The Birmingham age-herald., 1918-03-17
Soldiers Mind COmrdsted Tn Letter 10 Big" and "LHle'
 Brother Here Al Home
Lieutenant Jackson Now in France Tells of Life France and Discusses Horrors of Warfare, But Does
 Not Forget Little Brother in His Preparation

Second-Iieut James J. Jackson, for rle1ly a prominent young attorney or Birmingham but now somewhere m France" has written two letters to his brothers in Birmingham, one of them to o. c. Jackson, Dig broth CT, and another 'to Oliver Jackson, his little brother" and the contrast of
 the two letters gives food for thought
 to those back at home and brings to
 their minds what is in the minds of
 these brave fellows who are either on
 the firing line or ready to go into
 the trenches any day. No matter what
 they are confronted with they are
 thinking of the loved ones back at
 this shows all the more why the peo-
 pie at home should not forget the boys
 who are doing the real fighting.
 Extracts from the first letter. which
 is to the older brother, are as fel-
 lows:
 Time flies fast over here. Every body is busy. You folks over there can hardly realize the preparation nee
 essary to keep an army of the pres
 ent day going. It is better that we should have the difficulties of trans
 portation and not the Germans. It is being proven to me every minute of
 the day that we are fighting war over here that in the very near fu- ture would have been fought over there, and what a slaughter it would have beenl The Germans would have had a picnic with us. They, of course, would not have attacked until their fleet was capable of certain victory. You all naturally do not know of the wonderful ingenious inventions that France and Germany have France was the only nation that could cope with Germany in military finesse. We have been smart enough to place our selves in the hands of the French for development. TKey think we are very clever in seeing our own shortcom- 1 ings and in choosing their system rather than the English, who are near | lzinsmen of ours. You can rest as- l sured that when the French have fin- ished with us and declare we are suf- \ ficiently trained we will have the best I army in the world, equal to the
 French in efficiency and more numer-
 GUS. Then Germany had better pre- pare for us. for 1t won't be long be- fore we shall be knocking at the I Rhine.
 l By the time this arrives the fire works will be cracking pretty lively over here. Horrible things will be hap pening. There will not be much re- i nance to it: no enthusing music, Imagine an infantry attack in a gas l cloud. Each side will try to tear the l gas mask off the other. The soldier l immediately takes the track to king
 dom come" Not much romance in that
 is there?
 l About the time I received your let ter a present arrived from a French friend. Let me tabulate it for you: ] "Six quarts of Meets and Chan | dou champagne -efernay.
 | One quart Madeira.
 One quart porto.
 "One quart benedictine.
 i "The French drink champagne free l ly. The Madeira and porto arc consid- cred good light wine. Benedictine is . 1 family liquor of excellence. When a Trenchman wishes to do you a kind-
 ness or pay you delicate compliment he will send you some wine of ex-
 cellent quality. Of course he assumes you drink. Everyone drinks over here l that is the French They cannot i'm