Did this soldier serve in Italy in WW1?

[Vincennes]

I came across these two real photo postcards of a local WW1 veteran recently. His name is Russell Everett Hick. I show the photos below and the backs of the postcards in the following post. The notation on the back of one postcard spells his last name "Hicks", but all his records spell it as "Hick". My question is about that notation which lists him as: "Q. M. C. Com. Sales; A.E.F.; Italy". I know the 332nd. Infantry fought in Italy in WW1, but did any Quartermaster Corps men get assigned there?

Hick was born 27 Aug 1894 in Los Angeles, died 12 Sep 1981 In Tulsa. His WW2 draft registration card says he was working at the Tulsa Post Office in 1942. His records indicate: Russell E Hick, 2244279, Pvt., Mrs. Charles A Hadley, Mother, Vera OK, part of the Q M Corps Detachment, June Replacement Draft. Sailed June 28, 1918 from Brooklyn on the SS Tereisias. Returned on SS Roma from Marseille to Brooklyn on 28 June, 1919 and arrived July 17, 1919 as part of Marseilles Casual Company Number 16. Sent to Camp Merrit.

Without buying his records from the NARA (assuming they exist) how can I find out if he served in Italy in WW1.

Paul

[Vincennes]

Here is the reverse of the postcards.

Paul

[aznation]

If someone with a paid subscription to Newspapers.com can pull an article from the following newspaper for you I believe this article places Pvt. Russell E. Hick in Treviso, Italy with the Commissary Unit of the Quartermaster Corps. I can make out some of the article looking at the OCR'd version but can't see the full article as published.

 

Publication: The Linn-Palmer Record

Location: Palmer, Kansas

Issue Date: Friday, February 21, 1919

Page:1

 

Here's OCR'd version:

 

SOLDIERS LETTERS Treviso, Italy, Jan. 26, 19 1 9. Dear Uncle and Family: ; I received five letters today, and your letter was one of them, and it sure does cheer a soldier boy up to hear from the folks back home. ; ' " I have been making lots of good trips lately and will describe one of them in this letter. ' I am driving a Dodge light truck now and like it fine. I have drove it over a thousand miles in the last two weeks. I made a trip to Fiume, Austria, and am going to start -v tomorrow morning on another trip there, so will wait until my next letter to describe my trip to Austria. . The Lieutenant gave us permission to use the truck this afternoon (Sunday) so several of we boys drove out to the - battlefield. The Piave river is about 1 0 miles from Treviso. The river is about one-half mile from bank to bank, but the water is only about 50 yards wide. ' The Austrians had their front line trenches on one bank, and the Allies on the other, so you see it was certain death for anyone to try to cross this strip of open land. The railroad; bridge across the river at this point had three or four spans blown out of it, but is repaired now so the trains can cross. About 300 yards from this bridge is the wagon bridge. This also was blown up considerable, but it is patched up so we could cross. Just across the river is what is left of a town. When the Allies rnit over their heavy artillery barrage (that put the Austrians on the run) it simply leveled this town. There isn't a building for miles the other side of the . Piave that hasn't got a shell hole in it. We drove on the other side of the river for about 10 miles until we came to another bridge across the Piave. All along this route ' it had been under shell fire. There are hundreds of empty brass shells and lots of loaded ones piled along the road, but most of the empty ones have some kind of high explosive cap left in them and it is dangerous to carry them around. We passed along a piece of ground that had been under terrific shell fire. For a distance of half a mile there wasn't a space of ground 5 feet square that hadn't been plowed up by shells and some of the holes are 10 ft. deep and 20 ft. wide. Farther on down the road we passed an old gi avey afd and it was dotted with shell holes, .The tombstones were broken and it sure was a frightful sight. I have a vest pocket kodak and am getting several nice snap shots, and hope to show them to you within six months. There are 14 men in our Commissary Unit and we are suppling a regiment with tobacco, cigarettes and toilet articles and we will be here as long as the Infantry troops are here. ' , There are three-battalions in this regiment, one in Italy one in Austria .and one in Montihegro. I have been to all of them but the one in Montinegro and 1 guess if we could drive there easy

would make this trip,' but it is easier to go there by boat. Two of our men are there how with Com. supplies. Two of our -boys ; are in Rome ; on pass. 1 expect to go on a . 7 ,days pass with traveling times as soon as they get back. -President Wil son didn't v come up in this part of the country so I didn't have the opportunity to see him. Thave traveled many miles since I have been in Europe and expect to do a few more.' I have drove 4387 miles since I've been in Italy. i V I am wearing a gold 6 months foreign service stripe and expect to be wearing two when I get back to the old U. S. Hoping to hear from you often I remain your soldier nephew," . Pvt. Russell E. Hick. ' Esquebbecq, France. . Dec. 28, 1918

[aznation]

This article also mentions him being in Italy if someone can get it for you.

 

Publication: The Linn-Palmer Record

Location: Palmer, Kansas

Issue Date: Friday, November 15, 1918

Page: 5

 

OCR'd version:

 

Letter From Italy. , t Italy, Oct. 13, 1918. Dear Uncle and family: I will write you a few lines to let you know 1 tnat I haven't forgotten you. I am well and enjoying army life fine. I am on pass today and am- writing this in a cafe. . I get to go on pass to some large town about every two or three weeks.. The place where 1 am stationed I can stay out uutil 1 0 o'clock every night without a pass. I am a chauffer and like b my. work fine. I have been very busy lately and you know when you are busy, (at work you like) time passes very fasfT so you see my days of foreign service are turning into months. By the time you get this letter I will have over four months of foreign service..:"'';; I am getting to see a'ood deal, of this country in my last week's work. I drove 600 miles. '1 made a Trip to the front several days ago, and enjoyed it the most of any thing in my army life. When we were . about one half mile from the trenches ' the Austrians put ; a shell over and it hit just 100 yds. ahead of us. ' I saw four air plane battles, it takes good eyes to see them for they fly so high. What bolhaed me the most was the Italian guns, when they went off it would nearly take my (tin) "hat off, there seemed"T3"tjg"so much concussion in the air. - I haven't learned to - talk Italian yet, but have picked up several expressions and I have a good time trying to talk it. Hoping to hear from you soon, I remain your loving .nephew, Pvt. Russell. E. Hick. American E. F., Italy.

[Bob Hudson]

If someone with a paid subscription to Newspapers.com can pull an article from the following newspaper for you I believe this article places Pvt. Russell E. Hick in Treviso, Italy with the Commissary Unit of the Quartermaster Corps.

 

[aznation]

Thank you very much Bob for posting that one article.

 

Now, if someone can get this one from Newspapers.com and post it, that'd be wonderful.

 

Publication: The Linn-Palmer Record

Location: Palmer, Kansas

Issue Date: Friday, February 21, 1919

Page: 1

[hatchet]

27 Dec 1919

[Vincennes]

Thanks, guys. I do not subscribe to Newspapers.com so I missed these. It helps if your Uncle is a newspaper editor. This is the first WW1 soldier I have researched that was in Italy in WW1.

 

Paul

[Bob Hudson]

Thanks, guys. I do not subscribe to Newspapers.com so I missed these.

 

If you are not a subscriber and click on a newspapers.com link from Google, it often comes up with plain text at bottom of the page that includes some of the newspaper story. Just scroll down or search the page for a keyword. That's how aznation was able to find and post what he called the "OCR'd version:"

[aznation]

You're welcome Paul. Yes, that's the first time I've encountered someone searching for a soldier stationed in Italy during WWI as well. Interesting....and you're right it pays to have an Uncle who's a newspaper editor.

 

Thanks Bob and Hatchet for getting those articles.

 

For others, since I don't have a subscription to Newspapers.com, I as well as you can still do a search for articles on there without a paid subscription.

 

The way I do that is:

 

In the Google search line I type the following;

 

site:newspapers.com "Russell E. Hick" , or it can be any name or words your searching for as long as it's in quote marks.

 

If you have any hits on your Google search you can click on one of them.

 

Scroll down until you see, Show 1 article text (OCR) with a down arrow next to those words.

 

Click on the down arrow

 

It will show you the OCR'd (Optical Character Read) text version of the article.

 

To find whatever word/s you're looking for quickly, just do a search and find command in your browser and it will go right to those word/s.

 

You can copy and paste whatever part of the article into a Word document, Email, or whatever other software you have.

 

Note that sometimes the text version may not look totally correct as some of the letters in the article may not have been read correctly by the OCR scan and that some of the information regarding your subject may not be all together in one place. This could happen because the article relating to your subject may've been in two different columns in the paper.