Happy Mothers Day!

Careful Mother
Source

Visiting my Mother in New Hampshire, praise the Lord she's still with us at 94. And she says she can't believe she has a son in his seventies.

Heck, I can't believe it either.

Cherish your Mom, you only get one.

Revolution #73 Has Begun¹

Conflagration started by the lighting of the candles on my birthday cake.
(U.S. Air Force photo by Master Sgt. Christopher A. Campbell)

My 72nd revolution around the sun is complete. 1209 hours local on Thursday marked the anniversary of my birth, 72 years ago.

Where does the time go?

Beats me, I wasn't paying attention for a lot of the time, just living life and doing my thing.

I didn't wish to interrupt Dakota Viking's PBY tale so I didn't jump in on the 8th of May. Which is also Harry Truman's birthday (his namesake aircraft carrier has lost three F/A-18s during her time attacking the Houthis, one from Big Time's old squadron) and also VE day, commemorating the end of WWII in Europe.

We also got a new Pope on the 8th of May, Leo XIV. I had nothing to do with that, not being a Catholic and all.

So an eventful day for many.

As for me? The Missus Herself and I had a lovely dinner which came with a free dessert, what with it being my birthday and all.

The nicest thing about that was the server asked me if I wanted the staff to do their little birthday routine. When I asked if they liked doing that sort of thing, he said (knowing I was a veteran) -

Hey, you served us, now let us serve you.

Yes, I rather liked that. And yes, the young lad received a non-standard (higher than customary) tip for his remark. As he also was most attentive in getting our food to us, and making sure it was to our satisfaction, he more than earned that gratuity.

So yes, a good day.

My Muse is still out of town, I told her there was no hurry in getting back, she did leave me a couple of ideas which I'll probably get to next week.

Why next week?

Well, tomorrow is Mothers Day (during which I will be visiting me Mum) and there won't be much of a post Sunday. Then juvat is up on Monday, and if Dakota Viking sends me more PBY or frigate stories, you'll get those.

You pays your money, you takes your chances. In other words, the ice cream is free but you don't get to pick the flavor.

Or words to that effect ...

Have a nice weekend.

Ciao!

¹ Not what you expected?

Black Cat in the Night, Part 3

Source

“Up, Wake the F--K Up!” the chief line mechanic was barging through the tents …

“Rescue mission, we got planes down!”

Black Cat crews rolled out and trotted to their planes. They shouldn’t be up for another six hours.

Strap on his belt, knife, hatchet, and .45.

Pink Kitty was being given the “spin it up” signal from the ground crew, starters whining, engines coughing to a full throated roar. Steve dashes into the armorers bunker and throws 2 belts of .50 cal over his shoulders and grabs a box of belted .30 cal ammo in each hand.

He’s throwing the ammo into the plane and spies the ground chief … yelling through the prop noise, “Chief, get us another couple life rafts just in case, and it might be good to dig up a Doc to come along”.

Another Cat crew was turned away. One whole engine was torn down for a ring replacement; she’d be down for a few more hours. Their crew brought over some survival equipment and ammo. They wished Pink Kitty luck.

Good, the portside gunner brought extra ammo too, we were learning. The plane was being turned and spotted at the top of the ramp to the shore.

Here comes the eager beaver corpsman looking straight out of bootcamp, young, grinning, giddy for an adventure. He has his bag of Doc stuff and an inflatable life vest (he had to be shown how to use).

Load him up, “Sit there and stay out of the way till were airborne”

Damn, the kid was barely 18 …

Look to his gun, add a bit of lube to the usual parts, cycle the action, then brace as the engines growled louder and they slid, bobbing into the ocean.

Powering up, turn to parallel the beach, slight chop, bouncing a bit … smooth, airborne.

Pull up, higher than their normal night attack wave height. This was search and hopefully rescue. About 20 minutes out from the reported crash. Load up a belt into the .50, charge and fire, all good.

Doc is looking around wildly trying to see everything at once, bet he hasn’t flown more than twice in his life, if that. Steve gestures to the young corpsman to come over, and lets him have the whole starboard waist bubble all to himself for awhile. Steve delivered the cans of .30 cal to the bow gunner, exchanged an unimportant conversation with the flight mechanic and returned to the waist.

Doc was staring transfixed at the beauty, white fluffy clouds, deep blue sea, dark green jungles, tan beaches. “Sorry to interrupt.” The search area was near, time to pick up visual scanning.

Supposedly there were two F4F’s down, and more than a couple Jap planes in the area, down as well. Cactus was re-arming the dawn patrol to get them back out here for top cover. No idea what kind of fighter patrol the Japs might have out. Scan the sky, scan the ocean.

Can’t see anything in the sky, yet. Ocean is empty too. The pilot starts a search grid pattern, mile long legs back and forth over the reported crash area. He pulls his eyes up out of the blue of the ocean to the light and white of the sky … A flash of light, a dark dot … then nothing, what the heck did he just see?

“Uh, I hate to call this out but there might be something flying 10 o’ clock level, from my position, just under the starboard wing. Just a glimpse.”

“Roger”

Straining to see the dot again, the bow turret calls out life raft and dye, 1 o’clock low. The pilot circles around, eyeing the conditions and flies out to line up into the wind to land near the raft.

Sven is focused on the sky where that dark dot was, and where it could have gone. Putting this big Cat down on the surface left it very vulnerable to attack. He didn’t feel like going for a swim just now.

Lower, lower, trailing flaps on the wings adjusting via controls for landing. “Almost there Lads!” bump, splash, lurch forward as the water slows the boat much more than the air could. Engine speeds cut for landing, revved up again as we taxi to the raft. Rolling with the waves, rocking ungently, they pull the soaking Marine out of his raft and into the plane.

Steve lights a Lucky strike and passes it to the wet pilot. Then lights another for himself. Doesn’t appear to be injured, Doc gives him a quick once over, thumbs up.

The Marine aviator says he saw one of his squadron-mates go down a few miles northeast. They bounce their way to a takeoff … Where was that dot?

“Any air contacts?”

“Negative.”

“Keep looking.”

“Surface contact! Raft!” The plane rolls to port, as the pilot works out a landing. Lined up, bounce to a stop a swell picks up their tail and the whole plane surfs forward to the raft.

NOT. GOOD … the bottom of the raft looks like someone threw 5 gal. of red paint in it and over the struggling man in the raft. His eyes were rolling as he struggles to breathe through the blood. We drag him aboard and the doc takes over, engines spinning up for takeoff.

A Marine lieutenant, hit in the left armpit, exit just below the left nipple. Pale, loss of so much blood. One lung collapsed, the other being squeezed to nonfunction by the buildup of air in the chest, every breath draws in air to the chest cavity preventing the good lung from taking in air, he was suffocating by breathing.

Doc poured sulfa powder on the wounds, after cutting the uniform shirt free. Then he worked quickly to make those chest wounds air tight. Now … this 18 year old corpsman had to do something he’d only read about, use a scalpel to cut an incision between two ribs and let the air out of the chest cavity.

The smooth slide of the scalpel through the chest wall was unexpected, slight hiss of air, the copper smell of blood. The trick was to let the air out but not back in, cover on the inhale let the exhale work.

While the Doc worked, Steve kept scanning the sky for whatever he saw out there.

“Oh, God help!... he stopped breathing!”

The other rescued pilot, the mechanic and the radio operator were all working on the dying Marine, with the Doc directing them. Too much blood loss, not enough blood to carry the depleted oxygen to the vital organs. The soaked pilot's body was shutting down.

That young Corpsman begged, pleaded and cursed that lieutenant to live as he pounded on his chest to keep the heart going … In the end … Doc was exhausted and sobbing, the lieutenant was dead.

Tears, hard to see clearly, knock it off! There’s something out there. Look.

Nothing, nothing but beauty, and all he was looking for was ugliness and horror.

Glance back at the Doc, slumped over his dead patient, shoulders and head bobbing, the engines drown out the cries and screams of “WHY!”

Steve walks over and puts his head right next to the Doc’s.

“He was dead the instant that round hit him. If he had parachuted onto the deck of one of our fleet carriers with a full operating room, even they couldn’t have saved him.”

“You did good, look me up on the beach, and we’d welcome you on any missions you’d like.”

Steve got a teary eyed grin for that and an enthusiastic head nod.

Back to the gun bubble, scanning, what had he seen?, And were “they” still watching?

Engines thrumming along, one rescue, one recovery as it were. Back south to Cactus, one good thing, they wouldn’t be going out on a night raid tonight.

Lowering down to lineup to the beach, gently lower down to a smooth choppy landing. Taxi up to the dock, ground crew wants us to haul out of the water, push away and gun the engines, wheels rolling us up the ramp to the maintenance area. Spin around and shut down. Weapons and unexpended ordnance (ammo belts) need to be turned in.

The ground crew is already crawling all through the plane. Steve shuffles off to the chow hall, Spam and … No … New York strip and rice, beef like leather, wish for a baked potato, rice was getting old.

Off to his tent, sitting on a coconut log outside Steve’s tent was the Doc.

“I said look me up but I didn’t think so soon.”

The kid was in pain, “kid” what? 3-5 years younger, they were all young. His tentmate had tuned in Tokyo Rose as she spun Glenn Miller’s “In the Mood.” They passed that jar of moonshine around until the mood passed, then they passed it around a few more times until they passed out.

Black Cat in the Night, Part 2

Source

Looking out, the moonglow off the ocean, the stars were so different than the sky back home … What was the line from that movie? “We’re not in Kansas anymore”… Warm humid wind, with a dank jungle smell, and sea salt. Closing on Cactus. Slight glow of the sunrise in the east, pink clouds, good omen for Pink, the pilot, and by association, the crew of “Pink Kitty”.

Flaps down, floats out … grease the landing, taxi to the maintenance dock. Guns to be cleaned, engines to be serviced … Haul out, let the ground crew take over. Chow, Spam and rice as usual … Back to his tent and hit the cot that is his rack …

Base activity all around. Try to sleep. Fighter engines coughing on startup, revving to taxi then away down the strip. Krumps in the distance, ground attacks close. Roll over and pull the wool blanket over your head tighter … Can’t sleep, open the jar of “shine” those good ol’ southern boys made, take a couple deep swigs, fight off the natural reaction to retch at a sudden influx of pure alcohol.

Krump, Boom! … the daily harassment artillery fire has started for the day.

Won’t get much sleep (they never do). Tossing and turning for hours, half the “shine“ jar empty, would need to trade for some more. Sweating, hot blasts of humid air, and the stench of thousands of humans, their activity, their waste … and their dead.

The air was stifling, it took an effort to breathe in and out … humid stench.

He got up early and visited the “redneck shiners,” procured another jar, stashed it and grabbed some chow. Back to his tent and load up his gear, K-Bar, 1911, hatchet, extra mags for the pistol, med kit, survival pouch, basic gunsmithing tools in a roll … He wandered down to the docks. “Pink Kitty” was pulled up and getting loaded with ordnance.

No torpedoes, only bombs, and as usual the ground crews found a bunch of interesting items to drop on the Jap airfields. Beer bottles were the most common; some had noise makers such as razor blades to make a whistle on the way down. Anything to unnerve the enemy, whistling things thudding into the ground nearby, enough to keep them up at night. A different tactic was to wrap toilet paper tightly around the “spoon” of a grenade (toilet paper was a valuable commodity so this was uncommon) pull the pin and drop it. Either the impact would break the bond and release the “spoon”… or it sits there in the brush until moisture weakens the paper and … BANG!, random explosion out of nowhere.

If we were low enough we could drop grenades on their own, and they’d explode whenever, air or ground burst, didn’t matter. Anything to mess with the Japs' heads. We’d keep a box or bucket with “harassment noisemakers” at our feet to randomly chuck out on our 20-30 minute fly-bys.

Sun sliding lower, he goes over to the armory and draws 4 belts of ammo and loads them onto the plane. Thinking about it, he draws 4 more belts of .30 cal and 2 more of .50 cal. He loads them and secures them for flight. He puts on his life vest and slumps to the deck, wanting a nap before takeoff. Dozing off, waking to sweat tickling down his nose. Clumps and clatter, voices, the crew is coming aboard. As an afterthought, he checks and locks his 1911, all good.

He then goes through the check of the .50 cal Browning, lube, fit, function. Load and fire later.

Pilot briefs us on the mission, rough coordinates to land along our route etc. Standard harassment mission, we’d fly over the airfield and drop a couple bombs to get their attention. Wake them up, so to speak. Then slow lazy turn back 20 minutes later throw out a few “screaming” beer bottles, to keep them thinking. Then a slow turn back 20 minutes later and drop a couple real 250 lb. bombs. Rinse repeat. Various combinations of live ordnance and inert harassment objects were dropped throughout the night. After the fourth pass, fires were burning illuminating possible targets.

“Light them up lads!”

He already had his Browning aimed toward some interesting things illuminated in the firelight. Round tank or truck? Squeeze, Boomboomboomboomboom! … tracers slightly off … Now, tracers and armor piercing incendiaries zero in on the “tanks”… flashes of light as the rounds pierce the tank wall, followed by a brilliant flash of a fireball when the fuel ignites.

That woke them up … made them mad more likely.

Fighters starting and taxiing, in the dark! Tracers and searchlights frantically sweep the sky, reaching out for us dark intruders. Tracer patterns were an indicator of how squared away the gunners were. Nice tight patterns of tracers reaching up meant a well-trained crew. Huge gaps in the tracers frantically sweeping the sky … they were spraying and praying.

The pilot, Pink, roared down the taxiway giving the bow and port side gunners a shot. Then wheeling to the left, he lined up the starboard side guns. Plane! In the smoke and flickering firelight… making a run down the runway. Lead, reverse lead, squeeze. Walk the tracers up. Nothing … On Target? The fighter never lifts up. It continues on in a straight line to tumble-crash at the end of the runway. Was that a kill?

No time, another pass, 250 lb. bombs dropped, no secondary explosions.

“I’m going to pull a figure eight over this airfield, drop all our ordnance, and I want to make sure you gunners come back empty.”

Steve lugs the ammo cans of .30 cal up to the bow gunner in the nose, “Merry Christmas!”

Then back to his waist gun position.

He locks a new belt in place and slides an ammo can with a belt over to the port side gunner, “Here ya’ go pal!”

Pink banked to one side, the bubble gunner emptied his gun into the Jap base, then he reversed course and lined up the other side … .50’s empty, bombs expended. Time to return to base. It was a beautiful night … Actually morning with the sun coming up.

A black column of smoke rising behind them, pink glow to the east, all ordnance expended, guns empty (save for leftover partially expended belts) for defense if they get froggy enough to send up a couple Zeros out of spite.

Steve gets busy with his dustpan, scooping brass and belt links out the bubble. A few more scoops and he is done, exhausted, just glad he’s not flying. They were far enough away that any pursuit would have been seen. He slumped to the deck, pulled a wool blanket over him and drifted off to sleep.

Pink greased the landing again, and it was two hours later when Steve woke up, he’d missed the de-brief. Oh well, all he’d been able to contribute was “I shot stuff till it blew up or I couldn’t shoot it anymore.”

There was that one fighter that crashed on takeoff. Pink was fighting for one of his crew to get credit for a kill. There would be a review board.

Meanwhile, guns cleaned and stowed, excess ammo turned in to be re-belted. Stumble up to chow, Spam and re-constituted powdered eggs. A piece of toast that he could have used to scrape paint off the Black Cat. Crack open the ½ jar of “shine” gulp and gag … His tentmate calls out “pussy” as he retches against the pure alcohol. Sip … sip … crack open a book by Hemingway, sip some more.

Lucky Strike, to the lips, clank of the Zippo, deep inhale … slight buzz, clouding his head. Another sip, then gulp, gag, inhale another lungful of sweet smoke. Fighter engines sputtering to life on the flight line for the morning sorties. Dawn patrol was already up, they’d passed them on the way in. Outgoing artillery fire for now. They’d expect incoming harassment fire shortly.

Reading about an ambulance driver in WW1 wounded in the hospital … Sip, deep inhale, sip, buzzzz.

Some things made more sense, others only brought more questions. Sweat dripping, humid heat growing with every degree the sun rises. Bugs, rats, the stench …

Eight hours, they’d be at it again.

Black Cat in the Night, Part 1

Source

The matte black skin of the plane positively radiated heat in the dank, humid, setting of the sun. Av-gas, cigarette smoke, decaying plants, Spam and rice? open slit trenches, and a not so faint whiff of death, all assaulted the nose.

One at a time the two big radial engines coughed, whined, and sputtered their way into a powerful roar, decisively drowning out all other noise on the Marston matted parking area. The sun was below the horizon and as usual in the tropics, darkness came on quickly. They taxied down the ramp and to the water’s edge, some “pilot stuff” was going on up forward, and the mechanic was adjusting fuel pressure and timing on those big radials. They sounded a bit better. He was an aviation gunners mate (reserve), but wanted to “strike” for an active duty Mechanic position.

Stephen, “Steve, Sven, The Swede (he wasn’t Swedish)”, just a big strawberry blonde country boy... wouldn’t have anything to do until they got airborne, (and hopefully a few hours after that). Once up, he’d ready his .50cal waist bubble gun, test fire it and start scanning the moon glow off the water for dark shapes that shouldn’t be there.

Almost no wind, sea just off the beach smooth as glass, loaded as they were, the takeoff would be a long one. It was almost better to have a bit of chop on the water to help break the surface tension of the water “hanging on-to the hull”. They’d waste some fuel turning the “boat” into an aircraft.

“Gosh, let’s get going, air flow!, it’s an oven in here” He said out loud, nobody could hear.

Comms checks with the cockpit and each other, called out, those experienced talk in a normal voice, younger guys tended to yell a bit more until they figured things out. Still it was jarring, quiet, BLAST of static and a voice yelling in your ears.

Moving … nose pushes into the water, down farther then, that familiar feeling of buoyant floating, slight bob. The engines come to full power as she turns to parallel the beach for takeoff. Beautiful, almost full moon, it would be good hunting the next few nights weather permitting. Nightmare missions.

Steve had taken to squatting down flexing his legs and bracing against the bulkhead during takeoff and landing. That was more for rough takeoffs, this one would prove very smooth (and yes it took awhile to break free of the ocean).

.50 cal Browning loaded, charging handle racked back twice, “Starboard waist testing gun” squeeze the butterfly paddles … BAM, BAM, BAM, BAM. Okay, good to go. The other gun positions call out their tests, satisfactorily. He hears the twin .30’s chattering in the bow, the single .30 aft, and his other waist gunner’s .50 on the port side. Matter of habit, he gathers loose spent brass and belt links, off the deck and tosses them out, footing got slippery with a bunch of round brass and steel links all over.

Slight shiver as the couple hundred feet altitude change and the airflow in the open gunports, doubled to evaporate the sweat out of his dungaree shirt. The pilot was good and cared for “His Lads”, he had pulled up higher than “mission Normal” of wave-top height to cool down the boys in back … They loved him for those little gestures.

Pilot’s voice “You lads good?”

“Yessir, were all cooled down here Pink!”

Pink was our affectionate nickname for our pilot, and he was head over heels over a Georgia debutante who just loved the color pink, She sent him letters on pink stationary, He wore a shockingly bright pink silk scarf she sent him, and he named our Black Cat PBY … “Pink Kitty.” We forgive him, he is that good.

He dropped us back down to wave height for safety.

Scanning the surface and shorelines for anything out of place, surface with the moon behind, might as well be a searchlight. Shorelines were more difficult especially at night, things like straight lines stood out. Other than that just dark blobs.

The co-pilot and bow turret gunner call out “contact” at almost the same time, “Two … wait, three cargo ships.”

“What do you see?”

“I might have five?”

The plane banks, lining up, one torpedo, a couple 500 lb. bombs, and a handful of 250 pounders, alone, five or more ships … IJN running the “Slot.”

Steve swings his .50 to fire as far forward to centerline as he can and waits …

Moon on the other side of the plane ocean black, can’t see a thing. Plane level and steady, then the upward lurch, "Torpedo away!" The port side gunner starts banging away at something.

Then the deck tilts to port and the twin bow .30’s light off, “pocka-pocka-pocka.” Ahead he can see outgoing tracers, swinging to his side … Incoming tracers claw their way up to them, Sven sees the source and locks onto where the tracers are coming from … The Swede goes to work.

Hard to see the sights but with short bursts he’s able to get tracers on target. The short bursts get longer as he is rewarded with secondary fires and adrenaline. The torpedo must have hit some ship to port. As the sea lit up from the fireball he could see two ships on his side, one showing some small fires from damage, the other dark except for AA fire.

As they swept past the ships Swede swung the Browning around for a fleeing tail shot, armor piercing incendiaries, and saw a couple tracers ricochet into the sky … Still getting hits. Now he can’t see anything. Plane banking on another run, oh wow, that torpedo hit ship is burning so bright … There are so many more ships out here than we could see. The whole area is lit up.

We start another run lining up, the officers up front doing their thing. Browning forward (fresh belt in), looking for anything. The ship they’d damaged with gunfire was covered in more fires, he gave them a couple more bursts and concentrated on the undamaged ship, firing a much longer burst than taught, tracers hitting, flying left, right, and up … no secondaries yet.

The plane lurches again, a 500 lb. and two 250 lb’ers ride Newton’s physics (and a bit of luck) to the surface. The bombardier released at mast height just as the ship filled the forward windshield. The starboard side bomb went long and bounced off the port bow without exploding (which it did a couple heartbeats later in the water). The 500 lb'er was a perfect midship centerline hit, boilers out … dead in the water. The starboard bomb hit the side if the ship a couple feet above the waterline, tore through a berthing compartment and exploded in the aft steering space. The ship was dead.

Steve swings the gun aft again as they break away for their last run, hopefully. Fresh belt, get the foxtail and dustpan busy on clearing the footing. Bank done, leveling, engines powering up, he hasn’t heard any hits yet, yes they were painted flat black and hard to see, but they’d usually get hit a few times. Enough lead and enough luck. Then, with the onboard guns blasting away, you might not hear a small incoming hit.

Steve wasn’t sure what they were lining up in front, but they had more ordnance to expend, by his reckoning another 500 and twin 250‘s left.

Cockpit calls out we have four burning, two dead in the water, two fighting fires, and returning fire at us.

“I’m lining up on the biggest thing I see and we’ll pickle everything we got."

The Swede looked for anything to target, light, fire, tracers … Target to starboard, most likely one he’s hit before and sends a couple long bursts into the burning ship. Swing to stern as we fly past. The deck drops and slams back up banging a knee, unexpectedly. In pain, no target, he strains to see anything.

They did whatever they were doing up forward, and the plane lurched up again after losing 1000 pounds. Two 250 lb. bombs and a 500 pounder screamed down into whatever target they’d picked. We turned back to “Cactus,” Steve saw fireballs, but no details, just flame.

Keep scanning , though rare, there were sometimes night fighters about. Not tonight … Return to base.

The Farmer

Source

Edelbert Hoerner sat uncomfortably upon his old mule. He was more used to walking behind her with his plow or sitting behind her as she pulled his wagon. She was getting on in years but she still worked sunup to sundown without much complaint. Which is more than he could say for his Frau.

"Kommt schon¹, Bessie. We need to be back by nightfall or my missus will tan both our hides."

When the armies had come, he had taken his wife, their two children, and the wagon with enough to tide them over for a few days down to his in-law's farm near Horner's Mill. His mother-in-law wasn't the most generous person on the planet and had he shown up empty-handed, he would have heard it about it. Then and for weeks to come.

The closer they got to home, riding up the Taneytown Road, the more unsettled he felt. Whether the mule sensed the farmer's emotions or whether she sensed things on her own was a toss up.

"Ho, Bessie, hold up."

Lying in the road, a few rods ahead, were bloated corpses, men and horses. No doubt Bessie had smelt them well before he had seen them. He could smell them now.

He also smelled burnt things, buildings and crops maybe.

He dug his heels in, he needed to see what had become of his farm.

"That's deep enough, fellows. We need to be moving."

"Hell Sarge, first hard rain'll wash these fellas right up outta the ground."

"Not our problem Rufus. Grab your gear and let's move out."

Sergeant Adams looked around the small barnyard. No doubt a pretty little place in peacetime, it was a scene of horror now.

The house and the outbuildings were riddled with holes. The small shed near the barn had burned to the ground and still smoldered. From the smell, he had to assume that something, or someone, had burned in there with the shed.

They had buried as many bodies as they could find in the short time allotted to them. General Meade wanted to be on the move and soon. They'd licked Bobby Lee but he'd gotten what was left of the Army of Northern Virginia back up the Cashtown Pike. They'd lost a lot of men here over the past few days, but that army remained a dangerous foe.

Adams, like many of the men, was glad of the rest after three hard days of battle. Thing is though, if Lee kept getting away like this, the war would never end.

"You Gaumont?"

Gaumont looked up, it was a colonel, one he didn't recognize. He stood up as he spoke, "Yessir, Sergeant Louis Gaumont at your service."

"Your outfit have any officers left?"

"Sir, my regiment is down to seventy three men. The rest are back thataway." Gaumont nodded towards the Gettysburg battlefield. "Ain't none of them above ground. Best I can do is myself and Corporal Pelletier, he's over yonder, having a nap."

"I'm Colonel Snead, Sergeant, late of General Ewell's staff. The general has instructed me to take command of your brigade, well, what's left of 'em anyway."

"Heck fire Sir, I doubt the whole brigade numbers over a few hundred."

"Still and all, we need to get the boys up and on their feet. The Potomac, and safety, is still a long ways off. So get your men together, I'll be up the road a piece, getting the other units moving."

Gaumont saluted, then said, "Sir, we was whipped, wasn't we?"

"Yes Sergeant, the bluebellies stopped us cold, but we ain't quite whipped yet. We get back to Virginia and get resupplied, we'll whup the Yanks when they come on again. Them bluebellies can stand and fight, I'll give 'em that, but can they attack?"

Gaumont had no words to answer that, he could still picture those bluebellies pouring down off the ridge, fire in their eyes and murder in their hearts. Oh hell yes, those boys could attack as well as anyone.

Hoerner looked at the wreckage of his farm. It would be a lot of work fixing things up. He'd ridden around his fields, his corn was ruined, his apple orchard was nearly destroyed, and most of the land was littered with the detritus of war.

He'd found a placard on his well, "Dead man was inside, don't drink here."

So there was that to deal with, guess he'd have to dig another well. The missus would never drink from the existing well again, he knew that. He had doubts about that himself.

He tied Bessie up to one of the trees still standing near the barnyard. She didn't care for the smell, he didn't either, the smell of shit, piss, and blood was everywhere.

He walked towards what was left of his barn, nearly tripping over something as he did so.

He looked down, it was a hand, a man's hand protruding from the soil.

"Damn it, typical government job, they can't even bury the dead properly."

And there, just outside the barn door, was a leg. Nobody attached to it, just a leg.

Edelbert Hoerner wasn't a naïve man, he'd seen things as a young boy back in Thuringia during the revolutions of 1848. He was no stranger to violence, but this, this severed leg outside his barn. It was just too much.

Hoerner wept unashamedly as he buried the leg. He wondered what the boy who had been born with that leg was like. Had he worn blue, or gray, and in the big scheme of things, did it really matter?

As he tamped down the last of the earth, he said a silent prayer, in hopes that the fellow whose leg he'd just buried was still alive.

He didn't understand war, he just wanted to raise his crops, and his children, in peace. But no, there were always men who wanted more, who wanted things that didn't, or shouldn't, belong to them.

He walked back to his mule, untied her, and remounted. As he did so, it started to rain, hard.

As the rain fell harder, he drew his collar tight and muttered, "Es gibt kein schlechtes Wetter, nur schlechte Kleidung.² Kommt schon, Bessie. We're going to get wet, no need to dawdle."

For the armies, the battle of Gettysburg was over. For the civilians in the region, the remnants of that struggle would occupy them for many long weeks. Restoring their homes, burying the dead, evacuating the many wounded from both sides.

War, is indeed Hell.

¹ Come on. (German) Can be used to mean "move faster" or "let's go."

² There is no such thing as bad weather, only the wrong clothing." (German)

For Monday… sims

 About the title…Had a pretty good idea for a post that I didn’t want to forget when I would be able to sit down to start writing, so I put the proposed title in the post building app as a reminder.  Unfortunately, that didn’t work and I forgot anyway. Rats!  So I had a bit of a scramble to meet Sarge's deadline yesterday.  More to follow below on why that is so.

In any case, old house wise, the porch is finished, painters will paint it this week. For an untrained carpenter, I think it turned out OK.

Next projects are to put together store bought chairs, lounges, tables and cabinets and set them up in various rooms. AFTER laying the rugs. Forgot that a while ago, moving a couple of rooms of furniture twice is doubly painful.

Who’da thunk?

The front door episode is still ongoing, but a key milestone was passed this week.

K

The picture above is of the first attemp when I thought this would be easy. (Silly me!). One can see the stain doesn't match and the sanding still left the scratch marks.  So, back to Lowes and asked how to do it right.  The Paint Department guru took a look at the door picture and this one and gave the verdict I was dreading.

"Sand the whole darn thing down to the raw wood!"

Well...crap.

So, purchased 5 x 20 packs of 120 grit sandpaper (the finer grit is his recommendation...didn't want to remove too much wood) and got to work.

About 30 hours of sanding (and 116 sanding disks) later, that phase is done. Thank you, Lord!  Next hoop is finding a matching stain for the door to the side panel.

Damn Dogs seem to have a need to come in the front door instead of through the doggie door to get in the house. (The doggie door is a flap they can push open themselves, the front door requires human involvement,)  To make matters worse they scratch and claw the door instead of just ringing the doorbell. 

Who’da thunk?  Progress is slow, but...still progress!

On a separate topic, Mrs J and I spent Friday and Saturday looking at houses in College Station. 

We visited 4 houses this weekend, making the total visited this week and last at 9.  This was the last one.  We were pretty tired and a bit frustrated as every one we'd seen up to that point wasn't "quite" right.  Got to this one and it didn't look significantly different than any of the others we'd seen.  Except the lawn was very well tended.  

That changed about a nanosecond after we walked in.

 Photo was taken from the upstairs landing, but, it's even more stunning from below looking up at it.  The rest of the house and property is stunning also.

We think we're going to make an offer on it.  It's been on the market for several months, and the price is within our range (barely).  Crossing our fingers because there's a lot of hoops to jump through between now and moving out and then in. But...

That about wraps up this week recap, sorry for the brevity.  We got back late afternoon Sunday and I didn’t have a lot of time to write this post. 

So, bigger, better, faster next week.

Peace out y’all!

"Hello, are you there? Pick up please ..."

Source

In other news, the Muse seems to have run off.

Said something about a boat.

Can't say I blame her ...

I have always loved this song.

I'll be back, in my own sweet time.

Got a lot of stuff on my mind lately, makes it hard to be creative.

Though I try.

Friend of mine is struggling with cancer.

A member of our extended family suffered a massive heart attack, he lasted a week before he passed. A week ago today.

Life comes at you fast. Enjoy it while you can.

I'm going to do some of that for a bit.

Stay frosty my friends.

Things can get overwhelming at times.

Cherish those you're close to, they aren't always going to be there.

A Day in the Yard

Source

We'll get back to the fiction soon, I spent Friday chasing that machine above around Chez Sarge.

Invigorating it was, a lovely day. Warm but not too warm, bit of a cool breeze off the Bay made for a pleasant enough time.

But still, I' turning 72 in a week and I'm just not used to this.

Yet.

I'm getting there, it's good to be outside in the fresh air performing physical activity.

A very nice oatmeal stout was consumed when the task was complete.

Now I remember what I miss about doing my lawn, the chance to sit back, enjoy the yard and consume an adult beverage when the job is done.

Yup, I can get used to this.

Hhmm, I'll have to show that picture to Roberto, my mower kinda looks like a Transformer. I'm sure he'd get a kick out of that.

I know I do.

Back soon.

The Night

Source

Sergeant Adams had looked everywhere, but he couldn't find Major Johnson. Though the Rebs had fallen back and the farm was again in Union hands, the casualties had been heavy. 

They'd gone into the latest attack with two hundred and twenty seven men, he had taken the roll as acting sergeant major, he knew the numbers. He was still waiting for the bill for the latest attack.

He'd gone in with A Company, the twenty six he'd advanced with were now but a mere handful. He wasn't sure, but if there were still a dozen men of A Company still on their feet, he would be amazed.

"Sarge?"

Adams looked up, it was Corporal Williamson, one of the few NCOs still alive.

"What is it, Buck?"

"I've been around to the companies, I went ahead and did that while you looked for the major. I've got the butcher's bill."

"How many men are left?"

"Seventy five, a couple of them are wounded but can still fight."

"Damn. Has anyone seen Major Johnson?"

"Yes ..."

"Well?"

"Couple men from C Company found him in front of the farmhouse, Surgeon looked at him, not long, he won't last the night."

"Thanks, Buck. Where is he?"

"Barn, probably outside, the ones the doc can save are inside. Everyone else ..."

"Okay."

The first thing Ducheine noticed was the crickets chirping. He found that odd, why would he hear crickets if he was dead? He tried to shift himself and a hot searing pain ripped through his abdomen. A gasp escaped from his lips as he tried to overcome the pain.

He heard voices, where was he?

Then it came back, the big Irishman in the blue uniform, the hot pain of the bayonet. As he'd gone down he remembered the pain most of all, but he remembered the hatred in the man's voice. The man who had killed him.

But he sensed that he was still alive, though barely.

Weakly, he cried out, "Help me ..."

"Hey Bobby, got a live one over here. Can't be sure but ..."

Bobby Simpson moved over to where his friend Earl Smalls had called from, damn but it was dark. It was almost as if the lantern itself refused to shine in this hellish place.

"Shine that light over here, Bobby."

Simpson did so. On the ground, his eyes shining feverishly in the lantern light, was a badly wounded Confederate officer.

Smalls grunted, "Feckin' Reb, leave him. He's done for anyway."

Simpson paused, looking at the man, he knelt down.

"Yer hit bad, Cap'n, don't move so much, yer just hurting yersel'."

Ducheine groaned, "I know I'm dying lad, but I have ..."

"Come on, Bobby, leave the bastard. He's done for plenty of our boys, I'm sure. Now it's his turn to suffer and die. Let him, or help him along, we're wasting time. He'll be in Hell soon enough."

Simpson saw the man reaching into his jacket, without a thought, Simpson grabbed the man's wrist.

"Not so fast, pal."

Ducheine understood, he was going fast, there wasn't much time.

"There are letters in my pocket, inside my jacket. One's to my wife, one's to a family in Minnesota."

Simpson reached into the man's jacket, sure enough, there were papers in there. He drew them out. By the dim light of the lantern he looked at them, yup, two letters. One to an address in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, the other to an address in St. Cloud, in Minnesota.

"Who do you know in Minnesota, Cap'n?"

"I don't ... during one of the times we took the farm, there was a lieutenant, young fellow, dying ... He asked me to mail that one. I told him I would ... I promised ..."

"Cap'n?" He brought the lantern closer to the man's face.

"What the f**k, Bobby, what are you dawdling for?"

Simpson could see that the man was gone, his eyes were going dull, his spirit had fled.

"Nothing, Earl. This fellow's dead. Let's move on."

Adams went into the barn, it was like walking into Hell itself. Wounded were on the ground and on a couple of makeshift tables set up near the middle of the place. He bumped into an orderly headed for the entrance, the man was carrying a severed leg.

"Dear Jesus ..."

"Unless you're wounded, Sergeant, get the hell out of here!"

Adams looked at the surgeon, he was wearing a blood-soaked apron and had blood up to his elbows.  He was holding a saw, he took a drink from a silver flask then looked at Adams again.

"Major Johnson?"

"He's outside with the dead, now git!"

Adams headed outside, the orderly he'd bumped into was coming in.

"Your Major is outside, Sarge, to the left of the door as you exit. He's still alive, but that ain't gonna last."

"Uh, thanks."

Leaving the barn, he looked to his left, there was a row of bodies, most of them not moving. One of them was, he saw it was Johnson.

Rushing to him, he knelt down, "Major?"

Johnson stirred, he grinned. "Frank, you're still alive, saints be praised."

"Easy, Sir, I'll go get the surgeon, this ain't right ..."

"Don't, Frank, I'm not long for this world. The pain stopped a while ago, now I'm just cold."

Adams shook his head, it was one of the hottest nights he could ever remember.

"Come on, Sir, don't give up." Adams pleaded.

"It's my punishment, Frank. For killing Walker."

"Sir, that bastard deserved it, ain't no punishment for ..."

Johnson reached out and gripped Adams' jacket collar with surprising strength, "Yes, it is punishment. I had no right to shoot him, even though he might have been trying to shoot me. The man was scared, that's all ..."

"Hell, Sir, we're all scared, but most of us don't run. Walker did."

"I know, Frank, I know. Still and all, I feel pretty bad about it. You don't have your blanket with you, do you?"

Adams took his jacket off and covered the Major with it, "How's that, Sir?"

"Ephraim."

Adams looked around in confusion, "Sir?"

"It's my name, Frank, surely you knew that?"

"No Sir, I did not."

"Doesn't matter, doesn't matter, soon ..."

"Sir?"

Adams sighed, Major Johnson had died with the death of Corporal Walker on his conscience, that was bad. Though Adams wasn't a religious man, he did ask God, or whoever might be out there, if there was indeed anyone, to forgive the Major. He had been a good man, took care of his troops.

Adams stood up and took his kepi off, looking down at the man he'd followed into battle, he paused. Then he looked around, what sort of deity would permit this carnage? He didn't know but for now, he had to look to what was left of the regiment.

What was left of it.