Adirondack Daily Enterprise, March 10, 1990Born:
Died:
Married: Elizabeth TenEyck
Children:
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Adirondack Daily Enterprise, March 10, 1990
'Sightseeing' in France
By WILL DOOLlTTLE
Mr. Ten Eyck has blue eyes and a slightly pixieish face. He speaks softly, and pauses now and then, exhaling with a humming sound.
"We landed at Le Havre, France at 6 a.m., looked up on the docks and there was a soldier with his leg cut off, blood coming through the bandages. They marched 1,500 of us to the railroad station. That was the first air raid I was in. A Gorman bomber came over with a 50- pound bomb that went off about 100 feet from the station.
"We went to where Napoleon had his barracks, there are beautiful barracks there, about 20 miles from the Vosges mountains. We started losing soldiers from the flu — we would bury one in the morning, one in the afternoon. They called us the Sightseeing Six. We were shock troops. They would move us to one front to strengthen it, then move us to another.
"Next thing we know, it was Armistice Day and we were told to turn our horses in. We put the horses on the train again and started for Belgium. They wore big Perches, great big Perches, with feet like that," he formed a wide circle with his hands.
"I came home on the Finland. I passed coal so I could get a bath every day. We landed in Boston. I was discharged July 3, 1919 and I arrived home on the Fourth of July."
