Letters From the Front
Captain T. Magladery
Letter from England
New Liskeard Speaker Published:
Note: any spelling errors, etc. are as they appear in the original article.
Dated:
Letter from Capt. T. Magladery
Bramshott Camp, Dec. 9.
Will I say anything more about the weather? Anyhow it is raining again so that what I really think about it would undoubtedly be censored if not by the War Office at least by the Morality Department. A great many of the Canadians are sick, not seriously at all, but with bad colds, sore throats, etc. This is caused not so much by the bad weather as by the change of climate. It is rather amusing to hear the English boys who are now Canadians and who came over with us, and with the other battalions roundly and vehemently condemning this climate and earnestly wishing for a bit of Canada’s snow and ice as well as for her clear bracing air. If England would get busy and make some drastic changes in her weather conditions this would be the most wonderful and beautiful country in the world.
This morning I had the pleasure of meeting a native of Liskeard, not the Liskeard that is known as “Hob of the North” but Liskeard, England. It is a town of about six thousand people situated in what he claims is the most picturesque part of England. It is a very old town with old-fashioned houses and narrow streets, but this man spoke of it with much pride and expressed a great desire to hear about the new town of the same name in far off Canada. Needless to say the picture I painted for him did not make the town suffer any, and if he ever happens to visit us he may be a little disappointed that the town in itself hardly comes up to the advance notices.
The people here are hardly used to the Colonials. By that I mean that although they may not think that we are awfully good soldiers and although some of our fellows may have run a bit wild, still, they are so glad and proud that the Colonials responded with even greater loyalty and enthusiasm than was ever expected, that they take every opportunity to use us well to show their appreciation.
The war is, of course, taken much more seriously here that at home because we are closer to the actual war zone, because practically every family in this country is personally represented in the firing line, and because the failure of our fighting troops in Flanders and France would mean a still closer touch of the Kaiser’s fist. The Zeppelin scare is only a scare and hardly that but might almost be better named the “Zeppelin joke.” From conversations with men who know, and people who have actually been present when the raids took place I find that as soon as an explosion from a bomb takes place there is a mad rush of people, not to bomb-proof cellars but to the place where the damage was done, just to gratify their curiosity and to get a glimpse of the raiders. The whole thing is taken as a joke except of course by the timid ones, and the crowd carries on with laughing and joking very much as if the thing could never happen again, and just as if this was one of somebody’s little jokes. Perhaps a little severe, but still a joke all the same.
Transcribed by: Dion Loach
