LINK WITH HOME

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume LXXI, Issue 13772, 15 October 1942, Page 2

LINK WITH HOME

IMPORTANCE OF THE LETTER TO SOLDIERS “Most of our fighting is being done in regions from which men cannot hope to return on leave. There’s no six days at home from Libya or India. And we are an intensely home-loving people. When the B.E.F. was in France 60 per cent, of our men in some of our regiments were married. I do not know the percentage now, but it is consider-

able. Many a man in die Middle East has never seen his child. None knows when he will. So the maintenance of the link with home by letter is of an importance it is impossible to exaggerate. The efficiency of the letter service ranks with the provision of rations in preserving morale. I wonder sometimes if we realise it? A tank battalion I know of received no letters during the fighting from November 18 to January 10. They emerged from the battles; they said: ‘Now for some mail!’ But the mail was not there. Finally a bag of letters was found here, another somewhere else. (The commanding officer is my informant). Can we improve the letter service? I think so. The airgraph service is beyond price: letters in this form reachc the Middle East in three or four weeks. About 3 6,000 airgraphs can be transported on an aeroplane for the weight of one human being. Is it beyond our power to use more aircraft for this task?” —Mr J. L. Hodson, the London “Sunday Times” War Correspondent.