The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1919-01-10

satisfactory for they ere both good
boys ard first class workmen. 1 see
10. reasor. why it should not work
out very successfully. l am very
much pleased to, learn that you en-
joyed your trip to South Dakota
A receive mail rom home quite re
ularly. We are all now very anxious
for the day wheE we can sail back
to the good old u. S. A. How soon
that will be is hard to make any
future plans for, but everyone in
the u. S. A. can rest assured that it
will be as soon as it would be ad-
visable. We are row enjoying a
glass of LuXomburg beer to take the
place of Frerch wine. l have been
very well Stree / left Mankato.
missed ore sirgle meal when il was
possible to be had. Many have
cen the experiences. | have seen
mary very sorrowful sights but
where there is sorrow there is joy.
We al have mary thirgs to be very
thankful for. America does not
know the horrors of war and never
Will know ur.til each and everyone
has crossed No Mars lard Of the
past. | an ho"ing to join you at a
fine Sunday d - IL the very near
future, the sa,-J as OF Old Wishing
you ard yours q Kerry Christmas
and Happy Not : ar, am yours
truly, Edward Rya-.
Sergeant =. j. Frogley First Can
adiar Bz.sirg Co. Egyption EXpedi-
tionary Forces, Palestine. Mr. o.
NJ. Hatcher, Mankato, Mimi. Dear
Sir: Am back again out of GONZALES
cent camp and feeling fine but don't
know how long | shall last out here.
It's such a deadly place we are at
present, and we must stay and fin
ish the job before We can think of
coming home, which will be about
May 1st with all good luck. Well,
what do you think of the sudden end
ing of the great war. Quite surpris
ing wasn't it? We knew we were
giving John Turk run for his money.
We certainly had his wind at times
and il was q gambling drive. If johnny
knew how strong we were at time he
would have wiped us clean off the
map. bat believe me sir. never rode
so hard in all my life as | did that
thirty six hours CT horse back after
only beinG in Palestine about three
weeks and hardly got accustomed TO
the climate To stick us Canadians
in the push was little grilling. We
get the Tommies some when we tell
them they held the big drive up until
we came from France, which seems
much like it. AS soon as we landed
we were rushed right up and done a
little job for the cavalry to get over
the Jorden river. After that we rode
for eight hours with hardly a stop
trying TO flank JOHNNY and cut him off,
which we succeeded in doing, but
when we got orders to canter and
kept it up for about thirty-siX hours
and word went around we were try
ing to capture Won Sanders and his
staff. It was hell for leather" then
but he managed TO get away DISCUS
cd as one of the HedjeZ men who
were taking Damascus, but we got
the rest of his staff, even his batman,
so he must have made off alone in a
car.
It was kind of exciting to us Can
adams who were not used to such
fighting methods they used here, of
course, the first break through was
for the Infantry. but when they had
done their job it was for us to leap
his trenches anu go Ike the wind with
To~tv's High Explosives bursting over
head. 1t would make the old mare
staggcr> and shake her head. Thought
every minute old girl you'll get, it
when the machine guns started out a
tatting al around. She would snort
ard pitch herself right forward and
we were a dandy target mounted for
a jerry machine gun. We finally had
TO take it. with the bayonet about
three in the morning, but on reaching
Damascus we were al told to
clean all brass. We nearly dropped
with a blue faint but we saw through
it in about three hours. We had to
march through Damascus to show
them what the British Canadians,
Australians, Indians We're made of.
It wasn't 6 bad parade. Every Arab,
jew. Sheik and Bedouin turned out
in their silk robes singing ALA ALA
lScE kCf tiSTCSl ICu US Win YOU.
hUe1nan no good. Finished" and Lord
knows what else. but oh my wasn't
We glad when it was over.
Talk about stencil and dead Turks,
Jerrys. cameIs. RULES, donkeys! IT
was rotten. and flieS!-Well our mo-
squito sleeping nets would have done
well on the job. And the old horses
were just about crazy. That job done
VIC moved off back to the Sea of Gal
flea or otherwise known on the map
as Lake Tibereas, and there we ran
into some dirty work. The king of
The .HedieZs troops had been through
there ard butchered, well our COM
manding general threatened to give
them trouble if it didn't cease. There
were prisoners and Jerrys dying with
their insides open and the bodies
were all disfgured something out of
the ordinary. They certainly hate
the Turk and they show it. We near
~ came Kidding them with our ma
chine guns on the road to Allepo
They opened fire on us and if II
wasn't for squadron Of men patrol
ing we would have mistaken them
for Turks. We made short work of
mayor of Johny's who had shot our
captain OF the light horse to whom
we were attached. He did it so devil
ish while the captain was hitching
his horse Well if you could have
fcund one niece of him when the Au-