Letters Home World War 1 August 1918 |
Arthur is in a damp and beastly forest, talk of war lasting 2 or 3 more years, likes his new folding chair ...
August 3rd 1918
My Dear Mother
No letter from you since I last wrote some days ago. It has been very wet here last two or three days, poured all yesterday & has started it again today, so life in forest is anything but pleasant & so damp & beastly. I think we all have had enough of it & are longing to get out of it …
News about Soissons is good, we heard it this morng, of course not so very far from here. If only we can keep it up & give them a bad knock it might have some effect in Germany, where if one can believe the papers, they are beginning to realise Hindenburg’s promise of peace in Aug. is not in the least likely to come about, still, they are as determined as we are which is why they all talk of war lasting two years more & Americans talk of 3 years more & say they are only just starting!
Alison tells me her brother Norman is now acting brigade Major, so has got on well, he is still in Italy & hopes to leave in Oct.
I have just got my “Rorkee” (Indian) chair that Alison sent me; they fold up & take to bits & go in a bag, very handy. It is so comfortable. She ordered it a long time ago at Harrods, but they have only lately got a new lot in; I’ve been expecting it for 2 months …
I’m just sending a sub of £5 to Downside School War Memorial Fund, you sent me on circular of this the other day enclosing letter from Head Master. Propose to put up memorial to old boys killed in the war; a nice idea, probably take form of an addition to the church …
This fellows brother was wireless operator on the “Justicia” recently sunk off Irish coast, he writes to his brother that they got 3 of the Submarines that sunk her …
Where is Ernest, has he come over to France yet. Not the remotest chance of their getting 50,000 men in Ireland by Ist Sep. or is it 1st Oct what will they do.
Best love
Yr.affect son
Arthur
My Dear Mother
No letter from you since I last wrote some days ago. It has been very wet here last two or three days, poured all yesterday & has started it again today, so life in forest is anything but pleasant & so damp & beastly. I think we all have had enough of it & are longing to get out of it …
News about Soissons is good, we heard it this morng, of course not so very far from here. If only we can keep it up & give them a bad knock it might have some effect in Germany, where if one can believe the papers, they are beginning to realise Hindenburg’s promise of peace in Aug. is not in the least likely to come about, still, they are as determined as we are which is why they all talk of war lasting two years more & Americans talk of 3 years more & say they are only just starting!
Alison tells me her brother Norman is now acting brigade Major, so has got on well, he is still in Italy & hopes to leave in Oct.
I have just got my “Rorkee” (Indian) chair that Alison sent me; they fold up & take to bits & go in a bag, very handy. It is so comfortable. She ordered it a long time ago at Harrods, but they have only lately got a new lot in; I’ve been expecting it for 2 months …
I’m just sending a sub of £5 to Downside School War Memorial Fund, you sent me on circular of this the other day enclosing letter from Head Master. Propose to put up memorial to old boys killed in the war; a nice idea, probably take form of an addition to the church …
This fellows brother was wireless operator on the “Justicia” recently sunk off Irish coast, he writes to his brother that they got 3 of the Submarines that sunk her …
Where is Ernest, has he come over to France yet. Not the remotest chance of their getting 50,000 men in Ireland by Ist Sep. or is it 1st Oct what will they do.
Best love
Yr.affect son
Arthur
A new volunteer arrives, a solitary swan on the lake, asks Mother to buy him a book ...
Monday August 5th 1918
My Dear Mother
Yrs. of July 28th & enclosure came yesterday & an I.Times. Yes I got various I. Times you sent. A new volunteer, Belfast man about 32 arrived lately, he likes to see the I.T. so I pass it on to him. Think he is an insurance broker there, talks with an Irish Scotch accent, you can imagine the class, but seems a nice cheery sort of person. Was in army for a time & invalided out. Two men go home for good this week.
Our C.O. was called off to Paris suddenly at dejeuner time today it may have to do with our moving back for a bit to repair & overhaul cars. We expect to go any time now, I only hope it may be to some decent place, well back & far removed from guns & bombs, it would be such a pleasant change!
This last 24 hrs. I’ve been at a post. A Chateau very close behind the lines, too beastly close & I’m glad to say they are moving it further back for that reason. Slept, or rather lay down in the Chateau wine cellar with the Dr. At 2 we were warned of gas & had to put on our masks, when that was over the Bosches started Coup de Main & tremendous noise, torpedoes & shells & glass falling from vibration from already broken windows, so one had not much sleep! There is a moat around the Chateau & a solitary swan sails about apparently quite indifferent to gas, shells & bombs, also rifle bullets which whizz by every now and then, as it is so close …
I had a letter from Will today, just got back. Says they are only to have leave every 7 months now, rather hard, but I hope they will change that again before his next usual leave is due. Those things get changed so often.
I got 2 letters you forwarded. One is a notice about a book, “For Dauntless France” by Laurence Binjou, price 10/6, profits go to Red X; Hodder & Stoughton, Warwick Square, London EC are publishers. Work of our convoys come in to & generally work done by English helping the French, hospital, canteen etc. I’ll see it when I get back, but if you feel like 10/6 it might interest you. I’ll ask Alison to get it & keep it for me to look over …
Best love
Yr affect. son
Arthur
My Dear Mother
Yrs. of July 28th & enclosure came yesterday & an I.Times. Yes I got various I. Times you sent. A new volunteer, Belfast man about 32 arrived lately, he likes to see the I.T. so I pass it on to him. Think he is an insurance broker there, talks with an Irish Scotch accent, you can imagine the class, but seems a nice cheery sort of person. Was in army for a time & invalided out. Two men go home for good this week.
Our C.O. was called off to Paris suddenly at dejeuner time today it may have to do with our moving back for a bit to repair & overhaul cars. We expect to go any time now, I only hope it may be to some decent place, well back & far removed from guns & bombs, it would be such a pleasant change!
This last 24 hrs. I’ve been at a post. A Chateau very close behind the lines, too beastly close & I’m glad to say they are moving it further back for that reason. Slept, or rather lay down in the Chateau wine cellar with the Dr. At 2 we were warned of gas & had to put on our masks, when that was over the Bosches started Coup de Main & tremendous noise, torpedoes & shells & glass falling from vibration from already broken windows, so one had not much sleep! There is a moat around the Chateau & a solitary swan sails about apparently quite indifferent to gas, shells & bombs, also rifle bullets which whizz by every now and then, as it is so close …
I had a letter from Will today, just got back. Says they are only to have leave every 7 months now, rather hard, but I hope they will change that again before his next usual leave is due. Those things get changed so often.
I got 2 letters you forwarded. One is a notice about a book, “For Dauntless France” by Laurence Binjou, price 10/6, profits go to Red X; Hodder & Stoughton, Warwick Square, London EC are publishers. Work of our convoys come in to & generally work done by English helping the French, hospital, canteen etc. I’ll see it when I get back, but if you feel like 10/6 it might interest you. I’ll ask Alison to get it & keep it for me to look over …
Best love
Yr affect. son
Arthur
Arthur is on the move but not on the move, enjoying forest life, still doesn't want to be an officer, is looking forward to a rest ...
August 16th 1918
My Dear Mother,
Yrs of 7th came 2 days ago …
We never changed after all, at least have not done so sofar & I hope will not. I packed up & never expected to see this place again & was sent off with 6 cars to another division. Passed through 2 villages where we worked in April & May, since invaded by the Bosches. A lot knocked about & Bosche debris & remains everywhere. When we got to place we were to go, an order had come in ½ hour before we arrived to say sections were not to change, so we came back here. Awful dust, got back soon after 8 p.m. It was a wrecked village full of troops, dust & wreckage, just been evacuated by the Bosches & a battle raging just up the road. The other section we were to relieve an American one, had lost 4 men wounded & 2 cars wrecked the previous night, so it was not a sanatorium! Was very glad to get back even to this forest, as weather has been lovely & so alright tho’ of course damp in our barrack & I put out my bag & things yesterday to try & get them dry. I don’t think it is very good for one this perpetual living under trees, several have been out of sorts & In have for some days, however we expect to be very busy here any day now & possibly after that we may get back to refit perhaps by 1st Sep. After that forest life will begin to get quite unpleasant, but just now, this lovely weather, it is perfect.
The day before yesterday one of the volunteers got wounded, he & his shover were going up to a post, curiously enough the one we look upon as the safest, heavy fire & they had a near call. Car hit, luckily not chauffeur, so he was able to drive back & after having his wound dressed here the French Lieutenant & I took him straight to Paris in the staff car & to the Astoria Hotel Hospital for English & Americans run by Lord Michelham. English Drs. & Eng. & US nurses & a nice French Comtesse Matron. It is ???? of Champs Elysees, hotel where Mrs Blake & Margery used to stay in Paris. He was given a nice room & I left him with 2 nice nurses looking after him. The same man, he is Lt. Col. & 50, was 20 years in Egyptian army, only came out early April & was badly gassed with 7 others about 23rd Apl. & had only recently returned to the section & a very different looking man to when he first came out. The gassing had knocked him out & he was not up to much. One of the other gassed men has quite broken down & unable to return. Paris looked very empty & dull & not many people about. Of course Aug. there never are …
I am sort of 2nd now & help C.O. but I don’t care for responsibility of taking on C.O. job. One gets a commission in English Army as C.O. of these sections, tho’ I see no use in that as the rest of the crowd are not military. We shall carry on like this till our C.O. & I go home in Oct. I am due to start from here today 2 months, 16th Oct …
Frank Howard seems to have managed to get a very soft cushy job all through the war! What our French cook, rather a character, calls “la guerre au Chateau” !! I fear there are a lot like him, don’t know what war is & don’t want to; also probably do not care how long it lasts!!
I wonder what sort of job they would put me at if I was conscripted at home. I certainly would be quite unequal to drill & marching now I fear, this job has not made one feel any younger! One often sleeps so badly, several complain of it, what with bombing & shelling woods, guns firing & shaking hut, men coming in or going out on night work, it is at times very disturbing. One longs to get right back to a quiet village & enjoy a few nights real rest. Here it is impossible. We have not been out of shell range since I rejoined in April, infact many pass over & go some long way beyond us …
Our new Lieut. Seems nice & keen & talks a little English; I think he will be an enormous improvement on our last man. He at once applied for Croix de Guerre for Col. Ravenscroft who was wounded day before yest …
Best love
Yr affect son
Arthur
My Dear Mother,
Yrs of 7th came 2 days ago …
We never changed after all, at least have not done so sofar & I hope will not. I packed up & never expected to see this place again & was sent off with 6 cars to another division. Passed through 2 villages where we worked in April & May, since invaded by the Bosches. A lot knocked about & Bosche debris & remains everywhere. When we got to place we were to go, an order had come in ½ hour before we arrived to say sections were not to change, so we came back here. Awful dust, got back soon after 8 p.m. It was a wrecked village full of troops, dust & wreckage, just been evacuated by the Bosches & a battle raging just up the road. The other section we were to relieve an American one, had lost 4 men wounded & 2 cars wrecked the previous night, so it was not a sanatorium! Was very glad to get back even to this forest, as weather has been lovely & so alright tho’ of course damp in our barrack & I put out my bag & things yesterday to try & get them dry. I don’t think it is very good for one this perpetual living under trees, several have been out of sorts & In have for some days, however we expect to be very busy here any day now & possibly after that we may get back to refit perhaps by 1st Sep. After that forest life will begin to get quite unpleasant, but just now, this lovely weather, it is perfect.
The day before yesterday one of the volunteers got wounded, he & his shover were going up to a post, curiously enough the one we look upon as the safest, heavy fire & they had a near call. Car hit, luckily not chauffeur, so he was able to drive back & after having his wound dressed here the French Lieutenant & I took him straight to Paris in the staff car & to the Astoria Hotel Hospital for English & Americans run by Lord Michelham. English Drs. & Eng. & US nurses & a nice French Comtesse Matron. It is ???? of Champs Elysees, hotel where Mrs Blake & Margery used to stay in Paris. He was given a nice room & I left him with 2 nice nurses looking after him. The same man, he is Lt. Col. & 50, was 20 years in Egyptian army, only came out early April & was badly gassed with 7 others about 23rd Apl. & had only recently returned to the section & a very different looking man to when he first came out. The gassing had knocked him out & he was not up to much. One of the other gassed men has quite broken down & unable to return. Paris looked very empty & dull & not many people about. Of course Aug. there never are …
I am sort of 2nd now & help C.O. but I don’t care for responsibility of taking on C.O. job. One gets a commission in English Army as C.O. of these sections, tho’ I see no use in that as the rest of the crowd are not military. We shall carry on like this till our C.O. & I go home in Oct. I am due to start from here today 2 months, 16th Oct …
Frank Howard seems to have managed to get a very soft cushy job all through the war! What our French cook, rather a character, calls “la guerre au Chateau” !! I fear there are a lot like him, don’t know what war is & don’t want to; also probably do not care how long it lasts!!
I wonder what sort of job they would put me at if I was conscripted at home. I certainly would be quite unequal to drill & marching now I fear, this job has not made one feel any younger! One often sleeps so badly, several complain of it, what with bombing & shelling woods, guns firing & shaking hut, men coming in or going out on night work, it is at times very disturbing. One longs to get right back to a quiet village & enjoy a few nights real rest. Here it is impossible. We have not been out of shell range since I rejoined in April, infact many pass over & go some long way beyond us …
Our new Lieut. Seems nice & keen & talks a little English; I think he will be an enormous improvement on our last man. He at once applied for Croix de Guerre for Col. Ravenscroft who was wounded day before yest …
Best love
Yr affect son
Arthur
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