Letter from Ursula Valentine to her husband John Valentine
Title
Letter from Ursula Valentine to her husband John Valentine
Description
She thanks him for returning five photograps to her. Writes about difficulties with weekend visit to the country. She mentions that she is worried that a neighbour’s house was burgled and that she had notified the police sergeant that her and her daughter were going to be away from the house. She writes that she is sorry the leave situation is so poor and that she would like to add to the family.
Creator
Date
1942-05-28
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
EValentineUMValentineJRM420528
Transcription
[underlined] No 7 [/underlined]
Lido
May 28th
My dearest Johnny,
Thanks for your letter No 5 returning the photos. I’m sorry you’re not keen on them. We don’t pretend to care much for the serious one or the sideways laughing one (no 3) but personally I like no 1. very much and intend to have it framed & in a conspicuous place. It is good of you too, tho of course it is only one of your many charming expressions. I hope that in time we shall get others.
How did your new bathing shorts feel when you went swimming the other day? I hope they are big enough, this time.
You’ve no idea of the work that is entailed in a weekend visit to the country! Naturally we have take all our rations with us, & I’ve bought & boiled a piece of bacon & am taking a tin of butter, & our meat ration for Vera to cook down there.
[page break]
It’s going to be a problem to get all the stuff, food, nappies etc for Frances & our own clothes into a manageable space (we don’t want to have to have a taxi) = rucksacks seem the only solution.
The Greenish’s house was burgled on Whit Sunday while they were out playing golf, so I am rather nervous on that score. I have asked the neighbours to keep an eye on the house, & have notified the police too. The worst of it is that it seems to be chiefly food & clothes that they are after (there have been several burglaries around here recently) & even suppose an insurance co. paid up for losses, you wouldn’t get coupons to buy new clothes with or to make up for your stored provisions. So we must lock up well & hope nothing happens.
When I went to the police station to notify them I saw the sergeant with whom I had a bet ages ago about
[page break]
(3.)
the spelling of Aberystwyth. He recognised me, and gave me a long discourse on the subject. It seems that althou’ the spelling as above, with two ‘y’s in common, it is incorrect. He asked a professor of Cardiff University about it, who tells him that it should be spelt Aberystwith, but is spelt generally with two ‘ys’ as a sop] to the commercial English – tho’ why, I can’t imagine. However we agreed to call the bet off, & I shall continue to spell it with two ‘y’s.
I’m sorry the leave situation is so poor. I have heard various stories recently of all RAF leave being cancelled & chaps being recalled, so I think we were pretty lucky that you got yours when you did.
I have been thinking a lot recently about Algy (the bulge,)
[new page]
Don’t you know) and I feel more & more that we ought to inaugurate him in your next leave. It seems of primary importance to me that Frances shouldn’t be an only child, even if it means a harder struggle financially. If all goes well with you, it would be grand to double our family soon, if you are taken prisoner, then all the more reason for getting Algy on the stocks pretty soon, and if the very worst happened, then as I said it seems to me more important that Frances should have a companion than that we should be better off financially by that small margin. Let me know what you feel about it. and then apply for leave!!
Peter will be down for later at the end of June, but I thought that would be OK as you’d hardly be likely to get leave by then. If you [underlined] should [/underlined] I’d ask him to go to the Hillman’s.
With all my love to you my own darling
Ursula.
Lido
May 28th
My dearest Johnny,
Thanks for your letter No 5 returning the photos. I’m sorry you’re not keen on them. We don’t pretend to care much for the serious one or the sideways laughing one (no 3) but personally I like no 1. very much and intend to have it framed & in a conspicuous place. It is good of you too, tho of course it is only one of your many charming expressions. I hope that in time we shall get others.
How did your new bathing shorts feel when you went swimming the other day? I hope they are big enough, this time.
You’ve no idea of the work that is entailed in a weekend visit to the country! Naturally we have take all our rations with us, & I’ve bought & boiled a piece of bacon & am taking a tin of butter, & our meat ration for Vera to cook down there.
[page break]
It’s going to be a problem to get all the stuff, food, nappies etc for Frances & our own clothes into a manageable space (we don’t want to have to have a taxi) = rucksacks seem the only solution.
The Greenish’s house was burgled on Whit Sunday while they were out playing golf, so I am rather nervous on that score. I have asked the neighbours to keep an eye on the house, & have notified the police too. The worst of it is that it seems to be chiefly food & clothes that they are after (there have been several burglaries around here recently) & even suppose an insurance co. paid up for losses, you wouldn’t get coupons to buy new clothes with or to make up for your stored provisions. So we must lock up well & hope nothing happens.
When I went to the police station to notify them I saw the sergeant with whom I had a bet ages ago about
[page break]
(3.)
the spelling of Aberystwyth. He recognised me, and gave me a long discourse on the subject. It seems that althou’ the spelling as above, with two ‘y’s in common, it is incorrect. He asked a professor of Cardiff University about it, who tells him that it should be spelt Aberystwith, but is spelt generally with two ‘ys’ as a sop] to the commercial English – tho’ why, I can’t imagine. However we agreed to call the bet off, & I shall continue to spell it with two ‘y’s.
I’m sorry the leave situation is so poor. I have heard various stories recently of all RAF leave being cancelled & chaps being recalled, so I think we were pretty lucky that you got yours when you did.
I have been thinking a lot recently about Algy (the bulge,)
[new page]
Don’t you know) and I feel more & more that we ought to inaugurate him in your next leave. It seems of primary importance to me that Frances shouldn’t be an only child, even if it means a harder struggle financially. If all goes well with you, it would be grand to double our family soon, if you are taken prisoner, then all the more reason for getting Algy on the stocks pretty soon, and if the very worst happened, then as I said it seems to me more important that Frances should have a companion than that we should be better off financially by that small margin. Let me know what you feel about it. and then apply for leave!!
Peter will be down for later at the end of June, but I thought that would be OK as you’d hardly be likely to get leave by then. If you [underlined] should [/underlined] I’d ask him to go to the Hillman’s.
With all my love to you my own darling
Ursula.
Collection
Citation
Ursula Valentine, “Letter from Ursula Valentine to her husband John Valentine,” IBCC Digital Archive, accessed April 18, 2024, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/document/19903.
Item Relations
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