"Dear Captain, et al." chronicles the company from the time I joined it with the ASTP group on April Fools Day in 1944 until demobilization in January 1946. It is a day-to-day story taking us through training at Camp Claiborne with references to Camp Howze, Texas where it all began in the fall of 1942; transport to Europe and to the front; descriptions of every battle from the Siegfried Line, through the Belgium Bulge and across the Roer, Rhine, and Weser rivers to end on the Elbe forty-five kilometers from Berlin at war's end.

 The battle circumstances of every casualty are documented and nearly every man whose name ever appeared on a morning report record is included in some way. For both the heroes and the otherwise notorious, readers will find some vivid word portraits and a few actual ones. Yet, the real hero is Company K-335, a unit which made us all proud to be 84^th Division Railsplitters.

 How this was accomplished is mystery, just as how Company K became beloved even though forty-two of us never returned and our casualties in wounded, illness, and missing were more than double company strength. Perhaps it is that, granted only one youth to live, we can regain a portion through writing of it, the only way in which what is lost in time can be returned.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, visit the homepage for "Dear Captain, Et Al."
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