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The Townend Family Letters

Correspondence from the 1930s - 1940s between members of the Townend family
Annette's Letters to Parents

1939 - 1940

Postcard from France from Annette to Mrs A.B.S. Townend

29.8.39

We have been told that the night boats have been suspended, so we will come by the day boat on Thursday instead, arriving Thursday evening. I hope it will not put the H.D’s out too much. Apparently both trains and boats are uncertain, so I will telephone from London to say what train I am catching but I expect to catch the 7.15. If we are too late for that, I will ring up from Victoria. I hope someone will be able to meet me.

Love Annette

P.S. On third thoughts, I will phone anyway to be quite sure.

From Annette to Parents

Highways

Gt Leighs

13 Oct 1939

Dear Parents,

Most of this week’s happenings seem to be departures. Gavin went yesterday morning, Winsome today, to get the house at Ashtead ready for the others, who are driving tomorrow. I am going tomorrow too, instead of today, as previously arranged. I suppose nobody is having any ‘collections’ at the beginning of term, and so they have changed the going-up date to Saturday. I thought they might be stopping all the prizes for which we were supposed to have written our vac. essays, and was beginning to regret my industry in July, although actually the work I put in will be useful anyway, but I heard that there is still one general prize open, so I sent the essay in last week, and we shall presume, get them back with comments.

It is real autumn weather now, with a lot of mist, and the trees are turning very pretty, but it is warm enough to sit out for some time when the sun has got through the mist.

I have been doing a certain amount of work, and a certain amount of dressmaking, taking up a lot of hems which I was too lazy to do last year. On Tuesday I went round selling flags for the Red Cross day, up to the bungalows and round Little Leighs. Charlotte and Winsome came up to the end of the bungalows, as Charlotte was very keen to hold the moneybox, and Winsome came to take her home when she got tired. We had quite a lot of happy chat with the inhabitants. Old Mrs Mansfield almost sobbed with pleasure at seeing us, and said that her stomach was very bad, and what a nice lady my grandmother was. I didn’t know she knew of the family even over at Witham.

Richard has been cutting up the oak tree they were cutting down last week. If somebody doesn’t keep an eye on Uncle, he’ll be cutting down all the trees at the back of the hut, as he once started on the big oak tree’s branches when nobody was looking. Last night we went to a 6d dance at the village hall. Fuller of smoke than ever, what with the black-out, but quite enjoyable. May Mac came along too, because she was pining for a little life, she said. We get a lot of people, because this is one of the very few places to start social events going again.

We went to see “Beau Geste” on Monday, and were pleased to find it stuck so well to the book; we didn’t like to see the small boys as Americans, but otherwise were pretty well satisfied. Which reminds me that we were all surprised to find you so crushing about “The four feathers”.

Uncle Harry and Gavin have had some more arguments. it is rather terrible to see how impossible it seems for people to get any further when they have no common ground of ideas at all. It is like I felt in Germany when someone wanted to discuss politics with me, and was talking about responsibility for the last war. You couldn’t argue, because each side was in a world of its own, as it were.

Much love from

Annette

From Annette to Parents

Somerville College

Oxford

22.10.39

Dear Parents,

I have had a very pleasant birthday. I thank you for the kind gift you said you had sent off. It hasn’t yet arrived, but it doubtless will shortly. I had a little picture, another Van Gogh, from Christina, and six lovely pink chrysanthemums from Gavin, and another big bunch of chrysanthemums from Margaret Thompson and Barbara Roscoe. I took Romey out to lunch. She could not get down till late so there was not much time between lunch and tea, which was lucky, as there is nothing to do anyway on Sunday. I had a tea party, to which came Ann and Christina, Gavin, Gerry Irvine, John Macbeth and my neighbour in my new room, who knows Gavin, Kathleen Jordan.

My room is on the ground floor in Penrose, a corner room with two windows. There are large cubboards and a desk in all the Penrose rooms, and besides there is a nice view of the quad, and other facilities very nearly as handy as in my old room. We are not much disturbed by the war, as so many of the colleges are. West, opposite Penrose, is full of nurses and a clinical school. The people from there had to go to L.M.H. which they don’t like, as it is so far away. I am glad I didn’t choose a room there, not that I ever thought of doing so. The black-out is a bit of a bore not in our rooms, but it is almost pitch dark in the corridors and only blue lights in the bathrooms, so that one looks quite black in the bath, and no lights at all in the pantry. But I have bought a little candle, so as to be able to see to wash up, and not to waste a torch battery. I should have written before, but I was very busy with my treasurer’s duties, which come mainly at the beginning and end of term, except for taking the Sunday collections to the bank every week. Then on Tuesday I developed a cold, and on Wednesday and Thursday I forgot to do everything I ought to have done, and felt disinclined to do the things I remembered, so I have had to catch up on work since. We had to do one collection, a philology one which was rather a farce, because we all knew so little about the questions, and so we pretty well did it jointly, and Barbara met our tutor the other day, who asked if it was a mass effort, so she said yes. Mrs Sutherland (the tutor) didn’t seem to mind, all she said was “Oh I thought someone must have been prompting Miss Trilling!”; Esther Trilling actually does know nothing at all, but as Mrs S gave her good reports up till now, she doesn’t know that she knows it. This term we are going to a man who is much more practical, and lets us learn facts instead of indulging in beautiful theories, which are all very well with a background, but otherwise not.

I agree with what you say about what I said about our arguments. They never got to be unpleasant so that anything lasted from them to upset the happy home.

A lot of people we know seem still to be up. Large numbers of young men are here taking a special kind of exam to give them some sort of a degree before they are called up around Christmas. Things don’t really seem very different, except that there are always a lot of planes about, flying lower than at home. We had an air raid practice, going over to shelter at the University Press, among great piles of unbound books.

It is getting late. I can no longer think.

With much love from

Annette

From Annette to Parents

Somerville College

Oxford

30.10.39

Dear Parents,

We have now, I hope, got Romey’s exeat all fixed up. She is coming here on Friday, and we have got seats for “The importance of being earnest” in the evening. It is a wonderful cast, John Gielgud, Edith Evans, Peggy Ashcroft, and Gwen Frangçon-Davies. On Saturday she will go and stay with Joyce, until Monday. I may go on Saturday too, just for the day, but I don’t know.

I got your kind gift on Tuesday, which was pretty well worked out. I had already spent it, as a matter of fact. I bought two more pictures for my room, which needs them, as it has a picture rail, and the walls are divided into neat spaces by the windows and the door and cupboards. I got a nice landscape by a John Nash, and a Peter Scott, three wild geese flying against a leaden sky, with big green breakers in the foreground. Also I got “The Oxford book of modern verse”. With the half crown Aunt gave me I got a “Method for the recorder”; which was a thing I think I forgot to tell you last week, that Mrs Drake gave me a recorder at the beginning of term, as Christina had one (you know, it is a little pipe kind of instrument). It is great fun learning to play it, and there are no reeds to tune, as on the more advanced wind instruments. The small amount of ear needed for the recorder is just about what I’ve got.

I haven’t done very much this week. it has been cold and nasty. I have bought lots of thick woollen socks made by the blind very cheaply for 1/8 a pair, because they may rise in price soon, and there is less heating too, so one needs warm clothes even more than usual. The electricity and gas allowances have gone up by a quarter which is a good thing, but we still have to bump about with no lights in the pantries, but that I think is because they aren’t blacked-out, not for economy. I have a little candle I find quite useful to take about, to save torch batteries.

For the first time I have been out after dark. On Friday we went to see the London production of “Design for living”, which was quite amusing, and it was a wonderful moonlight night, and now there are no street lights and not many cars, the black buildings stand out finely against the sky. But yesterday I was coming home after a tea party at Herbert Burchnall’s, at dusk, and it was very uncanny to see all the black shapes flitting about the streets, more so than if it had been quite dark. We are advised to go out in tows and threes at night, on account of there being a lot of suspicious characters in the town, “Bogey-men” as Esther Trilling calls them. Once begins to realise what a mediaeval town must have been like.

I went yesterday to the blanket-knitting party the Principal and Dean have on Sunday evenings, and knitted a square, while the Principal read King James’s “Confidence”. Very pleasant. Good works are rather sliding, because there is a class on mediaeval MSS, for which I have always felt an interest, ever since looking at those in the British museum, but which has remained unsatisfied, on Thursdays at the same time as the Home nursing, so I have postponed that.

Most of the time I forget about the war. I haven’t looked at a newspaper for about ten days and I just ask someone else what has been happening. You will be interested to hear that Magdalen Tower has been blown up, or down, according to the German wireless, but it is the same as usual, as far as we can see. We have a great plane flying round about constantly all day, which gets annoying. I don’t know what it is doing, training, or surveying, I suppose.

Edward Fitch turned up on Saturday, and we were very pleased to see him. He has his conscientious objectors tribunal on Tuesday. Gavin hasn’t heard yet about his. Ann says that she notices a very hard strained manner about him, Which I had not. It must be less of a strain here though, really, with so many in the same position and a generally sympathetic attitude.

Much love Annette

From Annette to Parents

Somerville College

Oxford

6.11.39

Dear Parents,

Romey’s visit here was quite a success. She came on Friday for lunch, which we had very hastily here, so as to get in to the cinema as soon as possible after the beginning of “Jamaica Inn”, and indeed we did not miss anything essential. We enjoyed the film very much, in spite of the crushing criticisms it got in the papers here, and we thought that the accusation of “half-hearted brutality” was a bit hard, since whatever may have been wrong with the film, we all had the creeps afterwards for quite a time. In fact, it was a good thing we went to see “The importance of being earnest” afterwards. There was time to have high tea at Lyons before the theatre at 7.15. It was a delightful show altogether, and it was interesting to see John Gielgud doing a comic part so well. The last time I saw the play it seemed to be so frightfully brightly witty that one act was enough, but this cast did it so lightly and easily that it did not pall a moment. After that we came back, and made mild soup, with a tin of soup opened with a sheath knife, as we had forgotten the tin opener. Apart from, soup with milk is a good idea which never occurred to me before, but will do so again.

I did not go to Maidenhead on Saturday, because the return cost 5/- and I wanted to get back for a concert at 8.0 and it really seemed to leave so little time. I now hear that in our third year we allowed a night off a term, so might go and stay with Joey one time, or I may stay a night on the way home. As it was I did some work on Saturday and washed my hair, and went to this concert, which was very nice, Exeter hall and an excellent clarinettist was playing with a string quartet. It was a pleasure to hear someone playing a wind instrument really well.

Yesterday afternoon I went to hear John Gielgud giving a speech on behalf of the Red Cross entitled “Shakespeare in peace and war”. I was in two minds about going, as it might have been frightful, but actually it was very good. The speech was merely a few connecting remarks about how Shakespeare left out no aspect of the reactions to war, and the rest was recitations from a lot of the plays, which were a joy to listen to, and we heard nearly every word, from the back row of the gallery.

I went to the Principal’s knitting party after supper, instead of writing letters, which is why I write to you after breakfast. She continued to read the book by Henry James. It will take at least two more evenings, so I shall have to go to hear the rest.

The rest of the week contained nothing memorable. I still have read no papers, except when told there was something interesting. The only new thing is that butter is rationed but I like margarine, and don’t each much bread and butter anyhow, so I don’t mind. The big plane seems to have stopped flying round and round, which is a relief. It was infuriating, and the noise wasn’t so constant that one could ignore it.

Romey has to come back today about tea time, but luckily Gavin can have her to tea, as I have a French prose class (with M. Berthou, who did some of the Linguaphone records, and is now very old, but still a very good teacher, except for repeating himself) at 5.0.

I am afraid this is very dull, but I feel, not dull, but in a state of happy indifference.

Much love from

Annette

From Annette to Parents

Somerville College

Oxford

13.11.39

Dear Parents,

You doubtless remember the essay I wrote in Paris in July for the prize competition. The results were given out this week, and the prize has been divided into three, of whom I am one. It is very pleasing, although of course a lot of people hadn’t written essays, because I thought I might probably have a chance for the modern languages prize, which like all the individual subject prizes was not awarded, I had never thought of having a chance for the general one. It was particularly cheering, because I was feeling gloomy after a not very good essay last week. I think we shall get about £5 each.

This week I have been out once in the evening, to see a play by Emlyn Williams “The corn is green”, which, as he was not acting in it, we had thought might not be very good, but it proved to be not only very acted, but extremely interesting in subject. In the interval we met Ian Hogg and his father and some other people from India. Ian is getting a commission and going into camp almost at once, I think. He looked rather pale and strained, much more so than anyone I have seen so far.

Mrs Drake was staying here last night, after we had been to hear the Menges string quarted playing at the Sheldonian in the afternoon, a lovely concert. After tea Christina and I played our recorders to her mother, a concert of a very different kind but Mrs Drake said we had made great progress.

After supper we went again to hear the Principal reading Henry James, and to knit squares. I shall have to go again to hear the end of a fascinating book.

On Friday we had a preliminary air-raid warning, but nothing came of if, and we never heard how near the German planes were or anything.

As usual, I forgot to write until the last minute before the post, so this must be all, and I think it would be all anyway, as it has been a studious and domestic week.

Much love from

Annette.

From Annette to Parents

Somerville College

Oxford

20.11.39

Dear Parents,

I took Romey out again yesterday. As it was Sunday, we did not have a very exciting time, just lunch at the Kemp and then to an hour’s unaccompanied singing in New College Chapel, which was very nice, and then tea. Christina was there and Monique, the blind girl, and just as the kettle was boiling, all the electricity in Oxford went off, so there was not more fire to toast by, so we migrated to Monique’s room where there was a coal fire, taking all the tea with us, and had tea by candlelight. In the evening there was a very good piano concert, only of course Romey was gone by then. For next term Christina has the bright idea that she should take Romey riding on some Sundays, as she rides anyway on Sunday mornings and could easily change it to the afternoon. Romey is going to write to John Averil to see if he is now allowed out alone, as they could then borrow bicycles and go for a ride, if it were fine. It has rained most of the week, but today is so glorious one feels like walking miles and miles.

I went on Thursday to the E.T.C. revue, which was not bad. Gavin was not acting or managing, merely standing at the door, waving a torch. There is a moon again, so one can save torches walking after dark.

We are having rather a fuss at the moment because of only being allowed out till 10.30. We protested at the beginning of term, supported by several of the dons, and the principal said we must see whether anything went on so late that we could not get in by 10.30. Now the cinemas all stay open till 11.0, and also various concerts and things go on late. We were late on Saturday actually after a concert. We did not hurry, of course, as a protest, but we should have been late anyway. But when these facts were pointed out, the Dean and Principal said that cinemas were not worth considering, which seems beside the point entirely. And our Principal says that the principal of L.M.H. won’t agree to extend hours till 11.0, and she says our wont, and so it seems rather a deadlock. We are going to send in one more official petition to the S.C.R. who are all in favour 11.0 except the Dean, it appears, and if nothing happens then, people are planning mass protests by everybody coming in late. There are not practical reasons why we should come in at 10.30, before we were always agitating to stay out till 12.0 without special leave, as the men do, and were told the porter would have to be paid to stay up, and that was perfectly reasonable, but now that does not apply. The whole business seems perfectly futile, and I don’t know why I write about it at such length, especially as I personally am not often out late, but it is infuriating to be put off with the reason that of course one must suffer inconvenience in war time. Anyhow I seem to have filled up the paper. There was no other news.

With much love from

Annette

From Annette to Parents

Somerville College

Oxford

3.12.39

Dear Parents,

Forgive me for not writing last week. We suddenly had our tutorial put forward two days, so that I had to do the work for it in a great hurry, and nothing else. It’s been rather curious this half of the term doing Kant’s aesthetics for one tutor and the French novel for another; the latter seems so easy and superficial when one’s been sitting around the first half of the week trying to think whether beauty is pure form or the expression of feeling, and other such questions where apparently nobody ever gets anywhere.

We go down on Saturday. I am just going to write to Joyce to see if she can have me to stay the night. I had Romey out again yesterday and John Averil, who said he was going out with Aunt, it appears. I’ve always thought it must be quite easy for them to go out alone without anyone knowing. We had lunch at the Kemp café, and then Romey and John went for a bicycle ride, she on Christina’s and he on John roscoe’s bicycle. Then we had a tea party, John and Barbara Roscoe, and a friend of hers, and Esther Trilling. We had corn cobs out of tins, which are very good.

Barbara had Christina and me to tea on Thursday, and we had a Japanese meal of leeks and mushrooms and mince and eggs, fried in soya bean sauce, and of course rice, all very nice. Barbara laments the fact that one can’t get any of the proper Japanese foods now. We did cooking again on Saturday, this time sausages for the sherry party the J.C.R. committee gave the dons, which went off very successfully, and it was interesting to talk to some of these people whom I had seen every day for years, and never spoken a word to.

Last Saturday there was the dance at Rhodes House for all the women’s colleges combined. Christina took Gavin and me and Charles Elwell from Haileybury also, as her birthday party, which was kind. It was from 7.0 to 10.30, by Proctorial order, but we went to a sherry party first in Merton, so had a good start. Actually we are now allowed out till 11.0. The conclusion of the whole matter about which I wrote last time was that the Principal of St Hugh’s thought we had changed to 11.0, and changed for them, and so we had to follow suit and everything was cleared up by accident, after all our manifesto and stand on principles, which was rather a pleasing irony.

Last Thursday instead of reading old manuscripts at the class, we had an afternoon of mediaeval music, with a few records. I’ve had troubadour songs, one by Richard Coeur de Lion and another by Blondel, which was curious to think of.

I still do not look at the newspapers, and the sanctimonious tone of the wireless announcers irritates me beyond words. People do not discuss the war much, except of course Russia’s invasion of Finland, which the Socialists here still uphold, saying of course Russia has a good reason, and the Finns’ are fools to resist, and that England must have been working through them. Russia can still do no wrong.

We saw the film about Nazi oppression “Professor Mamlock”, which was as good as a Russian anti German Film might be, although there were not starving food queues ravening for milk and butter even last year in Germany, still less earlier. But that’s a small point.

Much love

Annette

From Annette to Parents

Highways

Gt Leighs

11.12.39

Dear Parents,

I wish you a happy Christmas. I have a present for Mother, a book of photographs of the statues at Chartres, including the shepherds, but for Papa I have not yet thought of anything, but I will. I tell you so that you may imagine you have them at Christmas, although sadly enough, you will not have them in reality.

I got home yesterday, after staying the night with Joyce. Their flat is very nice, except that they are rather troubled with damp walls at the moment. I slept on the divan in the drawing room, and after a very late breakfast we went for a walk along the river. I had to go after lunch to be home by supper, and also I was wondering what the buses were running like at home. Most G.W.R. trains are late now, I don’t know why, and it was lucky I did go by an early one, half an hour late though it was, because I had just time to get the 5 o’clock from Liverpool St. Sunday trains are now good, not like in September when Gavin had to wait 5 hours for a train.

This week has been very busy, what with work, financial business and amusement. On Monday we went to a German carol evening. Ann was singing and about 6 others, and it was very pleasant, and I got an idea for Christmas decoration, an evergreen wreath hung from the ceiling with fat red candles stuck in ti. On Tuesday we went to the Merton play, which Gavin stage managed. it was “Tom Thumb the great” by Fielding, a lovely skit and Shakespeare and all heroic tragedy. On Wednesday afternoon Dicky suddenly appeared, and we went to tea at the Coffee pot. He was in Oxford for the yacht club dinner. On Thursday we had our carol concert, in which I sang in the choir. It had been very bad, as there are so few people who really can sing who do, but on the evening we kept up our pitch, and came in on the right note when the organ started after an unaccompanied verse. After that there was a short party in the senior common room. On Friday was the scouts’ party, as our maids are also called and I had to help in my official position, as I had nothing else to do. The evacuated school which the college adopted did a play, really very well, and then there was musical chairs, dancing and carols, ending with Sir Roger. I spent most of the time taking round food and cigarettes, and we did the washing up afterwards, as the party is supposed to leave nothing to the scouts. I had nearly packed, but it was lucky I did not tell Joyce I would come on Saturday morning, as I had masses to do still.

I am sorry this is so badly written. I am just going to bed, feeling not tired but wolly from the nice fire.

With much love

from

Annette

From Annette to Parents

Highways

Gt Leighs

29.12 39

Dear Parents,

Firstly I have to thank you for your kind gift. I think I shall buy a warm house coat with Christmas money, because I feel my dressing gown is wearing a bit thin. But maybe that idea will pass when the cold weather stops. It has continued very cold most of the time, but I don’t mind it so much as when I first got home. Yesterday there was a slight fall of snow, which seems to have cleared the air. Before Christmas there was fog, and on Christmas day itself there was fog on and off. We all went along to drink sherry at the Vigue’s on Christmas morning, Peg and I on bicycles, and we had foggy drops on our hair by the time we got there, but when Dicky and I went to see the Watson’s before supper it had cleared, and then when the car came for Aunt Do it was foggy again. We thought it would be a sad thing if the fog were so thick the car couldn’t come and Auntie May could say “I told you so”. Nothing apparently would persuade her that it isn’t darker in the lanes because of the black out.

Christmas was quite happy, happier I feel without Auntie May, unkind though it may be to say so. We had no lack of presents, indeed we had more money given to us than ever before.

On Boxing day Richard was going over to the Parker’s to make up a party for the chase, and at about 6.0 Peg rang up and said one of the girls had fallen out, so would I like to go instead. We had dinner at the Parkers, and then went on to the Chase, which was quite amusing, although there were not many people there we knew, not even that Peg knew. (torn corner off page) it was the most wonderful clear moonlight night. There would really been no need for lights on the car. We got back about half past two ter cups of tea at the Parkers.

Rosemary has been dividing her time between Miss Kielberg’s and poor Perkin, about whose illness you have doubtless heard much already. But as Romey wrote yesterday, I think, there will no harm in reporting that this morning the cat got up and ate up everything that was given her, so she really seems to be recovering.

Last week there were no notable events, except the carol singing which went off very well. The only place we were regaled was the Carricks where Dicky much admired one of the men who sat in a corner and drank the best part of three bottles of beer in quarter of an hour. The countess said that she was getting on all right with the operation stockings Aunt gave her to knit, but that she gets lipstick all over them. How she does it I can’t think, unless she holds her wool in her mouth.

Romey and I went in to see “The lion has wings” on Friday. I enjoyed the part about how air attack and defence is done, but I thought the first propaganda bit rather weak, particularly the way they showed the King being happy among his Boys camp, and Hitler watching his troops, and said “We like peace, Hitler likes war” and then a moment later showed the King watching a troop review too. If one liked one could easily find pictures of Hitler surrounded by children. It seemed so stupid when there are so many really fool-proof things that could be said and demonstrated against the Nazi ideas.

I must now work really hard till the end of the vac. as this week I have done very little. I took a complete holiday for two days after Christmas, and read the Buchan omnibus I gave Romey, as she was reading some of her horse books. It is a book of five of Buchans historical novels, one of which I had read before. But I read the other four on end. Most refreshing. Dicky has now got hold of the book, so when Romey will get I don’t know but she doesn’t seem to mind.

Uncle Harry is coming to lunch and to stay the night, which will be nice. I thought we shouldn’t see him again before he leaves.

Much love

Annette

From Annette to Parents

Highways

Gt Leighs

5.1.40

Dear Parents,

I am sorry I forgot to say last week that I go up on the 13th, and term ends on March 9th I expect.

We all went up to the dance at the village hall on Saturday, and were much amused to see how Peg got off with a whole crowd of soldiers who were there. The whole dance went with more swing than usual and was great fun. The same soldiers came to the W.I. social on Tuesday. Peg was not there, of course, but it was a good thing they came, as there were very few young men there, and most of the people were the older women who like just to look on, but without the soldiers to make up numbers there wouldn’t have been much to look at. The rest of the family went again to the Hall yesterday for one of the 6d hops, but I didn’t go, as there has to be a lot of gaiety to set off the disadvantages of the fug and smoke to my mind, and I wanted to do some work.

On New Years Eve we went to the Watson’s, the whole lot of us, and the Macs came too, and we played some games, and Mrs Watson told fortunes from hands, and we drank sherry and more sherry at midnight and Dicky went out and came in as first footer with a piece of coal and an egg, as the darkest man present, and had to kiss everybody all round. And it was altogether a very cheery evening. On Monday we all went to tea at the Holbrook’s, and there again played games. Mrs Parker and Barbara were there too. One game we played I have not met before. Someone who knows how to draw sets off and draws say an animal, but perhaps first an ear and then a bit of a hind leg and so on until the whole thing is drawn, and the other people sit in a circle and copy each line as it appears on the paper of the person on the right, starting from the original. Barbara drew a most elegant baby giraffe, which turned into a legendary monster with vast thick legs and a head almost on the floor. it was much more amusing than the ordinary drawing consequences. For your kind party we went to Braintree to see Conrad Voidt in “The spy in black”, which we enjoyed, and then had an excellent tea at the tea shop close by. The weather has been cold but fine on the whole. No more snow after the one fall.

We were very pleased to see Uncle Harry on Friday. It does seem a good thing they have decided to keep on the new nurse and not take nan back, although she now wants to come back, since from all accounts Charlotte is much better with the new one. It is lunch time. I can’t quite decide whether to go to see “Edith Cavell” this afternoon, because it is so fine. Romey’s been out riding and as she’s going to the pictures, she can’t write.

Love Annette.

From Annette to Parents

Highways

11.1.40

Dear Parents,

Its no good Papa asking me if I don’t think Perseus is like a giraffe, because I don’t know Perseus. The only constellations I know are Orion and the plough, although I’ve always thought it would be nice to know some more.

Gavin went back to Oxford today, and I go on Saturday. he took a lot of books for me, as he said his trunk was half empty, and even said he would bring them to Somerville for me, which would really have been too noble. Rosemary and Uncle have gone to the weekly dance. I might have gone too, if I hadn’t had a slight sore throat, but I don’t know. I don’t really care for popular entertainment with all the smoke there is about, and rather lumping refreshments, unless there is a great swing about the show. On the whole I’d much rather be actually running or helping to run that sort of party, handing things round and washing up and so on. Dicky hasn’t gone either. He is finishing the Buchan omnibus I gave Romey and which she hasn’t looked at yet, chiefly because we had it, but also because she had all her horse books. Last Friday we went to see “Nurse Cavell” on your recommendation, and thought it very good. I had rather felt it might be awful, and had avoided going to it. No films on this week of any merit at all. I have not been away at all except to go to the dance at the Henry’s on Saturday, which was very pleasant. Actually of course most of the people at the dances we go to are hardly acquaintances of mine as I have been away such a lot every summer for years, and last year at Christmas, so ont he whole conversation remains rather polite unless one happens to hit on a lucky subject. Not that I mind at all. It just occurred to me the other evening.

On Sunday Peg and I took one kitten along to Waltham for the Henry Vigues. Max and Christopher Beale came over in the afternoon and we drove along in their car. They took the other kitten on the spur of the moment. At the Vignes they asked us to stay to tea, and then we walked back in a thick fog as no bus appeared. It was quite light really, enough to see vague shapes looming around, rather like the settings to French films, if you know what I mean.

I heard from Madame Blok. She is still in Paris, now at Mme Jalier’s flat, and says she has got a certain number of pupils for various subjects, which is a good thing. I also heard from Paulette Got. They are also back in Paris. I also had a Christmas card from Peggy Christie, which took exactly two months to get here from Australia. I have mostly been working, and going for walks as it has been fine, although cold and frosty. I never feel as if I’m doing much work, but when I look back it seems I have done quite a lot really, although nothing like what I should have liked.

With much love

from

Annette

From Annette to LJT

Somerville College

Oxford

Dear Mother,

I have just had a letter from one of our Austrian guides, the woman whose husband is a climber. She is in England, and he was out in India when the war broke out, and was interned, but has now been set free, or is about to be so. She asked me to ask you if you could possibly do something to help him to find a job of some kind, because he wants to earn enough money to pay his passage to England, where james Rowe (the farmer who lives near Withington) has offered him a job on his farm. Fritz Kolb has been offered a passage to America, but doesn’t want to accept charity and would rather earn his way if possible. Marthas (his wife’s) letter is in German, so I have translated freely. Of course, I don’t know Fritz but Martha was a very nice person. She says Fritz will do anything, and is very handy and doesn’t mind hard work. If you do think that there might be a chance of one of your many friends or acquaintances doing something for him, would you write to him.

Dr Fritz Kolb 86Y (B)

Central Internment Camp A

Ahmednagar.

What the ‘Dr’ means I don’t know, because there are so many doctors of all kinds in Germany. Martha hasn’t probably told him that she’s asked me to write, but if you write, you had perhaps better just explain the connection.

I hope my hasty note with Dicky’s letter wasn’t too illegible and incomprehensible. I thought it said the presentation for Miss Street was to be collected by Feb 1st, but its really March, so there is lots of time. Would you send you contribution to

Miss Tucker

15 Frithville Gdns.

W.12.

and put your signature on a sticky label about ½ “ by 2 “ to be put on the list for Miss Street.

I came up yesterday. This morning I went on the ice on Port Meadow and borrowed someone’s skates for a few minutes, and found it just like roller skating. I could stop by instinct, as it were, and got on pretty well, although of course a bit unsteady. I think I will buy some skates if it’s still freezing tomorrow, spending my Christmas money. Now my feet are grown it seems worth it, even if the are used so seldom, as it’s such a lovely sport when there is ice.

Otherwise everything is as usual, and no news yet.

I shall be very grateful if something can be done for Fritz Kolb, and I hope it’s not too much of a pig in a poke.

Much love

Annette

From Annette to Parents

Somerville College

Oxford

25.1.40

Dear Parents,

The great and only subject this week has been skating, the frost having held firm till yesterday, when it thawed rapidly all day, but still did not make the ice dangerous, and it seems to have frozen again today. I have been out most days in the afternoon, as by a great bit of luck, I have been lent some skates by a girl who doesn’t want to use them at all. I tried to buy some, but all shops seemed to have sold out of sixes. Port Meadow was the first place to go to, but it got very cut up with the hundreds of people on the very shallow ice, which had in many places grass sticking through it. We tried the reservoir by the railway, but the surroundings were unpleasant. The best place of all is the lake at Blenheim, where the public is allowed on one half before the big bridge, an enormous stretch anyway, very good ice, and of course the lovely setting. It was perfectly wonderful last Thursday, with a clear sky and a glorious sunset behind the bridge. I went there again on Saturday with various people, and enjoyed it equally. On Sunday Romey came out, and I had borrowed some other skates for her, but her ankles are so thin they didn’t give enough support, and it was rather wretched, because after a beautiful sunny morning it had become very hazy, and there was a biting wind on Port Meadow, which made efforts at learning very difficult. I wanted to go to the Cherwell on Monday with Ann and Christina, who skated right up to the bypass, but I had a committee meeting. On Tuesday we actually skated on the Thames up by Port Meadow, where the sailing boats are kept. We borrowed a board and a broom from the old man there and swept a clear space, and had great fun practising, just four of us as noone else seemed to have found the place. I have got on fairly well with outside edges, and yesterday, when we went to Blenheim again, this time with Mr and Mrs Drake, who came over for the day, I even began to be able to go backwards crossing over so as to go in a circle, the first step to a back outside edge. It now gets more unlike roller-skating, but that was a tremendous help.

I have only been out once in the evening, to the Ballet Rambert, who are quite good, with one or two very good people, (for a school, of course). The ballet “Lady into Fox” was the most striking, but on the whole I think I prefer the ones that are more of a dance and less of a story.

On Sunday I had a little tea party. Gavin came, Charles Elwell and Herbert Burchnall, who was up for the day, much improved in appearance through being in the navy. He’s had his hair cut and looks generally smartened up.

At the Principal’s knitting party this term we are having read to us another Henry James “The tragic muse”. I enjoy hearing it read, because I am sure I wouldn’t care to read it to myself, it goes so slowly, and I should miss most of the subtlety.

If there’s no match this Saturday, Romey is coming out, either to try skating or to go to the pictures.

Much love from

Annette

From Annette to Parents

Somerville College

Oxford

1.2.40

Dear Parents

The day I last wrote was the last day of skating. I went on the Cher, and skated twice up and down to Marston Ferry. On Friday it was damp, and on Saturday it rained all day, turning to snow in the afternoon and falling in white crystals like sugar. Then on Sunday night there was a really heavy fall of feathery snow, which was about 6 inches deep here, nothing like as bad as it seems to have been in other places. Now it is thawing, and it will be most revoltingly slushy.

Romey came out on Saturday, and we went to see “Love affair” Irene Dunn and Charles Boyer, very charming. I enjoyed it much more than “South Riding” which I saw with Ann the day before, and which was spoilt by the ending. We had tea at the Coffee Pot, where they no longer have lids to the water jugs.

On Sunday I went to tea with Gavin. Edward Fitch was there, just up for the weekend; he may be going to Finland with the Friend’s Ambulance. Which reminds me that Ian Hogg was here too, on Thursday. He rang up and asked Christina out to tea, and I thought it odd that he didn’t ask me, just a little, but apparently he thought I had joined up, having met someone who’d seen me in Essex. It seemed curious, because he knew I was up last term; Christina said he was most confused and full of apologies when he heard I was still here. But anyway, as we said, honour was saved. Ian has not been called up yet. He thinks he has been forgotten, as he came back from America after his age group was summoned.

There is going to be a dance at the Randolph on Saturday, to which we are going, Christina and someone I don’t know, and Gav and I. Next week-end Peg is coming to stay, so I shall have to get on with work. We have translations from German and French this term, so life is just one thing after another with that much extra, although they provide an agreable occupation.

Nothing of any note.

With much love

from

Annette.

From Peg to Annette and Gavin

Room 729, Shell-Mex House.

12.2.40

Dear Chicks (Annette, please hand this to Podgie next time you see him – I’m having an economy campaign and saving stamps!)

I had such a happy time at Oxford, that I though you’d merited a bread-and-butter letter. It was so kind of you to run around with me, so nobly and I enjoyed myself very much, and Please may I come again.

Podgie, what was the name of that author in the train? He was rather amusing, and we chatted amicably most of the way – two interesting things he told me (a) that the purpose of that curious erection on the pavement outside Queen’s is a water tank for the A.F.S. and (b) that the Clarendon isn’t going to be pulled down, but is going to become the head office of Woolworths’ for the duration, same as a lot of Government departments have commandeered hotels. He seemed to think that it would revert to being the Clarendon after the war was over. Anyway, it will continue to look the same.

We got talking about the Little Review, and were giggling in happy reminiscence about it, when another man in the carriage, unable to bear it any longer, leant forward and said “And do you remember so-and-so” also being a Little Review fan. So we had a very jolly journey, and got to Paddington surprisingly quickly.

I have got very bad neuralgia to-day; why, I can’t imagine – but it’s rendering me a bit weak in the hear, so I’ll stop.

Much love, and thank you both very much indeed, and Gavin, I hope you’ll do well in your Exam. (If I remember, I’ll write an official “good wishes” letter later), and Anne, are you sure we’re all square financially? If I owe you any more, let me know.

Peg

From Annette to Parents

Somerville College

Oxford

15.2.40

Dear Parents,

Thank you for a number of interesting letters. Its all very well for Papa to say we should get on learn astronomy, but he wouldn’t if he knew how cold it has been for weeks and weeks, in fact, ever since last term. This week we have again had a light fall of snow, and yesterday the ice on the flooded meadows was fit for skating. We went out for a bit. Which reminds that I must send you some pictures of snow and ice, Christina and me in the Parks in the snow, and skating at Blenheim, which people have taken.

I am sorry I did not write last week. I had a sore throat, which made me feel very low on Wednesday and Thursday, and I thought I must be in for a nasty go of something, as so many others, including Ann, had taken to their beds for days with a similar throat, but on Friday, as if by miracle, it disappeared, not even leaving a cold. I had some lozenges which I have been trying out on other people to see if that did the trick or whether it was just luck. Anyhow nothing had happened in the week, except the dance at the Randolph on Saturday, which was very pleasant, but nothing extraordinary. Last week again I didn’t go out at all because of working so as to have the week-end free for Peg. She came on Saturday morning and left on Sunday evening after supper. On Saturday we had lunch at the Kemp Hall, then met Gavin again and went to see Gerard Irvine in hospital, where he has been the whole term with some sort of poisoning. While we were there, there entered a perfect specimen of an art student, with long hair, orange tie, strange face, blue corduroy trousers and just the right type of voice. We were fascinated by seeing such a figure in reality. From there we went on and had tea in Fuller’s, and at 7.0 we went to the theatre, a light and entertaining piece called “Tony draws a horse”, sufficient to pass the evening agreably. then eggs and chips in a very good new snack bar, and home to bed.

On Sunday Peg and Gav went sight-seeing, Romey came to lunch and we chatted till it was time to get ready for a large tea party here. There came Philip, and his long friend Michael Stuttaford, Roger Green, who stutters badly in ordinary life, but has the most wonderful falsetto voice for comic female parts, Ann T, and a girl from the Slade, the daughter of one of Peg’s bosses, very nice.

We had a meal out and then saw Peg off at 8.30. She said she enjoyed herself and I hope she did.

James Joll was in Oxford for a few days. He had a sherry party to which Ann went. I went up to borrow a book the other day and he was having tea with Ann, and said he would have asked me and Gavin too if he’d known we were still here. A lot of my social life this term seems to be this kind of retrospective invitation. Rather like Eeyore, somehow. James has just finished training at Colchester and is going into the Devon regiment. He hates the army, he said.

Aunt is coming this week-end. I have got tickets for the London Philharmonic concert, as she will love it so, and Romey says she and John Averill will find something to do. Its such a popular concert that I can easily sell the tickets again if we decide against going.

For exercise I have taken to the Scottish reel class again. Such a pleasant atmosphere, because one feels it really is genuinely a part of these people’s life, unlike the crankiness of English country dancing. We teach the evacuated school the eightsome reel, and yesterday we asked the young who pipes for the Scottish club to pipe for us, with some success. The masters are very keen on the boys learning dances, and the Scottish ones have so much go in them. They all gazed in awe at the pipes which make an ear-splitting noise in the room, not very big, but not more noise than the forty boys when they are let loose.

No more. I am going to the pictures this afternoon, to see “The 39 steps” and “This man is news”, because the weather is so gloomy.

Much love from

Annette

P.S. Thank you so much for writing to Fritz Kolb. I hope the matter is not proving a nuisance.

From Annette to Parents

Somerville College

Oxford

22.2.40

Dear Parents,

We had a very nice weekend with Aunt here. I had to get her a room at the Royal Oak, a pleasant pub nearby, as the san and all available rooms here are full up with German measles and flu and this and that. Romey came out on Saturday and Sunday, because there was another thick fall of snow, and we went in the afternoon to the pictures, Errol Flynn in “Dodge city” rip-roaring Wild West in glorious Technicolour, and rather fun of its type. After tea we saw Jerry Irvine again, still in hospital, and his mother whom I had not met before. In the evening Aunt, Gav and I went to “The cherry Orchard” at the Playhouse. I enjoyed it more than I expected. I’ve never read any Tchekov at all, but it sound like a parody of what I thought it would be.

On Sunday morning I worked while Aunt and Romey went to church, and we all went to the Kemp cafeteria for lunch, meeting John Averil. I had asked Christina; luckily, because Gavin appeared and said he felt too queer to go to the concert, after a party the night before, which had affected his liver, so Christina came in his place. It was a wonderful concert. They did Beethoven’s Seventh absolutely superbly, and it was a delight to watch Malcolm Sergeant (or Sargent, I never know) conducting.

In the meantime Romey and John had just been mooning around, we gathered. I hope they were not too bored, but I don’t think the concert would have been much more exciting for them. We had tea at Lyons all together again, it being the only place open, and then moved on to Merton to see Gavin, who was better, and came to see Romey off and to drink soup at a snack bar. Aunt and I had coffee in Christina’s room, and we played a few of our recorder duets and chatted till about 10.0. I did not go and see Aunt off in the morning, because Gavin did, and I had a lot of work to make up.

Since then it has been damp and warm, and I have done nothing but work, going out only for Scottish reels on Tuesday, but not to any entertainment. People were skating up to Sunday, but I was last out on Friday.

I must rush out, as I’ve remembered I must get Romey a ticket to go to Maidenhead tomorrow, and it’s early closing today.

- I got a ticket all right. To return to skating, I was very pleased to end up with circles on the outside edge, which I hadn’t achieved before.

And that’s really about all. I am going to see the Principal on Monday or Tuesday about prospects for jobs. At the moment any idea of the Home Civil is out of the question, because the exams are stopped. And I have really no ideas.

Much love from

Annette

From Annette to Parents

Somerville College

Oxford

29.2.40

Dear Parents,

I just did a strange thing I’ve never done before; I sat down and wrote my name at the top of one of these sheets, as though to do an exercise. It’s become such a complete matter of habit.

I am sorry Papa has been ill. This will probably not be there in time for his birthday, especially as I think all my letters are a week late, since I sent one which did not get to Aunt in time, but anyway I wish him many happy returns.

I have had another slight cold this week, which is annoying. The weather has been on the whole soft and warm, feeling really like spring, but it seems to be worse weather for health.

There is but little news. Romey came to lunch before going to Maidenhead and to tea on her return. She and Christina were going riding next Sunday, but Christina will now be too busy, as she has a lot of time taken up with a play by the evacuated school, which comes off on Sunday.

Actually now I come to think of it, I have been to quite a lot of things, local talent completely, the E.T.C., the Majlis (the Indian society) and the temporary O.U.D.S., all of which did shows. The E.T.C. was a sort of modern morality play “A bride for the unicorn”, very well done considering, but I’m not sure if it was worth writing in the first place. The Majlis did “The toy cart” an Indian play of the second century B.C., which astounded us all by being complete melodrama, not all that different from the Victorian, all allowances being made. It was done in English, but the cast was all Indian except for one or two parts. I never realized before how different in tone our voices are from the Indians. One could spot the Englishmen immediately, although they were of course made up brown.

The O.U.D.S. did “Mandragola” a comedy by Machiavelli, very pleasant, and with a charming setting by the typical art student I told you we met in Gerard Irvine’s room (he, by the way, has gone home, though still ill with his obscure affliction) so the long hair and orange tie had something behind them.

On Monday I went to consult the Principal about careers, but got nowhere. I wanted to know what sort of things people had got, and she wanted to know what I wanted to do, and we did not advance, because it was very little use to say that I might be interested in most things, if I knew enough about them, which I do think is so. Still, I will go to the woman at the employment bureau and see if she can help. The Principal I feel, likes people who incline to teaching or social work, and those are the last things I want to do, since I don’t feel happy dealing with people in the mass, and I am sure I should loathe having to go round and get the rent out of people, which was part of estate management, one thing she mentioned.

I am thinking of going for an N.U.S. walking tour in the Wye valley for a week. Esther Trilling is probably going, and it would be the best way to vegetate, as Miss Starkie advises. Christina has asked me to stay a few days, to dance reels and play the recorder.

Much love from

Annette

From Annette to Parents

Highways

29.3.40

Dear Parents,

There was more doing this week because of Easter, and we really used the car quite a lot, because there was a lot of petrol saved up for Dicky to use. On Saturday there was the dance at the Marsh’s, at least it was at the County Hotel, and we went all four. It was very pleasant. There were a lot of people we know and hadn’t seen for a long time, a certain number in uniform, but a lot more without, as there were many medical students; Dicky got very hot in his uniform. Peg suggested he should leave off his jersey and just have a little modesty vest to fill in the gap, but he would not.

On Sunday we went over to see the Toulmins at the shoulder of Mutton. They were just down for the weekend, so they had to refuse our return invitation to come to tea sometime this week. It was delightful seeing them all again. The whole family was there except Roger, and there was besides a friend of Ann’s on leave from the army, whom I hardly recognized because he had his hair moderately sticking-up, and I had only seen him before looking extremely neat in khaki, with his plastered down and shining. It does make a difference. In Chelmsford I saw a sailor on the other side of the street and thought “That’s the first sailor I’ve seen besides Dicky” and it was Dicky, but with his cap on his hair cut so short, he does look different at a distance. To go back to the Shoulder, we had a very happy and inconsequential chat till nearly 7.0, when we tore ourselves away, just as Mr Toulmin had suggested playing some sort of race game, but as Ann and Stephen were making frantic signs in the background that they did not approve, it was as well we were going, and anyhow there was poor Aunt getting supper.

On Monday we had a great tea party, with Auntie Do, Mrs Watson and the two girls, and Mac and May. There had originally been an idea of going over to the Chase to dance, but as Richard and Gav had to rise up to catch the 6.48 train, that was dropped. I was really rather glad, because I don’t want to have too many late nights while working, because revision is mostly boring enough without feeling sleepy on top of it.

Yesterday we were at the Watson’s for tea, all except Uncle, who has been a little difficult with a cold all this week, one minute complaining that nobody has any sympathy, and then if he does stay in bed, insisting that he is better and must get up. Well, anyway, in the middle of tea he rang up and said that a telegram had just come to say Gav has got a first, whereat there was general rejoicing. I didn’t think he could get anything else, considering his record and the way he has worked. There are no details yet. Kenneth his tutor, was a Moderator, so he presumably has inside information before others.

This week we have had all weathers, wind, pouring rain, a spot of snow, and today a hard frost, 8 degrees. I have not been out very much to walk, because on Saturday night we did such a violent step in the Palais Glide that it pulled all the muscles down the front of my thighs, and I was stiff for two days. The step ending up with going rapidly down on one knee and then the other.

I go away next week. Peg hadn’t got tickets for the “Beggar’s Opera” before Easter, and had a cold, so only went back to the office yesterday, so she may not be able to get any, but anyhow I shall go up on Tuesday to shop a bit before going to the Drakes’.

We were all very amused by the story of the young Rani in your last letter, and also by the story of the revival of the aborigines, except that I am sorry it is Tara’s husband who leads them.

With much love from

Annette

From Annette to Parents

Heatherside

Gerrard’s Cross

Bucks

4.4.40

Dear Parents

I have just rushed away from great preparations for a small dance here this evening not having got my letter written this afternoon as I intended because we played recorder trios all the time, or duets with Mrs Drake playing the piano accompaniment instead of her recorder. The dance is only going to be about five couples which is really enough for the room, and in the middle we are going to dance reels, as some of the people coming know a few too, so it ought to be quite a merry time.

I got here yesterday morning, after spending the night at Peg’s old digs. We went to the “Beggars Opera” and enjoyed it very much. Both Michael Redgrave and his understudy had German measles, so John Gielgud took the part of Macheath and really did very well, although he has very little voice. As regards acting he was less like himself than I’ve ever seen him which was interesting. We thought it a valiant thing to do, to step into the breach and risk being laughed at for his attempt at singing, which was all right really, as I said, except for very high or very low notes. We think we must go again though to see Michael Redgrave.

I had come up fairly early on Tuesday, and went to see “Pinocchio” enjoying it very much except for the rather wishy washy fairy. Then I shopped, got stuff for new pyjamas, two white blouses for Schools, and a new afternoon frock, a bright greeny blue with a little scarlet bolero, for 35/-. I went down to meet Peg at her office and we went to see Auntie Arla before going on to have a meal. Ron and Audrey came in while we were there, which was nice. She seems nicer than one was led to expect, and Peg says she revises her opinion, formed I think only at the wedding, because of the very county relations. Ron has three weeks extra leave, having been let off the end of his course at Aldershot. They wanted to go to France, but found the place they wanted to go to is forbidden to any but the military.

Last Sunday Uncle Roy came down. We all walked up to Nrs Neild’s house to look round before the sale, which was on Monday, when we spent the whole afternoon there, to buy some of the books. Gavin bought Shakespeare Fielding and Jane Eyre, and I got two odd lots for the sake of a few things in them, a Wordsworth, a Tennyson, The Pilgrim’s Progress with Victorian illustrations, Robinson Crusoe, and a volume of Josephus, printed in 1709.

On Saturday I go to High Wycombe to meet Esther and go on to Chepstow, from whence we start to walk on Sunday. The weather at the moment is variable, but not too cold, warm rather. I bought a rucksack at Grose’s in London; they had no ladie’s frame ones so it had to be an ordinary one.

With much love

from

Annette

From Annette to Parents

Welsh Bicknor Youth Hostel

Monmouth

10.4.40

Dear Parents,

I write in the common room of a youth Hostel, with our party’s leader playing all manner of things as well as is possible on the rather bad violin of the Landlady’s small daughter. The said leader is a most entertaining Welshman, with a strong accent, who talks extremely fast, has a mass of black hair and an unquenchable thirst, which makes him tend to steer by pubs. He is moreover very musical, and he and Esther have an endless fund of tunes to sing as we go along or at any time. But the most remarkable performance is that of Trefor, when he sings South American Spanish songs after Pépé, an Argentinian in the party. There are eight of us altogether Trefor, Pépé, Jean Raymond (who is French) a very energetic school mistress, a young man from Cambridge, and a girl from Bedford College London, besides Esther and myself. There were to have been two Yugo Slav girls too, but they were too exhausted by sight seeing to come on.

It is great fun, and of course lovely country. The first day, Sunday, we walked from Chepstow to Usk in the valley of the river Usk. On Monday we cut across the dividing range again and came to Whitebrook, higher up the Wye valley. Then yesterday we came up the valley past Monmouth to this place. The weather has been kind, not too cloudly with patches of sun. The only blot has been that on Monday I got various blisters and yesterday by the time we got to Monmouth about 1.30 my feet were so sore that I took a bus to Goodrich, missing out a bit of the valley which we shall actually see from the other side on the way back, which left out about 6 miles; Esther stayed too and we did have quite a pleasant time, going to Goodrich castle, which has a nice Norman keep and lots of later bits and of course a wonderful commanding view. Today was to be spent less strenuously anyway, so I stayed behind while the others went off, and I suppose I only went about four miles altogether, just crossing the river into some woods, outskirts of the Forest of Dean where I had a broad view and I sat and read “National velvet” by Enid Bagnold, waving my feet in the breeze, which did them a lot of good. Tonight they are really better and I hope to be quite all right tomorrow to start back down the valley, which takes two days. Whether it was my shoes my socks or what I don’t know, but the thing I do know is that if I soap my feet they burn like fury by the end of the day so from now on I shall use Vaseline.

We heard the news of Germany’s invasion of Norway yesterday. It seems odd to be on a holiday which remains unaffected by such a thing, when for so long one has been as it were prepared to rush back from abroad.

Youth hostels are rough, with two decker beds, rather hard, cold water only in most cases, round here anyway, and of course nothing in the way of extra furniture. But the meals are quite good, here particularly, and anyhow it is pretty marvellous to have only to pay 1/1 a night for lodging. I’m afraid all this is a bit disjointed, but it would hardly be otherwise.

Much love from Annette

From Annette to Parents

Highways

Gt Leighs

19.4.40

Dear Parents,

You were wrong in your calculations of sending letters, because it is only today that Gav and I go up, and Romey doesn’t go back to school for another fortnight, but anyway they sent the letters on all right.

I got home last Saturday evening, after a wonderful last 2 days walking, and although I had still one or two sore spots on my feet they bore up very well with a lot of greasing. Of course we didn’t go really very far every day; Irene, the geography mistress, is going to send us the exact mileage for every day when she has worked it out and got her photographs printed to send us too. On Thursday, which was a glorious fine day, we crossed the Wye from Welsh Bicknor and came up over the top to Symond’s Yat and then down to the Seven Sisters rocks, and then up again, cutting out the big bend by Monmouth, through the village of Newland, which seemed the perfect English village, tucked away among green hills, with a big church dominating it. here there was a 15th century statue of a knight on a tomb out in the churchyard, which Irene says is a very rare thing to find. Moreover there was a pub called the Ostrich. That evening we did not get to Whitebrook until after half past eight, because we rather wandered as it was so beautiful. Besides, Esther and Trevor were having a terrific discussion about music, and quoting bits of symphonies and so on at each other, occasionally stopping in the road beating time with clasped hands, or falling on each other’s necks from astonishment at some piece of ignorance. I wished I had a moving camera, because the actions without the words were so very funny. That evening, knowing the hostel only provided a cold meal, we cooked our own, baked beans, spaghetti and fried onions, with a little milk to improve the sauce. We were so late that there was little time before 10.30, the official lights out in the hostels.

Next day we went to Tintern in the morning and saw the abbey, which is one of the few places that remain clearly in my mind from when we were, I suppose at Malvern. Unfortunately there was a cold wind blowing fiercely through all the holes in the Abbey, so it was not as nice as it might have been. We retired to a pub in the village to warm up again, and then went on across the river, along Offa’s Dyke for some way, until finally we struck a small road leading down to Chepstow, from which we had on one side a fine view of the Severn and on the other quite frequent looks over the cliffs down to the Wye. In Chepstow we met the other party, who had done the tour the other way round. I’m glad we went the way we did, because the first day was on the whole the dullest. We all had “feesh and cheeps at Cheepstow” as Pépé had been saying all day to keep his spirits up. He had three vast helpings, so that he really does seem to care for them. After that we went and sang all the evening in a pub; I had some qualms, because Trefor who had had his hair cut the minute he reached Chepstow, and looked quite mild and sane, had said he was going on a real blind, but luckily although he put away a lot of pints, it only appeared to make him sleepy.

On Saturday morning we all went and saw over Chepstow Castle, with great pleasure, before the parting of the ways. I came on quite a good train to London with Irene, a girl from Oxford in the other party and its leader, a Dr Parker, an interesting young physicist, working for the Admiralty. I got the 6.20 home and the 7.15 bus by the skin of my teeth. It was really a good thing to go away and vegetate for that week.

This week I have been twice to the pictures “The Women” and “The Stars look down”, both very good.

I must rush and get ready to go to Chelmsford with Gav and Aunt.

With much love

from

Annette.

Extracts from AMT’s diary

Tuesday, 18 June 1940

I went up to town and to the passport office as soon as it opened, but found there was a new form for Polly to fill in. Then to Oxford; the good train cut off for evacuees, I had to take a slow one, getting down at 1.50. A hot way to Headington. Found Romey was at a service, on a weekday. Fetched her on the way out. The food office, where we had to go, was not open till 4.0, her ration card having to be signed by the head man. Poor Romey very bewildered. I missed the 4.50 and had to get the 6 something taking two hours. Read “Jamaica Inn”, in a fever. It was too late to go home, so I saw Peg and then stayed at the Strand Palace the night.

Wednesday, 19 June 1940

Went to the Passport office, thinking I could get the permit at last, with Romey’s signature to everything, but no. Signature of parent or guardian required. Had to wait over an hour for nothing. Queues and queues of foreigners wanting permits for Canada. Came home very annoyed at all delays, and found everyone much excited because a German bomber crashed in Bishop’s Court garden last night.

Thursday, 20 June 1940

Aunt and I went in in the afternoon to see the bomber crowds along the roads. There was hardly anything left of it, but a lot of charred trees all round. It just missed two houses.

Wednesday, 3 July 1940

Up to London to meet Aunt John and Romey, whom I saw for about five seconds. Then off to catch a train to be at Bletchly park by 4.0. Aunt to take Romey and John to Scotland for Canada.