Soldiers' Letters.

Southern Cross, Volume 24, Issue 15, 5 August 1916, Page 6

Soldiers' Letters.

SAVED BY HIS HELMET. Corporal Tom Bigwood (lately promoted to be sergeant), .a son of the late Mr J. Bigwood, Mataura, in the course of a letter to his sister, Mrs A. Craig, Underwood, remarks : We left Egypt, some six weeks ago (this is written on sth May) for "somewhere in France,"' and if ever anyone was sick of the sand, the heat, and the natives, it was, yours truly. We had a line trip through the Mediterranean in a bigger troopship than ""any that ever visit old N.Z., followed by a long ride in the train. How I enjoyed it—and and the green fields, and the people, and eperything ! It reminded us so of N.Z. You might think that we would have been tired, but for my part it could have gone on for ever.

We reached our destination, mud up to the ankles, but better than sand. Since then I've been billetted in various places, from a fowlhouse to a college hall, and I'm not done vet.

I started this letter five days ago. Since then I've been made sergeant, arid the day after my promotion I was knocked down by -.a. German shell, but ; this is a sporting life, and I'm taking' the , good with the bad. I had a very narrow escape. I -was going through the trenches when a shrapnel shell burst over my head, and I stopped a piece of the shell case on my helmet. The piece of shell cut it,s way right through , into my,skull, making a big gash about three inches long. But for the fact that my head is pretty hard. and that I was wearing a steel' helmet I'd have been pushing up the daisies by now., I , intended to send the helmet home to you as a souvenir, but the day I left- our field ambulance the 'General heard about it and sent for the helmet, so I think that's good-bye to it. I'm in a good hospital ;near Boulogne, and it's a treat to be in a nice bed again. I hope to be back to my.company in five or six weeks, and meantime I believe I,hold, the proud position of being the first of our company (Ist Otago Battalion) to he wounded in France. ;

I'm quit,e all right, and may add that the conditions in France are much better than at Gallipoli.

" WE WILL GIVE YOU HELL !"

The Germans were the first to get the i news ipf [Lord Kitchener and his staff, writes Private T. Bogue in a letter published in the Wynjdhain Herald. They : stuck up a notice in their trenches about it, and we would not believe it. They stick t up all kinds of notices. One read ". "Eire high, NewSZealand. . Peace declared in eight days." We all want peace, and expect it any time now. A good many. casualties have occurr-' ed in our brigade. The,Germans can make it pretty hot when they like. They are very good/ shots, too. One has to look out and ziot put, his head tfc>o high above the' trenches. I nearly got caught by a sniper one day, and my knees played "Home Sweet Home" for a while. They ha< plenty of snipers when, we came first but our boys scared them, , and they are not so cheeky now. Even in dug outs one is not safe from high explosives. The Germans are wellsupplied with spies, and how they get information is surprising. They knew exactly when the Australians went up to the firing-line, and £Ut up a notice, "Welcome, Australia '. We will give you hell !,". Nearly every house here is an hotel. It. is wonderful how the people cling to their homes, for we are fighting right in the town boundary, and they go on with their business just the same, never knowing when a shell will wreck .their show. One day an observation balloon of ours broke loose, and the observers had to descend on a parachute, with the Germans peppering them. The trenches have all sorts of names, just like a town, and to deliver a message one has to go up Irish, Avenue or Essex street. "LIVING LIKE A LORD." BEER A PENNY A GLASS. Extracts from a letter received by Mr Frank Williams from his son, Corpl. Hector Williams, from the "Firing Line, France, 12/6/16," and published in the W.yndham .Herald I am in the best of health and

living like a lord, Up in the front line we have bacon and eggs, Quaker oats, fried onions. I shall make out a little trench menu, and you can show it to some of the stiay-at-homes. We have a lovely c©ke fire in our dugroutievery cold night, and it is grand —a nice piece of toast and a cup of Bovril before, laying down for a snooze. Of course, mind you, we have to buy these dainties ■ ourselves ; but there is nothing else to spend money on excepting "smokes.."-

It is all right here to have, a nice, drink of wine or beer, which we get for a penny a glass, and it is better than water (which we cannot be t,oo sure about). One would have to drink a lot of this wine and ,beer to get drunk, as it contains only, five per cent, of alcohol—and is just., how it should be. On coming ; ' here first we co'uld buy champagne for five or eight francs a bottle (a franc being eqtial to /Is of English money). The troops have been debarred from. . carrying-, it away, but may drink in the hotels, which count about every third or fourth house one passes. As. to body washing, when we come" out of the trenches we are marched in batches of 100 or so at a time down to a mill, where there are two vats (like those at the Edendale Sugar-of-Milk Factory). The water is heated by steam,, and so much •Jeyes' fluid is put in. Men get in the baths twenty to thirty at a time. It is grand. . If we' are reluctant to get out. the Ambulance men put on a little more steam. The greatest care is-taken-in changing ~ clothes on coming l out from the trenches for a bath. We return to the trenches with a complete change. Something like 200 women are employed washing clothes all the time for us New Zealanders alone.

Now a little about the fighting : Well, the guns are roaring and the flares are lighting up the place. Mind you, although there is a war on, it is a pretty sight for a newi chum to see the flares going—and good ,ones they are. We have a parachute here, and when it was fired out of a gun ah the shooting tjhat was going on ceased for the time being to look at it. It was simply lovely, with a steady breeze helping to; carry it to the Germans' lines.. We get several sent over, and they sometimes catch a man napping, and one has to be mighty .careful to take cover and wait for the rest. But the old "Jennie Wassers" are devils. First of all, one hears -their gun fired, then this great piece of steel, like a bottle (only bigger)} comes flying through the air. One good thing is that they can be seen coming, but it is hard to fix the direction till they begin to drop, and then one has to run like ——. Bang goes gun All eyes are turned T,o the sky."Look out ! Here she comes Hug the parapet !" A thud. She shakes the ground just like an earthquake. That is how things go when t,hey start.t There is shrapnel to contend with, and high explosives, too.