TRANSCRIBED FROM THE MALVERN TIMES JOURNAL NOVEMBER 15, 1917 P. 1
I enlisted, was examined and sworn into the navy on the 27th of June, 1917, in El Paso, Texas; left there for the training station at San Francisco, Cal, on July 1.
We went the lower route by the T. & P. through New Mexico and Arizona. We went through Yeoma, Ore., one of the hottest places this side of hades. The inhabitants there, which are mostly Indians, do not think anything of the weather when the thermometer registers 125 degrees in the shade. It was 1p8 degrees when we went through the 3rd of July. There were twenty of us in the bunch and we almost smoothered in the car with four fans going all the time. The dust would blow in the car so bad that you could not tell but that you had returned to dust, and there was dust in everything that we ate.
While crossing the Rocky mountains we would be down in the valley about to suffocate and look out of the car window at the top of the mountain and see them covered with snow. During that evening we had a lady in the car next to ours to faint from the effects of the heat. When we left the mountains we struck the Emperial Valley where it has not rained for six years. On the night of the third we landed in Los Angeles, laid over there for three hours. My friend and I started out to explore the city but froze out before we got started, when only about three or four hours before we were about to melt and trying to get off all the clothes possible. Los Angeles certainly is one of God’s chosen. It has one of the most perfect climates in the world.
At 10 o’clock on the Fourth of July we landed in San Francisco. There was no one to meet us and therefore, not knowing where to go we were in a pretty bad plight. At last we asked a sailor what we should do, and he said if we ever wanted to see the city we had better do it then. I learned since that he was right, for now it is the 12th of September and I have been over there three times. We decided to spend the night there. The next morning at 10 o’clock we assembled at the dock to take a boat over to the training station on Goat Island, (so called because it has gotten the goat of about nine or ten thousand men in the last six months.)
There on the docks was where my troubles began. When I left El Paso the recruiting officer did not give me a pass to the Island, so when I started up the gang plank and the boat’s swain asked me for my pass and I was unable to procure it, I was put under arrest, but thanks to the guard he got me mussed up with the other bunch and I gave him the dodge and have not seen him since. When we got to the dock at the Island which is about two miles from the city, we got off the boat, was lined up and marched up to the barracks, there we had to stand out in line for about two hours to get another examination. There was where the standing in line started and believe me, it has never ceased yet for we had to line up to get a drink of water or to go to bed. After the examination, which some of the boys failed to pass, we were marched around to “chow.” I did not know what that was but asked one of the sailors and he said it was dinner, which was welcomed by all. It consisted of spuds, boiled beef, gravy, soup, apples and ice cream, which we eagerly devoured. We are well fed at all times here. After lunch we were marched into the store room to get our clothes. It was there that we realized that we are no longer free men. We were told to pull off all clothes. A large fellow came along and sized us up, and then he called out some number, and they brought in a middy, the kind that the school girls wear. I asked him what he wanted me to do with it and he said put it on, which took about thirty minutes of hard work. Then came a pair of trousers, the pattern I never saw before. They are about 30 inches around at the bottom of the leg. The way they are made at the top would be impossible to describe. So that is what is wished on us for clothes.
Next we were marched up the hill to detention camp where we had to stay for twenty-one days. During the time had our hair clipped off, given three G. P. and vaccinated. After that I went further up the hill to the hospital school which branch I joined and am in school now and like it fine. Have to get up at five and run one and a half miles before breakfast, made up my bed, sweep the deck, it is not really the deck, just the floor of our tent our tent where three of us stay. We say deck to make it sound like we are sailors. Then, at 6:45 we line up for chow. When chow is over we go out and march until 9 o’clock, then we go to school the rest of the day. The same thing over every day; except Saturday and Wednesday, when we have everything we possess, from our cot to kerchief to wash.
We are here on the island for six months training, then we go to different place and France.
The way I have pictured it may seem hard, but it is not, we think it is great.
Good bye, I will meet you in France and maybe we will get to see the Kiaser.
ROY W. CARVER,
U. S. N. T. S. H. C. S.
San Francisco, Cal.
NOTES:
TRANSCRIBED BY KAREN PITTMAN
I enlisted, was examined and sworn into the navy on the 27th of June, 1917, in El Paso, Texas; left there for the training station at San Francisco, Cal, on July 1.
We went the lower route by the T. & P. through New Mexico and Arizona. We went through Yeoma, Ore., one of the hottest places this side of hades. The inhabitants there, which are mostly Indians, do not think anything of the weather when the thermometer registers 125 degrees in the shade. It was 1p8 degrees when we went through the 3rd of July. There were twenty of us in the bunch and we almost smoothered in the car with four fans going all the time. The dust would blow in the car so bad that you could not tell but that you had returned to dust, and there was dust in everything that we ate.
While crossing the Rocky mountains we would be down in the valley about to suffocate and look out of the car window at the top of the mountain and see them covered with snow. During that evening we had a lady in the car next to ours to faint from the effects of the heat. When we left the mountains we struck the Emperial Valley where it has not rained for six years. On the night of the third we landed in Los Angeles, laid over there for three hours. My friend and I started out to explore the city but froze out before we got started, when only about three or four hours before we were about to melt and trying to get off all the clothes possible. Los Angeles certainly is one of God’s chosen. It has one of the most perfect climates in the world.
At 10 o’clock on the Fourth of July we landed in San Francisco. There was no one to meet us and therefore, not knowing where to go we were in a pretty bad plight. At last we asked a sailor what we should do, and he said if we ever wanted to see the city we had better do it then. I learned since that he was right, for now it is the 12th of September and I have been over there three times. We decided to spend the night there. The next morning at 10 o’clock we assembled at the dock to take a boat over to the training station on Goat Island, (so called because it has gotten the goat of about nine or ten thousand men in the last six months.)
There on the docks was where my troubles began. When I left El Paso the recruiting officer did not give me a pass to the Island, so when I started up the gang plank and the boat’s swain asked me for my pass and I was unable to procure it, I was put under arrest, but thanks to the guard he got me mussed up with the other bunch and I gave him the dodge and have not seen him since. When we got to the dock at the Island which is about two miles from the city, we got off the boat, was lined up and marched up to the barracks, there we had to stand out in line for about two hours to get another examination. There was where the standing in line started and believe me, it has never ceased yet for we had to line up to get a drink of water or to go to bed. After the examination, which some of the boys failed to pass, we were marched around to “chow.” I did not know what that was but asked one of the sailors and he said it was dinner, which was welcomed by all. It consisted of spuds, boiled beef, gravy, soup, apples and ice cream, which we eagerly devoured. We are well fed at all times here. After lunch we were marched into the store room to get our clothes. It was there that we realized that we are no longer free men. We were told to pull off all clothes. A large fellow came along and sized us up, and then he called out some number, and they brought in a middy, the kind that the school girls wear. I asked him what he wanted me to do with it and he said put it on, which took about thirty minutes of hard work. Then came a pair of trousers, the pattern I never saw before. They are about 30 inches around at the bottom of the leg. The way they are made at the top would be impossible to describe. So that is what is wished on us for clothes.
Next we were marched up the hill to detention camp where we had to stay for twenty-one days. During the time had our hair clipped off, given three G. P. and vaccinated. After that I went further up the hill to the hospital school which branch I joined and am in school now and like it fine. Have to get up at five and run one and a half miles before breakfast, made up my bed, sweep the deck, it is not really the deck, just the floor of our tent our tent where three of us stay. We say deck to make it sound like we are sailors. Then, at 6:45 we line up for chow. When chow is over we go out and march until 9 o’clock, then we go to school the rest of the day. The same thing over every day; except Saturday and Wednesday, when we have everything we possess, from our cot to kerchief to wash.
We are here on the island for six months training, then we go to different place and France.
The way I have pictured it may seem hard, but it is not, we think it is great.
Good bye, I will meet you in France and maybe we will get to see the Kiaser.
ROY W. CARVER,
U. S. N. T. S. H. C. S.
San Francisco, Cal.
NOTES:
TRANSCRIBED BY KAREN PITTMAN