WWI AEF Officer's Letter Jan 1918 14th ENGINEER Regt. in France - GREAT CONTENT

Description

World War I soldier's letter, 4 pgs., approx. 5" x 8", dated
"France, Jan. 6, 1918"
, from Capt. (later Major) Robert G. Henderson, 14th Engineer Regiment, to his brother & sister-in-law, Harry & Mabel Henderson.
Includes the original envelope, addressed to Mrs. H.P. Henderson, at 27 Washington Square, New York City, with Jan. 7, 1918 dated ARMY POST OFFICE double-circle, red British PASSED BY CENSOR handstamp, and with "OPENED BY CENSOR." label affixed over the right edge of the cover. At bottom left is Henderson's self-censor signature, "OK, R.G. Henderson, Capt." (as an officer, he could to this).
The 14th Engineer Regiment was recruited in New England, mostly from railroad men, and arrived in France in the fall of 1917. They did important work repairing railroads, building railroads and bridges, often under gun and artillery fire.
Great content
, writing that the Regiment has been sawing wood while under shell fire, and writing in great detail of his recent leave in Paris, the shows he went to (including a "leg-and-more show", restaurants he ate at, including the famous Cafe de la Paix, and Maxims, and of the "extremely good looking" women there, noting that in the hotels at tea time, "if you even so much as dare to look at one, she will come to you...", and that "Paris is certainly a devil of a place for a carefree young soldier on leave". He also writes of the massive job to come of "getting France on its feet again", of repatriation huts beginning to go up in the midst of ruins just 7 miles from the front, and of old peasant women tilling the soil, with shell holes in the same field that they are working. l Kirchner), of the incessant rain and how it turns the chalk they use for railroad ballast into cream, and of a visit to the Regiment the day before by several U.S. & British dignitaries, including
Winston Churchill
, later to become Prime Minister during the second World War.
Includes:
"Dear Harry & Mabel,
Just now your cable message arrived and you seemed very close. Also your letter of Dec. 6th arrived this morning and I want to say that we were not the American engineers who distinguished themselves, it was another regiment. However, we have been sawing wood under shell fire and doing good effective work, which is the main thing.
My Paris leave was a complete and unadulterated success. I'm now broke but happy. We covered the theatres pretty well; Olympia - a good vaudeville show, Theatre Femina, a leg-and-more show evidently built for visitors and rather stupid; Grand Guignol - short plays very good on the whole; Casino de Paris - Gaby Deslys and a revue - a very good show; the opera Rigoletto, as fine a performance as you could possibly want; Concert Mayol, a typically Parisian theatre with good singing, the argot almost impossible to understand, a little play called 'Je ne veux pas coucher dans le Lit de ta Mere!', very naughty and a screat. Theatre Michel also very Parisian with Cleo de Merode in a burlesque called 'Judith, Courtisane..' on the whole rather stupid, and finally another theatre with a very good musical comedy. F
or food, the Cafe de la Paix was our headquarters, and we were also known at Maxim's, the Cafe de Paris, Ciros...so that you see we hit the high spots.
Paris is absolutely jammed with women all dressed in the most perfect taste and most of them extremely good looking, as a rule without hard faces - some with camouflage and some without. In the restaurants and in the hotels at tea time, if you even so much as dare to look at one, she will come to you and sit and drink...and chat with you. It's all very extraordinary and Paris is certainly a devil of a place for a carefree young soldier on leave. So you see that whether at the front or on leave, life over here is very different from life at home....
The question of getting France on its feet again after the war is an interesting one, but for the most part, I think, will have to be left to France. I don't know how the country where we are will be repatriated, but it certainly will, because even now, as close as 7 or 8 miles from the front, little repatriation huts are beginning to go up in the midst of the ruins. It's like the growth of the birch shoots in a burnt clearing, or the little branches growing out of the willow stumps. How I wish some of the American women could see 70 year old women tilling the soil as we have seen them beside the trucks in the back areas. One day I saw an old woman digging sugar beets, and a week later, passing by, there was a fresh shell hole in the same field - the persistence of the French peasant is simply amazing. I think the things they will need most are the agricultural materials and tools, but it is a case of starting from the very beginning again, which is the thing to bear in mind...."
Very Fine.
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