"Perhaps your love will save me..."

The one activity in US History that I enjoyed this year (if you could call it “enjoyment”) was the day we devoted to the soldiers who fought in World War II. Talking was not permitted the whole class period. We watched a clip from Saving Private Ryan (the opening sequences), and during the silent aftermath that followed, we were given letters addressed to us from our “families.” Each of us was to react to the letter and write one back.

For some reason, this activity really affected me. I don’t normally get angry or start physically shaking in class. I can never fully understand the trauma the soldiers on either side of the war went through. Yet even with my shallow level of comprehension, I still feel the soldier’s fear, confusion and anger. In one period, I became a soldier, given up to fate, both afraid and unafraid of imminent death.

I am pleased with the resulting letter. Reading it over again, I can feel the anger the soldier has at everyone, the enemy, his country, even his own family. Without trying to be conceited, I think it turned out well. Well enough to put on a blog, at least.

10/19/1944

Dear Mother and Father,

Your letter did get through, but I can scarcely hope for mine to do the same. We soldiers of the 29^th Infantry Division have been hearing rumors that the army censures any letters hinting at despair. At first, I refused to believe this. Now, I am forced to begin accepting its truth. How else could you still have the hope you do?

When I first signed up for the war, I was as eager as John for some action. The last few months have not been filled with the glory I imagined, however. You write that you are beginning to understand my experience. You could not possibly begin to comprehend the horrors of my experience. When I was in John’s position, I had no fear of losing a hand or leg, or even my life. Now, as my division gets closer to the front lines, I see more and more the horrors other soldiers have faced before me, the horrors that will soon be mine. I am lucky, perhaps, that I have not needed an arm amputated because of a German bullet, or worse, because of a bullet from one of my young and inexperienced fellow soldiers. But perhaps I really am unlucky, because I would have been able to get out of fighting and lay in a hospital and cared for by nurses as nice as Mother. Instead, my fate will be to wait, heart beating, in a ditch until the order comes to throw myself out of the hole and face a German gunman pointing his weapon straight at my fearful heart.

Your letter protects me. I keep it there, above my heart, at all times close. Perhaps your love will save me from the enemy fire.

I hope too, that the war will end soon and that we will be reunited before John faces these same horrors. Yet in these dark times, we can scarcely afford to hope.

Love always,

PFC Harding

29^th Infantry Division

US Army