[Dixielandjazz] Military Instruments

[Lowell Busching]

Bob Ringwald may be able to correct any misconception I have on this 
story, but Dick Cary, the musician and arranger and more, supposedly 
left the service after WW II and took his Peck Horn with him. Whether 
they let him, or the other musicians, take their horns with them or in 
the "confusion" of the mustering out process at that time, pack it in 
their bags, I have no idea.

During the time he was in the Army on the east coast Dick went "AWOL" to 
play on the Eddie Condon radio show. If anyone has those recordings they 
may notice his name was not mentioned on the earlier ones, even when he 
played piano or whatever, but once his commanding officer got credit for 
allowing him to appear, he was.  Maybe that same officer let him keep 
his Peck Horn, or just said nothing.

Are there any other such musicians on the list that knows these kind of 
things happened?  My uncle LeRoy was a jazz trombone player with the 
Army 164th during  W.W. II in the Pacific, starting with Guadecanal. 
Their instruments arrived about 6 months after they did. They worked as 
stretcher barriers until they arrived and then of course played in the 
regular Army functions as well as for entertaining the troops for years.

Before he got discharged in 45, LeRoy was "held over" by popular demand 
(of the Army) for another 6 months or so in Chicago to help welcome the 
troops back home.  I know he had a trombone when he came home, but 
whether it was the one he had used all those years or one he had left 
home, I have no idea. I would like to think the military might have let 
him keep his instrument after going through all that!

The military being what it is, this may not have been the case. Do any 
of the other list mates have similar experiences or stories from that 
era on what happened to all those instruments or if the military 
demanded them back?  Not just military marching band instruments, but 
the units like Glenn Miller's band. Military dance bands etc.

Zeke Zarchy, and I believe Trigger Albert, are still alive and may know. 
How about it Bob?

Mad Dog.