The Glasgow courier. [volume] (Glasgow, Mont.) 1913-current, 1943-02-18
Bill Jones is dead.

sand other communities.
Bill Jones is dead.
Bill Jones had just graduated from agricultural college. HI
was ambitious to put into action all he had learned about con
servation of soil, better breeding cattle, rotating crops, because
his dads farm was in pretty bad shape. When war came, Bill
enlisted in the army.
Bill went to the Philippines and the little town where he was
biIeted was overrun by a horde of Japs. BIZ fought as long
as he could and then, under orders, surrendered. They tied his
hands behind him and a Jap soldier started to rape a white
woman. He had torn her blouse off when Bill kicked him in
the belly, and three Japs waiting their turn rammed their bay
onets into Bills CUTS.
This happened about the time you were telling the folks
at your house that it was all darned nonsense to ration
sugar because cake and candy were certainly no diet for
soldiers.
Bill Jones is dead.
He was a soda jerker in a small town, and when the bands
blared and the flags fluttered, he signed up for the navy. They
put him on a torpedo boat. He learned to wear his hat on the
corner of his head, and to roll when he walked. Then his boat
got into a scrap down in the South Seas. Bill stood by his gun
and laughed when he fired it, but a shell hit its deck beside
Bill. When he tried to pull himself to his feet, he saw that his
right arm was in the scuppers five feet away. He reached for
his gun with his left hand and then things went black. The list
of the ship rolled a dead sailor into the scuppers where his dis
membered arm lay. Its extended thumb touched the tip of his
nose, so that in death as in life, Bill was thumbing his nose at
the Jap ship that got him.
This was the same day you were raising hell because
they were rationing gasoline, and for fear you couldn't drive
up to the lake to go fishing every week end this summer,
you hid four cans of gasoline in your garage.
Bill Jones is dead.
Bills dad had a lot of money, and when Bill wanted his own
plane, dad bought it for him. Bill was a wild devil, driving a
car out of all reason, and flying a plane the same way, and get
ting drunk too often. But he was the first man in his town to
respond to the Air Corps call for filters.
Bill got into a dog fight oyer the English Channel. There were
six German planes, but with a "Taly-ho!" Bill dived into the
bunch of them. He got two before a third one sent a burst
of bullets into his back that almost cut him in half, but held
on to the stick till he rammed the fourth plane and went down
with it locked in the flaming embrace of death.
This happened about the time you were bellyaching about
being abused because of outrageous treatment given you by
the tire rationing board which would not allow you recaps
for your pleasure car.
Bill Jones is dead.
Bill was a boy who had incInations for the ministry, but when
the call came he laid aside his Bible and joined the Marine
Corps. Bill wasn't much fun around the blanket where they
were shooting craps, and he wasn't so hot at the beer drinking
contests in the jukes, but he earned his sergeants stripes before
they sent his gang ashore in one of those new boats which land
through the surf.
The fstfuIl of fighting fools charged a machine gun nest, and
Bill had just taken careful aim and let go a hand grenade
when another machine gun caught him.. Four bullets hit his
head, but a Marine has four speeds forward and no reverse,
and Bill fell toward the enemy.
That was the afternoon when you were sitting at the golf
club with a highball in your hand, telling the other three
fellows in your fousome that if income taxes were not re-
duced, they were going to kill initiative in this country.
Bill Jones is dead.
Bill was a football player who had good prospects as a pro-
fessional coach at a small college. Then came Pearl Harbor.
Bill USED some 1OOtDau language, INC edu lOT lOWH u SSH
up with the parachute troops. He did all right.
Bill got into action in an air raid in enemy country. He hit
the ground with a dozen of his pals and raced where their
machine guns and grenades had landed near them. Fully
equipped, they made for a nearby farm house from which bull
lets were spraying like water out of a garden hose. =
Six of those machine gun bullets fairly cut Bills legs off, but
he lay on his belly in the mud and got two Heinies. Bills last
words were: "Of all the damn fool luck!"
That was the time you were telling the boys at the poker
game that the union racketeers and the munitions manu-
facturerS were markings fortune out of this war, when we
had no business getting into it in the first place.
Bill Jones is dead. h
Bill was an uneducated clam digger on the New England ~
,oast, but he knew about boats. He had only one eye and the N
Uniformed ranks wouldn't take him, SO he shipped on a tanker. /"
lis ship was bringing oil up the coast when a German pig boat W
anne up out of the slime and sent a torpedo into the hull e.
midships. The freighter burst into flames and Bill went over d.
lie side into the burning oil. 80
When he came to the surface, a machine gun was practicing ~