Purchase Diary's:
I was dreaming last night of Grandma Searle, in Fifty-Four Bridge Road, and myself as a child, as I was at that period. This is the first time I remember going so far back in my dreams; also the first time I remember dreaming of Grandma Searle. I have often thought about her, but I’ve never dreamed about her. Grandma died in the spring that I was eleven. When she died she had been living in Number Eight Angel Road for several years, so I was probably about seven or eight or nine, when she was living in Bridge Road. I first remember her in Number Eight. Grandma and Grandpa were in Number Eight, the house from which my mother had been married, when my mother and father moved into Number Six Angel Road. I was about three years old. My mother had lost her second baby, and Number Six falling vacant my parents had taken it, principally so that my mother could live next door to her mother. I can just remember our moving in. I can remember being in Number Eight, with the young aunts there, my mother’s sisters. Later Grandpa took Hamlet House, and I remember being there when Gladys was a baby. I must have been five or six years old. Then Grandpa left Hamlet House and went to live at Fifty-Four Bridge Road; and that is where I was in my dreams last night. Everything was exactly as it used to be, Grandma too. When I think of it I enjoyed many happy days with Grandma Searle. My adult opinion disapproves of her, but as a child I was very fond of her, and certainly she was kind to me.
My dreams are still back in the nineties. Last night I was dreaming of my other grandmother, Grandma Side. I woke happy and full of excitement, for the story I have long meditated over and which I think of as, Goodbye Gillespie, had fallen into its proper shape and sequence and I feel ready to write it. My mind has been dull all winter, but today it is quick alive, flowing with composition. I want, today to jot down some notes, mainly the right sequence, before I lose them again, so I hope we shall have no visitors.
The war news is bad. Last night the Jap’s landed on Singapore, the impregnable Singapore! Privately I think; why shouldn’t the Jap’s hold Singapore? What do the English want it for? It is not a white man’s land. We want it for money, for rich men’s investments. We took it once. The Jap’s want it for the same reason, because of its riches, so they’re trying to take it. Why don’t governments get together and arrange matters peaceably? Why must they make war? Why must the common man die to protect his so-called superiors? Why should we, or anybody else, hold an empire? This, of course, is rank political heresy. Well, I’m a heretic. I hate men, and the way they run the world. Men’s ideas and men’s works infuriate me. War! Hell let loose.
War news is disastrous. Singapore is falling. Naval defeat in the Channel.
It is my mother’s birthday. She is seventy-nine today.
It is still very cold. The Prime Minister’s statements in Parliament yesterday depress everybody. The figures he gave of our bombing of the German ships at Brest are downright worrying. He said that whilst the ships were there, for ten months, no less then four-thousand tons of bombs were dropped on them; three thousand two hundred and ninety-nine bomber “sorties were made, with a loss of two hundred and forty-seven air force men and forty-three aircraft. “Sortie” is used by the R.A.F. to indicate an action carried out by a machine; so, if two hundred forty-seven men were lost during these attacks this gives the surprisingly high average of almost six men in a crew, and indicates that most of the aircraft lost were of the bigger four-engine type. Churchill said, “The ships were undoubtedly hit several times and repair work was made very difficult.”
Changes in the cabinet were announced. Sir Stafford Cripps has been appointed Lord Privy Seal and leader of The House of Commons, so he came home from Russia for something. Mr. Eden, Secretary of State for Foreign affairs has been included in the Cabinet, and Sir Kingsley Wood has been dropped and also Lord Cranbourne. Lord Beaverbrook declined. He remains as Minister of Production, but intends to go to Washington, to speed up munitions there. So, it is another shuffle. That awful fool Sir Kingsley Wood has been dropped at last, and Mr. Eden promoted, but will this new set of men win the war for us? I’m afraid not.
Reports of a great naval battle off the Island of Bali were the Jap’s are attempting a landing. The U.S. navy and the Dutch are attacking them. The Jap’s have also landed on the Island of Timor, which is Portuguese, and neutral, but apparently neutrality means no more to the Jap’s than it does to the Germans.
It is a bright sunny morning but still very cold, with occasional flurries of snow, too cold for snowfall however. I have just been out to the gate to investigate a strange noise and I found two workmen cutting the railings. The Government is removing all Romford railings for scrap-iron for munitions factories.
I went to Wykeham Hall this afternoon to a meeting of the Friends of The Prisoners of War. Pretty futile, I think. A sort of mother’s meeting, with a Parson in charge, but the women get together for fun and a social good time rather than anything they can do for prisoners. This afternoon they actually played games, including a romp with oranges and lemons. What good does this do the prisoners? The “do” begins with hymn singing and prayers, pretty awful. Listening to the fool parson, looking at the stupid women, I thought how shoddy they all were. Well, I know people are stupid; but I feel today, Oh God, give me the real thing! If Catholic women had felt called to pray, they would have prayed the liturgical prayers naturally, and there would have been dignity and a sense of rightness and truly felt religion but as things were in that Wykenham Hall meeting today, no, there was no life in that religion; the women were like so many dead leaves rustling, the parson a nincompoop.
It is colder than ever. I feel very depressed, in fact I am in one of those moods so perilously near to dissolution, where I should like to close my eyes and die. I feel I cannot contend with anything any more. “These are the times that try men’s souls” all right, and women’s.
Sunshine today and is slightly warmer, though still freezing. Dorrie Stanforth was here for the evening. I have promised to go to the movies with her next Thursday if nothing happens. War news gets worse and worse. The fall of Rangoon expects to be inevitable and soon. News tonight that last night we dropped parachute troops in Northern France, who successfully destroyed a German radio location unit and plant there. The R.A.F. took them over; the Navy brought them back, the Infantry, Fusiliers and Welch detachment are fighting on the beaches to cover our men’s getaway.
February 6, 1942
I was dreaming last night of Grandma Searle, in Fifty-Four Bridge Road, and myself as a child, as I was at that period. This is the first time I remember going so far back in my dreams; also the first time I remember dreaming of Grandma Searle. I have often thought about her, but I’ve never dreamed about her. Grandma died in the spring that I was eleven. When she died she had been living in Number Eight Angel Road for several years, so I was probably about seven or eight or nine, when she was living in Bridge Road. I first remember her in Number Eight. Grandma and Grandpa were in Number Eight, the house from which my mother had been married, when my mother and father moved into Number Six Angel Road. I was about three years old. My mother had lost her second baby, and Number Six falling vacant my parents had taken it, principally so that my mother could live next door to her mother. I can just remember our moving in. I can remember being in Number Eight, with the young aunts there, my mother’s sisters. Later Grandpa took Hamlet House, and I remember being there when Gladys was a baby. I must have been five or six years old. Then Grandpa left Hamlet House and went to live at Fifty-Four Bridge Road; and that is where I was in my dreams last night. Everything was exactly as it used to be, Grandma too. When I think of it I enjoyed many happy days with Grandma Searle. My adult opinion disapproves of her, but as a child I was very fond of her, and certainly she was kind to me.
I
think today my cruel disapprobation of her, a consideration from my head, has
evaporated entirely away; what remains is the very positive affection of the
small child for the indulgent grandmother. Yes, it was a good dream.
Whilst
the Searle’s were in Fifty-Four Bridge Road, Number Eight Angel Road fell
vacant, and Grandma and Grandpa re-took it, moving back again into the house
that had been their home since my mother was a child of twelve. Alice married
from Number Eight when she was twenty.
February 8, 1942
My dreams are still back in the nineties. Last night I was dreaming of my other grandmother, Grandma Side. I woke happy and full of excitement, for the story I have long meditated over and which I think of as, Goodbye Gillespie, had fallen into its proper shape and sequence and I feel ready to write it. My mind has been dull all winter, but today it is quick alive, flowing with composition. I want, today to jot down some notes, mainly the right sequence, before I lose them again, so I hope we shall have no visitors.
There
is some good music on the radio today, so I hope I shall be permitted to listen
to it. Last night I was listening to dance music that came on after ten
o’clock. I was unable to read, for my mind was a simmer, so I found the dance
music pleasant and helpful. Melodious rhythm, I find, induces fertile
rumination. Well, about ten-fifteen Ted came into the room, and sat down to
chat awhile. He began by criticizing the music. It was all wrong of course.
I
tried to keep on listening to the music but could not, so I turned the radio
off. When Ted wants to talk he wants to talk. I thought as I listened to him
how Ted never praised anything. All his criticism is destructive. Nor does he
ever consider the other persons pleasure. It did not occur to him that the
music could please me, not for a minute. I thought: Why of course, Ted has
never danced. Often I want to dance. Sometimes I do, alone by myself around the
table. Something in me effervesces, and I want to be happy. I want to dance, so
I dance. I thought how stupid I’ve been all these years, especially in our
early years together. I ought to have made Ted learn to dance, and take me to
dances. Instead of which I let him argue, talk and talk and talk and worry
about religion. Suddenly last night I saw, it is the chapel in him. I saw the
poor little non-conformist boy, who was taught to regard dancing as sinful, and
who never had the price for it anyhow.
Yes,
as the twig is bent, Ted grew up in poverty and piety. He stays pious and he
stays mean. I grew up in more comfortable circumstances, and in a bohemian
household, where religion, meaning the Church of England, was taken for
granted, and where we sang and played and danced and went to the theater and
enjoyed ourselves as much as we could. We had our disasters, but we lived
zestfully. So, I want to be happy. I want to live for the sake of this world,
not of the next. Piety bores me. I want to laugh, to enjoy and I am silly about
money, I keep within my means but I can’t be mean. I can’t haggle about a price
or look for a bargain. In fact, I don’t want bargains. I hate the cheap. I want
the best possible and if I can't afford the very best, then the nearest I can
get to it. Second best doesn’t interest me. Ted takes joy in the second hand.
From
the age of twelve I went to the theatre regularly, once a week in my late teens
or twice a week. I loved theatre going. After I married I missed the theatre
tremendously. Ted said we couldn’t afford it, and I believed him, Of course we
could have afforded it and had Ted liked it, we should have done so. No, he
wouldn’t spend money for theaters, so we didn’t go. I can see now I should have
made him go. I should have assumed that theatres and parties and dances were
matter of course. I didn’t. I just let him have his own way about everything. I
was a fool. I even let him talk me into his fool religion. I surrendered to him
in everything, and in the long run it turns out to have been stupidity.
I
saw a reflection of Dad in myself this morning, and it surprised me. It was
like this: I was listening to the tail end of the nine o’clock news when Ted
returned from church. His breakfast was ready on the table, but before he sat
down to it he walked over to the radio and turned it off. He had heard the news
at seven. Then Ted began talking, first against the radio, but finally turning
it into his platitudinous ethics. I let him talk, moment-by-moment I became
more and more acutely bored, but I remained quiet and apparently politely
listening. Then all at once I saw I was behaving like Dad in his last years
with Mother. The more Mother rowed, the quieter he became, the further he
retired into himself. He held himself silent and still, but with a very
deliberate willing, because by nature Dad himself was voluble and explosive. He
practiced a wonderful patience.
So
with me, I realized I was deliberately holding myself still, both in body and
tongue and I recognized it as a technique I have been practicing for a very
long time. Not because I am patient, but because I am saving myself. I keep the
peace, not for peace’s sake, but because it is my peace. We save ourselves,
waiting, saving myself for myself because I have to.
It
is now three p.m. and some items in the news make me feel ill. At one o’clock
we were given a detailed account of how one Gordon Highlander killed seventeen
Japs single-handily in Malaysia, in one days fighting. I couldn’t eat my
dinner. I thought I should faint. To know you have killed one man must make you
feel different all the rest of your life; but to have killed seventeen-how must
you feel about that? I suppose he will go home to his wife’s bed! Yesterday a
record was put over of the actual battlefront in Russia; you heard the guns and
bombs of both sides, and the Russian broadcaster commentating. I think this
sort of thing is horrible. Men are killing and being killed, and the sound of
the death struggle is sent over the air to satisfy morbid curiosity. Simply
devilish, I think. I get weary of the news. Most of it now washes over me and I
do not take it in at all. Such items as these I loathe. Men at war. I hate it.
February 9, 1942
The war news is bad. Last night the Jap’s landed on Singapore, the impregnable Singapore! Privately I think; why shouldn’t the Jap’s hold Singapore? What do the English want it for? It is not a white man’s land. We want it for money, for rich men’s investments. We took it once. The Jap’s want it for the same reason, because of its riches, so they’re trying to take it. Why don’t governments get together and arrange matters peaceably? Why must they make war? Why must the common man die to protect his so-called superiors? Why should we, or anybody else, hold an empire? This, of course, is rank political heresy. Well, I’m a heretic. I hate men, and the way they run the world. Men’s ideas and men’s works infuriate me. War! Hell let loose.
Propaganda
nauseates me. Last night Sir Stafford Cripps broadcast the Sunday postscript.
All praise for the Russians, of course, and a plea for “greater war production”
here at home. He said he noticed on his return to this country our general
feeling of a lack of urgency. Of course all decent people are sick of the war.
No
normal person would ever go to war. Every sane person knows war to be lunacy.
What are we fighting for now? Prestige. Neither side will pause and say; let’s
talk over our difficulties, let’s come to terms. I am sure there isn’t anything
that couldn’t be arranged. Will men arrange anything? No, but they’ll keep on
killing, and keep on talking about how wicked the enemy is and how righteous
our own side is. The other side is just the same. We are told that the Germans
are not told the truth of the matter. But are we? War is a game played by the
big shots, whilst the public on both sides is kept bamboozled. What about the
Russians anyhow? Today it is the fashion to praise them. They are winning the
war for us says Cripps. To which I say shucks! The Russians are not winning the
war for us. They are fighting the Germans because the Germans attacked them and
they are fighting for themselves. How much did they help us when the Germans
attacked us? Not a man, not a gun, not a penny. Their perfidy is entirely
overlooked. Just the same it is history that they attacked the Poles in the
back and they were the aggressor in Finland. When the Russians attacked Finland
they were the villains and Finland the hero. Now that the Finn’s have joined
their lot to the Germans they have become the villains, and Russia is the hero.
Funny, isn’t it?
It
is true that since Hitler attacked Russia we have had no more big air raids
over England. Evidently Hitler can’t do everything. But, Russia isn’t “saving”
us, not a bit of it. She is saving herself, as she naturally would do, but she
signed a friendship pact with Germany didn’t she? Not with us. Yes, propaganda
talks make me sick.
February 13, 1942
War news is disastrous. Singapore is falling. Naval defeat in the Channel.
February 14, 1942
Yesterday we lost forty-two aircraft in the Channel. The German battleships left Brest and sailed home to Helgoland and we couldn’t stop them. We lose a little more of the war every day, but the talkers keep on talking. “Britain always muddles through.” Does she? Will she this time? What of all the lives she throws away for nothing? Rommel is advancing in Libya. The Jap’s are penetrating in Singapore, and filling up Malaysia. Each day there is a fresh setback somewhere or other, but we silly English still hold ourselves in our fathead complacency. Oh yes, we are quite sure we will win the war. I think the issue is doubtful. Hitler isn’t licked yet, not by a long chalk. We are all sick of the war. The old men talk, but the young men have had enough of it.
Yesterday we lost forty-two aircraft in the Channel. The German battleships left Brest and sailed home to Helgoland and we couldn’t stop them. We lose a little more of the war every day, but the talkers keep on talking. “Britain always muddles through.” Does she? Will she this time? What of all the lives she throws away for nothing? Rommel is advancing in Libya. The Jap’s are penetrating in Singapore, and filling up Malaysia. Each day there is a fresh setback somewhere or other, but we silly English still hold ourselves in our fathead complacency. Oh yes, we are quite sure we will win the war. I think the issue is doubtful. Hitler isn’t licked yet, not by a long chalk. We are all sick of the war. The old men talk, but the young men have had enough of it.
February 15, 1942
Singapore has fallen. The Jap’s have taken it, and claim that sixty thousand of our troops have surrendered. Churchill spoke over the air at nine o’clock tonight. Yes, more talk! Churchill is a fine talker, but is he a fine statesman? Eric is in Singapore. Somehow I can’t get depressed about Singapore. I think why should we hold it anyhow? It seems to me that geographically all Malaya and the Pacific Islands naturally belong to the yellow races, therefore why should we appropriate those places? White men can’t live properly there. It is for greed, of course. We covet the riches of those places, so we annex them. The Jap’s do not covet Europe. I think, let the Europeans stay at home. This idea of an Empire is a curse. There is one great thing to be said, for America; America has never desired colonies and “possessions.” What is the world fighting for but loot? Oh yes, there is a lot of fine talk about “freedom.” Oh God I am sick of the war!
Singapore has fallen. The Jap’s have taken it, and claim that sixty thousand of our troops have surrendered. Churchill spoke over the air at nine o’clock tonight. Yes, more talk! Churchill is a fine talker, but is he a fine statesman? Eric is in Singapore. Somehow I can’t get depressed about Singapore. I think why should we hold it anyhow? It seems to me that geographically all Malaya and the Pacific Islands naturally belong to the yellow races, therefore why should we appropriate those places? White men can’t live properly there. It is for greed, of course. We covet the riches of those places, so we annex them. The Jap’s do not covet Europe. I think, let the Europeans stay at home. This idea of an Empire is a curse. There is one great thing to be said, for America; America has never desired colonies and “possessions.” What is the world fighting for but loot? Oh yes, there is a lot of fine talk about “freedom.” Oh God I am sick of the war!
February 16, 1942
It is my mother’s birthday. She is seventy-nine today.
It
is a bitterly cold day again. Miss Coppen was here this afternoon, full of
depressing gossip. She tells me that Stanley, on the Council, says that the
German’s won’t defeat us by invading us, but by starvation; and that our food
situation is going to be acute by June; also our meat ration will shortly be
reduced to six pence.
On
the other hand her brother-in-law, who is head of the Home Defense Association
in the rural districts near Colchester, says the Germans will most certainly
invade us, that they will drop parachutes by the thousands. Also, officially,
Essex, Suffolk and Kent, are listed as the most likely counties for the
invasion to start in. Essex heads the list as the most dangerous, and Kent,
contrary to general ideas, comes third. This is official. Last week the
Colchester wardens were called to hear a special instruction, given by Air Army
High Officer, given to them behind locked doors, and with soldiers and police
on guard outside. They were told what to expect and what to do when the
invasion starts. Simply lovely!
Well
we shall see; but the general idea is Germany will attempt invasion this
spring. If so God help us! Why shouldn’t they? They must be terribly bucked
this weekend by their axis successes. Their admiral got his Scharnhorst,
Guiseman and Prince Eugene safely up the Channel, and our wonderful British
Navy couldn’t stop him and out East the Jap’s have taken Singapore, as well as
other Dutch Islands. It is true the Germans are reported to be suffering great
losses in Russia; nevertheless, they are still in Russia. So what? To date the
axis is winning the war.
February 18,
1942
It is still very cold. The Prime Minister’s statements in Parliament yesterday depress everybody. The figures he gave of our bombing of the German ships at Brest are downright worrying. He said that whilst the ships were there, for ten months, no less then four-thousand tons of bombs were dropped on them; three thousand two hundred and ninety-nine bomber “sorties were made, with a loss of two hundred and forty-seven air force men and forty-three aircraft. “Sortie” is used by the R.A.F. to indicate an action carried out by a machine; so, if two hundred forty-seven men were lost during these attacks this gives the surprisingly high average of almost six men in a crew, and indicates that most of the aircraft lost were of the bigger four-engine type. Churchill said, “The ships were undoubtedly hit several times and repair work was made very difficult.”
Yet
those ships came out and sailed home through the Channel! Where was the Navy?
Why did we not send our ships against them whilst they were in Brest? We boast
of Taranto but here were stationary targets and we simply wasted our R.A.F.
boys and machines against them. It is dreadful. Churchill is full of excuses,
but eventually announced that a tribunal is inquiring into this episode. It
should be. Churchill is a fine talker, but we are not winning the war. Mistake
after mistake is made. Our Dud’s are not weeded out; instead they are white
washed. The loss of Singapore is another major disaster. The impregnable
Singapore!
By
the way, I had a letter from Mother this morning in which she tells me she has
received a cable from Eric, from Colombo; no date, reading, "Transferred
Colombo, safe, well, love, Eric Side." Oh the relief, I wept, Thank God
she writes. He is Mother’s baby. Yes and I am thankful too.
Artie
writes he expects to be home March twentieth, his commission certain. A short
leave, and then where will he be sent? Cuth is safe in prison, but what fate
lies in wait for Artie? Oh this cursed war!
In
turning the radio dial around you can often pick up a foreign station. At
two-thirty this afternoon I heard a German giving the news in English. This
speaker claimed our aircraft losses in the Channel on Friday as sixty-two. We
were told forty-two. It is impossible to believe any accounts. They all sound
plausible, and they all lie. Men talking again. Oh, the stupidity of the war,
it infuriates me. Millions of young lives are thrown away simply because of
politics, damned men talking damned nonsense. Men are just having heroics. I
hate it. Men are gabbing about honor. Oh God, it is to laugh! War is hellish
lunacy, nothing else. Yet why are the multitudes such sheep? Is this the end of
the world? It is certainly what Bagger calls the end of our time.
February 19, 1942
Port Darwin in the north
of Australia was bombed by the Jap’s this morning and last night San Francisco
had an alert warning lasting twenty-five minutes because unidentified aircraft
was overhead. San Francisco was not bombed, but Port Darwin was, suffering
damages and casualties. So this hellish war goes on. Where next?
The
nine o’clock news says that Port Darwin has had two attacks today; one two
twin-engine bombers, accompanied by fighters, carried out this morning. Five
ships in the harbor have been sunk, hospitals and military installations and
air drones on shore, the number of casualties not yet known.
February 20, 1942
Changes in the cabinet were announced. Sir Stafford Cripps has been appointed Lord Privy Seal and leader of The House of Commons, so he came home from Russia for something. Mr. Eden, Secretary of State for Foreign affairs has been included in the Cabinet, and Sir Kingsley Wood has been dropped and also Lord Cranbourne. Lord Beaverbrook declined. He remains as Minister of Production, but intends to go to Washington, to speed up munitions there. So, it is another shuffle. That awful fool Sir Kingsley Wood has been dropped at last, and Mr. Eden promoted, but will this new set of men win the war for us? I’m afraid not.
February 21, 1942
Reports of a great naval battle off the Island of Bali were the Jap’s are attempting a landing. The U.S. navy and the Dutch are attacking them. The Jap’s have also landed on the Island of Timor, which is Portuguese, and neutral, but apparently neutrality means no more to the Jap’s than it does to the Germans.
February 22, 1942
It is a bright sunny morning but still very cold, with occasional flurries of snow, too cold for snowfall however. I have just been out to the gate to investigate a strange noise and I found two workmen cutting the railings. The Government is removing all Romford railings for scrap-iron for munitions factories.
February 23, 1942
I went to Wykeham Hall this afternoon to a meeting of the Friends of The Prisoners of War. Pretty futile, I think. A sort of mother’s meeting, with a Parson in charge, but the women get together for fun and a social good time rather than anything they can do for prisoners. This afternoon they actually played games, including a romp with oranges and lemons. What good does this do the prisoners? The “do” begins with hymn singing and prayers, pretty awful. Listening to the fool parson, looking at the stupid women, I thought how shoddy they all were. Well, I know people are stupid; but I feel today, Oh God, give me the real thing! If Catholic women had felt called to pray, they would have prayed the liturgical prayers naturally, and there would have been dignity and a sense of rightness and truly felt religion but as things were in that Wykenham Hall meeting today, no, there was no life in that religion; the women were like so many dead leaves rustling, the parson a nincompoop.
February 25,
1942
It is Harold’s birthday.
I wrote to him. I also made up a Red Cross Parcel for Cuthie. The weather is
bitter. There is shocking news from the Russian front. It is good news for the
Allies, but shocking nevertheless. The Russians have surprised the Germans
south of Lake Ilmen, and gained an important victory in the region of Staraya
Russia. They claim to have routed three German Divisions, and say that the
Germans left on the battlefield twelve thousand men killed. This is what is
called the Leningrad Front. The Russians are proving to be wonderful fighters,
but oh, the horror of it all.
February 26, 1942
It is colder than ever. I feel very depressed, in fact I am in one of those moods so perilously near to dissolution, where I should like to close my eyes and die. I feel I cannot contend with anything any more. “These are the times that try men’s souls” all right, and women’s.
February 28, 1942
Sunshine today and is slightly warmer, though still freezing. Dorrie Stanforth was here for the evening. I have promised to go to the movies with her next Thursday if nothing happens. War news gets worse and worse. The fall of Rangoon expects to be inevitable and soon. News tonight that last night we dropped parachute troops in Northern France, who successfully destroyed a German radio location unit and plant there. The R.A.F. took them over; the Navy brought them back, the Infantry, Fusiliers and Welch detachment are fighting on the beaches to cover our men’s getaway.
General
opinion is that it is high time we begin to take the offensive and to harass
Hitler on his western front. The Russians are still fighting strong on the
East, but they have still not driven the Germans out of Russia, but they are
not yet beaten.
A
letter came from Artie today telling the good news (for him) that he has passed
and will be an officer in the Reconnaissance Corps, and not be demoted to
Infantry. He’s very happy about this. Poor Artie, God keep him!
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