Evening star., 1946-07-01


ice, and goodness knows what not
Mr.. Patterson deserves all thest
things and more for his virtual ab.
olition of the hand salute b,
soldiers. Here is good riddance Of
bad rubbish with a vengeance
Nothing in my Army career came
so close to driving me crazy, with
the possible exception of the Ions
nours and low pay, than the hanc
salute. 1t wasn't so much the de-
livering of the hand salute to Of
flcers, as it was the confounded
hours spent in practicing the con-
founded thing.
For some reason, the officers who
trained me at Camp Blanding and
Camp. Wheeler, and I am sure ii
was true OF officers at all the other
IRTC centers. considered the mas
terlng of the hand salute an almost
impossible task for the rookie. They
worked on the theory that the
raising of the hand to the forehead
with the fingers properly placed
etc, and then bringing it down to
the side, was as difficult as third
year calculus or the stuffing and
mounting OF an elephant.
Long Practice Given.
So, we practiced it, day in and
day out, week in and week out. We
spent much more time learning the
hand salute than we did learning
how To throw properly a grenade or
shoot a BAR or how to avoid MPs
when returning to camp after hours,
and many other highly necessary
things. l have yet to see hand
salute clear a pillbox or knock q
sniper out of a tree.
The first salute I ever threw was
at Camp Blanding, half an hour
after my induction, and when l was
such a raw recruit that I thought
corporals were just about the might
lest men on earth l was returning
from the PIX, sauntering along with
cigar in my mouth and a brick
Of vanilla ice cream in my hand. ]
rounded corner and there, smack
in front of me, was bird colonel
I yanked the cigar out of my mouth
with my left hand and threw what
I thought was a salute with my
right, which was still holding the
ice cream.
The colonel gave me a look which
would have knocked down a run
ming deer at so yards. I sweated
l trembled. I shook and quivered
until my brand-new Army suit
which was three sizes too big for
me. all but fell of my frame Final
ly. the colonel spoke, and his voice
was the voice of doom.
Colonel Asks Questions.
Soldier" he said. what's your
name?"
I told him the best I could.
What's your NUMBER"
He might just as we'll have asked
me what 6o0o,033 was, multiplied
by 10000
What kind of ice cream is that?"
he thundered
vanilla" l Squeaked.
Vanilla, eh?" he said. TITS q
good thing 1t is vanilla. After this,
be sure you never salute a colonel
with a brick of chocolate ice cream
in your hand. You may CO."
Got Some Revenge.
The only fun in saluting was 50 :
luting officers when they had their
arms full of packages, and obviously
didn't want to return a salute. At
Camp Wheeler, when we would 20
into Macon on Saturday afternoons
and Sundays. we would walk the
streets Just to find heavily laden Of
ficers. Many is the time we have
walked single file, about IS PAGES
apart. and saluted a well-laden ON =
Ger until he burned. Boy, was that
fun!
You can see why officers were so
crazy about some of us enlisted men
can't you?
You don suppose the officers have
a right to grippe little, too, do you?
Perish the thought.
distributed by McNaucht Syndicate, Inc. }