WWII Rations and Mess Kits

The Art

 

Forgot to mention the previous 2 posts were from a journal by a Allied POW.

 

First biscuits baked on Anzio. They were an occasion. Cooks, left to right: Robert Gardner. Joe Germain, Edward Witorski, Mess Sergeant Willard Crawford, all of whom became the company's popular guys with the biscuits.

 

Sailor eating sandwich under propellers of torpedo being loaded aboard U.S. submarine at Groton sub base in New London, Connecticut. August 1943. Lt. Commander Charles Fenno Jacobs. (Navy

 

LOL I beat you to this one already Doc . I posted it earlier in the thread.

 

How to Order Food Like a WWII GI

By Mike Calahan, eHow Editor

If ever you find yourself inadvertently passing through a break in the space-time continuum and wake up as a soldier in WWII, here are some steps to ensure that, if nothing else, you get a decent meal.


Step1
Order up some ‘battery acid’. This will ensure you receive a cup of coffee. Like milk and sugar? Then order ‘blond and sweet’. Like your coffee black? Then be sure to order a cup of ‘black strap’ (suggesting the coffee is as black as blackstrap molasses)
. Step2
If you want a chicken entree, be sure to ask for a helping of ‘albatross’. If beef is on the menu, then be sure to get a slice of ‘tiger meat’.
Step3
Vegetarian? If so, you could easily get by with a bowl of ‘grass’. In this decade, grass was simply a term for salad.
Step4
Still hungry? Be sure to order some ‘punk’ with enough ‘salve’ to spread on top. This will get you some bread and butter.
Step5
As the food may not settle too well in your stomach, be sure to order up some ‘army strawberries’ for dessert. These are dried prunes and often times a must after eating at your camp’s mess hall.

How to Order Food Like a WWII GI | eHow.com

 

Rats! I knew it was bound to happen eventually.

 

Gotta love Willie and Joe! Is there a thread here at ww2f devoted to them?

--------------------------------

Never mind, I found the thread!

 

Thats ok. Sometimes great minds think alike LOL

 

Until room was found for post exchanges in newly built recreation huts in the camps, Brigade Marines depended upon the periodic visit of a truck carrying for sale at minimal cost such post exchange staples as smoking, washing, and shaving items.
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Previously, a truck would visit the camps periodically with a selection of post exchange items such as smoking, washing, asn shaving supplies. During the winter months, the recreation buildings served to provide space for small libraries, barber service, amateur shows, classrooms, and religious services.
The battalion camp galleys were primitive at best and tested the skills of the cooks and frequently the stomachs of the Marines, but at least the rations were usually feshly prepared and warm. World War II combat rations had not yet appeared. Rations were never elaborate or fancy but were healthy and adequate. Meals were made with frozen, dried, and tinned foods prepared on old Marine Corps World War I-vintage, kerosene-burning, trailer-mounted "buzzacot" stoves. Beans, forzen fowl, salmon, mashed potatoes, corned beef, stew, canned fruits, posdered milk, coffee, and some baked goods were typical items on the menu. (Officers were charged fifty cents per day for rations.) The menu was repeated every ten days. There were no field combat rations. Troops ate from their Wolrd War I mess kits: two pans with a handle and steel spoon, knife, and for,. Each man washed his own mess kit in GI cans holding boiling soapy water followed by a dip in boiling clear water. Nobody suffered, but it was an intiquated system.
Marines line up in the mud for chow served from expeditionary cans on a truck.
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With the arrival of the Army, the Marines changed from Navy rations to the Army menu which included experimental field rations consisting largely of Spam, sausage, and dehydrated items. The Navy had been supplying an acceptable variety of canned and dried foods, but the new Army rations werent' very popular with most Marines. There was no refrigeration, no running water in the galleys, and no good way to heat water until the Army brough in No. 5 coal ranges and immersion heaters to heat water to boiling for washing the men's mess gear. Prior to this, water had been heated on the cooking ranges. The mess hals had rough wooden benches and tables, and
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both the galleys an mess halls were pungent with the odor of mutton and codfish obtained from local sources. Messmen described the day's menu as "mutton, lamb, sheep, or ram." Local milk and cheese products were prohibited because it was reported that many of Iceland's cows were tubercular. The Marines were issued a highly concentrated chocolate candy bar as a "combat" rations to be consumed in case the Germans attacked and other rations were not available. one gunnery sergeant dubbed this ration "the last-chance goody bar."

HyperWar: Outpost in the North Atlantic: Marines in the Defense of Iceland

 

CREW OF A GENERAL LEE TANK heating field rations at Souk el Arba, 23 November 1942

 

Mess Truck