Armistice countdown: "Good news is coming in every day..."

Private Tom Fake with his wife Charlotte

and their young son Tommy

During the next few days, as the Centenary of the WW1 Armistice approaches, I'll be posting extracts from letters written in 1918 by Private Tom Fake to his wife Charlotte back home in Bristol.

Tom had been in France since the end of 1916, serving with the Rifle Brigade, and wrote home regularly throughout the war. His letters could be both amusing and touching, and I used many in my book Letters from the Trenches. He often worried about how his wife was coping at home without him, and in his letter of 2nd November 1918 he expresses relief at having heard from her: "Well I have received your long looked for letter at last, it seemed at eternity waiting for it."

He goes on to discuss the health of his son Tommy and other family members, then gives a flavour of what it felt like to be at the Western Front:

"Well my dear good news is coming in every day still, and everything is going very satisfactory [sic]. We are still in the same place as when I wrote you last and the line is miles in front of us now, in fact it's as good as going back for a rest. The weather also keeps fine and that is in our favour. We have had some rain today, but nothing to hurt."

As always, Tom closes his letter like this: "Good night my dears God bless you." He then jots down details of postal orders he's sent home to Charlotte, so that she can check she's received them.

Pictured below is Tom's letter from November 2nd.
Tomorrow: "We are better hearted out here now..."