Letter No 34
Middle East
30th Nov ’42
Dear Mum,
I’m going to give the pen & paper a hiding again & pound out a page or two. The will make 13 letters for the month so I don’t want any more complaints about the shortness of mail.
Yesterday I spent all day on the most important thing in this war - my bed. Since I came over here beds have been quite a hobby with all of us. I started sleeping on the hard ground, but this was definitely no good at all, then I got the seat out of a truck but there was about 8 inches of me hanging over the ends & this was uncomfortable, hence its short life. Next came the bed made from the ridge pole of a tent & a sheet of canvas. This lasted until I went into town again & then bought a folding, wooden camp stretcher. This was about the most comfortable I had & it got such a lot of use that one day the legs caved in & for the past few weeks it has been held up with all sorts of tins & boxes to save me sleeping on the floor. When I went on the trip I mentioned in my last letter I came across a jerry folding, iron, hospital bed. The canvas had been burned out of it but I brought it back to camp with me & yesterday I pulled the remains of the canvas off my bed & stitched it on the new frame. Now I can bask my spine most comfortably.
Received another comforts parcel from the A.C.F. this morning. It contained tobacco, cigs, chewing gum, shaving soap, handkerchief & a pair of sox. Our Christmas parcel will be up some time next month - I hope.
Our Scotch friends have gone further up now & I suppose it will be a long time before we see them again. They came down to our tent overnight for about a week & if I was with them for another fortnight I think I could just about fathom out what they were saying.
We have the wireless going each night now. It is an aircraft radio & we have to have earphones running from it. The tent looks like the electricity dept. with the number of wires we have trailing all over the floor. We lay in bed & listen to the English session on the German Radio & we often have a good laugh at them. They try & tell us that the German forces are holding the British at a town we passed through about a week or more ago. They also sink the British fleet in the Med. about three times a week & shoot down about 70 planes a day.
That’s about all from this letter but will write again shortly.
Give my love to Dad & Betty & my regards to Leo.
Lovingly Yours
Frank
Letter No 35
Middle East
1.12.42
Dear Mum,
I was right in the middle of doing a few modifications on the beaut new bed when your letter No 14 arrived so I left it to scratch out these few lines. I also received a letter from Aunty Molly & one from a girl in Tas.
Re George Briss I suppose you have dropped him a few lines by now so be sure to let me know if you hear anything from him. I won’t bother about writing to him at that address but I’ll wait until I hear from you.
I had a letter from Bert Ritchie in the last lot of mail but he told me that he tried to get away from the W.J. however your story may be the correct one. If you hear anything from him let me know from time to time.
Glad you like the copies of the A.I.F. News. Our squadron, being the only Aussie fighter in this part of the world, we strike the headlines quite often as you will see from the copy I sent you a few days ago.
I’ve no idea what I’m going to write to Aunty Molly about because, I suppose she reads all the letters I send to you. I will just have to write & thank her for the canteen order.
We have a new mascot in the tent at present - it is “Abdul” the tortise (sic). This beast measures about 11/2 x 1 3/4 inches & we drilled a hole in his shell & tied him to the centre ridge pole with a piece of wire & now he ambles round the tent & make a nuisance of himself.
My camera hasn’t been working lately due to the shortness of films but while the canteen truck was in Alex. I got one of the lads to get me twenty films so now I will be able to put it back into commission again,
I’m afraid that’s all for now but will write again when some news pops up.
Give my love to Dad & Betty
Lovingly yours.
Frank
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