The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1925-07-14
Reporter Gets
Out Of Army
AT Last
Weathers Day at Fl. Har-
riSon Camp and
Leaves.
BY Rookie" John l.. Niblack

4 my company cmomander,
Capt. l.. d. Macy, Company c,
Eleventh Infantry. Ft. Benja.
min Harrison, didn't know 1
had temporarily enlisted in the Citi-
zens Military Training camp, with
the aid Of his superior officer, in or
der to find just how things were run.
Captain Macy, in fact, treated me
just as any other Of his 1913 citizen
rockies. He gave his orders to ser.
geants. who gave them to lesser ser
geants, who passed them on to cor.
| porals.
The bugle that had just blown was
mess call, as l saw by the scurrying
rockies, most of whom had drilled
all morning and were hungry.
Nobody could complain about the
food The Government is allowed
10 cents a day to feed each Of the
citizen-soldiers, and we had Dreaded
pork chops all we wanted
/ potatoes. pie, cold water, bread and
butter, butter beans and other
things. 1 thought a high school boy
from Greencastls, Ind, was going to
kill himself eating beans. II took
two kitchen police to keep the dish
full for him.
Clean Guns
After dinner we were informed
the reds" and "basics," which in
cluded me and the other rockies
came with, didn't drill that after
noon. Only the whites" and blues"
drilled. We had a greasy gun is.
sued us, and in charge OF a private
and a corporal we punched a quart
or so of hard oil out OF each, and
washed them in gasoline. 1t was out
I I'm the sun, and the thermometer
stood about 10 in the shade, | be.
lieve If it registered like my back.
Finally, after punching some fifty
or sixty cleaning wads through the
gun, 1t was fairly clean. and the
private slung a strap on 1t. The
regular soldiers passed away the
time cussing each other and telling
how wild they were when on liberty
in Indianapolis. Each tried to tell
bigger yarn than the rest. They
treated the rockies fine. though, and
were very patient, much more so
than some non.coms 1 encountered
| in 1918.
Then we each drank about a gal
lon Of water. and retired 10 the
| tents, where we rested. In the mid
die of this resting a bugle blew
again, and somebody said something
| about retreat" We didn't bother.
and nobody bothered us.
That is, we weren't bothered until
one of the boys, who had been up
to the canteen drinking pop came
back and said:
Missed Retreat
my gosh! We ought to have been
up at retreat. 1 just got an awful
bawling out from the sergeant"
What did he say?"
HE said: You boys ought TO
have stood retreat. You're here to
drill not lay around. l guess Wen
get put on kitchen police or arrested
or something"
Well, we got up then, and went
out, just in time TO see all the com.
panies in line as the flag was low
cred. When they blew the mess CALL
however, we all knew what TO do,
and did.
After supper, some Of the boya'
played football some played baseball
and some played French harps or
anything. About every kind of
musical instrument in the world was
played. It seemed. Some of the boys
went to a movie at the camp and
some went to Indianapolis, but we
went to bed. The citizen soldiers
can get liberty each evening and
from Saturday noon until Sunday
night.
Rain During Night
Outside OF hard rainstorm In the
night. when l got somewhat wet
letting down the side walls Of our
tent. everything passed off fine. For
breakfast, which came after roll call
under arms, we ha deach a bottle
of milk, grape nuts. coffee. potatoes,
sausage and prunes. Then we went
back to the tents.
Pretty soon a guy came around.
Get out here and pick up all the
paper, cigarette stubs and matches,
he said.
Which we did.
Then they got ready for Gales
thentics. and l got ready to get out
of the army. / stumbled on a
friend, Frank Cox. a reserve lieu
tenant, and with his aid. persuaded
Captain Macy to let me so. after
telling him what II was all about /
had to reverse the process. turning
in my clothes piece by piece. and
finally they let me go.
can truthfully say I think a
month of the C. NJ. r. c. training
would be fine for any young man.