A Christmas Journey

The young Soldier was the eldest of ten children and according to southern tradition, the older children were expected to help support their family and raise their younger siblings!  With the Korean War winding down, jobs were very hard to get…many breadwinners were looking for meaningful work with not much success!  The young Soldier was the first person in his family to graduate from High School and had wanted to attend College but with his family’s financial condition, that was not an option at this time!  

The young Soldier had turned eighteen in April of 1954 and graduated from high school in June of that same year. In July, with no job in sight, he decided to enlist in the U.S. Army and volunteered his Service for Korea…he had never been any further from home than St. Louis and really had no idea where Korea was!  With the family still in dire financial straits, he had hoped to create a supplemental income allotment in their behalf from his monthly paycheck!

In August, the young Soldier passed the army physical and was sent to Camp Chaffee, Arkansas for his basic Infantry training, lasting eight weeks!  From there, he was sent to Aberdeen Proving Grounds, located just outside of Baltimore, Maryland on the Chesapeake Bay for another eight weeks of advanced training. 

The young Soldier’s assignment at Aberdeen Proving Grounds had proved to be quite uneventful until the holiday season of 1954 approached…he, along with his buddies, became very homesick as the Christmas day neared!  He was still only eighteen years old and this would be his first Christmas away from home and his family!  Even with the alcoholism and verbal abuse which usually displaced any form of Christmas spirit in their home, the young Soldier still missed being with his family!  He had accepted the fact that he would have to spend this Christmas day in the barracks with some of his buddies!  On weekends, he would take the base shuttle bus to downtown Baltimore just to walk and look in the department store windows and mentally Christmas shop presents for his family while listening to the Christmas music!

However, on the Friday evening of the Christmas weekend, the First Sergeant come to the barracks and stated that if anyone wanted a three day pass for Christmas weekend, they could receive one if their bunk and floor area could pass his stringent inspection!  The young Soldier’s heart leaped for joy and skipped a beat with high anticipation of the possibility of being able to be home for Christmas!  

The young Soldier wasted no time getting his floor area mopped and waxed along with his bunk being made ready for immediate inspection!  His bunk area passed inspection and he was given a three day weekend pass for Christmas!  As the Army only paid on the first of every month, the young Soldier found himself to be financially strapped and had only twenty cents to fund his round trip of two thousand miles or more!? Also, heavy snow had already covered the ground with much more snow expected over the weekend! The weather had turned very cold with the forecast calling for near zero temperatures!  He had never hitch-hiked any great distance before, but figured if he wanted to go home, there was no other choice!

The young Soldier estimated that if he was to reach home before Christmas, he would have to travel all night and all day of Christmas Eve to hopefully arrive in time for Christmas day!  As he had no money, he felt a regret for his younger brothers and sisters as he knew there would be no Christmas gifts for them this year but was still concerned for their physical well being!  He very much wanted to be with his family once again before having to return to Maryland for his overseas assignment!

That night before leaving, the young Soldier dressed as warm as he could! He put on long wool underwear and dressed in his ‘Class A’ uniform with his G.I. lined overcoat for the long trip that lay ahead! He took the Shuttle Bus to downtown Baltimore and asked for directions for which route he should take for his journey!  With directions firmly planted in his mind he threw his duffle bag over his shoulder and walked to the outskirts of Baltimore to find Route 40 that would take him home!

With the snow continuing to fall, the young Soldier commenced walking west on Route 40 with his thumb out hoping for a quick offer of a ride!   Shortly, he got a ride with a male individual in a convertible with a big tear in the canvas top---and as luck would have it, the car heater did not work either!  The young Soldier thought he had dressed warm enough for the trip, but had apparently underestimated the weather and nearly froze when they drove through the mountains…it was so cold he could hardly move his feet and toes!

The young Soldier’s first ride ended during the night at an isolated intersection somewhere in eastern Ohio, just past the Pennsylvania border!  It had continued to snow very hard with a cold and frigid wind blowing with a gale like force! He was shivering and had become very hungry as it had turned much colder than he had anticipated! The young Soldier estimated that he was probably at the point of “no return” and may as well ‘freeze to death’ going home rather than ‘freeze to death’ going back to his Army base!  He decided to continue homeward! 

He felt very discouraged, alone and forsaken! In a frozen stupor he visualized the face of his mother wearing her little head scarf with her unlined thin raggedly tweed winter coat held together by safety pins waving as to beckon her oldest child homeward!  He thought of the many times she had overcome adversity with prayer, so he decided to say a prayer for comfort and deliverance from the misery he had seemingly put himself in!  After he finished his silent prayer, a warm feeling of comfort enveloped him and he knew immediately that he would be looked after by a higher being!

Shortly thereafter, a car seemed to arrive out of nowhere and stopped to offer him a ride!  The driver was a U.S. Army Sergeant First Class, with his wife, on the way to St. Louis for the holidays!  They said they would take the young Soldier as far as they could before crossing over the Mississippi River into St. Louis!  He told them that if they would drop him off at that point, he would be very grateful!  Their car heater worked and he drifted off to sleep for some much needed rest and thawing out!  They traveled the rest of the night and on into the next day.  The Sergeant and his wife stopped to eat breakfast where the young Soldier would spend one of his two dimes for a hot drink that would last until he arrived home.

As they left the restaurant and continued their journey west, the young Soldier closed his eyes and thought of his mother and the many sacrifices and difficult times that she had endured and made in behalf of her children!  He loved his mother dearly and remembered the heartbreak and tears that she had shown when he had left for basic training in August…he wondered what his mother’s reaction would be when he arrived home unannounced and then would have to leave once more…her farewell tears would be hard for the young Soldier to bear again!

Later that day, the kind Sergeant and his wife dropped the young Soldier off at the Junctions of 111 and 40 before they crossed over the Mississippi River into St. Louis.  As the young Soldier got out of the car, he again thanked them profusely for their hospitality and wished them a very Merry Christmas! He was completely exhausted and was in dire need of a hot shower and shave!  However, he kept reminding himself that he would soon be home with his family!

The young Soldier started walking toward his home on highway 111 and almost immediately got a ride with a man in a pick-up truck for the final portion of his trip…the man was going to pass right through his hometown!  While feeling a deep sense of relief that he was finally on the last leg of an arduous journey, his pulse again quickened with excitement of being so near home! 

Soon, the familiar sight of the Cahokia Mounds appeared on his far right! He knew that before long he would be counting down the ‘three humps’ on Route 111 before experiencing the acrid smell of the Oil Refinery and then entering the Village limits of his hometown! 

The driver dropped the young Soldier off at the corner just two blocks from where he lived!  With his duffle bag thrown over his shoulder and as he had done many times before, he hurriedly walked the last few blocks to the little block house on the corner…HOME AT LAST!

As the young Soldier had not the time or money to call ahead, his family was not expecting to see him this Christmas!  Needless to say, his mother cried with pure joy and happiness upon his arrival! The rest of the family, and even his father, were very happy to see him---even if it would only be for an abbreviated Christmas weekend!

The young Soldier’s weekend pass would expire as he was scheduled to be back at Aberdeen Proving Grounds by midnight, the day after Christmas!  He had no idea how that was going to happen as he had no money for train fare and did not have the time to hitch-hike back to the East Coast!  He contacted Scott Air Force Base in Belleville, Illinois and told them of his dilemma and asked for their help! Fortunately, the Air Force had a Military Air Transport Service (MATS) Cargo Plane that was scheduled for a flight to Maguire Air Force Base on the day after Christmas!  If the young Soldier would pay a dollar for a parachute, in the event of an emergency, he would be allowed on that flight!  Between his family and friends, they were able to raise the dollar for his passage! 

The young Soldier arrived at Maguire Air Force Base late in the afternoon of December 26, 1954!  He was then directed to the Military Land Transportation Service and rode a shuttle bus back to Aberdeen Proving Grounds, Maryland and reported to his Command…and on time!

Shortly thereafter, the young Soldier was sent to Fort Dix, New Jersey for an overseas assignment to Europe.  He would be gone for the next two and one-half years with no chance of furlough back to the States!  And yes, while away, he missed and was homesick for his family each Christmas thereafter!

Fifty-seven years have since passed and the young Soldier has now become an old man!  Nevertheless, when the soft restrains of Christmas music is heard by him, he thinks of those lonely homesick nights spent in downtown Baltimore and the long Christmas journey home because of the love and concern he had and still has for his younger brothers and sisters…and now, his own family!

W.W. Watkins,