Letter to Lewis Ellis from John Smith
Title
Letter to Lewis Ellis from John Smith
Description
Catches up with gossip and notes Lewis is still in Canada. Was proud that Lewis had got his wings. Writes about his own news of acquaintances and activities. Announces that he was now a married man and continues with more news.
Creator
Date
1942-07-24
Temporal Coverage
Language
Format
Four page handwritten letter
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
ESmithJEllisEL420724
Transcription
227 Myrtle Rd
Heeley.
Sheffield 2.
24/7/42
Dear Lewis
Thank you very much for your letter. I was very pleased to hear from you. It certainly is a long time since I heard from you. It seems as though you didn’t receive my reply, so I hope I have better luck with this one.
So you’re still stuck in the prairies are you? You’re certainly seeing the world my lad, Ecclesfield will seem a bit tame if you ever decide to come back to it. Well, Lew, I’m so pleased that you are getting on so well in the R.A.F. and I was very proud to learn that you had got your wings. By the way, we stuck your photo (which was in the morning
[page break]
2/
paper) on the notice board. It was quite a good photo. I’ll bet youve got hosts of pictures of yourself. Why not send me one or two.
And now Lew, I’ve a tremendous announcement to make. I am now a MARRIED man. I was wed on April 18th. Lily’s grandpop conveniently died and the house had to be given up, so we took it on. Note the change of address. We had a lovely wedding, with hymn singing and the organ playing the Wedding march. Lily was in white and yours truly in pin stripes. There were crowds at the wedding. We held a reception at the S & E Co-op. There were speeches etc.
We then left and spent a few days at Hope at a guest house there. We had a grand
[page break]
3/
time as you can expect on a honeymoon. Since then we have spent a week at St. Annes on Sea. If you should come back to this country, you’ll have to come up and see us and meet the wife. Thats all about me.
Now for one or two things that have been happening at H. & P. The chief news is that Mr. Ashton is leaving. As I write he is on his last week. He is going to Manchester to take over a firm. Tom Caldwell has stepped into his job as manager, and Joe Wragg has become foreman.
I suppose you will know that Ronnie Grice is in the air force now. He’s at Blackpool. But everyone else is just about the same, except that I have got another job now. I’m in charge of the metal
[page break]
label place [deleted]s[/deleted] attached to F.T.D besides keeping an eye on the annealing. It may turn out to be a better job.
Well, Lew, I think this is about all for now, Try and write [deleted] off [/deleted] oftener if you can & don’t forget that photo. So Goodbye for now.
Take good care of yourself.
I Remain
Your Pal
John (Smith
Heeley.
Sheffield 2.
24/7/42
Dear Lewis
Thank you very much for your letter. I was very pleased to hear from you. It certainly is a long time since I heard from you. It seems as though you didn’t receive my reply, so I hope I have better luck with this one.
So you’re still stuck in the prairies are you? You’re certainly seeing the world my lad, Ecclesfield will seem a bit tame if you ever decide to come back to it. Well, Lew, I’m so pleased that you are getting on so well in the R.A.F. and I was very proud to learn that you had got your wings. By the way, we stuck your photo (which was in the morning
[page break]
2/
paper) on the notice board. It was quite a good photo. I’ll bet youve got hosts of pictures of yourself. Why not send me one or two.
And now Lew, I’ve a tremendous announcement to make. I am now a MARRIED man. I was wed on April 18th. Lily’s grandpop conveniently died and the house had to be given up, so we took it on. Note the change of address. We had a lovely wedding, with hymn singing and the organ playing the Wedding march. Lily was in white and yours truly in pin stripes. There were crowds at the wedding. We held a reception at the S & E Co-op. There were speeches etc.
We then left and spent a few days at Hope at a guest house there. We had a grand
[page break]
3/
time as you can expect on a honeymoon. Since then we have spent a week at St. Annes on Sea. If you should come back to this country, you’ll have to come up and see us and meet the wife. Thats all about me.
Now for one or two things that have been happening at H. & P. The chief news is that Mr. Ashton is leaving. As I write he is on his last week. He is going to Manchester to take over a firm. Tom Caldwell has stepped into his job as manager, and Joe Wragg has become foreman.
I suppose you will know that Ronnie Grice is in the air force now. He’s at Blackpool. But everyone else is just about the same, except that I have got another job now. I’m in charge of the metal
[page break]
label place [deleted]s[/deleted] attached to F.T.D besides keeping an eye on the annealing. It may turn out to be a better job.
Well, Lew, I think this is about all for now, Try and write [deleted] off [/deleted] oftener if you can & don’t forget that photo. So Goodbye for now.
Take good care of yourself.
I Remain
Your Pal
John (Smith
Collection
Citation
J Smith, “Letter to Lewis Ellis from John Smith,” IBCC Digital Archive, accessed July 19, 2025, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/collections/document/42133.