Letters to America

Sunday, September 26th, 1943

Dear Joan,

During the week we have got from Auntie Mary a nice letter, and two letters that you wrote to her from camp and she thought we would like to read. We enjoyed them very much but wonder why you didn’t write to Auntie Mary earlier. That was very unkind of you, Joan dear, and I hope you won’t do that sort of thing again. It must have worried Uncle and Auntie no end.

You don’t seem to have had very good luck with the weather when you were at camp, but from your account it seems you had good friends and plenty of fun. The Hobo Hike was a good idea. Did anyone manage to take a snap of you all dressed up?

Today Anne has been naughty, wouldn’t go to Sunday School(1). John went, with Dora and Patsy and Valerie, but for some reason Anne had made up her little mind that she wasn’t going and when she is like that, you cannot shift her. So she spent the afternoon in the back bedroom and didn’t even come out when Mummy and I found that our hot water tank had sprung a leak and water was coming thru the kitchen ceiling, as it still is. We have had an awful time with it, and don’t know how we are going to get a new one or get it repaired.

Yesterday I went to a wonderfully exciting football match between England and Wales at Wembley, which England von by 8 goals to 3. It was a lovely sunny afternoon and during the interval about 60 or so soldiers from the Army Physical Training School gave a marvellous display that thrilled the crowd. Usually the King manages to get to our international matches but yesterday there was no royalty present.

Although the days have continued sunny and warm, it is now quite cold in the mornings and evenings, and black-out(2) is just after 7, which isn’t so good. But we aren’t getting any air raids yet, so don’t mind too much, although we did think that they would let up a little on the black out during this winter. But all they have done is to allow us to take the paper out of our torches, and this is only being done because the bulbs are not so bright now as they used to be, in order to make them last longer.

Well cheerio(3), Joan darling, and be good.
Lots of love from
your Daddy
xxxxxxxxxxx

  1. Sunday school is a school for religious teaching usually for children and young people and usually a part of a church or parish.
  2. Blackout regulations were imposed on 1 September 1939, before the declaration of war. These required that all windows and doors should be covered at night with suitable material such as heavy curtains, cardboard or paint, to prevent the escape of any glimmer of light that might aid enemy aircraft. External lights such as street lights were switched off, or dimmed.
  3. People sometimes say 'cheerio' as a way of saying goodbye, especially in British English.