May 21st 1944

Dear Mom

The letter you wrote on the 3rd caught up to me yesterday.

I have written to the address that I gave you to have any mail sent there forwarded but as yet I have not received any. I have however received mail that you sent to Halifax.

The letter with Mrs. Coppens mother's address in it arrived the other day. The way things are at the present time I will not be able to go and visit her as we cannot travel more than 20 miles. The first chance that I get however I will go and see her. As far as I can find out it is not so very far from here.

Ever since I arrived here I have been going to write to Gordon but have not done it yet.

I am glad to hear that Shirley's foot is OK now, I hope that she has mo more trouble with it.

The pictures that I sent you were taken 3 or 4 days before I left Halifax except for the one in the snow, it was taken in Feb. just after I moved back to A23. I have one that I intend to send to Gram.

I would like to see just what you are doing to the basement but I won't see it now until it is all finished.

There must have been quite a bit of excitement around with the new arrivals in the household. It is too bad that you could not have given them away. As you say I think that the Lynch's will have trouble with Rex's appetite for eats but they may be lucky.

The airmail forms you sent will come in handy as they are almost impossible to get. We are issued with two a month, one each pay day. It just happened that I brought several with me so I won't need any for a while.

Well I have one more week of training, after that I don't know what will happen.

The fitters course that I took in Canada is no good over here so I will have to take the course over again. If everything goes well I will go on the course when I finish here. From what I can find out I should have no trouble getting the course again, I sure hope so.

The other day we were out on the range with the rifles. It was the first time that I had fired one since last June. I made 36 out of a possible 45. We are going out again this week I hope to do better if I can. The sights on my rifle were out but I had the armourer change them so I should do better.

The training we get here is a lot more fun than what we got in Canada. It is made more interesting. All the work is done outside except for the off lecture we get inside. The rain does not even chase us in unless it gets too heavy. The troop is broken in two with one half against the other so that the training is more of a game. We are given blank ammo which helps to add to the fun. The only trouble is it makes an awful mess of the rifle. Nearly all of our moving is done on the double not marching as at home. The first few days it was pretty hard but it is not bad now that we are getting used to it.

Could you send one of the Baby Brownie cameras to me if you can get a film for it. Then if you can find the odd film for it could you send them along. None of the boys that I know have cameras so one would be very welcome. As far as my camera is concerned keep it, use it if you can get film for it. The book of instructions for it are in the case with it. Audrey will probably be the one that uses it the most but that is all right. If you can get the finder fixed will you do that as I never had a chance to do it at any time.

You asked in one of your letters if I have an address book, yes I have.

By now I guess that it is all right if I tell you that I came over on the "Isle de France". It is about the size of the Empress of Asia. There was a little bit of every thing on it. There was army, navy, air force also C.W.A.C., WRENs and Wds in all it was quite a collection. We could not go near any of the parts of the ship that the women were in which was just as well.

There isn't anything else that I can think of for now so I will close but will write again in a day or two.

Love to all
Ted

P.S. The money here is not hard to get used to but you are always carrying a couple of pounds of change in your pocket.
T