Editor's Note: The following letter contains no great insights or revelations about World War II in the Italian theater of operations. But it does provide an insightful human look into the nature of war as a young chaplain writes home to his mother. -- DWT Transcription of a typed letter that Irvin Askine (Chaplain, Capt., US Army, 0-232812, Artillery HQ, 34th Inf. Div., APO #34, NY NY) wrote to his mother, Lillian C. Askine, at 1720 Madison, San Diego, California, from "Somewhere in Italy, 22 November, 1943: Dear Mother: Yesterday arrived an undated letter from you. And very good to have it. Four or five days ago came a package of candy from you. and since I cannot tell a lie, it arrived considerably the worse for wear. You will surely have been reading about our awful rains and floods and mud. And when you realize that at the very front we have to ford all rivers, leave our stuff out in rain for lack of canvas coverings, and generally live in horrific conditions, you will understand that not much of anything can be kept dry. So - Well, I got the sodden covering off of your package, and gingerly picked the candy out of the mess, and transferred it to another and drier box, and finally salvaged every piece. Ate it with a spoon. Another So, Please put future shipments of candy into a tin container, say a coffee can, and then seal the top on, all around, with inch wide adhesive tape. (Not scotch tape). Be not greatly concerned: All packages come to us quite wet. The Captain whom I have taken into my tent, out of the rain, got some peanut brittle that even was worse than mine. And we are eating it with a spoon. Also, please do not send us chewing gum, soap, razor blades, damned spam, blankety-blank powdered eggs, cussed vienna sausages, or hard candy. Government issues all of that to us on the front lines, free, and in super-abundant quantity. No, nor life savers either. But peanut brittle, peanut candy, and the white, peanut filled pillow-like candy just received from you are very, very much welcomed. if you could get Hershey almond bars into the mail, they would be prized, indeed. Long time ago, you and Father gave me an American Waltham watch, hunting case style, which I later traded in on an open face Elgin. Recently I sold the Elgin for $25. And it occurs to me that since you put the original investment into the watch situation, it is only fair that you get the investment back. And so I am sending you herewith a check for that original $25. If it so happens that your original investment was less than that sum: Well, all OK. It just grew that much. Anyway, I do not feel that the money is mine. We are still exactly right smack on the front lines. I have not been out of hearing of the War a day since first coming onto the beaches. Some days the War gets further ahead of us than on other days. But then we always move right up to it, right away. I have experienced every possible phaze (sic) of a Chaplain's job. I have been shelled, dive bombed, strafed, etc. I can get into my fox hole just a bit quicker than the next fellow, too. We are always within artillery range of the Germans. But we send them more than fifty shells for every one they send to us. And more than half of theirs are duds, too. (Hardly any of ours are duds, tho). I was once within small arms range of the Jerries, recovering two men who had paid the last full measure of devotion. (That was after dark, tho.) I have rendered first aid aplenty. Helped put a tourniquet on a man who completely lost a leg. All of which means that I am really in the War, for sure. But mostly our part is to line up hundreds of cannon and just literally pour hell into the German lines, after which the Infantry goes in and takes possession of what is left. And then we move up, and do it all over again. But the poor Infantrymen are the real heroes. When they start in, we lift our barrage to land a bit further on. And then we can hear the machine guns, grenades, and mortars start in. It is horrible. The German machine gun has a faster chatter than ours. But ours has a reassuring and business-like sound all its own. And then we get stopped for days at a time, getting all set to do it over. But always our airplane observers, or mountain top observers, will be radioing or foning, "Enemy tanks proceeding along such and such a road, at such and such a place. Pour it on". And then our artillery pours it on until the observer says, "Cease fire". Or the observer will say, "About ten enemy Infantrymen entered grove of such and such a place. Pour it on." And later the observer says, laconically, "Cease fire". I asked an observer at supper last night if he could see definite results of such "pouring it on". And he was almost indignant: "Of course", he said, "What the hell, D'you think we waste that ammunition? Ten men go into the grove, and three run out." So, the Artillery is definitely very much of a help in this winning of the war. The Jerries we capture say that no man can stand the way we pour Artillery fire into them. They think us crazy, indeed, for the way we "waste" ammunition. But we have it to "waste" and they don't. And we have a great preponderance of guns (Cannon) over them. And they have just simply got to take it off of us until they say "Uncle". The Infantrymen have to walk right into the awfulness of it, at close range. They have no overshoes, and they are wet to the knees. Their raincoats cannot possibly shed all of the downpour, and so they are damp all over. And comes nite, there is no place for them to dry off. They just crouch in the dripping bushes and shiver. And no warm food, either. They eat out of their packs, when they still have stuff in their packs. War is a hell of a thing. I sleep under fire, indeed, but for the most part in a tent, on a cot, on an air mattress, under three blankets. I can almost cry, when I contrast my comfort with the Infantrymen. (But there have been times when I have slept on the ground, with only one blanket, half under me, and half over me. Other times, for lack of lite to make camp after a blackout move, or on account of it being too rainy to make a camp, I have curled up in the back seat of my car and stayed there until morning). We always move forward through "War's desolation". That expression, "War's desolation", is going to mean something to me, hereafter, when I sing it. It is inexpressibly horrible. This country has a village about every 4 or 5 miles, in every valley, be the valley wide or narrow. And the highway goes thru the villages, in streets too narrow for the most part, for motor vehicles to pass. And the Germans have ruthlessly dynamited the building into the streets, to slow us up. Every bridge is destroyed. And all places where we might possibly ford the streams, or build temporary bridges, are mined with 11 pounds TNT mines, set to go off when a man steps in them, or a car or tank runs over them.. Too, there is a bouncing baby mine, set in a can about like a #2 1/2 tomato can, open at the top. When a concealed trip wire is stumbled into, the first can throws the bouncing baby about six feet into the air, where it explodes and drives about 360 ball bearing-like bullets with killing force into all directions for about 300 feet. I have dealt with many victims of mines. And that is all for today. Lots of love The above letter was provided courtesy of the author's niece, Judy Vasiliauskas of Henderson, Nevada. Judy V is a candidate for AMC Secretary. She adds: [My uncle] was a really neat person; I remember him well from my childhood. He was a Presbyterian minister. His son says that during the war, the mailman liked to stop at Grandma Askine's house last on his route, so he could get the news of the war....my uncle's letters were more timely than the local news on the radio! Back to Cry Havoc #34 Table of Contents Back to Cry Havoc List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 2001 by David W. Tschanz. This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com