August 24th, 1918
Major Donovan is over every few days to have his wound attended to and incidentally to see his brother Tim, who is a surgeon with the Buffalo Unit. Today he gave me a piece of news that came as a shock though hardly as a surprise—the orders are out to make Colonel McCoy a Brigadier General and he is to leave us. He has been with us less than four months yet I feel as if I had known him for forty years, and this war is going to be a different sort of thing for me lacking his presence. But the staying thing about life is that institutions go on even though men may pass. My thoughts turned to the regiment.
“Who is likely to be Colonel?” I asked.
“We are all united on Mitchell,” said the Major, “and I think General McCoy will be able to arrange it for us.”
“I have always thought that General McCoy can do anything he sets out to do. As for Mitchell, with the possible exception of yourself, Major, there is no man I had rather see have it.”
“Oh, Hell, Father, I don’t want to be Colonel. As Lieutenant Colonel I can get into the fight and that’s what I’m here for. We all want Mitchell.”
“You are a selfish creature, Bill. Did you ever see anybody more contented in action than the man you want to tie up to a telephone?”
“Well, somebody has to be tied up to the telephone, McCoy didn’t like it, nor MacArthur. And then, as you know, they can always find some reason to get away from it and have a little excitement.”
VITTEL
August 29th, 1918