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Date: June 1st 1944
Diary

[transcription and transcription annotations have been provided by the collection donor]

Thur June 1, 1944:
Weather was hot most of the day. During the day we saw some new German aircraft flying around. They are twin engine, single tail aircraft with engines in front of the nose.

Fri June 2, 1944:
no entry.

Sat June 3, 1944:
Weather dull. Last night there were a lot of Gerries practicing as we could see, flares, tracers and mortars etc. Maybe they are still hoping to win the war.

Sun June 4, 1944: to Mon June 5, 1944:
no entry.

Tue June 6, 1944:
Weather dull. We all received New Zealand Red Cross parcels to-day. Rumor has it that the second front has started near the Seine river. Another rumor that the second front is in full cry and this is supposed to have come from the German radio at 2:00 pm. The German interpreter in the Red Cross compound said we had a landing. English speaking Gerries in the Post Office drew a rough map, pointing to the spots where we had landed and two Gerries in the honey wagon said that we had landed at La Havre and Cherbourg. Everybody seems to be happy.

Wed June 7, 1944:
Weather sticky. A lot of sports equipment arrived for the RCAF, consisting of softballs, gloves, masks, mitts, pads, footballs, basketballs, volleyballs, etc. even a hardball. Some of the fellows here are doing some very nice carving, from the old handles of tooth brushes. One man has made a complete chess set from old tooth brush handles.

Thur June 8, 1944: to Fri June 9, 1944:
no entry.

Sat June 10, 1944:
The lights of all the barracks are off until further notice, that is, the Gerries will not turn them on. There reason is that they don’t want us to hear the news on the radio. These days there are a number of radios in the camp.

Sun June 11, 1944: to Mon June 13, 1944:
no entry.

Tue June 14, 1944:
Rumor has it that Churchill has visited France. It is raining here, in fact the rain is coming in the window. There is no glass in the windows. They were long gone, so the rain blows in the winter the snow blows in.

Wed June 15, 1944: to Fri June 17, 1944:
no entry.

Sat June 18, 1944:
Weather was just a little better than yesterday as it was cloudy, but there was no rain. During the afternoon we saw the MU14's flying around, nothing happened, no crashes, no bumps. I am sure the pilots all got back to their bases safely. It’s now 5:04 pm and from the route from the barracks we get a good view of a MU l09 crash. There is little other aircraft activity, so some of the fellows climbed up on the roof for a better look. The tail fell off at about 4000 ft or so. The aircraft spinning in all directions, the pilot almost had it straightened out, when it went back into a nose dive and hit the deck with a hell of a bang. You could see the dense cloud of black smoke. There have been numerous crashes near the camp. This is the first one that we’ve been able to see pile into the deck. We could see the whole thing.

Sun June 19, 1944: to Wed June 29, 1944:
no entry.

Thur June 30, 1944:
Weather fair. The gen is very good. Russians are advancing again. There is a lot of bombing over France and Germany. Unfortunately the Gerries are using their pilotless planes, V1's and V2's over London. There is flak not very far from the camp at the same time there is a formation of six aircraft flying just behind the clouds. They came into the open for a short time. They look like mosquitos, but we don’t know if they are our planes or Russians.