A sad day

The barracks were partitioned off into cubicles, each cubicle containing two beds and facilities for hanging our uniforms and personal items. At the foot of the bed was a foot locker, with certain specified items packed just so accordings to regulations. These were opened during inspection, and if we were found to be derelict in our presentation, we were given a demerit and made to do some extra duty around the base. One time my bed wasn't made tight enough and I was given the task of washing the windows of the library. It was the only demerit I remember getting and I can't remember actually doing it.
The assignment of cubicle mates was of vital importance. We had no choice in the matter, and I was lucky enough to have one with whom I was fairly compatible. She was a brash, sophisticated woman from Brooklyn, and at about thirty-two or thirty-three seemed quite old to me. Sensing my naive approach to life, she attempted to indoctrinate me into the basics of living in which she felt I was deficient. She had a tattoo on her thigh, and dyed her hair jet black. She made no claim to high moral standards, but since there was little opportunity for misbehaviour, her influence was fairly benign. We had no privacy whatever, and if someone wanted to set up a liaison with someone of the opposite sex, they would have beeen immediately discovered and routed out. The men were vastly outnumbered by the women, anyway. There wouldn't have been enough of them to go around.
I got down to Arlington Hall in July of 1944 and had served there for almost ten months, never having gotten off the base. Then, on April 12, 1945, our president, Franklin D. Roosevelt, suffered a brain hemorrhage and died a short time later. His body was shiipped by train to Washgton, D. C. and our unit was allowed to go to the Capitol to see the funeral parade.
I will never forget that day. It was a fairly warm day, but a slow and steady drizzle fell, and the funeral procession moved slowly past the spectators, most of whom were in tears. Eleanor Roosevelt rode in an open vehicle with no veil, her face composed and sad. She looked to neither left or right, and sat alone in quiet dignity.
I remember the crushing sadness of the spectators. There is nothing so solemn as a funeral procession, with its muffled drums and slow cadence. There was no music, and the muted footsteps of the marchers was the only sound heard as the slow procession passed by. For once I recognized the unfolding of an historic event. An era had passed by, and such a one as our dead president would never come again.