Letters from Norman Griffiths Ellsworth to his Mother, 1916 - Part 4 of 28

Photo inside 
Norm 
  
Hurrah! I've just had
31 letters from Australia 
brought in to me, but the 
Mail is now closing for Melb.
see you later. Norman.

Ward "M".
County of London War Hospital 
Epsom, Surrey.
England. Feb 14^th. 
1916 
  
My Dearest Mother & all at Home.
Just a line to let you
know that I am feeling very fit now, & the 10 innoculations 
that I have had, appear to have had the desired 
effects; & my bowels are working nice & steady. I have
been thro' 3 tests up to date, and all three, I am glad to 
say, have shewed negative results, & I am beginning to
look forward to my furlough in 3 weeks or a months time.
I was pleased to get a lot of my back letters last
week, there were 41 altogether, 10 from Mother, 10 from Mab,
5 from Charlie, 3 from May Tilton, 1 from George, 1 from
Aunt Hannah, 1 from Uncle Harry, & the others are from
Ruby Davidson, N. Wheeler, A.W. Sheldon (Mint) & Dave
Watson & one or two others. I have only had the parcels
from the Mint "Boys"; Dave Watson; & the Davidsons, &
where the remainder are, I don't know, anyhow, I am
most grateful to you all for your great kindness, & the
lot of trouble & expense that you have all gone to for
me, & how to repay you all, I don't know, but I
do thank you all from the bottom of my heart. 
I am  

Page 2.
very sorry to see by your letters that you have been unwell,
& it is imperative that you must have more assistance,
or take a smaller house, & the sooner some decision is
come to, & acted upon, the better it will be for your health,
& you will have a much easyier time of it; If you decide
on either of these suggestions, I would ask; no! I would 
insist that whatever money is to my credit, be used to
the utmost extent in defraying all expenses. It is no use,
Mother, our old house has served its purpose, & us very 
well up till now, but we must not allow sentiment to
interfere, & cause any further illness, & I'm sure the other
members of the family will support me in this statement.
If we had a smaller, & more up to date villa somewhere 
or other, the work will be considerably less, and
you will have far more rest than at present, and
your health considerably improved thereby, & we could
even then get somebody in to do the harder work,
such as washing, scrubbing, & cleaning, & that confounded 
window cleaning nonsense.
Now don't go & say,
"Oh, I mustn't take your money, you'll want it when you
"get married". Hang getting married, I've no such
intention, & I don't want to live anywhere away
from home, wherever it is, so don't let us have any

Page 3.
misunderstanding about the matter please.
I am very
glad that George is getting on so well at his business, &
I hope that his success will be lasting. Charlie seems
to be very comfortably settled now, & I hope he will
make a financial success of it, or at least, I should have
said, his boss.
I am indebted to dear Mab, for her lovely
long letters, & her news of "William the Silent" has 
interested me greatly, & I only wish that I had been 
in the house at the time to make his acquaintance. 
Tell her, the next time he comes, to "straffe" him, (whatever 
that means).
In one of your letters, was one from Rupert 
& I am glad to know that he is well, but regret to hear 
that he is troublesome, but still is only to be expected 
from one of his age & size, however I hope that he improves, 
& tell him that I am fully aware of his behaviour. 
Things are still the same here as when I wrote 
last week: the weather is sometimes showery, & cold, & 
sometimes fine. 
I am still able to have my pleasant 
& interesting little walks of an afternoon, & last night 
(Sunday), I went to one of the local churches. 

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Nearly every Church of England around here, have the 
chimes of bells, & on a clear night they could be heard 
in all directions very clearly, & it sounds beautiful. 
Most of the Churches are very very old, & they have a 
number of graves in the churchyard, with and the tombstones 
of some, appear to be crumbling with decay. 
The services 
are much the same as ours, but all have their little 
differences in the matter of intoning the responses etc. 
I have written to our B.C. (Capt Biddle) letting me him 
know my whereabouts & condition, & I hope to rejoin them 
sometime in May or June. Tell Mab, that I have not 
written to Braithwaite owing to his insobriety etc, in Egypt. 
I will write to Jack Tilton by this Mail & also to May. 
Everyone is expecting a bit battle soon as they are 
clearing all the Hospitals in England, this is a sure sign. 
I see that they are coining silver at the Mint, & I 
hope this means higher wages for the boys.  Baggs is now 
Deputy Master, Mardell having retired, is going to live 
at Castlemaine. 
Well Mother dear, I must now close as the  
mail closes at noon, so hoping you are all well, & with 
the fondest love to all   Believe me 
Your affectionate son 
Norman.

By your Boxing Day letter 
it appears that you did not 
get the Cable which I sent 
to you about the 10^th Decr 
re my arrival here 
Is this so?  N. 
  
P.S. Did you get my letter 
containing my trip to London? 
I have written to you every  
week since arriving in England. 
N.

County of London War Hospl 
Ward "M".  Epsom, Surrey.
England. Feb 21^st. 
  
My Dearest Mother & all at Home. 
Just a few lines to let 
you know that I am still feeling very  fit, and hope 
to go on my furlough in a fortnights time, as I have 
only one more test to go thro', & I am glad to say that 
all my tests have up to the present, shewed negative 
results, so I hope to go to Gravesend shortly. 
I still correspond 
with our cousins, who are all well I am glad to  
say, & they say that they are looking forward to my  
holiday with them all, & they also say that the Hays 
are anxious to see me, & that they will take me to see 
them, so I am practically assured of a good time. 
Of course I will pay for my board with them 
₤1 per week, I should say, as I get a ration allowance 
of 1/9' per day whilst on furlough, and I will 
then be in possession of my back pay, some ₤30,  
so you see I can easily afford it. 
I paid my second 
visit to London on Saturday last, this time for 
the purpose of attaching a reception at the

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Commonwealth Military Offices in Horseferry Rd, to 
the Hon Andrew Fisher, wife, & family: This took place 
in the Anzac buffet, where there was music and 
singing, followed by the usual speeches etc; and a  
bit of an afternoon tea affair to conclude with. 
It was quite dark when the show was over, &  
we then walked up to the City & soon lost ourselves 
in the various streets & traffic etc; As our passes 
expired at 9pm, we had to get our bit of supper, 
& carry ourselves back to Epsom, where we arrived 
at a few minutes after that hour. 
I received a letter 
from Jack Tilton last week from Kel-el-Tebir, or 
some place like that in Egypt, & he was quite well, 
& looking forward to a scrap, & I expect that they 
will get plenty of that in a few weeks time, now that 
the Russians have made such big gains, & the 
probability of the Suez Canal attack "falling flat", 
I expect that they will all be sent to Salonika 
I have been wondering 
what you have done concerning my suggestions re 
taking a new villa, & getting more assistance in the 
house, that I spoke of in my previous letter. I do 
hope that you will favourably consider it, for I

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feel sure that this is the only remedy, and it must 
take place sooner or later, & why not now.  Of course 
I know that the moving business means plenty of work, 
but hire a woman or two, at my expense, to do this. 
How is George & his business going on? I hope 
quite alright, also Charlie, he seems to have a fairly 
good job now, & I hope his pay is satisfactory. 
How is 
dear Mab? Give her my warmest love, & I hope she 
got the driving band off the Turkish shell, that I sent 
to her by rejistered post.  I hope Rupert is quite well 
& his conduct improved. I am glad to know that he  
is getting on well at school. 
I have not received the  
Rabbitskin vest, which Aunt Hannah so kindly 
sent to me, but I think I will get it all right. 
Give her my love & best thanks when you write to her, 
I hope you are better, dear Mother, & please don't 
worry about me, for I am quite alright.  How is 
Marion Ellsworth, & the rest of them, & the Lacks? I 
hope they are all well, also, at Winchelsea. 
As there is no more news at present, I will close 
with my kindest regards to all enquirers, & fondest 
love to you all at home.  Believe me 
Your loving Son 
Norman