France
Mar. 12, 1917,

Dear Bro -

Well I believe that while I have time I will write home once again, though it is a day earlier this week. I got your letter of Feb. 9th last week just after I I had mailed the last letter I wrote. We have moved to another village and were billeted in huts for awhile and at present we are making use of a French barn for purposes of sleeping and eating our meals.

The weather has moderated again, we had a slight snowfall last week but it is milder again, we get a little rain and of course we have any amount of mud to tramp around in. The weather feels different though now in March than it did last December, I guess it must be coming Spring which of course must come once a year in France as well as it does in Canada.

You seem to have had a good cold and stormy winter in Ontario this year. I guess though by the time this letter reaches there you will have pretty near forgotten about the Winter.

You asked what kind of a mixture mulligan was. Well it is meat stew. the same name applies to any one of the following mixtures: Fresh beef boiled in water and of course seasoned to tastes, Mutton treated in the same way.; sometimes a general mixture of meat and vegetables which comes in small tins but it is heated over again sometimes in the can and sometimes emptied into a pot. I hope this gives you a fair idea, you know it is supposed to make one meal a day in the army. Of course it is varied some days the meat is roasted and cold roast mutton is quite a treat.

I got the parcel Mother sent with the socks in it. They fit alright now whatever might have been the matter with them before you sent them on. To-day I got a parcel of oatmeal cookies from Rowcliffe's. It was quite a treat I can tell you, I was to share it with Eric Hurdon if he was near me but as he is in a different place altogether I shared it with some of the other Exeter boys in the same billet as I am. We moved a day's march from the place we joined the 58th but it is just such another place with lots of troops of different Battalions scattered about quartered in the village.

Arva Brokenshire was wounded in the leg the last time the 58th were in the line, I guess he is the first of the Exeter boys to be wounded in action over here. There have been a number of casualties from the Huron Batt. among the men who were drafted to France.

I had a letter from Mr. Horton, in England. He is now back at his old job of blacksmithing in the Transport Section of the 161st. He seems to like it better than he did training with the troops. It will suit him better to be shoeing horses than to be forming fours and going on route marches.

I am pretty well and hope everybody is well at home and that everything is going well.

From your Bro.
John Strang

I forgot to write my address -

No 654817, Pte J. C. Strang
D. Coy, 58th Batt., B.E.F.,
9th Brigade, 3rd Division
France