Letter 235- September 9, 1945

September 9, 1945 (est.)
(Stuttgart, Germany)

Dear Mudder and Dad,

I am now in the 51st Evacuation Hospital in Stuttgart, but don’t get excited because all I’ve got is a case of the worms and expect to go back to my company tomorrow. Big things are really beginning to pop right now so I hate to be away even if I am living the life of Reilley here in the hospital. If I make some funny mistakes on this typewriter don’t be surprised. This is a German model and it has got some of the damnedest things on it- άöüδζ and so forth. Things are still in the balance as to whether I go home with the Division or whether I am stuck over here in the closing out forces or some bloomin’ thing like that. All I know is that this is no time to be in the hospital. They sure are determined to feed my worms well before they knock the so and so’s off. We get ice cream at least once a day and often as not twice, but still I don’t like it. In a hosp. one feels like an invalid even if there isn’t anything wrong with him. Oh well, I’ll probably be out of here in a day or two so it doesn’t make any difference. If they count the points right I could be home by the first or November but if they don’t it’s hard to tell. At any rate I’ll know when I get back to the company.

The hospital is on a high hill overlooking all of Stuttgart. From here one would never know the city is merely an empty shell of what it once was. From my window I can see the entire thing as it sweeps around the more or less horseshoe like valley in front of me. It looks like any other prosperous town and I must admit that there is a great deal of activity going on everywhere. The weather has been bad for the last week or so and one can already smell the scent of Fall in the air. The mornings are often chilly and I imagine that by the first of October the frost will have begun to set in. In the country the people are working rather hard at the harvest, or the women are I should say. It would seem that the men do very little here in Germany but start wars. Everyday now I see long trainloads of troops passing through on their way toward the coastal ports and every time I see one I get as homesick as the devil.

Well that about does it.

Best Love,
Bill