Still in Arkansas

June 2, 1943 finds Ralph still in Arkansas, though now writing from Hazen. With the flood waters receding, he is anxious to return to the relative comfort of Camp Swift. However, he takes a moment to reflect on the way his view of this area has changed.

"Everyone is getting fed up with the whole thing. As far as I am concerned, if we had our barracks and showers, etc. up here I wouldn't mind staying. Oh yes, and mail, too. The most of the other outfits have sent their boys' mail up here, but I guess the 147th has forgotten us."

"When I came through here in February on the way to Camp Swift I thought this was the most desolate Godforsaken place I had ever seen. Now, in the summer time it looks entirely different. Everything is green with cotton, corn, oats, and rice growing everywhere. They are cutting oats around here now. Most of the rice fields are flooded, but they flood them on purpose. They make ditches and ridges in all kinds of curlyque patterns all over the field, then pump water into them 'til the ground is all covered with water."

"This vicinity is great for hunting and fishing. Hundreds of thousands of tons of fish are trapped and sold here along the White River every year."

"The main reason I wouldn't mind staying here is the people. They have the Texas people beat forty ways from Sunday when it comes to friendliness, hospitality, and trying to show you a good time, and for the ones who are interested, there are scads of the prettiest girls you ever saw and the friendliest. Most of the boys are taking advantage of the situation at every opportunity, but I'm saving all my loving for the sweetest girl in the world who's waiting back there in Columbus. I get so lonesome for her I can hardly stand it sometimes, and not being able to hear from her and the rest of you makes it worse yet."

"I'm sorry I haven't written more regular, but I just didn't have time. I'm usually busy through the day and we can't write after dark for we don't have any lights."

"Our bunch has been doing nothing but run motor boats and haul rocks for the last week or more. It takes about all of us, though, for there has to be a gang at the rock quarry at Little Rock to load the trucks and another one at this end to unload them, and it takes a bood many to run the motor boats and dive the trucks."

"Last week we were hauling rocks for a few days on the Arkansas River levee below Pine Bluff. They hauled day and night. I went down Sat. morning, loaded rock 'til about 3 o'clock, then another fellow and I got a truck and drove it the rest of the afternoon and all night. We got back into camp at 6:45 Sun. morning. I hadn't been in bed an hour when they announced that we could have the day off and go to town and stay 'til 10:30 that night. So I piled out of bed and got ready and went to town. Villars and another boy and I went to Little Rock. They took us out to Hazen in trucks and we could go anywhere we wanted to from there. I guess I forgot to mention that we moved to a new location last week. It's about 15 miles from the main highway and about half of it is mud road, and we've been having a lot of rain lately. So about the only way we can get to town is for them to take us out in trucks."

"The first thing we did when we got to Little Rock was to rent a bathroom in a hotel for a dollar and we all three shaved and took our first bath since we left Camp Swift."

"Villars has a great aunt who lives in Little Rock. He hadn't seen her for 10 or 12 years and didn't know for sure whether she was still living. We finally found her address in the city directory and went out to see her. We stayed there for supper. We got to sit on a real davenport in a living room, too, and it sure felt good."

"It's been plenty hot here the last couple of days. There's a pretty good breeze today, but I'm afraid it's going to blow up another rain and that means more mud. It's just getting dried off from the last one. The mosquitoes and chiggers are fierce here, especially at night. They almost carry us off. We have big tents to sleep in now instead of sleeping in the trucks. When it rains the tents get full of water, and there's water and mud all over the place. I sure hope we get out of here pretty soon and they have a nice furlough waiting for me when I get back to Swift."

"Well, that's about all I can think of now. Say "Hello" to all the folks for me."

"Love"
"Ralph"