Moss Letters

WWII Letters

26 August 1944

Dear folks:

I just finished a game of volleyball and in this weather that’s pretty strenuous.  Now I smell like a goat and will have to take a bath in a Japanese tub that we found.  Our water supply for bathing and washing clothes is mostly rainwater.  Almost every shack has a barrel with a drain pipe stock in the top.  The day before yesterday I was out with the major and we pretty well covered all the island in his jeep.  In one area at the southern end of the island we went into some of the caves where the Japs hid out when the Jig was up.  There are still plenty of them there and only yesterday 64 were taken prison.  We went into one large cave that had been hit with a big naval shell and we estimated there was between sixty or seventy dead ones there.  In another we found two who had hanged themselves and their headless bodies were leaned against the wall and their heads still hanging on the wire.  But a little time in those places and the stench nearly knocks you out, so we didn’t stick around long.

I was scheduled to see Dick last Sunday on Saipan.  I was going to fly over but I couldn’t get away.  Don’t know whether I will see him again or not.  I wasn’t going to mention this but now that he is well and the same as ever again, I guess it’s all right.  On August the 5th he was injured when a Jap grenade went off near him and he got about a half dozen pieces in his legs and feet and back.  He was sent to the hospital, and when I first got news about it I flew over to see him.  When I got there he was getting along fine and able to walk in the chow line.  He wouldn’t let me tell you about it and so I didn’t write anything, but he wasn’t seriously hurt so I thought is was all right.  He was in the hospital until about the 11th or 12th and then released.  He was a little shaken and damn glad to see me, but I assure you he is as fine as ever and the injury will have no effect whatsoever upon him.  Undoubtedly he will be awarded the Purple Heart and maybe he has it by now.  He will have plenty to tell you when he gets back.  But please don’t worry for he is in the best of health.

Now that the 2nd class mail has begun to catch up I have papers and magazines all over the place.  The box of seeds came the day before yesterday and in good shape and now I can sit around and munch them when mealtime seems a long way off.  Danny Gettman brings in armloads of Star Heralds and it’s a job to read all of them, but I don’t mind it.  Jack Conklin and I swapped news and he told me Mildred Roberts was getting a divorce—How did it last as long as it did?  He had a lot of other news and it’s all interesting.  I haven’t received a letter from you for about a week now, but I suppose it will come in with a rush someday.  Jack read me a few of his letters and in all of them everyone back there seems very optimistic and sees a bright future for the end of the war.  I hope they don’t get too optimistic because there’s a long way to go yet, but everything does look pretty good on the whole.

Well I think I better stop and get ready to crawl in.  I hope this letter doesn’t startle you and you won’t worry about Dick, because in all honesty he is fine.  Yesterday two fellows left on furlough to the states and I would have given them two hundred dollars for their papers but I don’t think they would bat an eye at that price.  I couldn’t blame them.  Don’t get your hopes up about me getting back for the quota is so small it’s almost nothing and is more like dangling a piece of meat in front of a dog just to keep him going.  Maybe the rotation plan will treat me better although that’s a year away yet.  Well that’s enough for tonight, so I’ll just go to bed and think about all of you like I’ve done for a long time now.

Love,

Harold Moss Signature

20 August 1944

Dear Folks:

I’ll try my patience tonight and see if I can write a letter in long hand for a change.  Maybe you can’t read it around the end but here goes.  This is Saturday night again but it just as well be any night I guess.  Maybe I can make it to church in the morning if nothing unforeseen comes up.  Well I had a little excitement during my tour yesterday.  While driving along in a jeep at the southern end of the island, we spotted a Jap running in the bushes and trying to dodge around a burned up truck.  We let go a few rounds at him and soon he came out hands up.  We stripped him down to his bare then took him to intelligence.  He was scared to death and thought for sure we were going to kill him in short order.  He was injured pretty badly and flies were all around him.  Later we gave him a can of rations and he dug into them as fast as he could.  Every time we gave him a cigarette or did anything for him he would bow his head very reverently two or three times.

I can’t think of much to write about.  We are getting somewhat stabilized here now and the garrison routines are coming back.  We have two volleyball courts constructed and several teams have been organized in the battery for a playoff.  My game isn’t so hot but I get in once in a while.

Dan Gettman brought in a slug of Star Heralds a few days ago and we talked about your visit with his mother.  He’s a typical valley Russian but a pretty good egg.

Hope I can see Dick in the next few days and swap mail with him.  He probably has quite a few.

I wished I could think of something more to write but can’t seem to tonight.  So I’ll stop this and get ready for those “cool clean sheets” and that “late Sunday morning sleep”.  (Yes, I’m kiddin’).

Love,

Harold Moss Signature

16 August 1944

Dear Folks:

It’s time I was writing you again, and several good things to report.  Yesterday I made a flying visit to Saipan again and once more saw Jack.  We see each other fairly often although you can never tell which one will be the last one.  Well after I got back I saw the mail orderly sweating out six or so bags of mail and I was hoping your package would be on this load.  Sure enough it was.  The watch is exactly the thing I wanted and I’m nuts about it. I almost hated to wear it.  This batch of mail was the first time we had received anything but first class mail, and now everyone is reading their hometown papers and magazines.  I received three issues of the Free Press, the earliest dated 11 [illegible] and the last June 8 so I must have a bunch more floating around somewhere.  But no matter how old they were they were gobbled up eagerly.  I see I rated the paper with a little about my visit with Bob Harris.  I hope Dick has received his issues by this time.  Anyway with all the mail and packages the morale [illegible] a while anyway.  Boy that stuff has to come a h__ of a long ways.  Yesterday [illegible] the news of the landings in Southern France and it seems that things [illegible] lasting in Europe.  Incidentally I listened to the Nazi commentator [illegible] and it was almost ridiculous to hear his account and then listen [illegible] only after he spoke the axis overseas musical program for the Allied [illegible] with the comment it was especially for the ‘boys on Saipan”.  [illegible]  yesterday I took quite a comprehensive look at the island from the [illegible] was rather surprised to find how nice looking an island it is. [illegible] look out and see almost all of the island, with [illegible] the rolling slopes, green and laid out with [illegible] imagine the maddened Japanese occupying such a [illegible] every battle the Japanese put up their [illegible] it was equally as bloody and dis- [illegible] fourteen Jap officers who had [illegible].  They are nothing short of [illegible] certain we came to the airport [illegible] every one had a burned Jap plane [illegible] climbed into the cockpit of one [illegible] Japs lost so many planes on the [illegible].

[illegible] well that is the typical [illegible] can smell a Jap before you can [illegible] it rains often.  Our office [illegible] rain out and provides a little [illegible] time.  I’m very fine as usual [illegible] can’t worry about me.  I’ll see Dick in a [illegible].

Love,

Harold Moss Signature

12 August 1944

Dear Folks:

If this was a Saturday night at home I certainly wouldn’t be having any time to write.  A Saturday night over here is pretty monotonous and letter writing is the chief way to kill some time.  We have a small generator in the battery and a few tents have electric lights.  So that’s why I can write at night.  The ‘Hippodrome’ closes every week at this time, and when the show is going there isn’t much to do.  I walked over to the Jeep and listened to some news and music for a while but that grew tiresome so this is where I ended up.

The day before yesterday I flew to Saipan in a Liaison plane to see Dick.  You know I am now on Tinian and I believe I told you all about that if it wasn’t censored.  It is only a ten-minute ride but it was a nice one.  We landed on Aslitho airfield and then I went right to see Dick.  He’s very well and looking fine.  I think he’s even getting heavier if my eyes don’t deceive me.  The mud is about ankle deep all over the island and the hitchhiking was bad.  I hadn’t seen him since about the last of July, so I thought I better get over while I had the chance. Of course I took all the letters that I had received from you so he could read them.  After I left Dick, stopped in at Jack’s outfit and spent a few minutes with him.  I didn’t have much time but thought I better stop.  I don’t think I’ll be seeing him for a long time to come.  He was running around in shorts helping put up a building.  He gave me the picture I’m enclosing.  It was taken on Oahu just before I left.  He took several others but this one is the only one he had time to develop.  He said he would forward the rest as soon as they are done.  I guess we both look kind of ‘goony’ in it but otherwise it’s pretty good.

The war news sounds increasingly good each week.  We hear most of the world news and from both sides.  According to our version we are going great guns in Europe and I guess the Pacific is rolling too.  Tokyo radio the other day announced that all Jap civilians would be armed to defend the country – if that is the case it will be a bloody slaughter.  But that isn’t so much different than here. Most of the civilians go with the soldiers and take part in the ‘banzi’ zero hour attacks.  I hope you read in the July 24th issue of Time about the last attack of the Japs north of Garapan on Saipan.  That is the place I visited and that I told you about in one of my previous letters.  The more you see of them the more you become convinced they are mad, unreasoning 20th century cannibals.

I suppose by now that you have heard of the Army’s new rotation plan.  The time is now three years overseas, after which you become eligible for return and reassignment on the mainland.  Well that’s another year to wait before there is even any hopes of getting back, and even then much is still probable.  There is a furlough plan in effect but the quotas are so small I think it must be more of a morale builder than anything else.

Well there isn’t much else I can think of to write, although it isn’t very late. I’m still getting along very well and feeling good.  In this weather skin diseases and ailments seem to be common and coral cuts take a long time to heal.  It seems like all little scratches and cuts don’t heal up like they used to at home.

Guess I better peel off, and go to bed and for the Nth time think of you without being able to say goodnight to you.

Love,

Harold Moss Signature

8 August 1944

Dear folks:

I have that comforting feeling that goes with a full stomach – we’ve just finished supper, and it wasn’t so bad considering the inexperienced chefs that prepared it.  Our menu was especially made unusual by some fresh cucumbers that we gathered from a patch across the road.  Along with these we had cocoa, corn beef, cold peas, and those biscuits that the Army insists have to be hard and tasteless.  Tomorrow our kitchen will be inaugurated and it will be a relief to get some hot cooking.  But perhaps what makes me feel so good this evening is that I have news from your front.  Three of your letters and one from [illegible] so damn welcome and so eagerly read.  I must have been doing more writing [illegible] if you received six from me in one week.  But then you are about [illegible] with the exception of the Washington friend who writes me [illegible].  Yesterday had a letter from Betty S. Myers who it seems, intends [illegible].  And again there isn’t a lot to do in the evenings before dark and [illegible] uses up some time.  I hope you have received my extra long one [illegible] time ago – I consumed the better fraction of an afternoon putting it [illegible] will answer a lot of questions you might have wanted answered.  And for [illegible] sort of fun to describe to you all that I can and let you know all [illegible] I would give about a thousand dollars for a movie camera right now to [illegible] this, but cameras are on the ‘verboten’ list.

[illegible] dig out your letter and see what I can comment on.  Well the first thing, [illegible] this operation will change Dick or myself noticeably – at least not me. [illegible) has seen enough sights of the worst nature but he’s just as jolly and matter of fact as ever.   When he saw me during the middle of the operation he said he sure hated to go back in there, but knowing him probably he felt more than I thought.  I think I [illegible] Garapan so I’ll skip that.  Our ‘office’ is a lot different than the station- [illegible] we had on Oahu.  We have a square [illegible] supported by four poles with nothing on the sides.  To keep out the rain we nailed up sheets of tin taken from a blown up Jap barn but whenever it rains (and it does often), we usually run around putting up ponchos and shelter halves to keep from getting wet.  The office work is pretty much streamlined but still there is much paper work to do.  I am a lucky guy and have a cot that is nothing less than luxurious.  Among other things the guys use to sleep on is stretchers, salvaged Jap beds, Jap mats, homemade beds and whatever you have.  Our camp looks like a hobo jungle.  And you asked about a PX.  No we don’t have one but necessaries are issued gratis.  I don’t think I’ve spent [illegible] three months [illegible] a nice paycheck I’ll have.  We’re the guys that make the paychecks [illegible].  I hope you are getting my new [illegible].

[illegible] guys are [illegible] a jeep listening to sweet music from Frisco and some [illegible].  [illegible] guys the news at six o’clock at dictation [illegible].    [illegible] produced dissemination to other troops.  Most of the [illegible] and news.  An announcement this afternoon [illegible] and we heard a quoted portion of the new Premier’s speech [illegible].   In the evenings we sometimes get China and listen to music from night [illegible] broadcasts from Manila with the usual line.

[illegible] to knock off about here and walk down sunset boulevard to the Roxy.

Love,

Harold Moss Signature

7 August 1944

Dear Folks:

In a few minutes I’m going over the hill and down the road to the show but first I better scratch you out a short epistle.  The last time I wrote you I was on Saipan where I was with Dick and where I could see Jack, but now I’m three miles across the channel on Tinian.  Tinian is a green, oblong island with a plateau down the middle.  It reminds me much of Maui.  The fields are well laid out, and abounding with sugar cane, sweet potatoes and other small crops.  Looking at the valley from Lake Minatare is much like the scene from here.  Most of the farm homes I have seen look as though the Jap farmers must have been pretty well off.  More presentable than those on Saipan.  Tinian towns must have been picturesque little settlements when it was whole, but now it looks like Garapan.  I never imagined I would see such destruction as I had seen in newsreels, etc., but that’s all I have seen for the last two months.  Every building and shed has been hit, and even small houses setting hidden in cane fields have been demolished.  On most of the Jap homes, the house is of wood with a tin roof, while the barn is usually reinforced concrete about eight inches thick, and a large cistern to collect rain water.  Water by the way is a pretty important matter here and probably it contributed no little in whipping the Japs.  Probably every Jap farmer was forced to build a concrete barn and maintain some stock for the army.  On the southern part of the island snipers and civilians are being collected, although the island has been secured for some time.  From the wreckage of houses we have taken what was left to make ourselves some shelter against the rain, and I wished you could see some of the Rube Goldberg contraptions that have been arranged.  The architectural masterpieces that are showers are something to see.  It seems that every piece of wreckage can be put to use in some way.  It has been raining a lot lately and the mud is bad to slip around in.  I’m getting behind on dirty clothes and tomorrow I think I’ll be forced to do some laundry.  I wished you could see us whip up our supper.  We have a small stove and we’re sure to make some man a good wife.  The rations get a little tiresome but soon we’ll have a kitchen and back to good rations.

Well Mom and Dad I’m still very well.  Dengue fever has hit some but I’ve been okeh so far.  Of course the only really bad element to it all is the distance from home.  I haven’t seen Dick for a week or two and probably won’t get to see him for some time although you can never tell.  Probably I may not see Jack again either.  Dusk is pulling the shades down so I better grab my mosquito drop and flashlight and get along to the show.  Last night we sat in the rain and saw a show that was bad for the dogfaces titled ‘Love Can’t Be Rationed’.  About the scarcity of men in the states and the feminine wolves.  What a situation.  Well adios this time.

Love,

Harold Moss Signature

28 July 1944

Dear Folks:

I haven’t received any mail for a couple of days but I guess that’s no excuse for not writing.  Very little news the past few days – at least what I can write about.  Haven’t seen Dick recently nor Jack Conklin either, but I believe we’ll have another little reunion again soon.  Living together on a little island like this maybe you would imagine it wouldn’t be so hard to see each other – but it isn’t as easy as it seems.  When I do get out it’s by the hitchhike method and it’s pretty good too.  Lots of vehicles running around.  On the northern end of the island they are still bringing a few snipers out and even now it’s not very safe to go nosing around, probably they will be (there) for sometime to come.  Dick had a little celebration a few days ago he was telling me about.  They slaughtered a calf and all enjoyed some good steaks.  A few head of livestock are grazing around our area, but they look pretty scrubby and thin.  This morning I put some heavy grease on my souvenirs, wrapped them up and now I’m wondering how I can send them to you.  But I’ll get them back someway.  When Dick finds anything he gives it to me because I can keep it a little better than he can.  Saw a good show last night ‘Waikiki Wedding’ with Bing Crosby – drew a lot of comments having been in Hawaii for quite a while.  The folks at home sure are deceived if they believe all they see.  And again tonight we are having a show.  Sounds like I’m having a vacation in the Marianas doesn’t it?  I wished it was.

Are you getting my new allotment alright – I was wondering about it.  Of course we haven’t been paid since we left Oahu so we’ll all be rich when we get back.  I’ll bet this is a wild crew when they get back.  They’d go really hog wild if they hit the states.  That’s about all we think about – when and what we will do when that time comes.

Well it’s getting pretty dusk and we don’t enjoy the luxury of electric lights so I’m going to have to taper off.  I’m really very well, getting lots to eat and today I even acquired that rare item called a cot.  I should sleep like a tired baby.  Things are getting a little safer and now we don’t stick so close to a foxhole as we used to – although I suppose we should.  I guess I shouldn’t write tonight because I hardly know what time it is where you are.  We try to figure it out.  We are a day earlier than you being across the International Date Line, plus the hours difference from that line.  Oh well maybe you can figure it up some day.  I think it’s something like thirty-two hours.  Well regardless of what it figures up to I’m still going to write goodnight.  Dad’s mention of beer in his letter brings visions of greatest ecstasy, and even the thought of an ice cream cone throw me into delicious raptures.  Well adios from an X Jap stomping ground.

Love,

Harold Moss Signature

26 July 1944

Dear Folks:

Just a few lines today before I get cleaned up a little and wonder how I’ll spend the rest of the evening.  Today was a hot one and sultry too, and you sweat just sitting around, however now I’m in pretty good shape and not wearing down to a shadow as you were afraid of.  As a matter of fact, I’m wondering how I will endure the cold weather of Nebraska.  I was remarking last night how swell it would be to see some snow or walk through a snowdrift, or look at the stars on a frosty night.  Did my washing today, a job I don’t like but its clean clothes for a while.  We have our hole fixed up and it isn’t bad at all.  Pretty noisy sleeping some nights though.  My work is considerably streamlined from what it was in Oahu and there isn’t quite so much paper work to attend to although in my estimation there still (is) far too much.

I see some of the fellows have an ox hooked to an ancient cart and are driving the old beast around howling miscellaneous stuff.  It’s surprising how the GI’s can improvise no matter where they go.

In a little while it will be mail time and I hope I rate one or two.  The mail system is pretty good, better than I expected however nothing but first class is coming so of course the watch has not arrived yet.  (I was writing with a Jap pen and the darn thing gets balky once in a while.)

Dick is still okeh but I won’t be seeing him for awhile.

Not very much this time but I knew you want to know how things are all the time.

Love,

Harold Moss Signature

24 July 1944

Dear Folks:

I received Dad’s letter today acknowledging the first one I mailed from here and I’m so glad it made you feel better.  Also had one from Mom but it was several days older.  I guess the first thing on this communiqué will be about yesterday.  Minatare moved 7,000 miles across the Pacific to Saipan when Dick, Jack Conklin and myself got together for an afternoon’s reunion.  Until yesterday the three of us had been unable to get together at one time, but we finally got CO’s okeh.  Dick attended services at the 27th Division cemetery just after dinner and met Jack and I at Jack’s outfit about three o’clock.  This tripartite reunion means more than you realize. While we were there Jack took several pictures and he’ll send them as soon as possible.  We thought also that it might be interesting to have it put in the Star-Herald with a short story below it.  Jack will send the pictures to his Dad, and he left the writing end of it up to me, but now I don’t know how much the censors will allow.  Probably by this time you have received my three page letter and there should be some material in that.  Jack wanted me to write his dad with a little story to go with the picture but you can get all the information from his folks, and you can fit something together.  About the first thing we do at these meetings is exchange news about the ‘old country’ and each adds to his bit of gossip.  It seems there are a million changes back there and very few of the old faces will be left.  Vic Sage getting wedded drew quite a comment, and every time someone has a baby we wonder how they could grow up so fast.  And Jack Lupher too – it seems they are all marrying the Russians.  Maybe it’s a good thing Dick got out when he did.  And speaking of Dick, he does a lot more talking than before and because he had so many harrowing experiences than Jack or I, he had quite a little to say.  I don’t suspect he will be writing much now but I’ll do his share and let you know all I find out.

The money enclosed is some of that I found that I told you about in a previous letter.  This little guy I got it from must have been a paymaster or something of the sort for he sure had a wad.  I’ve given away quite a slug too.  The 100 yen note is pretty scarce.  The holes in the bills were caused by a bullet which I found bedded in the center.  The exchange rate is 20 yen for an American dollar, and the smaller bills I believe are 50 sen or a half a yen.  As soon as I can arrange it I’m going to send home the sword and a few other items that Dick and I found – Dick found most of them.  The souvenir racket runs into some big stuff here and some fancy prices are quoted for some things.  Swords are quoted from $500 to $1,000.  But ours weren’t boughten, they were found.  Dick and I tried to imagine Mom’s little gasps if she could see some of the things.

I believe this is about all of interest this time.  A Bob Hope movie is on tonight.  Our ‘theatre’ is a hole scooped out by a bulldozer and the seats, the scooped out dirt.  Well, adios and ‘buenos noches’ for now.

Love,

Harold Moss Signature

18 July 1944

Dear folks:

Time out for another communiqué from Saipan and what I did and saw this morning should give me enough material for a good one but I don’t know how much you like to know about this stuff – I mean maybe you would rather not hear all the worse aspects. Dick came around this morning about ten in a jeep and asked me if I wanted to see some of the island and I said sure so we took off up through Charan Kanoa and on through Garapan to the north where the Japs held out the longest.  Dick had been around there before and knew where to go.  He wanted to find a Jap pistol and at the same time show me some dead Japs, and as we got near the area I didn’t know whether I was going to feel right or not.  Finally we pulled across a young cane field and came to stop about fifty yards from the beach.  I noticed the stench was terrific and the flies could be counted by the hundreds, and I felt a little hesitant at having to look around.  After putting a shell in the chamber I got out and Dick and I walked into the underbrush and trees.  We didn’t go far before we could see plenty of dead Japs.  Many of them had committed suicide by putting a grenade on their stomach and some had taken off one shoe, putting the end of the barrel in their stomach and fired their rifle with their big toe.  I saw several of these.  They have odd and many ways of killing themselves and one group looked as though they had lined up laying down and let the man in back of him blow his brains out.  We must have walked three or four hundred yards down the beach and the dead were scattered all through the area.  Some civilians had refused to give up and stayed with the soldiers and there was many of them all ages, some in family groups.  A number of the soldiers had bottles of sake and more of them had nothing but a stick with a spike on the end for a weapon.  Some had attempted to crawl over the rocks on the edge of the water and swim away and in one place in an opening in the rocks there must have been a dozen.  Dick found a very good looking officer’s sword in good condition.  They are about the most prize souvenir to get and we felt darn lucky.  Well about eleven thirty we started back down the wreckage littered road.  I thought a lot of things about what the war all means and how come all these people and soldiers are dead, and will they do the same thing fifty or a hundred years from now, but that’s all of no avail.  Garapan is a little smaller than Scottsbluff and the town was leveled.  If you can imagine the Stockfleth Chevrolet Garage when it burned and then apply it to every building in town you can see what a mess it must be.  It must have been a neat little town sitting below Mt. Tapochata but it is wreckage and debris from one end of the town to the other.

I still ate a pretty good dinner when I got back, and now it’s about time to take a good shower and get the smell off me.  Also this morning I found a pack of Jap money – there must have been about seven or eight thousand yen in it.  The exchange rate is twenty yen to a dollar. How can I sleep with so much money?  Ol’ Dick’s quite a soldier and hale as ever.  He doesn’t write much I guess but he’s okeh and wanting to get home as much as I do.  Guess this is enough for this time – will give another communiqué on my experiences in a day or two.

Love,

Harold Moss Signature