France, March 5th, 1917.

My dearest Hilda:-

Your socks and cap reached me safely yesterday - very many thanks. The socks are really beautiful. I notice you make them high in the leg which I like, and the little cap makes my tin hat more comfortable.

I also have to thank you for the Stevensons which a nice Victoria boy named Bledsoe and I shared and very much enjoyed. Thanks to the tin they arrived perfectly fresh and were most delicious. It is strange how our diet of bread and meat makes us crave for sweet things.

I don't think I have written you since you sent me your photo. I like it very much but it is a shame to send me mounted photos for I have to carry them in my pocket and they soon get broken. Can you realise a life in which one constantly carries about the whole of one's belongings.

I should very much like some more snapshots for I can carry them in my case without damage. I still have those of the kids and the wedding but I have not any of the pony and cart or the garden with its new fence.

In Effie's letter she says she is sending me a cake which is very good news and Maude Crosbee has promised to send me another as soon as I have time to write to tell her my address is the same. So things are looking up and as we say when the rations are good, we must be winning the war.

I am sorry you should have had so much cold and snow again this winter. I don't know what has happened to the climate in

BC Archives, MS-1901 Box 1 File 19 RUSSELL, Alma M., 1873 – 1964. Victoria; librarian. Letters from Cecil Harrow Unwin, 1916-1917.