A glimpse into history: World War I veteran’s letters transcribed for historical society

In 1886, Don Norton's parents ran a general store, post office and train depot in Nortonburg featured in this 1902 photo. However, after the Columbus, Hope and Greensburg railroad line stopped going the small town along County Road 450N, the post office closed in 1910, followed by the store in 1912. By the end of the 20th century, all that was left of Nortonburg was a few houses. Submitted photo

Two local residents with an interest in history have taken the letters of a local World War I veteran to help bring the soldier’s life into sharper focus for 21st century historians.

Retired Columbus educator Candy Carr spent more than 100 hours transcribing letters from Nortonburg native Don M. Norton (1892-1968), who wrote to his mother Matilda Maier Norton (1861-1957) while he served in the U.S. Navy in World War I.

The transcriptions, along with photographs and drawings, have been produced into an audio-visual presentation largely under the guidance of Adam Rediker of the Bartholomew County Historical Society.

The correspondence was organized and donated to the Historical Society in July, 1990, by Gladys Simmons, one of Norton’s distant relatives. The letters remained almost unnoticed for almost 28 years in an acid-free box tucked away in a corner of the Bartholomew County Historical Society’s research library, Rediker said.

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In the summer of 2018, Rediker asked Carr if she would be interested in transcribing Norton’s World War I letters to his mother. The retired educator said she agreed because her grandfather had fought in that military conflict, which made Carr interested in that period of American history.

When she consented to Rediker’s request, Carr assumed there were likely be about 10 letters to transcribe, she said. It turned out that Norton had written at least 180 letters (not including postcards) from July 10, 1917 to Jan. 22, 1919.

From July through November of last year, Carr logged what was equivalent to almost 16 full-time work days (123.5 hours) doing the transcriptions. In addition, she also tried to track down people who knew Norton, as well as conducted research about him through books and newspapers.

“After five months of typing and reading every word Don Norton wrote, I feel like I knew him,” Carr said.

Researching a life

In August and September, Rediker and other staff members spent 45 hours scanning the original letters in preparation for the development of a multi-media presentation about Norton. The presentation, which includes photos, music and narration, is being made available to interested parties, including fourth graders studying Indiana and history clubs in secondary schools, Carr said.

One of the first things Carr learned was that Norton had been in the Navy for only four months when he received word that his father, Ephraim Bailey Norton, had died in November 1917. After a two-week furlough, Norton did not mention his father’s death in subsequent letters to his mother.

It’s likely he was trying to avoid triggering feelings of grief in his mother, Carr said.

The serviceman’s letters reflect a church-going man in his mid-20s who foregoes gambling, drinking and associating with what he calls “loose women,” Carr said.

In one letter, Norton complains about a superior who ordered him to escort a woman nearly twice his age to her home. A few passages illustrated how Norton could be judgemental of others with different values, Carr said.

“He was a very righteous person who does come across as a little full of himself at times,” she said.

What did excite Norton, according to his letters, was conjuring up ways of earning extra money, such as creating stencils, making key checks, doing shoe repair, accepting extra guard duty or loading and unloading ships while off-duty, Carr said.

Carr emphasized Norton displayed a number of admirable qualities, such as being a dutiful son who sent a substantial amount of his military pay back home to his widowed mother. His letters also reflected a menagerie of feelings including humor, sarcasm, calmness — and occasionally fear, Carr said.

As long as the war was going on, Norton avoided descriptions of dangerous missions while he was stationed off the coast of Scotland, Carr said. He didn’t want his mother worrying, and all of his letters were being censored by the military, Carr said.

One classified detail that slipped past the censors was that Norton was serving on the U.S.S. Aroostook, a ship used for dropping mines on submarines. He would later describe the experience as “sitting on a thousand pounds of dynamite,” fully aware that he could die at any moment, Carr said.

The Aroostook crew participated in laying the North Sea Mine Barrage, placing thousands of mines across the mouth of the North Sea in order to create a barrier for German U-boats trying to depart from German seaports to the open Atlantic. The Aroostook crew members placed a total of 3,180 mines in this operation.

The war ends

It was Norton’s 26th birthday on Nov. 11, 1918 when peace was restored. Armistice Day (now Veteran’s Day) not only brought an end to the war that had claimed the lives of 117,000 U.S. soldiers, but it also stopped the letter censoring. That gave Norton the incentive to write a 22-page letter where he “just lets it all out there,” Carr said.

He describes two separate times when he thought death was imminent when the Aroostook made multiple 35-degree rolls in rough seas. He wrote about suffering “seasickness down to my socks” nearly every time he went out on the ship. He also described how the ship’s captain had saved the crew multiple times by outmaneuvering torpedoes, Carr said.

But it was seven months before Armistice Day that Norton’s greatest fear was revealed to his mother.

‘My worst dreaded thing is being a cripple for someone to look after,” Norton wrote on April 5, 1918. “I pray to God that if anything ever does happen, it will be fatal. I want to go all together or not at all.”

The worst did not befall Norton, who wrote that he wiped away tears upon receiving official word that the war was over.

“Someone struck up The Star Spangled Banner on the piano and all hands rose and sang,” Norton wrote on Nov. 19, 1918. “It was certainly a happy sign — no darkness (on the) ship for the first time.”

Carr said she finds the passage about the crew singing The Star Spangled Banner — 13 years before it became the national anthem — especially stirring.

After Norton returned home, he would work several years as a supervisor for what is now the Indiana Department of Transportation before accepting a maintenance supervisor’s position at Camp Atterbury.

He first married Laura Ault in 1924, but the couple divorced in 1937 without children. His second wife was Mary J. Nappure, who already had three sons from a previous marriage.

Married in 1941, the couple lived several years on the southeast corner of Marr and Rocky Ford roads. After retiring in 1951, Don Norton remained active with the Clifford Masonic Lodge and the Veterans of Foreign Wars.

Don and Mary Norton were married for 27 years until he died at the age of 76 on Dec. 12, 1968. Mary Norton died five years later in 1973.

A very private individual later in life, there’s no doubt Norton would be appalled his wartime experiences are getting this much public attention from 100 years ago after they occurred, Carr said.

But a key reason why the project is so valuable is that almost all communications between military and family members use modern technology such as Skype or satellite phones, Rediker said.

“So stories like Don Norton’s won’t be available (for historians) to capture any more,” Rediker said.

“That is part of what makes these letters such a treasure,” Carr said.

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“Letters Home” (Don Norton, U.S. Navy July 1917-January 1919) will include music, narration and a live presenter when the Powerpoint presentation is publicly shown at least three times this winter.

  • Tuesday, Jan. 28 – from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. during the Lunch and Learn program at the Bartholomew County Historical Museum, 524 Third St., Columbus.
  • Sunday, Feb. 2 – from 2 to 3:30 p.m. at the Yellow Trail Museum, 644 Main St., Hope.
  • Tuesday, Feb. 4, from 6 to 7:30 p.m. in the Red Room of the Bartholomew County Public Library, 535 Fifth St., Columbus.

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