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Monthly Archives: March 2017

10 March 1917 – Ted to Gertrude

March 10th/17

 

Dear Mother

Many thanks for your letter of Feb 7th, received at the beginning of the week. We have definite orders to leave here on 17th now, but I have been dining with my pal Reid tonight & he tells me not to be surprised if they are postponed! So what is one to make of it all? In any case I expect we shall leave here before the end of March. Is’nt the Mesopot news wonderfully good nowadays, & tonight I hear they are only 4 miles from Baghdad. But I fancy there will be lots for us to do when we get there, if not in this hot weather, at any rate as soon as the next cold weather begins.

I have been frightfully busy lately with all this mobilising an’ all. All the same I have been out to dinner with several people & have managed to get a game of tennis or two for exercise. I wonder if Dick ever got his leave or not. Poor Dick, I expect he feels the cold a bit, but he’s jolly lucky being able to get hold of Topher to help him along.

I am playing tennis with Mrs Bingley on Monday, & I’ll tell her about sister Bond. Yes rather I remember that “excelsior” ring awfully well. What a piece of luck you had finding it again.

You seem to be having some real cold weather at home now, all over Europe in fact. I don’t quite understand the German retreat yet, but from all accounts it seems all right for us, though then no doubt our plans for a spring offensive will have to be modified slightly.

I’m very sleepy tonight so please pardon a short note, but I have no news, & I owe heaps of letters.

Best love to all

Yr loving son

Ted

 
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Posted by on 10 March, '17 in About

 

8 March 1917 – Paul to Gertrude

H.M.S. MALAYA.
c/o G.P.O.

Thursday. 8th

 

Dear Mother – Thank you muchly for your letter- So glad Nance has been down again for the week-end. I am awfully pleased at that idea of them all going farming during the spring & summer. I do wish you could get Jane to go as well- she did’nt like last summer in Town & it would do her all the good in the world to get some good fresh air for 3 or 4 months.

My hands are fearfully cold at the moment – just come back from a funeral of one of our men who died yesterday & it’s bitterly cold ashore & was snowing most of the time. I wrote Ted a long letter the other day – 6 of these sheets I think it was.

So sorry I did’nt say goodbye to Capon- thoroughly remiss of me – will you make my apologies & say how sorry I was-

I don’t want these Wellingtons really- not much use these days. After the war perhaps – if they fit – but Dick’s feet are smaller than mine I think.

Must go & have some tea – & some dripping toast-

Bestest love to you all-

from your ever loving son

Paul

 
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Posted by on 8 March, '17 in About

 

4 March 1917 – Paul to Gertrude

Rosamond sent me some lovely fresh eggs the other day – simply gorgeous they were

H.M.S. MALAYA.
c/o G.P.O.

Sunday. 4th.

 

Dear Mother-

Thanks awfully for your letter & enquiries – I am perfectly fit and well again – but am having an Arsenic tonic to buck me up a bit. This sore throat seems to be fairly rife- I am sorry to hear Dreda had one too – & do so hope she is allright again now. I say it’s all Nance’s fault- as she’s had a cold for sometime & won’t do anything for it – but I’ve just written to her & thoroughly scolded her for not taking care of herself- So naughty of her not to take something.

Simply blowing a gale to-day & bitterly cold; so I have’nt been out on deck much.

Nance said she was going down to Delaford yesterday so as to help cheer Dreda up during her “convalescence”-

Must end now-

Heaps of love to you all

from your ever loving son

Paul

Will you send me a Box or Tin or Bottle of Horlicks – I liked it so much that night you gave me some in your room


 

http://www.toxipedia.org/display/toxipedia/Fowler%27s+Solution

 
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Posted by on 4 March, '17 in About

 

3 March 1917 – Ted to Gertrude

March 3/17

 

Dear Mother

We got a wire in just now – 11 PM – to tell us to be ready to move at a very early date, so I suppose that means we may be off at any time now. I thought I’d just try & catch the mail if I can & let you know the latest developments, though you know how often these things turn out to be false.

I told Mrs John Mackenzie about her pleated skirts & she remembered them well! She wanted to be remembered to you & tells me she has a birthday book with all our names in it, & Bunchie’s & heaps of others.

This is only just to tell you of our possible early departure, but whether it will come off or not I don’t know.

Best love to all

Yr loving son

Ted

 
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Posted by on 3 March, '17 in About

 

1 March 1917 – Ted to Gertrude

March 1st/1917

 

Dear Mother

Very many thanks for 2 letters from you yesterday, dated 24th Jan & 1st Feb, they both arrived by the same mail curiously enough. I see by my diary I only wrote to you on Sunday and this is Thursday. I have been out to dinner & tennis etc & have also been fairly busy in office. I believe we shall be leaving here on the 24th of this month & be at Basrah about the beginning of April I suppose, but I’m afraid that’s all I can tell you. I have been out to lunch today with a Mrs Kaye, & we went on to a polo tournament which is going on now & saw some quite good polo. I have come back now to catch the mail, & also I am dining out & going on to a dance. The Viceroy’s staff have a big dinner on tonight at the club, & I am going to that; I have several friends among them so shall not be quite lost!

Such lovely weather now, & gorgeous cool & clear mornings. It’s clouding up again this evening & is a bit warmer & muggy again but I expect a shower of rain will clear the air a bit. I can’t remember if I gave you an address for Mespot or not. Anyway, stick to Cox till you hear from me to the contrary, & then either of these will do

CAPT E.R.P.B
2/39 GARHWAL RIFLES
MESOPOTAMIA EXPEDITIONARY FORCE
C/O INDIA OFFICE

of course India Office will always get me;  but it means posting a day earlier, so if you want to catch the mail at the last minute then

CAPT E R P B
2/39 GARHWAL RIFLES
MESOPOTAMIA EXPEDITIONARY FORCE
C/O PRESIDENCY POST-MASTER
BOMBAY

dont put in any Brigade or Divisions even, just put a regiment. When in any doubt about me, ask the India Office, as they will have the latest news.

Yes I hear from all sources of Dick & Topher’s great Krewst, & they seem to have fixed it up splendidly. I thought poor old Dick would feel the cold rather, but there won’t be much more of it now I hope. I know he always revels in this country’s heat, which I always hate so much!

Yes that was a terrible explosion was’nt it, & as you say I don’t suppose we have heard the whole truth, but what we have heard is bad enough. I wonder if Dick & Paul managed to get leave together, but I expect they found it rather difficult.

I wonder what this retirement on the west means, & whether it’s going to be anything big or not. The papers are very quiet about it and they don’t seem at all ready to even guess at its true import. The news from Mesopot continues good, & I hear they have made big captures there in guns & men & material. Yes I love Fragments from France, thanks awfully for them, & the Daily Sketch is much appreciated in the mess. But I see the price of all these papers is going up a lot now & all the ½ penny ones are becoming 1d. No, I never have to pay extra postage, you always put on enough.

I can’t remember Cookson at the R.M.C but thanks for the note about Mrs Dot-massey-John-Mackenzie’s skirts! I’ll remind her about them when I see her this evening. She wears weird clothes nowadays, always very smart, but she’s so frightfully thin & requires very careful dressing I should imagine. We have’nt had the Tank films here yet, & no news of them. I should like to see them before we go. But I have no doubt they have cinemas in Mespot nowadays; certain to have ’em at Basrah & the Base.

So glad Ben has a job to suit her; yes I really think you’d be rather well advised to move up to London, if you could find a house. I know you have always wanted to do so, have’nt you

Must change for dinner now. Don’t worry to send me anything to Mesopot, I expect we’ll get all we want out there, & things are so expensive at home from all accounts.

Lots of love to all

yr loving son                Ted


Ted’s letters throughout the Mesopotamia campaign are full of place names familiar today: Basra, Ramadi, Mosul and Baghdad. This is a reminder that foreign policy decisions (such as those made at the Peace of Versailles and in the Sykes-Picot agreement) have consequences that play out over centuries.

 
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Posted by on 1 March, '17 in About