Conversations Between my Fart Sack and the Great Unwashed Part One

"Hey Sarge, did you say you wanted $11.00 for this sleeping bag and that we will really need it and can keep it without them taking it away?"

"Yes it is a good bag and you will need it. You are going overseas and you will be in the field for a long, long time?"

"OK. I will take it."

"Oh you beautiful tan and soft bag. I shall call you ÔSac' and you can call me ÔThe Great Unwashed'."

"Oh Great Unwashed! I am so glad to be away from that great stifling pile of bags. What a beautiful name, 'Sac'. I shall always be beholden to you, Great Unwashed."

"I promise to you Sac that I shall never refer to you as my ÔFart Sack' as so many others refer to theirs. You will be just 'Sac', and you will never complain even though you will be subject to my emissions when you encase my body. And I shall be your eyes and share the sights and sounds of our adventure."

"Ugh! Oh Great Unwashed, I will put up with you but please go easy on the C rations."

"Say Sac, how would you like my name and serial number painted on your flap, be all rolled up till you squeal, get dumped in the bed of a truck under a ton of other stuff, or be loaded on a freighter for a free cruise to wherever? Now be patriotic and don't bitch. It will be the adventure of your life."

The Great Unwashed

"I am shipping out and I will be on a cruise ship in the bottom hold with bunks eight high, no baths, people lines to eat and go to the head but it costs me nothing. Fact is, when I get out of the Continental U.S. I get a pay raise. Now, don't get yourself sunk by a German submarine; $11 is a lot to pay for a sack. Now run along. I will see you in about three weeks."

"Goodbye Great Unwashed, I have become fond of you, so make sure you get there all in one piece."

"There you are Sac!. Do you know where we are? We are in French Morocco, a beautiful country. I was worried about you because the Germans had sunk the Hewes on the evening of November 11th and on Nov. 12th the Scott, Bliss, and Rutledge were torpedoed, and other ships were scattered. I have been sleeping in fancy hotels but now we will be going to the outskirts of Rabat, then to the Cork Oak Fort de Mamota, eight miles east of Sale, Rabat's twin city. I shall build you a castle — a floorboard high walls, roofed by my pup tent, constructed from rough clear grained mahogany boards — and we don't have to share it."

Place Lyautey, Rabat, Morocco

"Oh! Great Unwashed I am so glad we are together. I had a horrible trip cramped up with all those seasick barracks bags and bedrolls. I shall always be grateful you found me and I shall relish being unrolled and slept in."

"Sac we are living along a well-paved road in the midst of beautiful cork trees. I have built you a castle as I promised. There is not much duty except I have been in charge of finding ponds and wet places around the area and spraying oil on them to keep the malaria-ridden mosquitoes down. I saw a hyena and from now on I will pack a rifle in the truck."

"Oh! Great Unwashed will that animal eat me?"

"Sac, no you don't smell bad enough yet."

"Sac, here comes a procession of Arabs. A man sitting is setting crosswise on a small donkey and there are six or eight women clothed in dirty rags, barefoot, following behind their master on the donkey. It is midmorning and they will be back at mid-afternoon. The women will be carrying a bundle of small dry branches on their heads but donkey and man will only lead the procession. They treat the women far worse than the donkey here."

"Oh! Great Unwashed don't get any ideas of acquiring a harem, slaves or whatever when you get back in the states even though the woods are full of dry sticks. You would be sitting on the donkey backwards with tar and feathers for a crown."

"I was talking to the guys during an egg fry Sac, and I heard one say an Arab offered to sell a 12 year old girl for $16.00."

"Oh! Great Unwashed you could put her in a barracks bag and haul her across Africa and Europe but I believe you would have a better chance with a dog."

"Sac, you are a smart-ass."

"Sac, on February 16, 1943 the German Tenth Panzer Division struck the inexperienced American Division at Faid Pass and pushed them through Kasserine Pass. Now the 3rd Division and the Second Armored Division as they have been tapped for 3,400 men to replace their losses. Most of these men volunteered and they were our best It was a bad day for America."

"Oh Great Unwashed, you show concern. We have lost a battle."

"Sac, how would you like to lose your castle and go on a trip across 1,200 miles of North Africa jammed into the back of a truck?"

"Oh! Great Unwashed, do I have to go? I like this beautiful cork tree.""Sac, it is May 2, 1943. You are a coward and did you know you got a new boss, Major General Lucian K. Truscott?"

"Sac, I wish you could see the beautiful country around Constantine and Bone, the old Roman Ruins."

"O Great Unwashed, you know it is hard to see all that beauty from the bottom of a two-ton truck."

"Sac, I can't see too much either out the back of a truck with the tarp on. I found a folding cot so you won't have to fight the creatures from entering your interior and biting my exterior. Have you noticed how I tuck the mosquito bar under you so you don't get malaria?"

"Oh! Great Unwashed, you are just saving your precious ass.""Sac, we stopped on the road and saw Hill 609. The Germans fortified this rocky hill and had artillery control of the main road and the railroad. The 34th Division drove the Germans to the high ground after a bitter battle then saturated them with artillery. The few Germans that came off the hill needed their heads screwed back on. We were downwind from the battleground and the smell of the dead was pronounced. I had never smelled the odor of decaying human flesh before. It will be hard to forget."

"Oh! Great Unwashed those poor dumb bastards."

"Sac have you heard about the Truscott Trott? Everybody in the division, by order of the General Truscott must be able to walk five miles in one hour and the combat troops are marching 30 miles in eight hours. A short-legged man trots and a long-legged man stretches. I have mad the five miles without much trouble."

"Oh! Great Unwashed, I am so proud of you. Are you training to chase Germans or are you getting in shape to out run them?"

"We are at the front but the Germans gave up when they saw us. That was easy — only two days of combat and we get a battle star. Now we have to pick up their mess and train, train. train.

The area is strewn with mines and my friend Sgt. Ellis had a close one. He stepped on the three prongs of a bouncing Betty and he knew immediately and hit the ground. It exploded over him sending it's many ball bearings in all directions, killing one man. He was shook and couldn't hear so good for a few days. Some of the guys sing the song ÔDirty Gerty from Bezerte" and its dirty verses. It is now the end of June and the first sirocco has hit with its hot winds off the sands of the Sahara bringing clouds of dust and unbearable heat. Now the order is to move and here we go through a stormy sea to Licata in Sicily."

A dogface hot water heater.

Bill Mauldin often featured the "Great Unwashed".

"Oh Great Unwashed I am so happy we are leaving Africa with all that heat, wind, sand, fleas and the millions of flies. I heard the flies on your mess kit gave you a bit of dysentery once and you didn't make it to the shit trench."

"Sac, the life of yours truly is a tough one. I get a helmet full of water about once a week to shave my few whiskers and wash a few of my dirtiest parts. I unbuttoned my shirt pocket the other day and found a prize of a wad of toilet paper."

"Oh Great Unwashed I am so appreciative of your spraying DDT on my interior and exterior. I was afraid you might be acquiring things that crawl and they would make a home in my interior.

Howard B. Nickelson |  Introduction |  Drafted |  Operation Torch.
Conversation Part 1 |  Sicily |  Conversation Part 2 |  Anzio
Breakout |  France |  Germany |  Austria