Letter from David Boldy to his father

Letter from David Boldy to his father

Letter from Leading Aircraftsman David Boldy to his father about about his air gunner course at East London.

1941-03-16

Three page handwritten letter

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923995 D. A. BOLDY. R.A.F.,
U/T Air Gunner,
No 41 Air School,
East London,
16th March, 1941.

My darling Dad,
Sorry for not having posted the letter enclosed with this one earlier but I just didn’t have any money. We have lived on practically nothing for weeks but managed pretty well. We shall now get regular pay - £1 1s per week till the end of the course.
Quite a lot of things have happened since I last wrote. We were at Port Elizabeth for a fortnight & we then came to East London as you will have seen from the address. After we had been at P.E. for a fortnight we again brought up the subject of a speedy training. We were interviewed by the adjutant who was awfully decent and promised us action within 24 hours. The promised action came off. Next morning we were told that we had been granted ten days leave [indecipherable word] berth accommodation on the train for Cape Town. Our leave was scheduled to commence at 4.30p.m. At 4.00p.m. word came through that we had been posted to East London & off we went. None of us were very happy [deleted] to be [/deleted] at P.E. and were not sorry to leave. The camp here is a lively one. Jolly good food & pretty nearly no red tape. What is more we have got
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cracking on the course right away. It is entirely a S. African course usually consisting of 30 S. Africans but the six of us have been included. The course is a very good one & the teaching thorough. I am enjoying the course immensely it is much more in my line. We have been on the range once to get our eye in. We shot with .22 rifles, I got 135 – 150. Not as good as I should have liked it to be. The course is done in two sections. 4 weeks of instruction on guns, morse code (eventually to receive at 20 words a minute) & aerial sighting. It is very interesting. The [deleted][indecipherable word][/deleted] second section also 4 weeks consists of flying - shooting in the air & dual flying – the latter pleases me immensely. In the first session we fire machine guns on the ground & also camera guns. I think we are all going to enjoy this. Incidentally we are still [underlined] R.A.F. [/underlined]
East London is a quiet sea-side resort but we are having a grand time here & have met any number of people including a number of girls. I have not fallen for any of them. Some of them are very sweet all the same. The very first day we were here we met some Scotchmen & a S. African officer at a hotel. A party of 7 of us had a terrific binge. It did us [deleted] the [/deleted] a world of good. We felt new men. Since then we have been out nearly every evening & have been taken everywhere. – To the flicks, pub-crawling, bathing & to peoples homes etc. Everyone has been really damn decent to us.
You will be glad to hear that I am taking an intelligent interest in this course. That is definitely a good sign. I intend to be a damn good
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[underlined] 2 [/underlined]
Air gunner. I am sure I shall like it.
I have quite a number of snaps to send you [deleted] whitch [/deleted] which I shall send on shortly. I have got into touch with Thomas Cook’s regarding the [deleted] cable yo [/deleted] money you sent. It was damn decent of you Dad. I did not like asking for it. But we thought we were going home & had a last fling in S. Africa as we thought. Also our new rate of pay 3s per day is not bad but it doesn’t cover a great deal. Still the main thing is that we are happy at East London, almost as happy as we were at Cape Town. I shall send a photograph of Shirley the girl I met at Cape Town. We had some good times there. We may go there on leave after the course. But I am not thinking of that at the moment. I am working instead. I pay attention at lectures & then do a spot of consolidating [deleted] at [/deleted] after lectures.
Some of us went roller skating at P.E. and enjoyed it. Apart from the little married girl and her friend I had no regrets in leaving P.E. I met her brother here yesterday he had motored in for the week-end from P.E. He is a nice lad. I was very pleased to see him.
I play quite a bit of Table Tennis these days. The only other exercise I get is swimming at weekends with sunbathing combined. I am getting quite brown. No more today. God bless you. Love & kisses from
Your loving son [underlined] David. [/underlined]