Letter from Mervyn Adder to his family
Title
Letter from Mervyn Adder to his family
Description
Letter and explanatory note. Mentions recent sergeants' dance to which officers could be invited. Gives a detailed description of an escape exercise that his crew and three other took part in. Mentions that they have a new wing commander who was related to Mary as well as a photograph put in the papers.
Creator
Temporal Coverage
Language
Format
Four page handwritten letter and printed explanatory note
Conforms To
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
SAdderM175073v10082, SAdderM175073v10081
Transcription
Sgts Mess.
RAF Station
Dunholme Lodge.
Monday
Dear All,
I haven’t very much to tell you this time as I wrote on Friday, but as I forgot to put my shorts in the parcel am going to make another parcel, and thought I would just write a short note to put in with them.
We had a Sergeants Dance here on Saturday night all the crew with the exception of Jock & Gerry went and we could invite Officers so Terry came along and we had a very good time indeed. There was plenty to eat, sandwiches, cakes and chocolate biscuits, and of course plenty to drink, I concentrated on the eats more than the drinks as I wanted to dance, but it didn’t really matter as non-dancers, inebriates all danced.
On Sunday morning our crew, along with three others, was on an escape exercise
[page break]
and we all came prepared for a nine mile ramble across fields wearing numerous sweaters, scarves and thick boots. We were given a map and compass and paired off, I went along with Johnny, and were then taken in a blacked out lorry into the country and about eight miles from Camp, from there we were to find our way back to Camp without being captured by the Home Guard, RAF Regiment, S.P’s and Police searchers.
It was a cold morning, the ground was hard as it had been freezing during the night but we soon became warm scrambling over hedges and jumping across ditches so that we really started to enjoy ourselves. We made very good time but were spotted by an S.P. when we were a mile from Camp and had to run for it, Johnny dropped behind as he was tired and I thought he had been caught, for when I looked round after jumping a ditch
[page break]
I couldn’t see Johnny or the S.P. I continued and was the first back, Johnny came in about half an hour later, he had jumped in a ditch and stopped there for about ten minutes before he dare stick his head out, but managed to give this S.P the slip. He lost his way then and was in somebodies front garden in Dunholme when some more S.P’s overtook him as he was trying to explain to the owner of the house what he was doing there. We enjoyed the show very much, there is another one on tonight but we are not in it.
We have just got a new Wing Co. and strangely enough he is the chap who is married to Mary’s cousin, I had seen a photograph of him and recognised him as soon as I saw him.
Did I tell you in my last letter that our
[page break]
photograph was put in the paper, it was only a column size and Jock and I who were standing on either side are not on, however they must have sent Jock’s up to a Scottish newspaper as his Mother had seen it in the paper and sent it to him. We are going to get copies of the photograph.
I dont [sic] think there is anything else to tell you at the moment so cheerio for now.
Love to All
Mervyn
P.S Our leave is moved back to March 4th
[underlined] Later [/underlined]
Wednesday.
Received parcel OK. Thanks a lot for the toffee and the apple – they were grand
[page break]
1944
This is a letter to all the family. This gives an interesting insight into an escape exercise. Straight from Dad’s Army. Mervyn was first back to camp, emphasising how athletic he was. His partner ended up in someone’s front garden and had to explain his presence to the owner!
He mentions Mary’s cousin’s husband who was a Wing Commander.
I wonder if he got his leave in March. I suspect not.
RAF Station
Dunholme Lodge.
Monday
Dear All,
I haven’t very much to tell you this time as I wrote on Friday, but as I forgot to put my shorts in the parcel am going to make another parcel, and thought I would just write a short note to put in with them.
We had a Sergeants Dance here on Saturday night all the crew with the exception of Jock & Gerry went and we could invite Officers so Terry came along and we had a very good time indeed. There was plenty to eat, sandwiches, cakes and chocolate biscuits, and of course plenty to drink, I concentrated on the eats more than the drinks as I wanted to dance, but it didn’t really matter as non-dancers, inebriates all danced.
On Sunday morning our crew, along with three others, was on an escape exercise
[page break]
and we all came prepared for a nine mile ramble across fields wearing numerous sweaters, scarves and thick boots. We were given a map and compass and paired off, I went along with Johnny, and were then taken in a blacked out lorry into the country and about eight miles from Camp, from there we were to find our way back to Camp without being captured by the Home Guard, RAF Regiment, S.P’s and Police searchers.
It was a cold morning, the ground was hard as it had been freezing during the night but we soon became warm scrambling over hedges and jumping across ditches so that we really started to enjoy ourselves. We made very good time but were spotted by an S.P. when we were a mile from Camp and had to run for it, Johnny dropped behind as he was tired and I thought he had been caught, for when I looked round after jumping a ditch
[page break]
I couldn’t see Johnny or the S.P. I continued and was the first back, Johnny came in about half an hour later, he had jumped in a ditch and stopped there for about ten minutes before he dare stick his head out, but managed to give this S.P the slip. He lost his way then and was in somebodies front garden in Dunholme when some more S.P’s overtook him as he was trying to explain to the owner of the house what he was doing there. We enjoyed the show very much, there is another one on tonight but we are not in it.
We have just got a new Wing Co. and strangely enough he is the chap who is married to Mary’s cousin, I had seen a photograph of him and recognised him as soon as I saw him.
Did I tell you in my last letter that our
[page break]
photograph was put in the paper, it was only a column size and Jock and I who were standing on either side are not on, however they must have sent Jock’s up to a Scottish newspaper as his Mother had seen it in the paper and sent it to him. We are going to get copies of the photograph.
I dont [sic] think there is anything else to tell you at the moment so cheerio for now.
Love to All
Mervyn
P.S Our leave is moved back to March 4th
[underlined] Later [/underlined]
Wednesday.
Received parcel OK. Thanks a lot for the toffee and the apple – they were grand
[page break]
1944
This is a letter to all the family. This gives an interesting insight into an escape exercise. Straight from Dad’s Army. Mervyn was first back to camp, emphasising how athletic he was. His partner ended up in someone’s front garden and had to explain his presence to the owner!
He mentions Mary’s cousin’s husband who was a Wing Commander.
I wonder if he got his leave in March. I suspect not.
Collection
Citation
M Adder, “Letter from Mervyn Adder to his family,” IBCC Digital Archive, accessed April 19, 2024, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/omeka/collections/document/33260.
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