Relatives of Ray Lieferman, who has been wounded in France are in receipt of an interesting letter written by him when in the hospital. He writes: “Just had my supper and am in my room with a partner of mine. We are in a large five story building which they are using for a hospital, and four of us are in a room. This leaves me in the best of health, and am happy and contented. My shoulder is feeling fine and I expect to be out in a very short time. It makes a fellow get kind of lonesome when he is back away from the lines with no guns cracking or no shells whistling and it is so quiet. It is very clean and nice and the nurses are so good to everyone. The Red Cross man brings us cigarettes and magazines around we have a great plenty of food stuffs. There is also a Red Cross theatre here which has nice moving pictures and everything is just splendid. I am doing all I can but a little money sure would help me. When we are in the lines a fellow is just simply hungry all the time and we sure eat our share of corn beef or corn willies as we call it. When we are all home Dad would tell us that we would be glad to eat bread and water someday. Well, I’ve beat that; I made a record for I hiked seven nights straight on a can of beans, a can of corn beef water and hardtack. But of course it is all in the game. A fellow used to think a little cut of a broken arm was something awful, as well as a little blood. The night I got wounded I bandaged up two of my comrades who were wounded so badly that they could not move. Then I carried three out of the woods who were on stretchers. First I had my wound dressed. Of course it pained me but we always help the comrade who is hardest hit. I walked to a hospital a kilometer away as that was only a first aid station where I had been fixed up. But as I said before, it is all in the game. Everybody learns sooner or later by experience. Now I will tell you all about how I got wounded. You see we were camped by a road about three hundred feet on one side of the lines. Our extra wagons and our guns were up to the line and there are always some men back resting and doing the work in the rear. Right along the road on the opposite side from us were twelve six inch rifles. They fire about twelve miles so they are always a little way back. A little way past them were some dugouts but we do not sleep in them as they are damp and a few shells dropping once in a while doesn’t bother us much anyway. Some French soldiers were in one a few nights before and one had started a fire. The German planes observed it and so they saw the guns also. So that evening they came over well guided by the firs. They Bombed for the guns and missed them and we were so close by that they got us. There were four of us in a put tent and I had lost my pack. It went up with the guns by mistake and so four of us bunked together. We all had gone to sleep and all at once I woke up and said: “Fellows.” We all listened and could hear a broche plane coming nearer. We knew we could not make the dugouts as they were too far away just then he dropped a bomb about a hundred yards away. Another one went off about three hundred feet away and a third just a rod from out tent. We all got hit at the same time. One was hit behind the ear and another helped him away while I helped the other two get bandaged up. I was lucky but still I would have been out of luck if there was any gas because my mask had been shot to pieces by a piece of shrapnel. I grabbed my sound comrades’ masks and put them around their necks. But there was no gas. You should see me now sitting in here in my slippers, pajamas and bathrobe just John D. Rockefeller – only I am only one of Uncle Sam’s buck privates. Liefermann is a member of the 76^th F. A. Battery F. A.E.F. He left Hibbing with the Battery B boys and has been in France since last summer.  Originally published in the Hibbing Tribune.

Editor’s Note: We do not have a photograph of Ray Lieferman.