438th AAA AW BN
APO 513 % Postmaster, N.Y.
10 September, 1945
Nancy
Dearest darling Wilma –
Say do you know that I already have about 65 days accrued leave coming to me? An officer gets 2½ days a month or 30 days per year and may accrue his leave up to a total of 120 days. The first year in the Army I accrued only 10 days; the second year – 22 days, and last year 30 days. What does it mean? Not a heck of a lot except that we get paid for that good time when we get discharged. It’s funny how all these things keep coming up about this stage of the game. Everything hinges on the subject of discharge – but what better subject could we talk about these days and nights.
Gee yesterday was a long, long day, dear. It was Sunday, cloudy. The courts were wet so we couldn’t play tennis. We sat around in the p.m. and then someone suggested shooting crap. That’s something we’ve never done – and I – never in my life. Well – I watched for an hour or so and then the disease got me. I had 700 odd francs in my wallet; I mean – it made an odd figure - and I decided I’d lose that. Actually I ended up winning 1000 francs – and now I still have an odd figure – dammit. But that is one dangerous game – and not for me. They started out light and kept raising the stakes. The dental officer ended up by losing $900.00 (dollars!) – yes that’s right – nine hundred. That’s what he owes and can’t pay yet. I don’t know how much he had in his wallet. And I know darn well he can’t afford it.
Well – at 1900 we went to the movies – George Raft in “Johnny Angel”. I thought it stank. And then back to quarters; read Time awhile and then to bed. Today it’s raining and another quiet day. Thursday I have court again and tomorrow I have to speak to the whole battalion. Guess the subject – yup – V.D. Boy are these boys going wild! And we used to have such an excellent record, too. I’ll be damned if I’m going to worry about it, though. I’ve done my duty in 3 years and if they want to foul up at this stage of the game – let them.
But why am I talking about things like that, sweetheart, when I should be writing only about us? I really can’t overdo telling you I love you, can I dear? I know the answer. Because if you want to hear it as often as I do – it means you always like it – and so do I. Funny how it never gets monotonous. I love you more than anything in the world, darling – and I’ll never get tired of telling you. And I thrill at the thought that we can count on our seeing and being with each other in only a matter of months – at the worst. There was a time, you remember, when it was years. And then it will be weeks – days – hours – well, you finish it, sweetheart.
I might as well stop here and dwell upon the last thought, dear. Just continue to be patient – and I’ll be back. For now, so long – and love to the folks.
Say do you know that I already have about 65 days accrued leave coming to me? An officer gets 2½ days a month or 30 days per year and may accrue his leave up to a total of 120 days. The first year in the Army I accrued only 10 days; the second year – 22 days, and last year 30 days. What does it mean? Not a heck of a lot except that we get paid for that good time when we get discharged. It’s funny how all these things keep coming up about this stage of the game. Everything hinges on the subject of discharge – but what better subject could we talk about these days and nights.
Gee yesterday was a long, long day, dear. It was Sunday, cloudy. The courts were wet so we couldn’t play tennis. We sat around in the p.m. and then someone suggested shooting crap. That’s something we’ve never done – and I – never in my life. Well – I watched for an hour or so and then the disease got me. I had 700 odd francs in my wallet; I mean – it made an odd figure - and I decided I’d lose that. Actually I ended up winning 1000 francs – and now I still have an odd figure – dammit. But that is one dangerous game – and not for me. They started out light and kept raising the stakes. The dental officer ended up by losing $900.00 (dollars!) – yes that’s right – nine hundred. That’s what he owes and can’t pay yet. I don’t know how much he had in his wallet. And I know darn well he can’t afford it.
Well – at 1900 we went to the movies – George Raft in “Johnny Angel”. I thought it stank. And then back to quarters; read Time awhile and then to bed. Today it’s raining and another quiet day. Thursday I have court again and tomorrow I have to speak to the whole battalion. Guess the subject – yup – V.D. Boy are these boys going wild! And we used to have such an excellent record, too. I’ll be damned if I’m going to worry about it, though. I’ve done my duty in 3 years and if they want to foul up at this stage of the game – let them.
But why am I talking about things like that, sweetheart, when I should be writing only about us? I really can’t overdo telling you I love you, can I dear? I know the answer. Because if you want to hear it as often as I do – it means you always like it – and so do I. Funny how it never gets monotonous. I love you more than anything in the world, darling – and I’ll never get tired of telling you. And I thrill at the thought that we can count on our seeing and being with each other in only a matter of months – at the worst. There was a time, you remember, when it was years. And then it will be weeks – days – hours – well, you finish it, sweetheart.
I might as well stop here and dwell upon the last thought, dear. Just continue to be patient – and I’ll be back. For now, so long – and love to the folks.
All my sincerest love for always.
Greg
* TIDBIT *
about "People: Notions in Motion"
about "People: Notions in Motion"
From Time Magazine (Volume XLVI, Number 11), published on 10 September 1945 comes this "PEOPLE" column.
Queen Helen, handsome mother of Rumania's King Mihai, heard that she was to be reimbursed for a personal war loss, suffered when U.S. bombers raided Brasov. En route to her from one of the raiders (Colonel Marshall R. Gray, now in Seattle) was a pair of nylons, to replace those she had torn while making royal tracks out of the city.
Princess Elizabeth of England was unofficially engaged to two foreign princes — according to rumors in each prince's country. Within eleven days Buckingham Palace denied that she was about to marry either 41-year-old Prince Regent Charles of Belgium, or 24-year-old Prince Philip of Greece.
Gabriel Pascal, British movie producer, went to Egypt to film Caesar and Cleopatra, found the Sphinx unphotogenic, imported a British-made model, left it behind after the shooting—inscribed: "With the compliments of [Cinemagnate] J. Arthur Rank."
Princess Gladys de Polignac of France's famed champagne family, Pommery (she married into it; her American mother married Le Petit Parisien's publisher), arrived in the U.S. on a Red Cross hunt for dental supplies, posed with a cluster of store teeth that was something new in costume jewelry. Item on her shopping list: four million false teeth.
Eleanor Roosevelt's future suddenly became a matter of speculation. Vassar College listed her name among some 200 submitted as possible successors next year to retiring President Henry Noble MacCracken. New York State's Republican Committee noted that her column had been "concerning itself more and more" with state and city politics, wondered aloud if she was going to run for Senator. From Hyde Park came a reminder that she had often sworn she would never run for public office. On the Vassar matter she made no comment.
Frances Perkins signed up for a temporary teaching job: two months of "management training" at Radcliffe College next winter.
Judy Garland, back in Hollywood after a long honeymoon, shared a secret with the world: she is going to have a baby next spring.
Out of the Past
Pastor Martin Niemöller, still weak from seven years of concentration-camp life, renewed an old fight (begun in 1934), to exclude Nazi-collaborating clergymen from the church, suffered two heart attacks at the German Protestant conference at Treysa.
Babe Ruth and Ty Cobb, bringing back memories of baseball's better days, battled it out at Manhattan's Polo Grounds. The plump Sultan of Swat masterminded his Eastern team to victory over the plump Nonpareil's Westerners in Esquire's annual Ail-American Boys' Game.
Gracie Hall Roosevelt, Eleanor's late brother, who once proved — to his own satisfaction — that a man could eat on $1.75 a week, left a $278,264 estate but owed more than $37,000 of it. A tax appraisal showed that his Manhattan creditors included the Hotel St. Regis ($101), Monte Carlo nightclub ($46), suburban Arrowhead Inn ($347).
Playing It Safe
Risë Stevens, Metropolitan Opera mezzo-soprano now slumming in Hollywood (Going My Way, Time to Love), had her voice insured for $1 million by Lloyd's. Premium: $10,000 a year.
Max Schmeling, who had been seized with an idea for "re-educating the youth of Germany," was told by the British Control Commission to save his strength. The one-time fighter and wartime Nazi propaganda stooge has an interest in a book-publishing firm; the commission refused the firm a publishing license.
Mme. Suzy, veteran Parisian milliner, brought her first batch of Paris hats to Manhattan since 1941, kept them temporarily under wraps, but did her best to describe them for reporters: "Hats, just hats . . . not large or heavy, but, on the other hand, not small. . . ."
Matters of Moment
The Rt. Hon. Alfred Duff Cooper, impeccable British Ambassador to France, gave a peccant Riviera innkeeper a nice demonstration of the retort diplomatic. The Ambassador, his Lady, and a motoring party of six friends lunched at the inn, got a bill for 16,000 francs (about $320). The Ambassador wrote his name on the bill, tucked it in an envelope addressed to the regional authority on price control, and called the headwaiter. "Would you be so kind as to send this," he murmured, arose, and departed.
Mohandas K. Gandhi introduced a new marital oath at the wedding of two friends, urged it on all his followers: no begetting of offspring till India wins freedom.
Colonel James Stewart got a movie star's welcome in Manhattan when he returned from two years' Air Forces service overseas. At 37, he still looked boyish, but his hair was greying. "I don't care what color it gets," he said, "as long as it stays in." He planned to go right back to cinemacting—in "anything except a war picture." Asked whether he preferred British or American girls, Jimmy looked pained. Said he: "I don't consider myself qualified to say."
Raymond B. Fosdick, president of the Rockefeller Foundation, issued a hurry-up appeal to the world to unite for self-protection against the atomic bomb. Writing in the New York Times Magazine, he observed that "brotherhood ... has suddenly become a condition of survival," guessed that if the late Wendell Willkie were titling his best-seller today he would make it: One World or NONE.
Princess Elizabeth of England was unofficially engaged to two foreign princes — according to rumors in each prince's country. Within eleven days Buckingham Palace denied that she was about to marry either 41-year-old Prince Regent Charles of Belgium, or 24-year-old Prince Philip of Greece.
Gabriel Pascal, British movie producer, went to Egypt to film Caesar and Cleopatra, found the Sphinx unphotogenic, imported a British-made model, left it behind after the shooting—inscribed: "With the compliments of [Cinemagnate] J. Arthur Rank."
Princess Gladys de Polignac of France's famed champagne family, Pommery (she married into it; her American mother married Le Petit Parisien's publisher), arrived in the U.S. on a Red Cross hunt for dental supplies, posed with a cluster of store teeth that was something new in costume jewelry. Item on her shopping list: four million false teeth.
Eleanor Roosevelt's future suddenly became a matter of speculation. Vassar College listed her name among some 200 submitted as possible successors next year to retiring President Henry Noble MacCracken. New York State's Republican Committee noted that her column had been "concerning itself more and more" with state and city politics, wondered aloud if she was going to run for Senator. From Hyde Park came a reminder that she had often sworn she would never run for public office. On the Vassar matter she made no comment.
Frances Perkins signed up for a temporary teaching job: two months of "management training" at Radcliffe College next winter.
Judy Garland, back in Hollywood after a long honeymoon, shared a secret with the world: she is going to have a baby next spring.
Out of the Past
Pastor Martin Niemöller, still weak from seven years of concentration-camp life, renewed an old fight (begun in 1934), to exclude Nazi-collaborating clergymen from the church, suffered two heart attacks at the German Protestant conference at Treysa.
Babe Ruth and Ty Cobb, bringing back memories of baseball's better days, battled it out at Manhattan's Polo Grounds. The plump Sultan of Swat masterminded his Eastern team to victory over the plump Nonpareil's Westerners in Esquire's annual Ail-American Boys' Game.
Gracie Hall Roosevelt, Eleanor's late brother, who once proved — to his own satisfaction — that a man could eat on $1.75 a week, left a $278,264 estate but owed more than $37,000 of it. A tax appraisal showed that his Manhattan creditors included the Hotel St. Regis ($101), Monte Carlo nightclub ($46), suburban Arrowhead Inn ($347).
Playing It Safe
Risë Stevens, Metropolitan Opera mezzo-soprano now slumming in Hollywood (Going My Way, Time to Love), had her voice insured for $1 million by Lloyd's. Premium: $10,000 a year.
Max Schmeling, who had been seized with an idea for "re-educating the youth of Germany," was told by the British Control Commission to save his strength. The one-time fighter and wartime Nazi propaganda stooge has an interest in a book-publishing firm; the commission refused the firm a publishing license.
Mme. Suzy, veteran Parisian milliner, brought her first batch of Paris hats to Manhattan since 1941, kept them temporarily under wraps, but did her best to describe them for reporters: "Hats, just hats . . . not large or heavy, but, on the other hand, not small. . . ."
Matters of Moment
The Rt. Hon. Alfred Duff Cooper, impeccable British Ambassador to France, gave a peccant Riviera innkeeper a nice demonstration of the retort diplomatic. The Ambassador, his Lady, and a motoring party of six friends lunched at the inn, got a bill for 16,000 francs (about $320). The Ambassador wrote his name on the bill, tucked it in an envelope addressed to the regional authority on price control, and called the headwaiter. "Would you be so kind as to send this," he murmured, arose, and departed.
Mohandas K. Gandhi introduced a new marital oath at the wedding of two friends, urged it on all his followers: no begetting of offspring till India wins freedom.
Colonel James Stewart got a movie star's welcome in Manhattan when he returned from two years' Air Forces service overseas. At 37, he still looked boyish, but his hair was greying. "I don't care what color it gets," he said, "as long as it stays in." He planned to go right back to cinemacting—in "anything except a war picture." Asked whether he preferred British or American girls, Jimmy looked pained. Said he: "I don't consider myself qualified to say."
Raymond B. Fosdick, president of the Rockefeller Foundation, issued a hurry-up appeal to the world to unite for self-protection against the atomic bomb. Writing in the New York Times Magazine, he observed that "brotherhood ... has suddenly become a condition of survival," guessed that if the late Wendell Willkie were titling his best-seller today he would make it: One World or NONE.
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