Tuesday 9 July, 1918
The same place
Letter No.69
My dear dad,
Something unusal seems to have happened to your letter card dated 1 July, 1918 - it only arrived this afternoon. I suppose you rec'd letter No 53, but as no reference has been made to it I am rather left in doubt. Auntie Jessie's parcel has not been lucky enough to reach me yet; probably it is on the way. I was very sorry to hear about Percy Edmondson; such hard luck on the parents to have their two boys killed - Smallwoods and Edmondsons were some of the best too. Indeed, the Divine Will passes human comprehension.

I had quite an adventure last night - caught in a thunderstorm. As I told mother there was a little thunder earlier on in the evening, but by bed time the clouds seemed to have passed over and Jerry and I decided to risk it and sleep out in the orchard - preferring open air to the stuffy billet. We hadn't been in bed long before a blinding flash of lightning startled us; then the rain came! Fortunately we were under a thickly foliaged tree which kept of the worst while we hurriedly got on all our clothes and "packed up", spending the remainder of the night in the barn. I didn't get very wet - the waterproof prevented that.

The weather was fine again this morning which was fortunate as B Coy was down on the rifle range. For the first part of the morning I did some firing with the Lewis Gun and afterwards rifle firing. I made up my mind that I wasn't going to do any more "buckshee" shooting in the afternoon or evening; so I bucked up my score pretty considerably and came 3rd or 4th out of our platoon. We had dinner on the range and arrived back at 2 o/clock. It had commenced to rain again so I decided to spend the afternoon writing letters. For tea today I had a couple of poached eggs; I am getting expert at cooking these useful things. I have been a mess orderly again today and after I had cleaned the tea dixie, I went for a bath and managed to get a new shirt and a new pair of pants. On the strength of this good fortune, I have - well, come out to write a few more letters!. The rain has cleared off for a little while.

I am being medically examined tomorrow morning - shall be passed as A super 1. I wonder what you are doing this evening - probably at a concert on the pier, eh? Well, I am just tired of letters now so I will dry up. Give my love to mother and all the other home folk. I hope you are feeling a good deal better for your holiday. All good wishes from your affectionate son,

Bert

Addendum. Wednesday.

I have been medically examined; papers marked A1! Physically fit to take Comm in R.A.F.!