To 'Jasp' and Mary

To 'Jasp' and Mary

Part of a letter to Ted Neale and Mary from a friend in South Africa. The writer apologises for taking so long to reply and writes of his new house.

Two handwritten sheets

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.

E[Author]NealeETH-MXX1201-0001,
E[Author]NealeETH-MXX1201-0002

1 Dec.
2 2nd Avenue
Bellville
Cape Province
South Africa
Dear ‘Joseph’ & Mary,
After you have been revived with a glass of water – or something stronger – you may have been able to get this far into the letter for the big’ Hallo!” and Seasons Greetings from an old ‘comrade’ - & the years have slipped by so fast & since we ‘diced ‘ together ‘Joseph’ that the word “old’’ is beginning to take an almost unpleasant note.
No doubt you have given me up as a bad job, for in front of me is a letter of yours dated “15 December”. However, tho’ I write rarely, it’s sometimes with a certain amount of misgiving that I take stock of myself in this Sunny Clime, and think of the evenings, or perhaps week-ends, I may have spent in the good company of those friends I left behind.
One musn’t [sic] become too depressed tho’, so I shake off
[page break]
old man gloom & get down to things – for I have a lot of work on hand and ahead of me.
Your letter of so long ago opens up with a reference to my change of address a frequent occurrence. This address will be permanent tho’ for some time as I am buying this place. It is not a new house, but I got it at a very reasonable price & on excellent terms & it has great possibilities – I am very busy planning for the coming year – last year being spent in decorating & getting the garden straight.
Next year I hope to complete a garage & turning a stoep into a kitchen – the kitchen will become the dining room.. I intend to build both garage & stoep up myself so I have quite a lot of my spare time booked. What is news of the ’crew’. Is Mae still with the ‘mob’ – his kiddies