“Mr and Mrs P. Smyth, of St. Stephen’s School, Bombay, have received a letter from their son, Private Patrick Bentham Smyth, who was posted as missing on June 29, 1941. The letter is dated July 18, and Private Smyth states: “I am still held a prisoner in a Transit camp somewhere on the island of Crete and I am happy and am enjoying good health. We are at present getting well fed although the food is very much the same every day but all the same it is filling. At present I am working in the hospital of the prison camp, which is a lot better than lying around doing nothing as it keeps one’s mind occupied. Two of my mates are working here with me—Jack Smith and Fred Aukett, and they also are enjoying good health. The job on which we are engaged at present is policing the hospital lines which is really a very easy job. We are allowed to write one page only.”
This is the first intimation Mr and Mrs Smyth have received as to their son’s whereabouts since the campaign in Greece and Crete. Private Smyth left New Zealand with the Third Echelon and was attached to the 6th Field Ambulance” [Franklin Times, Volume XXX, Issue 113, 8 October 1941, Page 2]