Charlevoix county herald. (East Jordan, Mich.) 189?-1953, 1918-09-27
From w. c. SPRING
TO w. A. StroebeD
Somewhere in France.
Aug. l9, 1918.

My Dear Bill
received your letter few days ago
which was dated May 18th. l cannot
imagine where it has been all this time
as our mail usually arrives within
month Just about the time you were
writing, we were going into the tren-
ches on our initial trip. Since then |
have had quite varied experience, l
have seen war as it actually is and am
quite satisfied of the truth of many
things we used to read about and won
derIf it were true. would not take
good deal of money for the experience
have had thus far, and if | return
safely as intend to, if possible, l can
tell you some very interesting stories.
know just what 1t feels like to be
under fire. know now what it means
to experience an Artillery lombard
ment from German IT'S to 210's in
calibre including gas. | know just
what kind of sensation it causes when
machine gun bullets swish around your
head and cut the leaves off the bushes
around your ears. In fact, | have ex-
perienced whole lot of sensations
that are new to me, hard to describe,
and not easy to forget.
have slept in a dugout, as my pla-
toon and myself shared it with the
trench-rats, in reality they owned it as
they were much in the majority, and
we were occupying only by their
courtesy for should they have become
an ally of the "Bosche" suddenly, | am
afraid it would have been up to us to
move. All kind of lurid stories are
told about how apt they are to attempt
to lunch off your ears while you are
asleep but that is fiction and in reality
they are quite harmless. They are very
large however and fearless of the men
and a genuine nuisance. There is
nothing more annoying than to have a
huge rat trot across your face when
you are asleep, and when a sudden
burst of epithets breaks loose from a
bunch of tired men who have been
sound asleep you do not need to in
vestigate, you can conclude that rat
has just completed such trip in their
neighborhood. You cannot resist say
ing amen" when you know the cause
of the outburst.
Our soldiers are wonderful Bill and a
genuine credit to the old u. S. A. II
would do you good if you could see the
way they adjust themselves to con.
ditions and hardships. Such thing as
complaining apparently has never
dawned upon them. | think | have
always felt my responsibility as an
officer but never as keenly as do now
To realize you have bunch of men
depending absolutely upon your judg
ment under the most trying circum
stances men can experience, and ready
to 90 to their death if you suggest il
surely brings a sense of responsibility
home to you. One thing | have dis
covered is that when under fire not 6
man will take cover until | do. The
spirit of the American is wonderful
He thinks he cannot be beaten anc
when you find man of that type he il
almost unbeatable for he doesn't realize
when he is. The French are jubilan
over the showing the Americans have
made. With the French now there il
no question of the result of the war tn,
only question is now, "How soon cal
we do it,"
This war is a crime Bill an absolute
crime and no one knows ii as well a
we who are engaged in it. The natioI
who caused it must be made to suffe
just as any criminal suffers for tn,
commission of such crime.
President Wilson's declarations as t
our policy is appreciated nowhere NOR,
than among our troops. No one coul,
be more anxious for a speedy endin,