The same old Lot
in
The same old Place
Still lively by the
Grace of God.

This 20th. Nov. 1915.

My dearest Ferne:

Bless your heart it wasn’t your last letter of Nov, 4th. which I have just now received that made me think you had deserted me. It arrived a few days after one of Oct. 25th. I think, which was nearly three weeks on the way, as were all your letters which came to me through England. I see, however, that this one has only been about two weeks, which I believe is about normal for out here.

We have had some very disturbing rumours out here this last week or so concerning the possibility of our being shipped to certain outlandish and unmentionable parts of the war zone, where letters would only arrive after about a month of evilsome voyaging, and when leave to anywhere but the next world would be altogether improbable, and such a thing as a life of even the most interrupted sort of connubial bliss altogether out of the question. However, we are hoping that the very considerable plans which are being developed toward making us fairly comfortable and keeping us as fit as may be during the winter are an hopeful indication of the permanence of our position here. However, to make sure, I wish you would write Kitchener on the subject expressing your strong disapproval on as many grounds as you think tenable of any project for separating us by a greater chasm than that which already divides us. I wonder what you could do with the "Man of Iron".

Well, my dear, for a change the rain has ceased and we are having good stiff fronts which in a way are more bearable than the everlasting damp and mud The last hour in trenches was a horrible nightmare. We went in just after a very heavy rainstorm had done its deadly work and suffered ourselves from considerable deposit of moisture. The soil here seems to lack any cohesive quality while its adhesive properties are abnormally developed. Consequently it was a great struggle to keep our little homes and ditches from crumbling, to keep the water running off and to keep ourselves from becoming absolutely encased in a sarcophagi of vile smelling clay. However, we are constantly borne up in our labour by the absolute certainty, topographically deduced and confirmed by military intelligence whose transmittance into civilian keeping is forbidden by our code, that Fritz opposite is two or three "damnsights" more uncomfortable than we are. If this good frosty weather keeps up for awhile we shall soon have things ship-shape for the rains of next month. We have been issued all round with long hip boots for use in trenches which are a tremendous help. They make it possible for the men to keep dry if not warm and prevent a lot of sickness.

Things will be rather different from last winter when the old British Army stood in water to their waists for weeks at a time and fought the Germans to a standstill in their rush to Calais - Hats off to them.

We are now occupying the terrain over which the great battles of last fall were fought, where the flower of German militarism was blighted and drooped in front of the Allied line. Everywhere one goes even to-day there are evidences of that fierce struggle; tall mounds here and there in the line; innumerable little wooden crosses here and there over the country inscribed with the name of some Tommy of the “Old Guard”, Fusiliers, Royal Scots, Dragoons. Wherever you dig you strike the lock of an old German musket, a helmet, a British mess tin, some fragment from this chaos of destruction. Terrific must have been the struggle they put up and terrible the strain on officers and men. One battalion of a famous British regiment in those days held the front which our whole divisions is covering to-day and held it tight and safe. The old ’’thin red line” indeed no longer red tis true, except in the fierce warrior hearts’ blood which sustained them and which they so freely spilt. What a huge and canny bluff they must have played!

Some funny things happened in those early days of the war. As Colonel Allen says ”The nerve of those beggars” and it must have looked to the Germans like pure English gall. For instance, a Brigade was sent over to hold Lille but on the way they met a German Army Corps! A single battalion was told off to take a town called Warneton strongly held. I dont suppose that battalion was ever heard of again. Like Don Quixote we went tilting at windmills with a stout lance tis true, but what a slender one. Only now are we building up the great ram which we hope will some day bring down the walls.

If it were not for this disquieting Balkan situation, we might almost feel confident of an early issue of the conflicts. It adds one more stronghold from which the Germans must be drawn unless indeed we can beat them so decisively here on this front as to endanger the very heart of Prussia and force them to withdraw. Perhaps we can. Meanwhile our guns keep up our spirits by slamming the enemy pretty consistently. As the old timers say: ”It wasn’t always so". Things are coming our way more and more every day so far as this front is concerned. If we only have by Spring the men and the guns to make one mighty effort reckless of the cost, we will win! Just listen to your little subaltern talking like a Brigadier, eh!

Old faces around the Officers’ board , even during the few weeks I have been here quite a change has taken place. There have been several casualties of course old Buster Reid whose hand is in bad shape, John Cameron, Rockie Cragg who got a bullet in the ear, but whose head was so solid it cound’t get in and only shook him up a bit, and Pete Wedd who developed water on the knee from straining it in the mud. Then Colonel Rennie has been made Brigadier and has the Fourth Brigade, so Major Alien is the C. 0. with Major Smith second in command I suppose. He is acting as such at present. His rise has certainly been rapid. Old Burt Rogers is back again and all we need to make it a family party once again is J. Knox Crawford and his little box of sweet smells and hair oils. John the exquisite John, oh how will he like the sweet smells and mud of Flanders.

Sunday morning: What do you think I did this morning? Got up put on a pair of rubber boots and an overcoat over my pyjamas and went out for a little run around the field to George’s horror. Temperature 19 above Zero. I wasn’t a bit cold and got dressed with a gusto, washed and shaved in water caked with thin ice and beat it up to breakfast without developing any symptoms of pneumonia. Little Willie’s circulation seems to be O.K. and the only thing that bothers me is those biting damp days we so often have. However, even now my cuticle is becoming scaly like a fish so in a few weeks even water will be of no consequence.

The boys are making fun of my new silhouette. I found my great coat too long so cut it off just at the knees. It looks pretty snappy to me, but of course looks as though intended to be a long coat and the tailor ran short. Then I wear my soft brown rubber boots around billets, with a pair of khaki stockinettes underneath, and turned down over the tops about four inches. Capt. Mason says all I need is a top hat to look like a mid-Victorian dandy. Anything below the knees is a horrible bore in this muddy situation and I hadn’t a British warm so made the best of what I had. My trench coat which started about three inches below the knees has now been reduced to about half way between my waist and knees, so that it just reaches the top of a pair of waders and keeps out of the muck. With a belt around outside it and pistol, one looks like a fireman more than anything I can think of. For summer when the trenches are in good shape there is nothing to beat a knee length fleece lined raincoat, but in winter - well you should see what happened to mine.'

I got the New York Times alright, dear one, and many thanks. The boys were all interested in the pictures, and also in the paper when they found in it an article by Judge Peck strongly condemning the American attitude at present. Truth to tell President Wilson is not a very popular person with Canadians in France. I suppose naturally it angers us who have travelled 2000 miles to fight in what seemed to us the cause of human progress and true civilization, to hear people who are just next door to us compliment themselves on being sane enough to keep out of war, and calling on a nation to give thanks because "We have prospered while "others are at war". Not that one necessarily expects the States to come in the actual fighting, but there seems to be something fundamentally lacking in the whole attitude of the Administration toward the principles involved, and the broad vital issues at stake.

Our Canadian papers are disgusting. One picks up a Canadian paper of a certain date and finds a whole page of war news!! Then looks back at the official news bulletin of that date in the "London Times" or "Morning Post" and finds that there was about a third of a column’ They simply take every fool rumour, every little incident and write a long colourable story, spun entirely out of the imagination of some piffling reporter. The consequence is that everything is distorted and absolutely contradictory reports appear on successive days.

A clear continuous panorama of war such as can be got from the meagre uninteresting reports in English papers is absolutely impossible to obtain from Canadian papers. For instance: How many Canadians realize that in the second battle of Ypres where the Canadians were cut up, the part they played was only one fragment of a terrible battle which lasted a month and cost the British Army perhaps 50,000 men; that whole regiments of British troops who came up to relieve us were wiped out to almost a man! Again at the time of the recent advance at Loos the British and French papers, at the head of their usual war columns, had a heading "British and French win a brilliant success" or "Large advance made". In a Canadian paper I find a great headline - "German Salient conquered". Now everyone knows that the German Salient is still very much there. - that the show at Loos was only a partial success, and that many months of hard prodding will be needed there before the job can be finished.

Now don’t think I don’t like to get the papers. Of course I do, and to know what is going on in dear old Toronto. But Lord, if you know any newspaper men, give them a piece of my mind will you!

I am enclosing a newspaper clipping marked. If you knew as much about this operation as I do you would be interested. Also the place marked is an important town to be found on most maps. Show it to Dad and Mother. We weren’t actually in it, but it was quite close beside us and kept me up on duty all night.

The poor dear Colleymen haven’t recovered yet, and are scared to death we are going to repeat it. We thought they might return the compliant, but they haven’t. Wish they would try!

So you are back to the stage again, little girl. The audience must have been rather different from what you once were used to. I should have liked more than I can say to have been there and made critical notes on your histrionic art. I suppose you would have been all fussed if I had. I am sure you did splendidly, if you just were your own delightful self and didn’t try to act.

Well, dearest, I could talk away to you for pages, but a letter is a letter, not a diary or a book of meditations. I shall tell the rest to Dad to whom I am writing.

Molly described to me your new suit, which is undoubtedly very smart. I wish, I wish, I could see you in it.

Good-bye dear sweetheart,
Yours ever,
ERROL.