The Farmington times. (Farmington, St. Francois County, Mo.) 1905-1926, 1918-11-15
FROM PRIVATE
FRED j. KERLAGON

Nantes, France, Oct. IL, 1918.
Mr.. A. w. Bradshaw, Editor Times,
Dear Sir:--Having few moments
of spare time will write you briefly
of my whereabouts and my line of
work. On coming over here | was
assigned to Base Hospital "a. The
pharmacy here not being in need of
any Pharmacists, was TO help and
assist the surgeon with the dressings
of wounds in the Officers Surgical
Ward. Recently was also made
Master of Details of the above ward
and two others, which is the super
vision of all sanitary conditions. For
such work French maids are employed.
am on day duty six weeks, then
| take night duty for three weeks. At
present | am working from z p. m.
to a. m. l am enjoying my work
and am getting along fine. This hos
pital is located in Nantes, said to be
the fifth largest city in France. 1t is
very pretty and many historical events
are credited it. / am enclosing some
clippings from the "Stars and
Stripes" newspaper published here
for the American soldiers. Said clip
pings do not necessarily refer to our
hospital. l am merely enclosing them
as / thought they may prove to be in
teresting reading to the ones back
home.
Respectfully yours,
= PVT. FRED J. KERLAG0N,
Base Hospital 80, A. E. F., France.
The clippings sent by Private Ker-
lagoon follow, and at least one of them
indicates that there are occasional
breaks in the grim necessities of war:
Members of a certain truck COM
pany and medical detachment sta
toned at S. o. S. headquarters just
nod coldly to one another as they pass
nowadays. And all because the medi-
cos allowed Marcel to wear out the
seat of his breeches sliding down an
upturned mess hall bench and lose his
wrist watch in the bath house, and,
worst of all, because they ripped off
Marcel's quartermaster Sergeant's
chevrons and sewed on medical corps
caduceus while the truck company was
off to the front with convoy of mo-
tor trucks.
Marcel Duplisse is the truck COM
pany's mascot. He was the proudest
of all the mascots around S. o. S.
headquarters because of his 500 franc
outfit of tailor-made uniforms, leather
puttees, wrist watch and general hab-
erdashery. In fact he was so proud of
his uniform that if he was out for a
stroll of Sunday with the First Ser
geant and a kindly French lady tried
to warm up to him and give him the
French equivalent of whats your
name, little boy?" Marcel would alb
solutely refuse to understand and re-
ply American, speak English"
Occasionally he would leave the
company headquarters long enough to
go over to the French canteen where
his mother works and let her feast
her eyes on the magnificent apparel of
her nine-year-old son. He liked to
have her tell him that he looked just
as brave and proud as his father,
mort pour la patrie," when he de-
parted for the front four long years
ago.
Wrist Watch on Exhibition
His numerous brothers and sisters
were even allowed a good look at his
wrist watch on such occasions.
At reveille he was always the first
in line, and if the sergeant in calling
the roll by any chance forgot to call
out his name, he was very much dis
tressed until he was assured that it
wouldn't happen again.
Things were going along beautiful
ly for Marcel until one dark day his
company got hurry order to move
out to the front with truck convoy
which was badly needed up behind
the front at st. Mihiel. The trip
would be too dangerous for Marcel,
the First Sergeant thought, so lie
turned him over to the Medicos for
safe keeping until the company's re-
turn. But the medicos were busy, and
. Marcel was only a casual mascot, SO
he did just about as he pleased.
Now a nine-year-old French kid is
just the same as any other kid of the
same age, even if he is a mascot.
First he tore the seat out of his
breeches. Then the medicos' dog
chewed his service hat, making it lose
that snappy, ironed appearance His
wrist watch disappeared from the win
dow sill of the bath house, and worst