Newspapers / Rockingham Post-Dispatch (Rockingham, N.C.) / March 7, 1918, edition 1 / Page 13
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ROCKINGHAM POST-DISPATCH, ROCKINGHAM, N. C. KNITTING MACHINE ' ,1 i;; !' TC li fmmn ; j faf , W..lrn N.w.p.w Lrto.,.. m .,,., .,,,,,... ,, .J J ' Af...rf...jA..v.)1 Tir"ATriif$siWnsyrinWiTisWl The comforts committee of the Navy League of the United States has Installed In Its headquarters several knitting machines for making sweaters, mufflers, socks and other wearing apparel for our fighters. U. S. Soldiers Confident They Can Whip Boche Troops in France Are Training to the Highest Point of Efficiency. KNOW NO FEAR OF FRITZ Soldier Writes of Work and Expert- ences with Army at the Front- Old Regulars to Be Used as " Crack Units of the Unit ed States Forces. Dear : This fs the first time I have had or have taken for letter writing in some days. I wrote home, and will devote the rest of the minutes between now and bedtime to a long delayed letter to you. I only just re turned to my company after being , away for a month In a blamed sight colder place. I had a long and won derful trip, the details of which I can't, of "course, recount. Let It be men tioned, however, that among , other things Tdld was sleep in a real steam heated room, with sheets, five electric lights, all going at once, and a bath room. I was a next-door neighbor of Hank Wales, of the I. N. S., who, I dis covered, worked in Sacramento, taking the job I left when I went to Panama. He knows you, and I mentioned that I did, but didn't go Into any details. My trip, my one night of luxury and tuy reversion to the life of the army have brought a realization of one thing, though: To pervert the title and main strain of the latest Broadway and first-line trench hit, the fun is over, over here. From now on it's business. France, to the American soldier, neyer again will be what It has been. This thought began to formulate Itself In the minds of the lucky Americans who came over here In the late sum mer of 1017, about the time the snow began to fall and the fog to come in from the coast Mow it has crystallzed. The grave, whole-souled, sincere six months' welcome of France Is over. It was a welcome not so much regal as It was genuine not one such as Is . spoken at a banquet when the mayor turns the hypothetical keys of the plty over, but of the man who opens bis home and his all and says, not in words, but In deeds, "You are one with us ; what we have is yours." And for tunate, were the Americans who were present at this welcome. The army that comes this year will be welcomed, but not as we were. No Longer a Novelty. Not that France has Intentionally moderated her tone. There has been a merely natural relaxation, of course, ' and the "soldat Americaine" now is accepted more as a matter of course than as a novelty. But the big factors are that the United States Is getting into the war and It is winter. There Is less liberty now than there was no all-night passes, and frequently Sunday is broken by Inspection and drills. There is no military permis sion to visit nearby cities except on business. Visiting of the cafes is per- . mitted only between noon and 2 p, m. and 6 p. m. find 8:30 for officers and enlisted men. Winter has brought long nights and cold days, its Bed Cross sweaters and the 17 pairs of socks : from home, anO, Incidentally, the keen est appreciation of three fruits cf clvl- ." Illation which "back home" aro such , common-places that their existence creates no more thought than 'the flea on Hector's back. These are light, heat and water. War, and Its concomitant economies, cause a step backward in evolution and human progress superficially, at least and luxuries vanish, one by one, while wliat, the American of today sub consciously considers as necessities are stinted. An aeon r so ago water ; and artificial heat and light might have been considered a luxury, or a dlsslpa tlon by our developing ancestors. But now they are normally in the class of things - we must have. There Is, of course, no alarming scarcity of any of . these things. Merely a conservation. ' Over here we hear that the lights are going out on Broadway, and Dear bora street, and Canal street, and Mar SPEEDS UP WORK - ket street; that they are mixing soft coal with hard to conserve, but at the same time give the flat dweller a warm radiator to get up by. And then we figure that the scintillating, on-and-off cigarette sign, at the corner of- Broad way and Sixth aveniyj, for Instance, would supply enough light for a whole division ; that Just one of those restless snakes pursuing each other around the edges of that sign would Illuminate the whole of this Grand Hotel du France, In which we now are billeted, and be a distinct betterment on our present two-candle power (actual) lighting plant. Every Town Has One. I am divulging no "outstanding physical characteristics which might betray locality" when I mention the Grand Hotel du France. They are as common as Maxim's restaurants in the United States. Every town has one, and they generally are august, aged hostelrles, living, like the Missis sippi river steamboats, on their reputa tion. This one is a comparative Juve nile. It is only one hundred and one years old, according to a corner stone we discovered the other day. But at that it hasn't got electric wiring and plumbing- and a furnace in the base ment, and if we only had Just the rat tle on the end of that snake's tall hanging on a cord In room No. 12 there would be four jubilant soldiers in that "petit chambre." When the United States took over the Grand Hotel du France it got it unfurnished, of course. It Immediately refurnished it with two double-decker bunks of the latest type nothing more. We sleep two In a corner, and I have one of the lowers. We have discovered, by the way, a virtue in this arrange ment The beds are sturdy) but can be Jarred by a jiggling of the body, and in the event that your bedinate, above or below, is addicted to snoring (and you would be surprised how many soldiers are) you can always stop him by "rocking the cradle"until he turns over. This is very handy. It saves looking all over the room for a shoe when you get up in the morning. There are four of us in this room. The most optimistic of the succeeding landlords of this hostelry must have PROTEGE OF MRS. MARSHALL - ram Clarence I. Morrison, now Morrison Marshall, protege of Mrs. Thomas R. Marshall, wife of the vice president, has developed from a tiny, undergrown infant to a bouncing seventeen-months-old boy. Mrs. Marshall found him In a Washington diet kitchen Infirmary and asked the mother to loan him to her for care in her own home. He was one of twins, and the mother is caring for the other. . The Marshalls have not adopted this one, but they have an Indefinite "loan" of him. Part of his rejuvenation was due to a few weeks In Michigan and Arisona where his foster parents went for a vacation. hi id trouble in recommending It to the four generations 'of transients who have abided here and gone. But all the soldiers do not fare so. We are lucky I A relative of a soldier "billeted out" was looking for him recently. The headquarters of the company were In a former private dwelling house. "Take a look upstairs," said a broth er soldier. "If you don't find him there look out In the carriage house and In the barn loft. If he's not there he'll be In the chicken house." Our room doesn't afford even that relic of the castle and pride of the bungalow, a fireplace. But our next door neighbor's does, and we are of ficially assigned to hang out around his grate. That solves the heat prob lem, and also the bathing question. Bathing facilities are limited in France at least that. In all of France, for example, there Is probably not one of those boors who bothers you about statistics on his daily matutinal Inun dation. I do not know the favorite Saturday night pastime of the people, either, but I can say that If there is a modern bathtub In this particular town the Americans have not yet found it So we merely heat a kerosene canful of water at our neighbor's fireplace and take a "bird bath." As there are eight men who must perform this ablu tion about one fireplace, and a good soldier takes a bath twice a week, and there are only seven nights In the week, this grate is a busy place. Drinking water is obtained only after difficulties sometimes. The American' doctors are taking no one's word about the supply but their own, and we are allowed to partake only after samples have been tested. Frequently, when In a town, the municipal supply is avoided and the supply is brought In in trucks from distant points. But I am not so skeptical of water as I was. Our last station was near a hospital. In front of this hospital always bung a big canvas bag full of Invitingly cool water. I cannot speak for the whole company, but my squad I know used always to drink thereof. We had kept It up for something near a month when one day a doctor in tortoise-shell glasses and a white apron espied a sol dier partaking at the bag. He became Immediately very vociferously appre hensive and expostulatory. "For the great jumped-up Holy Moses, man," said he, "don't drink that That's where we keep all the samples of contaminated water from this part of France." Find Disease Germs. In the last 17 days we've found germs of 13 deadly diseases right in that container. There are nine million bacteria to the square inch In that enough germs in that bag to kill the whole German army. I should say that my squad consumed several cubic feet of that water, and I don't know enough about mathematics to compute the number of germs. But we're all alive, and that was two months ago. But enough of this gassing. ' I re-' solved to be brief in my letters, and here I've brimmed over onto the third page. It has been cold where I am, but the last few days have been like springtime. Where I was last was up In the snow belt, where It gets on the ground and stays there, the only hope ful word the natives can give being that "it goes off the ground in April." Without going Into details, though, I learned one hopeful thing. While away I had an opportunity of talking with a lot of Americans who have been In the trenches. They were from dif ferent groups of troops and had been "In" at different times. And they all were confident that the Americans- can whip the Germans at every stage of the game. This isn't the boast of a few, but the consensus of the calm opinion of about 40, 1 guess, that I talked to. It was very encouraging, coming from men who have had a mouthful of the front Most of the fellows were from the old American regular army from the units over here, which are the only ones still intact, I believe. They are being trained to the highest point of military efficiency possible, and, they say, are to be used as the crack units of the United States forces, correspond ing with the famous "shock" units of the German and other armies. I guess the same is true of the Rainbow divi sion of the National Guard, which got such a send-off In the States. Regulars Fare Worse. The old regular army fellows seemed to have fared worse than the rest of us. They came over early In the game, most of them straight from the border with only a few days In the East, and went Into training im mediately. They were quartered up where the war has left an obvious mark and taken most of the superfl uities. They've been going hard ever since, learning everything of the latest weapons, maneuvers, signals and mili tary science that the French, British and Americans had to teach them. They're probably the soundest bunch of men, physically, In the world. And yet they're greatly neglected. This Is because they come. from the United States In general and no place In par ticular. Most of the regiments here come from a distant locality, and the folks back home organise welfare so cieties and send 'em tobacco and sweaters, but the regulars don't get in on this. ' - I had a few letters from the coast and probably will get more when the Christmas mall, which Is still coming in, catches up. Till la Guerre la Finis. ,; ' ROSS. p. S. The army censor who O-K'fi the above letter added In his owa handwriting the following wall: . "P. 8. Above statements regarding the regular forces being more or less forgotten are true, too true. - I, ton, am from the regular servloa and I happen to know we were everloeked nly too wall.". ' WANTED-AMERICANS! There are family of our own Uncle Sam. And Uncle Sam needs money your money everybody's money. He doesn't ask you to give it to him; he wants to borrow and pay you interest for it. Maybe you didn't have $50 or $100 to lend him in Liberty Bonds, but surely you have 25 cents. If we, all of us, buy one thrift stamp just one stamp apiece that is $22,500,000, and if everyone of us buys $4.12 worth 25 cents worth from time to time for sixteen times that's $370,800,000. Your pin money does help. Doesn't it? We don't know how much money you have how much how little. It doesn't matter, anyway. For it is getting to a point that every man every woman every boy every girl must make the business of helping win this war the most important thing on earth. Like the Liberty Bonds, the war savings certificates bear 4 interest. On January 1, 1923 each certificate will be worth $5. These stamps are exchangeable at face value plus accumulated interest at any time between now and January 1, 1923. You can buy from your mail carrier or at the Post Office. Buy your first one today. 1 mm&B Leak & Nature . Is Outwitted. The man who Invented the sewing machine achieved what he was after when he stopped trying to Imitate the human hand. If you go into a factory you will see machines doing things which only human skill could do but a short time ago, but the processes are quite different from the manual meth od. The inventors have risen superior to the formulae that nature -would seem to have laid down for them. WAR SAVINGS STAMPS Thrift Stamps cost 25 cents each and draw no Interest. You can buy them from your letter carrier, either city or rural route at the post office or your bank. Tou wia be given a card to paste them on. This costs nothing-. There are spaces for 16 Thrift Stamps on this card. When your card Is full, take it to your post office or bank any time, with a few cents additional and your card will be exchanged for an interest-bearing War Savins Certificate worth $6 on Jan. 1. 182J. This gives you t per cent Interest compounded quarterly. Tou can buy 20 War Savings Certificates at one time. They will cost you $82.40, and their face value at the time of re demption, January 1, 1923, will be $100. War 8avinga Certificates may be registered at any post office of the First, Second or Third Class. War Savings Certificates may be converted Into cash at the post office where Issued if you need the money. Tou will get interest, too, at about t per cent YEST BROS. j ; -JPsWs 90,000,000 of us in' the United Thit Advertisement Paid for and Donated Marshall & Natural Gas. Natural gas is probably formed in the earth by a process of natural dis tillation from the animal and vegetable remains of past geological epochs, and Is nearly the same product as is dis tilled from coal in the retorts of gas factories, only insteau of the heat of fires the Internal heat of the eartn, aided perhaps by chemical decomposi tion, has caused Its formation on a magnificent scale. TAY the Would Hoard the Pennies Guide It to Patriotic and Profitable Investment The childish instinct tends usually toward saving. But to this instinct must be added a purpose in the saving. The mere hoarding of coin pleases a child's fancy, but it does not teach the lesson of thrift. ; Teach your child his first lesson of patriotism by ; making him a factor in aiding the government, and his first lesson of investment by placing his money where it earns interest Thrift Stamps furnish the government with money for carrying on the war. They earn 4 per cent interest Replace the penny bank with a Thrift Stamp Book. Biiick and GKevrolet States - all in the by Parsons "Bankrupt." The discussion on the etymology of the work "bank" in Mr. Justice Darling's court might have been car ried a step further by the illustration of our term "bankrupt," says a Lon don paper. The old Venetian money changers end lenders carried on their, business at a stand or bench (banda), and when one was unable to meet his obligations his "banca" was broken (rupta). Hand That Dealers
Rockingham Post-Dispatch (Rockingham, N.C.)
Standardized title groups preceding, succeeding, and alternate titles together.
March 7, 1918, edition 1
13
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