Nathan J. Fullmer, Salt Lake City, Utah: an interview by Luke Kelly, August 11, 2001: Saving the legacy tape no. 282

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athan J. Fullmer t with p opl lik we w re and new draft es. There were a lot of ASTP people that were transferred in th r at th was and also some washed out air cadets. I don't know who cried the loudest th would be airplane drivers, or the would be college boys in uniform. But it was quite an experience. I've always said about Camp Shelby, and the surrounding areas where the training took place in the DeSoto National Forest, you could be in mud up to your knees and still have dust blowing in your face. I did not get a real good impression of the deep south. But that training continued, and there were no more heavy withdrawals of personnel as replacements after we got there. We got to be in the regular table of organization vyith the regiment, the 272nd. There were three regiments to the division, and then some cannon and support, and that sort of thing. Each regiment had-gee, I don't know-three battalions, and each battalion had four companies-three rifle companies and a weapons company. And each rifle company had three rifle platoons and a weapons platoon. I was in a rifle squad, a twelve man squad with a squad leader and an assistant squad leader, two Browning automatic rifles (BAR's), and the rest of us with M-1 rifles which I have one in the closet now that was given to me a couple of years ago. You know, forty some odd years ago I made my living with something like that. Well, that basic training continued until the fall of that year. I mentioned the BAR. That was the Browning automatic rifle, and it weighed about 18 pounds. It was a 4