The text reads as follows:

"My dear Cousin:

Just a few lines in answer to your last letter which I received a few days ago - or rather the last which I have received.

There is much that I could tell you of all that is happening out here but a lot would have to be left to your imagination & as your imagination would utterly fail to picture some incidents out here you would not be much better off. When I get back Amy my one desire will be to utterly & absolutely forget many things that I have seen here & yet it will be impossible. The more I see of it the more amazed I am at Human Beings Civilised beings carrying on like this & yet one cannot but help admire the endurance & cheerfulness of all amid surroundings that are some times beyond description.

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At the present moment I am in a School of Musketry some where in France. While in the 'line' I had orders to move down here to attend this class. Needless to say I was not sorry but long ere you get this I will be back again & at the same old work.

I am in real good health & as usual taking the Life as it comes making the best of circumstance whether good or bad. As far as the War is concerned you know as much about it as I do.

Time alone can show what will happen but if tis left to Britain to give in rest assured that it will last for a long while yet.

Tis Britain alone who is keeping the show going with her usual Bull-dog determination. However as our Colonel remarked very optimistically the other day: 'Every day brings the end nearer.' I would be sorry if it brought it further off.

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I do not know what news you would like. Descriptions of life in the line you have probably heard from other sources & a description from me may not interest you.

The Flanders Battle is on & probably you have read of the weather conditions out here.

The four days before I left the line for here it rained & heavy too.

The conditions were awful. I was wet to the skin for four days, the trench was wet & up to the knees in mud. The ground was loosened by bursting shells & the trenches kept falling in in places. Men were lying in the mud trying to get sleep. Shell fire smashed the trench & in every little hollow men were lying trying to get as much cover as possible from bursting shells.

One wet misty morning at 4.45 we attacked Fritz. In the early dawn our Bombardment was magnificent to watch

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& yet terrible. The roar of the guns the scream of the shells, the brilliant flashes of light, the rattle of machine guns, the whine of Aeroplanes over head, the mist the mud & the wet made a scene that I will not forget in a hurry.

We gained our objective & in the wet dug in & prepared for Fritz to counter attack. Three times he counter attacked that day & his shell fire was unceasing but three times he was driven back. He was in a bad way for the work of our guns was good. Our Support Trench was almost levelled down & our front line was in a mess but in the rain & in the mud we had to hang on & do our best to improve our position. That night at 11.30 we went out into No Mans Land to dig a communication trench up to a position we had taken. We had 800 yds to dig & there were 150 of us. We expected Fritz to attack

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so we carried 120 rounds of Am. Rifle loaded with 10 rounds & each man had three Bombs. We had to dig to within 100 yds of a German Strong Point manned by Machine Guns & you can imagine the target we would present.

The rain was falling heavily which was to our advantage. Fritz was throwing shells about hoping to hit someone.

However we got to work & we dug, truly dug for our lives. Any minute he might have seen us & turned on his Machine Guns. We knew that once we got down about two feet we were fairly safe. We were on a rise where the ground was hard but we worked like fury. Fritz would send up a brilliant flare now & again & light up the ground for chains round & we would lie flat on the ground. However Fritz had had too bad a time that day to trouble us, but every man & officer too breathed

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a sigh of relief when it was over.

The shell fire is the worst part of it all. To get to work on the Hun with Rifle Bayonet & Bomb is not so bad but to sit crouched day & night in a wet muddy trench & hear nothing but the scream of his shells is not pleasant & to see your comrades boys that you have associated with in N.Z. blown to pieces dying of wounds in the mud & to realise that it may be your turn next is also not pleasant. One of the boys in my section was hit in the face with a piece of shell & half his head taken off. Two other boys of the same section trying to get some sleep in a hollow they had scooped out in the trench. A shell landed between them. The sight was awful. Torn flesh & blood & mud all mixed up & that was all. It produces a queer feeling in those who see it.

I could not think. I was unused to such sights & I felt stunned

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it was so sudden. I heard the shell coming but I did not think of where it would land. The work of the stretcher bearers is terrible & if any deserves medals they do. They cannot dodge shells but must keep steadily on & carrying men in the dark up to their knees in mud stumbling over broken trench boards & in shell holes is awful work. Their danger is greater than ours by far. Their work is in the front line as well as ours & they are never during an attack free from shell fire.

The day I left the line it was raining heavily. I was wet & cold & had hardly any sleep & was done up. On my way out I passed a procession of men wheeling on small Lorries six dead men. They lay on the blood stained lorries the rain falling on their ghastly pale upturned faces & staring eyes. Can you imagine my thoughts. I cannot express them

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However Amy less said about it the better perhaps. At present as far as I am concerned all is well. The Life is at times strange & peculiar & the more one thinks about it the more peculiar it seems. When next I see you whenever that may be I will tell you some of its more amusing features.

Tis Sunday evening & I have just come back from a walk down to the beach. It is a lovely beach & in peace time I should imagine would be crowded every evening but at present tis almost deserted. But still it gives a certain amount of pleasure to walk along that beach to watch the shipping in its channel : to think of the time when once more the boat will leave beneath ones feet on the return voyage. Looking back to the days before the War it seems almost a different existence & one can hardly imagine peace again.

However Amy, I must close now.

Remember me to all at Home & to Uncle Neil & Aunt Grace. Keep on smiling in the same old style. Remember you are in 'Gods Own Country' Never wish to leave.

I am your Affec. Cousin Stewart"