Sgt
Stanley W Safford 39539976
5th
Auxiliary Surgical Group
Dodd
Field
Fort
Sam Houston
Texas
January
24, 1944
Dear Mother:
Received
your letter of the 20th today and will attempt to get one done this
evening. I would like to have gotten one
written to you yesterday but I took too much time on one to Joseph and was too
tired after that to do another one.
Gladys called Friday and asked me if I would like to go to the Richard Crooks[1]
concert with her Saturday night. I
accepted and we had a very enjoyable evening and we thought the concert to be
very good. After the performance we
stopped by a friend’s house and visited for a short while. The people had practically their entire house
furnished with Mexican things and even the house was adobe, quite different.
We
have had some very warm weather here the last couple days, which was quite a
change from what it was for a while then last evening it clouded up and this
morning it began to rain about ten o’clock.
And rather than just start in very light, it poured for about an hour
and hers rained off and off and on all day the same way. You ask about the snow. No it is very uncommon here and home and from
what they tell me it very seldom snows here.
Yes
I guess that Mrs. Miner will fell
quite bad about Richard going over, but they go over every day and we may soon
be on our way if the birds here have their way.
The Col. You ask about is a Doctor and I wonder if he is eve a good one
at that.
There
is only about three out of all the doctors we have around here, have ever had
any sense when it comes to administration. But they never put anything other
than a doctor to head Medical Units. Any
doctor from a Lt Col up is strictly administration. And the two MAC officers we have here are a
couple of dopes also. Heaven help me if
I ever go to OCS and come out the way they are.
Hold
the Income Tax material up until after the beginning of next month since I may
be home if things are carried out according to the chatter that they have here
at the present time.
 |
A 1944 aerial view of the POW
camp tents set up on Dodd Field.
|
Saturday
morning we got up to find the German
prisoners all out, 1,000 strong on strike. They were all standing out in the center of
the compound in a large circle and refused to do anything. It was all about somebody getting paid or
something. Well anyway the Captain who
commands them ordered all food kept out of the area and sent his guards in with
clubs and made them all line up in groups under the range of the machine guns
in the towers and stood them all at attention and kept them that way all day
except only once when they went to the lavatory. They had no water or food all day and night
and up until Sunday noon when they gave up.
If one of them sat down the MPs would go up and kick him to stand him
up. They put 35 of them abroad trucks
and sent them off with none of their belongings or otherwise and they did not
know where they were going. These were
the ring leaders. While all this was
going on they searched their tent and found American money etc., also canned food. So they have had some very careful plans laid
evidently from the looks of things. They
have always been quite curious about the animal surgery and one day one of them
asked about it and Sgt Ryan told them
they were going to use humans next. I
guess that Ryan rather scared him. They
have not been too curious since then. The
animals I speak of is about ten dogs one oh which has a litter of pups which
have just had their eyes open about a week.
And then once in a while we even have a cat. An we finally got the gate built and put in
place after having to go thru a lot of red tape.
One
of the dope Captains just came in and borrowed our typewriter to use at home. Well we just got it back from the repair
shop, and very likely when he gets thru with it we will have it there again.
All
I have done all day is to sit here and go over figures and names of subjects
for the new four weeks training program.
It seems that every time is left up to me in the end. Now tomorrow I have a couple more charts to
make out that is all pure foolishness and excess paper work.
I
talked to both Major Skinner and Major Grubin today and they both get a
big laugh out of the outfit and something was mentioned about the men getting
along and Major Skinner remarked that that applied to the officers as well, and
Major Grubin was telling me about all the non businesslike things that take
place and he thought it was a big joke also.
He said that he could stay away forever and never miss the place.
Well
it is getting late so I will draw this to a close for now and will write again
soon.
All my love,
Stanley
[1] Richard
Alexander Crooks (June 26, 1900 –
September 29, 1972) was an American tenor and a leading singer at the New York
Metropolitan Opera. - http://en.goldenmap.com/Richard_Crooks
Symphony Offers Four Novelties: Max Reiter
will follow, the intricately - orchestrated 4th Symphony of Tschaikowsky with a
group of musical novelties on the second half of the program to be presented
by the San Antonio Symphony Orchestra tonight at the Municipal Auditorium.
The four "Musical Miniatures" programmed are by
Boccherini, Liadov, Rimsky - Korsakoff and Dinicu. In the Dinicu piece,
"Hora Staccato," the string section will be "soloist" for
this brief work.
The "Russian Sailors' Dance" of Gliere will close the
orchestral part of the program, after which Richard Crooks, guest artist, will sing
operatic arias and songs in English, including negro spirituals. (San Antonio
Express, 22 Jan 1944, p 5)
No comments:
Post a Comment