My father's equipment

     I still have some of the equipment Dad saved from World War I.  My guess is that he had this with him in Cheppy.  First is his helmet.  The 35th Division patch is stenciled on the side. I also have his mess kit and first aid kit.   I saw similar items in museums in France. Note the close up of the mess kit stamped with "1918 France."

     When I was a boy, I often asked my dad about his experiences in the war.  He told of a time when his machine gun company was moving through woods and came under artillery fire.  The men all ran to the side of the road and fell to the ground.  Dad was carrying the heavy tripod of the machine gun on his shoulders and, after hitting the ground, felt something warm trickling down the back of his neck and shouted "I'm hit."  His buddy, who was next to him, leaned over and said, "The tripod hit you on the head." Dad would always point to a slight dent in the skin of his bald head.

Hotchkiss Machine gun in museum in Reims, France

     Of course the most valuable item that I have is Dad's diary.  He had begun it in training at Camp Doniphan, Oklahoma.  But apparently, after he got to France, he had to turn it in for security reasons.  There are no contemporaneous entries from then until after the war.  But in a section for "Battles I was in" appears this page in his handwriting about having breakfast in the "Dutch kitchen" in Cheppy. Below it are pictures of the inside of the kitchen part of the building and of the electrical wiring that the Germans installed in 1916.

Dad's diary

Inside of German kitchen

1916 electrical wiring