John Fetters
Born 02/05/1922
Interviewed by Matt McGill and Julie Fetters
Recorded on 10/07/2006
Transcribed on 11/18/06-11/26/2006 by Matt McGill
Matt McGill: Today is October the 6th, 2006. My name is Matt McGill and I am interviewing John Fetters at his home in Ohio. Mr. Fetters is my grandfather. He is 84 years old and was born on February 4th, 1922. Mr. Fetters served in WWII and he was in the 710th Ordinance, 10th Mountain Division. He held the following rank of sergeant.
MM: Can you tell me were you enlisted of did you draft?
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John Fetters: I was drafted.
MM: Where were you living at the time?
JF: I was living in Highland County, Ohio.
MM: Why were you put into the branch of 10th Mountain Division?
Julie Fetters: Did you choose the army or did they choose you?
JF: No, well, when you first go in - you go into the army and I went from Fort Thomas, Kentucky to Camp Roberts, California to take my training. [JF: Basic training] that was six weeks of basic training, then I was shipped back to Camp Hale, Colorado. We were on a train. I was the only one who got off up there. Snow about 4 feet deep, nobody to meet me, and in a little while a weasle came to pick me up. In fact, I was one of the first ones to go into the camp. So when we finally got the weasle and went into the camp to pick up my mattress and supplies, you know, to take over to the barracks, the altitude was so high, I was a huffin’ and a puffin’ but I made it alright. A lot of them that went in was shipped out cause as many was shipped in. Then, from there, I took an eight weeks skiing course we’d go out eight weeks all day long and climb the mountains at an altitude of 10,000, we went up as high as 13,000, 14,000 feet. We’d climb all day and ride back in. You were allowed three spills by the time you started until you finished, and I think everybody used them all.
Julie Fetters: What happened if you spilled more?
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JF: If you spilled one?
Julie Fetters: If you did more than three?
JF: Well, you were allowed three, see. You had to have to qualify. I managed to get through it that way and qualified as a ski trooper. Now, we had different categories in the division which was snowshoeing, rock climbing, mule packing, cross skiing, you know. Then we went during the training on what they call the six weeks maneuver; at 20 below zero. We were not allowed to have any heat or anything whatsoever. This was a training camp. They had never had a snow division before and they learned a lot. We had shoepacks - these little mountain tents and a lot of them took their shoepacks and set outside the tent or that is outside of their sleeping bags and they froze solid and they couldn’t get them on and they had frozen feet and they had trouble taking them back into camp and everything, but I managed to survive that and I thought, “well, I went this far I’ll go ahead.”
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MM: Had you ever had any previous experience skiing?
JF: No, none whatsoever, didn’t know the first principle at all. We had training on skis just the same as you would in regular training. They took us into a little grove, seven foot skis, took us into the middle of it and we put ‘em on and tell us to get out of there; it was a problem, but we made it. I might say it took three Rocky Mountain engines to pull us up there to Pando, Colorado and they were all up front, ‘cause on passenger trains, they can’t put ‘em on like they do on freight. They put one behind, one in the middle, and one in front. But these three Rocky Mountain engines were up front to pull us over the pass, see, and Camp Hale was all new. It was all fired by coal furnaces - two in each barracks, and the smoke they called it Pando smoke, I mean, you had the Pando cough all the time because the smoke just hovered in that valley, you know, and it was an experience. We learned a lot, and that’s about all I can say about that.
MM: During WWII, where were you in Europe?
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JF: I was the Mediterranean Theater of Operations - that was in Italy.
MM: Do you remember arriving, and what it was like there and staying there?
JF: Yeah, but some of that I wouldn’t want to tell. We arrived at Naples. All the little kids were out there, you know, greeting you and everything, but the things that they asked me you wouldn’t want to tell on this.
Julie Fetters: Give us an example.
JF: Well, they wanted to know if you wanted a girlfriend, you know; big sister, something like that.
MM: What was your job assigned to you?
JF: I guess you would have to call it a small arms supply clerk, because I went back to California, San Anita racetrack for a six weeks course and small arms, and we stayed at the San Anita racetrack. In fact, we slept in the horse stalls - two to a horse stall, and it was really nice, cause San Anita’s racetrack is a famous racetrack but the army had taken it over then and a lot of them would come in at night, you know, maybe a little high or something and they’d kick the walls, you know, like a bucking horse, you know, making noise and everything, you know, and that’s about it.
MM: Did you see any combat?
JF: Yes I was in two campaigns - the North Apennines and the Po Valley. We were a back up crew, you know, to keep everything a going and 10th Mountain Division is what spearheaded the war over in Italy and Europe and European Theater of Operations. They got a lot of the credit for helping win the war over there.
MM: What role did your unit and the 10th Mountain division play during the war?
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JF: Supplying the division. Keeping everything supplied to all the troops in the Division, you know, to make sure that they had everything that they needed, you know, and I think that pretty well covers it.
MM: Were there many casualties in your unit?
JF: Yeah, there was quite a few in the unit. I don’t know just how many there was, but there’s a memorial up by Camp Hale, Colorado, that’s got everybody listed on it. One famous skier that was in it was Sergeant Tobble Kobble from Norway. One of the famous skiers, he had the world’s record high jump, and he was killed in service and I’m just glad my name wasn’t on it.
MM: Can you tell me a couple of your most memorable experiences?
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JF: I think the most memorable would be on maneuvers. While we were on maneuvers at 20 below zero, for six weeks with no heat and it’s an experience I never want to go through again, but I got through it all right and a lot of them didn’t. The high altitude affected so many of them; they had to ship them out. They shipped as many out as the shipped in all the time till they got used to the high altitudes. I think if I remember when you were out there, you experienced the high altitude and how hard it was to breathe and so forth and so on.
Julie Fetters: How did you stay warm?
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JF: Well, we had equipment that was out of this world, it was all to be tested, you know, and trained. We had the best equipment there was in the world to test out, you know, and that pretty well covers that.
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MM: Were you ever awarded any medals or citations?
JF: Well, yes. I’m no Bronze star or Silver star or anything like that, because I wasn’t wounded or any casualty, which I’m glad of, but I think I had it listed on your sheet maybe rifle marksmanship and so forth and good conduct medal and the stars on the campaign ribbon, which was the North Apennines and the Po Valley. That’s when the drive started on through to river ridge and that was all done by the rock climbers.
MM: During the war, how did you stay in touch with your family?
JF: Corresponding by letters and sometimes by telephone.
MM: What was the food like at your camp?
JF: The food was great. Our food was really great. We didn’t have calisthenics like they do at other training camps, you know, cause up at the high altitude they couldn’t take it so we were more or less fortunate to not go through all of that calisthenics, you know, and which I thought was great and we had entertainers come in which would be like Rita Hayworth or Joe Lewis. Joe Lewis was supposed to box three rounds he got through one round and that was it he conked out. Rita Hayworth boy she got everybody’s eye, you know, and we had a lot of entertainers, service clubs helped entertain us and everything and they brought the girls in ever so often, you know, so that you would have, you know, a sociable life and so forth.
MM: Did you have plenty of supplies or was there ever a shortage?
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JF: No never no shortage like there is today.
MM: Did you feel pressure or were you under any stress during your training and life at war?
JF: Well no, maybe sometimes while we were in the Alps and Italy when we were back of the lines there at night and the guns were going over your head, you know, and everything and you could hear them, you know, and I suppose you would have to say you were under a little stress then, but other than that no.
MM: Was there something special you did for good luck?
JF: No not really I didn’t carry no rabbit foot or anything like that.
MM: How did people entertain themselves when they weren’t fighting?
JF: Well poker games, and crap games and everything like that and just living a social life among all your friends and everything.
MM: What did you do when you were on leave or when others were on leave?
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JF: Usually when I was on leave I’d try and if I had enough time to come back home and visit. Course when you were over seas, you didn’t get to do that see but see the war ended while we were in Italy and so they brought us back since we were a new division and was going to train us for flatland training and they were gonna send us to Camp Swift, Texas, which they did and we had mules all over the state of Texas cause there was no way of controlling them down there, you know. We had UI don’t know how many mules in the division up at Camp Hale and it cost a three cent stamp to get you there and $160 to get the mule. So they thought more of the mule than they did you and there were regular mule packers that took care of the mules and hulled the howitzers and the guns and everything, and if it hadn’t been for the mules, I don’t know what they would have done.
MM: Can you describe all of the places you traveled to during your service?
JF: Well, I went to Venice, Trieste. We used to go up to Trieste in Austria [Italy] to do skiing because there wasn’t enough snow in the Alps to tell about really and so I visited as much as I could in the foreign countries and the same way when I was back in this country.
MM: Which of those places did you like the best or did you enjoy being at the most?
JF: I would say that Trieste and Venice would be the two popular places.
MM: Do you recall any humorous or unusual events?
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JF: I don’t recall off hand. Maybe I’ll think of something a little later on.
MM: Do you have any photographs with you that you would like to talk about or share?
JF: Oh, I have photographs on things here, you know, old papers and everything like that I’ll let you pick out and decide what you want and so forth and so on.
MM: Did you ever pull pranks on others or did they ever pull pranks on you?
JF: Well, yes. At one time I had my bed wheeled outside, you know, while I was asleep, you know. and there’s lots of things they pull pranks on you.
MM: Do you remember any specific people from pictures or your time in the war that you would like to talk about.
JF: Well, now I have a friend in New Hampshire - George Greegle who was actually a skier in his boyhood days and he growed up and I went up to visit him and he showed me the ski jump where they jumped off of. He was a high jumper, you know, and he’s still living today. I correspond with him at Christmas time all the time and there’s a lot of them that I correspond with with Christmas cards and so forth.
MM: What did you think of the officers and your fellow soldiers?
JF: I think that the officers we had were super because they was just one of you. In other words they did not try to pull your rank on you or anything like that like some of the other outfits, you know, and everybody got along real good including all the officers, some of the higher ups, and the generals right on down and there was no problem whatsoever.
MM: Did you ever keep a personal Diary?
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JF: No not really no.
MM: Do you recall the day that you service ended?
JF: Yes. When we come back here and I had to spread out my discharge I spent the time in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, which was a federal prison and I stayed there until I was discharged I was in the cell blocks right with the prisoners which were the worst they were I guess but I got along fine with them. I was right in the cells with them and so forth and so on; locked them up at night and everything but I always felt that if I ever get out of here, I never want to be back.
MM: The weeks after you left and after that what did you do, did you visit people?
JF: Well yes I went back to the family farm I spent some time there then and see I wasn’t married until later on and really there wasn’t a whole lot I mean he had friends to go see and everything it was a whole different type of life then what we were living then.
MM: When you came back did you start working again or did you go to school?
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JF: No I didn’t go to college but I worked over at the Air Force base in Dayton for quite a while and then I came back and got into the farming business and that’s what I spent the rest of my life doing.
MM: Did you join a Veterans organization?
JF: Yes I belong to the American Legion all the Veterans organization, VFW and I belong to all them. I go to the VA regular all the time their supposed to take care of the veterans and everything; in fact, that’s where I get all my prescriptions and everything like that and their supposed to really take care of you. I think they do a good job of it.
MM: What did you do as a career after the war?
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JF: Farming.
MM: Did your military experience influence your thinking about war, or war in general?
JF: No.
MM: What kinds of activities does your post or association have?
JF: Well they’ve got entertainment going on all the time they put on feeds and everything and they...
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Julie Fetters: Are you talking about his division or about like those organizations he belongs to?
MM: Organizations.
JF: What’s this now?
Julie Fetters: Well, like you have reunions for the 10th Mountain Division.
JF: Yeah. But they haven’t … they had a 10th Mountain Division organization. I kept up with it for a while, but I finally dropped out of it because they just kept adding on and adding on and it got so expensive, you know. And I went to a reunion or two and there were just a lot of them that didn’t show up, you know. Especially the ones that you knew and so we just dropped out of that.
MM: How did your experience in the service affect your life afterwards?
JF: I don’t think it affected my life whatsoever because war is not for the average people but we were on a little different scale and I enjoyed all of it. The training and the skiing and testing everything and that was really what we were supposed to do. And when we went over to the Mediterranean theater, we rode on what they called the USS America. That was a passenger liner that was transferred to a troop ship. I think there were about 8,000 of us on there. I worked down in the hole where they had all of the fruit and everything. I got seasick. So I eat fruit and stuff and everything and kept something in my stomach to upchuck all the time. Some of them poor guys laid in them bunks all the time eight days going across the water.
MM: Was there anything else you’d like to talk about, about your war time experience or anything before or after the war?
JF: No, not really I don’t think. No, huh uh. I’ve got a lot of books and things from the 10th Mountain Division here and tapes and so forth but it’s interesting to read and study about what they done and everything. But, no, I don’t think it affected me whatsoever.
MM: Can you tell me about your bathing conditions or how you cleaned up during your time in the war?
JF: Well, that varied. They usually had, they were portable showers, you know, and of course latrines were all dug ahead, you know, and so forth. But then we got new clothing after each shower, you know, and some of it was kind of crude I’ll tell you. Water was maybe cold so forth and so on. You couldn’t expect anything better. We had to go along with it.
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MM: After the war did you ever ski again?
JF: Yeah I did some, yeah. But I haven’t kept it up which I should have done, invested money out at Vail, Colorado and places like that Aspen. But a lot of them put money in it and they tried to sweat it out and sweat it out, but they couldn’t get anywhere so they just dropped out of it. So if I’d have put money in that today, look where I’d have been. I’d have been a millionaire today ‘cause that, some of them stuck it out, you know. That’s what they’re doing now. They’re big wheels at Vail and Aspen. Places like that, which is Millionaire Row.
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MM: Do you want to go back to the question about humorous or unusual events? Can you think of any?
JF: No not right off hand no. I don’t know what they’d be.
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MM: Can you tell me what a weasle is?
JF: A weasle is a snow vehicle. It’s on tracks was made by the Studebaker Corporation and they had thousands of them at Camp Hale that they were testing all the time they would go over the top of the snow ,you know, and they had sleds they pulled behind them and hulled equipment on them and everything. We had to maintain a lot of them and take care of them and so forth. It was quite a vehicle I’ll tell you. I don’t know whether they still have any anywhere now or not.
MM: Was there any difference in the food you got in training camp and the food you got during battles and combat?
JF: Oh yes the food was a lot different. The food that we had at Camp Hale was very very good and then when we got over seas well then you eat a lot of rations, sea rations and so forth like that. We went on a ship from Leghorn down to Florence I think it was and the food was terrible, the latrines and everything were on top the wind was blowing everything right through on you and everything. It wasn’t a laugh at all but when we first landed at Naples we stayed at a what I would call a castle maybe; slept on the cement floors with sleeping bags and so forth until we got our orders to where we were gonna go so forth and so on. It was quite an experience I’ll say that.
MM: Did the war have any positive affects on you after?
JF: I really don’t think so other than being away from home for so long a length of time. We were entirely a different outfit you see. They weren’t as strict on us as they were the rest of them because they knew that we were gonna have a rough life in the mountains and cold weather and so forth and so on testing equipment so I don’t think that it really had any positive affect on me.
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MM: Do you think the war helped you mature as a person?
JF: Definitely it would have to because it was an entirely different life you see and you went from boyhood to manhood. It would affect you that way.
MM: Earlier you talked about how you had mules. Can you tell me what the mules were used for?
JF: The mules were used to haul your weapons like your howitzers and everything up to the battle lines, you know. They were really the key to the whole thing I think because one mule would hull to of the wheels and the other one would carry the barrel and the other one would carry the other part of the howitzer, the big guns and so forth. The mules were taken very good care of by the mule packers. They had the best food in the world and they were treated like kings; they were treated better than the troops were I think.
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MM: Did you ever have to rock climb?
JF: No, no rock climbing or snowshoeing or anything like that the only thing that I was in was the skiing part of it. See they had different sections they had snowshoeing, they had rock climbing, skiing, let’s see what else, the mule packing and so forth and so on, but you had to pick a field and stick with it. So that’s what we tried to do. We had calisthenics on skis, we had to do an about face ¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬on skis and so forth, on a seven foot ski that’s not easy to do.
MM: How did you get all of the equipment up the mountains?
JF: Well that was done by the mule, weasles, any motorized vehicle that could go in the snow, you know, so all of that was continuing to be tested while we were out on maneuvers and that was quite an experience that was. Well our equipment was well it was superb really because we had the best equipment there was as far as clothing and so forth cause we were testing it all out in the cold weather see so when we got into the Alps and so forth over into the Mediterranean but when we got over there, there wasn’t enough snow to do much and northing but mud and slop and so a lot of the equipment that we tested just didn’t prove out.
MM: Since you said you never had any previous experience skiing why do you think you were chosen to be a part of the 10th mountain division?
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JF: That’s a $64 question. They claim that everyone was a volunteer, but I wasn’t a volunteer. I guess I was picked out of the group just to be one of them to go up there. Really in a way I’m glad it turned out that way because it’s an experience that you just can’t imagine living in high altitude, snow country all the time, and I would say enjoy what you’re doing even if it was wartime.
MM: How did you stay warm or were you cold the whole time?
JF: We had heavy clothing all the time. We had sleeping bags that were out of this world. We had what they called the pup tent two men to a tent when were out on maneuvers and we’d go to bed at night and wake up in the morning and it would be under snow. It was an entirely different life and it’s just hard to explain. We had what they called shoepacks but we finally learned to put them in the sleeping bag with us because if you set them out in the tent they would freeze solid and you couldn’t get them back on; then they had to hull them back into camp with frozen feet and it was other word you had to learn a lot how to take care of yourself plus testing all the equipment.
