Although his Battalion was back in the front line in Calonne, Sherriff had been sent back to train new recruits once more. He had time to set down a couple of contented paragraphs before setting his letter aside, to be completed the following day:

‘Today is Easter Sunday and the finest day this year – I awoke in my bedroom in the farm house to find the sun streaming in my window and all the usual farm sounds in full swing – cocks crowing, hens chuckling, doves cooing – the men’s wooden clogs clattering over the cobbled farm yard – and the voices of the men washing and polishing up for church parade.

The Hen chuckling brought back to mind vividly the spring mornings two years ago when we used to hear Broody and the rest out in the garden and that sound of hens anywhere always reminds me of spring mornings at home’.

[Next letter: 9 April]