From 55154 D G Buckley
19th Battn. 4th Brigade C.E.F. A Coy.
Address reply to Sandling Camp.
Hythe. Kent Eng.
July 23/15

My Dear John

It gave us boys very great pleasure to read your letter received some time ago. You must have found it hard to write several pages of real interesting correspondence without the aid of a stenographer, and we appreciated your efforts to the full. So Western Ontario is still going strong, eh. How is Reg German doing. I suppose Billy Nugent and Tom Hendry and the other reliables are still in their old form.

You must be having a pretty fine old time in Guysboro this summer. Father wrote me that you had got some fine trout.

Do you remember the day we had Harold Butt out to Loon Lake. Them was the days!

We are still training hard, and feeling pretty fit. I think myself they are going to harden us up so that nothing short of a broadside from big guns will penetrate our ugly hides.

I am at present taking a special course in bomb making and throwing. We will all be put through the course in relay. McFayden has finished his, and made one of the best. The officers in charge wanted him to be one of the regular brigade bomb throwers but John thought he would sooner stay in the company, as a bomb throwers life is on average just 17 minutes after reaching the firing line, or that is the common report. We have to make dummy bombs out of jam tins etc, and spend hours each day practicing throwing them. It is quite an art to throw correctly. We have a couple of lectures each day and our heads are full of such terms as "percussions," "detonators" "time fuses" etc. When I think of all I have learned in the army since New Years, I often thank the Lord we were not shipped off to the front then, for though we thought we were wonderful soldiers, we must have been pretty d- green.

So you are thinking of joining some army organization. Dont try to get a commission with the Y.M.C.A. (even if I am using their paper) for the boys are still sore at it. They have a lot of cute looking chickens in the Y. here, and that is the main reason why we go there at all, as the church of England, and Salvation Army each have as good a canteen and reading room. However, Ish-ka-bibble!

How are the kids. I miss the little devils almost more than any one else, and I also miss the home life, but of course that is to be expected. It rather gets your goat to go past some cosy home, and see the family gathered round the table at supper, and you just pining to go in and eat a real family meal. I'm not homesick old scout, talking this way, and I realize that there would'nt be any cosy family gatherings if there were'nt any boys in kahki away from home.

The Germans seem to be giving Russia a darn hard time, and if Warsaw falls, it will turn loose a horde of Germans onto our front. The more the merrier for us.

How does your new engine in the motor boat work. I bet you have done some record times to Boyston. Do you remember the night you towed Harold Butt and I up to see the Boylston dames.

I had a letter from Rev W J S Brown the other day, but I take your sermons more to heart than anyone elses, for you really show signs of wisdom at times, you know. He wrote me a very nice letter and I appreciate his kindly thought.

The girlie has been very good to me since I left. When you get to Toronto again send her a good big box of chocolates for me and take it out of my salary.

Well John I guess you will get tired reading this rambling letter, so I had better cut it out for now.

Please remember me to any of the friends that enquire, and give the kids a handshake for me, and with my love to Abbie and the boys I remain

Affectionately
Douglas

P.S. Jack & John both send their best