1899

On April 15, 1919, five months after the November 11 Armistice, George Clark wrote a letter to Warren and Helen Kendall's nine-year-old son Billy (now W.H.K., Dartmouth '32) about the latter's birthday three weeks before. Its contents remind us afresh of the score of '99ers who served in some notable way abroad and at home in World War I. Only three of these men are still with us: Y Secretary Fod Martin, MajorRodney Sanbom, and Joe Gannon, creator of the "Avenue of the Allies," bedecked with the flags of the 22 allied nations. Here's a part of Secretary GGC's letter.

"Last Thursday I got up at four in the morning — by my own mental alarm clock — and hurried down town with thousands of others to see the 'Magnolia' bringing back the Yankee troops from France. The reporters on Newspaper Row were getting breakfast in the restaurants. I joined them and stuffed my pockets with crullers to eat later. Then I headed down State Street and Atlantic Avenue to Battery Wharf. It was still almost pitch dark. Salvation Army men were putting big boxes of doughnuts aboard the tug that was to take us down the harbor, while 'Y' secretaries were loading up with bags of chocolate and cigarettes.

"Suddenly a big crowd came marching, with a band playing for dear life. They had come on a special train from Providence. As they marched on to the ferry the sky in the East was turning a wonderful rose color. With flags flying and bands still playing we steamed out of our berths across waters now shimmering in the morning light.

"All at once right ahead we saw a dark mass like a great island rising against the yellow sky. The steamers began whistling like mad, the bands played harder than ever. And then we saw plainly the decks of the troopship, and the rigging too, all khaki colored. Those soldiers in khaki were everywhere. We steamed as close as we could. The Salvation Army and the 'Y' men threw doughnuts, chocolate, and oranges — the soldiers caught what they could — but a lot just went into the water.

"Slowly the 'Magnolia' continued up the Harbor, we escorting her, till she docked at Commonwealth Pier. Then off the boys marched in formation to South Station to catch trains to Camp Devens. Both NelsonBrown and Charlie Donahue had planned to be with me, but their mental alarm clocks evidently didn't go off, and they didn't make it. I looked and looked for MajorCavanaugh, but he also was missing, — to come on a later ship. It was disappointing, but it had been a wonderful sight, and much more exciting than if it had happened in the middle of the day in broad daylight. Later I heard also from Major Sewall who was to return soon from Bordeaux. He wanted accommodations for Mrs. Sewall and himself at the Reunion in June. That same day too I got a big bunch of proof from Mr. Musgrove in the mail, the proof of the seventeenth Class Report. You can be sure I stayed up late that night to correct it. and rushed it right back to Mushy's printing press in Hanover in the morning.

"That's all for now. But please tell Daddy what I've told you, and give my love to Roberta and your mother. And give Gordon a piggy-back ride for me. Maybe next March 24 I'll have a chance to give you a good birthday spanking myself."

By the way, our congratulations to HerbRogers! He's joining the Double Eight Corps on April 29.

Secretary, Newbury Rd., Bradford, N. H.

Class Agent, Box 87, West Cornwall, Conn.