Saturday Apr. 13 [1918] Dear Father: Today is another big day. I received permission to go down town for a few hours to attend to some things and went

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6 Saturday Apr. 13 [1918] Dear Father: Today is another big day. I received permission to go down town for a few hours to attend to some things and went up to guarteso (?). As I was coming back I met one of the boys with the mail. He gave me 10 letters all addressed to this P.O. There were three from you and two from Ethel the wonderful part of it one of the letters was postmarked Mar. 27. That is certainly speed just two days over two weeks could have hardly beaten it in peace times. I will have nothing more to say about the mail. Was a little disappointed to find one of your only clipping tho I have read them with great interest. In some ways I am very disappointed in them the editorials that is, especially the LA Times. You people evidently have received wonderful reports of American activities. They may be true, I hope they are, but we haven t heard anything to compare with it. But, I think it is a great mistake to take the this will be easy tone. Patriotism is fine, bold patriotism is necessary these days, but blatant patriotism rather smacks of what we are pleased to point out as a characteristic of our gentle friends across the Rhine. This 3 to 1 talk is all the worst kind of bull. We can whip Germany we could do it alone, I believe, if it should come to that but we certainly cannot do it at the ratio of three to one or two to one. Don t get the idea that the Boche can t and don t fight. I was talking yesterday to a French blessee. He has been at the front since the beginning and he described the various antagonists very picturesquely. It was mostly by gesture but his meaning was you shoot, Turks run you shoot again, Austrians run you shoot again, German guards his shoulders and marches straight on. He may be wrong, I hope he is, but his estimate surely argues with those of the troops in this recent drive which by the way does not look like any 3 to 1 party. I enclose an editorial which may interest you. I think its tone well contrast quite markedly with those of our, or now I have to say, your paper. I had hoped America would let the eagle quit screaming awhile and go to hatching eggs. There s going to be need for many a young un. And anyway there will be plenty of time to cheer when the boys come back. I wish I could send you some of the French papers, but guess it wouldn t go very well. Their spirit has come to the quiet determined, They shall not pass and We shall endure. You don t hear them chuckling over the fact that the German bogey is whilting to keep his courage up. I wouldn t have you think from this that we over here are feeling east down or uncertain as to the final issue. But here everything is quiet, there is none of the cheering, flag waving brand of patriotism. It would be impossible here. The French are brave, beyond all that we can realize. Not only do they bear up under their sorrow, their losses and their vanished hopes but they are cheerful under the burden which you know must be breaking their hearts. It has been strikingly brought home to me here in the hospital. Here everyone has given up all that is dearest, many of the women wear the widow s veil, the others have headbands at the front, and yet they are always kind, always gentle, looking after the maladies with unfailing smiles, playing like children in their free hours. I call that real bravery. And it does make a fellow want to get in and help, wish he had come over sooner look forward to the time when we can take our place in the line and carry the burden to the end. Of course will win we ve got

7 to one can t think of anything else but please tell people to quit telling what a great nation we are and to get busy and show it. Well, I guess I ll wind this up. It isn t exactly a letter more a series of ideas and impressions as they have come to me in the last two weeks. Some of it may sound foolish some may not please the censor and all of it is only my private view expressed privately to you. So don t think there is anything official. We evidently don t get nearly as much war news as you do. Can t understand why you have not received more letters. Have written at least once a week and several weeks more often. I guess before you get this I will be gone from here, but you can continue using this address until I send you another. Have received only one bundle of Fullerton papers but presume others are on the way. It is evidently just a case of the kind of steamers they strike. Regards to everybody received letters today from Mrs. Wilburn, Mrs. Reeve and Arthur Staty. Were greatly appreciated and will answer as soon as possible Tomorrow I go back to the grind. Love Stan. C. Stanley Chapman to Charles Chapman, Apr. 13, C. Stanley Chapman Papers, The Frank Mt. Pleasant Library of Special Collections & Archives, Chapman University.

8 Letter from Ernest Hemingway Milan, October 18, 1918 Dear Folks: I would like to come home and see you all, of course. But I can t until after the war is finished. And that isn t going to be such an awful length of time. There is nothing for you to worry about, because it has been fairly conclusively proved that I can t be bumped off. And wounds don t matter. I wouldn t mind being wounded again so much because I know just what it is like. And you can only suffer so much, you know, and it does give you an awfully satisfactory feeling to be wounded. It s getting beaten up in a good cause. There are no heroes in this war. We all offer our bodies and only a few are chosen, but it shouldn t reflect any special credit on those that are chosen. They are just the lucky ones. I am very proud and happy that mine was chosen, but it shouldn t give me any extra credit. Think of the thousands of other boys that offered. All the heroes are dead. And the real heroes are the parents. Dying is a very simple thing. I ve looked at death and really I know. If I should have died it would have been very easy for me. Quite the easiest thing I ever did. But the people at home do not realize that. They suffer a thousand times more. When a mother brings a son into the world she must know that some day the son will die, and the mother of a man that has died for his country should be the proudest woman in the world, and the happiest. And how much better to die in all the happy period of undisillusioned youth, to go out in a blaze of light, than to have your body worn out and old and illusions shattered. So, dear family, don t ever worry about me! It isn t bad to be wounded: I know, because I ve experienced it. And if I die, I m lucky. Does all that sound like the crazy, wild kid you sent out to learn about the world a year ago? It is a great old world, though, and I ve always had a good time and the odds are all in favor of coming back to the old place. But I thought I d tell you how I felt about it. Now I ll write you a nice, cheery, bunky letter in about a week, so don t get low over this one. I love you all. Ernie

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