Part 14 (1/2)

So they brought me home and here I am. I'm not after sayin' me father was a prevaricator--no, indeed! But I _am_ sayin' that where your folks is there will your heart be also, and, take it from me, the fellow who wrote, ”There's no place like home” knew what he was talkin' about!

There ain't--be it County Cork or old New York!

CHIEF PHARMACIST'S MATE HALL SPEAKS:

[Ill.u.s.tration: Marines on the job--manning the anti-aircraft guns.]

PRISONERS OF WAR

I WANT to be a doctor, that's why when the war came I turned to the Hospital Corps. I had heard of the advantages you derive from the instruction and the experience you get in that branch of service, and, besides, I liked the crowd of men going in for it. One high school had its whole football team in the corps. I figured if it was good enough for a star quarter-back it was good enough for yours truly.

I went in as an apprentice, of course, but I soon got onto the fact that I needn't stay one for the rest of my life if I really wanted to get ahead. Naturally it meant work and lots of it, but why stay in the ”pick-and-shovel” cla.s.s if you don't have to?

You see, advancement entailed certain responsibility. To be a pharmacist's mate third cla.s.s, you are supposed to be of immediate value to the medical officer in the sick bay of a s.h.i.+p. Once you are a pharmacist's mate second cla.s.s, you are supposed to take charge of a Hospital Corps man's work on board s.h.i.+p, and in case the medical officer is away for the time being. But to be a pharmacist mate first cla.s.s, it may be up to you to take charge of the medical department of a s.h.i.+p to which no medical officer is attached.

I went to it. I don't suppose I ever worked so hard in my entire life.

But I didn't see the use of being in a corps and staying down in the coal hole when there was plenty of room on top.

Our duties could be summed up briefly: we nursed the sick, and administered first aid to accident cases. Some of us were to accompany expeditionary forces to the front and give first aid to the wounded, beside a.s.sisting at surgical operations. That was about all we had to do, except to look after the medical stores and property, and know all there was to know about compounding medicine.

But one of the things I liked best about it was a certain fact that was brought out strongly--we were in the service to save lives. Get that into your head! It was drummed into ours. We began to think we were privileged people because, while we were in the war, it just happened to be our job to save life instead of taking it.

I don't mean by that that we wouldn't relish a chance to get a crack at Fritz, the killer of women and babes, but our official task happened to be helping poor chaps back who had been laid low by a piece of Hun steel.

Once I had got my rating, I was told to report for duty on a destroyer.

That just about suited me. I had been scared to death that they'd hold me at a base hospital, with no chance to cross the briny deep, and I went in search of my chum to say good-bye.

He was a quiet sort of chap, with a pair of horn-rimmed gla.s.ses that won for him the name of ”Specs.” He was as funny off duty as a goat, but the best corps man I have ever seen on his job. We were always together. We had plugged through the course together, and worried about the exams together, and we had hoped that fate would be kind to us and send us across on the same s.h.i.+p. But nothing doing. I parted from him with all kinds of promises to write and went aboard the destroyer.

The first man I saw on deck was ”Specs,” double gla.s.ses and all. I couldn't believe my eyes. I stared at him like a fool. And by cracky, it turned out to be his brother, who was c.o.xswain and enough like ”Specs”

to pa.s.s for himself. Well, needless to say, Trace and I hit it up from the word go.

We had a few accident cases which kept me fairly busy going over, but as we came nearer the Zone I got the fever that runs in every man's blood to catch a sight of Fritz. There were some fellows aboard who had crossed a half-dozen times without a squint at a submarine and with nothing fiercer to take a shot at than a sleepy whale.

We were escorting a merchant s.h.i.+p flotilla--a whole flock of us. It had been an exciting day all right! Early that morning, while it was yet dark, we had made out what seemed to us to be a ring of little lights upon the water. Take it from me, we don't rush in on anything like that.

It may be a German's coy trap for blowing you sky high. But we sure were curious and we circled the lights swiftly, by no means certain but that every minute would be our last. As we approached them we made them out. They were lifeboats full of men signaling wildly for help.

We flew to their rescue and picked them up. The lot of them were half frozen and barely able to tell us the old story of Fritz's stab in the dark. I had some work to do then! There were frostbitten hands and feet and ears to care for, and chills and fever to ward off. I worked over them for hours. We found out that they were the crew of a British cargo s.h.i.+p and as soon as it was light we landed them at a nearby port and set out to sea again.

It was a wild morning. The wind had risen to what was fast becoming a gale. Think of a gale at sea in November! Icy waves sweep your deck and toss your s.h.i.+p about like a ball in the water. No chance to cook a mouthful, as nothing would stay on the range long enough--hardtack for all hands and lucky to get it--stand by as best you can in case of a lurking Fritz.

The gale grew worse. I had never seen such an ugly storm. The sky was almost black and the sea was running so high that it seemed as though green mountains were cras.h.i.+ng down upon us as the combers fell. I don't know how we happened to weather it, but once the wind died down, we saw some distance away a British destroyer, bobbing about aimlessly on that wild sea. Her decks had been swept clean, her propellers smashed, her wireless gone. She was just a plaything of the waves. We went to her rescue. What was left of her crew was certainly glad to see us. They had given up all hope of help coming before Fritz saw her.