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My Dear Mother & Family:-
This is our first real rest for a long time so I am just writing before
hearing from you. Tomorrow is the 4th and no races or dances to go to. I
suppose you will have a great celebration in the States this year. Big
parties and celebrations were planned for the soldiers here but will be
enjoyed mostly by the wounded. On one of our trips we passed the new U.S.
Ambulance Train. The "Yanks" were sitting in the doors and when they saw
us they shouted, "We've got him going, give him hell". Some boys! Some of
the towns we came thru gave us a great send off. One thing about Hdq. Co.
is that the band is always along and that looks big to them. A band is a
great thing in the army. We have a few good soloists and have a concert in
the evening when we are in billets.
Our band is a dandy and it sounds great when we come thru some of these
narrow winding streets to hear them play "Come Out of the Kitchen, Mary
Ann"." A Long Trail Winding" is still the favorite however, and is sung
with great gusto. Next 4th of July you will have heard all of this stuff
while I'm eating your cooking again. We are eating like kings now however.
Got our new kitchens and have good grub. I was glad to trade from the
British to Uncle Sam. Then there is a big Y.M.C.A. canteen as I told you
and also our own commissary truck which comes around about once a week. We
can get real chocolate creams for fifty cents a pound, packed in boxes.
That's cheaper than you can buy it in the states. This truck carries
everything. Last pay, I drew 2 months or three hundred forty francs. Five
francs on the dollar. I've made up for the time when I was broke. Just
luckily when I was broke we were where we couldn't buy anything and
believe me I had company. When I sailed I had four dollars... Some roll to
take a trip to Europe on, eh?
I never told you much about my trip across, did I? Well sir, if anyone saw
that ship, I did.
[The ship was the “Aquatania”].
Only one place no one could go and that was in the engine room. She was
some floating city. We were escorted the last two days by sub chasers.
This is where the fun came in. Every day they would hold target practice.
Dad would have enjoyed this. The target was a two by four weighted at one
end and a flag on the other. Those gunners from our ship could hit that
thing bobbing around eight hundred yards from the ship. Can you imagine
that for shooting? A periscope on a conning tower has small chance out
there these days. All there was to it after they dropped the target was
that they swung this giant greyhound round in a circle going at full
speed, then the gunners would turn the big pieces also and when the man on
the upper deck sent down the range they would stick the cotton in their
ears and shout “On the target”, "Stand by" and a little later, "Fire" and
hit that two by four cutting the flag right off of it. It surely was fine
work. I've had a letter from one of the stewards who made up with me on
the way across. He was surely a good guy too. (Kept my stomach filled and
that is something.) I wasn't eating with the boys at all after I made up
with him. I'd wait till the officers were fed and slip up to the "D" deck
dining room and the old boy would have a feed spread out for me. All I had
to do then was hang around a while and listen to him tell what a great guy
he was and what a grand country "H’England” was and then beat it. He told
me that he never saw anything like the bloody Yanks, he couldn't see why
they were so damned curious and kicked about wearing life preservers and
coming in off the deck. One of our teachers at the school here said that
up until he began teaching Yanks he hardly ever heard the word "why". Now
he explains a thing, he said, and right away there is a chorus of "What
makes it do that?" and "Why does it do it that way"? Well, Mother, dear,
I'm glad I didn't miss it and secretly, you are too. Now aren't you? Love
to you and dad and all the rest.
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