TRANSCRIBED FROM THE SHARP COUNTY RECORD AUGUST 9, 1918 P. 4
Editor Record:---As I once lived in Sharp county and have many relatives and friends who still live there and are readers of the Record, I will write a few lines for your paper.
I enlisted in the U.S.A. Veterinary Corps at Riddle, New Mexico, on June 1, 1918, and left there on the first night of June, arriving at Camp Lee, Virginia, on the morning of June 5. Twelve of we boys enlisted from Guadalupe county and eleven of us are still together, one having been transferred to a different company. The government issued a special call for men who know something about handling and caring for horses, and the cowboys made a rush to enlist. I think there is the largest number of cowboys together here that has ever been seen in one bunch. We are nearly all western stockmen and are from all points west of the Mississippi river. We have champion riders here and also have the world’s champion rope twister with us. His name is Jack Ray. He won first prizes in the contest held at Las Vegas, New Mexico, last summer at the cowboy’s reunion.
We are well pleased with our work and general surroundings. Our work is not very hard and at present we are taking a good rest, being under quarantine from the fact that one boy developed a case of measles. Eighteen of us are cooped up now, but think we will be released soon. Our boys got measles from troops transferred here from Illinois. Outside of measles, health is splendid here. This is certainly a delightful climate, and there is much more rain here than I am used to in the dry desert of new Mexico.
We enjoy studying “horseology” and think we will make good. We are not enlisted as fighting units, but if it becomes necessary we will be called into action. Our work will be to care for wounded or sick horses “over there,” therefore we will be placed several miles back of the front line. We will not be in camp much longer, because the most of us knew a good deal about horses before coming for training here, and with a little special instruction we will soon be able to perform our duties over seas.
Camp Lee is one of the largest camps in the country, and is located about three miles east of Petersburg, Va., seven and a half miles from the Atlantic Ocean, forty miles from where the largest ships run, and a mile and a half from the Petersburg trenches and mine crater. I have seen Crater Hill and the trenches, which were made in the 60’s. These trenches can still be very plainly traced through the heavy forests and there are places where they are seven or eight feet deep now. Crater Hill is high ground, as the name implies, and there are holes in the earth ten or twelve feet deep, in which large pine trees are growing. Several monuments have been erected on this hill, which mark the point the different divisions reached before the mine explosion and where the brave soldiers fought their last fight. I think Pennsylvania and Massachusetts have the largest monuments in honor of their veterans.
This is a very poor country. The soil is a yellowish clay and, I judge, worn out for the last fifty years. There are wild fruits of many kinds here and plenty of good spring water. The people live pretty much the same way as their grandparents lived and farm about the same way. Some people may like such a country, but when I get out of the army I am going straight to New Mexico, and I shall not visit in Virginia as I return.
Chester A. Bray
NOTES: Bray was born in 1892 and died in 1964. He is buried in Ft. Sumner Cemetery in DeBaca County, New Mexico.
TRANSCRIBED BY DEBRA POLSTON
Editor Record:---As I once lived in Sharp county and have many relatives and friends who still live there and are readers of the Record, I will write a few lines for your paper.
I enlisted in the U.S.A. Veterinary Corps at Riddle, New Mexico, on June 1, 1918, and left there on the first night of June, arriving at Camp Lee, Virginia, on the morning of June 5. Twelve of we boys enlisted from Guadalupe county and eleven of us are still together, one having been transferred to a different company. The government issued a special call for men who know something about handling and caring for horses, and the cowboys made a rush to enlist. I think there is the largest number of cowboys together here that has ever been seen in one bunch. We are nearly all western stockmen and are from all points west of the Mississippi river. We have champion riders here and also have the world’s champion rope twister with us. His name is Jack Ray. He won first prizes in the contest held at Las Vegas, New Mexico, last summer at the cowboy’s reunion.
We are well pleased with our work and general surroundings. Our work is not very hard and at present we are taking a good rest, being under quarantine from the fact that one boy developed a case of measles. Eighteen of us are cooped up now, but think we will be released soon. Our boys got measles from troops transferred here from Illinois. Outside of measles, health is splendid here. This is certainly a delightful climate, and there is much more rain here than I am used to in the dry desert of new Mexico.
We enjoy studying “horseology” and think we will make good. We are not enlisted as fighting units, but if it becomes necessary we will be called into action. Our work will be to care for wounded or sick horses “over there,” therefore we will be placed several miles back of the front line. We will not be in camp much longer, because the most of us knew a good deal about horses before coming for training here, and with a little special instruction we will soon be able to perform our duties over seas.
Camp Lee is one of the largest camps in the country, and is located about three miles east of Petersburg, Va., seven and a half miles from the Atlantic Ocean, forty miles from where the largest ships run, and a mile and a half from the Petersburg trenches and mine crater. I have seen Crater Hill and the trenches, which were made in the 60’s. These trenches can still be very plainly traced through the heavy forests and there are places where they are seven or eight feet deep now. Crater Hill is high ground, as the name implies, and there are holes in the earth ten or twelve feet deep, in which large pine trees are growing. Several monuments have been erected on this hill, which mark the point the different divisions reached before the mine explosion and where the brave soldiers fought their last fight. I think Pennsylvania and Massachusetts have the largest monuments in honor of their veterans.
This is a very poor country. The soil is a yellowish clay and, I judge, worn out for the last fifty years. There are wild fruits of many kinds here and plenty of good spring water. The people live pretty much the same way as their grandparents lived and farm about the same way. Some people may like such a country, but when I get out of the army I am going straight to New Mexico, and I shall not visit in Virginia as I return.
Chester A. Bray
NOTES: Bray was born in 1892 and died in 1964. He is buried in Ft. Sumner Cemetery in DeBaca County, New Mexico.
TRANSCRIBED BY DEBRA POLSTON