Christmas is approaching and Bill is hoping he won’t get KP. The Portland paper has stories about the bombing campaign over Germany (“four thousand tons in 24 hours”) and a “big [tank] battle in Russia.” The men hear a War Dept. lecture about the progress of the war which Bill characterizes as “designed for the stupid GI Sad Sack, yet informative”. According to the lecturer Germany is taking a “hellova” beating and he gives Bill the impression that “we’d never see any action in Europe for sure.” He tells them the engineers are building a "new Burma Road". Bill closes describing how he “cut down a tree” while firing the .30 cal. machine gun.
Bill's machine gun probably wasn't the water-cooled model shown in the photo. Considering the cold weather and the simpler arrangement, he probably fired an air-cooled model which was what most combat units use.
ReplyDeleteDavid-How right you are! In a future letter Bill draws sketches of the various weapons he fires during his training. The .30 cal. machine gun drawing is clearly of the air-cooled model. I have made the correction. The photo now accompanying this post is correct.
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