MRS. KENNETH PENMAN
12 MAYCOT,
COMMONSIDE,
KESTON,
KENT

No. 14

S.I.F.

Dec 19th 1939.

My Darling,

Thank you so much for yours No. 7 and also for the tin of biscuits from Pier and Polly, it is very kind of them. Will you please thank them very much from me. I will of course write, but tonight I am going to devote to writing to you.

Actually tonight, besides your letter and parcel, I received also a letter from mother, Rita, Jack and Joan containing a helmet, a pair of gloves and saying that 200 cigarettes were on the way. So that I am in fact doing very well. I can see myself reporting sick with writers cramp.

Talking of going sick I was chatting last night with the head medical orderly of the unit to which we are attached, he was saying that in June of this year men were approached by the Government and asked to sign on for reserve service. They were ex regulars of course who had returned to civil life and…

…they were offered, by a benevolent government, £10 a year, having to sign on for four years for home service.

A lot of them jumped at it of course, however when war was declared they were immediately called up and were staggered to discover that the unit was going overseas, and that France counted as home service!

Many of these fellows are quite old men, one is 59, and having (as they think) been tricked into the game of war they are continually going sick. The head of the medical services with the B.E.F. is reported to have said that in the event of further malingering there are prisons provided for such gentry which is rather sought on those who are really sick. Actually I believe there is very little attempt made “to work a blighty”, it is too difficult.

One lad (I know him by sight) got 28 days in military prison recently. After 2 or 3 days they were startled to find he had heart disease. He had been eating soup which increases the heart beat and gives one palpitations. It used to work beautifully in the last war but modern science having advanced, they now inject a pigment into the blood stream and with X-ray they can get a remarkably fine picture of the heart’s action. Previously of course only bone showed up.

I imagine the subject under…

…discussion had worked up quite a nice lather in his innards, the result was his sentence trebled.

I was very interested to hear about the additional army allowance, I do hope we are successful. The details you gave were quite correct.

The day before yesterday I got quite a thrill. I received orders to go again to Regimantal HQ reporting first at Battery HQ. When I got to BHQ it was all a mistake. They had called the other four as well and I was able to discover that they too were not required to go. So I am still in the dark as to success or failure. I don’t know why it is but although at the time I was fairly confident, each day that passes makes me feel less so. I suppose it’s the tension of waiting.

I am afraid that in my mind the whole thing is quite out of proportion. It has begun to mean just a way of getting home to you for a little while, earlier than I otherwise should. I think I would do almost anything to see you again. I miss you so terribly. It hurts to write about it. Words are funny things anyway, written words. I long intensely to talk to you, my darling, again. Tell me lots about Jill in your letters sweetheart, I hate to think I’m missing all her changing ways.

On reading this over it…

…sounds rather melancholy, I’m not really honest!

The farm people in this country have a disgusting habit with their manure. Instead of putting straw in the byres and cleaning it out every day, and stacking it some distance from human habitation to rot, they make an enclosure into which they put straw about 4 feet deep every night, then drive the cows into the enclosure, and after about six months they call the result manure and shift it in carts out to the fields.

When they do this the stench is absolutely appalling. For the last few days the locals have been perusing this occupation next door. I’ve never smelt anything like it. The nights have been very dark recently but we have smelt our way home quite nicely.

By the way it is reported that we are having seven geese for Christmas Day. Six men to a goose. It doesn’t look as if I shall get my usual two drumsticks, still it is pretty good for the army. I do hope you manage to have a fairly jolly Christmas ‘cos if you don’t I shan’t either.

With all my love my beloved,

Cheerie Bye,

Yours,

Kenneth.