World War I Collection

The last two months there we had a so called school. The whole thing was a joke as far as learning anything was concerned. I believe the idea of the school was not to teach us, as much as to get our hundred dollars a month pay, and to boost the stock of those in command of the post.

The above are my impressions of St. Maxient before I left for Gondrecourt.

The way things finally turned out we were not so bad off, and could have had a very

Gondrecourt there are two more days in St. M. to remember. They were very cold and wet, and disagreeable, and it was impossible to find a warm place, but I wrote a letter that taxed my mental ability to the utmost. These two days were March 1st and 2nd '18.

Tuesday Apr. 23 '18 Went on the rifle range for the first time. They didn't get around to me so I didn't shoot. When we got back at noon it was rumored that we might leave that night for Gondrecourt. Orders came at 4 o'clock

Jack Stores didn't even have his coat with him. Stewart loaned him his overcoat. At the station we found that the next train left for Gondrecourt at 4:30 P.M. Then we wanted to know if there was not some other way that we could go to get there sooner. We found that there was a trian leaving Charmont at 9:18 for Neouve Chateau, and another leaving there for Gondrecourt at 4:30 It was then 7:20 and we didn't know how we would get to Charmont by 9:18, a distance of

back to the barracks this noon and found three letters from Hazel, one from Steve Barrows, one from Mrs. Wood and Miss Gordon. First mail in three weeks. -- Went on the machine gun range this afternoon and I shot the highest score of our squad of ten men. I got a score of 147 out of a possible 200. Won 25 francs. -- Heard that we are going to be in Gondrecourt an extra week. A new order, we have school from 7 until 9 P.M. besides our original time. All of us very peaved.

Thursday May 7 '18. "Carried on" with the Vickers in the morning. Went on the

I had gone into the barracks for a minute, so we were picked for the unfortunate ones. It happened that they slipped up on their roll call and Squires with Hughes as a pupil were the ones that fell. I went out to see the wreck, and the plane hit nose first. The engine was burried in the ground. The whole plane was nothing but kindling wood. Hughes died soon after they got him out of the wreck, and Squires died shortly after they got him to the hospital. Hughes was a mighty nice boy, and one of the St. Maxient, and Gondrecourt boys.