Jan 30 Tuesday 1917
Dear Mother
I received your letter tonight. We left Featherston about daylight last Sat having breakfast about 3 am. Only the 23rds came. The 24ths follow on Friday. I heard that they will decide after the shooting tests who will remain in the 23rds so that I may yet be put back. We came to canvas town near Trentham, but there are no huts & no beds but a wooden floor & six men to each tent. The days work starts at 4:15. They will leave here next Friday, destination not known, but not far from Featherston because we have to have the inoculation completed there. Final leave may come any time now, but we can never tell untill the day before. I may stay here if I fail at shooting and join the 24ths again. We never know anything untill a day before it happens, therefore it would be best not to send any parcel at present. I hope we soon go into huts again as canvas is not so good. They cant be kept as clean & meals are all served on the grass outside. We have the use of the Trentham Institutes in the evening also the canteen. All training is very easy nothing else but shooting. I suppose you got the parcell of old clothes all right if not I can get them after as I have the ticket. They were not worth much anyway. Dont alter the address on any letters yet. I will get them with same address as before. Tell Gorrie that I never saw Frank Abercrombie & I only heard that he was in the cook house. I am not sure. We can get leave any night now. I was in Wellington on Sunday had a royal time with several from our coy.
Vic
War Letters
WW1 letters from three brothers to their family in NZ
