Our Despatches from the Front (No. 113).
Page 20
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The Varied Duties a M.T. Men with a Tunnelling Company.
From time to time your correspondents on active service have given detailed itineraries of the daily routine of the units to which they belong, with particulars of working hours, and so on. It must have struck some of your non-military readers, after perusing such despatches, that men of the M.T. on active service have a great deal • of spare time on their hands and a very easy life. While granting that many can scarcely complain of too much hard work, I think it might be pointed out that in addition to driving, cleaning, and generally caring for our vehicles, we have sundry domestic duties.
Mending Clothes.
For example, washing and mending clothes, to say nothing of cleaning off mud which is generally so plentiful, washing our own feeding utensils and cleaning billets -are duties that help to keep us occupied. The task of keeping oneself clean presents its problems, especially when water is scarce, as it is in the locality I happen to be billeted in at the.present time. The slightest relaxation of care in the direction of personal cleanliness may mean the accumulation of those horrors, colloquially termed "chats."
Wasted Woollens.
Before the institution of the present system of divisional baths with clothing exchanges, disinfectors and laundries, great quantities of good woollen underclothing were con
signed to the flames because they were "chatty." When water is scarce remarkable washing feats are performed, and I have known five men wash and shave in one canteen • of water, a canteen holding about one quart. Actually the dirt is moistened and then wiped off on the towel.
One of the striking experiences of leave is the sight of clean, white towels, table linen, handkerchiefs, and HO on after the dinginess of months of active service. I have been reduced, during a temporary
shortage of water, to cleaning my teeth with cold tea, which luckily had no milk in it. These things are not mentioned as representative of the horrors_ of war ; they are just incidents which do not improve one's outlook when in a pessimistic mood.
I have not found that Tommy is a confirmed optimist or pessimist : he is optimist or pessimist by turns, the actual mood being dependent on small details. A British or Allied success makes optimists of us all, and for the past month or two we have been specially cheery.
Writing Home.
Another duty that helps to pass the time is letter writing, and an invitation to have a drink or join a game is sometimes answered with " Oh ! I've got to spin a yarn to the miscue." Few Tommies have ever written so many letters as thee. do now while separated from all friends and relatives. What makes it very difficult to put together anything like an interesting letter is the large range of subjects or happenings that one must not write about ; and then there is the consciousness that what is written has to be scrutinized by a censor with whom one is in daily contact. This latter circumstance effectually preeludes the introduction into our letters of terms of endearment and expressions of sentiment, just the features our people at home look for and appreciate most. Actually, this repression is not justified, the censors being too decent to take any notice of this sort of thing.