Hello there Bryant Service Club!

Once again it is a hearty thanks to you for remembering me at Christmas. You ask that I let you know how and when the package arrived. Well, it was a bit late for Christmas 1943 and is a few months early for it! It arrived a little worse for the long trip, but the contents were undamaged and needless to say, it was much appreciated by me and the boys of the hut, last evening.

My address has been changing, and until recently I hadn't felt that I could hang my hat and expect it to be there for very long. I enclose my current address.

The last time I wrote you, from N.H., I was very snug in "off the post" quarters, living with my ever loving wife. But this time I feel that I am at least much closer to the war, if not actually in it. By the time you receive this letter, I shall be a proud poppa, for our first is due the 12th of March. To your faculty who have been there for several years it may be "pointed out by the numbers" that I was married to Mary B. Ronne, also a Bryant graduate.

Well, English countryside is very beautiful, the people are as hospitable as their very severe war time rationing will permit. Just about everything is rationed--even handkerchiefs, and YES CANDY! America will look doubly good to me.

All for now, thanks again, and best regards to all, from,

1st Sgt. Louis C. Martelle
A. S. N. 31050857
2d S. A. D. A. P. O. #635
c/o Postmaster, N.Y., N.Y.
[Transcription ends]

34TH BASE HEADQUARTERS & AIR BASE SQUADRON
GRENIER FIELD
MANCHESTER, NEW HAMPSHIRE

June 12, 1943.

Dear Bryant Service Club Members:

Once again, a package, and a thank you note. I feel awfully guilty each time I say thank you, for the least I could do is to drop you a line once in a while and let you know what the score is on the “home front”. However, this is such a busy place, with so many little picky problems that require hours of tracking down, that the days go by, and I just don’t get to writing the way I used to.

Maybe you folks know, maybe not, but “old sarge” got himself married on the first of May. Yes, a Bryant girl - - Mary B. Ronne, of Pawtucket, R. I. It was one of those fussy weddings that you read about, and swear that you never will get yourself mixed up in. However, it was a load of fun when it was all over with, and will bring very pleasant memories of my squadron, and their thoughtfulness in later years.

Our squadron has taken two overnight hikes of about 33 miles. It was interesting, and although there were about 300 blisters half way through the first hike, the boys all survived and seemed to enjoy camping out all night by a fire, with no tent, and with only one blanket to roll up in. Yours truly made a little lean-to out of pine boughs, heaped the “floor” with dead fern and grass, got myself a buddy, made a double roll and was quite snug all night. Before starting the return hike, the Chaplain and seven of us climbed one of the local mountains. I was really tired when the last mile rolled along, and scarcely remember walking the distance I was so all in. The mountain climb seemed like fun, but sapped up a lot of needed energy. However, we averaged 4 2/5 miles per hour which is really walking, especially when you have a pack on your back.

Best regards to the Faculty and Students,
Louis C. Martelle
1st Sgt. A. C. [Transcription ends]

34th BASE HQ. & AIR BASE SQUADRON
GRENIER FIELD
MANCHESTER, NEW HAMPSHIRE

March 18, 1943.

BRYANT SERVICE CLUB
One Young Orchard Avenue,
Providence, Rhode Island

Dear Gang:

Thank you for the very interesting letter on campus gossip, and Bryant news in general. I am especially pleased to note that courses have been added that will enable the enlisted man or officer candidate – elect to further himself through training received while on a civilian status. If you have a fairly good knowledge of military correspondence it will be a great help in securing an office position, and it is there that a good many of the ratings are held. With the basic fundamentals of proper Military Psychology typing, etc, you can concentrate on drilling, stripping, and assembling of weapons, gas, first aid, and camouflage courses. They are all extremely interesting. They would have to be to keep me up until two in the morning just assembling or stripping a submachine gun, blindfolded, just for the practice! In fact the other day my duties as First Sergeant got me out of bed (a very comfortable one at that) at 4:30 AM, and 2:30 the following morning found me very busily working out a camouflage problem on a clay model that I have compiled from pictures.

Now a little news from the “home front”. Miss Mary B. Ronne was a graduate from Bryant. I used to go back and forth to college with her, and it looks as though another Bryant romance has blossomed, for on May 1st we are to be married here at the post chapel. With the pack of “Indians” I have under my supervision, I rather imagine that it will be rather an elaborate affair, for my Commanding Officer has deemed that the affair calls for a “must” formation. That in itself will fill the chapel to an overflow.

Well, thanks for remembering me. The address as you may gather is correct. Just how long it will continue to be correct will depend upon the War Department. Best regards to the faculty and to all the members of the Service Club.

Very truly yours,

LOUIS C. MARTELLE,
1st Sergeant. [Transcription ends]

34TH BASE HQ. & AIR BASE SQUADRON
GRENIER FIELD
MANCHESTER, NEW HAMPSHIRE

December 8, 1942.

Bryant Service Club,
Bryant College,
Providence, R. I.

Hello there!

A Merry Christmas to all of you at Bryant College. Yes, I received the package containing two boxes of delicious chocolate covered cherries. We here in the office are enjoying then very much, needless to say.

For us, business goes on much in the same busy routine, and although we are in the zone of interior there are endless details to be accomplished, and there is really very little time for play.

For quite some time I have hoped to be home at a time when Bryant was open, but all my short visits to Pawtucket have been on a Sunday, and since it is necessary to be back in camp by Monday morning at 0600 to call formation, it just is impossible to drop in. Maybe one of these days I shall take a much needed furlough and drop in to visit with all my former teachers, and you of the Service Club.

With every best wish for a pleasant holiday season, I remain,

Very truly yours,

Louis C. Martelle
1st Sgt.,
34th Base Hq & AB Sq [Transcription ends]

October 24, 1942.

Bryant Service Club
Bryant College
Providence, R.I.

Hello there!

It looks as though someone, somewhere slipped up on the detail. Yes, I would recommend KP for a week.

The folks at home forwarded to me a card which was sent out by Bryant service Club stating that the last package sent was not acknowledged. I received it in excellent condition, and was very grateful for it. In fact I sat right down and answered it, but didn’t’ answer to the Bryant Service Club, but to one of the faculty. I reckon it was at a busy time and slipped someone’s mind.

Since that date I have been promoted to First Sergeant. It is a job with many headaches, but a job that presents many interesting problems in dealing with men, both good and bad. I find it extremely fascinating, and hope that somewhere along the line I do some good. However, being the “Mother” of a squadron surely keeps one very busy. For an example: Last week the Major, my commanding officer, suggested that I handle the painting of the mess hall (130’ x 30’) and choose my own color scheme and do just what I pleased just as long as I kept within a prearranged price limit. It was fun planning colors, buying drape material, and actually supervising the making and painting. One of the cooks, a natural cartoonist, has put several sketches of the mess personnel on the walls, and I await with eager anticipation the inspection by the Base Administrative Inspector next Tuesday. It is the only mess hall on the field that has been painted on the interior, and he should be extremely surprised. However, that detail is but one of many in the course of a day. I feel qualified to take charge of anything from minding babies to being best man at a wedding; form simple plumbing difficulties to very complex status reports on personnel. Oh yes, I am a right hand man to Dorothy Dix, only she doesn’t know it.

On the 21st of next month, one of the leading banks in Manchester will have on display some of my work in clay. The theme is “Don’t Talk.”, or the “Civilian Quizz Program”. I have completed a soldier seated, and am making about eight civilian figures, all apparently asking questions. From each figure will be a runner with the question on the end of the runner. The figures stand about eight inches high, and it is quite a bit of work, but I enjoy it as a hobby in my room after work of the day is through. There aren’t too many evening s when there is free time, for the unexpected is always coming up.

The people of Manchester have treated most of the soldiers very cordially, and well they might, for we spend almost all of our money in town, and have brought a mild degree of prosperity to the townsfolk, in addition to the current boom. I have been entertained a good deal, and several of my boys have found the “right girl”, have settled down to an almost normal life. How long it will last, I don’t dare guess.

Incidentally, my present home address, for the records is s/o Mrs. Louis J. G. Martelle, 75 Pequot Road, Pawtucket, R. I., and any mail you may wish to send can be sent there. I receive the Bryant Alumni regularly, and quite often I see an item of some former classmate.

While at Bryant, I traveled with William Gavitt of Cranston. Bill is now a Captain in the Marines, somewhere in the Pacific according to the latest reports from his folks.

All for now, it is way beyond my bed time, and inasmuch as I haven’t done very much typing since I became 1st sgt, this workout has really taken me over the coals.

Very truly yours,

LOUIS C. MARTELLE,
1st Sgt,
34th Base Hq & AB Sq. [Transcription ends]