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where our battery was billeted.  I took a train from there to Bar-le-Duc, where it joined the main line of the Chemin de Fer de l'Est.  After an overnight stop in Paris I arrived next day at Tours.  I was just 40 miles from Saumur, which I had left less than a month before.

I don't remember the exact date of my arrival at Tours, and I have lost the order that sent me there.  But I do have a copy of Special order No. 94 of the A.E.F., which announced that I was on duty requiring me to participate regularly and frequently in aerial flights, from January 24 1918.  So that was the datd of my first flight, and I must have arrived at Tours a day or two earlier.  The magic words in that order entitled me to an increase of 25 per cent in pay from that date.  The order was dated July 13, 1918 which meant that I collected extra back pay thereafter.  There [[insert]] ^[[were]] [[/insert]] 21 other names beside mine on that special order.  Some of them did not live long enough to collect their back flying pay.

At Tours I was surprised to meet Mort Adams, one of our group of six Tennesseeans from Saumur.  I never saw Guthrie or Price again.  I saw Herbert Jones once more, in a hospital.  He had been gassed in April.  After I saw him he returned to his outfit and was killed in July.  Adams and I were trained together as observers.  Later, as American observation squadrons began to be organized and sent to the front, he was assigned to the 91st, the third American observation squadron to go on duty.  I was assigned to the 88th, the next one to go.

^[[Love, Dad.]]