War predictions Archives - Page 3 of 4

20 October 1944

Dear Folks:

A little while before bed so maybe I can knock out a short communiqué. Had a letter from Dick tonight – one of the longest I’ve received from him. He sounded pretty good – but said you sent him some sour letters because he didn’t tell you about his getting hurt. He thought you was a little fed up. His only reason for not telling [you] was to keep you from being upset and we didn’t expect you would receive anything official about it. Well he’s been through a lot more, and he’s a great guy, and I wouldn’t write anything to make him feel as he does. Maybe it was just the way he took your letters.

Betty Hutton’s show is coming tomorrow and it will be something to look forward to. A look at a white woman with shoes on will be a treat in itself. The boys scavenged some lumber and have built a pretty nice looking stage. The seats are dirt filled sacks. Last night at the show it rained in almost cloudburst proportions but it didn’t diter many of the customers.

We’ve been following the news pretty closely – especially listening to the events in the Philippines and around Formosa. A Jap news broadcast today said they had sunk eleven of our carriers along with two battleships and several other ships. They were painting a rosy picture for themselves and I hope it is all fiction. Such news is discouraging. I wish I could describe for you the great activity here and what I know.

It gets pretty hot here but morale is kept up partially by the fact that we get afternoons off except when something urgent comes along. Baseball and volleyball take up the afternoon. So far we’ve been unable to get PX supplies and we’re pretty disgusted about the fact – especially when other units are enjoying cokes, candy, etc. An ice cold coke would sell for a buck easily.

Well enough for tonight – not much news so I’ll quite for this time.

Love,

14 September 1944

Dearest Folks:

No show tonight and I have about (an) hour to spend before hitting the hay so I should be able to get a few letters finished. Received my last one from you a few days ago, but haven’t had much time to do any writing since then. Today was Sunday and I had expected to put in some leisure time watching a ball game or playing volleyball, but neither materialized. Have been going strong all day and it looks like we will keep up the pace for a while. The paper war is still going strong. Well for all they ride it and cast humorous aspersions at it, I still think it is pretty important and at some time in the future perhaps a good many arguments will be settled over them. We have not been paid in five months and preparing a payroll covering that length of time is quite a long and arduous job. Well I think that (is) enough shop talk. Now to my very limited personal life.

Yesterday went to Saipan on a ‘duck’ which is a two and a half ton amphibious truck. Pretty convenient machines – you just drive till you hit the water and then start the propeller going and there you have a boat. But they don’t move very fast and it was about a two hour trip. After taking care of a small amount of official business at the Finance Office, hitchhiked up Jack’s way and had dinner and then spent part of the afternoon with him. It was his day off so we took off our clothes, sat, sweated and talked, and there was a lot of talking done too. This time we discussed Jack’s love life and dwelt on the probable paths that Emick and Chambers and I will take, also. And then we got around to what our postwar plans were. Jack seems undecided between going to a photo school in Los Angeles or back to the University. And I’m undecided about taking a world tour (haven’t I had enough already?) and just taking it easy or going back to school. I hope you put the pressure on to go back, and Dick too. Probably that’s what I’ll do, although if I were to go back now I think I would feel a little funny somehow. It’s rather unexplainable but the circumstances seem a little different now. We were also a little irritated about the reports of civilian laxity back home and their little regard for the war, but I think it’s all pretty human and natural. But it seems to be a growing topic of discussion.

I haven’t seen Dick for quite some time now you know and I suspect he’s no longer around. I wrote to him about three weeks ago and haven’t got a reply yet. Even though he’s been gone only a short time I sure long to see him again. He’s such a good guy and I hate to see him run into any more trouble the same as you do. About his letter with the ‘beefing’ in – I don’t think he’s much different than many others. He used to talk to me about the subject and in many ways he is right. I’m surprised that the War Department would write about his injury since it was so light. And it would have to ruin your Denver vacation. That scrap he got into was certainly a rough one, and when I think about it I wished some people back home could have had a glimpse of the sordid scenes of Saipan when things were the hottest. I was just interrupted by the air raid sirens, and things were blacked out in a hurry but nothing showed up and now I can see again. The Nips haven’t given any trouble in the air since the battle ended. I heard the news yesterday about the Task Force strike near Manila. Sounds good and the noose is tightening quickly now. Another interruption, and this time a good one, a fellow just brought me a letter from Mom, a good long one and full of good stuff to write about. Whenever you hear any little gossip about somebody I knew or any clippings, be sure and give me the lowdown. Your first paragraph was about Dick and I believe I explained that pretty well a few days ago. I don’t know anything about the trouble or whether Dick received his box – I haven’t seen him in quite a while. Yeah, I am having a ‘spitting’ good time with all the seeds – the problem though is too keep the ants away. The major has been very good to me and loaned me his jeep to take Jack around the island last week. I’ll explain the circumstances some day. And I often wonder about why some people get the breaks as you say and seemingly don’t deserve them, but that often seems the case, and it doesn’t do any good to think about it. So the Carroll’s took off – that’s spotlight news. By the way Jack and I really get warmed up on how Duane is helping win the war. It’s hard to imagine him in the army with as many furloughs and leaves he has had. And probably Mrs. Carroll is anxious to expound on his experiences and army career. And Mildred Fry – that’s hot stuff too – we talked about her too, but it wasn’t all good.

It made me good to know that you remembered just how long I have been in – and last night I was saying this will be the 4^th Christmas away from all of you. The wonderful feeling of being free again I believe is beyond your imagination, and sometimes it seems hard to tell myself that it’s bound to be over someday. Well I’m going to taper off for tonight and I’ll be looking for some more mail from you tomorrow.

Love,

31 August 1944

Dear Folks:

Oh what a day rain, rain, rain. And when it rains it is a scramble to see that everything is dry and will stay that way. A few days ago my roommate and I built ourselves a home from the remnants of a Jap barn and covered the top with tin, shelter halves and ponchos. We thought we had it pretty well waterproofed but the acid test today proved differently, and before I knew it, the center of my bed looked like the old swimming hole. Later I put out my blankets to dry and then forgot to bring them in when it starting raining again. But, a few tent poles and some redecorating, patched the place up pretty well. Just after supper when it started to rain so hard, I stripped off and showered in the rain water.

Last night was a little different and for the first time in quite a while played a little bridge. We bid five twice, made it both times and was doubled once. We had a hot streak. Players are pretty hard to find and lately we haven’t found time to play much. Besides this diversion we have two volleyball courts laid out and occasionally get out to play a game, but I seem to be getting worse instead of better. A few days ago we went off daylight savings time and now it gets dark so early that we don’t have much time after supper.

I suppose everyone at home is very optimistic especially since the fall of Paris and the surrender of Bulgaria and Rumania. It certainly does look bright in Europe and probably it won’t last another ten months. Our group colonel told us yesterday he thought the war here would last probably until late 1945. If it ends that soon it’ll be sooner than I expect but I hope I’m wrong. Tokyo continues to broadcast especially for the GI’s on Saipan and calls us ‘orphans’ and ‘boneheads’. Also they have ‘Moby Dick’ who drawls along and gets sarcastic cracks in often. Tokyo like Germany is withdrawing according to plans, etc. etc.

Our mail has been delayed for some reason and haven’t heard from you in over two weeks and so I haven’t any of your mail to comment on. But someday it will catch up with me and I’ll have reading to last a week. But it isn’t so good getting along without it.

Well the boys are paging me for a pinochle game and there isn’t a lot of time. I think I’ll stop and come back again soon. The watch is running perfectly and just the thing I wanted. Well so long for tonight.

Love,

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 5^th 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 11^th or 12^th 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 2^nd 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,

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,

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 24^th 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 20^th 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,

1 September 1943

Dear Folks:

Although I just wrote you last night I guess another letter won’t be wrong after I laid off for a while. After recall we usually manage a volleyball game with teams from the other offices, then follow it up with a shower before supper. Now that I have showered and ate, I feel pretty good and ready to relax or get in a bridge game tonight. With the abundance of avocadoes on the nearby trees we usually have one for dinner and supper, although I can’t remember ever eating one in the states. Well the school kids are starting school again and everyday the little Japs etc trapaise by on the road on the long walk home. They look about the same anywhere I guess. I saw a class of small children at the Catholic parochial school and what a variety of brands. From the whitest to the blackest and shades in between.

Tomorrow is my day off and while I’m in town I think I’ll have the photographer work on me. Perhaps I can make the pictures suffice for Christmas presents. My friend in Washington is sending me a book—she always writes regularly and I consider her a very close friend.

I hope my allotments are arriving regularly and in the right amounts. Being so far away from the War Department offices we have many cases of incorrect and delayed allotments and I wouldn’t want to have them get messed up. Handling these things, together with other personnel work is the job that I am in, and I think it is one of the most desirable jobs in the regiment.

My Reader’s Digest came yesterday but it immediately starts the rounds in the billet and so far I’ve just read the jokes and shorts.

And of course the first of the month is that day that we are rewarded for efforts, payday, so I suppose the dice and cards will see plenty of action tonight although our billet seldom gets away from the bridge games long enough to try their luck.

I guess I’m like everyone else in enjoying the Free Press and especially the comments about the servicemen. Now perhaps I can keep track of those monkeys that made high school and after, the clutter of mischief and fun that those years were. I think I’d rather see Bill Emick more than any other one fellow. I wonder when you were digging around among the stuff I left you, came across my old model planes. You know I get a hankering to get out a bottle of glue and wood and start on another one. I guess the gas model is pretty well beat up, but I wouldn’t be surprised if I someday patched it up again, even if my glasses are an inch thick.

I heard a broadcast of Winston Churchill’s speech from Canada last night and also the Pope’s today. It seems pretty certain that the culmination of the war is in the home stretch, and our turn to swing the final punch, but too much optimism is not good.

The mountains look beautiful in their purple robes as the sun goes down, and the ocean is deep blue and quiet, so I’ll get in this mood too and take it easy for the rest of the night. I guess this (is) goodnight and the end of another column.

Love,

8 August 1943

Dear Folks:

I suppose I should be working, or at least look like I’m working, but this is Sunday morning and I guess some of (the) effects of civilian Sunday still persist. I just came from church a few minutes today and for something different the Chaplain had a small group of Hawaiian women to sing. But this group was about like the usual small town choir. It always seems that the worst singer is the director and this one was no exception. Every time I looked at her it reminded me of Amie Schmaltz alias Mrs. Snyder, for she looked just like her. They sang a Hawaiian hymn that sounded like a baby learning to talk. This afternoon I hope to float around in the salt water and get knocked around by the waves. I guess I told you about the new army recreation center, the ‘Tradewinds’ where we spend the Sunday afternoons. This Sunday morning is a beautiful one which reminds me of a balmy June at home and the pineapple fields and the palm trees reflect the same feeling. From where I sit I can see the ocean a few miles away, a deep blue with billuous clouds riding along the horizon.

I received the Free Press a few days ago and noted the letter about my meeting with Dick. The letter was a pretty poor one but I hope you caught the spirit of the good time we had. What do you think of the pictures?

Dad’s circular letter came yesterday and I think you have a good system making one copy go all around. I’m glad you got the book on the way. Hope I can keep in control until it gets here. A few days (ago) I bought ‘Mission to Moscow’ which is darn good reading and very interesting.

I don’t like to say too much about the war because it is such a big subject, but things look favorable on every front. I especially remember the President stating that an all-out offensive against Japan would begin this year. It seems far-fetched to me but I’m not in much of a position to critize or adjudge. You probably know that most of the island population is Japanese but there has never been an act of sabotage since the war began. The Japs seem to control most of the business stores, that is the small ones, and generally rate higher than the other races, in prominence, in education, and civic circles. The true Hawaiians are diminishing rapidly from intermarriage and only on the other side of the mountain are there still some vestiges of an old Hawaiian life and villages. The combinations from intermarriage are terrific and I think you could find any combination on the island.

I’m being paged to go to the PX and I’m about out of anything else to write so better stop.

Love,

15 July 1943

Dearest Folks:

Another of those evenings that seem long and empty, but maybe it will shorten if I try to catch up on some letters. Everyone seems to be taking great interest in the news and sticking around the radio to keep up with events. The situation does seem pretty good, at least there is action to put some life in the pessimistic, such as myself perhaps. Perhaps the war will terminate with a suddenness that will surprise a lot of us—some of the brass hats are even foreseeing a finish that they didn’t express last year, and when they begin to talk and think that way, it is something to really consider. Anyway I have felt more encouragement than I have in a long time. This whole discussion makes me think of a professor I had in sociology that said that the opinions and predictions of the public as a whole are many times more accurate than the experts and statistians. I hope he wasn’t exercising his lungs. I think it is nothing short of a miracle that the Russians have shown the world by holding the Germans, and it looks like they are going to do even more than that. Occasionally I can’t help but imagine how I would act under fire and when I do. I always think of the guys that are going down and who in the future will be probably little more than another number on the casualty list. If, when I am a citizen and civilian again, I don’t add my little squeak, no matter how small it is, to try to avert future wars like this, then I and anyone has no right to be a citizen. When you stop and retrospect and try to figure the situation out and relate it to what we think of as a civilized people, it all becomes very contrary to reason and senseless. Perhaps these things are getting like a custom or an unbreakable habit. Well I could go on for quite a few paragraphs in this manner, and at the same time get madder and madder but you might think I am developing into (a) pessimist or something like that—but that is far from the truth. Everyone should practice more reason and rely less on his guts. Maybe this letter does reflect a little of the bluer but if you stop to think about it, I don’t think that it does. I believe that anyone that thinks about it becomes wiser for the better and to a better advantage than the one who forms his ideas from the surface. Of course we have to be tough and relentless now, but the time that is spent creating the circumstances for these wars is many times more important than a year or two of fighting. As I see it the whole world must be ready to adopt and draft a new set of laws regarding dependency and relationship that heretofore were based on conceptions of isolation and dominance. I cannot honestly see how anyone can deny that. Perhaps few will theoretically but practically, many. My personal outlook is bright and I never for a minute feel that everything is dismal and hopeless. I hope you will believe that.

Since I came back from pass I haven’t heard from Dick and I’m beginning to feel a little anxious, but then maybe he’s just more delinquent than anything else. I wrote to him but as yet no answer.

The pictures I thought I’d stick in for the album. The group one is in front of the ‘office’. The Regimental CO is stepping out of the door. It was posed—I think the ‘old man’ has a propensity for his picture being taken.

I don’t know how I’m going to get a start for this sheet but I guess I’ve said about enough anyway. I think of how hot it must be at home, how it feels to get out in the sun awhile. Here it is about the same all the time and the seasons don’t have the meaning that they do there. I have to stop and remember just what season you are going through. The climate is absolutely the best I ever ran into. The evenings are perfect to sleep; the days never get too hot and there is very seldom any fog or any amount of rain to complain about. Of course not all of the island is so lucky as we are.

Well, it’s about time for the last bugle and they might miss me at bed check. So long for a while.

Love,

7 July 1943

Dearest Folks:

My letter writing is becoming atrocious but perhaps you have also had spells when you didn’t feel like writing or found so many other things to do that you neglected it. Well, I guess that’s my situation. On my pass last Sunday, the Fourth, I forgot all about the customary fireworks but had a good time dancing and loafing at the army recreation center. I believe it was one of the best days off that I spent since I’ve been here and the next time I hope to spend the day on the beach. I guess I told you about the places in a previous letter. Our open air theatre near our camp has been built up considerably. Until now we have night shows once a week at night that are usually put on by the USO or home talent. Although you might be a little abashed to sit through a movie I wished you could hear the cracks that come forth. From the picture I sent you, you can tell about what it used to look like. Tomorrow night we will have another show preceded by a little swing session by our band. The band is a part of the battery and I think they do a darn good job.

I haven’t heard from Dick since I returned but I guess it is up to me to write him a letter soon. I’m anxious to see the pictures we took and if they don’t turn out I’ll be very disappointed.

Tonight I think I’ll stay in and perhaps do a little more reading on my book that is plenty thick and will probably take me a long time to read. I hope you can find the ones I mentioned although you will probably have to do a little looking around. I very seldom work at night and I want to know as much when I get out of the army as when I came in, I hope.

Every time I see a newsreel on North Africa I think of Jim and wonder if possibly he is in some of the scenes. I suppose he was right in the thick of it and I hope he came out none the worse for it. It’s hard to imagine Halsey missing knowing him as I do and trying to picture him dead or a prisoner—I guess everyone experiences the same feeling, especially when the person is so well known and knowing his peculiarities. As for myself I don’t think the Allies will ever make an invasion of the continent as everyone thinks they will. The enemy has built up terrific defenses and the casualties and cost would be too high when they can either (be) bombed into submission or beaten from the Russian side. I would bet even money it will be a grand scale attack from the air and the Russian side but no invasion. I can’t see Japs whipped because of the big problems of supply and the new systems of communications that will be necessary before we can really begin to knock them off. I think it will be at least two years yet. I hope I’m way off on my opinions but I’m afraid the war with the Japs will be as long as the time the Germans have been fighting. Well, that’s enough on that.

I believe I’ve said enough for this letter. Maybe, too much, but I don’t feel unduly pessimistic about the future, because I really believe times will be better than ever when this is over. But unless somebody can formulate a lasting peace then we better quit now, and get ready for another one. I guess this is good night and don’t let what I have written make you feel gloomy or downhearted because I’m not myself. I know all will turn out the way we want it to and if you have the right kind of confidence it can never be shaken. I miss you all more than you can imagine.

Love,