This is a bit of an experiment to see if I can now post from
my office computer.
Although I think the financial allotment to his mother is
most likely the key motive for traveling north to join the
Canadian army once the U.S. entered WW I, I will throw out
one other that is pure speculation. With his background,
Chandler would have stood out as an oddity in US army
training. Basic training is a very cruel world where those
who are different can be subject to serious hazing. As an
aside, I have long been of the opinion that basic training is
fundamentally the same no matter what the service or what the
time period. Details change but the process is the same. I
first came to this realization when reading T.E. Lawrence's
THE MINT, which covers post WWI training as a private under
an assumed name, and saw the similarities with my own
training in another army fifty years later.
After the war, Chandler told people that a
"British uniform" was more "natural" to him and it is
certainly true that the Canadian army was a better fit for
him in many ways.
Still, I am persuaded that given the fact that he was leaving
his mother alone in L.A., the financial allotment was likely
an important consideration in choosing Canadian service.
Chandler was a man who took his obligations seriously, unlike
Hammett who was not a dependable husband or father.
I think his story of being turned down by the American army
for poor eyesight was likely a polite fiction that closed off
the need for any other explanation.
Richard Moore
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