The Hardin tribune-herald. [volume] (Hardin, Mont.) 1925-1973, 1944-12-21

A little later Bosnian got out q
partly filed bottle Of gin he had with
him and asked this same sensitive
captain if he'd like a drink. The
captain didn't even reach out his
hand. He simply answered:
Have you got enough for my
men too?"
He wouldn't take a drink himself
unless the enlisted men under him
could have some.
All officers are not like that, but
the battlefield does produce a broth
erhood. The common bond of death
draws humans toward each other
over the artificial barrier Of rank.
After a few weeks Of front-line
living your whole perspective on the
niceties and necessities Of life
changes.
You used to be sore when you
couldn't get a taxi. Now you've
struck gold when you find q
spot where you can lie down out
of the wind.
Even my own perspective has
changed, and as a correspondent
I've had only the barest taste Of
the rough life. For a lifetime I have
bathed with becoming regularity,
and I thought the world would come
to an end unless I changed my socks
every day. Now I have just had
my first bath in a month, and I 60
two weeks at a time without even
taking off my socks. Oddly enough,
1t doesn't seem to make much diff
ference.
The other day I had to laugh at
myself over a little emotion I ex-
perienced. We had arrived one eve
ming at a new front-line headquar-
tiers. 1t was conferred around a Tu-
nissan farmhouse, as practically all
command posts are.
Comfort on Ground.
Soldiers and officers alike were
sleeping just anywhere they could
in trucks, under trees, in the barn
and chicken houses. 1t was cold
and damp. as usual.
Nobody tells a correspondent
where to sleep or what to do when
he is gypsying around the front. He
shifts for himself. So I nosed around
and found a place to sleep. It was
under a big French grain wagon
sitting in the barnlot.
Some soldiers had found several
strips of corrugated tin roofing and
set them around three sides of the
wagon, making walls. The wagon
bed formed a roof overhead. They
had brought straw from a nearby
stack and put it on the ground I'M
der the wagon. There we threw u
bedding rolls.
It was the contest place I'd
slept in for a week. 1t had two
magnificent features-the ground
vas dry, and the wind was cut
off.
l vas SO pleased at finding
such a wonderful place that I
could feel my general spirits 60
up like an elevator.
When the detachment got or
ders to move the next day 1 felt a
genuine regret at leaving this lit
tie haven. And to think after all
it was only some pitiful straw on
the hard ground under a wagon.
Little things come to mean so
much in wartime.
At this front I'm the only person
l know who has a can-opener, and
it's in constant demand. I have to
carry it in my coverall pocket to
keep it from being stolen.
Stealing eases to be just stealing
when something you need badly is
taken. I've never stolen anything
yet. but I wouldn't put it past my
self under favorable circumstances.
have a pair of fingernail scissors
with me, and n day recently l
lent it six times to soldiers who
were just passing and asked if l
had any nail clippers or scissors.
Cold water and cold weather are
hard on soldiers hands. Their fin
gers get hard and crack around the
nails. Night after night I've lain
awake because my fingers had split
back from the nail and throbbed
with pain.
Our troops do manage to look
fairly clean and ~presentable, even
though sanitary facilities are
skinny. The Air Forces allow their
soldiers to grow boards. but the
rest of the army doesn't. Conse.
quently the men have to shave re.
gardless of how inconvenient it may
be.