The Coolidge examiner., 1945-03-16

| there-the HfeleSS DOdleS Oh WOm-
en- with dead babies in their arms,
floating in the water. Many OF
the sights l am not at liberty to
speak of Here in America, we
are more fortunate than many re-
alize. My ship was with the Navy
Task Force that raided Ryuku Is
lands 250 miles south of the jap
anese homeland" and we also
bombed hell out of them at For
mosa. Then came the invasion
of the Philippines. While Nc
Arthur was landing on Leyte, we
were giving them hell on Luzon.
My brother, Gordon Brannon, GIN
PIC, who is serving on an LIST,
and l were in on the invasion to-
gether, although we did not see
each other. He does not expect
another leave home until this mess
in the Pacific is over, Brannon
says, which he is afraid is long
way off yet But those of us on
the home front can shorten that
time, he says, by making sacrif1-
ces so that the men who are fight
ing can have the things necessary
with which to win victory.
LIT. JAMES D. GARRETT, %,
is serving with the Flying Octo-
pus" squadron of the First Ma
rine Air Wing in the Philippine
area, according to word received
this week He is a son Of Mr.. and
Mrs. Jack Garrett.
KATE MORRIS GILLESPIE,
Mariana Army Air Field, Tucson,
has been promoted to private first
class. She has been serving as
mail clerk at Mariana AAF since
May, 1914. After basic training at
FIT. Des Moines, Ia, Pfc. Gillespie
was transferred to Santa Ana Ar
my Air Base, California, and then
assigned to Mariana, one Of the
largest basic pilot schools in the
Army Air Forces training Com
mand.
PVT. WAYNE RAY, who has
been serving on the front lines in
Germany since October 1914. Is
back in the states and surprised
his wife and parents, Mr.. and Mrs.
William Ray, with a telephone
call from a hospital in Charles,
ton, S. c., Wednesday night. He
had not written them of the posi-
bility of his return and the sur
prise was complete. He may later
be sent to a hospital in the West,
Ray said, and hopes it will not be
long before he gets a furlough
home. He has been a Coolidge
resident since 1880 and entered
service in April of 1914.
STEPHEN S. (JAck) BOWEN,
serving with the 29th Division in
the European theater of opera
tions, has been promoted from
sergeant to staff sergeant, &C
cording to word received this
week. SfSgt Bowen, a squad
leader, has participated in the
Campaign of Western Europe and
the Campaign of Germany. He
is the son of Mrs. Vena Bowen,
employed at Hines Drug Com
pany, and has three brothers in
the service, Pvt. Donald Bowen,
William M. Bowen, sac, and Pvt.
Joseph Leroy Bowen.
LIT. MARTHA WORD arrived by
plane from San Francisco We'd
nesday night on two weeks leave
to visit her parents, Mr.. and Mrs
]. ]. Jones. She has been station
ed at Dibble General Hospital,
Menlo Park, California, since she
joined the Army Nurse Corps in
October of 1943.
TVS DELBERT ROYCE WoF-
FORD writes his parents, Mr.. and
Mrs. W. J. Wofford, of Ray, form
er Coolidge residents, to let them
know he is all right after having
recently been wounded in action in
Germany. From the way you
write, mother" he says, "you seem
to know / was hurt pretty bad.
Well, I'm all right, and the head
and face wounds were just scrat-
ches; they didn't leave me disfig-
ured-but I'm still as ugly as ev-
er."
Wofford, serving with the End
Infantry Division which has been
cited for ameritorious service says
he is not at liberty to tell his exact
location when the action took
place. 1t is still cold and there
is plenty of snow, he says. 1t
takes a regular mail over two
months to reach them and he has
only recently received the Christ
mas Edition (which was tops.
Thanks a million" Wofford has
been overseas since the summer
of 1914 and this war is hell in
more ways than one."
PVT. MARY VIRGINIA o'BRY-
AN writes from Ft. Des Moines,
Iowa, to let us know how much
she is enjoying the paper. Il read
it more closely here than l ever