A recent FB post about a Troop Kitchen Car shell on offer prompts me to enquire if the meals were cooked and served en route while the train was underway? Was there also a galley car for cleaning utensils and mess trays? How did food service work in a train using the Kitchen Car?

Thanks as always,

Wesley

Wesley -

It's my understanding that the Troop Kitchen Cars were used similar to a U.S. Army chow hall. The troops would come from their Troop Sleepers and get a food tray, get served and then head back to their car to eat the meal. I assume they later returned the trays to the Kitchen Car. There were no tables in the Kitchen Cars to eat. If this is NOT the way it was done, I welcome a correction.

Les Beckman,
Hoosier Valley Railroad Museum,
Home to Troop Kitchen Car # K-325

Not sure about the trays, I think they may have used their mess kits. One or more soldiers were assigned as "kitchen police" or KP's to help the cooks. For those who have been in the Army will know what a mess kit is. They are cleaned in 55 gallon trash cans heated to boiling by immersion heaters. Mess kits are dipped into it for cleaning before and after eating. It was all very simple yet hygienic. If trays were used then cleaning would have been the same. The Army is very careful about soldier health because without manpower all of that expensive equipment is useless. .

nedsn3 -

Using Mess Kits makes much more sense. Thanks for the clarification!


Les

When I went to the Boy Scout Jamboree in 1964 the US Army provided a kitchen car and crew to feed us on the train. We went to the kitchen to get our meals and ate in a baggage car with a long table down the middle. The trays were stacked and returned to the kitchen.
Anybody know of one of these cars being used after that?

The normal routine was to place the kitchen car or a baggage car serving the same function in the center of the train. At meal times all the troops on one end would line up and go to the far end of the train, turn back and when passing through the kitchen again get their meal and take it back to their seat to eat. The process would be repeated for the other end of the train. If mess kits were used after the meal the routine would be repeated to return them to the kitchen for cleaning as the troops passed back through the kitchen so the troops could keep their mess kits. If trays were used they could just be collected and returned to the kitchen. Very efficient. I've read this from Army manuals and histories and retired from the Air Force at the highest enlisted rank of Chief Master Sergeant (E-9).

Somewhere I have files on these from NARA that included some of the instructions for serving, but it would be dispensed from each end as noted and the units themselves provided their own mess crew. You'll see pictures of unit troop trains with paper cups and paper plates and it was often done this way. A helmet makes a handy support turned upside down to sit a paper plate paired with a dixie cup beverage on top of for cross-country travel, and for large movements it would be served to them in their seats in the round-style mermite-style cans distributed through the train with a crew to carry the containers of hot food and serve. Life magazine also did a spread on a Troop Train in 1943 and many of the photos that did not make it to print showed this same process in detail, I think with a baggage car converted to kitchen but with the same process in motion. There, of course, is more to the process but that was at least the typical wartime process of meal distribution. On trips that could not facilitate a full cooked meal, cold-cut sandwiches, fruit, and pastries would be prepared to a specific government specification for a "brown-bag" style lunch distributed in similar manner.

There aren't an abundance of wartime photos showing how it was done due to the sensitive nature of unit movements or any onboard activities, but here is one that illustrates this, part of the Myron Davis sets done of the 77th Division: http://images.google.com/hosted/life/9a ... 9a47d.html

A fascinating topic of logistics, in and of itself!

Was the train moving during this process? Were there any sort of vestibules between cars? I assume we aren't talking about the converted boxcar "troop sleepers".

Not aiming to distract from the thread, but the mention of the Troop Sleepers has me curious, did the Kitchen Cars also come equipped with Allied Full-Cushion trucks as well, and how difficult would it be to swap trucks with something more normal?

We ate on the go. I don't remember how we got between cars. The kitchen car was the same as the troop sleepers and had the same trucks.

John doesn't remember because getting between cars was a non-event. The troop sleepers had diaphragms when built.

Yes, meals were served while moving or standing and getting between cars was not a problem. Kitchen cars were similar to troop sleepers, but built by ACF while Pullman built the troop sleepers. The same process could be used when the sleepers were conventional cars. The Life magazine photo showed hot meal containers being used to distribute food.

Short government produced film on troop trains (1943) that shows either a kitchen car or baggage car and troops eating in their seats with their mess kits.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IIrSwQr4A3c&t=126s

Bob

Dennis -

Yes, there were diaphragms on the end of the cars. The drawing is a bit misleading. For one thing, the Troop Sleepers had a floor that was lower mandating a sloped riser (or steps?) at the ends of the cars so that they could conform to the standard floor height of regular passenger equipment which they operated with on many trains. Also not really shown is the fact that the Porter's "compartment", which was at the upper end of the car was "walled off" to keep him "separated" from the military personnel.

Les

Distributing the food with mermite cans (large insulated containers) to the troop cars where the soldiers used their mess kits makes most sense. When we received hot food in Vietnam, which wasn't often, it still came in mermite cans. Mess kits are easy to clean in heated-to-boiling 55 gallon trash cans. I'm not certain but I doubt that paper cups and plates were used during WW2. Mess kits are convenient and easy to use and troops are used to them. Also balancing a paper tray onto an inverted steel pot might be tricky!
Incidentally I read that each troop sleeper had a Pullman employee on board who had his own accommodations although the sketch posted above doesn't seem to show show that.
Ned 24 years a soldier but never a troop sleeper rider.