The Birmingham age-herald., 1918-10-25
DIR. W. B. CRUMPTON HEARS FROM SON
 ABOUT WAR WORK

The following letter has been received by pr. W. B. Crumpton from his son, Lieut.. Robert C. Crumpton:
 American Red Cross Hospital No. 5' s A. P. o. 7o2 September IS. 191S-Amer- ican Expeditionary Forces.
 My Dear Daddy: A few lines tonight ! to convey my love to you and the dear ! ones Wrote in my last letter of my transfer to this hospital. I've been here about 10 days and am very happy in my work. It allows me to come into closer contact with the boys and I get to care for them longer and in a far more satisfactory manner than before.
 'It is great pleasure to have a room all my own and be by myself at night, where I can read and write and study am not living at the hospital, am there all day and well into the night, but they are using every available bit Of tent space for the patients, hence have no room for the officers, though two are there every night. It is pleasure to be with very nice French family who are very solicitous and kind about my comfort. have far too much work to do adequately-having a few over 200 patients of my own to care for. large number are 'gassed patients and most or them are up and around-so we look after the sickest ones mostly and see the others in between times.
 There Is corps of doctors here from Grand Rapids. Mich, and they are a very fine body of men and well oua]i ned. too. It's great comfort to be where We can have adequate consulta- tons and keep the patients under our observation until they are well on the road to health. There is certainly a beautiful spirit among sthe doctors here. all so glad to pitch in and help, and If we are not satisfied with our consulta- tions, we call in another one and thresh things out, then we have pretty good idea of these cases when we get through
 Quite a number of these gas cases have pneumonia but so far only one Of mine has developed that complication This boy is pretty sick boy and when l was looking him over again this aft ernoon, he whispered to me, How long am l going to be with you?e I'll tell you, when you look at one of these boys and see him passing through the valley Of the shadow of death, it cer- tainly makes you realize what a ter rifle responsibility is on your shoulders. You can just bet that that plaintiye appeal from this dear boy set me to thinking hard. He's holding his own tonight and I shall go back a little later to see him. These boys don't complain at all-so gritty and so brave they are in everything-and I don't believe I'm going to lose him.
 "In another bed is another boy who was gassed in addition to a marked congestion of the lungs He has some very severe burns on the greater part of his body-his mind is very bright and acute and we hope to keep him with us: he's putting up great fight
 This hospital is entirely under can vas-the tents have a double lining and have good wooden floors and they are very warm and comfortable. It is Red Cross hospital and is operated by an army personnel in conjunction with Red Cross representatives. There are lot Of Red Cross workers here and they are so good to these boys. They give them all kinds of eatables and on cer- tain days of the week serve ice cream Think of ice cream here in France and the boys sure do go after it. too-don't know of any other place in France where they have it-then they furnish us with any and all the supplies we ask for and are unstinting about it-they are a most refreshing and wonderful people to work with.
 we are just outside of Paris short way, but have no time to go in as we have enough out here to occupy our attention and things in Paris cost like everything.
 we had an air raid the other night, and 1t seemed very much like I was back on the front Fritz dropped a cou- pie of bombs which struck about 50 yards from the hosptal-but he's getting good measure for everything he drops around here.
 We are all very jublant over the St. Mihiel success and we know we have the Hun beaten-but 1t will take just little more beating to make his thick skull realize 1t.
 <. october | Our boys are doing great hhings up at the front and we are all breathisss h hopes and fears Bulga-