Letter from Jimmy Doughty to his sister Winnie

Letter from Jimmy Doughty to his sister Winnie

Writes of waiting for waiting for another selection board and mentions his daily activities, including going into Sheerness. Describes his walk back along cliffs and meeting a crowd of girls. Catches up with news of friends and moans about the number of insects in local area.

1943-07-22

Four page handwritten letter and envelope

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EDoughtyJCDoughtyW430722

[postmark Eastchurch, Sheerness 22 July 1943] [postage stamp]

[underlined] W [/underlined] 206227. Pte. Doughty,
“B” Coy. A.T.S.
31, Highfield St.
Leicester

[page break]

[underlined] 1 [/underlined]

1386802. A.C.2. Doughty.
Hut 45.
2 Flight C. Sqdn.
R.A.F. Stn.
Eastchurch.
Sheerness
Kent.

Dear Win,

Thanks for the letter, at the moment I’m waiting for another selection board, I’ve been waiting in this darn room for 2 1/2 days now, and my name has still not been called.

Life in the camp is not to [sic] bad, but the trouble is finding something to do in the evenings.

Saturday we went to Sheerness

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[underlined] 2 [/underlined]

and had to push to darn bus up the hill when we came back.

When we got to Sheerness, we found it a proper little country town, and a darn sight, smaller and less interesting than Barking.

We rode there Sunday, and walked back along the cliffs. (about 7 miles).

We had to jump numerous streams and boggy patches, and on one of these streams we met crowd of girls who could not cross it. We being the heroes of this story, of course we helped them. Well we got 4 of the 5 over all right, but Bill got so week [sic] he couldnt [sic] lift the last one properly, so when I grabbed her she slipped and

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and pulled me down into the mud and water, and I hit Bill and he whent [sic] in, the girl was some how standing on Bill and myself and stepped off us onto the other side, [deleted] g [/deleted] quite dry and unmuddied, but we were in a rather sorry state.

One thing about this place is that you can go around almost as you like, you see blokes laying all over the place in just shorts, or singlets and trousers, most unusual state of affairs.

One thing you can thank this board, for such a long letter.

By the way can you tell me if Ray has been home on leave before you went.

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[underlined] 4 [/underlined]

One good thing about being out here is you have a permanent war on your own, with every kind of insect going, the moment you lay down on [deleted] cull [/deleted] either the grass or the beach you seem to become the target area, or maybe we have some [deleted] sort [/deleted] [inserted] sort [/inserted] of magnetism for them.

If you can read this you will be darn lucky, as I’ve written it on the palm of my hand.

Well I’ll close now, as this is all the paper I have on me, I am applying for [deleted] the [/deleted] leave, by [sic] the hopes of getting it are pretty grim,

So Best of Luck,
[underlined] Jim. [/underlined]