Name/Title
Spalsbury: #67 Letters Home January 3, 1944Entry/Object ID
2021.2.311A-IScope and Content
Letter Home from Pvt. R. C. Spalsbury, ASN 17135556, Btry B - 778th AAA Bn, Camp Haan, California to his parents Mr. and Mrs. George C. Spalsbury, 806 South Eleventh, Saint Joseph 10, Missouri. Post Marked JAN 3, 1944, 4:30 PM, Camp Haan, Calif., 6 cents Air Mail stamp.Context
Sunday Evening -
2 January 1944
Dear Marie and George -
Gee, but it seems a long time since I last wrote you. The last I recall is one last Monday night - six days ago. I must be getting negligent. But I'll try and compensate for it in the length and quality of this letter.
I was on Guard over the weekend. From 6 p.m. yesterday - Saturday - till 6 p.m. tonight, I was on duty. Slept last night down by Bn. Headquarters in the Guardhouse. I used my new sleeping bag, which I bought at the General Store Friday morning for ten bucks. It's really a dandy.
We were paid Friday - the 31st - end of the month. I received $24.75, which, I added to the $49.50 I'd received a week earlier on a supplementary payroll, was sufficient dough to pay back the fifty smackers the A.E.R. lent me. I got permission from Lt. Ryan to go down to Haan right away to pay it back. I'm enclosing the receipt. You can keep it for me in this envelope, should anything turn up that I'd need it. The gals seemed very pleased - I s'pose they're used to being paid in small installments of five and ten dollars, instead of one lump sum. I have plenty of cash to last me thru January, and will have even more when Haglund pays me back Tuesday the five bucks he borrowed before Christmas, and Duane's Christmas check arrives, and I'm paid my eight or nine dollars ration currency for my furlough. By the the way, I'll be due for another furlough by March 22nd, when I'll have been in the Service a year. Ya know you're supposed to have a furlough every six months.
I've got K.P. for tomorrow - Monday. With Guard today and K.P. tomorrow I think I've a good chance of being free of duty next weekend, so I kin get a weekend pass - maybe. I could've had one this weekend, but I wasn't around when the pass list was being signed. When Staff Sgt. Gross saw I didn't intend to go out on pass, he placed me on Guard. He's pretty fair - I don't get duty as much as some of these Pvts. and Pfcs. around here. We have so few Pvts. and Pfcs. in the Battery of late that the T/5's (Corporal Technicians) have been walking Guard also, lately. It certainly helps out, and is only fair to the small number of Pvts. and Pfcs. around here.
I haven't written Uncle Leo yet, but will within the next two days. I may even get off a short letter to him tonight. It's 9:35 right now, lights in the barracks have just gone out, and I'm squatting on a stool here in the latrine right by the stove.
Speaking of stoves - a good hot one is a rarity around here. There are two (coal oil ones) in each barracks - one at each end, - but some of 'em don't work at all, and the ones that do are pretty feeble. This one in the latrine is the pride of the whole Battery, and the number of boys usually around it is proof of that fact.
However, I'm really not suffering from the cold. It's pretty chilly in the mornings, especially when we get up - at 6:30, but it seldom reaches or goes below freezing here. I did notice frost on the roofs the other morning, though. The rain and dampness around here tend to make the cold sorta penetrating. We all have colds, even me. My nostrils were rather stuffy, so I bought some Vick's Nose Drops yesterday, and tonight I borrowed two aspirin from a fellow, who happened to have some. My bowels have been moving a lot lately, which, I guess, is an indication my cold is breaking.
More about me: I weighed 178 on a scale in L.A. when Bill and I were there the Sunday after Christmas day. Yesterday in the General Store I weighed 168. Apparently one of 'em is a bit off - probably the one in L.A. Shucks! I'd like to weigh that much, too. I'd like to weigh 180 or 190 stripped. ----I'm letting my hair grow out, and I have my old part back. I'd parted my hair for so long that I had no trouble in parting it again.
I sent three cards tonight, acknowledging Christmas cards from Mrs. Partridge, Nora Nelson, and Mrs. Leonard, and the Cox family.
I believe I told ya Katie's present came last week - three nice white "S"ed handkerchiefs from The Plymouth. She forgot to remove the sales slip (or did she forget?---) - they cost $1.50. Small of me to tell you this, isn't it? A package from Barbara came several days after Kathleen's. Barb sent me a fancy pack of assorted candy, cookies, and cheese wafers. Sweet of her, wasn't it? I would've liked her to send me one of those portraits of herself that you saw, Mom. But you can't expect a nice gal to do a thing like that until you send her one of yourself. - Maybe I will. -She's really much better looking than Kathleen. However, Katie letters are more interesting and she's much more clever than Barbara. I'll write 'em both "thank-you" letters this week, although they both owe me. I wonder if their boxes of dates have arrived yet. -I'm anxious to hear when the box of dates -also the small box of candy I sent you - arrives. The dates might not have arrived yet. I guess the Sun Gold Co. had a bunch of boxes to get off during the Holidays. I'm sure neither of the boxes reached you by Christmas, and I feel sorta badly about it. Enclosed is a five - dollar bill to apply toward that extra-special fountain pen which I'm sure you'll most easily get at Smith's Book Store. Maybe you've got it by now. But, knowing you as I do, I doubt it. If you really don't care about having a pen, - why - that's your business, and you can use the dough as you please. But it seemed to me the most practical and most useful gift for you.
I saw Speer yesterday, after quite a while, but not to talk to. Pvt. Charlie Gross and I (we'd been shopping at the General Store) were riding the bus back up to Topside, and I spied him walking along a street. He never has come over. As far as I'm concerned, he's just one of those messy persons that the world's so full of. I never liked him at Central or J.C., and nobody else did, either. But I should talk. Maybe some people can't stand me. -
Yes, Cpt. Kurtz is married. Like some of the other guys around here, he got married while on his furlough to a gal he'd gone with for several years. He's a good kid - doesn't drink (except beer occasionally) and has never been to a whorehouse (what 'm I saying ???). That's very unusual for any fellow in this outfit. Bill does smoke and curse, though, and is somewhat common, but - as I said before - still a nice kid. He's not half as common as most of the bastards in this outfit. Lord, you should've seen all the drunks running around the Battery yesterday!!! They were thick. Frankly, all us sober guys sorta enjoyed the display. But it is disgusting at times, when these young animals want to be so animalistic and undignified.
I certainly would have liked to have rec'd and read the account of Sidney Skolnik's death. Was he killed overseas, or how? Speaking of Lieutenants, I dreamed about Leland Duback and Hershel Hochman last night. I must be jealous of their gold bars. ---Have you heard anything about John Jamieson? From what I hear, India and southeastern Asia will be pretty important theater of war during 1944.
Did I tell ya Haglund and I heard the L.A. Philharmonics play one night last week here in Theatre No.1? - I think I did.
Had a letter from Marjorie Kramer the other day. Also a letter from the Lutheran Service Center in Pasadena, inviting me to spend Xmas day there. It was about five days late. It was sent to Pasadena J.C., then Loyola, then Camp Roberts, and finally here.
I'm anxious to read about the Conkling-Smith wedding. Hazel was always crazy about Frank Hartigan, but I guess the feeling wasn't the same on his part. I wonder where Claytic is stationed now. A week or two before I left Callan last July, he and Foster Smith arrived at C-58 to begin their Basic Training. And I also wonder where Foster, the Fourflusher, is.
I had an awfully nice letter from Duane last week.
The 778th is supposed to go to Camp Irwin for a 5-day problem sometime next week, but I imagine I and the other surplus fellows around the Battery will remain here to do Guard duty, and other odd jobs. Ten or twenty fellows always remain at the Battery.
That was nice of Peeks and Kernses, keeping you two from being lonesome.
That picture of Chas. Chaplin Jr. was in the Camp Haan Tracer about a month ago, so I knew he was here.
Graves, a fellow here who flunked out of the A.S.T.P. at L.A.C.C., said a fortune-teller told him on his furlough that he'd be in the European Army of Occupation in 1945. He's been in the Army about four years, and was overseas.
I'm glad you didn't send me a khaki sleeveless sweater like you did Duane, because Saturday we were all issued them in the Supply Room, thanks to various Red Cross Units thru-out the U.S. Mine hails from a town in Wisconsin.
My, what a disconnected letter this has turned out to be, but nice and newsy, I think. I didn't have any mail today, but hope to hear from you all tomorrow.
Love to you all,
SpalsCollection
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Title
Letter Home from Pvt. R. C. Spalsbury, ASN 17135556, Btry B - 778th AAA Bn, Camp Haan, California to his parents Mr. and Mrs. George C. Spalsbury, 806 South Eleventh, Saint Joseph 10, Missouri. Post Marked JAN 3, 1944, 4:30 PM, Camp Haan, Calif., 6 cents Air Mail stamp.Description
Handwritten letter home to parents back in St. Joseph after being called up to serve in the US Army during WWII. Pvt. Spalsbury, at the time of this letter, has completed Basic Training at Camp Callan, California, was stationed for a short time with a STAR Unit for ASTP (Army Specialized Training Program) soldiers in Pasadena, CA then moved to engineering training at Loyola University in Los Angeles, CA. After flunking out of the ASTP program, Robert was briefly stationed at Camp Roberts, located in central California assigned to the Infantry Replacement Training Center. At the time of this letter, Robert is stationed at Camp Haan in southern California, a U.S. Army training camp for Coast Artillery Anti Aircraft gunners.
This letter is four pages, front and back, written in blue ink on very thin plain stationery (likely Air Mail stock). The matching envelope is equally thin and shows signs of deterioration along the edges. The pages are folded in thirds.Dimensions
Height
10-1/2 inWidth
7-1/4 inCondition
Overall Condition
Very GoodRelationships
Related Person or Organization
Person or Organization
Robert C. Spalsbury
