bath – frogphilp.com

Grandad’s Diary. 12th March 1945

Some of the lads gone to Rhine for hauling supplies. Went to St. Nicks for bath. Doodies quieter wonder if Jerry evacuating Holland.

Is it me, or does Grandad have a bath every Tuesday? How civilised.

Meanwhile could it be that the oppresive threat of the doodlebug bomardment is coming to an end. Grandad doesn’d know for sure – all he knows is that fewer are coming over. Could it be that the Germans have fired them all and are now running away? Of course these days we could find out that sort of information from a range of news channels, radio, Twitter and so on, but Grandad, unless he was informed by military channels or rumour from people he met, just had to guess…

Grandad’s Diary. 25th February 1945

Town crier calling for volunteers to work filling in crates on dykes. about 50 with own spades. Having a bath at St. Nicholas and saw Bill Heywood in charge of bath!

In the previous entry, Grandad mentioned that a Doodlebug had fallen on the dyke. The work the following day must have been to get the damage repaired – pretty important work in the Low Countriees.

I wonder why the exclamation mark. Could it be that Bill Heywood would be the last person to take a bath, let alone be in charge of one?

It’s good to hear of the friendships that continued even in such difficult times.

Grandad’s Diary. 16th February 1945

Very many V. bombs today. Went to St. Nicholas for bath. Big black market centre. Busy on operations these days.

Again – the contrasts. There are bombs raining down on Grandad and meanwhile he goes to have a bath. it must have been a rare luxury in such times.

And he’s getting busier too – more balloons to put up and more to maintain no doubt. It’s interesting that he writes so little about his actual war work – i.e. being a balloon operator. Maybe it wasn’t the thing to do, lest ‘Jerry’ get his hands on the information and use it against them. This had probably been inculcated into British troops in the preceding war years.