Jasper County Democrat, Volume 21, Number 5, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 April 1918 — LETTERS FROM JASPER COUNTY SOLDIERS [ARTICLE]

LETTERS FROM JASPER COUNTY SOLDIERS

" Stanley Lane of Newton township, who is now located at Camp Meade, Maryland, writes an interesting letter home from which The Democrat is permitted to —publish the following: The quarantine has been raised and we took a hike around the camp. This is Wednesday afternoon and we either do athletic exercises or go on a hike. This camp is nine miles square and 36 miles around. About fifty or sixty thousand soldiers here now, and will be aboutone hundred thousand by the timie the first draft is over. On our way we hiked through about ten or twelve miles of fine forest, trenches, dugouts, etc. Large machine guns are digging trenches, x piles of trees cut and used in front and on the sides to keep them frolm caving in. They are from six to eight feet deep in a' zig-zag shape. We of the signal corps do not dig trenches or anything like that. Our branch is the highest in the army, and all of our work is dqne on the front, first behind the first line. We sign for all the different branches. I have the semiphore alphabet pretty good. It sounds like real war here, machine guns shooting 60 0» times a minute. I see in the paper where the Germans have a new gun that shoots seventy-five miles, but it is mostly bluff. We have one here that will shoot thirty-four and I don’t believe their’s will go that. We get fine instructions every Saturday forenoon, today it was on dressing the wounded in the field, or first aid, and gas, which is the first and worst the soldiers have to fight against, but the gas masks are safe, the liquid lasts forty hours. You 'breathe right through it and the air passes through the liquid, which kills all the gas. Everyone must carry a gas mask within fifteen miles of the front, and must wear them within three miles. When the gas alarm is given they must be put on in about six seconds, or while holding a breath. The second breath would prove fatal. There are different kinds of gas, some can be seen >n the clouds, others are invisible to sight or smell. We have instruments ahead with magnets that give the alarm, and with a mask everyone is safe. We will take radio wireless next —put up a pole, wires and set the instruments in six seconds; some quick work. We sure get good eats. Just got back from mess, had macaroni, potatoes, beans, meat, fruit salad (not with whipped cream like I used to have, though) and good coffee. I got thirty-six hours off last Saturday and went to Washington, D. C., which is only nineteen miles from here. The Washington monument is a stupendous shaft of granite 555 feet, 5 1-8 inches iff height. It is 55 feet square at the base, 34 feet at the top, and terminates in a pyramid of pure aluminum. The foundation of rock and cement is a 6 feet deep and 126 feet square. The corner stone was laid in 1848, and the monument was finished in 1885. It is the highest work, of masonry in the world. STANLEY L. LANE. Co. C, 324 Field Signal Bn., Camp Meade, Maryland. From Camp Sevier, South Carolina In a letter received "a few days ago from D. J. Babcock, who, with a few other Jasper county boys of the 309th engineers. Camp Taylor, Kentucky, were recently transferred to Camp Sevier, South Carolina, we copy the following which will be of interest to many readers of The Democrat: We are located about five or six miles from Greenville, S. C., a southern city of 85,000 or 40,000 population. On arrival here we were

placed in a detention camp under quarantine and we are doing but very little drilling now. Our camp is located in a large pine tree forest and most of our time is spent in pulling stumps and clearing off the ground. We live in tents, eight to a tent. The tents are provided with wooden floors and have a small stove in the center which we burn chips in to provide sufficient beat, as it gets quite cold here in the early hours of the morning, although the hours of daylight on days when the sun is shining are very warm. It is (on sunny days) as hot here now as it generallv gets in Indiana on the hottest days of the year. It has been rainy and cold here for the past couple of days, and a small fire feels very good. We are getting only fair grub now but expect to get better stuff soon. We are under the charge of a field artillery brigade, so us engineers must take what they se> fit to feed us and be satisfied with it, waiting for good eats when we get in our regular outfit. There are probably 600 or 70ft men in this detention camp, and it’s quite a problem to feed all of them, as everything has to be carried (cooked) from the artillery kitchen in the amain camp. Another added convenience here is our lighting system- Each tent is given a candle, which provides all the light we have. Most of the men in this camp are former members of the Ist Tennessee militia, who wendrafted into the field artillery. Taps here does not blow until 11 o'clock, but there is no place to go, so we generally go to bed at 10 p. m.

I understand that one can get a’ pass—for the asking—from Satur-1 day noon until reveille Monday | morning, thus permitting us to stay ( Saturday night in Greenville, if we desire to do so. Newspapers here cost 5c each, and our closest metropolitan daily is the “Atlanta Georgian/’ It is about 150 to 200 miles to Atlanta. Charleston. S. C-. the nearest Atlantic seaport, is about 280 miles from here. There are several small, camps scattered about in the woods and sticks of South Carolina, all I of which are similar to Camp Sev-| ier, and vastly different from Camp ( Taylor, which is almost like homq! in comparison to this place. The officers here are very nice. We hare no rifles here to keep I clean, and it is said that the 105th* engineers—the organisation we ex-! <pect to join—carries nothing but a ’ Colt .45 revolver, * railroad construction outfit anwlt is rumored | I will soon leave for France to build I railroads, etc., there. This organ!- . ration is not supposed to do much fighting, confining its efforts to keeping transportation lines in the rear lof the armies in good shape. I Everywhere we look kero there fare pine trees, and when the sun

shines one can feel the perspiration trickle down one’s back. The soil is rather a cross between sand and a red-like clay, and it is a bad place in damp weather. W’e have cleared a large enough spot here for a Y. M. C. A. tent and we put it up Saturday. We bad a physical examination Saturday, also, and I guess they found everyone in good shape. I just wish you could see this camp here. The ground in several places still has its quota of pine tree stumps and one has to detour for them every once In a while. But we get good food, and good treatment here and all seem satisfied. I believe we will like it all right after getting out of quarantine. I have plenty of spare time at present, all we do is stand reveille and retreat, and take a hike in the woods, sleeping the rest of the time. It is the rainy season here now and for the last two days it has poured down incessantly.

Vern Davisson Writes From France Mr. and Mrs. Harvey Davisson are in receipt of another letter from their son Vein, who is an ambulance driver in France, and which we are permitted to piibllsh. The letter follows: In France, March 20, 1918. Dear Folks: —- Received your letter the other day and was sure glad to hear from you. I see you have forgotten to date it, but I receive them anyway unless the ship goes down. I am trying to use the typewriter in the office, but it does not work very well. Received word from my insurance. It cime through all right and costs we $6.60 a month. Did you get my letter asking for a fountain pen, films, printing paper, developer and printing frame? I can not get any of that stuff here. My camera is a folding Brownie No. 2, size 2*4x3%. \ We are having some rainy weather here now, and I guess this Whole month will be that way. I *m. sending some good souvenirs to Mr. Hilliard’s store—a German star shell, a German coat, and two pieces of shrapnel, one from an aerial bomb and the other from shell which demolished the little shed our cars stand in when we are at the post. Yow may look at the coat and guess what happened to the Boche that was inside of It. It is getting d —d Shot around here nowadays. As soon as I can get the pictures made of the decoration of the | Section I will send you one. I think they will be good. The French shot down three Boche planes here in two days. One fell in No Man’s Land and neither side could get .out to it; another ; fell on this side and the other managed to plane back home,. but was badly winged. One of our drivers took the cook to the post last night and the Germans sent over three thousand big shells in and all around the post (censored) there, and many other things that I cannot mention, thereI fore the cook decided the best place Ito be is back at camp in the little.

, kitchen. We are ordered to cut down on lour baggage. We cannot keep our .trunks with us, therefore I am sending it to the American Express Co. for storage, which will cost me about fifty cents per month. If I sent it to the army storage I would be unable to get it until the war is over. We meet many Americans now* and most of them are from » /They are in a hurry to get busy and have the thing over with. They fare doing lots of good work now. | There is a Purdue ambulance section close here now. I was talking . with one of them today. They (have not seen any service yet, only having arrived here two months ago. i Well, I cannot think of mudh more to write, so will dose for this I time. Duvall and I are feeling fine and hope this finds you all the same. VERN DAVISSON. I P. S.—Tell Mr. Hilliard to be on the lookout for a package.