Jan 28, 1943
6:40 PM
Dear Folks:
Well I received my first letters from you today, Thursday. I received 3 of them. Two were letters you wrote and the other was the income tax forms etc.
So Dort and Jim had chicken pox. I thought they had it already. Boy it certainly takes a long time for mail to travel back and forth. I don’t know where my mind is but I can’t remember if I told you or not. I’ve been classified as pilot.
I went on guard duty yesterday at 2 PM. We go on for 24 hours. We walk post for two hours and then we have 4 hours off. So I only got about 2 hours sleep last night. I’m sort of tired but I’m not so sleepy. That rifle gets pretty heavy after two hours. My hours were 2 til 4, 8 til 10 and then 2 AM til 4 AM and then 8 AM til 10 AM and then I had to stay at the guard house until 2:00 this afternoon. Some fun. The food has not been so good this week for some reason. They seem to run in streaks, we get real good food for awhile and then we get some that isn’t so good. I’ve been eating like a horse. But I don’t get enough milk. We get quite a lot of ice cream though.
You really must have had a lot of snow up there. It has been cold down here but not 10 degrees below. But it was down to about 15 degrees above. There was a cold north wind and it went right through a person. Today is a little warmer and the wind has stopped blowing. Boy my lips are chapped and I haven’t anything to put on them.
I think we are going to get an open post pretty soon. That means everybody can go to town some certain day for probably ten hours. If we do I’ll try to get my picture taken and send you one.
That guard duty is nice. I had to march up and down a road about 1/4 mile long. I had my best uniform on with my cap with a bill on and my big overcoat on. I had that big rifle with a bayonet on the end of it over my shoulder and there I was marching up and down the road in the middle of the night.
I think I’ll take a shower and get to bed when I finish this letter. The bugle is what calls me in the morning and I don’t have any trouble getting up if you please. My little Chinese friend has trouble getting up though. Well I’ll close for now. I’ll write tomorrow or the next day.
Yours truly,
Alva Bessey
It’s 7:40 PM
P.S. I was certainly glad to hear from you folks.
“Dort” was Alva’s sister Dorothy, age 16 and a junior in high school. This was her senior picture taken the following year. She was my mother.
Ancestors Across the Ages 