John C. Douglass, a soldier during World War I, was originally from Amsterdam, New York. Douglass was sent to the Naval Training Station at Charleston, South Carolina, upon enlisting in March 1918. After several rounds of inoculations and three weeks of quarantine, he and his companions began their training, first at the Isle of Palms and later at the Naval Air Station in Pensacola, Florida. Following the training he returned to Charleston and was assigned to a group of carpenters and relocated to Pensacola as part of the Navy's aviation branch. John's correspondence does not indicate whether they reached Europe's mainland or not or when they returned home; the final letter was written from Ireland roughly two weeks before armistice was reached. By midsummer, his company began preparing to go overseas, and arrived in Ireland in September 1918.
From the description of John C. Douglass papers, 1918. (Southern Illinois University). WorldCat record id: 316230340
