Click here for entry for Friday 18th September – Saturday 26th September 1942
Sunday September 27
Day 540
Church parade. Wrote afterwards and spent afternoon playing cards in hut.
Monday September 28
Day 541
B ??? returned to Maadi – hoping I will be soon also – days very monotonous.
Tuesday September 29
Day 542
Missed M.O. as large number of boys came in yesterday. Usual procedures for day.
Wednesday September 30
Day 543
Before M.O. again. Grade B1, can’t understand whats keeping me here – leg OK.
Thursday October 1st
Day 544
Day passed as usual.
Friday October 2
Day 545
Down on beach most of day.
Saturday October 3
Day 546
Received & answered mail – and swam. Skin getting very brown. Thunder storm & rain at night. Heaviest I have seen over here.
Sunday October 4
Day 547
Showery during morning – clear towards late afternoon. Ground rather muddy.
Monday October 5
Day 548
B Newman(?) returned to Maadi – hoping to get A1 on Wednesday.
Tuesday October 6
Day 549
Received patriotic parcel – Canterbury one, also tin tobacco & cigarettes. Usual afternoon on beach.
Click here for entry for Wednesday 7th October – Wednesday 14th October 1942
14 Weeks Worth of Socks 
What was a “patriotic parcel”?
I think it was like a Red Cross parcel – I found this about them – “women packed the thousands of individual parcels which were crated and sent overseas by provincial patriotic councils to every serviceman four times a year: the cake, biscuits, sweets, all in their separate tins, tinned fruit, coffee and milk, and various meats, the cigarettes, soap, razor blades, footpowder, fruit salts, handkerchiefs, writing paper, playing cards, small books and other oddments. Some of these were purchased with patriotic funds, others were made or contributed by citizens.”
That’s very interesting. I don’t know if there was a similar activity in the U.S. during World War II. In the U.S., I think, families did that, but the results would have been uneven depending upon a family’s financial capacity and, sadly, interest in the soldier. I am sure some did without.
Today, individual chapters of the Daughters of the American Revolution “adopt” U.S. military units serving in war zones and send them “patriotic parcels”.
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