Seilles Belgium
Feb 5th 1919

My Dear Sister:

My last letter to any of the family was to Evelyn dated Jan 28th & 30th so I will continue on from then.

On the 31st I was off duty but did not do anything of account. On the 1st Feb. I visited Bonn in the evening and the same day I received your letter of Jan 7th which I will also answer. On the 2nd went to church service in the morning and in the afternoon went in to Godesburg with Marshall but it was raw and cold so did not stay long. On the 3rd had an all day pass and in the morning went to Bonn and to the excellent baths there. The rest of the day was spent in getting ready to move. On the 4th we loaded our kit on the lorries in the morning and at 2pm marched to the station at Mehlem and boarded the train. Was lucky enough to get a third class carriage while about half of the battery travelled in box cars. Left Mehlem 3.30P.M. and travelled by way of Bonn, Cologne, Aix-la-Chapelle and Liege to our present destination which was reached at about 6.A.M. after an all night ride.

This is just a small village about a mile from Andenne which is just across the Meuse River from us. Namur is about eight miles up the river from here and Huy is about six miles down the river. We are billeted in a vacant Chateau and fairly comfortable. Some of the furniture is still in the building but we have to sleep on the floor, quite a change after having good beds for the past seven weeks. Have gas in the building for lighting. The room we are in has two huge sideboards of Antique carved Mahogany which would be worth some money. The general opinion is that we will be here for about a month or so. Hope not, as it is a very quiet spot to be in especially at that time of year. Expect we will be able to get passes to Namur occasionally but it is not a very large place.

We have colors now for the first time. They are patches which are worn on the arm of the tunic near the shoulder and denote the unit to which we belong. Ours is something like this -

[diagram of unit colours]

All men who have been in France have colors of some kind and there are great collections of them. You will notice them in Canada now.

I received a letter from Eliz tonight telling about the train accident. Apparently she was also ready to move but it was cancelled at the last minute. She said they also expected number of sick from Germany so apparently she will still be there for some time yet.

So you were out for New Years dinner. It would be appreciatted I am sure. I guess there was a time when we were moving that I did not write very often so that would account for no mail from me. Later I have been writing more regularly.

This is about all the news just now so will close for this time. This our first move toward Canada and next time I hope we may be a little further on our way. Write as usual.

Love to all.
Rob