The daily Gate City and constitution-Democrat. (Keokuk, Iowa) 1916-1922, 1917-10-31
NEGRO SOLDIERS
From ALABAMA
s,o Doings at keokuk Station When
Long Train Load Transfers
From Mobile for
Des Moines.
GOING TO GET MIR. KAISER
ruI Of Fun, Frolic and Dissemination
- whip the Bosches as the Great
Adventure In Their
Whole Lives.
CHING TO GET MIR. KAISER

through the darkness a long, sinu'
.ns unlighted train slid into the
.h;rd track at the union station pc
{ s;ae iostling, noisy crowd Of Keokuk
aagroes The crowd numbered at
last thousand and 1t was burning
red flares and carrying a Dig band'
n,aving patriotic music. From every
nindoyy of the long train there were
,brust several heads and shoulders OF
s.ranping. strong, laughing, talking
negroes. Everywhere was the vibrant,
nndu,ating, cataphonic, almost must
cal roar of fourteen hundred negroes
talking and shouting at once.
over four hundred embryonic sol
diers from Alabama to Fort Des
Moines had stopped in KeoKuk TO
have their train transferred from the
Burlington to the Rock Island rail-
road The transfer took about an
hour around nine o'clock.
That they were excellent soldiers
IN the making was evident to the
sprinkling of white folks in that vel
coming crowd that filed the vicinity
of the station. They were husky EEL
lows in excellent humor with the DEN
mite object of getting Mr.. Kaiser.
with training and under good officers.
thew are capable Of cleaning trench
Of bosches in record time, and they
showed this in every 1.-THE, strong
movement One of them said loud
enough to be heard by all the crowd:
Yves gwine to git Kaiser; gwine to
git his haid Use done besought de
Lord. and he tole me I'd git his haid."
He was laughing as he said it. All
were laughing all the time. at was
mighty good show, better than any
minstrel, and it put You in good
humor for week. said white man
afterward.
A thousand Keokuk people Of their
own race shook the hands of the four
huIAlred leaning from the train win
dows and platforms, wishing the sol
diers good luck. The soldiers them
selves had no doubt about that. A
hundred said they were coming back
and not going to get killed in Ger
many. Another hundred told what
they will do to Mr.. Kaiser and the
Huns And they were laughing joy
ously all the time.
Sleep Walking Stunt.
In the midst of the noise and the
crowd and the band music and the red
fire, a long, slim figure clad like an
underwear advertisement, bare feet In
visible in the darkness, slipped one
leg after the other out Of car win
dow and dropped lightly to the
ground. He walked in drawers and
Shirt fifty feet on the platform before
two keokuk men caught his arms and
told him he ought to get back on the
train; they led him easily back to
car platform where those on the train
pulled him aboard and he disappeared
within the coach-and in few min
utes he woke up and exclaimed he
mad been asleep and dreamed he was
IN Germany. He. had slept through
all the noise and confusion and done
MS little stunt while walking in his
sleep. Others explained for him, one
saying: Hes one of dem ole country
nlsgers-don't know how to act in
city"
one-fourth of the soldiers were from
Mobile, and the others came from 9TH
er southern Alabama points. They
mad been off the train only once since
ieaYing Mobile until they reached Keo-
huk After the handshaking, some of