Jeannette.
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Jeannette counted upon receiving an answer to her letter about the first of March. She waited patiently until the seventh, then there was a great rain and the creek was so swollen they had no mail until the tenth; and even then, among the letters and papers that came, there was no letter from Italy.
She reasoned: he is well and fighting again; he has not gotten my letter; the censor held it because of my comments upon the war.
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Lieutenant Allen was in the hospital at Verona until the twentieth of April, 1918, when he was discharged as an incurable, his lungs having been horribly lacerated by a soft-nosed bullet.
[pg 31] When discharged from the hospital he was taken to Genoa and there placed aboard ship and sent to Liverpool; and on a returning transport which had brought over fifteen hundred Canadians, he and forty-seven other helpless, war-wrecked men, were returned to Montreal, Canada, the city where they had enlisted.
On Sunday, the twenty-sixth of May, he arrived in Lexington and to keep from frightening his mother, by a mighty effort managed to walk from a taxicab to his father’s door and into the house; when he had a severe coughing spell which prostrated him. His father and the servants carried him to his own room; while his mother lay unconscious on a lounge where they had placed her.
A little space was given to his return, his war record and present precarious condition in the Lexington and Louisville papers. A few of his old friends called and not being able to see him, left cards and sent flowers. Some of the men he had known were on their way to Europe, some already in France and one of his friends, Lieutenant Gardner, had been killed. The attention of the public was on those over there or leaving—not upon the wounded and disabled who were being returned.
For several weeks he seemed to improve, as the weather was pleasant and he had the most careful nursing. But one night he had a severe hemorrhage and after it was checked his doctor informed his parents that there was no chance for his recovery. He did not suffer greatly, but grew slowly weaker until he knew the end was near.