Free Response Answer 27-0771

(B) of 20-continued: A. and C. I don't want you to take my word for this. I not only hope but challenge you to consult with with any of the officers who were with the 17th regiment of the 7th Division during the battle of Attu. He was under fire as much, if not more time than any one soldier in the regiment. He will not say this of himself, but if asked will say that he was satisfied that he had done his share. This is typical of him. But if you will consult my report that has to do with the action of the various chaplains chaplains of the seventeenth, his will stand out. Both the correspondent of the New York paper and other news will at time carry a report of his actions. After the battle he was going over mountains, on foot mind you, all over the cockeyed island all the time that we were there preaching from 7 to 9 and more services a week. He work so hard and continuous all the time while there that his health broke and he was later declared unfit for combat (over)

duty and was transferred out of a regiment of men who had come to love him because of what he was and still is - a true asset to the Chaplaincy. I don't know why he didn't get some decoration for his work on Attu during actions, but I do know that when the decorations were all given out that upon seeing some who got them for seemingly nothing at all. And to think that his name was not so much as mentioned didn't make just made me so mad that I could hardly stand it. It just made me so contemptably disgusted with the whole cockeyed affair that I haven't as yet so much as worn one single ribbon, metal, or decoration for combat action. And what's more I don't care a whole lot whatever I ever do if Chaplain Clarence J Merriman now of APO 960-75 station hospital doesn't receive some recognition, which beyond the any shadow of a doubt he definitely deserves