A WORLD WAR II ARMY RECRUIT

By Linda Lee Greene, Author & Artist.



US Army rookie, Pvt. Marlin “Bob” Gaffin, in early December, 1941 is based at Ft. Thomas, Kentucky Recruitment Center. The weekend following Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor, by way of a day pass, Bob travels a distance of less than four miles by bus to Cincinnati, Ohio to spend time with his boyhood friend, Bill Greene and his cousin, Ralph Dixon, both of whom are living and working in Cincinnati. On their first day together, they take in a movie in downtown Cincinnati. Bob notes in a letter to his mother that the price of admission for both Bill and Ralph was 40ȼ. Because he is a soldier, Bob got in for 20ȼ. He asserts in the letter that the show was a high-priced one!

            The news Bob omits from his letter is the fact that Bill had returned to Ft. Thomas with Bob for the purpose of enlisting, just as droves of young boys are doing across the nation. Bob withholds the news out of respect for Bill’s parents, whom might not have learned as yet of their son’s enlistment. Bill is eventually sent to Ft. Benjamin Harrison, Indiana for induction into the Army.    

            A major concern of Bob and his fellow recruits is their next destination. Bob is hoping to go to a warmer climate for his military training, to Virginia specifically. And as he watches his compatriots spattered to training camps across the country—to Texas, Missouri, Virginia and elsewhere, Bob learns that he will go to Ft. Knox, Kentucky, only about 240 miles away from his current location. Those early days of waiting at Ft. Thomas comprise time spent in nothing more demanding than keeping spic and span…No dirt in the Army…We haven’t done anything outside of scrubbing the floor and ourselves, he adds in his letter.

Apart from cleaning duties, Bob is disappointed that field drills are kept to a minimum. He dislikes lying around and waiting for assignment. Soon, field drills commence with a vengeance—sloshing in boot-sucking and foot-dragging mud, as rain is a consistent menace. That his body is a veritable pincushion for inoculations and vaccinations also annoys him, but like all things with stoic Bob Gaffin, he takes it in stride. 

            Bobbie Mendenhall and Woodrow Hoop, two of Bob’s homeboys, are in barracks with him at Ft. Thomas. Like towns everywhere, Peebles, Ohio, their tiny hometown, is quickly emptying of its brightest and best young men. Farm-boys, Bobbie, Woodrow, and Bob, all of whom have handled hunting guns since young boyhood, spend much of their time acquainting themselves with guns the likes of which they have never seen: 30-caliber, water-cooled, machine guns that shoot 380 bullets a minute; .45 automatic pistols; rifles, and as time goes by, 50-caliber machine guns. Bob predicts he will end up driving a truck or a half-track, stateside, he tells himself, for it is yet to sink into his consciousness that he will be shipped overseas. His is an unconscious look into his future, for indeed he will man a half-track, but on the battlefields of North Africa in the next year, followed by Italy and Europe ‘til war’s end.

            We are being issued the strictest of orders, to be ready to leave here for camp anytime. Maybe a week or in the next 10 minutes. All furloughs have been canceled until further orders. All reserves discharged were ordered to report to their draft boards at once, Bob explains in his letter to his mother. Ever the optimist, Bob states in a letter to his sister, Roma, I’ll save some Dinero (if I can) and then maybe I can come home. I can get a round trip ticket from here to Peebles and back for about $6.50. That’s awful reasonable. But the boys had to have $20 a piece for maintenance, they said. Of course that was just an old army gag to keep the whole company from wanting furloughs at the same time. You know 20’s are scarce in the army. But the Sergeant told me if I wanted a pass later on to get me a ticket to home and then to borrow a 20 from someone for a minute to show the Lieutenant, and I could get by. Ha. Ha. Tell everyone I said thanks for all the nice Christmas cards and presents…Well sis write and tell me the news, and I’ll do my best to come home before I leave for (God knows where) and tell everyone to write. Kiss Dot for me, will you? Bob’s letters to his worried mother, siblings, and his girlfriend, Dorothy “Dot” reliably end with I’ll be seeing you all, and tell everyone I said hello, and keep your chin up!©



The above is based on a true story and details of actual letters.



Image: Bob Gaffin 



Recommended Reading: GUARDIANS AND OTHER ANGELS by Linda Lee Greene, a work of historical fiction chronicling the lives of the Gaffin and Greene families spanning much of the twentieth century.