Letter from Harry Massey to Barbara Massey

Letter No. 91 Wednesday - Jan 7th Major J H Massey 6 Palestinian Coy, The Buffs MEF

My own darling sweetheart -

You are being wonderful about writing letters to me - & I am now being very much more fortunate in the way in which they are arriving. No 69 came yesterday - & today I had no. 70, your Xmas one, & no 71. It did not really matter that the Xmas one was late, as the little one which you enclosed in your parcel was sweet. I loved this one too from you & Maxie.

I enjoy & love & appreciate your letters so much, my darling - I have told you that often before - & I will do, as much if not omre than ever before. And so you must never feel that just because you are feeling flat & humdrum & sad when you write your letter reflects your mood - that you are doing anything wrong, it just cannot be helped, & I still have your letters. You are able to be flat in a much more interesting & often amusing way than anybody else could be.

I am beginning this late tonight, as I went to the camp cinema to see Ann Sothern in "Dulcie" , she is quite funny & has been quite successful in imitating Gracie Allen - & of course, she is better looking.

The Bank pass sheet came along in one of your letters - it is really quite healthy, isn't it? You said in a recent p.c. that I must have had my leave with Frank, as I had been drawing money. I did have £30 in August & Sept on account of getting a bit behind with a few

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things, & also making some purchases for you & for me. But I have not drawn any at all since Sept, which is rather amazing - & indicates the life I lead. But the Bank must be getting fairly low by now, I should think, though I never look or ask. rather only send quarterly sheets on account of paper shortage I just carry on & pay my mess bill every two weeks - & draw out £5 from time to time, which always lasts me 2-3 weeks unless I buy something. It is frightfully easy for me to save money - because I much prefer to stay here & write to you & other letters, & try to do some reading. And amusement prices in Tel-Aviv, drinks, food etc, are so exortionate that I cannot bear to pay them. I went in with Ben on Sunday evening to have a bath at his peoples' house for the express purpose of getting warm. We had dinner there too & then went out with his wife & some of his family - 3 small whiskies & soda, 2 things mostly ice, called sherry cobblers & 1 fruit salad cost 18/6. It just annoys me, & makes me feel that these people are beginning to think that the war may be over soon, & they must hurry up to make more profits quickly before the British Army departs. It is amazing to go into one of these places at 6 or 7 in the evening - they are full of Jews, just talking & listening to the music, & nearly all tables quite empty.

And also, I am so keen to save as much as I can for us, after the war. A wonderful

3. holiday - not leave - together - then to be really able to spread ourselves on our house if only we can find one. And you are being so wonderfully economical about clothes, even though they are rationed. You, & I hope you will allow me to help, must buy an absolute trousseau when all this is over. Lots of really lovely things - you deserve them so much, my darling. And nobody in this world will be able to look lovlier than you.

It was silly of me to have had your Cairo dressing gown made up I & should have just sent you the material. I meant to do that, but the man in the shop persuaded me that nobody could make it up as well as his people, & all for 10/-. I think it is a lovely idea to have it made into a house gown, or wahtever you call it - & even lovelier when you have a bath & put it on over a nightdress & we have nice Gins Frenches & make love in front of the fire. I can guarantee, my sweetheart, that you will be made love to whenever that happens. Oh, I do want to come home. You will have my A.G. to say that my application has now been turned down. I saw Col. L. today, who had had a copy of the letter - & asked him what I should do now, & I told him about Hughes' certificate which is coming on. He said I should apply again - which, of course, I intended

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doing anyway - but I was quite glad to hear him say that. I was afraid he would say that they would get fed up with me if I tried again, & that I should now try & forget about it. I told you in my letters that I intended to write to him rather than talk to him - but he brought it up himself. When the next time for applications comes round, which will probably be in February or March, I will send him a copy of my letter & ask him quite straight if he can do any thing to help it. But I am afraid that I now feel less hopeful than I did before. There are so many officers out here & the vacancies are so terribly few - luck must enter into it so very much. That does not seem to be our speciality . Which means that once again we are back at looking forward to the end of the war. It is a sad prospect & when I am dying for you. If only Japan had had the sense to stay out. It might have been over really quite soon. Now, the one hope seems to be that we may crush Germany first & then Japan will go quickly or else give up. But it is still hard to see the end.

Friday - 9 January. I was President of a Court Martial all yesterday & did not finish until after 7-0 pm. It was only notable for the fact that the defending officer was a Jewish barrister, it was his first time, only having been commissioned a short time ago. He was more than I could bear - cross examining soldier witnesses & trying to twist them this way & that & make them

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say things they did not mean. In the middle of the first witness, I had had enough & closed the Court & gave him a large raspberry & told him I had seldom seen a more unsavoury sigh "in all my military career"! He was very respectful & apologetic was a bit better afterwards - but still pretty tiresome. The accused was up on three charges & we found him not guilty of two of them & guilty of the third. And I should have done exactly the same thing if the barrister had never been there.

I am being picked on for Court Martial again - I had two on Monday. Arab deserters & dished them out 6 & 4 months respectively of field punishment. They are hopeless people & they tell the most teriffic lies & never bat an eyelid.

Last week, I had to Court Martial five of the brutes, but, thank the Lord, they all pleaded guilty & I was finished by lunch time. I had to preside over an interesting case about three weeks ago. This was another Arab & charged with desertion The chap was already in the guardroom, when he went away. He had had a message that his fiancee was about to be married to somebody else, & so he went off to see about it. The trouble was that the girl's father had become tired of waiting for the dowry for his daughter, was short of money, & so decided to sell her to another man. The gallaant Arab soldier managed to frustrate this