July 26, 1942
Camp Livingston, LA

Dear Mom,
Received your letter yesterday. Also got one from Marjorie Reese, so I’ve got some correspondence to catch up on. I owe a letter to Lucille and one to a girl in Shreveport, LA. This last week I’ve written to Peg, Alice, Ruth and another guy in Rutland Vermont.
It has been plenty hot here, but is cooling off some now, getting ready to rain I guess. Well, I’ll continue now. I interrupted this to sew a set of PFC stripes on one of the fellows shirts. Made a quarter for a few minutes work. By the time I finished that it was supper time and since supper I’ve been to the canteen and got $3.60 worth of pictures back and sat talking with some of the fellows for a while.
We had another day of river crossing. We did the same as before, but after about an hour of it, we started scouting around. We found several row boats on a nearby lake, so commandeer them. Chet (Chester?) sent back after his outboard motor, and in the meantime, the captain and I raced three of the noncom’s across the lake with boats. To everyone’s surprise, and the captains joy, we won by a boat length. Not much ahead for a three-quarter mile race.
We spent nearly the whole day just paddling and swimming around. I got a honey of a sunburn, especially my legs. They have tanned down pretty good now.
Friday the Battalion went on a 25 mile hike. I was on guard (only walked two hours) so didn’t go. Out of 275 men only two fell out, but the rest were nearly dead when they got back. I’ll have to make it up next Thursday.
We had Friday off to get ready for the hike and Saturday off to recuperate and Sunday as usual. It made quite a vacation.
Well, I reckon that’s all I can think of now so will close,

Love to all,
Wayne.