Rob Dettman (front, left) is both the Chef de Guerre of the 40&8 and the Commander of the Morris Honor Guard. Many members of the Morris Honor Guard are also members of the 40&8. Behind Dettman in a similar gray cap is Jerry Terando. (Michael Urbanec)
The Forty & Eight isn’t new to Morris as a veterans group, but it was revived in 2018 by Jerry Terando, Steve Huetteman and Chef de Gare of Voiture Rob Dettman.
The Society of Forty Men and Eight Horses is an independent, invitation-only honor society of American veterans and service members. The Forty & Eight was founded in 1920 by American veterans returning from France, according to its website, fortyandeight.org.
“Chef de Gare of Voiture” is French for station master, a title given to the person managing a train station. All the titles within the Forty & Eight are based on the titles given to French rail workers because the original members were stationed on trains carrying supplies through France during World War I.
“They were small, cramped little cars that held either 20 men or 40 men, or eight horses,” Terando said. “So, you imagine if they get you up there, they might not have cleaned up the car very well. It’s kind of the luck of the draw, which car you would get.”
The Forty & Eight was about trying to find comrades who understood the conditions, Terando said. It was, and in some ways still is, an offshoot of the American Legion. Many of the members of the Forty & Eight in Morris also are members of the American Legion and Morris Color Guard.
Huetteman said the men who made up the original Forty & Eight were put in boxcars, most likely to get to the front lines.
“The reason they made light of being in the miserable boxcar – cramped and uncomfortable – is because that was better than the experience that they had once they got off the boxcar,” Huetteman said. “They got gassed. They had all the experiences that soldiers had to go through on the front lines, the trenches. It was better to be on the boxcar than it was to be in the trenches.”
Jerry Griffin, a soldier who served on the ammunition train, described the conditions in a letter home to his parents: “I can live here if I have to, but I’d a thousand million times rather be in any place in America than here. It rains six and one-half days a week. The last three weeks we have been living in dugouts about 30 feet under the ground. We have air raids two and three times a day. The anti-aircraft group has been going all day today. Well, I suppose this war won’t last much longer. We are sending five to every one the Huns send over. It won’t be long before we all have peace.”
This letter was written Oct. 30, 1918, a little over a week before the armistice that was signed Nov. 11, 1918.
Terando said one of the primary programs that the Forty & Eight runs is a scholarship for local nursing students.
“The old DoughBoys, they realized the value of the nurses who tended to quite a few of them,” Terando said. “They started that program.”
The Forty & Eight also runs a program aiding veterans and the Veterans Affairs hospitals, and the Americanism program. The Americanism program has members going into local elementary schools, where they provide flags for children, explain the flags’ meanings and teach them how to take proper care of it.
“We’ve gone into the elementary schools,” Huetteman said. “We give out coloring books, and every kid gets a little American flag. We show them how it’s properly folded, and we teach them the proper etiquette and what to do when a flag crosses your path during a parade or at an event. We’re teaching them what to do to keep traditions alive.”
Terando is a Vietnam veteran who served from 1969 to 1971 in Germany on a howitzer unit that had nuclear capability. He served in the U.S. National Guard for seven years after his service.
Huetteman was a military police officer during operations Desert Storm and Desert Shield, serving in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, where he helped provide security while water desalination plants, oil refineries, airports and highways were being built.
Michael Urbanec covers Grundy County and the City of Morris, Coal City, Minooka, and more for the Morris Herald-News
Copyright © 2023 Shaw Local News Network
Copyright © 2023 Shaw Local News Network

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