France 22/1/1917

My dear Mother,

No doubt you will have been a bit anxious about me lately, since I have not found opportunity to write to you for about 3 weeks. We just completed another term in and about the firing line, of about a months duration and were for the most part under shell fire.

We were not far from the place where I first experienced war, only about a mile to the right. It is fairly cold but not uncomfortably so and in fact so far the weather has been very much like Glen Innes in the winter. A lot more rain falls here though and therefore there is plenty of mud which is the great problem the military has to deal with at present. When it rains in the trenches it washes the sides down into the bottom of the trench so that, in a short time it becomes knee deep in slush and mad. When this gets a bit dry and sticky, it is hard to move through it and cases of strong men getting stuck in the mud were frequent.

We spent Christmas under fire and did not have a very gay one. On Christmas eve we were treated to a barrage of German shells in the front line and my word it was lively too while it lasted. They ran rings round us on our post with shrapnel and whizz bangs but did not hit anyone. They knocked our parapet down and buried our trench cooker which we used for making tea and Oxo and made us very wild.

At present I am away at a Musketry School, undergoing a course of shooting.

France is getting a bit short of tucker now and it is the devils own job to get sugar and french bread. We walked 5 kilos the other night to try to buy some and failed. Fancy me walking 4 miles for 2 lbs of sugar.

The uncles and cousins in England are still writing and send parcels to me and they often come in hands as the Army tucker gets a bit short now and then. We get about 11 or 12 oz. of bread a day and as I have a pretty healthy appetite, I generally eat it all at one go and then have to fossick round for the next meals.

I just this moment received a letter from Edie which is the 2nd each have written. I have not received Hilda’s or any from Mother yet, but may at any moment. We also received our tobacco issue of 4 packets of good cigarettes and a box of matches each on Sunday morning.

Tell Gert I will answer her letter and also Edies as soon as some news accumulates.

W.H.E.