The Mess Sergeant's Orders
Oct 6, 2020 23:49:18 #
It didn’t seem to be more than a few weeks after the Japanese attach on Pearl Harbor that the U.S. Army had officers in the area around were we lived scouting out the land and beginning the process of buying up land and causing people to leave the area. Their purpose was a training camp where later two different divisions were trained for the invasion of Europe.
We noticed the difference when there where be convoys extending from our farm place all the way along the road passed our school which was 3 miles distance. There would be jeeps, half-tracks, tanks, and a variety of equipment. Even the ditches along the roadside became filled with communications cable for the different maneuvers their training required. On mornings when we saw convoys on the road, our parents would drive us to school. Otherwise we walked the three miles.
Almost immediately, we would be visited by a truck or jeep with several soldiers who came to our farm and inquired about buying chickens, eggs, hogs, and other produce. It seemed that the camp’s mess sergeants had an ever-increasing demand for fresh produce and meat beyond what the government supplied.
So, the soldiers, not more than teenagers, and I would go out into our farm after dark and try to catch any chickens my mother decided to sell. I got a lot of laughs at these soldiers trying to help me catch chickens in the dark in totally unfamiliar surroundings. They would fall over things, run into fences and such. It finally came to the point that we had nothing left to sell them.
Finally, we had sold everything my mother was willing to part with and had nothing else for the mess sergeants to buy. But one evening a very large U.S. Army truck pulled up to our house and out stepped a sergeant, who was Selby Johnson, a first cousin. He had his M-1 rifle and said he was required to carry it everywhere he went. He had time to eat supper with us and we had a good visit.
He and his brother, Orsey Johnson went through the entire war in Europe. Orsey in infantry and Selby as a sergeant in the Red Ball fleet of trucks delivering critical supplies to the front.
Orsey was seriously wounded in the Battle of the Bulge, waked up later in a hospital in France. It was some time before his parents learned he was alive and in a hospital. When the war was over and both returned home they decided to come and visit us. They showed up around 1:00 AM in the morning and we stayed up the rest of the night listening to stories. Just Sayin…RJS
We noticed the difference when there where be convoys extending from our farm place all the way along the road passed our school which was 3 miles distance. There would be jeeps, half-tracks, tanks, and a variety of equipment. Even the ditches along the roadside became filled with communications cable for the different maneuvers their training required. On mornings when we saw convoys on the road, our parents would drive us to school. Otherwise we walked the three miles.
Almost immediately, we would be visited by a truck or jeep with several soldiers who came to our farm and inquired about buying chickens, eggs, hogs, and other produce. It seemed that the camp’s mess sergeants had an ever-increasing demand for fresh produce and meat beyond what the government supplied.
So, the soldiers, not more than teenagers, and I would go out into our farm after dark and try to catch any chickens my mother decided to sell. I got a lot of laughs at these soldiers trying to help me catch chickens in the dark in totally unfamiliar surroundings. They would fall over things, run into fences and such. It finally came to the point that we had nothing left to sell them.
Finally, we had sold everything my mother was willing to part with and had nothing else for the mess sergeants to buy. But one evening a very large U.S. Army truck pulled up to our house and out stepped a sergeant, who was Selby Johnson, a first cousin. He had his M-1 rifle and said he was required to carry it everywhere he went. He had time to eat supper with us and we had a good visit.
He and his brother, Orsey Johnson went through the entire war in Europe. Orsey in infantry and Selby as a sergeant in the Red Ball fleet of trucks delivering critical supplies to the front.
Orsey was seriously wounded in the Battle of the Bulge, waked up later in a hospital in France. It was some time before his parents learned he was alive and in a hospital. When the war was over and both returned home they decided to come and visit us. They showed up around 1:00 AM in the morning and we stayed up the rest of the night listening to stories. Just Sayin…RJS
Oct 6, 2020 23:54:31 #
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