DLA016-0155  Partial letter; Transcription

SOUTHILL PARK, BIGGLESWADE,

BEDFORDSHIRE.

5th

Dear Bee –

Yes we are only 20 miles from Cambridge. So do arrange for Freeman to shoot on Monday, and go over to Cambridge from here. We shall be shooting in the Park so not far off – and he could either send him over – or arrange to hire a car for him from Cambridge –

Do write and say for certain that he can do that –

Now I wonder if you or

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Freeman can help me with something

There is a man – Major Gilham

1a Avenue Mansions

The Avenue.

Blackheath.

He chucked up everything when the war began and joined up – He is a chartered accountant – & passed very high as a C.A. he served all through the war in the ordonnance dept. He was

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kept on by the war office after the war – & sent to India. Then back here and then out to [Mespot.?] Now he is home, and discharged from the army, and simply desperate to get a job. He is 49 –very strong. Never had fever or any illness when he was in India – and can stand the heat – He wouldn’t mind going back to India. In fact I think he would like to.

His wife is a nurse. She nursed me and the children through a good many illnesses

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and is the very best nurse I have ever come across.

They aren’t what you call Ladies & gentlemen, but they are splendid people – capable and simply desperate now for a job. I wonder if Freeman knows of anything in India for him?– Don’t bother to write to me about this, but if anything could be got for him I’d be eternally grateful. He obviously is a good man at his job – as otherwise the army would have discharged him directly the war was over, but they kept him on you see till this year.

Editorial Note:

Letter is possibly authored by Samuel Howard Whitbread (1858-1944), British politician and member of the Whitbread brewing family whose home was Southill Park, Biggleswade.

SMDL

02/01/2018