Letters, Apr. 3, 1944

To the Pestkas

Sirs:

In TIME (Feb. 28) you have published our picture, a picture of six Polish Pestkas, members of Polish Women’s Auxiliary Service, recently arrived to this country. In the short time since our arrival to the United States we had met several times with most gracious hospitality of the Americans and with their warm, friendly interest in our country and the work we were doing. The photograph which you have published recently is one more proof of this interest and we are most appreciative of it. We would like, however, to add a few words of comment and to explain that we are not “just ourselves,” as your caption seems to imply, but represent the Polish women who had taken part in this war alongside of their men ever since Sept. 1, 1939. . . .

There are two Polish Women’s armies to day: one in Poland, the underground army of nameless soldiers who know they are fighting a good fight. Another, the Pestkas, the Polish Women’s Auxiliary Service, who had gone through “thick & thin” with the Polish Army in Poland, in Russia, Iraq, Iran, Palestine, Egypt and Great Britain. They had fought not only against the enemy, but also against the epidemics which broke out among the Polish evacuees from Soviet Russia. Many of them died in this fight. . . .

Among the six of us there is none who would not have lost someone dear in this war or left them to live the miserable life of people oppressed by the cruelty of ruthless occupants. . . .

Coming to this country we felt the weight of responsibility on us. … We have learned a great deal already during the past few weeks and, frankly, we hope to learn some thing more than where to buy lipsticks and how to cross legs for the American photographers. We do not think lipsticks are important enough to be a subject of comment of the American press. More important to us are the Enfield rifles we learned to shoot, and the hand grenades we learned to throw.

And most important of all is our way back to Independent Poland.

CAPTAIN IRENA GRODZKA New York City

¶Lipstick and crossed legs are attractive features of the American scene. TIME meant no slight to Captain Grod-zka and her Pestkas, who have proved their valor at firsthand.—ED.

Pleasure Given & Received

Sirs:

Upon my departure from the Eighth Air Force I wish to thank you and your organization for your great help. The morale of our hard-fighting officers and men has been encouraged and supported by the fact that you, through your publications, have told their kinsmen and acquaintances at home about their superior performance in battle. . . .

You and your whole organization would have derived great pleasure from seeing, as I have, worn and battered copies of TIME and LIFE being passed from hand to hand and studied and read by groups of mechanics and combat crews as they were awaiting the time to take off, or “sweating” their formations back from Germany.

We have had many of your representatives with us during the course of the last two years and they have invariably been of high type and have cooperated with us in every respect. It is a pleasure to work with such outstanding individuals.

IRA C. EAKER Lieutenant General, U.S.A. APO 650 c/o Postmaster New York City

Pole-Vaulting Quisling Sirs:

I believe that young Norwegian Nazi’s “prizewinning dream” (TIME, March 6) demonstrates better than anything we can write or say the type of mentality which has been attracted to Quisling in Occupied Norway. . . . The rubbery highflying fantasy of the tale … is reminiscent of another “classic” in the history of Norwegian letters. I refer to the “novel” that came from the pen of Charles Hoff, onetime world champion pole vaulter, shortly after he returned to Norway after his escapades in America. Hoff’s story ended with an earthquake destroying Manhattan, and with the poor but honest hero marrying the multimillionaire’s daughter. Yes, you guessed it. Hoff is also one of Quisling’s few henchmen today.

HANS OLAV Counselor

Norwegian Embassy Washington

¶The U.S. last saw the Great Hoff in the winter and spring of 1925-26, when he broke the world’s indoor pole vault record 15 times.—ED.

Freyberg v. “The Boss” Sirs: In TIME (March 6) you quote Winston Churchill: “General Alexander has probably seen more fighting against the Germans than any living British commander, unless it be General Freyberg, who is also in the fray. . . .” General Freyberg, as you may know, is a New Zealander. Rommel characterized them as the finest fighting men among the Nazis’ enemies. . . . Freyberg is from Wellington College, New Zealand. . . . After he became a hero at Gallipoli in 1915, Freyberg returned on special leave to New Zealand. He visited Wellington College to talk to the boys who had come behind him, of whom I was one.

I remember his being introduced by J. P. (“The Boss”) Firth, a giant of a marvelous man who was the headmaster. The Boss recalled that many times he had flogged Frey-berg V.C. The hero of the Dardanelles, standing there among the begowned pedagogues, smiled wryly and rubbed the seat of his pants.

. . . The Boss always concluded his matutinal remarks somewhat as follows: “I should like to see the following in the corridor, immediately after prayers. . . .” On the particular day of Freyberg’s visit, I was among The Boss’s honored guests on account of a certain amount of low-grade gunpowder, made in the College lab, having been ignited at a most strategic moment under a line of old-fashioned outhouses.

What I recall particularly is that Freyberg rose, after the names of the dav’s felons had been announced, to ask that The Boss stay his hand and that the boys, who would otherwise have been soundly beaten in the corridor … be granted a full pardon. Seeing that he had scored his point, he went full out and asked that the whole college be excused from classes for the rest of the day. It was a lead-pipe tactic. The Boss groaned once in his beard and surrendered.

On the way out my accomplice in crime and I pushed our way through the crowd and grabbed Freyberg by the tails of his tunic. He turned round and, exercising his privilege as an “Old Boy,” gruffly ordered us to “absquatulate,” which means nothing worse than “scram.” But we were inspired at having touched with our hands a real, live hero and a good Samaritan. . . .

EDWARD WILLIAM SCOTT Bogotá, Colombia .

¶ For a revealing vignette of New Zealander Freyberg, TIME thanks “Bouncing” Scott (TIME, Feb. 10, 1941), onetime pugilist, newspaper reporter (New York Graphic], editor (Panama American), now a vice president of Costa Rica’s TACA airline.—ED.

What’s Up?

Sirs: What on earth is the matter with everyone today? I am only 17, but . . . there is some-thing radically wrong with the English town which “adopted” Norah Carpenter because she became the “proud” mother of illegitimate quadruplets [TIME, March 13] ; with the hundreds of people who showered her with presents and admiration. . . .

If everyone in the world accepts as a normal and rightful thing the making of a heroine out of any unmarried mother merely be cause she happens to produce three more than the usual number of illegitimate children, and who speak of the wife, if at all, in terms of scorn for being cruel enough not to give a divorce which is against her religious beliefs — if this is the moral code under which we will operate in the world to come, I, for one, have no desire to live in that world. Aren’t there any sane, decent persons left on the earth? … I repeat, with vehemence and bewilderment, what the hell is the matter with everyone?

ELIZABETH GELLHORN

Los Angeles

Sirs: . . . Are the English as “shocked” over the affair as we should be? Or have they become as “modern” and “broadminded” as we? (CORP.) FRANK G. RIVERA Shreveport, La.

Sirs: I am not deeply concerned about England’s declining birth rate; neither am I greatly exercised about an English barmaid’s morals. But I am vitally concerned when MY money is used to finance such a misalliance. As an American taxpayer, I vehemently protest this ridiculous procedure. What a fine mess would result from such a precedent. Every barmaid and trollop in England would get herself annexed to our Treasury Department. . . .

The $70 the U.S. Army proposes to donate monthly to this barmaid is MY money, and it was never intended to endow moral misalliances. I protest this procedure, together with the flaunting of the whole unsavory affair in the face of American womanhood.

RUTH CLARK

Milwaukee 100% Yes

Sirs:

The poll by the “poll-minded” Army officer in the Southwest Pacific (TIME, Feb. 7), as it pertains to the Negro, certainly does not reflect a clear picture of the attitude or thoughts of Negro troops in the Pacific or European theaters. There can be no doubt as to what the results would be if such a poll should be taken among those who suffer as a result of discrimination. The result would show 100% “YES” to the question, “Do you think there is too much discrimination shown against the Negro. . . .”

This happens to be the second World War for the preservation of Democracy in which I have volunteered my services. . . . During the first World War, for one reason or an other, awards and decorations were given to me. . . . The Distinguished Service Cross, Purple Heart and Croix de Guerre medals are lovely souvenirs and reminders, but without sufficient merit to enable me to purchase a first-class railroad ticket from Washington to a point south. … It is indeed strange that it should have been necessary upon two occasions for me to don the uniform of my native land and be transported to foreign soil to enjoy the privileges of everyday normal living without the bogie of discrimination rearing its head.

The Negro soldier of this war . . . will no longer be satisfied with disenfranchisement, Jim-Crowism and the denial of the rights and privileges granted by the Constitution of the United States. He will expect the United States to set the example for the world as being a true Democracy where all men regardless of race, creed, or color will enjoy the benefits of those principles for which men are giving their lives. He will recall that the bullets, shell fragments and bombs of this war were indiscriminate in their toll of lives sacrificed upon the altar of Democracy.

(M/SGT.) WILLIAM A. JOHNSON c/o Postmaster

New York City

One Woman

Sirs:

Besides worrying about how the soldiers are going to vote, the politicians better give a worry to the votes of the 10,000,000 wives and sweethearts.

As a wife whose husband is being drafted this month, believe me, I’m really giving a care about who’s going to be running this show. If I’m going to stay home on the farm and raise my little boys while their dad is gone to fight, I’m certainly entitled to speak up about what I want.

I want a change in President. Roosevelt isn’t a leader; he’s a great big reflecting mirror. I want a man who isn’t afraid of hard things, and who doesn’t talk a lot. I’m for Stassen for President. He has a quiet sure touch for the right action to take. Willkie talks so much—just like Roosevelt. And Dewey’s sitting out this war in too much comfort for so young a man, if you ask me.

I want a war aim a whole lot more definite than “unconditional surrender.” That’s more of Roosevelt’s big talk. For my part, let’s chase the bullies into their own backyard, and then keep ourselves strong and alert to make them stay there rather than trying to demolish them to the last man now so we can sink back on the sofa later.

Well, there are 10,000,000 other women who want their men back soon but with honor. I’m just one.

ELIZABETH LYMAN R.F.D. #2

Omaha

Even as You and I

Dear U.S. at War:

You’re cute.

You say that “even Sam Grafton” now expresses concern over the enigma of U.S. foreign policy.

I don’t understand the word “even.” I was expressing concern over U.S. foreign policy while most of the pundits you cite were expressing the deepest satisfaction with same. Shades of the “moronic little king” and the sale of oil to Japan in 1939 !

As to whether I blame the State Department and never President Roosevelt, I could quote you dozens of passages to the contrary; but, what the devil, libraries are dusty, time is short, violets are blue and hooray for you.

SAMUEL GRAFTON

New York City

¶ TIME’S bedeviled, dusty, short-winded, blue-eyed U.S. at War editor should have avoided the word “even.” It wasn’t cute.—ED.