Along busy Central Avenue, on the outskirts of Memphis, Tenn., rolled 80 trucks of the 110th Quartermaster Regiment, making slow progress through Sunday traffic. In the cabs and on the hard seats behind sat 350 soldiers, ties discarded, collars open under a blistering sun. After the manner of the U.S. soldier, Model 1941, or the Roman soldier, B.C. 100, they were also making merry by waving at girls, shouting boisterous pleasantries at civilians. They had a right to be cheerful, they had just finished more than a month's hard work in the Second Army maneuvers in central Tennessee, and done a good, cheerful job of it.
Past the first tee of the Memphis Country Club the convoy moved at a snail's pace. Along the walk bordering the course strolled a group of girls in shorts. From the trucks came a drumfire of soldiers' shouts—"Yoo-Hoo-o-o"—"Hi, baby"—a fanfare of whistling.
"'Tis He!" On the first tee, hard by the street, a leathery-faced golfer was getting ready to tee off. "Fore," shouted a soldier. The golfer turned and glared at the trucks. Thereupon the soldiers let him have it: "Hey, buddy, do you need a caddy?" The man on the tee handed his driver to a caddy, jumped a three-foot fence, stalked to the convoy. A command car in the column jerked to a stop, and its officers piled out to face an Awful Fact. The golfer was Lieut. General Ben Lear, commander of the Second Army, director of the maneuvers from which the 110th had just emerged.
Ben Lear was a first sergeant before he was an officer, and what he had to tell the 110th's officers sizzled with first sergeant's wrath. When all the burning words had been said, Ben Lear told the convoy to move on, that it would hear from him after it got back to its home station at Camp Joseph T. Robinson, 145 miles away.
The men of the 110th, like the rest of the soldiers, know Ben Lear (in uniform). They know him as a ranker who lives commendably close to his troops, a rugged soldier despite his 62 years, a great believer in spit-and-polish. They know and generally approve his dislike of sloppy soldiers, his decisive action (TIME, June 23) to clear his Second Army of incompetent officers so that its outfits can grow into first-class fighting units. They know him, too, as a commander too much preoccupied with small details.
Tough Touch. But tough and touchy as Ben Lear is, no soldier of the 110th was prepared for the tough touch that awaited them when they pulled in at Camp Robinson toward sundown. The General's order: that the 110th return at once to Memphis and stand by. They were to get mass punishment, the innocent with the guilty.
Toward midnight the trucks were loaded again and the convoy was off. To rest tired drivers, it stopped three hours on the way, resumed the journey by dawn. Before noon the 110th had pitched tents on Memphis airport, was waiting for the lightning to strike. It struck soon. To the airport came Ben Lear in person, read the riot act again—"disgrace to the Army . . . loose conduct and rowdyism . . . breach of discipline." Then he announced sentence. After a night's rest, the 110th would head home. And on the way every man in the outfit must march 15 miles.