IMPRESSIONS OF ENGLAND

Wairarapa Times-Age, 3 September 1940, Page 6

IMPRESSIONS OF ENGLAND

FROM A NEW ZEALANDER. Lieutenant H. V. Donald writes from England to his mother, Mrs V. E. Donald, of Masterton, as follows: During the last week I have had a wonderful time having had the good fortune to be put in to a drivers’ and maintenance course which consisted chiefly of driving trucks and motor cycles all over the countryside. I bought a good camera while in London on leave with Graeme and have taken quite a lot of photos during the last week which I will send home when they are developed. I cannot tell you exactly where we are because of censorship but we are quite close to London in one of the most historic areas in England. Lately we have visited Bisley, Bagshot, Windsor, Reading, Tunbridge Wells, Aidershot, Guildford, Farnborough, Maidenhead and innumerable otheiplaces of interest; Eton and Ascot, in fact all over the area west and south of London, through narrow country lanes as well as the main highways, sampling English beer in wayside inns which date back four hundred years. Today we visited Eton College, the first part of its buildings having been erected in 1442. We had morning tea in their tuck shop and were shouted a beer in “Taps,” the only hotel in which the Etonians are allowed to drink beer. Boys over 16 can drink there but none of them may smoke and part of the tradition is to drink beer out. of what is called the “Long Glass.” a very curious receptacle a yard long with a bulb cn the bottom and a bell, mouth. The senior Etonians have competitions to see who can empty the glass quickest and of course the result is that most of the pint and a half of beer goes over their stiff collars and dress suits. We drove through Windsor Park and saw all the deer roaming round in the open, by now quite used to the public, and some of them with as many as 16 points with good, wide, even spreads. By the way, I saw the two Wapiti in New Zealand House which Dad presented and next time I go to London I will get a small silver plate put on each shield to show where they game from. We then called in at Windsor Castle and were shown over quite a big portion of it, down in dungeons, up in towers and through secret pasasges in the walls which are anything up to 23ft thick and are made of huge blocks of chalk. I have one or two photos of this which should come out rather well. Two or throe days ago we went to Bagshot and visited the Duke of Connaught and had a good look over his grounds. The poor old chap is very feeble and has to be driven wherever he goes, but considering he is 90 I suppose he is not doing badly. From Wind-: sor Castle we saw where the secret passage which Charles II used to visit Nell Gwynn across the street about 100yds away and we saw also the dungeon. where Anne Boleyn was kept in captivity for some time. We were very’ lucky. Graeme and I. with regard to our leave. As he was stationed away up by the Scottish border I applied for extra leave to go up and see him and was granted five days whereas the others only had three. Just as we were about to leave in the train I got a telegram from Graeme to say that he had 48 hours’ leave and was coming down to London to see me so I spent all the time in London thoroughly enjoying every minute of it. It was rather expensive, however, and it was not long before I found I was nearly out of money, as nearly all my funds had gone to Egypt with the Mess Committee money, thereby increasing by 25 per cent, so I made use of Dad's offer to use the- company funds and drew £lO. My own money has since arrived and I am going to post the firm’s money back tonight. With nine of the £lO I bought a very excellent little pocket camera with a leather case which has already proved exceptionally useful. Unfortunately I only had one night with Graeme in which’ time we went to a very good variety show called “Shepherd's Pie” and after that to a night club having an extremely good reunion. We are both anxiously waiting for some news from home, no letters having reached here at all from

New Zealand since we arrived. I believe it all went to Egypt first. , I have got a job training a batch of snipers as well as my platoon and very shortly I am going to Bisley to a snipers’ course, so I am kept fairly busy. I am really getting more than my share of courses and things and some of the others are becoming quite envious. There are isolated bombing raids all over England every day now but most of them are very hit and miss, mostly miss. I saw my first sight of the enemy about three days ago when a lone bomber came over and dropped some bombs on Aldershot, killing two or three people within about three miles of where I was. I was watching the plane and the explosion of the bombs soon made us realise who it was. He dropped about nine bombs and then made off for the coast followed shortly afterwards by a lone British fighter. Shortly afterwards we heard that he had been brought down about 15 miles away, so it. cost him dear. Well, it is getting too dark to write so I must close now. We will give Gerry hell when he comes. Your cables came, thanks awfully. Give my love to everyone. All's well and will be weii.