Letters from Home Dear Bdy 
I’ve just been watching your mother’s face as 
she was writing to you. I don’t know what she 
said, but I’ll bank on it that she was telling you 
some things you ought to know, because she’s 
been at work for nearly two hours, and she’s worn 
all the paint off the end of the pen holder. 
She’s spent days going over all your civilian 
clothes and the house smells so of camphor balls 
that I have to smoke that extra cigar every 
evening in self defense. Your room’s all ready for 
you—sheets on the bed, and everything. 
I have an idea you'd better read that letter of 
hers over two or three times. She believes in you, 
but there never was a mother who didn’t have, 
somewhere down deep in her soul, just enough fear 
of human nature to make her worry about her 
son. So, if she’s given you any advice, take it. I 
know that all she’s asked of you is a square deal, 
and I know you well enough to be sure you’ll give 
her that, and then some. 
I’m not expecting you to drop in on us before 
next Sunday, anyway, but when you do I think I 
can scrape up the interest on a Liberty Bond or so 
to buy a new suit and a pair of regular shoes for 
you. So don’t wait any longer than you have to 
—and while you’re waiting, don’t forget that 
square deal. It means a lot to her, and to me. 
Hastily. 
Dad Son of Mine 
They’re sending you home to me at 
last. 
Through all these months of waiting 
and longing, I’ve been wearing a star 
for you and holding my head high and 
thinking wonderful thoughts about you. 
I’ve watched you through ocean mists 
and dreamed anxious dreams. Yes, and 
cried a little, too, but not where people 
could see. 
And now you’re coming home. Oh, 
it seems too good to be true. I’ve just 
read your letters again. They say so 
much more than you ever thought when 
you were writing them. Just happen- 
ings—that’s all most of the things you 
wrote about were to you. But to me 
they said you were facing the biggest 
thing in life, facing it bravely as I 
should want my son to face it. You 
were offering your body and your soul 
for a thing bigger than you or me or 
America. 
Don’t think me silly or sentimental 
because I say these things. Just remem- 
ber that while you were going through 
that fire and terror I had to sit here and 
smile. I had to be as brave as you, so 
that you shouldn’t be ashamed of me. 
When I wrote to you I tried to write 
cheerful, encouraging letters, because I 
did not want you to go into battle feel- 
ing that I was holding you back from 
the big sacrifice. It’s only now, when 
the fighting is over, that I can let down 
a little and be just your mother, just 
the woman who loves you better than 
anything else in the world and is so glad 
to know you’re coming back to her that 
she doesn’t care who sees her cry. 
Perhaps for some of the boys who have 
stood with you so finely through these 
trials the fighting is not yet all over. 
The fighting I mean is that between a 
man and himself, and for many of them 
this will be the hardest battle of all. 
During the long days and evenings of 
waiting before they can start for home, 
thoughts will creep into their minds 
which will be hard to resist. There will 
be times, after all these months of 
action, when the longing for change and 
for the companionship of women may 
lead them into associations which will 
spoil their homecoming and cause them 
shame and humiliation and even perhaps 
make them unfit to receive the love that 
awaits them here. 
You, dearest boy, are just as human 
as your comrades, and feelings like these 
may come to you, too. I don’t ask you 
to crush them—they are only natural 
and they only prove that war has failed 
to dry up the wellspring of your emo- 
tions. I ask you only to recognize them 
when they come and to control them 
with the fine strength you have gained 
while fighting for the ideals and prin- 
ciples of America. Just remember that 
many joyous years of life are ahead of 
you and that the risk of spoiling them 
and the love that will fill them is too 
tremendous to run for a short hour of 
seeming pleasure. 
Many of the boys who will come home 
with you have no mothers to write to 
them. Some of them may think that no 
one cares what they do. But somebody 
does care. America cares. And the 
girls they will marry some day care. 
And, oh, the difference it will make 
in their lives if they will just remember 
that there is always somebody, always I 
Help them to remember. Help them 
to come home clean and fine. Don’t let 
them spoil everything now. They have 
been so splendid. 
If you think this letter will help them, 
give it to them. If they have no mothers 
let me be their mother until they have 
come back and taken the high places 
that await them here. Tell them to 
write to me—how I should treasure their 
letters! 
And of course you will write to me. 
Just say that you understand—that you 
know why I have written this letter. 
Then I can wait, months—yes, even 
years, knowing that you will come home 
to me as fine and clean as you were 
when I sent you away to camp so 
long ago. 
Mother 
Published for distribution by the War Department, Commission on Training Camp Activities 
u«] Letters from Home