Letter to prisoner of war John Valentine from his wife Ursula
Title
Letter to prisoner of war John Valentine from his wife Ursula
Description
Still waiting to move into their new house. Reports arrival of his letters written in September and writes describing their new house. Mentions finances and sends Christmas greetings and talks of future plans. Concludes with mention of daughter's new hair ribbon.
Creator
Date
1943-11-01
Temporal Coverage
Language
Format
Two 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
EValentineUMValentineJRM431101
Transcription
Start of transcription
To Sgt JRM Valentine
British P/W No. 483
Stalag Luft VI via Luft III
Germany.
[stamp GEPRUFT 25]
From Mrs Valentine
Little Close, Devon Road
Salcombe Devon.
1st November 1943
My own darling Johnnie,
I expected to be up in town today wrestling with the house-decoration, but the solicitors apparently couldn’t get it all fixed up for 30th October as at first arranged, so I’m still waiting. What [underlined] do [/underlined] solicitors do all day long? During the week I received your letter of Sept. 5th & one or two earlier cards. In this letter you write a good deal about the house at Bromfield & sound as enthusiastic about it as I was. What a pity that it turned out to be such a wreck! If only it had been as sound as it looked at first sight it would have done fine. Felmersham is definitely not so picturesque, it is only 12 years old, & it is hard for a semi-detached house to look picturesque. But it is built of brick, not rough-cast, which I dislike, & its garden is much bigger than the one at Bromfield though it hasn’t the old trees which were there. Anyway I was very glad to see from your letter that you approve of buying a house even tho’ it hasn’t all the land we wanted – we couldn’t have afforded it. I was also very pleased to see that you have ordered an extra allowance from the RAF for me. I haven’t heard from them about it – in fact they have just docked me my 3/6 London allowance six weeks in arrear – a wonderful system of accounts, truly! I will give you more exact descriptions of your new home-to-be when I get there – I have thought & dreamed & wondered & calculated such
[page break]
a lot about it since I saw it over 2 months ago that I really can’t remember any more what is fact & what wishful thinking.
It seems a long way off to Christmas but this letter may not reach you till then, so I send you my warmest Christmas wishes & a special big dollop of love. Its no good any Christmas pretending to be the real thing until you come home again. Frances & I will probably be down here again for the holiday, since Ba & Peter hope to be here too & Mother is very anxious to have the family united, so I expect there will be considerable jollification, but my heart will be with you, my darling. Mother & Daddy are ordering a book to be sent to you for a Christmas present, which will probably reach you for your birthday. I haven’t sent you anything apart from your quarterly parcel, but if funds allow I’ll buy you a present for the house or garden. I want to put in several fruit trees & bushes & am just waiting to see how much I have left over from the £40 I have put aside for the removal. While living here of course I have saved money but most of it is earmarked, £8 for paint, floor stain, brushes, kettles & other ironmongery bought in Kingsbridge & sent direct to the house (this includes paint for the outside woodwork which I hope to tackle in the spring) £5 for the Building Society’s solicitor, £8 to Mother for the green carpet which was in the back bedroom at Lido & is destined for our sittingroom – so it goes on. I have had 2 very nice letters from George Touche about your Rolex watches, but the matter isn’t settled quite yet, tho’ everyone is eager to help. Frances now wears a small blue ribbon to restrain the “curl right down the middle of the forehead.” She sends you a big kiss. Yours always Ursula
To Sgt JRM Valentine
British P/W No. 483
Stalag Luft VI via Luft III
Germany.
[stamp GEPRUFT 25]
From Mrs Valentine
Little Close, Devon Road
Salcombe Devon.
1st November 1943
My own darling Johnnie,
I expected to be up in town today wrestling with the house-decoration, but the solicitors apparently couldn’t get it all fixed up for 30th October as at first arranged, so I’m still waiting. What [underlined] do [/underlined] solicitors do all day long? During the week I received your letter of Sept. 5th & one or two earlier cards. In this letter you write a good deal about the house at Bromfield & sound as enthusiastic about it as I was. What a pity that it turned out to be such a wreck! If only it had been as sound as it looked at first sight it would have done fine. Felmersham is definitely not so picturesque, it is only 12 years old, & it is hard for a semi-detached house to look picturesque. But it is built of brick, not rough-cast, which I dislike, & its garden is much bigger than the one at Bromfield though it hasn’t the old trees which were there. Anyway I was very glad to see from your letter that you approve of buying a house even tho’ it hasn’t all the land we wanted – we couldn’t have afforded it. I was also very pleased to see that you have ordered an extra allowance from the RAF for me. I haven’t heard from them about it – in fact they have just docked me my 3/6 London allowance six weeks in arrear – a wonderful system of accounts, truly! I will give you more exact descriptions of your new home-to-be when I get there – I have thought & dreamed & wondered & calculated such
[page break]
a lot about it since I saw it over 2 months ago that I really can’t remember any more what is fact & what wishful thinking.
It seems a long way off to Christmas but this letter may not reach you till then, so I send you my warmest Christmas wishes & a special big dollop of love. Its no good any Christmas pretending to be the real thing until you come home again. Frances & I will probably be down here again for the holiday, since Ba & Peter hope to be here too & Mother is very anxious to have the family united, so I expect there will be considerable jollification, but my heart will be with you, my darling. Mother & Daddy are ordering a book to be sent to you for a Christmas present, which will probably reach you for your birthday. I haven’t sent you anything apart from your quarterly parcel, but if funds allow I’ll buy you a present for the house or garden. I want to put in several fruit trees & bushes & am just waiting to see how much I have left over from the £40 I have put aside for the removal. While living here of course I have saved money but most of it is earmarked, £8 for paint, floor stain, brushes, kettles & other ironmongery bought in Kingsbridge & sent direct to the house (this includes paint for the outside woodwork which I hope to tackle in the spring) £5 for the Building Society’s solicitor, £8 to Mother for the green carpet which was in the back bedroom at Lido & is destined for our sittingroom – so it goes on. I have had 2 very nice letters from George Touche about your Rolex watches, but the matter isn’t settled quite yet, tho’ everyone is eager to help. Frances now wears a small blue ribbon to restrain the “curl right down the middle of the forehead.” She sends you a big kiss. Yours always Ursula
Collection
Citation
Ursula Valentine, “Letter to prisoner of war John Valentine from his wife Ursula,” IBCC Digital Archive, accessed April 26, 2024, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/document/20066.
Item Relations
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