The Maui news. [volume] (Wailuku, Maui, H.I.) 1900-current, 1919-02-07
Big League Ball
Players Long To
Be Out OF Army

CHICAGO, January 29-(Associated
Press Correspondence) Somewhere
in Germany Grover Cleveland Alex
ander, the $4,000 pitcher with the
Chicago Nationals, and three other
major league players attached to the
American Army of Occupation, are
impatiently counting the days when
they will board a homeward trans
port.
What a grand and glorious feeling
that will be for the gang; we all
have said it will be the happiest days
of our lives, writes Sergt. Charles
Ward, of the 342nd field artillery, a
part of the Eighty-ninth division now
stationed in Germany. With Ward,
who formerly was a member Of the
Brooklyn Nationals, are Pitcher Alex
ander, Otis Lambeth, of the Cleve-
land Americans, Johnny Noyes of the
Philadelphia Nationals, and Lloyd
Waite of the Pittsburg Nationals.
The players are members of the
same detachment doing patrol duty
in one of the German towns on the
Rhine.
Wards letter relating his expert
ence while enroute to the German
border was dated December 10. 1t
follows in part:
I'VE are well on our way into Ger
many and are now resting in a Ger
man village called Spang for a few
days. We started on this journey
from a town called Beney in France
being mounted on horseback. l eX-
perienced a little hard luck with my
mount when his back became sore
from the saddle after riding for three
days steady. l had to walk for the
remainder of the eight days of the
Journey, making eleven days in all
that we were on the road, and be-
lieve me, we were all in when we
reached this town. Can you imagine
Alexander, Noyes, Lambeth, Lieut.
enant Waite and myself travelling for
miles on horseback pulling big bat
teries behind us and going into big
shell holes large enough to bury a
whole detachment?
las soon as we put foot on German
soil we really thought u treatment
from the Germans we had fought
would be altogether different from
what we experienced in the allied
country, and above all, we would not
receive any more good eats. But to
the contrary, we Toasted fine and on
ly last night We were dished out a
grand German meal with excellent
apple butter thrown in. | had some
German homemade bread, and it was
like mother used to make. We al
ways leave a few marks, when we
are leaving, with the people that give
us some feed, and you would think
that they were being handed $1,000
the way they rave over it. A mark
is about 20 cents in our money.
"Our infantry is two days ahead
of us and we will all be happy when
we get to our destination. Alexander,
Moves and Lamberth and myself sat
down in one of the towns of LuXem-
burg for over two hours relating some
of the great times we had while play
ing ball and wishing that we were
again in the real country, the good
old u. S. A., getting ready for the
spring training trip to the Southern
climate instead of trying to make
these people understand is. We can
hardly wait for the time to come
when we will again board a ship that
will take us across the Atlantic to
our dear old home, the land of the
stars and stripes. We have all said
that it will be the happiest day of
our lives when we hear our comman-
der say get ready to sail for home.
What a grand and glorious feeling
that will be for the gang"