Letter 258- Thanksgiving Day 1945

Thanksgiving Day 1945
Giessen, Germany (Hesse)

Dear Mudder and Dad,

Well, its 9 o’clock at night and Thanksgiving is practically over with. Down the road a piece from here is a large apartment building with a company or so of Infantry living there and tonight when I passed there coming back from the movies I saw them unloading fresh cut Christmas trees so I guess that the Christmas season is just around the corner. These other holidays don’t mean a great deal to me but I really dread Christmas. In ’43 at Camp Abbot I was miserable. Last year at Bitche I was so miserable anyway that I didn’t know the difference. And so it goes. At least I’m reasonably sure that this will be my last Christmas away from home for a while.

In some ways I feel sorry for the fellows that are going home with the 100th. They’re going to come close to making it but I doubt if any of them will be actually home Christmas Day. We really had a swell dinner today anyway. The whole works and you should have seen the Kraut cooks when we dived into that meal. I thought they were going to bust with pride. I gotta hand it to them. They worked like slaves all last night to get that meal out and they really did themselves proud.

Still no mail and I’m getting sunk down to the point where I can just barely see over the bow in my shoelaces. It’s been practically two weeks now since I’ve received a letter. There’s no use griping though because all the griping I’ve done in the past two years seems to have fallen on deaf ears. They’re still running the thing the way I think it shouldn’t be run.

I’m beginning to get over this damn cold that’s been plaguing me for the last week anyway. That good old “Deutch Klima” is slowly exterminating the AEF. I think they must be supermen to live in this climate because it’s as bad or worse than England and that is saying a lot. I’ve been here two weeks now and I’ve yet to see the sun. I still doubt that they have one in this part of the country.

There’s something I want to tell you but I’m keeping my yap shut for once because every time I’ve had good news for you before the boomin’ things have blown up in my face.

I hope you’ll excuse some of the lousy English and spelling in this letter. The typewriter that I’m using is one of those noiseless affairs that you have to jump up and down on the keyboard in order to put enough weight on the keys.

That’s it I guess. Hope you spent an enjoyable Thanksgiving as well as a happy wedding anniversary.

Best Love,
Bill