10/3/1944

Dear Sis─

You remember I once wrote you that I wish I were where Hal was, France. Well, I’m here and now I wish I were somewhere else. Don’t worry though, we’re not anywheres [sic] near the Seegfried [sic] line or Germany as yet.

I haven’t been out of camp yet but from general observation, I’d say that the country here is similar to Italy in general, that is, the better part of Italy. At the port where we landed, we saw a few Chinese and Filipino civilians. I guess the chinks thought we were chinks too, I don’t know if anybody ever told them.

It was damn windy for a couple of days here and it sure made a mess of things. Dust in your tents and blankets, in fact dust in everything from your mess kit to the ears. But, the wind has lifted now so no more dust, not so much anyway. It’s a hell of a lot colder here than I expected. I thought that it’d be warm for a while yet but no, it seems that old man Winter is on his way. I sleep with three blankets and I’m still cold, and I’m a grouchy man when I have to get out in the morning. We build fires to warm up at night, and in the morning. I think it’s cold now so I’d like to know what the hell I’m going to do when winter really comes along. When I was in Shelby, I preferred cold to the heat, but I’ve changed my mind since.

Incidentally, I don’t know the whereabouts of Hal in France, and I’ve never written him, vice-versa, so I don’t know how he is. But I imagine he write [sic] you, because when he gave me hell about writing home etc, I figured he was a writing man.

You remember those pictures you sent over? Sure you do. Well, they’re just a memory to me now because I lost them, along with one of Mom and a couple of others, in the vicinity of the damned Arno River in Italy. That wasn’t all I lost there, I bet some paeson [sic] has what I lost now.

We did get to see Naples while we were awaiting shipment to here, and it isn’t much of a place. Some parts of it look all right, but the rest and most of it is dirty, filthy, and stinking. It’s really one hell of a mess, and I don’t think you’d care to see it.

Well, we’ve finished our “tour” of Italy now, all the way up to and a little beyond Pisa. One can have all kinds of feeling, depending on the mood, where one looks back on it all. I know some day it’s going to be the topic of a lot of nice healthy conversation but I guess we’ll have to sweat it out until then.

I started this letter pretty late and I’m sort of rushing to finish it before it gets dark. I guess you can see that by the way the hand writing [sic] has been going. And now, believe it or not, it’s a little too dark, so, be good & take care of yourself huh ─
Love Stan