Letters to America

Saturday, November 14th, 1942

My darling Joan,

I know you will be very pleased to hear that your birthday parcel arrived safely last Wednesday, and we all thank you very much for it. There was something in it for me too – a tin of Prem(1) for which I have to use coupons. When John woke up Wed. morning he said to me “Mummy, do you think Joan’s parcel will come?” and I said “No, John, I’m afraid old Hitler has sent it to the bottom of the sea” (as I really did think it was lost). Well, they went off to school and the postman brought it about 11.30 a.m. and you should just have seen their faces light up when they came home and found it on the table! It was a wrench for them to go back to school and leave their new games, but they raced home and as soon as they had finished tea, they went up to the back bedroom and played for 2 whole hours without a stop – first one and then the other. Anne has the Mother Goose and John The Circus Comes To Town. I played a game with them first just to show them the rules and they soon knew them. They love the Victory Lollies(2) and have been taking one to school in the afternoons and have had some today. I haven’t opened the butterscotch(3) yet.

It was a terrible day last Wednesday: very foggy(4). Daddy had to walk home from Harrow – all the buses had stopped. You just couldn’t see at all. He saw a man with a torch going his way, so he got behind and followed him. It is lovely today, sunshiny but very cold. We don’t want any more fog like that. Daddy and the twins have gone on the allotment(5). There is a wasps nest in the ‘heap’ and Daddy is going to dig it out. He said it should be very interesting. He has said that the wasps turn all their babies out of the little cells in the Winter and go down the hole themselves and die off. Mrs Gleadhall came along last Monday and said she was just going to post Dora’s Christmas gift to you, and said Dora had written you a nice letter. Do hope you get it. I nearly forgot to tell you. A child brought John’s slippers back to school last Tuesday (last week I told you he had lost them) so that’s alright. John and Anne have been going to school with another little girl this week. Her name is Beryl and she lives quite close. She came this morning and they stayed home while I went shopping in Wealdstone. Getting quite big, aren’t they. Hope you are quite well dear, and having good fun with your friends. I also hope your Commando group is doing well with the salvage campaign(6). The church bells are going to ring tomorrow morning all over England in honour of the Victory in Egypt. It will be lovely to hear them again. The war is going very well for us just now, isn’t it darling. Hope we keep it up, don’t you?

With very best love to my big daughter Joan from

Mummy
xxxxxxxxxxxx

  1. Prem was a canned meat product like Spam.
  2. Victory Lollies were patriotic lollipops.
  3. Butterscotch is similar to toffee, but is soft, not hard. It is made from brown sugar and butter. Some recipes include corn syrup, cream, vanilla, and salt.
  4. Fog was very common in London in those days. It was often made much worse by smoke from coal fires used to heat buildings and this was a serious risk to health. In 1956 the Clean Air Act was introduced to reduce emissions of smoke and other gases. These thick 'pea soup fogs' are no longer a problem in London.
  5. An allotment is a small area of land in a town which a person rents to grow plants and vegetables on.
  6. During World War II scrap drives were a popular way for everyone to contribute to the war effort. By salvaging and recycling unused or unwanted metal for example, the government could build ships, airplanes and other equipment needed to fight the war.