Letter from Douglas Hudson to his parents
Title
Letter from Douglas Hudson to his parents
Description
Written on boxing night reports arrival of letters. Hope letters home have started to arrive. Catches up with family and friends news. Says he was thinking of them over Christmas day. Writes of availability of cheap wine and champagne and drinking to absent friends. Reports arrival of Red Cross parcels just before Christmas and use of items in them to supplement food. Continues with more family gossip and mentions how much he smokes and how much it costs. Concludes saying he is off to prepare couscous.
Creator
Date
1941-12-26
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
EHudsonJDHudsonP-HE411226
Transcription
Royal Air Force. 755052. Sgt. J. D. Hudson.
c/o. Consul Général des Etats Unis.
Rue Michelet.
Alger. Algérie. Afrique du Nord.
26-12-41.
My Dear Mother & Dad,
I am writing this letter to you on Boxing Night, and I am very pleased to say that I received five letters on Dec. 23rd just as I finished writing my previous letter to you. They were:- Mothers dated Nov. 2nd 11th & 16th, Dad’s of Nov. 12th & Mary’s of Nov. 14th. I am also very glad to learn from your latest cable, to which I replied immediately, that you received six letters from me, the latest dated September 17th, after an absence of mail of about 14 weeks. Several people are receiving cables saying that the mail has started arriving again. Let us hope that this will continue, but that future letters will be more speedy in getting through. Mother mentions how much she misses me. I know this only too well, and I can so honestly say that I miss you both just as much. It will be the greatest day in my life when we meet again, and it cannot arrive too quickly. It is the main thing for which I live these times. Christmas is now over and I have been thinking about you all the time. Under the circumstances we didn’t do too badly. As you know wine is very cheap here and there is plenty of it. Accordingly we had plenty, also quite a stock of Mausseux, which is a cheap champagne. On Christmas eve, or rather Christmas morning it was 1. am, a few of us, at the suggestion of the British C.O. here who said “as we seem to be the only sober people at this stage of the proceedings, let us drink to Absent Friends,” did so, and I hope the message the toast contained made your ears burn, if you were still awake. We utilised many of our Red Cross Parcel items to supplement our food, and opened tins of stew, peas, ham etc. and
[page break]
made milk and cream to go with our home made rice pudding, & Red Cross sultana pudding. These Red Cross Parcels arrived just before Christmas and I am convinced we were just as excited as any normal kid is on receiving presents from Santa Claus. I don’t think it is necessary now for you to send the soap & tea I asked for as these have been supplied by the Red Cross. Just as you wish, however. Well, I was very pleased to learn from Dad’s letter that work & business are going well and do hope they will continue like that. Nobody knows better than I do that Dad deserves some real good luck. I am interested to learn that you got the book “In Lightest Africa” and that it tells about Laghouat. What you mention is quite fitting with the little I have found out. Tony & I both received the book mark calendars you sent, & in my last envelope I included a note of thanks written by Tony. He has received since a Christmas card from Mother for which he sends his thanks and appreciation. The large calendar has not arrived yet. It is good to hear that Dad gets his 50 or 60 cigarettes & 1 oz of tobacco. I smoke about 140 cigarettes weekly at 2 francs for 20. I don’t know the rate (if there is one) of exchange, but imagine 2 francs is about 2d. They are made from black tobacco which is very much stronger than the English cigs. & far less scented. To-day I received a cable from E.W.7 with a pre-paid reply & sent off an answer immediately to the [indecipherable word] Athenaeum. It was good to receive these greetings and I appreciate them no end. I will now say good-bye until next letter. Jimmy & I are going to prepare a supper dish of Cous-Cous (like Semolina) boiled up in milk (our own made) with juice to flavour. I have Lemon Curd, Bramble Jelly, Plum, Honey, & Plum & Apples in my selection. They are useful. Also tin of pineapples, & prunes. As ever all my love & thoughts. Douglas.
c/o. Consul Général des Etats Unis.
Rue Michelet.
Alger. Algérie. Afrique du Nord.
26-12-41.
My Dear Mother & Dad,
I am writing this letter to you on Boxing Night, and I am very pleased to say that I received five letters on Dec. 23rd just as I finished writing my previous letter to you. They were:- Mothers dated Nov. 2nd 11th & 16th, Dad’s of Nov. 12th & Mary’s of Nov. 14th. I am also very glad to learn from your latest cable, to which I replied immediately, that you received six letters from me, the latest dated September 17th, after an absence of mail of about 14 weeks. Several people are receiving cables saying that the mail has started arriving again. Let us hope that this will continue, but that future letters will be more speedy in getting through. Mother mentions how much she misses me. I know this only too well, and I can so honestly say that I miss you both just as much. It will be the greatest day in my life when we meet again, and it cannot arrive too quickly. It is the main thing for which I live these times. Christmas is now over and I have been thinking about you all the time. Under the circumstances we didn’t do too badly. As you know wine is very cheap here and there is plenty of it. Accordingly we had plenty, also quite a stock of Mausseux, which is a cheap champagne. On Christmas eve, or rather Christmas morning it was 1. am, a few of us, at the suggestion of the British C.O. here who said “as we seem to be the only sober people at this stage of the proceedings, let us drink to Absent Friends,” did so, and I hope the message the toast contained made your ears burn, if you were still awake. We utilised many of our Red Cross Parcel items to supplement our food, and opened tins of stew, peas, ham etc. and
[page break]
made milk and cream to go with our home made rice pudding, & Red Cross sultana pudding. These Red Cross Parcels arrived just before Christmas and I am convinced we were just as excited as any normal kid is on receiving presents from Santa Claus. I don’t think it is necessary now for you to send the soap & tea I asked for as these have been supplied by the Red Cross. Just as you wish, however. Well, I was very pleased to learn from Dad’s letter that work & business are going well and do hope they will continue like that. Nobody knows better than I do that Dad deserves some real good luck. I am interested to learn that you got the book “In Lightest Africa” and that it tells about Laghouat. What you mention is quite fitting with the little I have found out. Tony & I both received the book mark calendars you sent, & in my last envelope I included a note of thanks written by Tony. He has received since a Christmas card from Mother for which he sends his thanks and appreciation. The large calendar has not arrived yet. It is good to hear that Dad gets his 50 or 60 cigarettes & 1 oz of tobacco. I smoke about 140 cigarettes weekly at 2 francs for 20. I don’t know the rate (if there is one) of exchange, but imagine 2 francs is about 2d. They are made from black tobacco which is very much stronger than the English cigs. & far less scented. To-day I received a cable from E.W.7 with a pre-paid reply & sent off an answer immediately to the [indecipherable word] Athenaeum. It was good to receive these greetings and I appreciate them no end. I will now say good-bye until next letter. Jimmy & I are going to prepare a supper dish of Cous-Cous (like Semolina) boiled up in milk (our own made) with juice to flavour. I have Lemon Curd, Bramble Jelly, Plum, Honey, & Plum & Apples in my selection. They are useful. Also tin of pineapples, & prunes. As ever all my love & thoughts. Douglas.
Collection
Citation
James Douglas Hudson, “Letter from Douglas Hudson to his parents,” IBCC Digital Archive, accessed April 23, 2024, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/document/22577.
Item Relations
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