A GENERAL TO HIS WIFE.

Press, Volume L, Issue 15156, 21 December 1914, Page 2

A GENERAL TO HIS WIFE.

A liEGACY FOPv CHILDREN

Lady Smith-Dorrien, speaking at, a women's patriotic meeting at Salisbury, read the following extracts from a letter from her husband, General Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien, written to her from the trenches during the battle of the Aisne: — "Knowing afi I do that you are striving to help the wives and families of the brave who' are*. Jfighting under mc in this glorious war, I should like too to tell them, when you have an opportunity, a little about the doings of their husbands, brothers, and sons, so that they may learn to appreciate them at their true value. "Never has an army been called on to engage in such desperate fighting as is of daily occurrence in the" present war, and never have any troops behaved so magnificently as our soldiers in this war. The stories of the battles of Lo Mons and Lβ Cateau are only beginning to be known, but at them a British force not only held its own against a. German army four times its own size, but it hit the enemy so hard that never were they able to do more than follow it up. "Of course our troops had to fall back before them, an operation which would demoralise most armies. Not bo with burs, however. Though they naturally did not like retiring for twelve successive days, they merely fell sullenly back, striking hard whenever attacked, and the moment the order came to go forward there were smiling faces, everywhere. Then followed the battles of the Marne and the Aisne. "Tell our women that all these great battles have, day after day, witnessed countless feats of heroism and brave fighting. Large numbers will be given Victoria Crosses and Distinguished Conduct Medals, bub many more have earned them, for it has been impossible to bring every case to notice. "Tell the women that, proud as I am to have such soldiers under my command, they should be prouder still to be near and dear relations of such men, and that they can show their pride by their own behaviour. Let them think of their husbands and brothers undergoing the greatest imag* inable fatigues, often cold and wet for days together, and through it all, though in constant danger, performing deeds of which any country might be proud. "Tell the wives to talk to their children about their brave fathers, and for themselves never to do anything a full account of which they would shrink from giving their husbands on their return irom the war. "Tell the women and. girls they can serve their country best-by leading quiet lives, thus setting an example of self-restraint and uprightness at home, which, equally with the bravery of their dear ones in the war. is necessary to bring the country through this great national crisis with credit to those who have the good fortune to livo under the Union Jack."