Ferguson: In praise of flu
By Mrs. Walter Ferguson
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Green contends national service won’t end strikes
Workable war economy and WLB with absolute power would stop labor strife, AFL head says
By William Green, AFL president
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Fabrics, suits and glitter headline 1944 fashions
Silks from China feature show in East
By Lenore Brundige, Press staff writer
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Roving Reporter
By Ernie Pyle
In Italy – (by wireless)
During my time with various parts of the 36th Division, I fell in with one of the regimental surgeons – Capt. Emmett L. Allamon of Port Arthur, Texas.
Capt. Allamon is an unusual man. He is slight in build, he talks with a direct look and a flattering smile, and his mind is very acute and analytical. He has the idiosyncrasy of hesitating a couple of seconds between phrases, and then when he speaks, he rattles the phrases off so fast you feel you’ve been left behind.
Capt. Allamon has distinguished himself a couple of times in Italy. His regimental commander commended him the other day for running his jeep right down to the edge of a battlefield and pulling out the wounded. And before that he had the interesting experience of being a German prisoner for six days.
Taken prisoners by Germans
He and his first sergeant, Frank T. Holland of West, Texas, were captured shortly after we struck Italy. They weren’t really treated as prisoners but as fellow medics. About 20 American wounded were captured at the same time, and the Germans let Capt. Allamon do all the operating and the dressing of their wounds.
Then after two days, the Germans had to retreat. Apparently, the German medical officers didn’t want to turn in the captain and sergeant as regular prisoners, so they held a conference, finally took the question to their colonel, and came back with the verdict that the two Americans should retreat with them.
None of the Germans spoke English, but Capt. Allamon spoke just enough French to get along. They retreated for four days, and then early one morning they found the sentry asleep and just walked away.
An Italian farm family hid them for several days. The Italian grapevine carried the word of their presence to the nearest town in Allied hands. It was thus that one morning an Italian arrived and said they could come with him. The two Americans walked with him for nine miles, found a British scout car waiting for them, and eventually landed back with their own outfit.
Enclosed aid station comforts wounded
Capt. Allamon says he learned from the Germans that it’s best to put your medical-aid station in a building, even if it’s only an old goat shed, rather than in tents. There is something psychologically comforting about having rigid walls around you in the combat zone. Also, Capt. Allamon has a theory that the greatest medicine you can give a wounded man is some warmth and comfort.
So, he always gets his aid stations into a building, if possible, has a fire going in the fireplace day and night, and has hot coffee always ready. The minute a man is carried in, or walks in, he is given coffee and a cigarette, he warms himself before the fire, he feels a sense of security again, and his spirits rise. I know it works, for I have sat in one of Capt. Allamon’s aid stations night after night and seen it work.
Ex-newsboys make best soldiers
Capt. Allamon, like all frontline medical officers, is touched by what he calls the “mental wreckage” of war – the men whose spirits break under the unnatural strain and incessant danger of the battlefield.
Capt. Allamon feels that American children in recent generations have had too much parental protection and too little opportunity for self-efficiency, and that the resulting weakness makes a man crumble when faced with something he feels he cannot bear.
The captain says that if he could pick a company of men best suited for warfare, he’d choose all ex-newsboys. He thinks they would have shifted for themselves so early in life that they would have built up an inner strength that would carry them through battle.
Personally, I am sort of on the fence. I hate to think of an America of 130 million people so hard inside that nothing could touch them.
And, on the other hand, it is only a comparative few who do crack up. The mystery to me is that there is anybody at all, no matter how strong, who can keep his spirits from breaking in the midst of battle.
Maj. de Seversky: Jet plane is broadest application of age-old rocket propulsion idea
By Maj. Alexander P. de Seversky
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Walker to quit chairmanship
Announcement due Jan. 22 at Chicago conclave
Chicago, Illinois (UP) –
Postmaster General Frank C. Walker, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, is expected to resign that post at the committee’s meeting in Washington, Jan. 22.
Sources within the committee said it was understood Mr. Walker would submit his resignation at the same time the group meets to choose the 1944 presidential nomination site.
Robert E. Hannegan, Commissioner of Internal Revenue and formerly of St. Louis, has been mentioned prominently as his successor.
Mr. Walker and the executive vice chairman of the committee, Ambrose O’Connell, arrived from New York yesterday to confer with Mayor Edward J. Kelly regarding Chicago as the site for the 1944 convention.
He said he had “no comment” on reports that he would announce his resignation as committee chairman during his stay in Chicago.
He did not know, he said, what Mr. Roosevelt intended to do regarding the approaching election, adding:
I doubt that anyone knows what the President’s political plans for the future are.
With Chicago practically assured as the Democratic convention city, Mr. Walker indicated the date would be during the latter part of July or early August.
He said:
The Democrats are going to conduct a short, snappy campaign and the date makes little difference.
WPB relaxes order on idle steel stocks
Dealers get permission to purchase excess supplies
By Robert Taylor, Press Washington correspondent
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Fighting radio crews serve all battlefields
Motorized plants, walkie-talkies are ‘network’
By Si Steinhauser
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The home front –
Women with special college training can join WAC as physical therapy aide
Major study basis for candidates’ selection
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Völkischer Beobachter (January 14, 1944)
Die Raubmächte proklamieren:
Schärfste Feindbedingungen für das verratene Italien
Der lachende Dritte – der Bolschewismus
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Im Schatten der kommenden Präsidentenwahl –
Roosevelts Gegner beziehen ihre Stellungen
Von unserer Stockholmer Schriftleitung
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U.S. Navy Department (January 14, 1944)
CINCPAC Press Release No. 226
Aircraft of the 7th Army Air Force attacked installations on Mille Atoll in the Marshall Islands on January 12 (West Longitude Date). There was no enemy fighter opposition. All of our planes returned safely.
U.S. State Department (January 14, 1944)
President Roosevelt to Prime Minister Churchill
London, 14 January 1944
Op priority
Secret
Number 441, personal and secret, from the President for the Former Naval Person.
Your 536. It is my understanding that in Tehran UJ was given a promise that OVERLORD be launched during May and supported by strongest practicable ANVIL at about the same time and that he agreed to plan for simultaneous Russian attack on Eastern front.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . .
ROOSEVELT
The Ambassador in the United Kingdom to the President
London, 14 January 1944
Secret
For the President from Ambassador Winant.
I have just received the following confidential communication dated January 13 from Mr. Eden regarding a matter which you discussed with him at your recent meeting in Egypt:
13 January, 1944My dear Ambassador,
Before I left Egypt the President mentioned to me that Father Hughes, an English priest who is at present in charge of the Apostolic Delegation in Cairo, had complained to him of the treatment by the authorities concerned of Italian priests and nuns who had been arrested or interned. I told the President at the time that I was sure that there was another side to this question, and informed Lord Killearn of the conversation. I have now in front of me several reports from Lord Killearn which show that I was right, and that Father Hughes, in making these complaints, had, to say the least, allowed his heart to rule his head.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . .