Letter from Donald Law Patrick Cameron to his Family, 1917

                                                                                                                            Palestine 23rd Nov. '17

Dear old Mon, This note will have to do the whole damn family till I can get some more

paper, have nothing to say beyond that I'm very much alive & thats the main thing

in these parts. Had some nice letters from you all, last week. They were written just

after you had moved to Whaling Road.  Sorry I haven't been writing to you all

regularly, but for over a month now writing has been impossible, not on account

of lack of paper, lack of inclination was the real cause, you see, when

you are getting shifted about from one part of the firing line to another, never 

staying in one part longer than a couple of days, it needs a very persevering

person to get to work with a pencil; now Mon, Mary wants me to write

to Mrs Potts, Mother wants me to write to Chrissie McDonald, Dot Lurner

of Leichhardt has written two letters which demand answers & there are lots

of people whom I should write to but its absolutely impossible for me to do

as until things are a little more settled on this front, a chap is in the trenches

one day & a few hours later away to blazes on some other part of the line,

night marches are common occurrences in the camel corps, they are the 

things that make you curse the war, imagine riding along in pitch dark

from about seven oclock at night till just about dawn the following morning, carry

on as usual the next day, snatching what rest you can, until you get

to your destination, by which time you are so dog tired that you drop like

a stone when you have unsaddled your camel, I'll sleep for weeks when

I come back. Of course there is a bright side to the life, its

awfully pretty country we're in now, very much like Australia in

some things, gum-trees, wattle, prickly pear, foxes, grouse & plovers, lots

of little things that remind me of the back country every day.

Plenty of fruit here too, oranges mostly, we have passed through

dozens of orchards of beautiful oranges, in fact I've a tummy-ache

at the present time through eating too many of them, we are getting into

civilized parts now though so I suppose in future will have to by buy them.

2

I posted a letter to Mum last week with a photo of Frank Thompson

in it, I want you all to see, please that it does not go astray as he gave it

to me on the day of his death. Tell Mary I gave that letter of Thelma

More's to Billy Graham last week. I was going back from the firing line

with a lot of Turkish prisoners when I suddenly spotted him looking on

from the side of the road, I just had time to hand him down the letter

say good day & off again, it's rather a slow way of corresponding that

way of Miss More's, it took seven months for that letter to reach him.

Hope to be home in time for my 21st Birthday safe & sound,

afraid I wont have time to get to Scotland, I'll take a trip there

after the war if all goes well. Thanks for the little photo of

Betty, she looks sweet in that costume; I'm enclosing a little

souvenir for you here, its a Turkish note I had given to me by an a

Turkish officer whom I gave a drink of water to, I dont know if the

scent will remain on it, but when he gave it to me it was heavily

perfumed with some smell of roses, foppish sort of little Johnny he

was, wasn't he? Tell every body that I will be writing later, the

only people I'm writing to for the present are you at home & Jimmy McEwan.

Hope Dad's arm is O.K. by this time. Tell Mary I know

a little Corporal in this company by the name of Jack Cameron who knew

Les Fuller well over here; there are three of we Cameron's in

this company.

 Write & tell me everything you think will interest me, you

& Mary always seem to be in a hurry lately, judging by your scanty one

& two page letters, stop at home one night for a change & write.

Love to Mother Mary & Betty

from your loving Brother                                                                               

Don