Witley
Feb17/17

Dear Hazel -

I have been feeling rotten all day today so perhaps this letter won't be up to much. I got a couple of letters from you this week that I should have rec'd about 2 weeks ago. The mail service is very irregular now and I suppose it will be that way for a while if all that the Kaiser says is going to come true. I don't think that the Huns can blockade this place at all and neither do any of the other great thinkers around here. The situation in France looks very favourable at the present time and I think that the big offensive will soon begin. We will likely get there in lots of time to see some lively scraps. We have all our overseas equipment now and I will have get some snaps to show you how we look in our new outfits

This is Sat night and we haven't done very much for the last few days. We are still attending the sig school and it has been a cinch so far. We are taking up advanced work now and our bunch are quite familiar with the work already. I don't know when we will go to France, we may never go at all. The last bunch that left here went to Scotland to do garrison duty. They were certainly an unlucky bunch.

I am sure - judging by your last letters that you are having a big time in Canada this winter. The winter has broken up here now and the rainy season is on and the mud is rather deep too. We have dances at night too but it is decidedly different dancing with the boys all the time to what it is dancing with a nice girl. Of course they have real dances over here but I don't feel like going to any of them. I never cared much for dancing anyway unless I had someone that I liked to dance with and you were about the only one that I enjoyed dancing with - I suppose you will think that I have a great line of dope but I sometimes mean what I say. Anyway Hazel I still love you and tho perhaps my letters don't always show it I love you just as much as I did last summer when we used to have those good times together I often think of some of those evenings we spent together and of course there are regrets. I guess your Dad and Blanche would think that we were dippy alright when Lee & I used to stay so late sometimes but of course it was always Lee's fault wasn't it?

Of course we don't know any thing about the future but if it should happen that we would never have those privileges again - the memory of those last 3 or 4 months will be very pleasant - to me anyway. Of course nearly every soldier imagines that someday he is going back to the ones he loves but there are thousands who never will and no one knows who the lucky ones will be so we are all prepared to be among the unlucky but at the same time hope to be in the other class.

There is nothing new to write about - everything is going on the same old way and we all long for the excitement of either going to France or back to Canada - Anything but this. Well Hazel dear as I mentioned at the start there isn't much to this letter. Perhaps I will feel more like writing tomorrow.

With lots of love and kisses like we used to have last year and heres hoping will have again before very long.

Jack