Mexican-American War Veteran

Located in the Railroad Car

This war excitement is all bunk, you know.

I saw it at the station. Everyone helloing and talking brave and prancing about in bandbox uniforms. It’s not that way at all, you know. War is a dirty business and a lot of those fine young men back there are not coming home whole,  may be not coming home at all.

I did my time in the ranks as a volunteer in Mexico in ’48. It was as mean a time in my life as I never want to see again.  It is all weariness and hunger and lice as big as rats. If the enemy don’t shoot you or bayonet you or run over you with their horses, you die of the itching or the bad food or the lack of water or the bloody flux.  I don’t ever want to see shoulder straps and brass buttons for the rest of my life.

And those boys back there will know exactly what I mean in a few months. You mind what I say, now.