Sincerely, Joel C. Swisher

Dear Aunt Mary,

Thy letter of Oct 28 reached me yesterday and I shall endeavor to answer some of thy questions. I hope by this time you folks know I am safe.

Do not worry about the insurance taking too much out of my wages. The insurance costs me only $6.70 per month and my wages are over here $33.50, That leaves me about $26. That is more than I can spend so I took a Liberty Bond on the installment plan of $5 per mo. for 10 mo. That still leaves me $21. I think that is still too much for me to spend, altho things are somewhat dear over here and a fellow sees a lot of apples and candy and such like that you feel like having, as the army grub while plenty and of good quality gets monotonous some times. I will see how much I have by the next payday and if I have quite a bit of this month’s pay left I’ll make a $5 or $10 allotment to thee and have thee invest it in Building Loan. We can make allotments to anyone we desire. However I won’t do anything along this line for a month or two as I want to see how much I am going to need. There are several little things I want to get and they charge Americans 2 or 3 times as much as the things cost before troops began to come here. The fool Americans threw their money as though they had lots, naturally as the French stores raised their prices.

Now as to indemnity in case I was hurt. It is my understanding, and thee can get it for thyself in war insurance bill that passed in Oct, regardless of whether we have insurance or not the government will pay us a certain monthly compensation if we get crippled in the service. I don’t know the minimum but think it is about $40 and runs as high as $100 per month if we lose both arms or both legs, or both eyes, or in manner are totally disabled. Furthermore, those of us who took out insurance will have that paid to us direct instead of our beneficiary, in case we are totally disabled. So thee sees we are well provided for in case we are crippled and our folks are provided for in case we are killed. If I had a wife or another dependent on me they would get paid while I am in the service and would be paid if I were killed regardless of whether I had insurance or not. An aunt is not near enough of kin to come under this benefit, so the only way I could fix it was to take out insurance. If I am killed thee gets the money and if I am badly crippled, I get it, (at least that is my understanding) so we are both protected.

P.S. Decided to send thy Xmas handkerchief in this letter.