Evening star., 1944-06-21
| |Doughboys Find War
Has Not Touched
Many in Rome
Nv KENNETH l.. DIXON.

WITH THE AEF IN ROME,
June 7 Delayed After the shat
tered cities of Southern Italy. Rome
Is breathtakingly beautiful IN all
its untouched maguiticcace, It's
people are clean. its women attfae~
tive and we'll dressed. It's men cent
paratively well fed and healthy
/ looking.
1 But there is another side ot Rome
the well-to-do Romans. many et
them English speaking people, many
of them expatriates from Allied
lands, still others well-educated
Italian linguists.
There is something not SO beau-
/ tiful about the plaintive Sc,g they
all started to sing even before they
had finished hailing the doughooys
as their liberators.
Waiting Called Ordeal.
"You have been so long" sighed
the beautiful. smartly dressed wom-
an in the bar. Waiting has been
an ordeal-more than you can imag-
inc. We have expected you since
September"
(Yes, lady, the lads have been
delayed. There was short de-
lay at Salerno. You may have
| heard of Salerno-a lot of folks
back home have. They were told
in little telegramsD
"You will never know what we
have been through" said the res
taurant keeper, spreading his hands.
"All through the winter We kept
wondering if you were ever COM
ing and those German dogs-pfftt!
they were in our way everywhere.
eyes it was that way. In the
dead of winter some of the boys
wondered, too, If they would ever
get to Rome and some of them
aren't here today. And those
Germans-yeS, they were in our
way everywhere, too
"Nothing to Wear"
"It's been terrible" the lady said,
looking disdainfully at her beautiful
dress. "See this? We have nothing
| 10 wear, IlOIIllIlS db I'LL.
(Have you noticed the soldiers
watching you, lady? They didn't
known such clothes still existed
in this world. One of them said
this morning that Roman women
seemed to be even better dressed
in many cases than women back
home. Don't say that so loud,
lady, the clothes these guys have
on they've worn all winter, too
Its been so crowded in Rome all
winter, double the normal popula-
tion. We could hardly move
around" sighed the banker. And
the food was terrible, very little
bread, no beer for months and
months, only little American
whisky left and the price of every
thing-ah, the price OF everything!"
(Yes, it was crowded in the
foxholes on Mount Lungo, too,
and Casino was overpopulated
with the dead You could not
move around at all there. Bread?
Whisky? Oh. yes, some of the
boys remember those things.
They had a little beer at Anzio.
And the price of everything-yes,
the price of everything. -
Pleads for Cigarette.
"Give me one cigarette, pleaded
the matron in the well-tailored suit.
Even the black market has had
only few American cigarettes late
ly. It's been terrible"
Give me package Of coffee"
smiled the sleek young man in his
20s. 1--WE haven't had coffee in two
months
How soon will there be gasoline?"
asked the taxi driver. Its been al
most impossible to get gasoline. It's
been terrible"
Yes, yes, yes. It's been terrible.
Here's cigarette-coffee-
morrow, gasoline--yes, it's been
terrible, this waiting But don't
say it again. The boys who lie
forever along the road to Rome
might hear youD
Great God!" said the soldier sit
ting wearily on the curb, resting his
burning feet. Amazement was
written all over his dirty, bearded
face. Great God! The war has
never touched some of them here,
has it?"
Then he got up, shouldered his
gun and pack again and started
slowly on through the town, on be-
yond Rome.