This text was obtained via automated optical character recognition.
It has not been edited and may therefore contain several errors.

---

On Wednesday, 19 February 1941, eighteen other volunteers and
I,	from Hancock County, Mississippi departed from Bay St. Louis by bus destined for Camp Shelby, Mississippi where we would be inducted for military service.
We met at the courthouse in Bay St. Louis where relatives and friends had assembled to see us off. A contingent of the Bay St. Louis High School Band led the march from the courthouse to the bus station.
The nineteen volunteers were:	William Clyde Osburn, John
Peter Vairin Jr., John Dennett Chase, Willard Leo Necaise, Harry Aloysius Tucker Jr., Peter William Garriga, James Woodrow Bilbo, Orvis Alvister Shiyou, Roy Randolph Koenenn, Virgil Edmund Nelson, Horace Lucien Lee, John Robert Cameron, Earl Joseph Favre, Charlie A. Necaise, Elgin Luther Dedeaux, Bert Eugene Estapa, Hamilton Hildervert Morel Jr., George Summers, and Frank Fillmore Taconi. Previously Horace Lee, John Robert Cameron, and I were students at the same school.
I was assigned to the 31st Infantry "Dixie" Division, Camp Blanding, Florida, effective 23 February 1941. Most of the original group from Hancock County were sent to Camp Blanding, Florida. I was disappointed that Horace Lee, a close friend for many years, was not one of the group. After arrival at Camp Blanding, I was assigned to Company "M" of the 155th Infantry Regiment. I would be a member of Company "M" for the next five years.
Basic training began immediately with emphasis placed on physical conditioning since it was a prerequisite toward becoming a finished combat soldier. Extensive field training continued as individual units, then in combination with other echelons of the division.
In early July 1941, we made a sixty-mile road march to Ocala Forest, in the heart of Florida, in three days. After three days of maneuvers in the dense thickets of the forest, we were permitted to rest, paid for the first time, then began the return march to Camp Blanding in three days. This field training was accomplished during the hottest and most uncomfortable weather of the hot and humid north Florida summer. Once back in Camp Blanding, we began preparations to take part in grand scale war games in Louisiana.
Early in August 1941, we began the long trip to the Louisiana bayou country by truck convoy. Our trip was so routed as to bring us through our home territories, if possible. Civic organizations and other groups of well wishers all along the
-1-