June 13, 1952
The 4077th to the 43rd, Korea
Dear, dear, dear Dean,
You've been gone for almost three weeks now and I miss you with each passing day. I miss your wit and giggles or how we ran to Rosie's to forget many things, although the still was something a little more local. I miss how you would make sure that this camp was safe or have your men play nurses or orderlies when we were swamped with the wounded. I miss everything about you. That month you stayed here was amazing and I hope to see you in one piece when you return here, whenever that may be. I know that Daddy likes to keep you busy when the war gets heavy.
I've heard news from your end and there is news on this end as well. I'll start with yours, things that I heard in your last letter and from around, and the move on to the morale booster here. There might be news that you have not yet heard, so bear with me, Dean. I'm sorry if I got to it first! I can't help it sometimes and always need to get ahead of myself. Colonel Potter does get a lot from I-Corp.
So, I've heard that Daddy has been promoted to general after almost thirty years of being a colonel! I know that this promotion was not of his doing and that he hates it so (I can tell), although I think it's about time. Maybe he'll get out of your hair and command some other people? I wouldn't know. All I know is that he likes you around and that he hates my guts still. What was stranger was that he sent me such a formal letter and I received it yesterday, the first one ever from him. I don't know what to write back to him and I don't think I can mentally. So, tell him I add my congratulations on this bittersweet promotion and I hope that it makes him immune to enemy fire.
I'm sorry to make you the messenger, Dean. I hate it when it has to be so and this is such a situation. However, what am I to say to a man who hardly saw me in his life and cursed the day I was born, all because I was a girl? That I dared to make myself not a son? Ridiculous, I'd say. If he wants me, he can come talk to me.
Also on your end, but more to the south (where you're probably heading to after Munsan) is civil trouble. The current South Korean President, Syngman Rhee, has declared martial law in Pusan. This is bad because I've heard that there is a lot of unrest and that the locals have been fighting with each other. Sadly, it's not just in Pusan that is heading in the same direction. It's slowly becoming a civil war all over South Korea. The truce talks are dragging on of course and everybody is tired of the fighting and they want the war to end…by killing another one.
I don't know where the fighting is other than Pusan except for areas around it, because it's not around the 4077th, so I have to check in with Colonel Potter for the most current news. If it's near the unit, we're gonna have to have extra people on guard duty or get a move on. We can just have Klinger too, walking in dresses as he does. He's scary enough in one of those outfits!
Also in the news from your side to mine (maybe the other way around): Operation Counter, as it's called over here. The 45th Infantry Division launched a two-phased series of attacks, starting last week and possible ending at the end of the month or the next. They were there to establish the eleven patrol bases in the Old Baldy area. The 2nd and 3rd Battalions and 180th Infantry Regiment are also fighting fiercely for Outpost Eerie on Hill 191, which is counterattacked by two Chinese battalions.
That is a direct report from Radar, so the wounded are going to be coming in soon. We've been anticipating them for some time now, especially with all of that fighting and unrest. So, to make this short and to finish all of the news I've heard, I have to write quickly because I have about an hour before they come from there and my shift is about to be doubled. All this fighting and no peace seem a little redundant, don't you think?
It's not just here that there's fighting, you know. There are also reports of air raids in North Korea. General Clark is in charge of everyone after General MacArthur left. Well, fired, most likely, as Hawkeye and I theorize when we read in-between the lines of the newspapers, but dare we not speak it in front of others. While the general has graced us with his brief presence some time ago, Hawkeye and I have been hearing of the back and forth battles he's had with Truman. It's enough to see destruction everyday. Was it enough to try and run into North Korea and China?
Well, anyway, in the meantime, Clark is planning this new operation out carefully, I can see, since the fighting is more aggressive than ever before. If this new operation and the heavy raids continue, we're going to be overloaded and the camp crowded to the brim with wounded. Post-Op is already full and there are more beds coming for the rest of the men when they come. Next coming are the camp's beds. The Swamp is targeted for resting wounded men, which I won't mind. Hawkeye and BJ (and maybe Frank) are already arranged to be with Colonel Potter in his tent while I go to sleep with Margaret.
You can tell it's frantic here, Dean. Things here are insane again and everyone's nerves have been on end. However, Hawkeye, BJ and I have been keeping everything…interesting…so far. Our goal, because morale had dropped to a dangerous low once more, was to prank everybody we know in the camp and keep it all a secret, even going as far as pranking ourselves. We haven't done much since the protest in the cold except for the usual gags, so Hawkeye and BJ wanted to play a joke on everybody in the camp. I was volunteered to help, lovingly persuaded to join the cause while in the Supply Room with Hawkeye.
With each having certain knowledge of everybody in the camp, the three of us captains set out to do our dirty deeds, for we knew that while one was being watched and on shift, the others were free to do what they wanted. So, while I was putting both alive and dead fleas, cockroaches and flies into the makeup boxes of the nurses in my old quarters (and in the other nurses' tent too), BJ and Hawkeye were up to no good in an equally silly way. While I was employed to help them in any way possible, most of it done by Hawkeye and BJ, with a little help from me, if I could get myself in.
Indeed, like I said, we had to keep the suspicions off of us somehow. Hawkeye and I rigged it so that one of our dates was infamously ruined and everyone in the camp knew about it, naked bodies covered and all. BJ mailed something to himself in the form of a package, pretending that it was sent from the States from Peg (like her famous baked goods) and had confetti explode in his face. All and all, something to blow off some steam, although the funniest happened to be to our favorite people, as described below.
~Frank: for my "favorite" major in the whole of Korea, Hawkeye, BJ and I took out his gun and molded one of our own, out of World War II cottage cheese from the Mess Tent, and put it in his gun belt. As Colonel Potter ordered some of the newly-trained South Korean guards to watch out for the camp (also to learn some English from none other than Frank and Hawkeye, who reminded them that Frank Burns "eats worms"), we had a motley crew of good Korean men walk around the camp. They were also being pushed on by Frank, who would shoot bullets in the air to sometimes to get them moving when they were cooperating. When the surplus cottage cheese hardened into what we wanted it to be, we stuffed it back into the gun belt carefully. Low and behold, as Frank was threatening the South Korean guards again, he took out the "gun", having it crumble in his hands from the heat of his body. After all, too much human heat would melt it, so we knew it was perfectly done and perfectly without bullets.
~Margaret: my other "favorite" major, the one who has been training me for command of the nurses, has been getting some special treatment…in the form of Hawkeye. Since her lovely fiancé, Colonel Donald Penobscott, WAS here in the camp for another week (on break from all that tiring paperwork on Tokyo), Hawkeye thought that we could get two for the price of one…by sabotaging their late-night dinner and bedtime, similar to our date. Apparently, Penobscott had imported some REAL goodies from the States, just for him and Margaret, so the two Swampmen and I went inside Margaret's tent the night before the event and changed everything. We took out the food and replaced it with rubber replicas. Margaret's cot was not there (her place of rest transformed into a luxurious bed just for her and Penobscott, which was also another goody he brought) and everything seemed to be perfectly in place for the lovely couple for a rumble. In turn, we stuffed everything with the cook's surprise to keep the impression of perfection (some light grey colored soup and some leftover gold from the Talent Show, to leave our mark). The candles we put in could not be lit and had bulbs (plastic replacements that lit up when you shook them right). Also, when touched it the right way, the tablecloth, table and even the tent will come down and apart. Oh, Dean, you can IMAGINE the anger from the major and colonel both!
~Father Mulcahy: this was a tough one, but I think BJ had the right idea and it was all in good nature, without any real harm done. On Sunday last, the eighth day of this month, our very own BJ (the one who usually hits up Sunday services) switched out the hymn books with script books containing the words and songs to the new musical About Face (Peter de Rose and others writing it originally). So, with Sunday services underway with everybody coming in to follow along, we heard Father Mulcahy reciting from the musical (instead of the Bible) and we were responding accordingly! Everybody was confused as hell (except for me, Hawkeye and BJ of course) and we enacted it as is, Colonel Potter actually leading the way! To say the least, it was interesting and even the good Padre was excited to have a change to the services. Towards the end, with us three captains coming up to apologize for making a mockery of the Sunday Mass (and trying to keep the pranking a secret), Father Mulcahy forgave us and was even laughing. He added, "God enjoys a good laugh every now and then."
~Klinger: actually, this wasn't too hard and it needed a little work. And no, Dean, we didn't fool around with his dresses, bras and dolls. Instead, we fooled around with his gun. Oh, yes, Klinger still has guard duty, even without you and the 43rd around to play the part. The man would not use his gun, not even to shoot, so minutes before he went out on guard duty, Hawkeye and I snuck into his quarters and took his gun and replaced his bullets with glitter! After sneaking out of there snickering and laughing, the corporal in dress, heels and purse took it and headed to his almost-nightly duty, walking back and forth for a while that night. However, when Frank came out of the latrine and passed by Klinger, he was not able to say the password of the night (then "Felix the Cat has pimples", long since changed) and was detained by Klinger, no matter who he was! After a verbal fight between the two (like alley cats at each other's throats), Klinger picked up his gun and it went off by itself – with glitter whizzing by everywhere! It was so funny! Needless to say, Frank got the last laugh. He had a mix of gunpowder residue and glitter in his face, creating a comical scene that only Frank can make.
~Radar: now, this little bugger was not exempt either. BJ and I thought this one out and then targeted the one thing that Radar loves the most, which happens to be his teddy bear. Taking the teddy bear out of Radar's hands one night while he was sleeping, we hid the little thing in Post-Op, making Radar a little annoyed because it went missing. When he found it, he put it back on his cot. BJ then took it away again and hid it in Margaret's tent (where Penobscott was sleeping off his drinks from Rosie's before he left for Tokyo) until Margaret took it back to the office. I then took it next and hid it in Klinger's collection of dresses before it was returned by the crossdressing corporal. Afterward, I left it next to the picture of Frank's mother, the arm wrapping around the frame until Frank yelled at Radar about leaving his things in officers' territory. And so it went, us two taking turns to hide the bear. After about a few days of doing it, Radar was so frustrated that he believed that his bear was actually walking himself places! Finally, BJ and I admitted to playing with the teddy bear and promised not to play with it…for a while at least.
~Colonel Potter: holy crap, this was a toughie and we had to tread carefully. I let Hawkeye and BJ handle this one since I didn't feel like I had the honor of playing a prank on the great CO himself. However, the Swampmen made me help, so I was stuck…sabotaging his laundry! The colonel doesn't like the Korean laundrywomen putting in extra starch in his pants, so we bribed them to do it and more. My Korean had gotten better, so I was volunteered to help explain everything, since they knew little English, and that alone got them going. We also made sure that there were black targets painted on the ass end of his pants, so when we looked to the colonel's behind, there were black circles on it! Needless to say, this prank lasted less than a day. The colonel caught on quickly after he yelled at the laundrywomen again about the starch and demanded that they also wash the pants again, demanding to know how a target got there. They explained in their broken English it was us three captains who told them to do it all, so we were called into Colonel Potter's office again.
Colonel Potter had been sitting at his end of the desk, finishing off a cigar. "Now, be seated, the three of you pranksters."
The colonel didn't look too pleased as we sat down, trying hard not to snicker at the camp's happenings (all in thanks to us). When Colonel Potter saw our guilty faces when the butt was put out, he added, "Now, this camp's morale has been down at another low, going down since your little protest." He then paused. "For a few weeks now, I've been hearing of girly fo-fo glitter around my camp, tents and dates being sabotaged, random vermin in the nurses' makeup, packages from home exploding and even teddy bears walking by themselves."
"We held its hands and it just went, Colonel," BJ almost protested, admitting guilt because it was harder to claim innocence. "The teddy bear was just determined to walk on its own."
Colonel Potter put up his hand. "I know, BJ. It's like the gun in Frank's belt turned into cottage cheese by itself. It just happened."
"What are you looking at me for?" Hawkeye asked as the colonel looked at him suddenly, even severely. "My hands are clean on this matter." He even showed his clean hands, recently rubbed down with pure alcohol, since he had emergency surgery this morning.
"Surely just like Lady Macbeth," I added with a snicker.
"I wouldn't talk, Captain," Colonel Potter said to me sternly. "I know all of you have air-tight alibis when something happened. I also happen to know who was where when it all happened. When one or the other was someplace and blamed for the prank, the others would laugh in a corner or hide behind pranks supposedly happening to them. Now, boys and girl, want to tell me why the pranks all of a sudden, even on your CO here?"
"Why not?" BJ asked, seeing that the gig was up. "Why not, Colonel? We're a little bored."
"We needed a little fun," I added in.
"Well, Penobscott was about to press charges." Colonel Potter sighed. "He thought that you three were out to get him, thinking that Pierce here was trying to have an affair with Margaret."
"My hands are still clean, Colonel," Hawkeye reminded him again. "Oh, Jeanie, what are you doing tonight? I got the coat hanger for the Supply Room."
"Enough, children." Colonel Potter motioned his hands up and down, as if to calm down a bunch of rowdy children, which is what we acted like anyway, Dean, and we couldn't help ourselves. "You've caused enough commotion in this camp already. Now, we can deal with this civilly or I can feed you to the wolves out there, who are about ready to rip you all apart."
"That's a pretty good deal to me," I commented quietly, noting the seriousness of the situation finally.
"Glad you think so, Captain," Colonel Potter replied, looking angry for a second and then turning merry and then serious once more. "I'll make a deal with all three of you. If you cut the pranks down for a little while, since General Kent is coming here for an inspection in two weeks, then I'll make sure that the pack doesn't cut you down into the tiny pieces they want you to be. However, continue with the senseless pranks and not include me in your plans, then I'll let Penobscott press all of those dandy charges."
"That's harsh, Colonel," BJ remarked.
"I have to be or I'll have my butt in the sling right now." Colonel Potter looked at all of us. "Do you all understand?"
"Yes, Sir," was the reply, mine the loudest of the three.
Then, a second later, I asked, "Colonel, do you have anything up your sleeve?"
He smiled, Dean. Colonel Potter smiled a grin I had not seen previously. It made me shudder, but not in a bad way. It was sort of in a funny way, as if I knew something was up and I couldn't put my finger on it just yet.
"Ahh, Captain, I think I have a good sendoff for Penobscott there," the colonel would only say. "You just wait!"
"What might it be?" Hawkeye inquired. "Oh, come on, tell us, tell us, tell us!" He clapped his hands, his tone reminding me of the first day I really met him, when he first talked to me, when Henry was around.
God, even that seems like ages ago, Dean. It was such a long time ago…
"You'll see," were the last words from our CO before we were all dismissed, an evil look at us from Margaret when we came out of the office. Before we knew it though, Margaret was in the office with Colonel Potter, complaining about how childish we were and how it should be dealt with.
However, Margaret didn't have the last word, despite the colonel's reassurances that we were going to stop the pranks. A few hours later, towards evening, when Penobscott's jeep came to take him to Kimpo and then to Tokyo, Colonel Potter made sure he went off with a bang (coming back next time to wed Margaret, we can hope). The jeep's backend tied with Klinger's high heels (the ones without a partner and a whoopee cushion was in the passenger's seat. Just before the colonel went off to Tokyo, he reported an early afternoon splash with Margaret in her tent (somebody throwing cold water on them while they were in bed for a quickie, to be precise). All of that finished up Penobscott's visit to the 4077th. Best of all, everything went without charges being put on me, BJ and Hawkeye, since Colonel Potter orchestrated the last pranks.
Laughing now, but in a hurry to get to my shift and the wounded before Margaret yells at me again –
Your sister forever in trouble, Jeanie
