LETTER FROM SIR PHILIP GIBBS

Press, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 25206, 10 June 1947, Page 2

LETTER FROM SIR PHILIP GIBBS

NEWS FOR WOMEN

THANKS TO TRAVEL CLUB On April 14, the Canterbury QT.Z.) Travel Club sent overseas a consignment of food parcels addressed to the villagers of Shamley Green, Surrey, England. Each householder in the village was to receive a parcel. Amongst the residents of Shamley Green is the well-known writer, Sir Philip Gibbs, who, like his neighbours, shared in the generosity of the Travel Club. Yesterday the following letter of ihanks was received by the club, from Sir Philip Gibbs:— “On behalf of all the villagers in Shamley Green, Surrey, I write to send our warmest thanks tor your generous and kind-hearted gifts of food from New Zealand. The distribution of the parcels to every householder in the village was, as some of them said, ‘Just like a fairy-tale.’ Very old people and very young, ex-servicemen and their wives, farmers and ploughmen, the blacksmith, the hedger-and-ditcher, the carpenter, and the cobbler, veterans of the First World War and demobilised from the second, gathered gleefully outside the village hall. "Some of -them had come from cottages built in the time of Shakespeare’s England, others from little houses of pre-war date. Some drove in their cars to the village hall from fair-sized homesteads where in the old days there was no lack of food, and where still the flower gardens and the padaocks are filled with the beauty of May-time in England. “The inhabitants of Shamley Green are living through lean days on a strictly rationed and sadly monotonous diet so that, whatever their means, they looked forward with zest to a treat in store. “Their anticipations were surpassed by what they found in your packages . . . so many goocj things . . . and there was general excitement and delight. “ ‘Tongues? ... I haven’t tasted one for years!’ “ ‘Two packages of suet! I shall be able to make some roly-poly puddings!’ “ ‘Cheese! . . . Lapib cutlets, and peas! . . . Marvellous!’ “So everybody chattered . and laughed, and everyone wanted to know how they could send their thanks for these splendid gifts. ‘We can’t thank them enough,’ were words many times repeated. “I convey the thanks of all of them by this letter written at their request, rhe inhabitants of Shamley Green send ■their love and gratitude to the Canterbury Travel Club.”