(Page 1)

Culverden Castle Camp
Turnbridge Wells, Kent.
Sept. 1, 1918.

Dear Mr. Swain:
I think that I promised to write you after reaching England. Since I have been here nearly six weeks 
I think it is time to keep that promise.

By the time you receive this I will be in winter billets, but I can't say where. Rumors are rampant 
in the army, and some say we will go to a town on the coast, others that we go to London, some say 
Scotland, or Northumberland and I suppose if I listened long enough I would hear on the best authority 
that we will spend the winter guarding mine-fields in the North Sea. Personally, I hope by spring to 
be in an American cantonment in France. But in any case mail will follow me up as it has done so far, 
though after embarking from Halifax I received no mail for over thirty days, but then it

over.

(Page 2)

2.

began to come in bunches. The American magazines and papers are much appreciated, not only by myself 
but by all the other men in the battalion, for after reading them myself I place them in the canteen. 
The English papers and magazines are very different though there is an English edition of the "Cosmopolitan" 
not as good as the original.

I have had quite a nice lot of adventures since leaving home. Two scraps with "tin-fish," and air raid, 
and a court martial being the most important. The blanked censor wouldn't pass my description of them, 
and sent my letters back witht he warning to be careful in my description. I always wondered what a censor 
was like, but I know now. We had one on board ship coming over. He was about five feet high, ten inches 
broad, seven inches thick, with a face mostly  all jaw and pimples. No wonder

(Page 3)

3.

nobody loves a censor. And they can't be blamed for their disposition. A face like that would make 
anybody sour on the world.

I have an awful time wtih the English currency, and the English language. Here, cakes and cookies 
are "biscuits," pies are "tarts," candy is "sweets," buns and wafers are "scones" shoes are "boots," 
drugstores are "chemists' shops" and the end of a street is its "top." I am getting so proficient in 
the use of the "King's English" however, that I can enter nearly any shop with the feeling that I 
stand at least an even chance (pronounced "chawnce") of getting what I want.

I have hiked over all the raods of southern England and every one of them is paved. They are kept in 
excellent condition, being oiled and taned weekly. They are apparently never out of repair, and are 
just as good after a three day downpour

over.

(Page 4)

4.

as before. The country is very beautiful, with its hedges, some of which are cut into shapes of houses, 
animals, birds, etc., and the stretches of Kentish hop-fields. Hops are the greatest of Kent's agricultural 
products. And they surely need a lot of them, for everyone in England over three years of age takes his or 
her daily pint or quart or gallon. Yesterday afternoon while in town I saw a mother emerge from a 
public-house (saloon) with a large can holding some three quarts. She distributed the contents among her 
children, even the toothless two-month-old in a baby-carriage getting its share.

There are no frame houses in this country. I've been all over Middlesex, Surrey, Kenth, and a few other 
counties and have so far seen only half of a frame house. That was the upper story of a farm-house. The 
ground floor was of stone. All buildings are

(Page 5)

5.

of stone, brick, or cement. Some are of stucco, though not many. On route marches we suddenly round a 
turn of a hedge and are transported back several hundred years when we see a house or a group of houses 
that were old when Columbus was trading the Spanish crown-jewels for enough grub to feed his crew on the 
little excursion to America. There are no skyscrapers here. The largest building I have seen is the 
hospital out of which I was but recently discharged. It was five floors high, and was formerly the 
largest hotel in Kent. I had a fine time in the hospital. Could sleep all day if I wanted to, had real 
sheets and a sure-enough mattress, a room all to myself, plenty of books and magazines, and could amuse 
myself by dropping various kinds of missles on non-coms passing along the street below my window. They 
weren't allowed to enter the hospital, so I was safe from punishment. And such pretty nurses!

(Page 6)

6.

A St. Louis paper which I received states that the Kaiser and Von Ludendorff said that the hardest 
part of the war was yet ahead of Germany. Somebody must have told them that I had arrived safely over 
here. I'll do my darndest to make it the hardest part anyway.

I am taking a course in sketching from a former artist now in camp, and am keeping a book of sketches 
of those comic, tragic, or dramatic incidents which I am meeting with. It will be very valuable to me 
after I get back. Tell me how things are getting on in the office and the town, and tell the city it 
will have to worry along somehow until I get back to tell it how to get along. Also ask Clyde that 
memorable question which Doc Styles asked after he had

(Page 7)

7.

reached camp, "Do you think you'll ever amount to anything?"

Gosh dang it, there goes "Parade for Pay." Gee, they ought to bring it around to us instead of making 
us go after it. There is so little of it that it is hardly worth falling in for, but a month's pay is 
a month's pay, whether it is the one cent daily of a Chinese coolie, or the two-bits of a British soldier. 
So I guess I will go after it.

Sincerely
Gay Miller.
Bugler Gay Miller #4433.
Co. D. 4th Batt. Queen's Own
Royal West Kents.
Turnbridge Wells, Kent,
England.

(Page 8)

[no text]

(Page 9)

Mr. E.E. Swain
Kirksville, Mo.
U.S.A.

[illegible postmark]

OPENED

(Page 10)

4433. Co. D.
4th Queen's Own.

CENSOR.

6390

W.W.I.122.47