Series 01 Part 02: Hughes family correspondence, 3 April 1917-22 September 1918 - Page 513
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[Page 513]
3.
his neighbour's leather legging; & a fourth delivered some luckily more or less spent shot into another fellow's sealskin waistcoat. Then I thought it time to go home, otherwise I wouldn't be here today to tell the tale.
Your final scraps just before you returned to England were different altogether to most of the earlier ones, & through the failure of your guns you seemed to have been exposed to much greater risks from which only your good flying saved you. It must have been very hard to make your final break with the old squadron, though I gather from a casual remark or two that some of the new men were not up to the standard of the first lot that you went out with in January. Poor Claye, I felt sorry to think he would have to trust his life to perhaps some one of the newer men who was not up to your standard. Your C.O. was very decent to you, & I believe him when he said "Well, you know, old chap, we shall never get anyone to replace you". It must be very hard to lose one's best man just when so many new & less efficient men are filling vacancies in a squadron. At the same time I don't believe your chances of early promotion are gone. Both General Salmond & your Colonel seem to know a good man when they see one, & they will probably have reported on you to G.H.Q.
As for ourselves at this end of the earth, things are going on in the same old groove. Mary Jennings who was a daughter of old Sir Patrick Jennings, formerly Premier of N.S.W., died quite suddenly in Brisbane last week, & John Mullins & I went to her funeral at Waverley Cemetery on Saturday last. Mother who knew her, went to St Patricks for a short ceremony before the funeral, but the truth is that the world's memory is short, & few seemed to think it worth while to bother about the daughter of one who was for many years the biggest figure in Catholic