Grantville Gazette IV, page 23
"Yes, sir."
"You have to know how important this rail project is. We need a way to supply Gustav's armies that is better than horses and wagons, and this is the best shot we have. In fact it is one of the most important projects we have right now. And from what I hear, you're doing a good job. If you don't know that, it is partially my fault. I should have visited your unit and let you know. So we're going there right now. Besides, that tramway subsidiary of yours has made life a lot easier for people in Grantville."
"Now sir? We don't have anything prepared to show you. All we have is the track out to the farm and our training locomotive. It's not too impressive, sir."
"Call and have the engine and a flatcar meet us at this end of the track. We'll ride out on the train."
When they arrived at the railhead they saw Sergeant Hatfield, Corporals Toeffel and Rau with Private Schultz turning the lawn tractor locomotive around by picking it up off the tracks and rolling it around the flatcar. Corporal Lehrer and Private Schroder from the signal platoon were there, practicing hooking up a telegraph to an existing wire. As usual, the four men on the train crew were dressed in stained mechanics coveralls. All the NCOs stripes were painted on, upside down. Private Schultz was wearing a set of coveralls that were too small. Hatfield and Schultz had their up-time pistols in holsters, but Toeffel had two wheel lock pistols stuck in his belt. Rau had a sheathed knife that must have had fourteen inches of blade strapped to his leg. As a finishing touch, all four were wearing ball caps with Blue Barn dog food logos on them. Lehrer and Schroder were wearing clean overalls and also wearing Blue Barn dog food caps.
With Hatfield and his crew riding on the engine driven by Toeffel, there was plenty of room on the flatcar for Elizabeth and the general.
"Tell me about this. What am I looking at?" General Jackson asked.
"Sir, all this line was laid by the original crew using the existing road as a roadbed; it's basically two-foot gauge tracks using prefab rail sections. This runs out to Hatfield's father-in-law's farm where we have a turning wye. Then the rail branches into two lines and they head off into the woods. Total we have right now is about fifteen miles of track, not counting the wye, our storage yard and three sidings. We tried using strap iron on the top of six-by-four-inch wooden rails to save material, but it kept breaking. Then we got lucky and found the twenty-pound rail that was used in the dog hole mines and on the lumber trails. The twenty pound is fine for narrow gauge, but if you want to make a higher capacity standard gauge line you'll need heavier track."
"And your people have put in this track since the project started?"
"Yes, sir. We're up to about one and a half miles a day on unprepared ground. This stretch on the road we averaged about two and a half miles a day. Right now we have about forty-five miles of track we have recovered, and we're building twenty miles of that into twenty-foot sections of prefab, with the rails and ties already together. That lets us lay track just like a big toy train. If the lines are replaced with new made heavier rail the old rails can be reused."
The general looked at the engine, "Lieutenant that really is just a big lawn tractor isn't it? And why isn't Hatfield driving? I thought he was your engineer?"
"Yes, sir. The engine has close to twenty-eight horsepower. We had to modify it to a 0-6-0 configuration to adequately transfer power to the tracks. Toeffel is driving because we're training rail crews as well as track crews. Corporals Toeffel and Rau are both trained drivers. Sergeant Hatfield likes to let both men get more experience, so I would bet that Rau was driving on the trip into town. Private Schultz is trained to be a brakeman, though with just one car he's along for his muscle more than his skill."
"Hatfield," the general called out, "how many cars can that thing pull?"
"Ten is all we have overhauled right now, General, and we have pulled them all at one time, loaded. Now that's on level ground. On a hill, it's about half that. But we're working on three more locomotives. One is a bigger one using a Subaru with a four cylinder engine and four-wheel drive. It should be able to pull twice that load. You'll have to talk to Lieutenant Bicard and Sergeant Born about the horse-drawn cars. I don't know much about them," Anse answered.
"Lieutenant, how much can each car carry?"
"Sir, from what I can figure out, the coal cars are rated at two tons each, the lumber cars at five tons, and the flatcars at ten tons. However, we won't carry more than two tons a car because they start spreading the rails at about two and a half tons. We're also building some cars we can use for horse-drawn trams and they can carry about a ton and a half each."
"So on level ground with what is really a lawn tractor, you can move twenty tons at ten to fifteen miles an hour. Is that about right, Lieutenant?"
"Yes sir, though it is much closer to ten than fifteen miles per hour. And we're getting better. Give us better equipment and we can lay track faster. As we get more coal cars overhauled, we'll be able to haul a lot of ballast to level out the roadbed and smooth over rough spots."
General Jackson appeared lost in thought as they rode to the end of the track where Sergeant Torbert had a group of recruits clearing ground. A horse-drawn railcar was nearby, loaded with prefabricated track sections.
After watching for a while, the general asked, "Those all your men, Lieutenant?"
"No sir. Most of them are from the First Volunteer regiment we're cross training. Torbert works well with the recruits and we have cross trained about two hundred in track laying and clearing," Elizabeth answered.
"And what are they doing?" the general continued.
"They are laying what we call a training fork. They put in a switch on the branch and run a set of rails out in to the woods for about a mile and a half. They have to clear and level the ground first for the length of the fork. They have some prefab track sections ready to lay, and we're using the horse-drawn trams to transport the sections to them. Right now we have four forks, but they can be removed and the rail reused."
"Well, let's head back," said the general.
At the end of the rail they found that the crew had turned the engine around ready to head back.
"I want to stop at your headquarters and see your camp, Lieutenant," General Jackson said.
They arrived at the camp just as Sergeant Schmidt was feeding the first shift.
"What is that thing, Lieutenant, a stove on wheels?" the General asked.
"That's our field kitchen, General. I based the burners on my grandpa's crawfish boiler and the chief had it made in a metal shop in town. We laid a special siding for it as practice with switches," Elizabeth answered.
"I like it. And this is your design?"
"Well, yes. With the chief's help, sir. Want a closer look?"
General Jackson walked over to look at the kitchen. As he got closer he saw that the mess car was just one of the improvements; there were garbage cans and immersion heaters running off a bottled gas tank that was on a rail car parked behind the kitchen car. The soldiers were washing their tin plates and forks in heated water. In front of the mess car was a water tank mounted on rail wheels.
Just then Sergeant Schmidt saw him. "Want some fish, General? We have enough for everyone. I'll get you some. Grab a plate and wash it and your hands. No one gets fed unless they wash up. The lieutenant is a 'Teufel' for washing."
"I haven't heard that sort of lecture since I was in Basic Training," said Jackson.
"Sir, if there's anything I learned from my daddy it's the importance of field sanitation. He used to think it was a pain in the rear end. But he read an article in The Field Artillery Journal years ago about how the Afrika Korps had a large amount of soldiers who couldn't fight because they were sick. When he took my brother and me to France we walked through some of the British cemeteries from the First World War. He always got angry about how many men died needlessly from disease."
She continued, "I didn't know anything about the old way of doing things with mess kits, but between the chief and the up-time sergeants who were in the Army, we came up with the immersion heaters and the basic setup. The first sergeant told me that the old immersion heaters used dripping gasoline, which struck me as dangerous and a pain to deal with. So they came up with one that would use natural gas instead."
General Jackson was amazed by what he was seeing. "Lieutenant, I want to bring Ed Piazza and Greg Fererra out here to see this. We need a field kitchen and this plan would be perfect. We could mount it on a wagon instead of a rail car. What else do you have to show me?"
Elizabeth led him to her field office, where PFC Bode called up on the company computer the design for the field shower unit and a design for tent heaters that would run off the same bottled gas as the kitchen. Then they went to the shop tent to meet PFC Dressel, the company blacksmith and to see the natural gas/coal-fired forge that Sergeants Hatfield and Torbert had come up with for making small critical parts from scrap steel.
After that, Elizabeth took him to the signal shack, which was a purpose built car with a telegraph station on board as well as the company's one radio. "We started training telegraph operators before we got the radio and it wasn't too difficult to cross train the telegraphers to send Morse over the radio," Elizabeth explained to General Jackson.
"Eighteen miles of railroad, three hundred troops trained to lay track, trained engine crews, trained horse-drawn trams, you're making your own parts and your troops eat better than any in the field. You know, you have done a hell of a job, Major."
As Elizabeth turned to correct the General she saw the smile on his face.
"It's long overdue, Elizabeth," General Jackson said, as he held the insignia of a major out to her.
"Thank you, sir."
"Don't thank me, Major, you earned it. Now what do you need to make this unit ready to go? As of now this unit is no longer provisional and I think the army is going to want more than one battalion like this."
"Well, we need more blacksmiths to work on fabricating new equipment, one or two captains, a few more lieutenants, at least one more radio, and if possible a small sawmill. I already have a signal detachment that can lay wire and operate a telegraph system. I'd also like to transfer about two hundred and fifty men to fill out the track laying platoons and form a horse-drawn tram company. You talk about expanding to a battalion and more. If we do, I want to make Hatfield, Plotz, Born, and Bach warrant officers so they can command platoons. Promote Bicard to captain so he can command the tram company and Torbert to first sergeant as a start. Anything else we can build and we'll promote from within as I expand the TOE." Elizabeth paused, "And sir, this unit will be the One hundred forty-first Railway Battalion, otherwise known as the Louisiana Tigers."
"Well, before I ask why one hundred forty-first and why Louisiana, where's this band I keep hearing rumors about?" the general asked.
Elizabeth smiled and said, "Easy, sir, they're the wire platoon and some of the telegraph operators of the signal detachment."
Jackson smiled as he shook his head, thinking she's got military bureaucrat in her blood and knows very well how to hide things in the open. He then asked, "You know that Richelieu has changed the name of Virginia to Louisiana, don't you?"
"Sir, it's my home and I want to ram it up the rear end of the arrogant Frenchman that took the name of my home away from me. Besides, there are no alligators and bayous in Virginia. They sure don't grow rice there. And, I 'gaw-ron-tee' that there's no way they would ever come up with Tabasco Sauce there," Elizabeth said. "Besides that sir, I wanted my people to realize that there was more to the old United States than the great state of West Virginia."
"Does this have anything to do with the LSU football team being called Tigers?" the general asked.
"Well sir, the One-four-one is one of the Louisiana units that LSU got the tiger mascot from. My daddy served with the One-four-one until he had to leave for promotion," Elizabeth replied.
"Done," he said. "How were you ever able to get Plotz, Hatfield and Torbert to work together or work at all? That's really amazing," General Jackson told her.
"Well, General, it just took a half-English coonass to sort these hillbillies out." Elizabeth answered with a smile, "Really, they're all good men, sir."
On a cold spring morning in 1634 a new train was loading up in Grantville to move north. This was a different sort of unit from the normal volunteer regiments that completed training in the Grantville area.
First, a marching band was playing New Orleans style brass band music and alternating numbers with the fifes and drums. On the bass drum was written "U.S. Military Railway Band" around a brick-red colored shield-shaped crest with the head of a Bengal tiger on it; below the shield was a gold ribbon with the words "Try Us."
Another difference was the load on this train was made up of steel-wheeled railcars, not rubber tired vehicles. These trains were loaded on the standard gauge flatcars for transport to Halle, where they would be loaded on barges.
Large amounts and different types of equipment were moving out. Flatcars were loaded with prefabricated sections of rail, lumber cars were laden with rails, coal cars were filled with equipment, and there was one car loaded with spools of telegraph wire.
Another difference was that families were going with this unit. With the attached Volunteer Pioneer Regiment to provide security and track laying support, the total convoy numbered nearly two thousand personnel.
A young woman dressed in up-time U.S. Army battledress with a new gold oak leaf on her right collar walked the length of the train accompanied by an older man in overalls.
"Well Chief, I guess we're as ready as we'll ever be," Elizabeth said.
"Yes ma'am, I agree with you. Time to go," Chief Warrant Officer Charlie Schwartz replied.
"I'll meet you back at our train," Elizabeth told him. She then went over where two other young women were waiting for her.
"You take care of yourself and be careful," Mary Pat Flanagan said.
"And what am I supposed to do now that you're leaving?" Caroline Platzer asked.
Beth looked at her roommates of her last two years at WVU and said, "I'll miss both of you very much, but you know I'll be back." After hugging her friends, she went to the lead locomotive and pumped her arm up and down, the signal to move out. The 141st Railway Battalion was going to war.
"Well Chief, on to Halle. I hope the navy has the river open so we can travel on barges up to Scherwin Lake," Elizabeth said.
"Ma'am, it'll be a lot easier and quicker to get to where we need to go on barges," Chief Schwartz replied.
"I couldn't agree with you more. This is going to be a pain, but on the other hand, we're going to be needed," Elizabeth said.
"Well, we have the advance detachment with some equipment at the Schwerin Lake railhead, but we have to lot to work out on how we're going support the army," the chief said.
"Your idea of setting up an advanced base camp at Schwerin Lake is a good one," Elizabeth replied. "We'll just have to see what happens when we get there."
CONTINUING SERIALS
Heavy Metal Music
or
Revolution in Three Flats
David Carrico
Grantville, March, 1633
Franz hissed in pain as his crippled hand was flexed, twisted and pulled by Dr. Nichols' strong fingers. Sweat beaded his forehead as he endured the testing manipulation. He sighed in relief when the doctor finally released it.
"Sorry," Dr. Nichols said. "I know that hurt, but I had to see what the condition was." He made some notes in a folder, then looked up. "Well, as the old joke goes, I have bad news and good news. Which do you want first?"
Franz swallowed as Marla took his claw in both her hands. "The bad first, if you please," he replied.
Dr. Nichols looked at them both seriously. "I can't help you surgically. I'm sorry. The damage is severe, but I probably could have saved it if I could have seen it right after it happened. Maybe not, with the knuckles smashed in the last two fingers, but we would have had a good chance. Now . . . Frankly, it healed wrong. I'm not faulting those who tended you—fact is, they did as good a job as any down-timer could have done."
He glanced down at his notes, then back up, and continued, "I have—had, rather—a good friend back up-time who could have fixed it, even now, but he was a fully trained specialized orthopedic surgeon with all the appropriate tools and technology at his fingertips. All modesty aside, I'm a good surgeon, but orthopedics, especially with the small bones like in the hand, requires not only the training but the tools, and I don't have either one. Even if I did, I'm not sure I could justify expending them for what is, to be honest, a relatively minor injury. Our resources are so limited right now that they have to be reserved for truly major problems."
Franz looked down at where Marla's hands clasped tightly around the hand in question, sighed, and said, "I understand."
