Letter to Teddy from London, England

18 August 1916
LDCunningham [Co’y] D [B’tn] 128
#782373 C.E.F. Gen. P.O.
London, England

Dear Teddy:– 

we are out just about 3 days it will be in an other few min. and the weather is foggy today we can not see the next boat behind use it is about half mile away and I did not go forward to see if we could see the one ahead the same distance. It is great to see the big boats coming along so straight in the water, and they seem to be going so fast to they go about 13 miles an hour now quite away from old Canada an’t it.

Teddy it is a new one for me you will remember that I was one boy that was never going to cross the ocean no matter how much money I would ever get to travel with but here I am tomorrow noon half way across the Atlantic It is a good trip for any young man, It gives him an idea of the imencity of the world and of the power on a man can consentrate into one big boat. When it is nice and calm on the boat the water runs in big rolls that must be 15 and 20 feet deep, but they don’t bother the boat it take about a half doz. of them to rock from one end of the boat to the other so the boat goes on great like the roll wasent there

we go to bed at 9.30 and get up at 6 A.M. so we get lots of sleep but we can sleep here just the same as we used to be able to on rainy A.M.s at home. The fog horn goes every so many minuets on each alternate boat. There is lumber and wheat in the bottom of this ship. Our room is about four flights of stairs down from main deck and there is two decks up after that. Today it was foggy but not many sick days

Well Teddy I wanted to have a better and longer talk with you before I left but never got time to say near what I wanted to.

Now look here kid this enlisting was just between you and I and of coarse I am the only one that possibly knows just how much pluck you have, and I may be the only

one that is willing to give you credit for being game to give your life for the country and as you go on you will here things to that will make you feel bad. But I am confident that you will make good and that you were game and that is all that is necessary, the folks that do the most talking around a community are always the most gutless them selves. Remember that you want to be as indifferent about other peoples opinion as if there was no one living in the whole community but you just be sure that you are satisfied with your self watch each week and if you an’t satisfied with how much work you are doing why size things up and do what you should do the next week. That is the only good a man gets out of experience is so he won’t make the same mistake twice.

 I am not feeling as good on the boat as I was on the train, I never felt better in my life than I did on the trip on the train, but I guess I ate to much the first few days and I caught a little cold on guard here the night before last I went and got some more pills this A.M. to get rid of the cold. It is so damp on the boat that a fellow fells cold evenings and lots of other times.

[Saved as 16-08-18 because written three days after 128 Batt. embarked 15 August 1916]