{"id":6439,"date":"2018-01-19T23:22:34","date_gmt":"2018-01-19T23:22:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.archivingwheeling.org\/blog\/?p=6439"},"modified":"2018-01-19T23:22:34","modified_gmt":"2018-01-19T23:22:34","slug":"from-camp-lee-to-the-great-war-january-19-1918-podcast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.archivingwheeling.org\/blog\/from-camp-lee-to-the-great-war-january-19-1918-podcast","title":{"rendered":"From Camp Lee to the Great War: January 19, 1918 – Lester Scott"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\u201cThere are big bets up here now that we will never go over. Some think [the war] is over now. Some think it will over in two months. Others think will last two years. Judge for yourself is the way I do\u2026\u201d<\/h2>\n
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In his nineteenth letter home from Camp Lee, Virginia, to his sister Minnie Riggle, US Army Wagoner (mule team driver) Lester Scott, a World War I soldier from Wheeling, West Virginia, writes that he\u2019s pretty much given up on getting to come home until maybe the spring when the farm boys get leave to help with the crops. He thinks his girlfriend Cleo\u2019s hair might be too short and he\u2019s planning to write her soon. He thinks they may never go over to France. Many think the war will be over soon. He\u2019s spending his time in classes on military courtesy, first aid, and signaling.<\/p>\n

Elsewhere on the same day, the Bolsheviks (under Vladimir Lenin), forcibly dissolved the democratically elected Russian Constituent Assembly that was meeting to draft a constitution in the wake of the October 1917 Revolution. This action ensured Bolshevik control of the new Soviet Union.<\/p>\n

Lester Scott was drafted in 1917 and trained at Camp Lee, where so many Wheeling soldiers were trained. And, like so many of his Ohio Valley comrades, he served in the 314th Field Artillery Supply Company, Battery \u201cA,\u201d 80th (Blue Ridge) Division in France. This is his nineteenth letter from Camp Lee, dated 100 years ago today, January 19, 1918.
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January 19, 1918 Letter \u2013 Lester Scott to his sister, Minnie Riggle<\/h2>\n
\"January<\/a>
Letter to Minnie Riggle from Lester Scott, January 19, 1918.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n