LANSDOWNE,
GARHWAL,
U.P.
Aug 10/16
Dear Mother
No mail in this week, it’s very late arriving in Bombay for some reason & does’nt get in till tomorrow morning (Friday) so it won’t probably be up here till Sunday or Monday; it’s a nuisance when it’s as late as that.
Nothing much doing up here. We have just got orders to raise a third battalion of Garhwalis, I suppose they have done so well that they want to make more use of them. We, both the 1st & 2nd Battns:, are giving some men each to form a nucleous, but no officers have been appointed yet, & the thing is very much in the embryo stage at present. I don’t quite know if it will be permanent, or only a temporary war measure, but I fancy they’d have some difficulty in recruiting in peace time sufficiently to keep 3 battalions going.
We’ve had a tremendous lot of rain lately, very heavy indeed, & one gets a good many duckings during the week, merely incidental on going out, as one can’t stay indoors all day, & as it’s nearly always raining you simply must get wet.
I have changed my quarters, & am now domiciled in two tiny rooms which were originally built for the Brigade Head quarters office clerks to be in; but during the war Bde H.Q. have been done away with, so these quarters are empty. They are small but quite allright, for after all it matters little where one lives nowadays, so long as you have a roof over your head.
I get the Spectator & pink paper regularly; very many thanks for them
I’ve been thinking a lot of poor Ben this week; I do hope she’s all right; I know she’ll be brave, but there is so little to be said or done is’nt there; if sympathy of family friends is any comfort she must indeed find plenty; for no one who knows Ben – however slightly – could help being more than anxious to share her sorrow.
Best love to all
Yr loving son
Ted
