FLOYD E. WEST SR. AT CAMP DEVENS, SEPT,1918

((First posted in January 2008. I've done a little editing of the 
original))

When journalists talk about a possible “bird flu” epidemic, the
historical event they draw parallels to is the Great Influenza
outbreak of 1918. It first appeared near Fort Riley Kansas in
January and by March had reached New York. Soldiers in crowded
barracks fell victim to it easily and troop movements helped spread
it quickly.

And in the midst of this my grandfather enlisted in the Army in April,
1918.


Then on 8 Sept. 1918 the first case of a new, more virulent strain was
reported at Camp Devens in Ayer, Massachusetts. By the end of the month
there were 14,000 cases of the illness and over 700 deaths attributed to it.
Camp Devens was placed under quarantine but the whole state of Massachusetts
was already swept by the disease as the figures on this site  show. My
grandfather was one the troops assigned to a medical detachment working
at the Camp Hospital.



Camp Devens’ hospital surely was not meant to deal with such a
catastrophic event and the accounts I’ve read while horrific must
pale in comparison to what my grandfather must have seen and
experienced. I wonder what he must have thought as he went
about his duties at the hospital? Growing up he must have heard
about the diptheria outbreak that had caused the deaths of six
relatives forty years before. Now he was in the midst of
something much worse where hundreds could die in a single night.
Did he wonder when he himself might begin to show symptoms
and end up a patient himself?

But he survived and was given a furlough at the end of November.
From what I’ve read, the epidemic began and expanded quickly
but subsided within a month and a half. By the end of October it
was over for the most part and by November the authorities must
have felt it was safe enough to allow Private West a furlough to
visit home in early December.


I can’t imagine they would have allowed it if he’d been stricken
with pneumonia during the height of the epidemic, so my guess is
that he came down with it sometime after he returned to
Camp Devens. The Army doctors must have felt the damage to his
lungs was sufficient to keep him from his duty as a hospital
orderly and so my grandfather was given an honorable discharge
on 12Mar 1919, less than a year after he'd enlisted.

Some soldiers in World War 1 saw hell on a battlefield.

Others, such as my grandfather, saw another sort of hell in
hospital wards full of comrades racked with the Spanish Influenza.

I used a variety of sources researching this post. One of them is
“Fever of War: The Influenza Epidemic in the U.S. Army During
World War I” by Carol R. Byerly, (NYU Press, 2005) which you
can preview at GoogleBooks.

THE HONORABLE DISCHARGE OF FLOYD E. WEST

(First posted in December 2007) 
 

An earlier post was on the Enlistment document of my

grandfather Floyd Earl West Sr. Thanks to my Aunt Dot I have

a copy of it and also of his Discharge. The second line with his rank

is smudged here but by holding the paper up before a light I could

make out most of the writing. Also, I’m not sure if the

commandant’s last name is correct but it is the best guess I

could come up with in trying to read it.

I’m grateful my to Aunt Dot for giving me these copies and for

all the other items she’s sent along! I don’t know how difficult it
might be to obtain these elsewhere, but the information on them
is invaluable to someone researching their family history and
genealogy.

“Honorable Discharge from the United States Army
TO ALL WHOM IT MAY CONCERN:
This is to certify that Floyd E. West
Private First Class Hospital Detachment
THE UNITED STATES ARMY, is hereby HONORABLY
DISCHARGED from the military service of the United States by
reason of Pursuant to W. D. Cir.I77 A.G. O. Nov.21/1918.

Said Floyd E. West was born in South Paris, in the State of

Maine. When enlisted he was 25 years of age and by occupation

a Farmer. He had Blue eyes, Brown hair, Medium complexion,

and was 5 feet 5 1/2 inches in height.

Given under my hand at Camp Devens Mass. this twelfth day of
March, one thousand nine hundred and nineteen.
A. O. Davis(?)
Lt. Col. M.C. U.S.A.commanding.”

FURLOUGH FOR MY GRANDFATHER, PART2

Continuing with posts about my grandfather Floyd E West's WW1 service:

There's not much more information on these images but it does tell me that
Pop was back on base on December 6, 1918.  The form is signed by
Capt. John E Tracy who was commanding the soldiers of the medical
detachment.

FURLOUGH FOR MY GRANDFATHER, PART1

I first blogged about my grandfather's WW1 furlough papers back in 2007 but didn't discuss their content. So in commemoration of the start of WW1,I'm doing so now.

These are furlough papers for my grandfather Floyd E West, issued while he was serving at Camp Devens, Ma. during World War 1. It was granted on Nov. 29 1918 and on the
front side gives his rank as "Private 1st C Det Med Dep Base Hospital. The date he
was expected to report back is smudged and unreadable.

On the back side, there is a section on Pay and Rations I don't really understand, but
looking at the two dates in December I think he was supposed to be back from his
visit to Upton, Maine by December 10, 1918.

Lastly is the physical description, which says he is 25 years old, 5ft 5 1/2 inches tall
with "medium" complexion, blue eyes and brown hair. One of the things I was struck
by was that his signature was very much like that of my Dad, Floyd E West, Jr! 

ENLISTMENT RECORD OF FLOYD E. WEST SR.

In observance of the start of World War 1, this week I'll be reposting a series I did back in 2007 on my grandfather Floyd E West Sr's World War 1 service. This was posted on 17Dec 2007.

I mentioned back in July that Aunt Dot and I exchanged some
family research at my nephew Paul’s wedding. One of the items
she gave me was her childhood memories of my Dad. Another
item was a photocopy of my Grandfather West’s WW1 discharge
and his enlistment record as shown above.



I think the two papers were folded together which would explain
the dark lines across the pages. In the transcription below, I’ve
put a question mark after any entry I’m not certain about. I’ve
also italicized the handwritten information.

I received an email from my cousin Diana tonight as I was typing
this and in it she passed along information from Aunt Dot that
Pop was an orderly at the Camp Devens base hospital, that he
was only in for a short period before contracting double
pneumonia and that he was shipped home after his recovery.


I’ll have more to say on that after I’ve posted the transcription
of his discharge form.


In my reply to Diana, I remarked that today I realized that
between the service records and the memoir that Aunt Dot
gave me earlier this year I have learned more about Pop than
I ever knew before, and much more than I know about my
other grandfather!




ENLISTMENT RECORD
Name: West, Floyd E. #2722093 Grade: Private First Class

Enlisted, or Inducted, Apr.29, 1918 , at So. Paris, Me.

Serving in First enlistment period at date of discharge.

Prior service:* none

Noncommissioned officer: none(?)

Marksmanship, gunner qualification or rating: not armed

Horsemanship: not mounted(?)

Battles, engagements, skirmishes, expeditions: (left blank)

Knowledge of any vocation: Farmer

Wounds received in service: none

Physical condition when discharged: Good

Typhoid prophylaxis completed: ---------------

Paratyphoid prophylaxis completed: June 27/18

Married or single : Single

Character: Excellent

Remarks: No A.W.O.L. or absences under G.O. 45/1914.
This soldier entitled to travel pay.



Signature of soldier: Floyd E. West


John Burnette (?)1st St. M.C. U.S.A.Commanding Detachment

FLOYD E.WEST SR. AT FORT DEVENS, SEPTEMBER 1918

In light of the present flu epidemic, Heather Wilkinson Rojo over
at Nutfield Genealogy has put together a list of geneablog links 
dealing with the great Spanish Influenza outbreak of 1918 and its
effects of the bloggers' ancestors.

Back in 2008 I wrote about how my grandfather, Floyd Earl West Sr
was caught up himself in the midst of the epidemic:


When journalists talk about the possible “bird flu” epidemic, the
historical event they draw parallels to is the Great Influenza
outbreak of 1918. But by the fall of that year there had not been
any large number of cases since the spring.


Then on 8 Sept. 1918 the first case was reported at Camp Devens
in Ayer, Massachusetts. By the end of the month there were
14,000 cases of the illness and over 700 deaths attributed to it.
Camp Devens was placed under quarantine but the whole state
of Massachusetts was already swept by the disease as the
figures on this site shows.



Camp Devens’ hospital surely was not meant to deal with such a
catastrophic event and the accounts I’ve read while horrific must
pale in comparison to what my grandfather must have seen and
experienced. I wonder what he must have thought as he went
about his duties at the hospital. Growing up he must have heard
about the diptheria outbreak that had caused the deaths of six
relatives forty years before. Now he was in the midst of
something much worse where hundreds could die in a single night.
Did he wonder when he himself might begin to show symptoms
and end up a patient himself?


And yet he survived and was given a furlough at the end of
November. From what I’ve read, the epidemic began and
expanded quickly but subsided within a month and a half. By the
end of October it was over for the most part and by November
the authorities must have felt it was safe enough to allow Private
West a furlough to visit home in early December.


I can’t imagine they would have allowed it if he’d been stricken
with the pneumonia during the height of the epidemic, so my
guess is that he came down with it sometime after he returned to
Camp Devens. The Army doctors must have felt the damage to his
lungs was sufficient to keep him from his duty as a hospital
orderly and so my grandfather was given an honorable discharge
on 12Mar 1919.

Some soldiers in World War I saw hell on a battlefield.

Others, such as my grandfather, saw another sort of hell in
hospital wards full of comrades racked with the Spanish Influenza.

I used a variety of sources researching this post. One of them is
“Fever of War: The Influenza Epidemic in the U.S. Army During
World War I” by Carol R. Byerly, (NYU Press, 2005) which you
can preview at GoogleBooks.

WINTER, MALDEN, MA. 1953

As you can see from the above photo, I come from a long line of hardy
Maine people who thought nothing of going out to work and play in
harsh Winter weather. From left to right, that's my grandfather Floyd E.
West Sr., his father Philip J. West, and his stepmother Alphonsene
Turgeon West. The caption says "Some catch taken in Spring,1923"
and that would refer to the wildcat or bobcat slung over P.J.'s shoulder.
Of course, technically, it isn't a Winter photo but the weather conditions
are wintery.


As for myself, I take after my Mother's side of the family. I can't say all
Irish American's have a similar view but I do know both Mom and her
brother, my Uncle Ed, weren't the type to love the sight of the first
snowfall. My earliest memories of snow involve the house on Beach St.
in Malden. I have some pictures taken one winter day there. The first
is looking over towards Clapp St, which was one house away from ours.
The other is looking over towards the other side. Up until now I didn't
know what street those other buildings in the distance faced but a quick
look at Google Maps just now told me it's Springdale St.







There was a long driveway that opened up into a wide parking area
between our house and the Tedesco's next door, and in the early to mid
fifties, in the pre-snow blower age, everyone shoveled.(unless you were
lucky to know someone who drove a snowplow who'd do plow you out
when he did your street). The other photos show my Mom doing some
shoveling. I'm certain she did not do all that herself, but was probably
clearing the end of the driveway after the plow went by so that Dad
and Uncle Ed could get in when they came home from work. I suspect
my Aunt Emily took the pictures.







Meanwhile, as the adults worked, my cousins and I looked on,
mostly because we were too young to do much shoveling and besides,
we probably couldn't move much bundled in those snowsuits! But we
did make snowmen and have snowball fights and sled, having the
fun any kid has in the snow, heedless of the cruel shock that loomed
ahead of us like a tree at the bottom of the hill: adolescence and
snow shovels and the dreaded words: "Go help your father shovel the
driveway!"



Written for the 64th edition of the Carnival of Genealogy

POP'S PORTRAIT POSTCARD

I posted this picture of my grandfather Floyd Earl West, Sr. in my
series about my Road Trip vacation but thought I'd go a bit more
in depth about it now.

"Pop" served in the U.S. Army as an hospital orderly at Camp Devens
(later Fort Devens), Massachusetts in WW1 during the Spanish Influenza
epidemic of 1918. He entered the Army in April 1918 and was discharged
in March of 1919 so that gives me a timeframe on when it was taken. My
guess is he had it taken when he was on leave in November, 1917.


As I mentioned before, this is a postcard and on the back I can see that it
was taken at Avery Studios. Apparently business was good because there
is a list of 6 locations in Boston:

601 Washington St.
637 " "
361 " "

90 Court St.
129 Court St.

21 Tremont St.





Boston at that time was an active port city and railroad center and I would
think that a photography business would be very busy taking pictures of
soldiers and sailors to be sent home to loved ones. If you look at the background
behind Pop you can see it is a painting of an Army camp scene with tents and
the American flag flying proudly above it. There must have been a background
for sailors as well. I'm still trying to find a mention of Avery Studios in Boston
City directories for the period but so far no luck.

I also was struck by the chest pocket on "Pop" 's tunic. There's clearly something
in there because you can see the slight the edge of it pressing against the
cloth. Perhaps his papers or something else that "Pop" felt might be more secure
there than in his uniform's pants pockets?

As you can see, Pop never sent the postcard, instead bringing it home to his family
where it has been passed down still in great condition (The blue streaks are on the
image, not on the original, a result of some goof I made in scanning ) and now Aunt
Dot has passed it on to me.

Maybe I'm prejudiced, but "Pop" sure cut a fine figure in uniform!

THE OBITUARY OF FLOYD EARL WEST SR.

From the Norway, Me. Advertiser-Democrat February 5,
1970:


"Floyd E. West


UPTON--- Floyd Earl West, 76,
died at his home, Wednesday, January
28.

He was born April 14,1893 at South
Paris, the son of Philip J. and Clara
(Ellingwood) West.

He married the former Cora Barker.
Mr. West lived most of his life in Up-
ton and Wilsons Mills and was a re-
tired woodsman. He was a veteran of
World War I.

Surviving are his widow of Upton;
three daughters, Mrs. Malcolm Harvey
Wentworth Location, Mrs. Charles
Bargar, Uhrichsville, Ohio, Mrs. Her-
bert Balser, Milan, N.H; two sons,
Floyd E. Jr., of Abington, Mass, and
Stanley R. of Molan, N.H.; two broth-
hers, Clarence P. West of Wilsons Mills
and William Tidswell, Turner; 15
grandchildren; and a great-grandchild.

Funeral services were held Satur-
day, January 31 at 2 pm from the
Greenleaf Funeral Home, Bethel, Rev.
Bertha Burris officiating.
Burial in the spring at the Lincoln
Plantation Cemetery."

I found this clipping tucked away in the top drawer of the
dresser the other night while trying to find my old school
report cards. I immediately scanned it and saved the image,
but it wasn't until I was discussing finding the obituary with
a co-worker at the bookstore that I realized that it was
incorrect, genealogically speaking. My father did indeed have
a brother named Stanley, who was born before Dad but he
died in infancy. The Stanley R. West in the obituary is actually
his nephew, the son of my Aunt Hazel who is the "Mrs.
Malcolm Harvey" in the list of children. I was told by my
parents that Stanley's father had died and that when Hazel
married Malcolm Harvey, my grandmother raised Stanley.
A researcher might assume that there was only the one
Stanley unless they already knew the family history or had
seen the death record of the infant Stanley.

Another error but a minor one is the typo in Stanley's
residence which should be Milan, not Molan, N.H. And finally
there is how my Aunts are listed, not by their own names but
by their husbands.

The information in death notices and obituaries is usually
provided by the surviving family or family friends and often
reflects their viewpoint of the deceased and the family. So
while obituaries are a great source of family information, it's
still important to check the facts!

AN UPDATE

My cousin Diana, one of Aunt Dorothy’s daughters, reads this
blog and will occasionally send along a comment on what I’ve
written which are always fun for me because I learn something
new.

In my post about family cars I mentioned how my Dad said
he’d learned to driveon the back roads up in Maine but I
wasn’t sure if it was with a Model A or Model T Ford.
Diana sent me this:

"Bill,
Was just reading your most recent blog....and thought you
might find this tidbit interesting. When I was about 10 (so
we're talking 45 years ago!) My parents went to Maine and
towed Pop's old Model A Roadster all the way to Ohio. A
guy that lived in Freeport had bought it to restore and paid
my parents' gas expenses to go up to New England and
bring it back here ....thus rescuing it from rusting away in
the field where it had been located for years! This is
probably the same Model A that Uncle Bud learned to drive
in!

A few years ago, the man from Freeport got desperate for
money and sold the body off the car to someone else....the
other guy had a coupe and wanted a Roadster so he bought
only the body. Then, the man from Freeport died. Well, to
make a long story short, my husband and I ended up with
the chassis and engine to Pop's car and Gary is currently
building a Speedster out of it. He took pictures of early
speedsters and picked all the points that he liked best and
is building this car completely from scratch! It won't be
Pop's Roadster but at least we'll have Pop's "car" running
again, hopefully later this year!
Diana"

When I emailed Diana back to ask if I could post her
comments here, she included another great bit of
information in her reply:

"By the way..........when Gary restored our Model A Town
Sedan, Mom bought us a Flying Quail radiator cap
(traditional dressy cap) in honor of Pop. So I've always
called the Quail, Floyd!!!

Diana"

So that Model A from Maine lives on in Ohio!

AFLOAT IN GENEALOGY

Hmm. I almost forgot to enter a float myself!

Of course mine would be entitled “West in New England”
and the sides of the float would be painted to make it look like
one of the log jams I’d see on the Androscoggin River when
we visited up home. My grandfather Floyd E. West Sr. and
his father Philip Jonathan West worked around the lumber
business in their lives.

There’d be a large map of Massachusetts and Northern New
England (so far there is no evidence of any connection to
Connecticut or Rhode Island.) with three ships touching the
shore: The Mayflower at Plymouth, another 17th century
sailing ship to the north of Boston to represent my Essex
County ancestors of the Great Migration, and a 19th century
steamer between at Boston to represent my Irish McFarlands
and Whites and German Offlinchers.

My West ancestors would stand in a line down the center of
the float with the Elusive John Cutter West shrouded in a
cloud of steam(no smoking!!) since nothing is known of the
family before him, and off to either side would stand members
of the other branches of the family: Abbott, Ames, Barker,
Benson, Barrows, Coburn, Dunham, Edson, Ellingwood,
Griffith, Haskell, Hastings, Houghton, Laughton, Packard,
Richardson, Upton, and the others.

When the line reached my father, he would be joined by my
mother. Behind her would stand the assembled McFarlands
Whites and Offlinchers.

And at the front of the float would be my sister and my
brother in law’s family as well as my brother’s.

There’d be small model buildings as well to represent what
sort of work they’d done in life: a sawmill, a smithy, and a
farmhouse for my New England lines and a small elevated
railway train model to since John McFarland helped in
the construction.

And from a speaker in the back, there will issue the strains
of “Hot Cross Buns.”

As played on a flutaphone.

FLOYD E. WEST SR. AT CAMP DEVENS, SEPT,1918

When journalists talk about the possible “bird flu” epidemic, the
historical event they draw parallels to is the Great Influenza
outbreak of 1918. But by the fall of that year there had not been
any large number of cases since the spring.


Then on 8 Sept. 1918 the first case was reported at Camp Devens
in Ayer, Massachusetts. By the end of the month there were
14,000 cases of the illness and over 700 deaths attributed to it.
Camp Devens was placed under quarantine but the whole state
of Massachusetts was already swept by the disease as the
figures on this site shows.



Camp Devens’ hospital surely was not meant to deal with such a
catastrophic event and the accounts I’ve read while horrific must
pale in comparison to what my grandfather must have seen and
experienced. I wonder what he must have thought as he went
about his duties at the hospital. Growing up he must have heard
about the diptheria outbreak that had caused the deaths of six
relatives forty years before. Now he was in the midst of
something much worse where hundreds could die in a single night.
Did he wonder when he himself might begin to show symptoms
and end up a patient himself?


And yet he survived and was given a furlough at the end of
November. From what I’ve read, the epidemic began and
expanded quickly but subsided within a month and a half. By the
end of October it was over for the most part and by November
the authorities must have felt it was safe enough to allow Private
West a furlough to visit home in early December.


I can’t imagine they would have allowed it if he’d been stricken
with the pneumonia during the height of the epidemic, so my
guess is that he came down with it sometime after he returned to
Camp Devens. The Army doctors must have felt the damage to his
lungs was sufficient to keep him from his duty as a hospital
orderly and so my grandfather was given an honorable discharge
on 12Mar 1919.

Some soldiers in World War I saw hell on a battlefield.

Others, such as my grandfather, saw another sort of hell in
hospital wards full of comrades racked with the Spanish Influenza.

I used a variety of sources researching this post. One of them is
“Fever of War: The Influenza Epidemic in the U.S. Army During
World War I” by Carol R. Byerly, (NYU Press, 2005) which you
can preview at GoogleBooks.

THE HONORABLE DISCHARGE OF FLOYD E. WEST, Sr.

My earlier post was on the Enlistment document of my

grandfather Floyd Earl West Sr. Thanks to my Aunt Dot I have

a copy of it and also his Discharge. The second line with his rank

is smudged but by holding the paper up before a light I could

make out most of the writing. Also, I’m not sure if the

commandant’s last name is correct but it is the best guess I

could come up with in trying to read it.

I’m grateful my to Aunt Dot for giving me these copies and for

all the other items she’s sent along! I don’t know how difficult it
might be to obtain these elsewhere, but the information on them
is invaluable to someone researching their family history and
genealogy.

In my grandfather’s case, I googled the “Camp Devens” (which
eventually became Fort Devens) and then looked at the dates

on Pop’s papers. That along with the email that Pop had

contracted double pneumonia during his enlistment, told me

that he’d been at Camp Devens during an outbreak of the

Spanish Influenza in the fall of 1918. Quite probably he became

ill because of his duties as a hospital orderly during that time.

I’ll have more on that later.

“Honorable Discharge from the United States Army
TO ALL WHOM IT MAY CONCERN:
This is to certify that Floyd E. West
Private First Class Hospital Detachment
THE UNITED STATES ARMY, is hereby HONORABLY
DISCHARGED from the military service of the United States by
reason of Pursuant to W. D. Cir.I77 A.G. O. Nov.21/1918.

Said Floyd E. West was born in South Paris, in the State of

Maine. When enlisted he was 25 years of age and by occupation

a Farmer. He had Blue eyes, Brown hair, Medium complexion,

and was 5 feet 5 1/2 inches in height.

Given under my hand at Camp Devens Mass. this twelfth day of
March, one thousand nine hundred and nineteen.
A. O. Davis(?)
Lt. Col. M.C. U.S.A.
commanding.”

ENLISTMENT RECORD OF FLOYD E. WEST SR.

I mentioned back in July that Aunt Dot and I exchanged some
family research at my nephew Paul’s wedding. One of the items
she gave me was her childhood memories of my Dad. Another
item was a photocopy of my Grandfather West’s WW1 discharge
and his enlistment record as shown above.



I think the two papers were folded together which would explain
the dark lines across the pages. In the transcription below, I’ve
put a question mark after any entry I’m not certain about. I’ve
also italicized the handwritten information.

I received an email from my cousin Diana tonight as I was typing
this and in it she passed along information from Aunt Dot that
Pop was an orderly at the Camp Devens base hospital, that he
was only in for a short period before contracting double
pneumonia and that he was shipped home after his recovery.


I’ll have more to say on that after I’ve posted the transcription
of his discharge form.


In my reply to Diana, I remarked that today I realized that
between the service records and the memoir that Aunt Dot
gave me earlier this year I have learned more about Pop than
I ever knew before, and much more than I know about my
other grandfather!




ENLISTMENT RECORD
Name: West, Floyd E. #2722093 Grade: Private First Class

Enlisted, or Inducted, Apr.29, 1918 , at So. Paris, Me.

Serving in First enlistment period at date of discharge.

Prior service:* none

Noncommissioned officer: none(?)

Marksmanship, gunner qualification or rating: not armed

Horsemanship: not mounted(?)

Battles, engagements, skirmishes, expeditions: (left blank)

Knowledge of any vocation: Farmer

Wounds received in service: none

Physical condition when discharged: Good

Typhoid prophylaxis completed: ---------------

Paratyphoid prophylaxis completed: June 27/18

Married or single : Single

Character: Excellent

Remarks: No A.W.O.L. or absences under G.O. 45/1914.
This soldier entitled to travel pay.

Signature of soldier: Floyd E. West

John Burnette (?)
1st St. M.C. U.S.A.
Commanding Detachment

FURLOUGH2

Here’s the other two parts of my grandfather Floyd E. West Sr.’s
WW1 furlough papers for Nov.30th-Dec 10th, 1918 to visit his
family back up in Upton, Maine. Pop was a good soldier. He was
back in Camp Devens by Dec. 8th!






This document confirms what I’d been told by my folks about
Pop serving in some sort of capacity in a military base hospital.
If I’m reading it correctly, it says he held the rank of Private
First Class detached at the Medical Department at the Fort
Devens Base Hospital.




Never having been in the military myself, I don’t know if the
forms have changed much over the years but I’ve never seen a
reference to furlough papers in genealogy books and certainly not
of any from WW1.

Of course, I don’t imagine many would have survived. After all,
it was just paperwork. It was the furlough itself, the time away
from camp that was spent in relaxation or in visiting your loved
ones that was the most important thing to a soldier!

FURLOUGH1

These are images of the WWI furlough papers issued to my

grandfather, Floyd E. West Sr. that were sent to me from my

Aunt (Dot)Dorothy and Cousin Diana. I'll have more to say

about them after I post the second part tomorrow night.

FOUR GENERATIONS

I'm not certain which one of my cousins Aunt Dot is holding in
this photo, but from left to right, this is my grandfather Floyd E.
West Sr., Aunt Dot and child, and my great grandfather Philip
Jonathan (P.J.) West. The photo must have been taken in the
late forties or early fifties. P. J. passed away in 1954 at 86.

AUNT DOT'S MEMORIES3

This is the third in a series of posts that are word for word
transcriptions of 13 hand written pages given to me by my
Dad's sister Dorothy. They are her memories of their childhood
growing up in the Depression era in Oxford County, Maine.


This section deals mostly with Pop...my grandfather Floyd E.
West, Sr. and what jobs he worked at.







"Pop was always afraid of the water-afraid of drowning or of
some of us lost to it.

He had a tiny hut at Beaver Brook- across the lake from where
we were living. He tended traps there all winter crossing the
lake on snowshoes and carrying a pick-pole. When ice started
breaking up in the spring it was pretty scary watching him
leave with his heavy pack sack strapped to his back. He would
step onto a large chunk of ice and shove with his pick-pole until
he got to another chunk big enough to hold him-then step onto
it-or push the chunk out of the way and stay on the one he was
floating on. I always wondered if and when he would come back.
He was gone several days and I used to be afraid the ice would
be all gone when he was ready to return.



When Flossie was born Mother went to Bethel and stayed for
two weeks. She had made new dresses for Hazel and me and I
can still rember those dresses hanging up high on the wall. They
were orange with white daisies with bright blue centers.



While Mother was gone Pop took us out to the dam every day.
Bud & Hazel were allowed to go to the house to play with
cousins Lee and Leita but since Aunt Mabel had a girl (Ruth),
younger than me, he thought she shouldn’t have to watch two
little ones. He always took me to the longshop where he was
building a motorboat for Clarence. I took my naps in the boat
he was working on. The finished boat was named the Kiko.
The last time I saw the Kiko was about 1959/60. It was no
longer the beauty it had been.



Pop had a 9 passenger green buick, convertible, touring car.
The only time I remember riding in it was when we went to
Bethel to get mother. in the late 1930’s Pop cut that car in half
and made a farm tractor out of it. The jitter-bug was all the
rage at that time. There wasn’t money for tractors and many
people were converting old cars to use in the fields. The back
tires were big truck tires.


Among other jobs -Pop was a guide for the fishermen who
came from the big city’s and didn’t know where to catch
anything. Most of the men in town were guides. Besides
knowing where to fish - the guides did the cooking and
entertaining of these guests. Story telling was a great asset.
These men could string out some pretty outlandish yarns.


We moved into the Will Hart place when Flossie was a year
old- 1931. There was a big old barn in the field close by. The
owner had a fishing lodge where he floated his 2 cows to
every summer. In winter we kept the cows in his barn- so had
milk & butter from June to Labor Day. Bud & I loved to climb
in the loft and pitch hay onto the barn floor then jump down
into it."

AUNT DOT'S MEMORIES2

This is the second segment of my transcription of the 13 page
handwritten memories of my Aunt Dot on her and my Dad's
childhood.



"Pop" is my grandfather Floyd Earl West Sr. and "Mother"
is my grandmother Cora Berthella Barker. Hazel was my
Dad's older sister, and Flossie the youungest. "Uncle
Clarence" and "Aunt Mable" were my grand uncle Clarence
West and his wife. Uncle Clarence was the caretaker for over
fifty years at the Aziscoos Dam.


I'd heard the story about the geese from Dad when I was a kid
but I never knew the story of how he came to be called Bud nor
that he had been called "Pudge" in high school.



And I am quite certain he'd never have told us about setting the
bed on fire!



"My brother, Floyd Earl West, Jr. was probably never called by
his sir name. Hazel was taught to call him brother and it came
out budda- hence the nickname Bud. In high school at Gould
Academy, he was known as Pudge and when his class mates
ask about him to this day- -he is still Pudge!


Bud always took good care of me---



When we lived on the lake shore Hazel was in grade school and
had walk out to the dam to get on the bus. Mother often went
to meet the bus and walk Hazel home. If she got to talking with
Aunt Mable it was sometimes awhile before they returned. Bud
was left in charge and most of the time we would be taking a
nap when she left. One time we got to playing with a box of
matches on Pop’s bed and set it on fire. When mother got home
the wall and bed were pretty well in flames. Bud and I were in
the doorway. He was buttoning my coat.(We were in the
neighborhood of being 3 & 5 years old as Flossie hadn’t been
born yet.) She got water from the lake and put the fire out. We
had a constant reminder as there was a large wood clock on a
shelf above the bed and one end of the clock was charred.



We always had lots of snow and loved to pile it up and make
tunnels and snow houses. One winter Hazel, Bud, & I made a
snow cave and Bud crawled inside and was cleaning it out
when the whole thing caved in on him. We were frantic trying
to uncover him. Yelled for Mother and she came down the hill
and dug him out. Was I scared!!



One of our favorite things to do was to battle with Uncle
Clarence’s geese. That goose and gander came up the lake
every day and always got out of the water at our place. We
were told to stay up the steps where they couldn’t reach us but
we just knew we could get the best of them. We made plans to
stand back to back-one of us had a broom and the other a
clothes stick to beat these geese back to the lake. They went
back all right-each carrying a screaming kid by the seat of our
pants. Mother always rescued us before they got in the water.
Our back “cheeks” had an awful lot of big black spots but we
were already planning how we would get the upper hand and
win tomorrow. "

AUNT DOT'S MEMORIES

This the first in a series of posts which are my transcriptions
of 13 handwritten pages. They were written by my Aunt Dot
 (Dorothy West Bargar) and given to me yesterday when we attended
my nephew Paul's wedding.

Some explanations of the names mentioned: Phillip was
Phllip Jonathan West, Dot's grandfather and my great
grandfather. Hazel was her older sister and Flossie(Florence)
the youngest.

"Dingle" is a new term to me and sounds like a shed.


"Our family lived on Back Street in Upton from about 1830 to
1927. I have a picture of Bud and Hazel, taken Aug., 1926 that
was given me by Pop’s cousin Louie West (his dad was great
uncle Paul -Philip’s brother). This was the first I heard that I
ever lived in Upton. My birthday was in April of that year.


From conversations, I think I remember we probably moved
to Magalloway for a short time, then to Wilsons Mills. Phillip
stayed in Magalloway.


The first place I remember living was in a little square cabin on
the shore of Azichoos lake back a trail from the dam house.
There was a wagon trail past an old stone quarry and a foot
path along the lake shore. The quarry was home of the bear
that we always looked out for. The cabin was partitioned off in
one corner-a room big enough for a white iron double bed and a
built in double bed with a bunk (half size) up under the eaves.
There was a path between the beds wide enough for a dresser.
The remainder of the cabin was one L shaped room (except the
L was upside down & backwards) (end p.1)


The back door opened to a covered walk that led to a dingle
where we kept outdoor tools and dry wood for the fire. The
space from the door to the dingle was about the width of a
standard sidewalk. I have always remembered the dingle
because that is where the bag of toys that Santa brought was
kept. I only remember one Christmas that we received presents
and must have been when I was three because Flossie was not
yet in the family.


Don’t remember what Hazel& Mother got. Pop got a necktie,
Bud got pocket knife. (he would have been 5 years old) and I got
a pull toy -it was a green platform with red wheels & a red pull
string and had a white celluloid lamb on the platform. We also
got a tiddle wink game, which at my age was a great failure at,
but liked it anyway. That was probably 1929.


In years later we always decorated the house and had fun
making our decorations from newspapers and magazines. For
many years we had carefully saved the few fold out paper
Christmas bells and a few pieces of red & green rope that had
come with the family before any time that I recall."(end p 2)