Valdez daily prospector., 1917-02-06
THE FIGHTING
 FORTY.SECOND
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move them back. 1t may be easily understood how. after few such blunders, the sergeant would lose the respect of his men and find it hard to maintain discipline in his squad.
 Once we were put to building an arbor over our horses. Officers picked out the trees to be cut-trees that most of us knew would never be strong enough. Half the troop spent week working on something that we knew would be failure. As we had expected the first wind completely wrecked our structure.
 Throughout, inefficiency was the rule rather than the exception among those in authority. On the parad,- ground officers would blunder in giv- ing commands and then, in rage, jeal- ous for their virgin authority, would Elame the men for their own short comings. Even after two months training, in sham battle, the squad ron in which 1 was serving charged our own side-a force firmly en- trenched with machine guns. In act ual service this would have meant T needless loss of three hundred lives
 As weeks went on the guardsmen grumbled more and more. It took ls month and half to get uniforms alone; now after five months scme of the regular equipment is still lacking.
 The Fighting Forty-second" is |" cavalry regiment. It soon pecarne known all along the border as "Tb,. IiCrsG.esS f'orty-Second" Twelve hundred of us had seventy horses.
 Slowly we dropped into the regtr lar routine oi army life. The soldier of the movies diappeared from the "e- crGit's vision. Instead of stormjH2 trenches he had to shovel manure and dig ditches for twelve hours day ag that. Tho soldier of today is an ordi- diary working man, and for the ,aps- part a very unskilied one His !'Ie is deadly, iaily routine, monotonCuS grind of heavy labor. unfit for men of indoor occupations.
 Sc lay by day the grumblins in- creased. But the grumbiug was not SO much because Of the neccssary hard work as because of the miSmGu- agement and inetficiency Of those iH authority. The man who tried to lo his best was veXed continually by net ty annoyances brought upon him D.. incapable officers.
 Of course, the officers. for the most part, were not to blame for thelr mi. handling of affairs. They were us. not fitted for their jobs. They did their best-but their best was unne- iievably poor. Efficient leaders men who know their business-a d pre- requisite in any army; that fact is generally understood. But caraD!n officers can never be obtained l." th@ present method of appOintmrl,i.
 Let us see how appointments WcIc conducted in my regiment. There Was all examination for oticrrships, which q great number of men entered. son" of them had been in the millIi? To, fifteen years, and were really rGn'p~- tent soldiers A sergeant 1 knew nHd served eight years, part of it in thv regular army, and atood third in tic test. But neither he nor any of those at the head of the list won out. iAt
 
 entirely and followed the dictdtci Of politics. One man was appointed lieu tcnart who had been bare six months in the militia and who stp3d twenty-ilfth on the list. And in ;,Ct- ual war this man would have had con llol of the lives of hundreds. : Our Colonel is true to type. \ sue lessful business and former politiciaI his only value to the regiment is as a publicity agent. Among both officers and men he is unpopular. No one has any confidence in him. Scoras nf times men have remarked bitterly that to follow him into q &kirnli,h i meant suicide. His inddeqUacies he ! covers up by buster. The men cal bim the Roaring Colonel" This is : the man who said, when asked what he thought the solution of the officer f problem" would be: We will never have the best kind of officers in this | regiment until they are all appoin,i 1 ed by me-"
 So here we are waiting to be re- called. For six months we have beer ] charges of the government. We are disappointed and disgusted. Concern ing the hard work. the more or less 1 inadequate food and the duties of camp we do not complain. These are