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Extracts from Arthur’s Letters to his wife, Gladys, August - October 1943

29-8-43 My thoughts are always with you and all the time I’m wondering how you are occupying yourself. I see from a newspaper I managed to get hold of that you’ve been enjoying a heat wave recently so I expect you will have been taking advantage of the sunshine and can imagine you sitting in a deck chair in the garden and knitting or reading…

Well I’m in a new part of Sicily but can’t course the sky is full of our planes winging their way to Italy but the Luftwaffe is conspicuous by its absence and seems quite unable to cope with the situation out here as she is in Western Europe.

6-9-43 I’m still very well darling and hope that you are too…. I feel awfully anxious about you dear and hope soon to have some letters — those elusive letters that are probably travelling from one transit camp to another which is the way of mail out here.

We’ve again been swimming and sunbathing and I’m now sitting in the shade of the tent writing to my beloved wife. ‘Conner’ has just been announced: it is an army slang word derived from Hindustani and meaning food. I don’t know how it should be spelt but that’s how it’s pronounced. I hope that your rations of conner are alright…

I’m going to have a course on surveying — similar to builders’ surveyors but we survey gun positions instead of building sites. I think it will be more interesting than plain gunnery because the latter does pall especially when one is not very busy. I’ve heard that when qualified a fellow gets an extra 1/- a day so shall go all out for it.

13-9-43 Since I last wrote you Italy’s capitulation has been made public and I’m sure you at home will be as pleased as we are out here. It simplifies things immensely as we now only need root out the German divisions in that country and, apparently, in this task we can expect the active cooperation of the Italians judging by their recent behaviour. What a strange war this is where the enemies of one day become the allies of the next, but it forebodes ill for the Germans and certainly brings the end of the war nearer.

By the way one of the strangest things about Italy’s fall was the reaction of the people here. On the night when we first had the news they were full of excitement and overjoyed — smiling and congratulating each other because it was all over — one unacquainted with the truth might have thought the victory was theirs. This gives one an insight into the position in Italy and the reason for the half-hearted resistance of the Italians throughout the war.

16-9-43 I’m still on the island of Sicily of course and the weather remains perfect with the sun beaming down from cloudless skies the whole day through and the bathing is marvellous — hope I’m not making you too envious my darling. For all I know it may be a miserable day, cloudy and rainy, when you receive this letter — one of those typical English summer days — but I hope not dearest and trust that you also are basking in sunshine.

As usual we are in an orchard and sleep beneath lemon trees arranged neatly in rows like the orchards in Kent; all around are hills which hem us in from all directions, upon the slopes of which are vineyards and many kinds of fruit and vegetables such as figs, dates, pomegranates, tangerines, egg fruit, tomatoes, onions and so on. The people of Sicily eat very little meat — the soil seems incapable of producing grazing for cattle although goats are fairly common but chiefly raised for their milk and asses and oxen are the beasts of burden used in the fields. However they greatly prize tins of our bully beef or, for that matter, any part of our rations that they can cadge.

The sun is just sinking behind the highest hill and very soon it will be dark as there isn’t much twilight in this country so I cannot write much more…

26-9-43 well dearest we are still in the same place and it’s not so bad here now that we have a recreation room and a few books which have now reached us. Also we have the wireless and the B.B.C. news bulletins which nowadays are so encouraging after the long series of misfortunes we suffered earlier in the war. In the town there are concerts and yesterday Gracie Fields was here and gave a show but I missed it.

Yesterday we had a big parade before General Montgomery and he issued medals to a number of officers and men in this and other artillery regiments — one D.S.O. and several M.C.’s and M.M.’s. afterwards he called us all around him and said a few words of congratulations on the successes in N. Africa and Sicily. Of course most of the people in this regiment served all through the N. African campaigns and have many thrilling tales to tell of their experiences. Bill and I are the only greenhorns with no campaigning experiences. The general is just like his pictures and rather quietly spoken. He is brimful of confidence in our success over the Nazis…the ceremonial parade was irksome as we had to stand for hours in the sun on the square before a large municipal building ironically bearing the word VICTORY inscribed thereon by the Italians and with pictures of Mussolini. All buildings, either state or private, have these paintings of Mussolini as well as quotations from his speeches and no one bothers to remove them — so much has he fallen from grace that it’s not considered of sufficient importance to erase them.

3-10-43 Yesterday I travelled with a leave party and am now in Catania on leave until Wednesday. I’m afraid leave doesn’t excite me in the least now — what a different story when I was in England… We’re billeted comfortably in what was formerly a hospital and I’m in a room sleeping 8 — on the floor of course. It’s a modern building and we have a dining room with tables and chairs — perhaps, you may think, these latter are not unusual features of a dining room but it’s so long since I enjoyed these amenities that I wrote these words without thought — and a sitting room with similar amenities. There are comfortable wicker chairs and sofas to sit upon and occasional tables for card playing and so forth. We are waited upon by Italians at meals and have our room swept for us; also they do our washing — in fact for a few days we have no duties or fatigues and are left to our own devices.

This is a large, and formerly was quite a prosperous city with many fine buildings. A number of the buildings now remaining intact are taken over for canteens and other purposes. The services canteen occupies one of the most imposing of these state buildings with a fine pillared front and wide stone staircase leading onto a courtyard around which is a gallery supported by marble columns. In this courtyard chairs and tables are set fringed with palm trees and here one may sit and enjoy tea and cakes — albeit at an outrageous price. In this same courtyard, under the azure Sicilian sky and the warm sun, concerts are held and after writing this letter I’m going along to listen to one… As you see, a lot is being done for the comfort of the troops at this place.

5-10-43 Am still on leave but return to my unit tomorrow. I’ve today sent a parcel containing the stockings about which I told you in an earlier letter. They aren’t I’m afraid a good quality but perhaps you can wear them at work and save your best ones for special occasions. I shouldn’t have bought them knowing they’re not good enough for you but for the fact that it’s so difficult to obtain them at home and at least these cost you no clothes coupons so they may serve a useful purpose.

There are dozens of ice cream bars in the city and one can obtain tea, diminutive cakes, toffee and pears. A surprisingly large number of shops are open but they have no stocks of materials, merely oddments which they were able to salvage, and prices are high. For instance, ladies’ handkerchiefs are 2/- and 2/6 each and a nice table cloth which I examined — alas I could not do more than examine it — was £3/5/-

There’s still a considerable civilian population in the city mainly engaged upon demolitions or working for AMGOT who control all these occupied areas. This is a large city and has a big business and shopping centre. The Sicilians are keen business people: even quite small children hawk various commodities around the streets and become a nuisance because they’re constantly stepping in front of one offering their dictionaries, bags of pears etc. The women do the laundry for the troops and make a decent job of it for a reasonable number of lire.

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