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This letter is from Jack Endacott, best friend of Frank and new husband of Olive who wrote the letter posted below on 15 September. Frank and Jack were colleagues at the GEC offices in Kingsway, London. This letter was not completed on 19 September 1939 and the other half will be posted separately 70 years on from the date it was eventually finished.
19/9/39
Tuesday
60th City of London
R.A. A.A. T.A.
No.2 Section
169 Battery
Artillery House
Bromley Road S.E.6
My dear Frank,
Well firstly I must thank you very much for your good wishes etc. expressed in your letter to Olive. It was nice of you to write such a lengthy letter when I know, from first hand experience now, you are so busy. I was very sorry to hear your news about Louise, especially just now when things are so difficult. Never mind old son, don't take it to heart too much for I feel that there is plenty of time and opportunity available yet. Still, I do know how you must feel and believe me I do feel sorry.
They say "join the Army and see the world" and believe me we are seeing it. Firstly we went to our S.P. at Foots Gray and having dug ourselves well in made the site something like, we were moved last Tuesday to Eltham. The whole Battery are here but we are off again tomorrow to Dartford Heath! Still, as long as it is not France I shall be thankful! Olive has been coming down on Saturdays and Sundays and I am now about due another 24 hrs. leave.
I'm very sorry that we couldn't get you to do your stuff on Sept. 9th especially after promising you the job, but Olive's elder brother carried it through very well. I understand that Olive has written you 12 pages, so I expect you have heard all about it. It was tough having 6 hrs. leave on my wedding day but was lucky getting the 24 hrs. so soon after. We both thought of getting married immediately war was declared, but it was not until the following Thursday that I got the o.k. for leave. Frank, it doesn't seem possible what has happened all under a month does it - I never really thought that we should go to war. Messrs Mercer, Stubbs, Pearce, Mills and Calyer (A.S.B.) are here and we keep more or less, as far as possible, together. We tried a little advertising ('O for an Osram') on our tin hats but this did not meet with approval! The Osram lads have had a nice letter from F.Y.J. together with 100 cigarettes, but so far I've not heard a word from T.W.H. I've managed to sort out a nice little job for myself as telephonist on the Command Post. Actually it saves me a considerable amount of sandbag filling!
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On the day that War broke out, 3rd September 1939 I was still stationed at Marls Copse. We packed up and came back to White City with all our equipment and within that week we were off to Southampton, boarded a big ship (can't think of the name 63 years ago) for "somewhere in France" which was Cherbourg. Whilst some troops were unloading guns, etc., I was posted with a Lewis Gun on a jetty which jutted well into the sea, next to the beautiful cathedral-like railway station (rebuilt by reparation money from World War I, smashed again in World War II by the Germans). Obviously I obeyed orders to man the machine gun on my own, but I complained to the Orderly Officer about manning the gun without protection or revetment as we thought any moment a German fighter aircraft would swoop down from the sky to attack, in which case I wouldn't have been here now. However, I was told that no materials were available for protection, as a result I still bitterly complained. Eventually a temporary wall was erected, and you will never guess what with. Answer: hundreds of bully beef tins stacked to a height of six feet around my gun position with tins removed in the wall at various intervals as lookout and firing points. Thank God Jerry did not attack. Whilst at Cherbourg, lining up for roll-call one morning in front of the station a speeding car ran into our column and two or three soldiers were killed. Makes one wonder whether the 5th Column was involved!
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