Published by Good Press, 2019

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      EAN 4064066171568

Table of Contents

       THE WHEREFORE OF MY LITTLE BOOK

       JACK TAR

       CHIEF GUNNER BLAKE SPEAKS

       SUNK BY SUBMARINE

       CHIEF PETTY OFFICER WILSON SPEAKS

       WAR CLOUDS GATHER

       COMMANDER WOODMAN SPEAKS

       THE STUFF HEROES ARE MADE OF

       CHIEF YEOMAN LANG SPEAKS

       DEPTH BOMBS AND DESTROYERS

       HOSPITAL APPRENTICE DUDLEY SPEAKS

       IN TRAINING

       CHIEF PETTY OFFICER BERTRAM SPEAKS

       ZEPS AND TORPEDOES

       CAPTAIN BARCLAY OF THE MARINE CORPS SPEAKS

       "THE LEATHER NECKS"

       BUGLER COLBY SPEAKS

       THE WAY WITH THE FRENCHIES

       ENSIGN STAFFORD SPEAKS

       A YANKEE STANDS BY

       SEAMAN BURKE SPEAKS

       A TASTE OF HELL

       SECOND-CLASS GUNNER'S MATE FOWLER SPEAKS

       THE WANDERLUST AND THE WAR

       CHIEF NURSE STEVENS SPEAKS

       UNDER THE RED CROSS BANNER

       GUNNER'S MATE M'QUIRE SPEAKS

       "ABANDON SHIP!"

       CHIEF PHARMACIST'S MATE HALL SPEAKS

       PRISONERS OF WAR

       FIREMAN SEYMOUR SPEAKS

       FRITZ GETS TAGGED

       WARRANT CARPENTER HOYT SPEAKS

       THE FLOWER OF FRANCE

THE WHEREFORE OF MY LITTLE BOOK

       Table of Contents

      We have learned some things in war times that we did not know in days of peace. We have made the amazing discovery that our own fathers and brothers and husbands and lovers are potential heroes. We knew they were brave and strong and eager to defend us if need be. We knew that they went to work in the morning and returned at night just so that we might live in comfort; but we never dreamed that the day would come when we would see them marching off to war—a war that would take them far from their own shores. We never dreamed that, like the knights of old, they would ride away on a quest as holy as that of the Crusaders.

      As for army and navy life—it had always been a sealed book to us, a realm into which one was born, a heritage that passed from father to son. We heard of life at the army post. We saw a uniform now and then, but not until our own men donned khaki and blue did we of the outside world learn of the traditions of the army and of the navy, which dated back to the days of our nation's birth.

      We did not know that each regiment had its own glorious story of achievement—a story which all raw recruits were eager to live up to—a story of undaunted fighting in the very face of death that won for it its sobriquet.

      Because the army lay at our very door, we came to know it better, to learn its proud lesson more swiftly, but little by little the navy, through the lips of our men, unlocked its traditions, tenderly fostered, which had fired its new sons to go forth and fight to the finish rather than yield an inch.

      As a first lieutenant in the Girls' National Honor Guard, I was appointed in May, 1917, for active duty in hospital relief work. It was then that I came to know Miss Mary duBose, Chief Nurse of the United States Naval Hospital, whose co-operation at every turn has helped this little volume to come into being.

      The boys of the navy are her children. She watches over them with the brooding tenderness of a mother. Praise of their achievements she receives with flashing pride. With her entire heart and soul she is wrapped up in her work. Through her shines the spirit of the service—the tireless devotion to duty.

      I had never before been inside a naval hospital. I had a vague idea that it would be a great machine, rather overcrowded, to be sure, in war times, but running on oiled hinges—completely soulless.

      I found instead a huge building, which, in spite of its size, breathed a warm hominess. Its halls and wards are spotless. Through the great windows the sun pours in on the patients, as cheery a lot of boys as you would care