Letter from Harry Massey to Barbara Massey

Letter No 71 - Thursday - Sept. 11th

Major J.H. Massey 6 Palestinian Coy, The Buffs M.E.F.

My sweetest darling,

Well - the coy & myself have now arrived in our new station - & it is still M.E.F. The journey yesterday was a bit of a strain & quite a mix up. We came by sail, instead of setting off at a reasonable time of the day, we had to start at 4.30 pm & arrive in the dark at 8.30. Four hours for a journey of about 60 miles. One camp is about 5 miles from the main station & so in the morning I went to see a wonderful department of the army called Movement Control & carefully arranged with them to have the train stopped at a small station quite near. These people are rudely referred to as "Bloody little Movement & bugger all control" - they certainly lived up to their reputation yesterday. The train did stop, but only long enough to allow myself, two Sgts, one Corporal & one private soldier to emerge - then moved off - just like that. I was wild & rushed into the stationmaster's office, where four revolting Arabs all talked at once. & made me wilder still. It was Peter's first train journey - & of course he got off the train with me.

We are partly in huts & partly in tents. The Officers Mess is in a tent, & on the end of

2.

which is a small room, oblong 21 ft x 10 ft & that is mine. In it, I have my camp bed & sand fly net - all my clothes an odd nails & knocked together shelves - Peter & his bed, made by the Army pioneer & my table, on which are your photographs, my working materials, a lamp, & odds & ends. And so this is the scene & still are the surroundings from which I shall be writing to you until further notice. It has a window at either end, one overlooking country & the other the officers latrine & it has a concrete floor, beaver boarding walls & corrugated iron roof. The lamp is a good one, thank goodness - one of those high pressure affairs with a mantle. And so I suppose I must be thankful for this, & that I have a room & not a tent. But I am attended by a collection of flies & moths large & small & all kinds of other queer things which fly. what a fly blown, bloody country this is. To be honest, the country is not bad - rolling away on one side & a fair range of hills on the other. The Judeaen hills I think, which lead on right up to Jerusalem. Now that I am nearer to the Holy City again, about 50 miles I believe it is - I must make a real effort to go there & do some

3.

concentrated sightseeing. My local town of course is now Tel Aviv, about 10 miles away - I expect I shall go in there about 2-3 times in a month & each time with Ben Arzi.

There is a cinema here - open air - & the usual change of programme every night. But I am told the machine is pretty dicky, the first weeks programme is foul - the only one I shall probably see being "Torrid Zone" with James Cagney, & which we probably saw together some years ago.

It really is a great thing having the Coy all together once more & under my hand. I have given myself a hell of a talking programme tomorrow. All officers, 9.30 to 10.30: Sgts 10.30 to 11.30 - break. for a mug of tea - Cpls 12.0 to 12.30 - Lance Cpls 12.30 to 1.0 - the whole Coy from 2.0 to 3.0. By which time everybody should know, individually & collectively just what I think of them. They all need it very badly - it is good training for my political career!

There is no doubt at all that this place is very enervating & sleepy than where I have came from. It is now 11.45 pm & although I realise that I must go to bed, I feel

4.

quite wide awake. I am glad of this, because the other place was very sleepy. I can see already that I am going to have much to do for a few weeks - but I have now begun my letter & I will try very hard to add same on each day & push off 8 or 10 pages every 4 or 5 days.

Dearest Love & good night, sweet, lovely darling XXX Harry.

Friday 12 Sept. - I must tell you about my visit to Damascus last week. I was very cross about it at the time, as I was in the middle of all this hand over. I was just going there & back in one day, by car & fear hard drive either way, to be a witness in a Court Martial. But I am delighted that I have done it, in case I do not get another chance. The country itself is nothing - just brown, barren & dull - completely flat on one side, but relieved to a certain extent by Mount Hermon & its range of hills on the other. The Court was held in a place called Mezza Barracks - a big, pink, stucco building, & now occupied by a British Infantry Btn, I managed to get away by 11.30 & set off to have a look at the town. I had brought Sgt Labilseh with me, for company & someone to talk to & also because he was very anxious to come - he jumped up & down with excitement when I finally told him he could come along. Really, he is remarkably good & efficient as an Orderly Room Sgt. - but he is frightfully girlish. We left at 0530 in the morning & had thermos tea & bananas on

5.

the way. But, I'm forgetting, we are now in Damascus & there was so little time, that we made straight for the Great Mosque, having decided to see that if nothing else. But it was Friday & we were not allowed inside, as it was the time for midday prayers. So we went around the outside, which was very probably more interesting. It was possible to see into the mosque - which has no roof, of course, & so there is plenty of light - from various doors & gates in the walls. There was not a great deal to see - various tall pinnacles of minarets & fountains, lots of dirty Arabs bowing & scraping - but the main thing was the mosaic on one wall, which depicts Paradise & is very famous - looked from where I was to be really very lovely. There was much Ranan & pagan carving & uncovered & not uncovered pillars & arches & gates & remains by Nazi bombs. But the whole place is surrounded by the old Syrian bazaar & market. Here, everybody is making all manner of things int he open shop windows: woodwork, metal work, jewelry, embroidery & food & the cooking of it. It was absolutely interesting, & you & I could have spent days just wandering round looking & watching. I thought of it. The funny little hankie I enclose was from the modern part of the bazaar & cost 1 pence, which equals 10 Syrian pounds which equals about 2-1.2d. But the old part is a really remarkable hive of human industry.

After this I went to the "Cercle des Officier"