Letter to David Donaldson from his mother
Title
Letter to David Donaldson from his mother
Description
Catches up with family news, activities and her beliefs, giving him her thoughts on some spiritual matters prior to his confirmation and telling him confirmaton presents (books) she will give him.
Creator
Date
1930-11-30
Temporal Coverage
Coverage
Language
Format
Five 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
EDonaldsonFIDonaldsonDW301130
Transcription
[underlined] Sunday [/underlined]
THE ELMS,
PEAR TREE AVENUE,
BITTERNE,
SOUTHAMPTON.
Dearest Dave
Just a note to send you a line to give you my blessing before [word deleted] I see you, I should like to have written so that you had it today Sunday, but dreadful to relate could not get time to sit down & write you an unhurried letter, I have been using my brain too much this last week & making too many speeches & my poor spirit has had to look after itself with dire results – But I think you know enough of what I feel about religion without
[page break]
my saying any more, how intensely I feel “things spiritual” are the only part of life that really matter, & that that connection is one of the surest indications of the existence of God, that one has to spend all one's life searching for him by developing that [word deleted] spiritual side, I feel the search goes on like a temperature chart you know [illustration of jagged chart] with high marks and very low ones but I always [underlined] hope [/underlined] in the end it reaches a high point, its so hard to be bothered about it, [inserted] especially [/inserted] when one is young & other things are so important – but I cannot tell you how [indecipherable word]
[page break]
2
people who are what I call the really truly good they make me feel at once “The peace of God which passes all understanding” & that to me means they are so sure of what they are after - & knowing that are afraid of nothing, [inserted] living their lives with [/inserted] eternal life as a background to the whole of this one –
I am going to give you another translation of the bible, unless you can think of anything else you want, also Addresses by Lord Haldane, because I think he is [inserted] or was [/inserted] what is a rare combination, [character deleted] a very great intellect & a still greater soul,
[page break]
so many nimble little intellects ate always so busy doing away with the soul, so its a great comfort to find a really large one proving conclusively its [word deleted] [inserted] existence [/inserted] – you may not enjoy them now but I think some day you will enjoy them -
We shall be over by 1.45 tomorrow & will call at Oak Braces, if you are not there go straight on to chapel
This does not seem a very what shall I say affectionate letter, but I expect you would dislike me if I told you how fond I am of you, in spite of the home truths we hurl at one another from time to time, but I am! Your very loving
Mother
[page break]
I thgink probably Alistair & Poga will come to lunch with you at Oak Braces – Daddy, Nannie, Dorothy & myself will arrive after lunch about 1.45. Norman is not coming.
THE ELMS,
PEAR TREE AVENUE,
BITTERNE,
SOUTHAMPTON.
Dearest Dave
Just a note to send you a line to give you my blessing before [word deleted] I see you, I should like to have written so that you had it today Sunday, but dreadful to relate could not get time to sit down & write you an unhurried letter, I have been using my brain too much this last week & making too many speeches & my poor spirit has had to look after itself with dire results – But I think you know enough of what I feel about religion without
[page break]
my saying any more, how intensely I feel “things spiritual” are the only part of life that really matter, & that that connection is one of the surest indications of the existence of God, that one has to spend all one's life searching for him by developing that [word deleted] spiritual side, I feel the search goes on like a temperature chart you know [illustration of jagged chart] with high marks and very low ones but I always [underlined] hope [/underlined] in the end it reaches a high point, its so hard to be bothered about it, [inserted] especially [/inserted] when one is young & other things are so important – but I cannot tell you how [indecipherable word]
[page break]
2
people who are what I call the really truly good they make me feel at once “The peace of God which passes all understanding” & that to me means they are so sure of what they are after - & knowing that are afraid of nothing, [inserted] living their lives with [/inserted] eternal life as a background to the whole of this one –
I am going to give you another translation of the bible, unless you can think of anything else you want, also Addresses by Lord Haldane, because I think he is [inserted] or was [/inserted] what is a rare combination, [character deleted] a very great intellect & a still greater soul,
[page break]
so many nimble little intellects ate always so busy doing away with the soul, so its a great comfort to find a really large one proving conclusively its [word deleted] [inserted] existence [/inserted] – you may not enjoy them now but I think some day you will enjoy them -
We shall be over by 1.45 tomorrow & will call at Oak Braces, if you are not there go straight on to chapel
This does not seem a very what shall I say affectionate letter, but I expect you would dislike me if I told you how fond I am of you, in spite of the home truths we hurl at one another from time to time, but I am! Your very loving
Mother
[page break]
I thgink probably Alistair & Poga will come to lunch with you at Oak Braces – Daddy, Nannie, Dorothy & myself will arrive after lunch about 1.45. Norman is not coming.
Collection
Citation
F Donaldson, “Letter to David Donaldson from his mother,” IBCC Digital Archive, accessed April 16, 2024, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/document/12001.
Item Relations
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