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Z 93," Front Belge, Oct 7 Don't worry if you don't hear from me Darlings - This offensive is taking up all our time. I've never seen any thing like it since the beginning of the war.
Ambulances for miles almost touching each other. a continual stream. Hundreds come in and are operated on and are sent on every hour. I've never seen such wounds and so many deaths. Dying on the stretchers before they can be attended to. The mud is so impossible. Food had to be gotten to the troops by airmen and some of the wounded lay on their [sic] 4 or 5 days before an ambulance could get to them. Sometimes the men get stuck waist deep in the mud and it is impossible to get them out food has to be taken to them for a day or two if they haven't died from exposure in the mean time and then sometimes they are shot to get them our of their misery. It seems incredible but this mud is almost like quicksand - it clings and sucks down so. Went ") in Ypres yesterday the first time I've been outside the sheds and operating room for 3 weeks. So beautiful and so sad - full of soldiers and [illegible] very picturesque there lovely old ruins - but breaks your heart. Had tea on the ramparts where so much blood has been shed. Only an occasional shell going over as a reminder the war was still on. The ramparts look rather like the palisades up the Hudson. Went to the top of Mt. Kimmel too - it was clear enough to see miles- Lille- and lots of places.
The end prob nearer but not too soon as they seem to think I'm afraid -
We are advancing to Poelcappell at present - man and mud and blackened tree trunks it still gets shelled heavily so a gay life is ahead of us. I wish I'd been at your dinner party. Vinton wrote me about it. Tell her to please send me some records she got them but found that they had to be sent via Red X. Send them to me c/o
Major Paget;" Headquarters;" British Red Cross;" Bolongne sur Mer;" France Sir Arthur Lawly came to see me last night.
