D -24
Major P.C. Benham,
G Branch
HQ 1 Corps District
BAOR
Sunday 18th February
10.30 pm.
My own most precious darling,
Phew! What a day, one of the worst ever and I now feel like a piece of chewed string. Up to 11 ocl I had nothing but calls from the Chief of Staff, ‘have you got so and so ready?’, ‘Are the maps marked?’ ‘Have such and such details available ’! from 11-1.15 I was making notes of the Conference, (all the red flannel in Europe was there), and from 2.30 – 7 ocl I was drafting the minutes and again between 8.30 and just now I’ve been checking the draft and trying to catch up on me days work. Luckily I’m duty officer I think! Still things might have been ‘worser’ and I’ve certainly earned my pay today. Possibly thinking about today’s jobs I just couldn’t get to sleep last night and kept having to put the light on and smoke a cigarette – I was reasonably early to bed but it must have been well after 0200 hrs by the time I got to sleep – it was one of those nights when my pyjama pants kept riding up and having to be pulled down – on such occasions I always wish most fervently I wore a nightie – you’ve no idea how lucky you are! or have you? My mind just cavorted round what seemed to be the never ending problems ahead, it flitted nimbly from today’s conference to our holiday, to the Gibson’s course, the exam, the office and back to the conference and so all over again – as the hours clocked by so did I wonder the more whether it is really wise for me to take the exam in November, or whether it wouldn’t be better to work in the office ‘til September getting the old eye in again and reading up the books before the 6 months intensive starts – There is still plenty of time to decide on this line of action, but the main consideration is finance, and I’m awaiting a reply now to my letter to Gerald telling him what the form is about the Gibson’s course – it is all a wee bit worrying and there is no-one here who one can ask for a second opinion. What would you do, darling? Before last night and early this morning I had never really considered the possibility of waiting ‘til March, because I was so dead keen to get the exam over and done with.
As I was rather afraid the order about the first dispatch date from here for Group 25 being the 6th March was, to put it crudely, all balls. Camp Orders were a misprint and it should have read 11th March! I heard that not long before I went to bed last night and that had also become the proverbial mountain before I had got much older!
I say, what a worried Peter you must think I am, I can honestly say I’ve not really, and know that everything will turn out OK in the end and it is only when one is a bit tired that these things get out of proportion and I have no right whatever to convey to you the entirely false impression that I’m harassed – I’m very far from it, and when I write D-24 at the top of my letter I says ‘whoopee!’ press on the days, roll on the 14th! I can think of little else but that Great Day, those coins rattling into the old telephone box, and that voice, sweetest by far, than any other in the world say ‘Hello, is that really you, home for ever?’ Angel girl I just love you ginormously much, and long only to be able to tell you what you mean to me – Now, after writing all this to you, I feel as though I’d just put back a pint of champagne (in fact I’ve just had about a pint of well-stewed char!) and all the cares of the world, all the mountains made from worm casts have vanished into thin air. God bless you for everything, for being more wonderful, more precious than anything I know or shall ever know. ALL my love belongs to you, only you, dearest heart,
yours for ever
and always
Peter
P.S. This one made me smile the other day (it wasn’t addressed to me!) Image of Chad looking like a WC cistern. WOT! ANOTHER BOG?
In envelope headed ‘O A S’ addressed to Mrs Peter C Benham, 9 Vint Crescent Colchester Essex.
Postmarked FIELD POST OFFICE 734 dated 19 FE 46. Signed P.C. Benham.
On front of envelope 18 Feb.
The Bay Museum & Research Facility 