Dear Mum, Dad and Jack:

Here I am again and it surprised me that it should be so soon but the Army has got kind and allowed us to write as often as we can…. It is real tough on us when we have no cigs but they won’t let us get them. They did let us have all of our mail but still no parcels.

I have some good news to tell you but I will give it to you later. The training is tougher now than ever before and I am not fooling. Day before yesterday we went on a forced route march and it was the toughest I ever was in like everything in the Army. A forced route march is one where you have a given distance to go as quickly as possible. The other companies did it fast but we were the last company to do it and we beat them all.

Now to tell you what we did, we went eleven and one half miles in two hours. That is a fact folks that is what we did. We would walk one hundred yards and run about five hundred then do that over again. Some of the boys passed out on their feet. There were fifteen of us who landed back at camp just two hours after we left and we all just fell where we stopped, I was never so done-in in all my life. Never again will I do that. My back has been sore since and I went to the M.O. (Medical Officer) this morning and he gave me excused duties for twenty four hours which accounts for this writing today and not tonight…. I still can’t get over that forced route march it seems so far for such a short time but it is true. I never thought I would be able to do it.

Your letters are swell Mum. You give so much news in them, everything that is of any interest is in your letters and what you don’t describe comes in these clippings you send. Just keep on sending them along with all the news.

None of your airmails are censored and so far only one letter I got was censored. Are any of mine censored? I don’t know what to say about the ring, can’t tell where I will be when it gets here. Use your own judgment but if you send it be sure to send it registered mail and put your return address on it. By the way, before I go any further get something for Jack and for Bette for their birthdays. I meant to tell you before this because you may be too late now but I forget in each letter. I am sure keeping you busy buying things Mum, but hope you don’t mind.…

I wish you wouldn’t mention those blueberries, etc. I very nearly starve when you say that. The only blueberries I see are in papers and dreams. The only berries I see over here are blackberries and I don’t like them so much.

The first thing you know Jack will be going back to school, it seems such a short time ago he was through. I sure hope he has a few days in the City before school starts again. Did he have a good vacation? I bet he is so big now I wouldn’t recognize him at first glance. Send me a late picture of him will you?…

So Janie is going to be married is she? I thought it was to be in June? Wish her the best for me if you see her. Pretty soon they will be all gone. Glad to hear that Grandpa is getting around again, he still goes in for those horse races. He should get busy and jump on a horse and go in the race…. Ask A.J.W. if he still talks to himself in the bathtub about the foreign affairs of the Masonic gang in that strange tongue.…

Now for what I think is a little good news. For the first time I think I got a break in the Army, read that again to make sure you got it right. Remember I told you they wanted me to take a stripe after coming off leave and I refused…. Well Sgt. Major Merry…said he understood my way of thinking and that there was a lot of responsibility for so little extra. Then he started asking me a lot of questions about my schooling, incidentally he gave me the devil for not getting my eleven but said I should know it. Did I hear you say I told you so? He asked a number of other questions and I asked him what the quiz was for. He said I am going to put you in the orderly room as clerk and you can’t refuse this. The orderly room is the same as the main office of a company…. Well, you can bet I didn’t refuse that and I start tomorrow. Of course I have quite a bit to learn but I believe I can do it. I know a little about typewriting and that helps. One thing I won’t have to go on those route marches and parades and I won’t mind that I have to go on scheme …there is a chance for promotion there too and if I am good enough to get it I will take it.

There is a big difference between that and a Cpl. with the boys. You can make yourself a lot of bad friends with the boys through no fault of your own by just obeying orders. So tomorrow I will try my hand as a clerk and hope for the best. One thing it will be better than route and my feet won’t get so sore….

It is getting darn dark and is hard to see. It gets dark over here now about eight thirty since they took an hour off. We are just four hours ahead of you now.

I should not say this perhaps but I have been in two bombing raids lately and it was quite exciting. They got three of the blankety — one night and I saw them all fall. It is quite an experience I assure you and you feel like watching the fireworks display instead of taking cover.  You can tell Jack I saw a German Focke-Wulf plane twice and see what he says….

The best of everything in the world to you all and I hope to be back before too long.

Lots of Love to all,

Bill

PS. Don’t forget the pictures.