Roving Reporter
By Ernie Pyle
In Italy – (by wireless)
I heard a funny story about a demonstration, back of the lines, of a new type of rifle grenade.
It seems a lot of high-ranking officers were invited to the demonstration, including generals and colonels. Rows of chairs were placed for them out in the open.
Then a soldier fired the new grenade. It landed about 150 yards ahead of the officers, and failed to go off. No sooner had it hit the ground than a big black dog, doubtless with retriever blood in him, dashed out, grabbed the grenade in his mouth, and started back toward the assembled brass.
They say you never saw such a scramble as the visiting dignitaries made getting out of their chairs and heading rapidly to the rear. Fortunately, the grenade was so hot the dog had to drop it. At last reports, it still hadn’t gone off.
An old dog man, himself
Speaking of dogs, the 47th Bomb Group has more of them than any outfit I’ve been with yet. It’s hard for an infantryman to take care of a dog, but the Air Force men are often based at the same field for weeks or months, and can live a sort of permanent life.
One of the soldiers was telling about an order put out some months ago by the doctors, requiring that all dogs in camp be shot. For some reason, it was never carried out.
Then the soldier said:
Boy, I’d like to see any doctor try to have our dogs killed now, with this new squadron commander we’ve got.
He was referring to Lt. Col. Reginald Clizbe, who is a dog man himself. Incidentally, Clizbe was a major when we mentioned him a few days ago, but now he has gone up a step.
Too black to picture
Col. Clizbe has a coal-black Labrador retriever named Tarfu. That’s one of those mystic Air Force names which you’ll have to get somebody else to explain to you.
Col. Clizbe got Tarfu in England when he was so tiny, he carried him inside his shirt. Now he’s as big as a German shepherd. He is wonderfully smart, and good too. He is so black that Col. Clizbe can’t even get a good snapshot of him. He was raised on the treeless and windswept plains around two airdromes in Tunisia, and he still hasn’t learned to use a tree.
There’s a great communion between man and dog. Tarfu almost goes frantic when it’s time for the colonel to return from a mission.
Col. Clizbe has a large doghouse for Tarfu, built out of frag bomb boxes, and he keeps it right in the tent with him. Anytime he says “Bed,” whether it’s day or night, Tarfu goes reluctantly into his doghouse and lies down.
Likes a face wash
Of a morning when Col. Clizbe gets up. Tarfu waits about 15 seconds, then slips out of his doghouse, gets into Col. Clizbe’s sleeping bag, and burrows clear down out of sight. If he were a little dog, it wouldn’t be so funny, but he’s so big he practically fills the bag.
Unlike most dogs, he loves to have his face washed. After Col. Clizbe gets through washing his own face of a morning, he washes Tarfu’s.
I actually get jealous when I see some of the soldiers over here with dogs deeply attached to them. it’s the nearest thing to civility in this weird foreign life of ours.
Pitt partner in Italy
Of late I’ve had to carry around a little vial of something called liver essence, and get a slug of it injected into me by a needle about twice a week.
It’s supposed to be good for hemoglobin. Mine has got down to 20 points below what is required to keep a man alive, which seems to me a great joke on the medical profession, since I’m still here.
At any rate, my latest needle pricking was done by Capt. John R. Grant, who is doctor for a service squadron I happened to be near. Capt. Grant comes from Pittsburgh. He drives a jeep with “Pitt Panther” painted on the front of it. In front of his dispensary is a red-and-white sign which says, “Limp in, leap out.” That’s good psychology, but it didn’t work on me. I limped in, and crawled out. It gives me the willies to have people sticking needles into me.
