The Madison daily leader. [volume] (Madison, S.D.) 1890-current, 1918-12-28
LEROY ABBOTT
MOTOR TRUCK COMPANY C BOY
WRITES HIS EXPERIENCES.

Mr.. and Mrs. S. l.. Abbott, Ninth
street NE, are in receipt of an inter
esting letter from their son Leroy,
from which the following are ex-
tracts. Leroy left Madison with
Company f which was made up most
ly of Madison men, later merged in
to motor truck companies. They had
their first military experience on the
Madison State Normal school campus
where they were encamped several
weeks. After detailing his expert
ences in camps on this side of the
water Leroy tells of life overseas.
Following is his letter in part:
1--WE left Camp Mills on the morn
ing of the Sth of December at A a..
M, for Hoboken by train and later
were loaded onto a barge which car
ried us down the river. We could
see battleships, transports, liners and
tugs galore. We were soon march
ing up a g~angplank in single file on
to what was the third largest trans
port afloat at that time. 1t was some
boat. We stayed there all day and
night. The next day we pulled out
into the bay past the Statue of Lib
erty and waited there two days be-
fore u convoy and our escort of sub
chasers were ready. We did not go
straight across, but sort of a zig-zag
course. In that way they claimed the
chances we're good for lodging the
subs. 1t Is said our chasers got n
sub. / know we were all ordered be-
low deck one day towards evening
and ives could feel our boat make a
short turn or at least imagined it any
way, but the sub. didn't get us. We
had fine Yeats and a lot of good
amusement On the voyage across
Just a few were seasick.
1--WE landed at Brest. France. Our
ships were all too large to go into
the dock to unload so we just an
chored and lay there overnight
French tugs which looked like pea
nut shucks compared with our boats
came out to unload us. We were
soon ashore and marching into Brest
Then we took a train and rode for
four days and five nights with the
temperature below zero and showing
and no heat in the cars. We got off
the train at 5 o'clock. 1t was darl
and snow drifted knee deep. Wa
marched over half a mile with some
toes or even feet frozen to a little
village of SO or 100 population. Be
ing so near the front we could hear
the guns, but our officers and sol
diers said it was just some artillery
practice, but We soon found out i
on detached service the next day Il
a new chateau, IL out of my compan.
and SO out of II company. In {
month we moved to Longres, farther
back of the lines about sc. miles. w
were there about two months ant
finally got back to our companies
near the front again. We could hea.
the big guns every night and coulc
always tell when there was extr;
hard Smelling of the lines in the Tou
sector. While on detached service
WEI were camouflaged so we coul'
not be seen from the air. 1t hap
pened that our planes kept the gun
ners back from here so nothing ey
} citing happened.
! July 10 we moved to where we ar
now. In our line of work sometime
a bunch of us go out to Bordeaux o
some other seacoast town and get
bunch of trucks, taking them up t
the front. We are hauling supple
of all kinds to the different organic
atoms stationed around here, artil
lery. aviation fields, infantry and ey
erything else. In one air raid the
7 didn't do any damage here, but o
course we were expecting a bonn
i most any second. The boche plane
passed over this town and didn'
, know it. I guess. They were FLYNN
quite high when they went owe
about s o'clock p. m. Twenty min
utes later we got a telegram at head
, quarters telling about a big air raj
in Paris"