10 - Humor

At times humorous things happened. They were not funny to everyone but that did not keep us from laughing. Now in the Army the officers were always treated just a little bit better. We would have a slit trench. They would have their own latrine. Now the privates had to clean the damn things each morning and they, the enlisted men would use diesel oil! Now this one morning the shit detail was doing their job when a new lieutenant who had just joined the Company had to go! Well to make a long story short he lit a cigarette and dropped the match into the hole beside himself. Ker-Boom! Singeing his own backside.

One way we could give them a bad time was when we were in a rest area was to write a lot of letters! They had to read and censor them. So we could keep them from doing a lot of catching up on their sleep for a few days. Most of the officers turned into regular fellows after the first combat patrol as we all depended on each other to stay above. None of us would wear identifying pins on clothes in combat as that would point out to the Jap’s who the leaders were. In the heat of combat most anyone could be a leader if the need arose.

One time when we got our cigarette rations one of the fellows named Mitchell Pillarick got three packs of Camels and thought he would save them for the next day. He sat them up on the edge of his fox hole. In the middle of the night a Jap tossed a grenade. When it went off he ended up with six packs of half cigarettes. Mom met him at one of the reunions we went to.

Ken's World War II Experiences 01-Into The Army 02-California Living 03-Food, Drink & Rations 04-On Patrol 05-Never Volunteer! 06-Jungle Patrols 07-Foxhole Lore 08-God In the Foxhole 09-Life As It Was <Previous 10-Humor Next> 11-Entertainment 12-The End of the War 13-After The War 14-Coming Home 15-On Veterans