NOTE: on top which says: D. C. (Daniel C.) Schaffner sent garden seeds. what a return!


Feves
9 May 1949

Dear families,
Dear benefactors,
Dear Mr. and Mrs. Schaffner

Please excuse the time I took to answer your letter and precious parcel because I was sick. I feel better now, but I have rheumatism.

Dear Mrs. Schaffner, we don�t know how to express our thanks for your great generosity from which we so gladly benefit.

The parcel arrived just in time as we had not been yet at the grain merchants to buy our seeds for the garden which has allowed us to save a nice bit of money. We immediately sowed most of the seeds the weather being appropriate, and it is quite grown by now. Dear Mr. and Mrs. Schaffner, thank you a thousand times.

We want to give you a little outlook on our situation, two old people living in a wooden shack, where in summer we suffocate, and freeze in winter.

I, the husband, am 78 years old, and my wife will soon be 80. We have been married for 53 years and had three children, two boys and a girl, one of the boys died in a German concentration camp, and so did our daughter�s husband. She is now a widow with two little girls.

On Sept. 4, 1944, at 11 a.m. a gun thump on the shutters, at 12 noon we have to be out, evacuated, we could not take the horse or the carriage. We dressed in a hurry, with whatever we could wear on our backs. At 12 noon, here is the Gestapo �march straight ahead.� Where were we going? God only knew!!

We were lucky. We stayed in Metz during three months of misery and hunger.

On Nov. 19, 1944, the Patton Army entered the city to free us from Hitler and his gang. We were present at the city limits when the first American boys entered ... Dear Mrs. Schaffner, what a riot, what a joy!!

When we came back to our home village, where we had a beautiful little house bought and all fixed up with the fruit of our labors and savings, there was not a stone left of our home between fire and bombing. Dear Madame, we lived some very sad times.

As war damages, we received 58,500 francs, but what can we buy with the prices of everything! We bought as we went along, a stove, a bed, a linen cupboard, a kitchen cupboard, three chairs, a couple of sheets, two pillowcases, a suit of clothes for me, and the money is gone!

I have a social security pension: 5800 francs. (note from translator about $19.00, as you have 300 francs for $1.00) But for two people we have to go easy! We are still working in the fields, more than our strength allows us to.

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Schaffner, now we only have to thank you again and again, a thousand times for your personal gifts and the gifts of the "Generous Morganville" which were bestowed on Feves inhabitants.

I have two little granddaughters, children of my widowed daughter, who have received some pretty clothes which fit them, as tailor-made garments do.

May God keep your generous uncle in good health, as you told me he had been sick, so he can bring joy and happiness to the underprivileged French.

Dear families, please accept all our thanks and wishes of sincere friendship.

My wife, daughters and granddaughters are joining me in all these wishes.

Alfred Roget
Feves
Maizieres-les-Metz
Moselle

P.S. Hurrah for Morganville, hurrah for the U.S.A. and the American people