Item 04: Memoirs of a Colonial Boy by Robert Joseph Stewart, ca. 1971 - Page 253
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[Page 253]
125A
From the beginning of the war, Paris had been strictly out-of-bounds to all British and Dominion troops on leave. But a few months before the battle of Messines this long-standing prohibition was cancelled, and a limited number of officers and other ranks were permitted to enjoy a ten-day sojourn in the French capital. I was in the first group selected for this special leave, and with two officers of our Division, I booked in at the comfortable little central Hotel "Astra" in the Rue de Caumartin.
Despite the war-time rationings and restrictions, Paris was very gay: the policy of the top French Administration was to keep it so, to maintain the morale of the civilian population and the many men of the French fighting services on leave there.
The weather, in early Summer, was perfect the whole time of my stay. The Folies Bergere and Olympic vaudeville theatres were crowded to capacity nightly, and the smaller music halls and restaurant-bars up around the Place Pigalle and Montemarte [Monmartre] were always full of pleasure-seekers. Every night three or four of us went to a show after dining and wining extravagantly in one of the fashionable restaurants. After that, we usually went to another night-spot for supper and conviviality. One night at the Olympic, our ex-Guardee Provost Marshal, Colonel Henry Deering Bart, joined us in our box. After the last item on the programme, he invited us to be his guests at the famous red-plush Maximes restaurant, where he was well known, and the management and staff received us with much deference indeed.
It was usually between 2 and 3 a.m. when we got to bed. When we arose much later in the morning we felt rather jaded, but after having some coffee and rolls, we usually went along to a magnificent barber's shop near-by and spend an hour in the chair getting the full-treatment - shave, shampoo, massage, manicure, etc. This refreshed and recuperated us enough to do some more sightseeing in a taxi, have lunch at a popular out-of-town cafe, and then start another round of gaiety.
When I got back to my unit, a week before the Messines attack, all I had to show for £120 spent, was a silver cigarette case.