“Damn fool women poking their noses into a man’s war. Get in.”
Frances was in no position to argue and it wasn’t until she squeezed into a seat in the back that she realized how totally exhausted she was. She slept off and on for the next two hours, quietly hoping her presence had been forgotten and desperately grateful for the ride.
They arrived in Luxembourg a little after ten at night and Frances immediately fell into conversation with some American soldiers. They told her that another carload of officers would be leaving for Trier within the hour and she managed to hitch a ride with them. There was talk of an advance guard moving across the Rhine and so when they parked outside the hotel where General William Mitchell, chief of the army’s air service in France, was meeting with other Allied officers, she sat up in the car the rest of the night hoping to catch his attention.
Wrapped in the spirit of adventure and a euphoric state of exhaustion, she spotted General Mitchell emerging from the hotel just before dawn. After his gruff reaction at finding her walking alone and giving her a ride, he said he was not going to be the one to stop her now and approved her accompanying his aide Major Louis Brereton into German territory.
Frances and the major drove through the small villages, where Germans stared in amazement but no one tried to stop them. As they drove at full speed through one of the larger towns, people threw rocks and clods of dirt at their car and from then on, they stayed on the back roads. Finally, a little after five the next morning, they approached Koblenz. At first the town appeared quietly menacing, but as they crossed the bridge spanning the Rhine river, a small band was playing “The Star-Spangled Banner,” bringing tears to their eyes.
Major Brereton encouraged Frances to return to Paris without delay. There were rumors of riots in other parts of Germany and the only troops immediately following them into Koblenz were a small band of military police. But Frances stayed on for several days, working with the supply troops as they arrived and the doctors and nurses who tended to the prisoners and the wounded left behind by the retreating German forces.34
Frances was flown back to Paris on November 10 and the next morning, as word of the Armistice started to spread, the city slowly came alive. By afternoon the crowds made the streets impassable and honking horns, beating drums, music, and song filled the air—“Yankee Doodle Dandy,” “God Save the King,” “Hail, Hail, the Gang’s All Here,” and almost constantly the “Marseillaise.” There were too many women in mourning for sons and husbands to have the joy be unabashed, but the relief was palpable. Frances made the rounds as best she could and ended the evening at Maxim’s, squeezed into a table with General William Mitchell.35
A few days later, Frances learned that she had been declared the first correspondent and the first American woman to cross the Rhine. Mary Roberts Rinehart had finally made it to France only two days before the end of the war, but was happily reunited with her son Stanley and stayed on for several months to cover the peace conference that was to follow.
As the war was ending, the international flu epidemic of 1918 hit. Frances was one of the hundreds of thousands struck with the virus, which killed so many people that newspaper obituaries were divided into three sections: deaths, war dead, and “epidemic casualties.” Letters from home told her that everyone was wearing masks, theaters were closed, and some studios had stopped production. Troop movements were canceled. To go outside was to risk your life. Young and old were dying of the disease after only a few days of being afflicted. Her dear New York friend, the composer Felix Arndt, who had written Nola for his wife and Marionette for Frances, was gone at the age of twenty-two. Adela Rogers St. Johns’s beloved new stepmother had died as well. No one escaped being touched in one way or another.36
Frances recovered, yet for a time it looked as if Fred Thomson might be home before her. Then on December 7, the day before the first contingent of the 143rd were to board the ship for the States, he received word from the General Headquarters that he was being detached from his regiment and named the chaplain of the Bordeaux embarkation camp. He was to remain for at least six more months and be the coordinating officer for all their educational, recreational, and religious activities. Before taking effect, the assignment allowed an extended leave in Paris and he arranged to meet Frances before her departure.37
As Frances sat in the crowded lobby of the Ritz Hotel waiting for Fred, boisterous Americans dominated the throngs of people almost desperate to celebrate. She watched “the hunting pack out for the kill” as two Frenchwomen moved in on a tall American army captain and a shorter young man in an Italian uniform. As the captain glanced in her direction, Frances locked eyes with Bosworth’s cinematographer George Hill. He said something quickly to his friend and came over to join her.
“I heard you were in France, but I’ve been stationed in Italy ever since I arrived in Europe,” George said as he sat down next to her. “Somebody told me you were going to marry a sky pilot. Is that true?”
He asked it with such incredulity that Frances laughed out loud as she nodded yes.
“A preacher’s wife,” George said, shaking his head in bewilderment. “I can’t quite see you in that role.”
Frances assured him he would understand when he met Fred, who should be arriving soon, and as they waited, they traded war stories mixed with news from home. His Italian friend was still entertaining the two young women and George waved to him to join them.38
“You’ll get a great kick out of this chap. He’s the wildest coot in the Italian flying corps. He cracked up so many of their planes we called him the Austrian Ace.”
“Does he speak English?” Frances asked in a whisper as the young man walked toward them.
“Speak English? He’s American. His name is Walter Wanger.”
Within minutes, Walter and Frances were comparing notes on their San Francisco childhoods and determining how their families might have known each other. His father, Sigmund Feuchtwanger, had been a successful clothes manufacturer, but Walter’s mother changed the family name to Wanger after his father’s death. Walter had gone off to Dartmouth and independently produced several plays, but was becoming intrigued by the movie business and wanted to work in Hollywood after the war.39
Frances was fascinated by this multifaceted charmer and, inclined to give the benefit of the doubt to anyone from San Francisco, volunteered to give him letters of introduction to Lasky and Zukor. Walter was holding her hand in thanks just as Fred Thomson walked though the door.
Introductions were made and Fred and George, both well over six feet, dwarfed Frances and Walter. The two men stayed and talked for another half hour before Fred and Frances were finally alone.
“I liked your friend Captain Hill very much, but where did you pick up that American imposter who was holding your hand when I arrived?” Frances explained the situation, but while he and George would become close friends, Fred never did have much patience for the showman Walter Wanger.
Fred and Frances spent Christmas together in Paris and with prewar guidebooks in hand, they visited Versailles, Napoleon’s tomb, and all the other tourist attractions. They welcomed in the new year of 1919 and in early February, she boarded the transport ship the Baltic and headed for New York.40
Chapter 8
Frances was greeted at the dock by reporters eager to hear her war stories. The reception had been arranged by Pete Smith, the Famous Players Lasky publicity man she had known when he was promoting Bosworth films. Frances
