January 2, 1946
Giessen, Germany (Hesse)
Dear Mudder and Dad,
Dear Mudder and Dad,
I hardly know how to start this letter. Today I received orders to be at the Labor Center tomorrow for transfer to an AAA outfit for shipment home and it’s one of the rawest deals I’ve ever had and I’ve had plenty in this damn army. Some damn fool has blundered with my records and rated me as having 57 points instead of 47 which I actually have. The Captain called this to their attention but they’ve done nothing to correct the error. In short I’ll be transferred and when they find out that I haven’t the right number of points I’ll get canned and will undoubtedly end up in some stinking hole as full time KP or something—all this when I’m only 5 days from having a rating for which I’ve slaved for 2 months now. My whole army career has a story of me getting the dirty end of the stick. I thought that it couldn’t happen again and I’ll be damned if it hasn’t. I feel mad, sick and hurt about the whole deal. This has been the only place I’ve ever been in the army where I was treated really decently and now I’m transferred just because some damn son of a bitch is too lazy to pay attention to what he’s doing. It just seems that if you do your best and try to do right you end up out of luck. The captain says that he’ll call up tomorrow and try to get something done about it but he admits that my chances are pretty slim. Actually this will hold up my getting home because LSC gets first priority always.
That’s really all I’ve got to say. I’m so sick about the whole thing that I can’t write a real letter. If anything breaks I’ll let you know.
Long live Joe Stalin!
Bill
Yikes! A comment like that closing could negatively impact a career in the late 1940s.
ReplyDeleteYes, certainly after the Berlin Blockade in June of 1948 onward any comment, even in obvious jest about "Uncle Joe" would not be laughed at by the "Authorities".
ReplyDelete