At the time of the depression the president of United States Roosevelt did very good to help the people and keep the family healthy by having people working with WPA also to keep the young man off the streets by having civil concentration camp to help the families also.

A Beautiful Life In Berlin, New Hampshire

By Henry R. Lambert

AuthorHouse

Copyright © 2009 Henry R. Lambert
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4490-3770-3

Contents

Chapter 1......................1Chapter 2......................11Chapter 3......................19Chapter 4......................27Chapter 5......................37Chapter 6......................45Chapter 7......................51Chapter 8......................57Chapter 9......................65Chapter 10.....................73Chapter 11.....................77Chapter 12.....................85Chapter 13.....................91Chapter 14.....................95

Chapter One

My grandfather, Reme Lambert, was born in Paris, France. As a young man, he tried to make a good living, but times were difficult and it was hard for him and his two younger brothers, Morris and Albert, who was a priest, to find work. He heard stories about going to the New World where jobs were easy to come by, so he talked with his brothers and parents, and the boys made their decision to leave France.

It was very hard to leave their father, mother and sister behind, but they felt there was no other choice but to go, so they traveled to Le Havre, boarded a small ship and waved goodbye to their family members. It took them about two weeks to cross the ocean to Canada.

Upon arrival in North America, they spoke to some of the Canadians and asked if there were any French-speaking people there. They were told that the French-speaking people lived mostly around Qubec, so that's where my grandfather and his two brothers decided was the best place for them to start a new life.

In Qubec, Albert wanted to continue his service to God and decided work with the native Indian tribes to teach them about the Catholic religion. Morris decided that he would be better off farming. My grandfather found work as a teamster delivering goods to various stores in Qubec. During this time, he met a young lady named Margaret, with whom he fell in love and married. Soon his family began to grow, and he and his wife began raising their children, Elizabeth, Whitey, Marguerite and Henry, who was on the way.

Because Reme had heard prospects were better in the United States than in Canada, and was concerned about supporting his growing family, he talked to Marguerite about moving there. At the time, my grandmother was pregnant with my father and told my grandfather it would be better for them to stay in Canada until the baby was born, to which he agreed. However, my grandmother died in childbirth, and my grandfather decided right away to go to the United States.

My father Henry, who was born on Jan. 1, 1899, was only two weeks old when the family arrived in Berlin, New Hampshire, a city amid the heavily forested White Mountains. Looming in the distance was Mt. Washington, the highest peak in the northeastern U.S. at an elevation of 6,288 feet. Reme had heard there was plenty of work in the lumber business and mills in the area.

In Berlin, my grandfather applied for work at the city hall, and procured a teamster job working with horses and delivering goods to different stores. Horse-drawn delivery carts were common then and it was a good job. He eventually met and married a schoolteacher, and they had three children together, a daughter, Rose, and two sons, Maurice and Robert. Grandmother was a very kind lady and did a very nice job raising the children - her own as well as her stepchildren.

While my father was growing up, he attended school at St. Anne's on Prospect Street right next to the Androscoggin River, which flowed down from Maine and ran through the city. To earn spending money, he would help various people around Berlin, chopping wood for the winter and doing all sorts of odd jobs.

During that time, the Brown family started a business alongside the Androscoggin making leather goods, paper goods and peanut oil, which were shipped all over the world. The company needed people to work in the woods to harvest lumber, which powered the factories. The lumber was hewn, then floated down the Androscoggin to conveyor belts, where it was moved from the river to large piles at the various outbuildings. There were also men working on the water to keep the wood moving down river for making paper goods. For this reason, Berlin was known as the Lumberjack City, and the river was the lifeblood of the city's prosperous economy.

When my father walked to school every day, he had to cross the bridge over the Androscoggin because he lived on east side of Berlin. In the winter, there was a lot of snow and it got very cold. Sometimes the temperature dipped to 40F below. The streets, mostly unpaved, would often be covered with almost five feet of snow, and tractors, called "old Bessies," were used to keep the roads open. A reminder of winter's heavy snowfall was ever present as it capped Mt. Washington almost the year 'round.

In those days, Berliners never worried about electricity because they had four dynamos on the river to produce electricity for the city and all the factories. In addition to the Brown Company, there was also the Burgess Mill, which produced sulfides fiber. At that time, it was the largest mill of its kinds in the world.

Berlin was a good place to live - beautiful and plenty of jobs - and people came from all over the world, seeking opportunity. There were Polish, Jewish and Italian people; folks were very nice, got along with their neighbors and helped each other out. My father really enjoyed living there with his brothers and sisters.

One day while walking on Main Street, my father heard that men were needed to enlist in the Army. He was only 16 years old, but he lied about his age and signed up to take his training in New York. My grandmother found out that he had volunteered and was furious. She wrote a letter to the president of the United States telling him that Henry Lambert was under age when he volunteered to enlist and asked him to send her son back home because he lied about his age.

Henry was surprised to learn that he was being sent back home after my grandmother wrote to the president. He was furious with her, but my grandmother explained to him that it was better for his future that he go back to school and finish his education. She wanted to make him realize that life would be better for him in the long run. He eventually agreed with her and returned to school.

However, war was raging in Europe and on April 6, 1917, the U.S. Congress declared war on Germany. Again my father volunteered, but this time he was of age. He spent five weeks training in the 26th Division in New York, and was then sent overseas to fight in the trenches. At that time, the use of chemical weapons, a distinguishing feature of World War I, was widespread. Gases used included chlorine, mustard and phosgene. The Germans were using mustard gas where my father was fighting and he took a hit, which exposed him to the sickening gas. It made him very ill, and he was sent to a Paris hospital for treatment.

At first the doctors thought that he was going to die, but they worked very hard to save him. Although he only weighed 89 pounds at the worst of his stay, he eventually regained his health. He remained in the hospital until the war was over (cease-fire, November 1918; peace treaty signed June 28, 1919), when he was able to walk around Paris. He met a young lady who showed him around. He really enjoyed himself during that time, but soon he got orders to return to the United States.

In a case of history repeating itself, Henry Lambert sailed from Le Havre, France,...