November 3, 1942

Dear Mother
Sure wish you had been home last night when I called because may not get to see you to(o) soon again.
We left the Fort at about 3:30 PM yesterday.

Got into town about 6:15PM. They had reserved space in the Harvey restaurant there, we had a delicious meal of ham, potatoes, salad, roll etc. When I got out I stood in line for a telephone. When I could not get you at either phone I therefore had to give up the booth, we were due to assemble for the train at 7:30 but did not get it then we stood around and like to have frozen until 10:30 when it finally came. We are on a car of about 1900 make a Pullman. One of your customers is porter on this car. I have the lower birth, so I could therefore look out the window at the various stops. We are traveling under blackout regulations. We are pulling onto another siding as we have done all night and morning. We got into India at 4:45 this morning, left 5:15. we had breakfast at 1:00 and we have had 3-5 sidings and we just went through Butram and we have the great Salt Sea on our left and it is 8:15 so we have made just simply wonderful time. There are about 15 cars on the train and about 500 or 600 men. The entire train is army some are going as far as Virginia, Missouri, one or two to Indiana and then the group to Texas where I am going, then somewhere else in Texas then some of them went to Utah and various others in California and Oregon. We are now stopped at a place called Niland. To(o) bad I do not have Marshall’s address and I could drop him a line when going through Arizona he would probably be quite surprised to hear from me down here. There will probably be a lot of others the same. There is more dirt and dust in this car than I have ever seen before. When I woke up this morning everything was covered with dust and just lay anything down and it will become covered with dust. The porter does not seem to be able to find a table for me to write on so I am writing on my knees. They have told them that they could gamble if they did not gamble with paper money so they are sure going to it and getting their dollar bills changed and throwing them away.
I am getting rather sleepy and tired so will dose for now. More later.

11:00 AM
We have passed over the Colorado River which we could see winding its way in the distance on the banks in the old territorial prison which is

now ruins and behind it the famous Boot Hill Cemetery.

They were out of water in the lavatory at Yuma and what a place to be out of water. I understand that my time heading is about 1 hr behind Arizona time off to the side of the tracks I can see the giant irrigation projects in the middle of the seemingly endless desert, time to eat lunch, more later.
It is now after lunch. We had delicious roast beef, beets, macaroni soup, salad and ice cream. Here and there along the way we see nice green patches of alfalfa and I just saw a nice ripe field of maise. It is very pretty. The beautiful hills in the distance melt into the flat desert land. I am also seeing here and there a little more frequently the giant Arizona cactus. They are very pretty against the background of musty grey to deep purple mountains. I now have a tablet to write on. We just went through a place called Fullers Point, a few Mexicans, a small school and a horse or two, we are now on the desert again. These small villages always have a few tamarrack trees around. They are sure pretty even though they are grey and dusty.
From the looks of things I guess when it rains it really rains from the looks of some of the gullies and stumps along the tracks.

Last Sunday evening at the Fort had a very good program although I enjoyed Susanne Foster more than any. She sang five numbers among them was “Ah Sweet Mystery of Life”. They also had Dinah Shore and the man who played Jules Later (?) in Tobacco Road.
It was very hard to sleep at the Fort because of the fog horns in the bay.
I never saw so much actually as there was at the harbor, there were dozens of ships under construction.
The dust is so thick on the table that a person could write your name in it in just the short time it has been up.
You should see the lovely tags we have hanging around our necks, two identically the same from some reason.
We have two pairs of army shoes and I have not counted the others on full yet there is one rain coat one overcoat etc. I had better bring this letter to an end so that I can mail it at the next stop if we can get off. Take good care of yourself and see about that arm. Say hello to Muriel for me.
Goodbye for now
Stanley.