The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1919-01-16
IN AT THE FINISH

To the long list of interesting letters
we have given our readers from boys
serving at the front, during the past year
OF more, we add another, telling of some
of the activities during the closing days
and hours of the great World War 1t is
from Private Lloyd E. Goodwin of Bat
terry F, 135th Field Artillery, A, E. F..
Private Goodwin enlisted at Cleveland,
Ohio, May %, 1917, and was in training
at Camp Sheridan, Ala, until starting
for France. The letter tells of his trip
across and activities up to the close of
hostilities
Private Goodwin is a summer resident
of Belfast and the son of Nellie Burgess
| Goodwin, Belfast girl.
/ Thanksgiving Day, Nov. %, 1918.
/ Courouvre, France
/ Dear Folks.-This certainly has been a
fine day for Thanksgiving Day, for it has
been quite cold and has rained steady all
day. 1t started raining last Sunday after
noon and hasn't stopped since. We had
a good dinner at 800 O'Clock this after
noon, of roast beef, gravy and mashed
potatoes, bread and butter, coffee, half
of big cucumber pickle, and piece of
peach cobbler. 1t was served in good
quantities so we got plenty. We are to
have doughnuts and coffee at o'clock
tonight One thing about soldier is
that he is always hungry, never gets
enough and can eat at any time
When peace was declared we were in a
position on a large plain in the ST. Mihiel
sector, just north of ST. Maurice, and we
had to have breakfast at 4. 80 in the morn
ing, before it got light, because it the
Huns had seen our rolling kitchen coming
along in the day time we would have
been out of luck for our breakfast. am
at liberty now to tell you everything
been, so here goes.
We sailed out of New York harbor on
the morning of June 18th, on the Cunard
S. S. Hevovata (Which has since been
sunh. There were quite a number of
other troop ships in our flotilla, and we
were conveyed by bunch of sub chas-
ers, a couple of war ships, three or four
planes and dirigble balloon, so you see
we were very we'll protected. Our boat
was an old freighter, made over into
troop ship to carry troops from Australia
to France. We were only with that con-
voy one night, for when we woke up the
next morning we were all alone in the
ocean and not ship in sight Some
said that our coal was poor and that we
couldn't keep up; others said that we had
had some accident with the engines.
Anyway, the next thing we knew we
were nearing land and on the first of
July we found ourselves in the harbor of
Halifax, N. S., where we remained four
days. We couldn't leave the ship, and on
the afternoon of the Fourth we pulled up
anchor and with fourteen other boats and
British cruiser, we started for France.
There were troop ships, 1relghterS, a
Canadian hospital ship, couple of NUM-
ton ships and our guardian, the cruiser,
in our flotilla.
Our trip across was very uneventful
until we were three days out from the
Irish coast. AT the time seven destroy
erS came out to meet US and made circle
around our boats; but that morning, about
seven O'Clock, we heard an explosion
that made the whole ship t1emble. We
surely thought that Sub" had got us,
but it was depth bomb fired by one of
the destroyers, Nearly dozen were
cropped within half hour and we learn
ed that two of ''Heinies" submarines had
said their last say.
After we had landed we learned that
one other Sub" had tried to dive under
one of the troop ships that carried part of
our brigade to get near the munition ship,
which was in our very center, but the
SUBJ either didn't see the troop ship, or
didn't go deep enough, for it rammed the
troop ship and was smashed to pieces,
making large hole in the 136th Regts
boat, but by pumping all the time they