Letter from Terry Ford to his family

Letter from Terry Ford to his family

Terry Ford writes to his parents about his trip to Knaresborough with his friend John. He requested various items of clothing and footwear.

1943-09-22

Five 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.

EFordTAFord[Fam]430922-0001,
EFordTAFord[Fam]430922-0002,
EFordTAFord[Fam]430922-0003,
EFordTAFord[Fam]430922-0004,
EFordTAFord[Fam]430922-0005

P/O FORD. T.A.
Officers Mess
RAF Station
CALVELEY,
Nr. NANTWICH
Cheshire.

22-9-43.

Dear Folks,
Thanks a lot for the long letter. I was very pleased to hear of your favourable reception by the Great White Chief. Still if you have to wait a month before you even go to see him again, its going to be some time before you get organised isn’t it?

About the Income Tax dad, I was thinking if I have to pay it at all I might as well do it in a lump sum, as by cheque I shan’t really miss it. What do you think?

As you see we have been posted at last, thank goodness although I had a wizard time the last week in Harrogate

[page break]

On Saturday, I had some very amusing experiences. John & I went Knaresborough on the bus. In the queue an old boy had a fit & carried on a bit. When we got Knaresborough we went on the river & just ahead of us a boat containing two women and a child sank after striking a submerged rock. The child made a dickens of a row, but were rescued O.K. by another boat. We hastened to see if we could help, but I lost control & we nearly sank the rescue craft which caused the small child to give vent to hideous howls again, so we withdrew quickly.

On going back to Harrogate I met another RAF friend & we went for a drink. He

[page break]

introduced me to some very nice girls. In the course of buying some beer I was loudly accused by the bar-maid of swindling her by giving her a two bob bit instead of a half-crown. On retiring discomfited I knocked a couple of whiskies over. I may say that I was completely sober all the evening though rather happy. We then decided to go to the mess dance. [deleted word] my partner & I got in free, but I marred that by knocking over a chairful of whiskies, which someone had left. Luckily they didn’t seem to mind.

To finish up the evening I went to what is usually the gent’s cloakroom, not knowing it had been changed into the ladies for that evening. I soon found out though, when a mob of screaming women threw me out

[page break]

on my ear (actually there were only three but it seemed more). After that the evening went off happily but uneventfully.

This station is the last word in primitiveness, almost as bad as Don’s tents, but it should be quite pleasant when we get going tomorrow. It should last 6 weeks but it will probably be longer as the weather is bad.

Could you please send [underlined] all [/underlined] my woollen socks & my RAF black boots please mum as quickly as possible as I have gone through both my pairs of shoes. I will send a pair for grampy to mend as soon as I can find some brown paper.

Do you think it would be safe to send my bike on here? If not I will pop home if I can & fetch it if we get a week-end off? We have a long way

[page break]
to walk as the station is very spread out. If there are any thick sweaters being given away by anyone, one of those would come in useful too, but don’t go out of your way

You are probably wondering why I am writing so much, but as this place is quite a way from anywhere & the mess isn’t very entertaining I haven’t much else to do.

Anyway I will close now,
With much love
Terry

[page break]