Dear Folks:
Just dropped in at Regimental Headquarters and it is so nice and warm here that I am going to write a few letters. I have been quite fortunate lately on letters and think I should return the favor.
Thought we would be out of this place tomorrow which is Sunday but the latest rumor is that we don't know when we will go.
Methinks I can't tell you where we are on the Western Front proper, and it is a mighty good thing I guess that the war stopped just when it did. In a few hours more we would have been in the very thicket of it.
It was surely the eleventh hour for us. I think I see the hand of providence. Well we were ready to see action on this front. We have seen action on a quieter front and I had the privilege of hearing the eleventh hour guns give the parting shot to the Bosche. The firing was intense up to the very last moment.
Saw a University friend a few days ago. He is the little fellow who played E flat clarinet with me in the S.U.I. band. He is in a bunch of Railroad engineers - that is they have charge of a certain bunch of American railroads here. He is working in the offices.
We turned in our Colt automatics tonight but of course that can mean anything. We are in hopes that we will soon be on our way home but don't look for me before July 4th. I feel sure that I will be home by that time. Do you know that I can get home in almost fifteen days? It would take almost two days to get to a sea port town, seven days to cross the ocean and then to Des Moines and home.
You see we aren't so far from home even though we are some five thousand miles from home. Well it will surely be a great homecoming for us when we do get home. Of course the men first over here are undoubtedly the ones who will get back first and that is right too. Those fine devils deserve a few years rest. They have been through hell if anyone has.
I am sending you a copy of the Stars and Stripes that ran a good description of the last hours of the war. It is quite well written I think.
Have seen many interesting things in the past few days. After we get through our close order drill in the mornings we take a five or so mile hike and we go up a different direction each time and whenever we see a dug out or barbed wire entanglement or the like we stop and look it over. Some of them are quite interesting. Have been all ears and eyes since coming over and will tell you all kinds of lies and the like when I get home. Think I'll be worse than a sailor.
The German army has been within six kilometers (3 3/4 miles) from this place so you see it has been through some action.
We are playing at the Church in the morning and will also have the pleasure of hearing the "tenor" from the Grand Opera from Paris. Chaplain Chase, our Regimental Chaplain will accompany him on the organ. The Church is beautiful on the inside and very old I guess. It has many paintings and the alter is beautiful. I had the pleasure of playing the pipe organ a while this afternoon.
It is an old one and of a single keyboard. Then I played a clarinet solo affair with it and you know how similar the tones are as both work on the same principal. There is a big celebration there tomorrow, it being the Feast of St. Martin. I think I am not well up on things Catholic but these ceremonies are always beautiful and impressive.
Must close as I wish to write "Miss Sweetheart" and one of the boys here in France.
Am in the best of health.
Grant
