Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1910-04-02
"OLD SWADDIE" TALKS OF ARMY LIFE

F ARMY LIFE
laborer he'd be a sucker to go into the
army to be one and to take army wages
and army discipline for that kind of
work
you'll be thinking that in saying thes.
things I am calling myself pinhead.
Well. that's right, too. I am. But it's
too late for me.
I've been in the service too long TO
quit, and have sort of ossifed myself in
the uniform. It's become a habit with
me to hang around in the army
But this isn't saving, either. mind
you, that slews and slathers of old nom
CONS, men who have been in the service
quite as long as / have been. are not get
ting out Of the army every day
That's what's causing all the worry in
Washington. They never actually wohe
up to 1t down thee that the army had
gone bad until they began to notice the
big gangs of fine, seasoned non-coms
who were quitting the service. Then
they snapped themselves TO the realiza-
ton that things were In such shape that
the army ought to be investigated.
Plenty Of folks have got the idea that
the army went bad just because the can
teen was shut down. That's mistake
The breaking up of the canteen was bad
enough, and busted discipline all TO film
ders. But there were whole lot OF other
things.
THE filthy and excessive fatigue duty
that I've been talking about was one
of the main things. After that came
those practice marches
There always was plenty of dril-more
than plenty-and I'm saying it that never
was one of these bunk fatigue soldiers
either. But when they started this prac-
tice march scheme agoing, that just
about set the match to the haystack.
An average of three fifteen-mile hikes
there and back in all kinds of wind and
weather every week. generally in heavy
marching order. and then five or SIX
hundred-mile overland hike from post 10
post about that far removed from each
other, and in hot weather-the old-timerS,
even among the officers, had TO rub their
eyes when that kind of unnecessary stuff
was fastened upon the army. =
The old-timers among the enlisted men
didn't buck. but the new men in the out
fits took it pizen hard: and they bucked,
and they're still bucking, by companies.
troops and battalions not to say regi-
ments. The growl about that incessant
practice march business is constant and
it's thoroughly just growl at that.
THE mean little monthly pay that il
being dished out to the enlisted men IL
another one of the big things.
The pay of the American soldier was
dollar was a dollars worth and would
buy something. / reckon you jumpers
that kick around New York know how a
dollar has shrunk of late years, and how
little it'n get you in comparison with
what it got you even five or ten years
ago.
The pay of the enlisted man gets him
hardly anything these days except his
tobacco and his washing-and even the
laundresses, when 1t comes to that have
about doubled their rates for swabbing
clothes of late years on the ground that
they couldn't exist on the money that
they used to ask for doing the soldiers
washing.
Then, again. no man can be a machine
all the time without having a little
amusement and diversion. They've made,
as / say, a swil-carter of the soldier. an
officers dog-robber; they've fastened
grueling marches on him that take up
nearly all the rest of his spare time,
they've been obliged on account of the
short-handedness to fasten two or three
times too much guard duty on him: well.
then. when he is able out of all this to
snatch out minute for himself. is he to
be expected to squat on the barracks
floor and twiddle his thumbs and wait
for some trumpet call to summon him to
the next duty?
HE wants, like any other human being
that's M against a hard grind. to break
post once in while and take a look at
the things that lie outside the military
routine.
How much OF that he can do on the
pay that he gets now? I'm not speaking
understand, of the fellows that take the
army game so hard that they've got to
go out and get drunk outside the post
limits whenever they find themselves in
possession of q dollar, but of the clean
chaps who like to break the grind by
going into town to attend a theater oc-
casionally. or something of that sort.
They can do q lot on the pay that
they get now; yes. lott And, to take
another end Of 1t, the thing has got 80
rotten in q good many places that the
doors Of theaters and such places are
shut in the faces of men in uniform
which is another swell reason, isn't 1t.
why fellows that really don't have to
should enlist in the army?
You go to any American military post
in the United States or over seas today
and you'll find that the first-enlistment
men in the outfits feel that they've been
trapped and tricked and imposed upon.
and IL you can figure out any way to
make military discipline stand up when
all hands have got that kind of a feel
ing under their shirts. you ought to in
vest in q postcard and send your idea
to the War Department in Washington.
I'm just after reading in today's pa
pers about that canteen affair down out
side Honolulu. Schofeld barracks, down
there, is about twenty miles from Homo
lulu. and the men, driven to desperation
by the monotony. have been filling up
on vile bootleg whisky on pay days and
getting themselves chucked into the clfnk
in whole companies, to the utter rout of
discipline. Well. the commanding officer
down there. seeing these things. and how
his command was going to the dogs, de-
cided that he'd try the scheme of start
ing, just outside the post limits, little
plant where the soldiers could get decent
beer, and no spirits, at the cost price.
And he'd no sooner suggested it than
the big howl was raised all over the
by the anti-canteen women
who've done SO much to ruin the army
and send soldiers to the insane asylums
from the horrible booze they've drank
in place of the beer they used to get at
the canteen. Queer that men don't fall
over each other to enlist when they read