(Editor’s note: The following letter was included with the discharge papers World War II veterans received at Fort McPherson in 1946. The text was edited slightly to fix mistakes.)
ORIENTATION BRANCH
Separation Center
Fort McPherson, Georgia
For your information and guidance, the following article by Bob Rutherford is reprinted as it appeared in the ATLANTA CONSTITUTION, 15 October 1945:
“When you get those discharge papers Mr. Veteran head for home.”
That’s the advice Detective supt. E.I. Hilderbrand and other Atlanta police officers faced with a mountain of problems of larceny reports by soldiers recently discharged from Fort McPherson’s separation center have to offer the newly turned civilians.
Far from being a reflection on the city’s hospitality, the advice is offered as a protective measure for themselves.
“The state’s professional pick-pockets, thieves, confidence men and prostitutes have evidently realized that lush pickings are to be had in Atlanta, where dozens of service men, their billfolds bulging with mustering out payments, back time pay, are released every day,” Superintendent Hilderbrand explained.
Many soldiers arrive at their homes with most of the money they were paid at the separation center, but the ones who leave Fort McPherson and plan on spending a few days in Atlanta to “pitch a big one” in celebration of their discharge from the service are proving to be a headache for the superintendent and the detective force.
Most of the stories the “rolled” veterans bring to the police headquarters follow the same pattern. They begin drinking in a taproom, a stranger comes up and offers to buy them more drinks and the next morning they wake up with nothing to show for their celebration but headaches and empty billfolds.
Detectives are able to report a high recovery rate in all other types of larcenies, but under the above circumstances they are many times powerless to apprehend the criminal. The soldier is very seldom able to give an accurate description of the person who took the money, and because most of them are unacquainted with the city, they cannot tell the detectives where the crime took place.
In cases where police officers do make an arrest of someone taking money from a soldier or an ex-service man, the victims have usually returned to their homes or to some other city hundreds of miles away, where it would be inconvenient for them to return to Atlanta to prosecute.
Some soldiers tell the detectives they have been fed knockout drops while drinking, but Hilderbrand said actual cases of this sort are rare.
“At the most, only one out of every 1,000 ever received that treatment,” he said. “It is much simpler for the criminal to keep on feeding his victim liquor until he passes out.”
Those who get the drink treatment in bar rooms, however, get off light in comparison with their more unfortunate buddies who bring strangers up to their hotel rooms for drinking parties. In those cases, the victims often report losing not only their money, but their clothing and personal belongings as well.
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