the juice and she started,
And Bill he ain’t never come back. The first news we had of the Boches
Was shot splinters, right in the eye.
I cussed twice as loud as the Colonel,
And forgot all about the old pie. A Boche he runs out with a tank gun;
I gave him H.E. in the guts.
You ought to have seen him pop open!
They sure was well fed, was them sluts. We wiped out two nests with case shot,
And was just gettin’ into a third,
When we plunked in a hole full of water.
That God-damned Bill sure was a bird. He hollers, “Frank, you’re married;
If only one gets out, it’s you.”
And he rammed me up out of the turret…
I guess that’s about all I knew. A stinkin’ whizz-bang beaned me,
Or I might of rescued Bill,
But it’s too late now. He’s sleepin’
By our tank, on that God-damned hill. They gave him a Medal of Honor,
For savin’ me for you,
So if it’s a boy we’ll name it Bill,
It’s the least and the most we can do.
