This is one
of the chaplain's voluntary tasks, and we were kept close to it every
afternoon for some weeks after the offensive began. For some time the
number of letters was about four hundred every day. A number of men had
written farewell letters--very moving they seemed, but I did not think
it part of my duty to look too closely at these. They had addressed them
and then put them in their pockets, hoping that if they were killed they
might be discovered. Some had been finished just before the order to go
over the parapet. But the curious thing was that these were sent home,
with a few words in a covering note saying they were alive and well, as
a sort of keepsake. In those written after arrival in hospital a sense
of gratitude to God was very frequent, and a great longing for home and
the children. Some strange phrases were used: a mother would be
addressed as 'Dear old face,' or simply 'Old face.' But poets used to
write verses to their mistresses' eyebrows, and why not a letter to a
mother's face?
The German prisoners sent a message asking if they might speak with the
_Hauptmann-Pfarrer_.
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