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A Tour of Duty Home Page Essays Memoirs Fiction Plays Poetry References
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Excerpt from
“A Tour of Duty” by Bill Edmonds Sergeant Owens let us know that he was
not a draftee. He had joined the army, he
said, as soon as he was old enough. It
was not tactful for him to boast of this among companions, almost all of whom
had registered for the draft, then waited, savoring precious freedom until the
dreaded call came from on high—that famous greeting from the president
summoning them to fight for flag and country.
So we listened with pleasure one night when Owens, having imbibed too
freely of some stolen schnapps, told us the true, detailed account of his
enlistment. After the spring thaw in 1942, he said,
he rode his mule down from the mountains to the county seat.
The road was too muddy for any vehicle, even his dad’s trusty old Ford
truck, and had dangerous stretches where a horse might lose its footing and
plunge down a steep slope into a flooding creek.
But the mule, he claimed, was so sure-footed it could walk a tightrope if
it had to. Arriving at
the center of the town—which he did not name ---he tethered his mule to a
hitching post in front of the courthouse. He was immediately hailed by the
county sheriff who had been standing on the courthouse steps, puffing a cigar.
The sheriff approached him and the conversation went like this:
“ You the Owens kid, from Coon Holler, right?” “ That’s
me.”
“I’ll bet yer eighteen.”
“Ah am, Ah am.”
“Let me see your draft card, son.”
“What’s that?”
“ Don’t you know there’s a wah on, Boy?”
“A wah? You mean them
damnyankees is invadin’ us again?”
“Nah, its the Germans.”
“ The Germans! My paw went
off to fight them before I was born. He
said they was licked for good!” “Not
good enough I reckon. You come with me. They’s
a man across the street wants to see you.” The man across the street was sitting at
a desk in the front part of Peabody’s Barber Shop. He was wearing an army uniform with a lot of stripes on
his sleeves. He wrote down
Owens’ name, and address---such as it was---and congratulated him on
volunteering for the U. S. army. He
was quite friendly, mentioning that as a volunteer Owens would get a zero in
front of his number so everyone would know he had joined up because he wanted to
serve his country instead of waiting to be drafted.
“And the train will be here in about twenty minutes, so get on down to
the station”
The sheriff said, “I’ll see that he gets on it.” Owens, who was fond of animals, finished
his story by expressing his concern for the mule he had abandoned in front of
the courthouse. Had the sheriff
taken care of it? Had it stood
there hungry and thirsty for a long time? Had
someone stolen it? He blamed
himself for not remembering to turn it loose, to find its way home, before he
went to the railroad station . Overseas, Owens
was assigned to drive a huge tank- recovery vehicle which we called
“the wrecker.” We
believed the assignment came to him because of his large size. He was over six
feet tall and had broad shoulders and a very rugged aspect, including a bony
face with a jutting chin. He had a
very small dog, a chihuahua, which he had stolen somewhere in France. He drove the big wrecker with the dog tucked inside his
jacket, its tiny face peering out an unbuttoned opening. Sergeant Harris, the company wit, declared that Owens was an excellent driver because he had no
thoughts in his head to distract him.
But that was not true. We ,who had to listen to his boasting
about amorous conquests during evening
bull sessions, knew that he thought about women most of the time.
But we thought most of his stories were fictional.
He seemed a gentle giant, passive, slow moving, with a flair for telling
absurd stories. I saw
Owens for the last time the day we arrived at Camp Miles Standish, near Boston.
I was in a booth at the camp P.
X., sipping a genuine coke and
reflecting on the joy of being back in the USA.
Suddenly Owens was there, looming over me, thrusting out a somewhat
crumpled sheet of writing paper. He
was accompanied by a burly companion who somehow managed to look like a hill-billy
even in uniform. Owens
said, “Can you tell me what this says ?”
The letter was from France. The language was simple, the cursive script
was difficult. As I
deciphered it, I seemed to see again that dreary little town in Lorraine where
we had been billeted for almost two weeks in early April.
We had learned that the first American soldiers to enter the town had
been members of a cavalry regiment, scouting ahead in sleek armored cars. They
had been met by joyful, flag-waving, French inhabitants and their glowering
German neighbors. It proved
to be a premature celebration of liberation.
The Americans moved on and a few hours later a German unit---retreating
in front of our main forces—surged through the town, pausing just long enough
to pound on the doors where French or American flags were flying.
Whoever opened the door was instantly shot..
The letter
had been mailed in that sad town. Its
theme was of another kind of heartbreak.
“ Now that the war is over,” she wrote, “I pray every day that you
will come back to me. The
baby is beautiful---he is big—will be big like you---oh, how I wish he could
see his father.” The
burly companion slapped Owens on the back, and shouted jubilantly, “Yer a
daddy! Hey, You have to give
me a cigar!” Owens,
beaming proudly, said, “let’s go get beers---Ah’ll pay for yers.”
They turned to leave. I
called after them. “ Don’t you
want the letter?” Owens hesitated, then came back, snatched the letter and
thrust it, unfolded, into his pocket. They
went off to their celebration, talking loudly, laughing boisterously, like
athletes leaving a winning game. |