Trench and camp. [volume] (Augusta, Ga.) 1917-1919, 1918-03-13
QFrom the New York SUM

he was in the British army five
months. He was of those who held a
front line trench at Ypres five weeks
went over the top so MANY times that
he lost c0unt-f0ur times in one boil
ing summer week A speck of shrap-
mel pierced his right hand. a Ger
mans dubbed musket smashed his
shoulder in q ruined house at ST. Jul
Liam, and his chum snuffed out the Ger
man. He did mans work; claims no
more and no less He was honorabIy
discharged for reasons which will ap-
pear
Nothing extraordinary about this :?
All right; tken let him tell why he
especially remembers his 18th birth
day, July "A, 1917.
You know the country around
Ypres is pretty watery anyway, and it
had rained for seven days and nights
I was walking along a duck board. You
know duck boards are the plankS that
they sink into the goo in the trenches
one plank ON top of another until there
is sort of q solid path. | stepped on a
loose one, the other end flew up and ]
spilled into four feet of mud that was
mostly water. Sympathy? Jeff sings
out my chun1, Tiny Bradford, you been
lickin' for four weeks about not havin
a bawth, and here's hOpin' you're sat
fsfied now I swabbed the mud out OF
my eyes, went to the. c. O's office,
where there was a fire. and they let me
hang up my clothes and get them dry
for the first time in an awful while.
That's why I remember the day [ was
a."
Perhaps Youngest in War.
Sydney Jaffe, d New York boy now
back in New York was perhaps the
youngest soldier in the war. He en-
listed and was accepted at IS, was a
British rifleman 1875 days. There is no
question of that. Official records prove
it The rest of the story is his own
British officers here call it incredible,
but the boy sticks to it. He says the
dreariest Of all fighting fronts, the
Ypres salient, was an old story to him
before he was IA. And now with that
behind him, he is living with his
mother at $50 East 164th Street and
clerl1iHg for an Exemption Board on
the East Side, helping in another way
to recruit the array of freedom.
His story begins just where he be-
gan when he told it to THE Sun" yes
terday:
II was born near London, and when
was my father died Of sickness
brought ON by Boer War wounds l
have. two brothers, and in 1914 my
mother moved us. all to New York. /
went to Public School 147 in East
Broadway, and then started in Morris
High School was pretty we'll sat
isfied until took two days off to- visit
two friends-tfIey were. big lads-who
were going to join the American army
They didn't say anything. but from all
their talk [ got to thinking. It looked
funny that I had come away from
England just when the war started,
when. everybody that could ought to be
going the other way Well, the next
morning after | saw my two friends
off I went to a British recruiting office
here and enlisted. 1t was on June Z
last year and L was 10. LIZ years old
but fairly big. and my voice had
changed. (Jaffe is about 5 feet 6
inches tall now.
Said He Was Is.
Itold 'ern I was IS and they took
me. My mother was going to kick, but
as I thought I would be. training in
Canada for seven months L told her SO,
and that the war would be over by
then But a, week after got to Cam
ada I was. grabbed for a draft they
were sending over and was sent along,
Twas in A Company, Sixth Battalion,
the. Rifle Brigade, and later in the
Twelfth Battalion From England they
sent us, right over. We were at a
French seaport two days, then up the
line to Calais and a four days march
to Ypres. Gee, that was some march,"
Sydney Jaffe stopped as If he. had
told it all, and the astounding inter
viewer had to prod him with, We'll, GO
on. What did you do at YpreS?"
oh" he said, in precise English.
not Of the East Side out of London.
I'VE started doing cur work. like in
and out of the lines and going over
the top occasionally. 1t was summer
and our bodies were nearly raw from
sunburn. At one stretch we were in
OUT trench for five weeks-you know
at times relief was bad and of course
there's nothing to do but stay where
you are titti it comes. Well, after that
the C. O. says-this was in July,
thinl1-Boys, you're out for a long rest
now. We pay out tomorrow and draw
as. Ta14ch as. you like.
Il drew out 100 francs and spent
week in Poperingte, with my chum
Tiny Bradford who was IS, but
smaller than I. He went in, by the
way, in 1914, on the second day of the
war