Written by Felix Swehla on July 4, 1943
We arrived in England safe and sound.
England . EuropeEngland July 4th
Dear Ben + All –
I suppose by now you are wondering where I am and why I haven’t been writing.
We arrived in England safe and sound. It was a nice long ride, but I enjoyed it very much. Certainly saw lots of water but it wasn’t bad as I thought it would be, The water wasn’t much rougher than our lakes back home. As far as I know there wasn’t a one on the ship that got sick.
Uncle Felix most likely traveled on the Queen Mary – a British luxury liner – retrofitted for troops – with about 15,000 other men aboard.
As for this Country, I like it, The farms are very small, most of the work is done by one horse, even have one horse hay – mower sure seem funny. They haul the hay on on one horse wagon put on a load and away they go.
The cattle here is a very good breed from the looks of them in pasture, every cow and steer is fat as can be.
It doesn’t get dark here till midnight or after the Sun. goes down about 11:00 at night only about four hours of darkness. It hard to figure out when to go to bed. The time is six hours different here from back home. Being today is the fourth what are you doing? I’ve got a hunch you are working.
The trains in this country are very funny. I sure get a big kick out of them.
We are having a hell of a time with this money it goes in pounds and Shillings and several other unknown coins, We are catching on fast. I think in a few days we will know what its all about.
The weather here is fairly nice, a little cool at night, sorta foggy in the morning nice and sunny in the afternoon.
I will be glad when we get our mail. But I suppose that won’t be for some time yet.
Our APO number on our address is change again thin time it is 645 every thing else is the same.
We sleep on straw mattress makes me think of the good old deer hunting days.
I think I am going to town for awhile this PM being its the 4th. Maybe I’ll be able to tell you about it next time.
Well Ben I went to town so now I will write some more and tell you a few things about it.
First off I never saw so many bicycles in all my life, from kids to old men and old women they all ride them, you see a garage and look in all you see in Bicycle and very few cars.
The Beer isn’t too bad, it is real dark in color, It has a peculiar taste but after a couple of big shupps it goes pretty good.
I started this the fourth and now its the 6th we still aren’t allowed to send any mail out. They should let us mail letters in a few days.
I want to finish this so it will be ready when they call for mail going out.
It is raining out now, they say that it keeps raining most of the time once it starts.
I will end this and start writing to some one else. This is the first letter I wrote in nearly three weeks.
Good bye, From Felix
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