Letters to and from

The last letter

To my dearest wife Nancy,

I write to you in hopes you can forgive me. I feel that I can almost sympathise with the enemy. If their trenches are half as bad as ours then I feel for them. Our trenches are horrid, wet due to the rain that is forever pouring. Sometimes I wonder if the water will take us before the enemy. It floods all the time, at some point even up to our waists making it almost impossible for us to get from one place to another.

I have gone to the medical part of the trenches on numerous occasions from both disease and exhaustion. It is always crowded at the centre the groans of injured men still haunt me when I go for a very scarce rest. I see men both dead and alive being carried to and from the front lines. It is horrid. I still don't know how men can be excited to come here, how I could have been excited. I hope the war is over before our young Arthur can join for I fear he will never be the happy boy his at this very moment.

How are you doing? I haven't gotten any letters from you for the 6 weeks I have been here, but they say a ship that had letters from Australia and new recruitments was sunk just off shore so maybe your letters were on that. How was Roseys first day at school? Did she end up making friends? I hope so, she deserves them. It may be a while if ever, she can see dad again. I imagine her little face with plump rosy lips that stretched all the way to her eyes looking at me, curious and ready to explore. It's one of the only reasons I still have the will to live. I hope to see you all again, as I know you hope from me thousands of miles away.

I wish I hadn't succumb the false posters of the war making it look as if it's the best thing you could do. For if I hadn't. I could be with you, Arthur and Rosey. Maybe if I get back (I won't say when for I fear giving you false hope) we can go to the river that's just off of Warwick Road to have a nice picnic. I could go swimming with Rosey while you and Arthur play on the shore line. I remember how he hated the water choosing to build sandcastles than to paddle along the water. That would be a wonderful distraction from the harsh reality that surrounds us every day. The idea of coming home and having a day, week, month, year with you is the only idea keeping sain through this torturous experience.

One of my closest friends, Stefan, (the Irish man with the thick accent that I briefly mentioned in my last letter to you) has sadly passed away from the horrid trench foot. Do you remember me explaining the disease to you in a paragraph of my letter sent 2 weeks ago? It is the infection of the foot that eats away at your flesh as if it's a nice sweet from the candy shop. They had tried amputating Stefan's foot but the disease had spread all the way through his body leaving him to die in agony, pushing him to the limits of insanity. I must say I do not wish that torture upon even the worst criminal.  I felt for him even though I was not the one with the disease. The pain is enough to make even the toughest men cry. Comrades around me tell me of stories of men screaming in pain for days whilst their foot is being eaten whole by the horrid trench foot. Men in the trenches fear it hitting them, although we all know we can't prevent it from getting to us.

There have been many deaths here at the western front, not only of trench foot and gun shells but of gas bombs thrown in trenches killing tens of men quietly. There have been so many deaths that I am numb about the subject. It is as if death walks freely through trenches leaving forgotten souls in his wake. I know that if I were to face death I would greet him as if he was a friend for he has been around me for such a long period of time.

No matter where you look you are confronted by the smell of flesh decomposing, bodies that have been left in the mud sinking, as if the world is trying to take back the bodies that it gave to society. I fear not death but the idea that my identity will slip into oblivion like those who have not slipped but jumped into it before me. Even the one you cherish most would be unrecognisable to you. That is what I fear, you not being able to grieve my death for you still have hope that I am not one of the fallen yet to be identified.

I must leave you now for we are about to do the stand to and god knows how many shells spray down on us relentlessly at that time. I hope to be back in your arms soon, whether that is in death or in this life. I will always love and think of you through this torture. Take care of our children for me and do not tell them of the torment I'm going through but what I once was, a caring husband, and loving father.

With all my love hopes and dreams,

Fredrick Rowbotham