The Oskaloosa herald., 1918-08-15
LESSONS OF WAR
sink DOWN DEEP
BOYS ARE ALL TAUGHT TO DO
THINGS THOROUGHLY.
AND NEVER COMPLAIN At LOT
The French People Appreciate What
America is Doing For Them and
Are Generous in Their Hospi-
taiity to Our Soldiers.

taiity to Our Soldiers.
An interesting letter from overseas
written by Claude Phillips to his par
ents, Mr.. and Mrs. A. w. Phillips of
New Sharon, Iowa. Claude is an
enlisted man in Aviation service. He
is mechanician, in the Aeronautical
Engineering department. Has been
in overseas service for seven months.
Is wearing one gold chevron and is
located on training field in France.
He says: 49,.
Dear Mother:--If you do not hear
from me at home as often as in the
lpast, do not be alarmed or worried,
as | am very busy, and am all right
and am quite likely to be here for
lsome time yet. The government is
keeping most of the older men at
4 these schools and sending the new
linen to the front. My work is prae-
ideally the same as it was. l usually
have new man to instruct as we go
lalong. There are an endless amount
of things to learn about Aeronauties.
| Lessons Of War.
| If this war keeps on lasting / am
i going to be some mechanic. The
main things | have learned are how
to work rapidly and carefully, and
how to do neat work and have pa
thence. A mechanic in the aviation
must do those things or he is no
good. Among other things | can do
is to solder two pieces of tin together,
and you cannot tell by looking at
them where they are put together.
Yesterday, July IA, we helped the
French people celebrate. l was
honored by being one of As picked
men from the post here to take part
in very formal military affair at
which about twenty soldiers were dec
GRATED with the French medals,
"Croix De Guerre," etc. 1t was
very formal affair, and afterward the
American Aviation led the parade.
Boys Never Complain.
You should see the boys over here.
One never hears a complaint about
hardships that cannot be helped. But
1
ed to many of the Marines, especially
those who are in the hospitals and on
leave on account of wounds. Most of
them say it is great, and are anxious
| to get back at them. The worst you
ever hear any of them say is that at
is hell up there" and they don't want
to go back, but are ready when the
time comes to go.
| Every one is happy. OF course none
of US want to be over here if we did
not have a job before us and we are
anxious to get it finished, but we are
mad now and we are here to kill
lGermans. We don't want any pris-
oners, nor do we want to be taken
prisoners. The Germans have found
this out and are afraid of us. In the
aviation especially we have Americas
most daring men. | tell you it is
wonderful to live in such company.
Of course most of us rather expect to
be lucky and come back. But if
don't l will consider my life well
Ispent - better than l could have
lspent it in any other way.
Just to show what kind of men we
have with US:
| Mccreery's Prophecy.
Our Squadron Commander when we
left U. S., Lieut.. McCreery, was
standing among a small bunch of his
men. was one of them Just as
we caught the last sight of land he
said: Boys, l never expect to see
that again and am glad am going"
He was right. He never will; and
he was as tickled to go as kid to a
circus. With that kind of men
Heading, we cannot help but clean up
the Dutch.
/ am very glad to hear of Mr.. Cor
lett coming over here. l hope / see
him, but that is not very likely. Tell
Mrs. Corlett my French address is
lClermont Fereaud Puy De Dome, so
he will know If he is anywhere near
here and il he wants to go up here is
the place to get. The crops here
are looking fine.I never saw such
wheat in my life, both the bearded
/ anu II III hSluo
of to 10 acres and some even small
er. They are seldom square, are
either triangular or irregular in shape.
The heads are large and the berries
are very large and plump.
French Appreciate Americans. :
/ Yesterday was Sunday and was
gone from camp from 10 a. m. until
IL a. m. | went to Cleremont, took
the trolley to Rayat. and spent the
afternoon in park among the hills.
In the evening came back to Clere-
mont, had supper. will tell you of
our supper. There were three of
us. We ate the regular supper, mi
nus the snails." The interesting
part came after the supper. A good
: looking Frenchman possibly 40 years
of age came in and sat next to us. His
occupation being of some kind ex,
empting him from service, so he did
not wear uniform as almost all
Frenchmen do He was not used to
) seeing American soldiers. He finish.
led his supper and ordered cigarettes.