1917.

My dear Mabel:-

The censor has just returned this letter to me as it has too much information.

_____ without a candle, they are very leaky and intensely cold and draughty. We lie on the floor. There is no stove and nowhere to dry our wet clothes. It says much for the accomodation I had been used to previously that I looked on these huts as most luxurious places when I was here before. No doubt I shall soon get used to all these things again and I certainly ought not to grumble. I might have had to spend the _____ battalion in about _____when they go back for _____. I would far rather work with the Engineers than rest with the battalion. After the rest we are going to Berlin as soon as possible, suppose we shall have to walk all the way!

Would you like a nice little French baby girl, eighteen months old. She is such a dear, I should like to take her with me. Flo sent me a black velvet cat mascot and she has eaten it all. She is the happiest baby I have known, though both _____ was wounded outside the house and was taken indoors only to be killed as he lay there by a shell. The mother and hour old baby were in the cellar below and the mother died from the shock. Pretty thing, war, isn't it?

Not far from here I came across fifty partly clothed skeletons of women and children all close together. They had been caught by the gas eighteen months ago. The poor things had tried to get away but had failed.

On a very clear day a little while ago, I saw an intensely exciting air fight. For a long time they manoeuvred for

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