Letter to Jean Welland from Jack Darby
Title
Letter to Jean Welland from Jack Darby
Description
Jack is spending Christmas with his cousin near New York. He has been to a few films and shows. He has been promoted to Pilot Officer.
Creator
Date
1943-12-20
Temporal Coverage
Spatial Coverage
Language
Format
One double sided handwritten sheet and envelope
Publisher
Rights
This content is available under a CC BY-NC 4.0 International license (Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0). It has been published ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre. For more information, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ and https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/legal.
Contributor
Identifier
EDarbyCAHWellandJ431220-0001, DarbyCAHWellandJ431220-0002, EDarbyCAHWellandJ431220-0003
Transcription
[postmark]
[inserted] 22-12-43 [/inserted]
Miss. J. Welland
7. Queens Drive,
Surbiton
Surrey. England
[page break]
ARIE VERNES
365 BEECHMONT DRIVE
NEW ROCHELLE, NEW YORK
U.S.A.
No. 51.
20/12/43.
Dear Jean,
Just a few lines to let you know I’ve wangled some leave and shall be spending Christmas in New York with my cousin. I finished on 10th at Edmonton and caught the 9pm ‘Continental’ for Toronto where we arrived Monday morning at 930. the train was late as there was a 30” snowfall [deleted] at [/deleted] in Eastern Manitoba and the temperature went down to -30 below zero, however we were pretty comfortable, had a special coach with sleeping berths. As I had to pay my own fare from Toronto I decided to fly, it was worth it as it saves 14 hours travelling. Since I’ve been here have had a marvellous time, seen all the sights, have visited Radio City where we saw an excellent variety show and the premiere of Greer Garson and Walter Pidgeon in ‘Madame Curie’ an excellent film. Other places of interest such as Rockefeller Centre, Empire State Building Broadway. Fifth Avenue and so on.
[page break]
2/
should like to let you loose on the shops here, you don’t know theres a war on, plenty of everything stuff I have’nt seen since the war. Since I’ve been here I’ve also seen the Ice Show with all the big skating stars, its really marvellous, they even have a jitterbug scene on the ice.
By the way, I had quite a nice Christmas present, had a letter from the Air Ministry. have been appointed to commissioned rank, thats the wording, in other words, I’m one of the flat hat brigade as the rest of the boys call them. shall be getting my uniform in England so don’t expect me to appear at first like a ruddy Air Marshal. I’m only a Pilot Officer to start with, they said that there were no vacancies for Wing Commanders, so I accepted my present rank.
Well, must really close now, shall be writing a more detailled [sic] letter later on.
Cheerio, hope to be seeing you soon
Yours
Jack
[inserted] 22-12-43 [/inserted]
Miss. J. Welland
7. Queens Drive,
Surbiton
Surrey. England
[page break]
ARIE VERNES
365 BEECHMONT DRIVE
NEW ROCHELLE, NEW YORK
U.S.A.
No. 51.
20/12/43.
Dear Jean,
Just a few lines to let you know I’ve wangled some leave and shall be spending Christmas in New York with my cousin. I finished on 10th at Edmonton and caught the 9pm ‘Continental’ for Toronto where we arrived Monday morning at 930. the train was late as there was a 30” snowfall [deleted] at [/deleted] in Eastern Manitoba and the temperature went down to -30 below zero, however we were pretty comfortable, had a special coach with sleeping berths. As I had to pay my own fare from Toronto I decided to fly, it was worth it as it saves 14 hours travelling. Since I’ve been here have had a marvellous time, seen all the sights, have visited Radio City where we saw an excellent variety show and the premiere of Greer Garson and Walter Pidgeon in ‘Madame Curie’ an excellent film. Other places of interest such as Rockefeller Centre, Empire State Building Broadway. Fifth Avenue and so on.
[page break]
2/
should like to let you loose on the shops here, you don’t know theres a war on, plenty of everything stuff I have’nt seen since the war. Since I’ve been here I’ve also seen the Ice Show with all the big skating stars, its really marvellous, they even have a jitterbug scene on the ice.
By the way, I had quite a nice Christmas present, had a letter from the Air Ministry. have been appointed to commissioned rank, thats the wording, in other words, I’m one of the flat hat brigade as the rest of the boys call them. shall be getting my uniform in England so don’t expect me to appear at first like a ruddy Air Marshal. I’m only a Pilot Officer to start with, they said that there were no vacancies for Wing Commanders, so I accepted my present rank.
Well, must really close now, shall be writing a more detailled [sic] letter later on.
Cheerio, hope to be seeing you soon
Yours
Jack
Collection
Citation
Jack Darby, “Letter to Jean Welland from Jack Darby,” IBCC Digital Archive, accessed June 9, 2026, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/collections/document/39641.