Author Archives: Ted Berryman

on board “P 93”

Aug 25/17

Dear Mother

Very many thanks for a letter from you dated July 4^th, which arrived quite unexpectedly on 23^rd, 2 days ago. We had just got orders to move up river, & were not expecting an English mail at all. So D. Gabb’s going into the I.A. is he? Well, I suppose he knows what he wants to do best. I don’t imagine I shall see him now as they will probably have to stay in India a bit learning the language etc.

I’m writing this on board the river steamer and will try and tell you all about it. We got orders rather unexpectedly to move at 24 hours’ notice – none too long if you have a big camp to strike & pack up and heaps & heaps of stores & baggage etc to pack up & load. However, that’s by the way. These “p boats” as they are commonly called are paddle steamers built & designed for rivers such as this. They are shallow-draft boats, and to each side of them is attached a huge flat barge, which is filled with stores, rations, men, animals, transport carts, guns, in fact anything & everything that requires conveyance up river.

As you may imagine a big paddle steamer with a big barge tied on each side is a very unwieldy craft, & the navigation of this river is none too easy owing to its extraordinary winding course & the speed of the current. The river bed varies a lot too in depth, & we run aground on uncharted sandbanks frequently, but it’s never serious, & a little puffing & jerking on the part of the engines & we are off again.

Well old “P 93” (one of the latest                    by the way, cabins, dining saloon, electric lights & fans, lots of deck space for officers & men & “very modern improvements”,  including a lovely bath room with a full size lie-down splash-all-over-the-place English bath, gorgeous) came alongside our camp at 7 yesterday morning & we commenced loading her up with tents, ammunition, rations and all the hundred and one things that a regiment carts about with it. Every single ounce had to be manhandled and taken & loaded on the ship from the camp, as of course there are no cranes or such luxuries.

It was a piping hot day, one of the hottest we’ve had, & the N.W. wind that had brought such relief the previous day after the heat of the week changed to a S. wind, which was just what we did’nt want, as this brings a damp & sticky atmosphere with it, & is trying enough to sit still in, much more so to do manual labour in, & very strenuous labour at that! However the men tackled the job with their usual good spirits & by 11.30 we were finished and off up the river.

I have told you how winding and tortous the river is, & the country on either side is dead flat, most uninteresting & monotonous. To the East we can just see the dim blue outline of the Pusht-i-Koh hills, on the Persian border, but the other side runs away to the horizon in one bare, flat, featureless plain. Every few miles you come across a small barbed-wire encampment, a few tents & matting huts on the river bank, apparently tenantless except for a sentry with a fixed bayonet in his little shelter. These are the “marching posts”, or camps where troops who are marching, & not going by steamer, rest for the night.

Occasionally you see a bigger encampment & more troops, & there are posts guarding the long line of communications from Basra to Baghdad & beyond. A dreary life this must be for the troops on the line of communications – for they are miles from anywhere, & can only watch the steamers bearing their more fortunate companions up the river to where things happen, or down stream on leave, or on transfer to some base hospital, though perhaps it’s better to garrison an L. of C. post than to be sick & wounded : a choice of evils! Still the L. of C. must be kept intact, & doubtless we shall all get our turn of this uninteresting duty someday.

It has been a hot voyage, as the wind is in the South & it is muggy & sticky. But we are doing it in great comfort, & the old Tigris must indeed marvel at the great change that has come over her traffic in the last year.

We reach Kut tomorrow – I trust I am giving nothing away! – and from there go on by train. I should like to put in a day or two at Kut, to have a look round, though I believe it has altered beyond all recognition since the days of the Siege.

The country we are passing through now as I write, though dull & uninteresting to the eye, is all the same of historic interest. For it was across these dry dusty plains that all the fighting took place in 1916 during the ineffectual effort to relieve the Kut garrison; and again more fighting took place in the winter of 1916-17 all round here, when Kut was re-taken & the way to Baghdad opened. But there is little to indicate that anything ever happened here, at anyrate nothing can be seen from the steamer.

Well, that’s all for the present. I’ll see if I can post this at Kut & then I’ll write again when we reach our destination.

Best love to all

yr loving son

Ted

Photo of P-Boats

http://m.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205024104

It’s likely he meant Poshtkue, Western Iran – not to be confused with Pusht-e-Koh, Afghanistan.

http://aroundguides.com/12624146

Aug 22/17

Dear Mother

No mail in yet and I hear it won’t be in for some days as it has only just reached Bombay. There is I’m afraid no news to tell you. Since I last wrote it has been frightfully hot, still muggy days & 115° in our tents, most awfully trying. Still the nights are fairly cool & the v. early mornings when we go on parade, but the rest of the day after about 7.30 is rotten.

However we are all keeping fit, though feeling very limp & slack of course, it’s absolutely impossible to feel otherwise. We just sit & drip & lose weight all day till the evening & long for the sun to go down. But I expect there are people a good deal worse off than us, right up at the front, in small tents & not so many comforts easily obtainable such as ice, which we have.

We are in big tents, the same kind as we were in in Delhi last cold weather; all troops have them out here now & they are really essent if you want troops to keep fit. We have a little thermometer in ours so’s we can keep a daily record of the temperatures; & just now we put it in a little light tent which we were living in when we were at Basra & which we now use as a sort of bathroom attached to our big tent, & in there it registered 125°! So we can thank our stars we have big tents to live in & not the small ones, which are really no protection whatever. The light tents are for use when “active operations” are in progress & you can’t cart the big ones about, but by that time the weather will be much more reasonable.

We are sort of on the end of a wire about our move up river, & we may more or less get orders to go any day now. Personally I don’t want to move in this heat. It means a big business, unpitching & packing all the tents, loading them all up on barges & all our heavy kit & stores & rations as well. You see all this would have to be done by hand, as we have no cranes or appliances of that sort of course. However if it’s got to be done it’s got to be done & we’ll do it of course, so that’s that.

I have had long letters from Col D.B. There seems little or no likelihood of his returning. He is not fit yet & I fancy his medical board will give him an extension. Then his time in command is up in November, so it’s hardly likely they’d send him out to finish it off. I rather fancy he hopes to get a job in India, so I gather from his letters.

As regards my prospects, this means – silly as it sounds! – that I shall keep the command till some one else gets it. I mean Henderson, our 2nd in command & on sick leave at home, may come out & take it on, or some senior fellow in the 39^th or any other rgt – they are not particular nowadays – may be put in. Impossible to say; but don’t count on my keeping it; I may do so, & I may not; I’ve got it by a piece of luck, & it will be luckier still to keep it. How I should love to command it in some fighting, & to see the results of one’s efforts this hot weather. For indeed we have been working hard to get the regiment as efficient as possible & in good fighting trim & I should be grievously disappointed if they failed in any way. But I know they won’t, I’m confident they will do their very very best.

Such sad news from Lansdowne, Mrs Bobby Reed died the other day, having given birth to triplets, all girls, & all doing well I believe. They arrived 7 weeks before they were due it seems, so her death I suppose is not surprising. Poor Bobby, he’s awfully cut up of course, & the regiment has lost one of the best & brightest women members. She was one of the best, & as you know a great friend of mine & her loss will be felt by us all. Personally I can hardly realise it: one gets used somehow to hearing of the death of one’s men friends nowadays; but it does’nt seem right that people like Mrs Bobby Reed should die.

I must struggle to write to some more people, but I don’t feel in the least energetic. Excuse this rotten letter, but I’m sure you will understand. Heat, no news, & no letter of yours to answer, 3 very just causes for a short note, are’nt they…

Best love to all

yr loving son                Ted

Edith Giles, wife of Capt Henry Robert Baynes Reed CIE DSO MC

http://www.thekingscandlesticks.com/webs/pedigrees/482.html

Only one of the triplets, Jocelyn, survived and lived to 78.

Aug 14/17

Dear Mother

Very many thanks indeed for 2 letters from your last mail, which arrived 2 days ago, somewhat unexpectedly as we were not hoping to get it till 2 days later. Your letters were dated June 20^th & 27^th, long long ones & I loved getting them. Two mails arrived together & they are the first we’ve had for 3 weeks. I’m afraid I got no letters off the old Mongolia; only 11 bags for M.E.F. were saved but it appears nothing for us was amongst them. They talk glibly of salving some more bags, but I should think the letters would be ruined by now. I lost one or two parcels from Nell on board which is somewhat annoying. You seem to have got a whole budget of letters from me all together, 4 you mention in one letter and 2 in the next, most erratic the posts appear to be. However we have been very lucky so far – tap-wood – losing so few.

It’s been very hot this last week, & hardly any breeze. Trying weather, especially if one has been a bit off colour as I have, it takes so much longer to pick up. However the cold weather is not far off now, & then I shall be as fit as a fiddle. Besides the nights are nice & cool now, I pulled up a blanket over me about 2 o’clock this morning & slept quite comfortably under it; before I had nothing on me.

Yesterday I went out to tea with the matron of No 2 B.G.H, Sister Macfarlane to whom I asked you to write. A very pleasant little tea, with ices to wind up with! Gorgeous they were, as it was fearfully hot & I could have eaten hundreds! How ever I thought one was all that was good for me. I went into the hospital to see my friends the sisters who were all very cheery, and it was quite a pleasant afternoon despite the heat. How I sigh for a nice cold winter day again; the other members of the family, especially Dick & Jim, seem to revel in the hot weather, but I’m afraid I have no use for it.

Otherwise we have been leading our usual humdrum life. No news of a move yet & I don’t suppose we shall move for a fortnight yet.

There seems to be some doubt as to my rank, quoting from your last mail letters. I see the letter in which I told you I had been promoted to tempy. Lt Col has been sunk, at least I work it out to have been so. Anyhow, things are as follows; on active service, if acting as 2nd in cmd & you are under the rank of major, they promote you to tempy: major, as long as you are 2nd in command & with the rgt; if anyone senior comes in, you of course revert to your permanent rank.

So when I came out here I became a tempy: major, or rather 15 days after we’d been out, which is the rule, but it took such a long time to be gazetted in orders that I only got news of it a few weeks ago. I was made a tempy: Major on April 8^th; then D.B. went sick, & 15 days after he had gone sick and I took on command, I became entitled to be promoted to tempy: Lt Col, but this again took ages to appear in orders; my date of promotion to Lt Col is May 14^th, just 3 months ago, but it only appeared in orders about 6 weeks ago.

Similarly I revert to my lower rank in the event of D.B. coming back, or if they put anyone else in command, which is quite likely as I am somewhat junior and there are any amount of fellows in other regiments who are senior to me but who have not got even temporary commands. However they may let me keep it on; anyhow I’ve had it 3½ months now, & I’m drawing Lt Col’s pay so I’ve not done so badly. So don’t be alarmed or despondent if one day I write and say I’ve been demoted! I hope I’ve made this quite plain. The India office would always be able to tell you what I am, if you’re ever in doubt! It’s something to have risen to even tempy: Lt Col, in these days when all sorts of odd people get such rapid promotion.

No have’nt seen any Gabbs yet. I heard Desmond had gone on leave to India, but did’nt know he’d gone to stay with Lil. Rather a good idea, I must remember that if I get any leave next year! I had a brief note from Dick last mail, talking glibly about “my last letter” which I presume went down in the Mongolia, sickening is’nt it as I suppose it was in answer to one I wrote from Karachi after meeting all his friends there. Really I don’t know what’s best for Topher. I sympathise with him immensely, he must be so heartily sick of being a Tommy, & besides I expect he’d like to earn a little more pay. Surely a commission in the A.S.C. [Army Service Corps] would not be impossible, a stammer would’nt matter there, & he’s seen enough scrapping to warrant his going into the A.S.C.

So glad you like Eve’s leaf! It’s interesting certainly, but now I hear they think the Garden of Eden was more up Baghdad way! However, Kurnah will do very well for the present. I chucked learning Arabic several weeks ago. I found it very hard to begin with, & no one decent to teach you. The man I had was an Armenian coffee-shop keeper, who spoke English, but of course had no idea of teaching; he sad “Yes sir” to everything you said, right or wrong. Besides, I’ve got heaps of other things to do, & it’s too hot to sit down and work. Very unenterprising perhaps, but I found I was making practically no progress, so thought it best to chuck it in altogether.

Things seem to be in a good old muddle in Russia don’t they. Really it is amazing the way she’s behaved. We’ve financed her & fed her & munitioned her & done everything for her, & now she’s let us down badly like this. Thank heavens I’m English, for truly we & the French are the only people worth being in Europe just now. The rest are useless.

Piping hot day & not a breeze of any sort. I’m sitting – dripping positively – & yet I am stripped to the waist & only a towel on, & yet I’m boiled alive.

In your letter of June 27^th you say you have had another letter from me. I wonder if you managed to get Topher what he wanted, I see Mark Cross advertises “just the thing” I should imagine, but I’ve no doubt you got him something to his liking.

Fun those flying men must have had who came over for the day from Reading, Ben tells me there’s a Major who came over too with that balloon, Eric; what’s he doing by the way? I thought he was in France somewhere, but he seems to be perpetually at home; sick leave I suppose, at least that’s what he always seemed to be on. I should so hate to be always on sick leave, the very expression is horrible I think.

So specs is now a defender of his country & quite time too. However it’s his show, & his conscience that’s got to be worried, if anyone’s, if he did’nt try & join up before. I am truly thankful to hear Dreda has left the bank for a far more congenial occupation. Does she dress in that saucy farming rig with gaiters an’ all! When I retire & live on my farm I shall have to take lessons from Rosamond & Dreda. I still cling to the idea of retiring as soon as I can (I can get £200 a year in 5 years’ time) & start something of the sort, so I must save up a little capital for investment, & my pension will help along, though I’m afraid taxes will be alarmingly high for many years to come yet. You talk of strawberries & make my mouth water indeed. I trust I shall be home next year to enjoy a few.

Best love to all

ever yr loving son

Ted.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Army_Service_Corps

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_Days

Aug 8/17

Dear Mother

No English mail in this week & I’m afraid we shan’t get one till next week, as the fortnightly krewst is in working order for the present, though it seems it has been stopped again now.

Still very hot, but the nights are getting cooler. It was only 72° at 5 this morning, & it gets up to 112° or so at midday, an extraordinary difference is’nt it. But we are within sight of the cold weather now anyhow & have’nt got much more of this rotten hot weather to get through. How I do hate the heat!

I was out to dinner last night with some pals on the staff of the G.O.C. Tigris Defences, & there I met one Lee, a Captain in the Connaught Rangers. It appears he married a Miss Marks, who used to stay with the Bromley-Bowines, & used to go over to Pirbright with the family & sing at soldiers’ concerts. Lee told me she remembered us all quite well & appeared much struck with us! I can’t quite place her somehow, I seem to have a vague recollection of her name but not her face, but I expect you would remember her all right & the girls too. Where are the Bromley-Bowines by the way? He was a good chap & so was she; is she married yet I wonder? Funny my knocking against Lee like that was’nt it.

There were some swimming sports yesterday which Fox & I went to see. Our men got one or two prizes but on the whole they were rather dull. I paid a visit to my old hospital & met my nurse friends & they were all very nice, & all divided in their opinion as to whether I looked fit or not! Miss Macfarlane, the matron, however, said I looked very well, & so did Bat the doctor, so that’s all right.

No news or signs of our moving yet, though I hear our camp is all ready for us at Baghdad, & we have only to walk into it. Till then I’m afraid I shan’t be able to look up any friends or acquaintances in the Queens.

We still manage to catch a nice lot of fish out of the river which helps to keep the menu going. We shall soon be able to shoot for partridges, & a small bird called a sand-grouse, which fairly swarms out here, there are literally millions of them. I have brought a gun & a few cartridges out with me, but I don’t know really if I’ll have much opportunity to shoot, one is fairly busy nowadays.

A dull letter I’m afraid but it’s not been a particularly exciting week-

Best love to all

yr loving son

Ted

Marched into war to It’s a Long Way to Tipperary

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connaught_Rangers

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandgrouse

August 1^st/17

Dear Mother

Very many thanks indeed for your letter from Totland Bay dated 13^th June. You seem to have had quite a pleasant & peaceful time there and I’m right glad to hear it. From all accounts you came back looking all the better for the change.

And I like the photograph you sent. Quite right my dear mother to have something to hand down to posterity; I think you’ve done your bit splendidly in the war, in many more ways than hospital work not the least of which is in keeping so wonderfully cheery & always smiling for all your anxious moments, from which I’m afraid you are seldom free. But I trust it is some satisfaction to you to know that your cheery & happy bearing  & the way you never allow us to catch even a glimpse of the anxious thoughts that must be always with you, all this I say helps us more than we can possibly say to carry on with whatever particular job we are doing. You’ve been just splendid all through. The photograph is quite good I think; you look rather like a Serbian nurse I think, at least what I remember of their pictures in the paper! But it’s a good “likeness” & easily recognisable.

I’m out of hospital again you see, but I suppose I told you this last week, as I got out before mail day. I have been taking things easy for a week, & am really perfectly fit again now, & feel much stronger & better all round. Trying weather to convalesce in all the same; 115° the usual thing nowadays, but coolish nights which is a blessing. And now we have begun August, one of the hottest months of the year according to past records. But it’s only a month & after that in September the days begin to get bearable, & after that again they are cold & bright & the climate I believe leaves nothing to be desired; one hears that the cold weather out here is perfectly delightful.

I got a parcel from you a day or two ago, containing some gorgeous soap, lemonade powder (most refreshing) & some lemon tablets which I’m afraid had all melted into a sort of paste! & some tea, beef & milk tablets which I hope to try some day. All together a most pleasing little parcel, (& a bottle of Eau de Cologne too, most acceptable) thanks most awfully for it. I’m afraid no letters were for me in the few bags saved off the Mongolia, & now I see the parcels mail 4^th – 18^th July has been sunk. The submarine show seems to be much the same, same number of boats sunk each week; I do hope we are really rounding up a good many U-boats nowadays.

The Russians are doing badly are’nt they, which is a nuisance, & I’m afraid it means prolonging the war. But the news from France is still good, Messines an’ all, & I expect by the time you get this there will have been another of Haig’s ‘Hammer blows’ struck.

So glad to hear Dreda contemplates farm work, & she seems to have found a nice place to start on. Much better than the stuffy old bank. I remember having a drink of the water, as far as I remember very cold coming from such a deep well. How I would love a glass of it now! Today is a fiendish day, a howling gale and thick clouds of dust, settling down in a thick layer over everything; impossible to keep clean too. The wind does’nt lower the temperature, it just keeps the hot air moving, and the dust.

I see they propose starting the weekly mails again. Many thanks for all the papers, daily sketches etc, most acceptable.

Best love to all

yr loving son

Ted

If Gertrude looked like a Serbian nurse, then this is probably the photograph

Gertrude in her Red Cross uniform

July 26/17

Dear Mother

I’ve left hospital now & am back with the regiment again, quite fit but a little slack of course, but I am taking things very easy and should soon be my old self again. The people in the hospital were more than kind, and I was sorry to leave all the comforts and pleasant surroundings & to have to come back to comparative discomfort again. However, one can’t stay in hospital for ever. I want you to write to 2 of the sisters if you will & to thank them for all they did for me; one is the Matron of the hospital, Sister Macfarlane, & the other is the sister in charge of the officers’ wards, by name Rowan-Watson. I’d be awful pleased if you’d just drop ’em each a line thanking ’em for all they did for me, and the other sisters of course, but these were the two chief ones of course.

Incidentally I have told Cox to send you £1, with which I want you to purchase a few odds and ends like shaving soap, acid drops, coloured hankies and any little thing to send to Sister Macfarlane for her Red X store, where she keeps a few things like that to give to patients. It will be some slight return for her goodness to me. You might include a box of sandalwood soap, which is for her to take for herself (make sure of this). Address No 2 British General Hospital, Amara, M.E.F.

It’s been very hot these last 3 weeks, but of course being in hospital for a fortnight was very pleasant as regards weather. The fans, & being inside a house too, made things much cooler. We are averaging 115° a day here now in camp, but the nights are dropping to 84° (81° this morning) in the early morning about 3 a.m., & last night I pulled a blanket over me about 4 a.m. Today there is a bit of a breeze, which is very welcome. Otherwise for the last 3 weeks there has’nt been a breath of wind.

I told you I had some letters last mail, it appears they rescued 11 bags for Mesopotamia from the Mongolia, which was mined outside Bombay, but whether those two letters came off her or not I can’t say. She was bringing the mails of the 31^st May, & your letter was posted in Guildford on that date, so probably came by the next mail. And now I see the parcel mail posted in London between 4^th – 18^th July has been sunk – also they are resuming the weekly mails from England.

Everything points to the submarine menace being well in hand, both as regards sinking or destroying submarines, building new ships, & making England self-supporting. It is most gratifying to read the optimistic speeches made by L-G- & others on the subject. All the same, the Russians are still rather trying are’nt they. Otherwise I don’t see how the war could go better. I suppose there will be a big advance in France sometime soon now, & as soon as America can put a lot of troops into the country things ought to take a most decided turn in our favour. But, barring the unexpected (which after all is always expected in war, paradoxical as it may sound) I don’t quite see how we are to avoid going on till 1918. Still, I live in hopes.

We are still stuck here, but may move on to B. any moment now I imagine. However, this is quite a good place to be in for the hot weather, both Basra & Baghdad being hotter from all accounts.

I hope you got my cables all right. I thought I’d keep you informed regularly of my progress, as the I.O. or War Office, whoever it is sends the wires, are apt to be rather alarming at times.

I believe we get some English mail today, but it won’t be in probably till this evening, after I’ve posted this.

I got a whole lot of papers last week from you. Thanks awfully, most acceptable in hospital. I see old Tree is dead, I’m glad I saw him act once or twice.

I had a line from Mrs Bingley last week, very cheery.

Love to all

Yr loving son

Ted

In the June “Windsor” there’s a v. good article on Indian troops which wd interest you; the Garhwalis are much to the fore

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windsor_Magazine

No 2 B.G.H
Amara

18^th July 17

Dear Mother

Such a pleasant surprise this morning, after a wash & brush up early & my bed had been made up, I sort of dozed off again till breakfast time & woke up to find a whole heap of letters and papers on my bed, including 2 from you dated May 30^th & June 6^th. I had thoroughly made up my mind to get no letters from home for 3 weeks or a month, as the mail leaving London on 31^st May had been sunk (by a mine, I hear, only 60 miles from Bombay if you please!) & with this fortnightly krewst beginning I could’nt hope for a mail I thought for a long time. Thanks awfully for the letters & papers, which I have not had time to peruse yet, but they are MOST WELCOME, as the trash in the hospital library nearly turns one silly to read.

Also thanks awfully for 2 cables, received 3 days ago, on the 14^th to be strictly accurate, both exactly the same, I got one in the morning & one in the evening. As they were addressed direct to the hospital, I imagine you had received a W.O. or India O. wire saying I had been admitted to hospital. The O.C. hospital said he had worded the official wire so as to make it as all right as possible and not to make it too alarming for you. He was a charming man, Col: Hefferman by name, and died suddenly 2 days ago from cerebral malaria, brought on by the great heat of the past few days I fancy. He always used to come & talk to me morning & evening on his sort of semi official rounds. I wired you “going on well”. I wonder if you ever got it? They said it would take 2 or 3 days, possibly more.

Well, I’m much better, though by the time you get this it will be such stale news. I’m allowed up, & today I’m allowed out for a breath of fresh air; I am on good solid diet, chickens, eggs, an’ all, I drink whiskey & soda for dinner, & in myself I feel as fit as a fiddle, a wee bit “leggy” perhaps, but that’s only incidental on being in bed for 10 days or so. The doctor is quite pleased with my progress, & practically every day I’ve been in here I’ve been promoted to some extra diet or privilege, & my progress has been systematic & regular.

You see, I went on a milk & rice pudding diet at once in camp, a week before I came into hospital, when the first symptoms were apparent, and then I thought it best to come into hospital as there is’nt very much doing nowadays & it’s as good a time to “go sick” as you could find, ‘cos in hospital they treat you proper & one gets fitter so much quicker than if you let the disease hang on till you drop. Of course if we had been doing any soldiering, up at the front & all that, I would’nt have dreamt of coming in here, but would have managed to get fit again somehow, as I’ve never really felt absolutely rotten, I could always have carried on. So taking things all round, if I’ve got to have dysentery, better have it now. And now I hope to get absolutely rid of it & to be out and about again & rejoin in 2 or 3 days.

Everyone is most awfully nice & kind here, doctor awfully good chap. Sisters perfect darlings & look after you like mothers; brother patients very nice, & I get heaps of visitors from the regiment & pals in Amara every day, so the time passes pleasantly enough.

This last fortnight has been terribly hot. In here of course we have electric fans & my ward is particularly cool. But outside & in camp temperatures have been running up to 118° in the shade, & not a breath of air to relieve things. Cases of heat stroke are common among “Tommies”, but they have little “aid-posts” dotted about all over the place, with a canvas trough full of water, into which you hurl any unfortunate fellow who goes down with heat-stroke till medical aid can be summoned. The great thing is of course to bring down the patient’s temperature, by cold water, ice etc. Poor Col: Hefferman went up to 110°; think of it! It sounds incredible, but the doctor here took it himself & vouches for the truth of it, & he tells me temperatures of 108 & 109 are common in cases of heat stroke. Of course they get ’em into hospital with all possible speed & treat them with ice & wet towels etc & most of ’em recover.

I hear the regiment is keeping wonderfully fit, despite our men being hill men & not used to great heat. One man has died of heat-stroke, & we’ve had no more cases of it. All other officers are very fit & cheery & drop in to see me often; they say it’s “devilish hot” in camp but they keep smiling, & so shall I when I go back, so don’t worry about me. Besides there’s only about another month of this preposterous weather, & after that it begins to come within reasonable limits once more.

Yes the air raid on Folkestone was a bad show. All the same- it’s only a very minor thing in the war, & makes absolutely no difference to the result- I know it’s time we might be able to keep off these raids, but it would mean a constant day & night patrol of several hundreds of miles of E. & S. coast, & it would be playing into Germany’s hands to keep back all the hundreds of ‘planes & pilots for this purpose when they could be far more profitably employed on the Western front, where things matter & where after all the war is going to be decided. One simply must look at these things broadly & comprehensively; very unpleasant for the raided town I know, but we must not let little -(they are little, compared with the big things happening elsewhere)- raids like this turn us from our main purpose, killing Boches & winning the war on the Western front-

What a terrible thing the Vanguard being blown up like that: evidently done by spies I suppose, though I fail to see how it is ever to be found out what really happened- In your letter you were rather depressed about the Russians, but certainly since then they seem to have girded on their armour in fine style, & I see in today’s wires they claim to have captured nearly 40,000 prisoners in 12 days, to say nothing of numerous guns & much booty. I only hope we can really trust these reports, it means a lot if we can. By the time you get this I expect things will be moving again in France.

I’m very glad to hear you say you think of taking a rest, & I think it’s the best thing you can do. What’s Jane going to do? I’m weekly expecting to hear of her taking up some war work, as apparently there’s lots to do.

I can hardly credit your story of Hart’s men actually funking that ladder business; I can forgive him for funking perhaps, but not for saying so & not having a try anyhow. There must be very few men left in England now. Good old Capon, he deserved a pat on the back- & you too for holding the ladder, though as you say, Heaven knows what would have happened if it had slipped! I trust Specs will turn out a reliable defender of England- he may yet have a chance to prove his mettle. Dick & Jim both seem to like hot climates, of course I simply loathe them, especially when they are damp & sticky, as Singapore must be. Cheery weekends at Delaford lately you’ve been having.

Well, I must end up- I’m ever & ever so much better, nearly well in fact, & I’m awful sorry to have been such a nuisance, as I’m afraid you must have wondered what’s really the matter, as I expect all official wires are very bald & sketchy.

Best love to all

Yr loving son               Ted

Lt Col Francis Joseph Christopher Heffernan

http://www.cwgc.org/find-war-dead/casualty/628759/

http://www.westernfrontassociation.com/great-war-at-sea-in-air/royal-navy/3142-hms-vanguard-and-other-accidental-losses-in-british-home-waters.html

July 12^th

The Doctor has just been round and has now promoted me to fish diet, the one next above “semi-solids” but he says I’d better not get up yet. So evidently everything is going on all right & I’m feeling as fit as a fiddle.

By the way do you remember I told you our C.O. was giving me a picture of N. Chapelle as a wedding present? Did it ever turn up? as he said it was being sent straight to Delaford. I seem to remember you saying it had arrived one day. Do let me know what happened to it & if it’s arrived.

Best love to all, & I’m going along fine so don’t worry

Ever yr loving son

Ted

Ted’s picture of Neuve Chappelle did eventually turn up.

Ted’s picture of Neuve Chappelle by James Prinsep Beadle

No 2 British Genl: Hospital
Amara

July 11/17

Dear Mother

Please don’t be alarmed at the address, as it only means I’m in here for a few days to get over a slight go of dysentery, & I ought to be fit again shortly & back with the regiment, certainly easily by the time you get this. I felt rotten all last week in camp & had symptoms of dysentery, but I did’nt want to come to hospital & our M-O- treated me in camp. But I got no better, & after all it’s the wisest thing to get these things treated properly early, before they get a hold of you, then they are much more easily cured. So on Sunday (this is Wednesday) I came in here, & am now under treatment. I am much better, even in these three days; they won’t let me out of bed, but that is the usual thing I believe, rest & quiet, & injections of stuff called “emitine” which is certainly marvellous in its results.

The first 3 days I was here I was on “fluid” diet, milk & egg flips & weak soup, a very dull affair! But today I have been promoted to “semi-solid”, which means custard for lunch & an egg for breakfast & tea – I hope they did’nt send any alarmist wires home about me. Dysentery I believe is always reported as a “seriously ill” case, & I asked the Doctor here not to be too depressing, but he has to wire home about all officers admitted to hospital- I am thinking of wiring to you also, to say I’m all right, which I really am – I fancy I have a very mild go, & have caught it early in its career, so I shall soon be back with the regiment again. This emitine takes 10 days through, & by the time that’s finished I ought to be quite fit again. So don’t worry in the least about me please; I’m perfectly all right, & am feeling most awfully fit, & very hungry! as all last week I was on slops, milk & eggs etc, & they cut your food down here too, & I’m told it’s a good sign to be hungry. Anyhow the doctor was fearfully pleased with me this morning, & as I say, promoted me to semi-solids, so I’ll be all right again in no time-

Thanks awfully for a mail letter which I got yesterday, most opportunely on my birthday. It was dated 23^rd May- The matron here gave me a few hankies & a writing block & some shaving soap from the Red X as presents, & everyone was very nice. The sisters are perfect darlings of course, & treat one like mothers; they are simply magnificent, & it’s impossible not to get well quickly under their treatment. I do admire them so, working in all the awful heat. Of course we have electric fans in hospital here, & it’s most awfully comfortable, just like home.

The actual building is the former residence of the Turkish governor of Amara, before we drove them out of it in 1915; it is built on the banks of the Tigris, & is a big square building, 2 storeys, with a courtyard place in the middle, & can accomodate about 60 patients, all officers: the men are all accomodated in the old Turkish barracks close by. At present there are only about 30 patients, & only 2 of us dysenterys, my stable companion being an army vet: quite a nice person. Fox & our doctor strolled in to see me last night, as it’s only about 2 miles to camp. They were surprised to see me looking “so well”, as they said, & told me I looked a hundred times fitter than when I came in on Sunday.

It’s been very hot these last 3 days, up to 118º in the shade, but these fans cool the place a lot of course: still it’s hottish o’ nights, & hard to get to sleep sometimes. They have just brought me my evening basin of water, so I must perform that very unsatisfactory duty of trying to wash in bed; useless I call it!

I have’nt yet met Desmond Gabb, as you see we (our brigade, that is) have been split up so far, & we shan’t all meet till we all collect at Baghdad sooner or later. When we do collect I must certainly go over to the Queens & see if I can find any old pals or if I know anyone by name.

We get no more mails now for a month, as the ones we got yesterday were the 24^th May, & the 31^st May ones were sunk- By the way, the ship was sunk sixty miles from Bombay! By a mine, dropped by some neutral I suppose, or possibly a raider. Sickening is’nt it getting so near as that and then being sunk.

Many thanks for Printer’s Pie which came yesterday, I have’nt read it yet, but have had a good laugh at some of the pictures. Several other papers also turned up, for which very many thanks, but I have’nt had time to read them yet. I will finish this off tomorrow, & give you the latest news of my condition after the Doctor’s made his morning rounds. I’m certainly feeling very fit this evening. Good-night.

He continued the letter the next day

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emetine

http://recipewise.co.uk/egg-flip

Probable location of Hospital, scene of further siege in 2004

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIMIC-House

SS Mongolia, sunk 23/06/17

http://www.wrecksite.eu/wreck.aspx?132085

Images from Printer’s Pie

http://www.bonzo.me.uk/indexP.htm

July 5/17

Dear Mother

No mail in from you this week of course under the new fortnightly show, and I see that the letter mails leaving London on 31^st May & parcel mails of 24^th of May have been “lost at sea” as the official wording is. Sickening is’nt it, I think it’s the mail after next, as I got letters dated 7^th by last mail, so we ought to get 24^th May letters next mail, but after that I’m afraid we’ll have to go a whole month without any.

No news much here. Everyone seems to be on the move nowadays, up river, so I expect we shall get our orders shortly. Meanwhile we are very comfy here, though we have had one or two real big days of wind and dust, and it has been hottish, 107 or 108 every day on an average in our tents. The last 2 days have been quite still with no wind; it does away with dust of course, but it makes it a wee bit hotter.

We had a wonderful eclipse of the moon last night, a total one, lasting about 2 hours. I had’nt noticed it in my diary though I see now it is down there. Of course we saw it soon enough as soon as it began at about 11 p.m. as the moon was full, and in about ½ hour or ¾ hour it was entirely blotted out, and only glowed a dull crimson like a cinder, a most impressive sight. It stayed like that for about 2 hours or so & then got all right again. I’ve never seen such a good eclipse and of course we had a splendid view of it. I was sleeping out in the open, as I always do nowadays, and kept on waking up & having a look at the show.

I’ve not been very grand these last few days, “liver” I think the doctor has put it down as; but he has treated me with various dopes and things & I’m ever so much better now, in fact practically well again. In these hot climates I suppose one has a day off occasionally.

We had some swimming sports here the other day for the men, who, as I have told you I think, spend most of the day bathing and we thought we would encourage them by having a few sports, especially for those who have learnt to swim here. The diving was most amusing, as our men are not natural divers, & have only learnt a bit here under our instruction, so you can imagine their efforts off our spring board were amusing to say the least of it.

There seems to be a bit of a lull in France now at the time of writing. What a wonderful show that Messines business must have been, with 19 mines going up, & what a tremendous success it was. On the whole things seem to be going well; the submarine figures are keeping fairly low and level, Russia appears to be going to do an advance, & America’s help in money ships & aeroplanes should be of inestimable value. And perhaps our Salonika army may be able to move more freely now Greece is out of it. But by the time you get this I expect lots of things will have happened so it’s not much good speculating.

The flies seem to have got worse here in the last few days, I spent most of the day swatting them in my tent. They were’nt so bad at first, but seem to have got worse lately.

No news of my socks from the G.O.C! so I expect he’s bagged em himself. However praps I’ll be seeing him in a week or two, though of course I should’nt dare ask him about them!

I’m writing this before breakfast & it looks like another warmish day as there is’nt a breath of wind, though it may get up later of course; I trust it will.

Must end up now. Best love to all

yr loving son

Ted

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_eclipse

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Messines_%281917%29