A LETTER IN A BOTTLE

Hellooooooooooo folks !

I've been playing hookey.

Being a bit of a social butterfly

 as all the little activities that I do have finally started up again after the Summer holiday break.

It's nice to be back in stride again.

Now, today I have what I think is a very interesting story for you.

...........

Way back in 1916 a young man joined the Australian Army to go off to fight in WWI. He set sail for the war with his battalion from Melbourne and as he sailed away from those Australian shores he quickly wrote a short note on a government issued letter card to a girl he knew (we don't know if she was a girlfriend or just a friend).

He  rolled this note up and placed it in a bottle and threw it overboard leaving it bobbing around in the ocean.

We don't know whether he returned or whether he was killed in that terrible war. We don't even know his name as we are unable to decipher it, but one day the girl he wrote that note in the bottle to, received, in the mail, a letter containing the note from the bottle!!!

This is it.

Note that he says there were no stamps available !!!

 (or letter boxes I'm afraid !!!)

The back contains a blessing for those young men.

If you scan it you will note that it can be sung to the tune of the British National Anthem which of course was our National Anthem at that time.

Yes, the bottle had washed up onto the shore and someone had picked it up and noticed the note there inside the bottle. As the letter included the girl's address the finder placed it into an envelope and posted it on with an explanation of how it was found.

 If you click on any of these photos you will be able to enlarge them and read the beautiful old cursive script.

( It was called Copperplate writing when I went to school. )

This is what the letter in the bottle said:

SS Nestor

3/10/16

Dear Dorothy,

                      This is the day after our departure and I am throwing this note overboard in a bottle - Perhaps fate will carry it to your hands.

I saw you and Miss ....... when the launch was following the Nestor. I was waving to you through a port hole but could not attract your attention.

I have been made a Troop-Deck Sergeant of our unit and beyond the duties attached to that job have nothing else to do- although perhaps it is a bit early to speak.

I was sorry to go away without seeing Kathy but it couldn't be helped.

Well I hope this finds you. Good luck to all in the family.

Yours very sincerely

..............................

That girl was Tony's great aunt who later married a returned soldier who had been gassed during that terrible war. He was not the soldier who wrote the letter in the bottle and we have no more information about this curious event.

Tony's aunt died about ten years ago when she was 107 and I did not hear this story till we found the letter amongst all of her valued possessions.

Isn't it an amazing story?

I'm linking in with Shay's Favourite Things Friday as finding out these stories about our family's past is one of my favourite things.

Cheers.