Stein-EinarH

Dear Tom

Hallo! I want to send you a letter from the states and tell you how the situation is. It is one year and six months since I left Sauda to get a better life and to realise my dream of being a big man here in the US. The first day I went to Stavanger. I was in Stavanger in about three days and waited for the big ship, I was sailing over the ocean with. The boat was called “The dream” and was a ship that transported wood and stone to the US. “The dream” was about 60 foot and had four sails, and it was really nice. The day I was going on board in the ship I was unlucky and broke my collarbone. I was scared and thought I couldn’t travel to US. But I tried to hide the injury and nobody saw that I was hurt.

We started to sail and after two days the bad weather started. It started to blow and the waves got bigger and bigger and the ship had to slow down and got big problems. The ship was near to sink many times and all the people on the boat were ready to die. I fainted a couple of times because it hurt so much in my collarbone, but my new friend Tor helped me and got us the best sitting places on board. The ship won over the waves and I won over the pain. After the storm we got some days with nice weather and we could relax. Rest of the trip the weather changed many times and everybody got sea sick. We went out of food the last days and many were so hungry that they fainted several times. I can remember the enthusiasm on the ship when we saw land for the first time in a very long time. I don’t now how many days the tour from Norway to the US took, because I was so exhausted in the end of the trip.

When we came to US we had to take a test. They wanted to know if we could speak and read. I and my friend Tor were sent to a north state called Ohio. We travelled to Ohio in a transport train and the tour took many days. We hadn’t eaten for days so when the train stopped on a farm we ran out of the train and stole some food. We were many so nobody got satisfied but it kept us conscious. When we came to Ohio we tried to find a place to sleep and something to eat, but it was hopeless. We slept on the street and tried to get work every day, but it wasn’t easy since we couldn’t speak English. But after some weeks we learned a little English and got to work for a transport company called TNR. I was the coachman for the horses and Tor worked as an assistant at the office. We worked in this company for some months and the boss was old and sick so we had to work as much as possible. When the boss died I and Tor took over the company and got all his money so we could by a new horse. We tried to find a cheap horse and a good wagon. We started a new route that went from Ohio to Kansas and before that we had a route from Ohio to New York. These routes were the most used routs in this end of the country. We earned much money on these routes and started other routes to different states. Nowadays we have seven horses and many Norwegian men work for us. We also have a new house where many of the workers sleep when they are home for a rest between the tours. I hope you and your family could travel to us and visit and maybe move over here. I think you would enjoy working as a coachman for some of my horses. I have a big house so it’s not a problem to find a place to stay.

Lots of love from your friend Stein Einar.

To my beautiful wife!

Vietnam: 12.06.1965

Hallo again sweetheart. Now it is many weeks since last time I written to you. It has been a very busy 2 weeks and we have just come back from a dangerous operation. We were in the bush in seven days and have fight. We killed many Vietnamese and some of my friends get killed. The last days are probably the worst day in my life, my troop has been fighting with the Vietnamese and my best friend in the group Tom was killed. I fell that if I have pull on the rifle only one second quicker he would still be alive. I don’t now much about him because he was a very silence guy and just smiled and listen to what the other men in the group want to tell. I now that he was only 23 years and come from California. He has showed me pictures of her little girl and every night when I get in bed I think about her. The troop has been to a big group of friends and it is more and more tragic when a guy in the troop die. The situation in the bush was very bad, and I hope the war could stop before more of my friends were killed.

Now my troops and I are on a train form a town I don’t remember the name of to a little place outside of Saigon. On the station we meet Vietnamese children and every of the men stopped and try to talk with them. It was very hard to see these young and scary children. I haven’t think about what I am gone to do in the next days, but I have think about that I maybe have killed there father and destroy there houses just because we want to win this stupid war. After this meeting nobody of the guys in the troop say a word. I think we now seen that it more then the life we killed how is destroy but that we destroy many young and civil pupils.

When we came to this place outside of Saigon we must stay low in some days and wait. The air force shall come and use “Agent Orange” and napalm bombs so we can walk safer through the forest. This bomb burn down the bush and everything get to ashes. If they don’t come must we walk to a little base and take helicopter in to the town. I hope that I came back to the base fast as possible so I could write a new letter to you.

Love from Brad