Letters from Harold Edward 'Pompey' Elliott to his sister-in-law, April 1915 - December 1916 - Part 9

Dhurach mirror her old Baaby] [[ ^you ]]
& what a queer idea to pray for rain
to Keep you home. It is lovely to hear
all the little stories about them.
I am delighted with the little Snaps
Mum looks a lot fatter & Dhurachs
hair looks lovely in the one where
Katie is folding up a hose. I
wonder how that would look enlarged
& with the part of the play house that 
is showing properly shaded off.
I think you ought to try it
& see how it looks. Jacky Boy
is not here. They are coming
here shortly & I guess they will
wish they were away. We didn’t
Know when we were well off to
wish we were down here I guess
Its just a pig sty. Geordie looks
well but is in a pretty dangerous
place just now as they get a lot
of shelling. One can only hope
he will be all right. So the 
 

laddie must pray for him too.
He is a dear wee rubbish that laddie
But if he gets playing jokes on his Dida
like he did locking his mum in
with the Chookies his little tailboard
will have to be warmed up for him
What do you think. A lot of the people
have got sick through the Cold & Wet.
Eric Walker,  Charles Elliott, Ronald
Dickson & Norman Goode are all in
hospital with rheumatism, Pleurisy
& the like. I have a shocking cold in my
head just now. It would be just my luck
if it gets to my chest & gives me another
spell in Hospital with Pleurisy or
Bronchitis. Well I must stop now
Baaby. I’m scandalous Busy.
So Liz has bagged poor Rory at last.
Well she Kept going all right. Bye Baaby
dear. Millions of loves & pogues.
Membrance to Nana.
Yours affect Dida 
 

France
2/11/16
My dear Baaby,
I got a whole heap of
letters on my return from the Trenches
yours dated the 10^th Sept. amongst them.
Tell the wee laddie that Dida was pleased
to hear about him sweeping up the fire so
it wouldn’t burn the linoleum. And tell
Gagy [[ ^Dhurach ]] that I think she is very clever to be
able to play little exercises on the piano like
that. Tell her Dida can’t play like that because
he never had a “Baaby dear” to teach
him all these things when he was little
like that. It is simply pouring rain today
again. I am back in my tin hut once
more & pretty comfortable but you can imagine
what the front trenches are like now. Even
before the rain they were from 1ft to
4 feet deep in slush & mud. There
are no dug outs in them & the men have no
rest at all during the whole time they
are in them. If it were decided
that we are not going to attack again for
some time we could easily make them 
 

fairly comfortable as the ground here is
hilly & not perfectly flat as it was
at the last place. Here the trenches are
real trenches & not mud Barricades
like they were at the other place. And you
can make quite dry & comfortable dug outs
by digging through the clay surface into the
white chalk underneath without the
labor & trouble of cementing everything
As we had to do before. Of course they
have to be timbered a little to stop collapse
But all the roads as well as the fields are
were simply pulverised. Imagine a well
tilled field with loose soil down to a
couple of feet or more - then move thousands
of troops & horses & guns over it during the
wet until it is stirred to the consistency
of Cream & you can imagine what the
place is like. If you get a dry day the
mixture hardens a little & it becomes
like glue & every step you take you can
hear your feet come out with a plop like 
 

a pump thats running dry. Up
near the front lines there are many of
our own dead stilly unburied but
the cold prevents them being offensive
as they were in the Peninsula. But it is
dreadful to see them, lying in all sorts of
attitudes some with their poor dead
faces turned up to the sky & rain. Others
trodden in the mire until you walk upon
them before you Notice them.  -- -- --
Have just been told we are probably to move
back to Billets tonight. It will be a terribly
toilsome march through the mud but we may
well put up with that. – although some other
poor devils will have to come in for it – again
--  --  -- --  --  -- --  --
Tell Katie to read Kipling’s “Just-So” Stories
to the wee pets & tell them that “Best Beloved”
was Mr Kiplings little boy & that he grew
up till he was 18 & then came over
here to stop the Old Kaiser Killing other
little Babies & the naughty Germans 
 

Killed him too & now poor old
Kipling hasn’t any “Best Beloved” because
he only had one child & he is very sad
just like Gagy [[ ^Dhurach ]] & the Laddie were when
Baaby went away to Warnambool. I
feel very much ashamed that Australia
has voted against Conscription. I
wish those sperriks who voted against
it could all be brought here & have
to live here under the Shadow of War.
All the young men are gone from the Villages
only old men & women are left & the women
& girls plow in the fields [[ ^{back from the front} ]] & here roads [[ ^fields ]] &
Villages Roads & Streets are alike
trodden into the mud & slime after
being smashed to powder. It will serve
us right if after the War part of Australia
has to be given up to the Germans
for Germany is far from being beaten
yet. & if we don’t wake up to the fact
we will end by being beaten by him.
The advance made by us here is not even
a flea bite to the Advances Germany 
 

has made in other places. I had
a letter from young M^cLeod of Diggers
Rest wanting me to give him a
recommendation as a Motor Driver
I suppose he can drive a Motor
but I don’t Know very much about
his capabilities as a Motor Driver
This is about all the news except
that I hear it is Jacky boy’s people
who are coming along to take over
this mud pile & pea soup from
us.
Bye & Pogues from
Dida 
 

France
14/11/16
My dear Baaby,
I have your [[ ^little ]] Sperrik of a
letter, dated the 17^th Sept. but you
said it was to be continued next
week & it wasn’t. Anyhow all I
got from you [[ ^{the next mail} ]] was the address on the
cards the little people wrote. I have
an Interpreter here who has a sister
in Paris. I got him to write to
her & send me up patterns of silk
now fashionable there. Today I am
sending down the money to her to
buy & send to Katie two dress
lengths one of black & one of blue
taffeta & one black the same for
you. Also in each parcel there
will be two scarfs for each of you
She says they are “très chic” i.e.
“Very smart” I hope you will like
them. I hope you will like your
black silk too. It did not
seem to me as nice as the
Kind which Mrs Milne sent
to Nana for me from Cairo 
 

for me but I suppose that Kind is
not fashionable any more. Let me
Know what you think of it. Not just
skite so it will please me
but truly & really. The price of the
Black was 15 francs about 11/ a yard
metre (which is a little more [[ ^{about 3 inches} ]] than
a yard). The Blue was a litte cheaper
about 13 francs a metre. The Scarves
were about £ 1 each.. I had your
parcel sent as from Jacky Boy so
there ought not to be any duty.
We are going back to the Sperriky
old muddy trenches in three
days time. You have no Idea
what the mud is like Baaby
Broadmeadows at its worst was
paradise compared to this. My
trip to England & the Clothes I bought
for myself there & this just about
settles the £ 50 quidlets I had saved
up but I have a few more collecting.
Tell Mum I will send her the next
£ 50 out for sure. No more presents 
 

for a long time now. There was a boy
named M^cKenzie about whom Katie
was asking in her last letter. I
have made all enquiry I can, but
have nothing more to add. He went
out in that Charge with the 60^th Battn
when Geoff M^cCrae was Killed &
when the roll was Called he didn’t
Answer to it. There is a chance
that he may be a prisoner in Germany
of course but it is a very slender
one. There were many many dead
lying out in front of our lines &
we could not get them in or bury
them or even find out who they were.
I enclose a [[ ^newspaper ]] cutting on the mud here.
I hope to meet Jacky boy again on
the march up to the Trenches.
Col Denehy was in just now &
was telling me that his sister-in
-law met Katie at the Depot &
that Katie asked her about Lieut
Gray. I think poor Mrs Gray must
have asked every one she Knows