Letter to Douglas Hudson from his parents
Title
Letter to Douglas Hudson from his parents
Description
Glad to receive cable from him as no letters for eight weeks. Glad he is getting letters and hopes calendars will arrive soon. Understand a little why no letters due to disturbance in his part of world recently. Catches up with family news and asks after his culinary activities. Talks of rationing and shortages. Writes of father's activities and health. Mentions neighbour bringing gifts and reminisces over past.
Creator
Date
1941-11-19
Spatial Coverage
Language
Format
Two page handwritten letter and envelope
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
EHudsonP-HEHudsonJD411119
Transcription
Prisoners of War Post
[inserted] 87 [/inserted]
[underlined] Air Mail [/underlined]
[postmark] [two ink stamps]
PRISONER OF WAR POST
755052 Sgt. J. D. Hudson
Interned British Airman
Camp Militaire
[underlined] Laghouat [/underlined]
Algerie
Afrique du Nord.
[page break]
From Mrs Hudson
191 Halifax Road
Nelson
Lancs.
England.
[four German ink stamps]
Geöffnet
[inserted] 13-2-42 [/inserted]
[page break]
[inserted] 1625 _ 5827 [/inserted]
[inserted] 87 [/inserted]
191 Halifax Road
Nelson. Lancs.
England.
Wed. 19th Nov/41.
My dear Douglas.
You can imagine what a joy it was for us to have your cable on Monday morning. We have not had a letter from you for eight weeks last Saturday & in these circumstances the cabled messages are priceless. I am so glad you are getting my letters all right & hope you will soon get the calendars which I’ve sent in the hope that you will have a little pleasure from them. We can understand a little why we have not had any letters recently, there has been so much disturbance in your part of the world.
Well love I don’t seem to have much news to give you. A post-card from Auntie Maud in Edinburgh tells that she is having a very happy time with Molly & Co. & that baby Andrew continues to thrive. Auntie Dorothy has taken to writing more frequently. I think the reason for that is that Grandad was very happy with us & seemed pleased when we suggested that he should come & stay with us again in the Spring when our apple tree (which we expect to have delivered any time) is in bloom, says she most optimistically!!! I often wonder about your culinary efforts – are you still allowed to
[page break]
do your own cooking & are you able to get things to cook. How I do wish I could send you a cake occasionally!! Not that I do much baking.!! In fact I’ve not done any for several months owing to the shortages or perhaps it would be more correct to say “rationing”, as we’ve not had any real shortages of essential food. But this week our ration of sugar & fats is increased so I made a cake & a mince pasty. The mince-meat is supposed to be distributed as part of our jam ration. Tonight Dad goes out again – the nights come round so quickly & Dad doesn’t seem to have properly recovered from his severe cold. He is very irritable & not very hungry & gets very angry if I mention his lack of appetite. Says the Hudson’s don’t eat much!! Thank goodness I’m not a Hudson!! Did I tell you in a previous letter that Miss Chester (next door) had been at Blackpool for a week's holiday. She came in last night & brought me the most beautiful calendar – a little gift from Blackpool which pleases me very much but which I must leave in its pretty box until New Year’s Day.
It is very raw & cold here today & the view is restricted to the far edge of the “lake” with a real November haze. I wonder if you will remember that it is 19 years on November 21st since I took you to school. The memory is still very vivid. I didn’t like to lose my baby & it felt like that when I left you at school with the other little children. We’ve travelled many roads together since then, rough & smooth & what a mercy that memory seems to single out the smooth & happy ways. Goodbye once again
With all our love & thoughts & “Happy Christmas” from Mother & Dad.
755052 Hudson
Camp Militaire
Laghouat Algerie
Afrique du Nord.
[inserted] 87 [/inserted]
[underlined] Air Mail [/underlined]
[postmark] [two ink stamps]
PRISONER OF WAR POST
755052 Sgt. J. D. Hudson
Interned British Airman
Camp Militaire
[underlined] Laghouat [/underlined]
Algerie
Afrique du Nord.
[page break]
From Mrs Hudson
191 Halifax Road
Nelson
Lancs.
England.
[four German ink stamps]
Geöffnet
[inserted] 13-2-42 [/inserted]
[page break]
[inserted] 1625 _ 5827 [/inserted]
[inserted] 87 [/inserted]
191 Halifax Road
Nelson. Lancs.
England.
Wed. 19th Nov/41.
My dear Douglas.
You can imagine what a joy it was for us to have your cable on Monday morning. We have not had a letter from you for eight weeks last Saturday & in these circumstances the cabled messages are priceless. I am so glad you are getting my letters all right & hope you will soon get the calendars which I’ve sent in the hope that you will have a little pleasure from them. We can understand a little why we have not had any letters recently, there has been so much disturbance in your part of the world.
Well love I don’t seem to have much news to give you. A post-card from Auntie Maud in Edinburgh tells that she is having a very happy time with Molly & Co. & that baby Andrew continues to thrive. Auntie Dorothy has taken to writing more frequently. I think the reason for that is that Grandad was very happy with us & seemed pleased when we suggested that he should come & stay with us again in the Spring when our apple tree (which we expect to have delivered any time) is in bloom, says she most optimistically!!! I often wonder about your culinary efforts – are you still allowed to
[page break]
do your own cooking & are you able to get things to cook. How I do wish I could send you a cake occasionally!! Not that I do much baking.!! In fact I’ve not done any for several months owing to the shortages or perhaps it would be more correct to say “rationing”, as we’ve not had any real shortages of essential food. But this week our ration of sugar & fats is increased so I made a cake & a mince pasty. The mince-meat is supposed to be distributed as part of our jam ration. Tonight Dad goes out again – the nights come round so quickly & Dad doesn’t seem to have properly recovered from his severe cold. He is very irritable & not very hungry & gets very angry if I mention his lack of appetite. Says the Hudson’s don’t eat much!! Thank goodness I’m not a Hudson!! Did I tell you in a previous letter that Miss Chester (next door) had been at Blackpool for a week's holiday. She came in last night & brought me the most beautiful calendar – a little gift from Blackpool which pleases me very much but which I must leave in its pretty box until New Year’s Day.
It is very raw & cold here today & the view is restricted to the far edge of the “lake” with a real November haze. I wonder if you will remember that it is 19 years on November 21st since I took you to school. The memory is still very vivid. I didn’t like to lose my baby & it felt like that when I left you at school with the other little children. We’ve travelled many roads together since then, rough & smooth & what a mercy that memory seems to single out the smooth & happy ways. Goodbye once again
With all our love & thoughts & “Happy Christmas” from Mother & Dad.
755052 Hudson
Camp Militaire
Laghouat Algerie
Afrique du Nord.
Collection
Citation
P Hudson, “Letter to Douglas Hudson from his parents,” IBCC Digital Archive, accessed April 23, 2024, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/document/23395.
Item Relations
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