Page 165 - some-stuff-i-wrote-and-some-stuff-i-didn't-(2011)-h-morris-williams

Some Stuff I Wrote and Some Stuff I Didn't (2011) H. Morris Williams

Since his place of employment was quite some distance from his home, he
would walk home on Saturday afternoons and stay with his mother and three

sisters (his father having died several years before) until about noon on
Sunday, when he would undertake the journey back to his place of employment

in order to be at work at the required time early on Monday morning.

On the weekend that he decided to leave England and come to America, and as
he left home that Sunday and headed back to his work, his mother walked part

of the way with him in order to spend the most possible time with him.

Years later, he related how, after she turned around and headed back home,

that he watched her until she disappeared from sight, knowing that this was the

last time he would ever see her.

That night, instead of going back to his place of employment, he stowed away

on a ship that was headed for America, although he did not know which part of
America.

After the ship was well out to sea, he made his presence known to the ship’s
officers and they of course had no choice but to let him remain on the ship

until it reached Canada, but he was required to work his way over the rest of

the trip.

After the ship docked in Canada he managed to get a job digging rock with

hand tools out of a rock quarry. There were no child labor laws in those days,
and if a 14-year-old boy was stout enough to mine rocks from a quarry, then

nobody had a problem with it.

Joseph Dicks made up his mind that he would leave the rock quarry as soon as
he felt he was mature enough to get accepted by the United States Army, and at

age 16 he made his way to Ottawa, Canada and down to New York State, where
he represented himself to be old enough to be accepted in to the army.

They accepted his enlistment.

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