Sergeant-Major Earnest Sharpest
Sergeant-Major Earnest Sharpest
In many ways the Army was easier than Earnie's adventures in school. In many ways the Army was worlds tougher than anything the little man had every experienced. He appreciated the camaraderie, and he appreciated the many studies in the Army. Although his memory was not good, and he had no knack for math, or even reading for that matter, he did appreciate learning. And he learned something every single day.
Earnie, unlike most of those around him, had joined the Army to save lives. He worried about his boys (he found himself thinking protectively about them), and he studied harder than he had ever done before.It caused him quite a bit of trouble that he had entered the Army as a conscientious objector (he wanted to serve his country, and protect the people about him, but he did not wish to kill or bring harm to another person, even if that other person was termed an "enemy"), but Earnie smiled and soldiered on. At night, when Earnie knelt by the foot of his cot to pray, the other soldiers threw their boots at him. They called him a coward because he did not carry a gun. They made fun of his size, and his very unregulation moustaches (during the day, Earnie tucked the long strands of hair into his uniform). They excluded him from soldier games, and came up with far better (worse) names to call him than any of the children had in school.I will get the job done. Earnie told himself. I will not give up. I will never give up. He marched. I will not surrender. They might destroy me, he thought with a smile, but they will never defeat me.(play sound file to hear the Sergeant-Major)
The drill sergeants did not appreciate Earnie, not all that much. Still, at night, as they sat around the special drill sergeant campfire, the tough men talked about that one cowardly Earnest Sharpest, and just how tough he was. None of these very tough drill sergeants had ever had a tougher recruit. It didn't matter what they did to him. It didn't matter how tough they were on him, or how many pupshups he was forced to do — the twinkle never deserted the tough, strong little man's eyes. The drill sergeants were amazed."If only we could get him to kill," they muttered to each other. Because who had ever heard of a nice soldier?Soon the soldiers, at the hardest parts of their days, were looking to Earnie for encouragement. They yearned to hear him whisper: "Laddie, it's not that bad! Soldier On!" They bucked up, all of them, whenever Earnie offered them a kindly word. No matter how bad it got, Earnie twinkled.His convictions were strong, and important, and even
when making him unpopular, he wouldn't back down.
Earnie's convictions did not make him popular, but his strength of character soon won most of the men over. They found Earnest to be fearless. He had survived so much in his story that war just seemed like another chapter in the sad tale of his life. When the day of battle came, Earnie was at the head of all the men, and they were glad that he was with them, even if he did not carry a gun. It was true that the sergeants didn't like him, as much as they respected him, but they had no choice but to award Earnest the promotion to corporal.Corporal Earnest Sharpest led the charge.It was a brutal and nightmarish scramble across a wasteland of pits opening up explosively before the men, angry wasps creasing their hair, the screams of the shattered, a headlong dash into sure death.Only a remnant of his men made it to the destination, and most of them were wounded by the time they had dug into their foxholes. Exhausted, they huddled in the mud of their own blood, hardly even hearing anymore the constant barrage of mortar explosion and whizzing bullets overhead. But Earnie only had ears for the screams of his mates downed by bullets and shrapnel on their mad scrambling charge.Earnest scrambled low over the course of their previous advance, and each wounded man he came to, he slung him over his shoulder and plodded back to friendly lines. He repeated this dangerous journey more than ten times, sometimes a soldier slung over each shoulder, saving fourteen men who would surely have died if Earnest had not reached them.Earnest was congratulated by several officers and offered a leave of absence, and when he refused, he was offered a clean cot for the night, but Earnest turned and marched back out to be with his mates.The men were so happy to see Earnest they cheered his arrival and were filled with new life and energy. With terrified and caring eyes, they had watched the tireless Earnest rescuing their wounded mates from the battlefield, and upon his return they were ready to follow him into the hottest pit of hell if it became an option."Lead us Corporal Earnie!" they cried. Of the two hundred thirty-one men who had begun the charge only seventy-six remained and not a sergeant or officer among them. These were the throw-away men, never meant to last the day, but now they were here just beneath the enemy.Earnie's moustaches quirked and his eyes flashed. He lifted up a castaway sword and stood to his full height (which wasn't all that much) and boomed in his deep, crusty voice: "Soldier On Boys! CHARGE!"The men leapt to their feet and charged with Earnie before them. Soldier On they cried as they rushed into deadly gunfire. By all natural laws of nature, they never should have made it. No one in the Army expected them to make it. The enemy certainly did not consider them to be the awesome threat they turned out to be.But Corporal Earnest and his men took the position, negating the deadly machine gun nests. And Earnest, bearing his borrowed sword, actually came into close personal conflict with the enemy, parrying many bayonet thrusts, managing to disarm three enemy soldiers despite his diminuitive size. Earnest held true to his convictions, despite the fear of imminent death. He had come to war to save lives and even face-to-face with the enemy, he did not take a life.* * * * * * *
This might be a nice place to end the story with Earnie's great achievement, but sadly, his troubles had only just begun.No sooner had they achieved their objective, capturing nearly 100 enemy soldiers, when Earnie's brave men suffered a terrible setback: the enemy retaliated with extreme prejudice, bombarding their own recently captured position with monstrous cannon fire. The earth opened up in a torrent of explosions. Earnest was dashed backward, end over end, and all of his remaining men disappeared into the yawing chasm of a cannon crater.When Earnie woke, he was not certain if he were alive or dead. He heard bells ringing in his head, great iron bells and myriads of chimes and gongs. But his first thought was of his men. He crawled to the lip of the chasm and stared down. Only twenty of his men were alive, and they were trapped at the bottom of the crater with no means of escape.Enemy tanks and jeeps were speeding toward their location. Earnie looked back and forth between the approcahing enemy and his trapped men. His head was rattled. It was hard to think, not to mention very difficult to breathe."Go Earnie! Run! Escape! Get back to our side!" His men cried up to him. They were frantic. They had grown to care about their diminuitive leader, even if they didn't quite agree with his convictions. They wanted him to live, even if they could not.Earnie the Hero.
All Artwork and stories on this "Soldier On" Site ©Copyright 2007 by Douglas Christian Larsen
I Dinna Ken Aboot
Surrender.
Never, never, never
never, never, never
NEVER give up.
Soldier On!
Sergeant-Major Earnest Sharpest
Home - Soldier On - Never Give Up - Artistry - Dream - Persist - Creativity - Renaissance - Fate - Eclectica - Sharpest 2 - Aboot
Message from Sergeant-Major Earnie:
"No, no, my good friend, I know nothing of surrender.
Never, never, never, never, never, never, NEVER give up.
Soldier On. I say Soldier On."Links to other Douglas Christian Larsen - DCLWolf Sites on the Internet:
www.TruthSeek.net - Seek Truth with Your Whole Heart, Mind, Soul, Spirit and Strength, and you will find HIm
www.FluHQ.net - Fight the Flu Naturally, Don't put your faith in placebos, you have to fight the flu
www.SoldierOn.net - Motivational truth and wisdom quotations: NEVER give up, Soldier On
www.DramaticParables.com - Christian Skits, Plays, with parable storytelling making the difference
www.Tolkster.org - The Fine Art Tribute to J.R.R. Tolkien by Douglas Christian Larsen
The BIG Book of Gospel Drama - Scripts in print for drama ministries and Biblical illumination
www.BeautyGospel.com - Spark interest on the Beauty of the Gospel, original spiritual artwork
Douglas Christian Larsen at other sites and venues:
Fine Art America - Douglas Christian Larsen black and white optical obsessions
Soldier On Fine Art Posters at www.SoldierOn.net:
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"Creativity" Fine Art Posters by Douglas Christian Larsen at Soldier On.net
"Artistic" Fine Art Posters by Douglas Christian Larsen at Soldier On.net
"Never Give Up" Fine Art Posters by Douglas Christian Larsen at Soldier On.net
"Eclectic" Fine Art Posters by Douglas Christian Larsen at Soldier On.net
"Renaissance" Fine Art Posters by Douglas Christian Larsen at Soldier On.net
"Fate/Destiny" Fine Art Posters by Douglas Christian Larsen at Soldier On.net
"Dreams" Fine Art Posters by Douglas Christian Larsen at Soldier On.net
"Persistence" Fine Art Posters by Douglas Christian Larsen at Soldier On.net
Cyrano Hercule Savinien de Bergerac - a Tribute by Douglas Christian Larsen
"Sword" Fine Art Posters by Douglas Christian Larsen at Soldier On.net
"Genius" Fine Art Posters by Douglas Christian Larsen at Soldier On.net
"Aboot" - learn more about the fine-art posters of Soldier On at Soldier On.net
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Fine Art Posters, all original, created over thousands of exhaustive hours of concentration, labor and love, combining the power of words with all the colors of the rainbow, authentic artwork meant to last a lifetime (or longer!). This is artwork meant for intense study and concentration, exercising the eyes and the mind, focusing on beauty and optical illusions, the power of Virtual Shattered Glass by Douglas Christian Larsen, virtual stained glass that seems to glow and shimmer. Optical illusions, bold colors, intense color contrasts and sympathetic hues, the fine artwork of Douglas Christian Larsen. Now available on ImageKind with a vast selection of framing and matting options, available on fine-art canvas, on the finest museum-quality papers, and even as greeting cards.
Other Sites of Note:
www.Rodolphus.org - the Dark Fiction of Rodolphus, artistic psychological horror stories, angry and bittersweet
www.DCLWolf.com - Fiction of the Wolf, the mystical fiction of Douglas Christian Larsen
