Every evening he was going to write to his father about what he had done and seen in Bristol
Canadian soldiers arriving in England, 1940. Photograph: Fox Photos/Getty Images
When I was recently in London I had occasion to go to the Baker Street area, and realising that I should have to wait for a train at Paddington, I decided to have a light lunch near the home of Sherlock Holmes. I ordered a pint of beer and a sandwich. My only companion at the bar was also having a pint of beer and a sandwich. We discovered to our mutual astonishment that the sandwiches contained cheese, and so it was natural that my conversation with Bill should begin.
He was a young soldier in battle-dress, obviously a Canadian, but not wearing distinguishing badges. Having finished his beer and ordered another cheese sandwich in vain, he asked me casually if I could put him on the way to Bristol.
Bristol is not a very good place in which to spend a holiday these days and I suggested that there were many quieter spots in England he might visit, fully expecting that he would have some friends or relations in Bristol with whom to stay. He had not, but there was a much more important reason for him to go, bombs or no bombs. His dad had been born there and he had promised that he would spend his first long leave in Bristol.
His leave had coincided with his monthly cheque for 56 dollars from home, and he was going to have six glorious days. As soon as he arrived he was going to ask a policeman to direct him to some quiet hotel. There he would deposit money with the manager and ask him to give him every morning a certain sum and no more. Every evening he was going to write to dad and tell him what he had done and seen.
I was introduced by means of photographs to a charming Canadian family: dad from Bristol, mother born in Canada, and sister who sent a monthly parcel which always contained a pair of silk stockings which he could give as a present to the lady of one of the homes where he was sure to be welcomed. He still had the silk stockings. In his six months' stay in England he had not been invited to any English home.
To be within easy distance of London was a godsend. Londoners were great guys. Londoners talked to you naturally. They did not talk to you as though they were rather unwilling uncles taking scruffy nephews out to tea. He thought that all troops should be quartered near large towns, where they would be more likely to meet people who knew their way about a bit. "You can't," he said, "have a really good chat about things over cups of tea with women helpers in a hostel, however friendly they may be," and if you went into a pub in some places people thought you had gone there to drink as much as you could and left you to your own devices. As a result you did what you were expected to do and got a bad name.
It was here that my heart warmed to him. I too had known that particular form of misery. I assured him that Manchester and Liverpool would be the same to him as London. There would be people to ask him home and they would be delighted to treat him as a friend, even without the silk stockings. But I knew about the other places. I thought of my own days when as a young soldier I spent night after night in a canteen gazing on stewed prunes and incredibly yellow custard. I thought too of later days when, having had a good deal of worldly experience in other countries, I first came to a country town to live and was solemnly assured that only common workmen drank pints of beer. A gentleman should never have more than half a pint at a time, and then not from a glass but from a tankard; to make it absolutely certain that the world should know you were a gentleman it was better, however, to stand at the bar and order a double whisky.
I explained these things to Bill, who was delighted to find that there was not some particular form of curse upon Canadians in England. We agreed that, essential as is the work of providing hostels, canteens and entertainments for the troops it is equally essential a duty on the part of the civilian population to make those away from home, whether a hundred miles or two thousand miles.
So I took Bill to Paddington and into the train for Bristol, where I have every confidence that he found some "great guys."