Cooper, Ethel – June 1915
6.6.15
My dear Emmie,
I had a letter from you today, sent through Switzerland, and written on the 21st of April. I was so glad to get it, though letters are unsatisfactory things now – one never knows what will be censured and what not, and even with this pile that is waiting here – this is the 45th! – I always have the feeling that the police may descend upon me at any moment and appropriate them…
The little painter, Fritz Zalisz, with his weak heart and all sorts of internal troubles has been recruited, and writes miserably from his barracks, where they are getting 6 weeks’ training before being sent to the front! Absolutely the last man has been called in by now – old men, children and the utterly unfit are all that one sees out of uniform.
13.6.15
My dear Emmie,
Hilda’s husband has fallen – she came to me yesterday morning with the news, or rather all that she knew – her own letters returned to her through the post, and on the stamped ‘Fallen for his country’… If she could, I would advise her to go home and live with her brother and his wife and get work in England, but she is a German subject now, and can’t…
America’s note to Germany is in the papers this morning – it looks like war, but it may be a long time before it comes through all the discussion that had to be gone through over every point. From France and Belgium, the official German reports are very scanty, but privately I hear that the losses are tremendous… If we could only break through in Belgium or in the Dardanelles, it would be the beginning of the end, but it is taking a long time…
27.6.15
My dear Emmie,
… This week Sandor has to report himself for military inspection. He has been rejected three times, but now there is an order that all men, fit or unfit, have to be inspected again. They say everybody who is not absolutely a cripple is being taken now, so we quite expect that we will have to go. Of course, I know that at the end of the first week’s training of any sort, he will be turned out, for he has absolutely no stamina…
There is no news from Willy, but there has been a stoppage of the post along the whole West line for over a fortnight. When the news is really bad, they stop the whole post to prevent it leaking back privately until they have some kind of victory to counteract the effect…
