The Townend Family Letters

1942 January

From LJT to Annette No 49

8 Theatre Rd. Calcutta.
Jan 4th 1942

My darling Annette,

Your letter written on Aunt’s birthday, and enclosing the first of your photos, reached us on New Year’s Day, so your guess was good and your wishes arrived at exactly to the moment. Thank you for them and the letter and the photo. I like it (the photo) and I think I shall like it even more as one of a set of several. Its very nice to have a larger one of you than the little snap shot taken looking over Symons Yat.

I am most interested to hear that you have been to see Miss Martindale and of her opinion that it might be advisable for you to apply for a post that would lead on to the Administrative grade. Its good of her to remember and to take trouble about you. I wonder whether I had better address letters to Highways in case you have been shifted.

Aunt’s idea of having Apple trees and rough grass on the front lawn is a very good one. That grass is of no great use, and an awful both to keep mown. I can well imagine that having Peggy laid up did make poor Aunt very busy, and must have been very annoying for Peg too.

By great luck I got hold of a very intelligent woman, who is a first rate talker, for the New year’s Eve party, and she got on like a house on fire with one of the Sapper men who have come so much to the house lately, Vivian Cowan. He is an extremely intelligent, amusing man, and that evening he revealed a wide knowledge of English literature, and a ability to quote from and argue about the Poets, which delighted Mrs Forsythe, she being given that way herself. They not only amused themselves but the rest of the party as well. I thought the Saturday Club dance was just the right sort of thing for war-time. It was simply done. And more than half the men were in uniform. I thought of you all as we sang Old Lang Syne, and our little party, each of us parted from bits of our families, not only exchanged our own good wishes but sent wishes home to our folk over the sea.

We are getting now slightly used to the feeling that air raids are a definite possibility, and certainly have the impression that Calcutta is or would be far better able to give a good account of herself now than she could have done when the war with Japan broke out. The great exodus of the more white livered from Calcutta has slowed down. I don’t want to tar all the people who have gone with that brush, for I think it is sensible to get woman and children, and old folk who are no use away, but that able bodied men with jobs to do, should fly at the mere distant shadow of an air raid on the far horizon, seems to me shameful. The Bengalis have been protesting so hotly ever since the beginning of the war that they are just as much a martial race as any other of the Indian peoples, that it is interesting to see the reactions of many of them the moment there is a question of personal danger. We hear the good news from Rangoon that the Anglo Indians have been sticking to their posts and behaving very well. Dad’s two armed guards, both from the Punjab I think, are very sarcastic about the people down here. They were through the last war and know what being under fire means. In a way its rather nice to have them in the compound, for its likely that in an emergency they would steady the other servants.

We have had people in here almost every evening or been out ourselves so I have had almost no time for reading. I have dipped into Vera Brittain’s book, “England’s Hour” now and again, and find it curiously stirring to the emotions. It rings much truer than anything else I have read of hers. A remark quoted from one of the English papers, in the Statesman this morning, pleased us. It said “Its not much use Congress opening the door, if all they do is to shout abuse through it”. Its neat that! I’d like to have said it myself.

In a few moments I must break off and go and tidy myself up to go and have tea with Mrs Edgley. “Beakie” otherwise Mr Justice Edgley, and Dad both have to attend a meeting, so Mrs E and I are to entertain one another. They are in some anxiety about Hugh, who is somewhere on the Burma frontier as far as they know, but they have not had a letter from him since just after the war with Japan broke out.

Best love, my dear, and thank you again
Mother

Family letter No 49

8 Theatre Rd,  Calcutta

Jan 4th, 1942.

My Dears,

The days since my birthday have been busy, and have combined a lot of social doings with work.  I broke off my last my last letter just as we were going to see “Major Barbara”.  It is a good film, and we all enjoyed it.  Herbert thinks it not quite as good as “Pygmalion”, and perhaps he is right, but I think only because “Pygmalion” is, in itself, a more attractive play.  An unusual occurrence for us, we went twice to the flicks in a few days, for at 6 o’clock on Tuesday we went to see “Target for Tonight” and liked it immensely.  On Sunday we went to tea with some friends who have moved out into the country beyond Tollygunge, for the sake of their children.  They have a sort of small farm, and keep cows and chickens, and grow vegetables and fodder crops.  The children have ponies to ride and a little pony cart in which to drive about with their governess.  It certainly seems a much more wholesome and normal sort of life for children of eight and ten, than that led by most of the children who have been brought out to Calcutta.  It was lucky we managed to go there when we did, for the petrol ration has now been halved, so our movements will be extremely limited.  Herbert had especially wanted to go there, for Mrs Forsythe is making humus, and he was convinced that she was not doing it by the proper method, and nor she was.  He has spent quite a time since, writing out instructions for her.

Monday was a day of official parties.  In the afternoon we had to attend the Viceroys garden party at Belvedere, and I was summoned to tea at the Vicereine’s table.  Just after we arrived we met our Sapper friends, so took them under our wing and introduced them to a few people.  It was a much smaller party than usual, and less picturesque, for none of the ruling princes were there, except Tipperah, from the Assam border, who lives a good part of his time in Calcutta.  That same evening we dined at Government House, where it was a biggish dinner, but informal, the men all in Dinner jackets or Khaki.  Herbert survived the ordeal of two parties in one day very well.  When I had to leave Idris in office with the possibility of several candidates to interview, I felt rather like I do when I have to leave Herbert to do the house-keeping.

We had what is really our first party here on New Years Eve.  One of our former Sapper friends, brought two new ones to dinner, and I got a few more people to make up a little party for the Saturday Club dance.  It was not the usual fancy dress riot that it usually is.  Many of the men were in khaki or air force blue, with a sprinkling of sailors and it was a merry evening, in spite of war shadows.  We had thought of coming home fairly early, but it was almost three o’clock when we got back here, and I sent the men back to the Fort in our car.  I did not feel very tired the next day, and was up as usual at 6.30 and ready to go to office at 9 o’clock, but a message came from Idris that as it was really a holiday, he thought we would not go down till ten o’clock.  We had only a skeleton staff in office, and it was a handy day for dealing with papers that had been put aside till there was more time.  There was also a great event.  A young chemical engineer who has been working for three years in Nepal, and came down to join the army about six weeks ago, walked into the office.  We had asked to have him for the High Explosives factory, but had thought it only a dim possibility that we should get him, and certainly did not suppose we should get him so quickly.  Getting demobbed from the army and appointed in the Ordnance was going to take two or three days, so I invited him to stay with us.  He was a nice man, and a perfect guest, for he did not require any looking after.  It has cheered us considerably to get two or three very good men during the last week, for we had had a bad patch when none of the higher grades of  Engineers or chemists seemed to be forthcoming.  Mr Brett moved from khaki into grey flannels yesterday and left us about 6 p.m. en route for his new job.

On New Years’ Day, from which I seem to have jumped forward quite a bit, I decided to come home about three o’clock, as I was feeling sleepy, and there was no urgent work to be done.  It was lucky I did, for just as Herbert and I were sitting down to tea in the garden, a taxi drove in and a strange woman advanced across the lawn, explaining that she and her two children and a friend with two more children, had just arrived by Air from Rangoon, and had been advised by friends of ours in Rangoon to come to us if they were in any difficulty.  Being New Year’s Day the Banks, and Agencies like Cox’s and Thomas Cook’s were shut and these poor dears, already tired, after considerable nervous strain just felt that they wanted some help and support.  They wanted to get on to Delhi where they have friends, as soon as possible, and had half thought of trying to get off that night, but I persuaded them to spend a night in Calcutta, and leaving them with Herbert in the garden, I went up to cope with the reserving of accomodation on the train, via the telephone.  Luckily there was a whole first Class carriage on the mid-day express available the next day, so it was fixed.  I could at a pinch have put them all up here, by sending Mr Brett back to a hotel or to someone else, but they had already got rooms in the Great Eastern Hotel, so it seemed best for them to stay there.  I sent Mogul and one of the chaprassis to see them from the hotel to the station and off in the train the next day.  They left Rangoon not so much from fear of the actual raids, but because so many of the servants were running away, and because all the menial staff of the Corporation had gone, and there was no one left to do the conservancy work or clean the streets.  They were afraid of some outbreak of epidemic for the children.  All through these various things I have been suffering from a weeping eye.  It began while I was at “Major Barbara”.  I thought it was a cold.  At the Garden Party I met Percy Brown, who says he has recently had the same complaints, and went to an eye specialist about it.  He passed on the prescriptions and instructions for treatment to me but I am sorry to say that after six days it does not seem much better.  I will give it another day, and then go to an eye man myself.  Luckily it does not hurt, nor look to grossly unsightly, but its uncomfortable to have to keep mopping it all the time.

Even on Friday we did not have an entirely free evening, for Arthur Moore, the editor of the Statesman, who is moving into a flat close to us, asked whether he might have dinner here.  Idris and Herbert so often disapprove of things in his paper, that I am always a little nervous when Arthur comes here, for fear they may break out against him!

Harry and Winsome have just moved into the Firm’s big house, reserved for the senior partner.  Its a lovely house and garden, and in spite of being very busy, I think Winsome is looking forward to getting it arranged to her liking.  When they lived in it before, she could not make any changes because they only occupied it for a few months.  We called in to see them on our way out to the Rankens, where we were invited to see the colour films they have recently taken of a trip in Rajputana.  It was an almost entirely American party.  The films were good, and did not go on too long.  Added to this, we met some old friends, whom we had not seen for a long time, so it was a satisfactory party. 

Herbert has stood up to the extra entertaining and the constant stream of visitors in and out of the house during this Christmas and New Year season very well indeed.  He is really looking well.

We got letters from Annette and from Bernard Tennant two days ago, as well as a mail from New Zealand, and yesterday I got a card from Eric Shipton, who is now British Consul in Kashgar.  His servant, Llhakpar Tenzing, formerly one of the Everest Porters, also signed the card.  I could not read the post-mark on it, and wonder how long it took to come down over the Himalayas.

Best love to you all

LJT

Family letter from HPV

Calcutta,
January 4th 1942

My dear Annette (name handwritten)

New Year’s day for me opened in solitude, for I was in bed after seeing my dear wife and our guests leave for a dance at the Saturday from which they returned at 2.30 or thereabouts. Good wishes towards you all marked the occasion; but no good resolutions, now that I come to think of it. I did not go to office that day, though I worked at home, for on the day before I had found that the clerks were many of them sitting at their tables without work to do and it seemed rather foolish to compel them to repeat this performance this day also.

The usual annoyance, never expected by me, let me confess, of being sent baskets of flowers and fruit by Indian gentlemen with messages that I had to acknowledge. Also my usual failure to write letters of congratulations to recipients of New Year honours. I did not get much work done actually.

In the afternoon as we sat at tea in the garden there appeared a lady who introduced herself as having a letter from Robin Hutchings an I.C.S. officer belonging to Bengal but working in Burma. She had come up from Rangoon with another lady and four children, all of whom were waiting in a taxi. Both of them wives of I.C.S. They had left Rangoon because the servants had fled and there were difficulties about water-supply and conservancy. It was hard on them to be landed here on a public holiday, when all Banks and travel agencies were closed; they wanted to get to Delhi and Joan got on the phone and fixed things up. It was a shame to me to let her do it but I am not a success on the phone, not being able to make Bengali clerks understand me; her voice travels well. We had not enough money in the house to be able to pay for the tickets but there was a man staying with us who had just drawn pay and from him we borrowed it. The children played serenely and gave no trouble; the two women looked dead-beat.

Other social events included going to the laying of the foundation stone of a Lascar’s Home by the Viceroy, and the opening of an Exhibition by the Governor. Both sparsely attended; but the reduction of the petrol ration by half explains this. I regretted having to use the petrol to get out to the home-site. It is clear that I shall have to use the bicycle for getting to office and let the guard fend for himself. The police insist on our having these armed guards and they are a nuisance.

Last week I omitted the chief thing about the hats. When Ismail was asked by Joan why he brought a Homburg, a fancy-dress hat and a double Terai of the most disreputable when with a morning coat the topper was needed, he replied “Some Sahibs wear one sort of hat and some another”, which is very true in Calcutta.

Nowadays when Mogul brings the tea-things into the garden he arms himself with a long cane. This is to terrorize the kites and hawks, one of which darted down upon him the other day and seized a pot of a Marmite in its claws off the tray. I like these birds but they are a nuisance. As also the crows with their infinite cunning. The six kittens belong to “Matthew’s cat” after all; for we saw her feeding them. They are amusing as they prowl along in a pack beside her, with occasional gambollings. We watched two of them stalk side by side a myna yesterday in a most professional manner, spoilt only by the fact that the mynah had seen them from the start. Mr. Case who was here to dinner the other night told how a similar wild cat had kittens on their sweepers’ staircase and how a resolve to drown most of them ended in his setting out saucers of milk.

Which reminds me that every morning before letting in the clutch our substitute driver who is somewhat of a gawk or buffoon incidentally bows his head and puts his hands together over the driving wheel as if in prayer. Certainly it is in prayer.

I must not omit my weekly reference to the fact that making all these mistakes on the typewriter is infuriation. It is no credit to me that having seen Mr. Porter rattling away on his typewriter as if it was the easiest thing in the world I became depressed and almost renounced the idea of typing anything at all. Instead as if in desperation I reverted to exercises, in the hope that I may strengthen my little fingers; but there have been so many people in the house that the exercise periods have been brief and I doubt whether anything good will come of this revival.

We went out to the Rankins’ last night before dinner to see coloured movies of Delhi and Rajputana (pretty good) and there I fell in with the Dutch consul’s wife on whom with great pleasure I used a few words of Malay, foolishly. This has reminded me that I am rapidly forgetting the little that I learnt, which distresses me though it can be of no earthly use to remember it.

A letter from Annette two days ago which pleased us much.

(handwritten addition at end of letter)
I dont like the photo very much, and yet was glad to see it. Although I do not comment on the home letters they are a great pleasure always.

Much love
Dad

(to Romey) I am sorry to see that some of the Canadians at Hong Kong came from Winnipeg, and wondered if you had met any of them.

Family letter from HPV

8 Theatre Road
Calcutta.
January 11th 1941 (should be 1942)

My dear Richard and Annette (names handwritten)

The circular letter from Joan will not be written this week. She has been having trouble with her eye; nothing painful but there is a lot of watering. At first she merely used a prescription that Percy Brown said that he had been given for the same sort of thing; but after some days when there appeared to be no improvement she went to Col Kirwan and obtained not only advice as to treatment but orders to cease using the eyes. So for the past two or three days she has not been to office and has passed her time in “thinking” and in listening to wireless or to the conversation of friends. She is better and was thinking of writing as usual but it seemed to me folly to risk all that she has gained and I volunteered to be substitute.

The difficulty is to remember what has happened. The young man who made cordite in Nepal has moved on to Kirkee. We had Gordon Lloyd in one night but saw him only at breakfast; he merely used us for bed and a meal so that he might come in for a dance. One of the women volunteer drivers fetched him. He is back again at the little place down south of Calcutta but they have now better arrangements about food and rely no more on eggs only. Yesterday there arrived another man, a Mr. Hughes, who is coming into the Supply Office and who will stay until he has had time to look round. We went to the movies in the evening; not Joan.

It was a film called “Father takes a wife” and to my mind one of its kind unusually good. In it there was that ugly woman with the fallen face who delivers wise cracks with such skill and there were many of the wise cracks. Also there was a good first half to the show and we felt that we had had our money’s worth.

Other entertainments have been a visit from a couple of people before dinner one night; short and not unpleasing. Drinks at Arthur Moore’s of the Statesman, to meet the General and his wife and other folk who proved agreeable. I found Mrs Forsythe who is the one keen on growing things and on making humus; I had given her a note on methods, since her own were clearly wrong, and she had asked for something in Bengali to pass on to villagers near, and I had now to tell her that the Bengali translation of the note prepared by me at Chinsura was so bad as to be unintelligible. It is really a futile language, in which it is almost impossible to express anything at all out of the way; but the clerk who translated the note for me must have been unable to understand the English. This has been a setback.

Winsome came in this morning, looking charming in her little round hat on which there have been comments in previous letters. As soon as they moved into the new house, the Firm’s house, the hot water system broke down; apparently the bottom fell out of the boiler. After six day’s of difficulty they have decided to put in geysers instead of having the system repaired; and perhaps in India this is the better idea. Many of the servants in Alipore have gone back to their homes for fear of air-raids but their’s have stood fast and speak with contempt of the runaways.

We have dug slit trenches in the garden in case there should be any raid and in case people in the road want to come in. There was an appeal in the papers for this to be done, more by way of establishing confidence than for anything else. There seems to be less alarm than at first and my officers say that many middle-class people who moved out of Calcutta are returning. There are not so many places where they can go to, unless they like to run the risk of various diseases which are greater than the risk of bombs.

Two days I saw a thing new to me. An officer who had come in on business wiped his nose on his tie. In a report about a threatened civil suit another officer said of allegations that a Sub-deputy Collector had forced his way into a house on some land “There is no house on the land and so the Marwari who brought the accusation is guilty of blasphemy against a Government Officer”. Strange that after all these years I should bump into three specimens of babu English when before I have met none.

I had forgotten that I had a merriment of my own on Tuesday; a lunch at Sir Upendra Bhattacharya’s; he is the man who discovered the cure for that previously very fatal disease Kala-azar. It proved to be rather a knock-out meal. Grape fruit, Mulligatawny, fried fish in lavish lumps, chicken done with red peppers, mutton with four kinds of vegetables, cold meats with several salads including one of asparagus tips, fruit with whipped cream and ice-cream, coffee. To me mostly forbidden and in any case far beyond my power of digestion. Conversation not too brisk. Largely about a scheme for providing first aid centres in this area in addition to those of the Government. There was a meeting about it on Sunday; a lot of havering which my end of the room ended by starting a subscription list.

Another visitor was Mrs Case, who is assistant secretary of the Himalayan Club. She models in wax; her mother modelled the giant flea and the giant mosquito in the South Kensington Museum. And her grand mother the flowers on Queen Victoria’s wedding cake; Joan is much pleased with this heredity-example.

She is unable when consulted to suggest any more news except that one evening we went round to Col Kirwan’s for a show of coloured movies of Kashmir, Delhi and Sikkim. Pretty good. Also there were four or five women there who struck me as educated clean and good too, though there is no reference, for or against, to their morals. Groth in a letter from the States asked whether we had read a book called “Pain Sex and Time”: the most extraordinary title that ever I did hear.

And she says, to resume, to give her love,
Much love
Dad

Family letter from HPV (not in AMT’s set of letters)

Calcutta, Jan 18th, 1942 (rec’d by sea, March 3rd)

My Dears,

Not too good a week. I have reverted to my old and objectionable trick of lying awake at night; and have had three bad nights. One without any reason that I can think of, one after a small party of folk before dinner, and one after going to the movies after a slack afternoon (I slept, it being Saturday) This morning I slept on till 11 o’clock, remained in bed till 12:15 and slept again from 2:15 till 4:30. Now I am having tea and watching the gamboling of the kittens. All this gives me a sad feeling of incompetence. Clearly I ought to have taken that offer of a certificate of incompetence to work anywhere that was made by the doctor in Wellington.
I have met another man whose driver, like mine, also says a prayer before putting in his clutch. And his driver is also a bad driver. Mine weaves zigzags on the road. He says it is to avoid bumps. When he meets another car, he thrusts out the heel of his hand against his rival, for so he regards any other driver on the road, and thus indicates that the other should make way and yield precedence. It is an ingrained habit and no cure is possible.
Omm. Not a Buddhist invocation, but an error in typing. In one of the Calcutta papers I saw an account of a robbery which said that the man robbed was ‘washed of his fortune’ of Rs. 60,000; it is a phrase that I had never heard before. Apparently a translation of a Hindi expression that corresponds to our “cleaning someone out”.
“Really, Sir,” said the Superintendent of the Leper Asylum, “we feel alarm not because there may be bombings in Calcutta, but because the British soldiers may come to protect us …….for then will the ladies be safe?” I encouraged him by arithmetic, not by casting doubt on the likelihood of the soldiers giving all their attention to such things. How many soldiers would be needed and how many days for them to work round to any particular Bengal lady, given the population of Calcutta and the distances to be traveled? It may be that he thought me to be mocking him.
Which reminds me about a silly story told yesterday, as to a tale by a small girl at a convent. “Our Sister was made a Mother yesterday and it took the Bishop two hours.” And that reminds me that a mongoose, small and to my mind not attractive, ran across the floor of the restaurant just at that moment. Why prefer it to a rat?
In view of the energetic way in which I have spent this day, it amuses me to think that the District Magistrate of Jessore was insistent that I should go up there today and open an exhibition, returning by a train that would get in at about 1 o’clock at night. It is sad that my colour always looks so good, for no one believes that I am ever tired. I have many appeals to get through this week, but there are two days holidays which well may give me time to write the decisions.
I was told by a Bengali gentleman that little Mr. Mallik, who was one of the Ministers in the Cabinet that has been thrown out, will of course never again wear the grey top hat, purchased by him for garden parties and the like. He well continue to be asked to them. And so it appears that a topper is, as it were, a mark of high official rank, to be discarded like a cocked hat on resignation.
We get a good deal of pleasure out of the five wild kittens which come out and cavort on the edge of the lawn at tea-time. More merry and more acrobatic than tame kittens, in my opinion, but Joan does not agree.

Much love, Dad

From LJT to Annette No 1 From Mrs H.P.V.Townend

8 Theatre Rd
Calcutta.

Jan 18th 1942

My darling Annette,
My darling Annette (How silly! But I wont scrap this)

It was very very nice of you to think of cabling your personal Christmas greetings to us. The wire reached us as we sat at tea in the garden one evening last week, and really I felt so warmed and delighted by it, for mails have been few and far between lately. You were the last person we heard from, in the letter which enclosed the first of your photos. Evidently the Air Mails to and from Canada have gone to glory, for its ages since we had letters from Rosemary and John. How lucky it is that the news from the Western part of the world, is good, for the Eastern Theatre of war makes us anxious, however much we know that the Japs will get it in the neck in the end. Hugh Edgley is somewhere on the Burma frontier and his people have’nt heard anything of him for a long while. Gordon Lloyd suddenly dashed in the other evening to say he had got his orders, and was off the following day, somewhere “overseas” but he did not know where. I am glad we have been able to do something for him here, though frankly I think he is rather a tiresome young man. He has the irritating habit of showing off. Still I wish him well, and I hope he comes safe through this horrible business.

The lack of letters from home has been compensated for in some small degree by two or three mails from New Zealand and Australia bringing us letters from friends there, especially from the Watson family. I wish I had a little more time to answer letters like that. I am rather touched that the two boys, aged fourteen and sixteen, or seventeen, should each have written me two letters since we left Brisbane. They are such nice lads.

There has been some talk going on at our various parties with the Sappers, which you would have enjoyed. Capt Cowan (he got his third pip a few days ago) apparently spent his early life in a highly literary atmosphere, his father and various relatives being Professors of English or D.Litt. or such things, and his sisters also taking their B.As. in English. He got going with Mrs Forsyth, one of my friends who does a lot of book reviewing for the Statesman, and who is a lover of The Georgian poets, and again the other evening with a clever Irish-woman, whose husband is Professor of English and/or Economics at the Calcutta University. Its rather refreshing to have bouts of talk like that is these days. Tom Hewitson, with whom I had a long talk the other evening, though an architect by profession, would apparently like to be an artist, and spends much of his spare time in the days of peace, painting. What a different flavour a Military mess must take on in War-time with its members drawn from every sort of profession, and interests ranging through the whole gamut of possibilities.

I have been reading snatches of Vera Brittain’s book, “England’s Hour” and enjoying it. Last evening I read her impressions of a weekend spent at Somerville in the Autumn of 1040. Whatever one may say in the way of criticism of her, she has got a vivid pen. It was terribly tantalizing to have several days in the house and not to be able to read my new books.

Idris and I had thought of flying to Dacca to-day to interview a certain engineer, whose period of service with Government is up and who, we thought might be useful in one of the Ordanance Factories. We could call the man to Calcutta for an interview, but Idris wanted an excuse for a flight. However the said Engineer walked into the office a few days ago. I then suggested to Idris that probably one of our Sapper friends would like to see the surrounding country from the air, and he has taken one of them out this morning. He uses his plane a good deal for sort of auxillary Government work, and has a grant of petrol in order to allow him to keep himself in practice, but casual flying is not allowed these days. Cross country flights are permitted but previous sanction must be obtained.

It will be most interesting to hear whether you change your job. I’m also anxious for new of Dicky

Best love, my dear
From
Mother

P.S. Did I say that the Statesman gave information that coupons would have to be given up in order to get delivery of clothes – so I am not sending any –

Family letter from LJT No 1 

8 Theatre Rd, Calcutta

Jan 18th, 1941

My Dears,

It was foolish of me to go on with the serial numbers of my letters instead of starting again with No 1 on Jan 4th 1942.  I start the fresh numbering to-day.

As far as I can remember, last week was the first occasion on which I have not been able to write my weekly letter through any physical disability.  The tiresome bout of “pink eye” which prevented me using my eyes for several days, has cleared up now.  I was tempted to write last Sunday, for the eyes were much better, but it was as well I did not, for when I went to office on Monday, I found my eye (only one was affected) began to water copiously, directly I began to read or write much, so I could only do a little dictating, and generally see Miss Jacob, the typist, was carrying on alright, and then I had to abandon work.  I called in at the Himalayan Club office on my way home, and did some dictating to my clerk there, before coming home to another part day of meditation in a darkened room.  It is odd feeling perfectly well and yet having to sit idle, as I did from mid-day on Thursday of last week, for Friday, Saturday, Sunday and part of Monday.  It was a good opportunity for thinking over all sorts of things that had been pushed into the back of my mind, to await leisure for consideration.  It was interesting trying to keep my mind steadily on the subjects I set myself to think out.  A lot of matters connected with the Himalayan Club were my first task, and having come to a number of conclusions, I phoned to the woman who has recently been appointed as my Assistant Sec for the Himalayan Club, and she came to tea, and took down a lot of instructions from me about matters she has promised to deal with.  It was far more difficult to keep my mind to the point when I started to think out a “talk” on the New Zealand Alps, which I have to give to the Himalayan Club some time soon.  My thoughts kept on hareing off down delightful byways, and I found myself enjoying memories of this or that delightful experience or interesting encounter.  My friends were good to me, and came to comfort me with talk.  Phyllis Gurner and I had the first real long tete a tete we have managed since I came back to India.  She has recently taken over the job of Provincial Commissioner of the Girl Guides for Bengal, and is trying to clean up the dreadful mess left by the first Indian woman to hold the post.  Its the job that I was asked to take on just after I had undertaken my present work.  I was most interested to hear something of what is happening, but sad to realize even more fully than I did what a terrible failure the first attempt to put an Indian woman in to a position of command, where she can only appeal for help in making decisions that affect general policy, to “All India”.  The result of her four or five years of Office is complete chaos, and such sickness in the Girl Guide movement in Calcutta, that it will be a big job to revive many of the dead or dying companies.

An important event to Idris and myself was the arrival of his new Assistant Director from South India a week ago yesterday.  Mr Hughes has been staying here for the time being, and has just gone off now to the United Service Club, where he plans to live till he makes up his mind whether to fetch his wife and little daughter up from Travancore.  He is a nice man, and seems most capable.  This week he has been getting the hang of things, and I have been able to pass on to him lots of information, which I collected with some difficulty when first I started working.  Such things as matters of procedure, of the forms which letters take, and when one has to use the tiresome formal method, “Sir, I have the honour” and, finishing up, “I am Sir, your most obedient servant”, and perhaps most useful of all, the list which I have compiled bit by bit, of the groups of letters by which people are known, and by which departments and sections are known too.  No-one who has worked in this group of Government. departments, for a long period seems able to realize how difficult it is for a newcomer to understand some observation such as “Its 12A’s fault for not informing C.A.P.  Probably the D.D.O.F. forgot to issue the order”.  Its so clear when one has been working for a while.

I was very glad to get back to work again on Tuesday.  It irked me to be idle.  Luckily George Hawes, who does Honorary part time work in the office, had just finished up the end of year reports and accounts of his Insurance Company, and was able to give a lot of his time to doingthe work that I usually deal with, so things did not get behind-hand.

One of the nice party of Sappers of whom we have been seeing a good deal lately, recently got orders of transfer to the other side of India, so his three friends have a little farewell dinner for him in the guest room of the Plassy Mess, to which they invited Phyllis Gurner and myself (They invited our husbands as well but they have both cried off dining out)  It was a charming little party, with some rattling talk.  Ramsey Chase was away on tour in the country parts of Western Bengal last week, and arriving back at mid-day on Saturday, he phoned and asked if he might come here for a bath, instead of useing the rather inadequate little tub in his tent.  He stayed on for tea and Tom Hewitson, the man who has just gone away, joined us.  Later Ramsey went to see “Father Takes a Wife” with Herbert and Tom, who wanted to get back to do a little work before dinner, stayed on to talk to me.  Herbert and Ramsey, and Mr Hughes, who also went to the cinema, came back chuckling and pleased with what they had seen.  They said there were more wise-cracks to the inch than they had ever encountered before.  I was then living behind dark glasses in dimly lit rooms, so could not go with them.  I did however venture to go to dinner at the Bengal Club the following evening and on to the Symphony concert.  Though I wore dark glasses I am afraid it did give my eye a bit of a set back, and was the real reason that it started bothering and made it necessary for me to come home from office on Monday.

Herbert has been keeping so well that I ventured on having a small “drink party” on Friday evening, chiefly to entertain two Indian couples whom we felt we must ask to something.  Herbert had been rather tired for two or three days, and this party just sent him over the edge.  He got bad indegestion and slept badly.  Unfortunately we had accepted a kind invitation from Mr Hughes to go to a six o’clock cinema and a grill afterwards at the Firpo’s, for yesterday evening, and Herbert did not like to cry off.  He was looking awfully tired at dinner-time, and though he got to sleep alright, he woke about three o’clock with a bad attack of indegestion.  His medicine relieved him after a while and he got to sleep.  I have left him sleeping and Now, at 11.30 a.m. he is still sound asleep.  I hope this long rest will restore him.  Winsome has just rung up to ask us to lunch there, but I told her I want to let Herbert sleep on as long as he can, and then spend the day just sitting in the garden reading a detective story or some light amusement.

This week has seen another slight rearrangement of furniture in this house.  There had been a few things here, i.e. a sofa and chairs, a writing table, and three bedroom wardrobes belonging to one of the High Court Judges, which had been so long in the house that they were almost considered part of it.  The Judge is about to retire, and suddenly awoke to the fact that he has some belongings scattered about, so he has collected his things, and is putting them into an auction.  I dropped into some auction rooms and left a bid for a set of four comfortable cane chairs and a table, which I duly got for the verandah, and I have a bid to-day for a writing table for the verandah.  The wardrobes were really surplus, and made my spare rooms very liberally furnished, so once I had got over the shock of parting with them, it is a matter of no importance.  Except for bombing, earthquake or such acts of God or the Kings Enemies, our furniture should now remain undisturbed for it is all our own.

Our English annuals are just coming into flower in the garden, and we have the most beautiful bed of double pink dahlias.  They are quite a picture at the moment.  We are also growing our own lettuces which have now come into use, and tomatoes soon will do so.

Winsome has now been elected President of the Ladies War Committee of the Red Cross, and I think she will make a very good one.  She is so splendidly conscientious and methodical, and thinks out every detail of organization.

Mails have been most erratic lately.  It seems as if just a few letters come in at a time, and not the huge batch which used to come with a mail boat.  It was a great joy to us to get telegrams of greeting from Highways and from Annette.

There are many things now which make us feel more nearly in the war zone.  Like the rest of the world, we eagerly await news from Malaya and the Phillipines from day to day, and long for the day when the democracies will have gathered their strength in the Far East and are able to drive the little yellow men into their holes

Best love to you all

LJT

From LJT to Romey

Jan 18th, 1942
(rec’d Mar 23rd)

My darling Romey,

H.D. and I have decided that it is no use trying to send letters by Air Mail until things quiet down -- so this goes off by sea.
It seems such an age since we last had news of you and I suppose it will be a lot longer before we get letters this other way round the world. I am getting a bit anxious about your photos, which have not arrived yet. I can’t remember whether you posted them before or after the Christmas presents, and I have not time to look up your back letters at the moment.
Has Dad told you what a lot of fun he gets out of watching the family of kittens who live in the garden? He puts down buttered toast for them every evening when we are having tea, and they have begun to connect it with the appearance of the tea table, and hurry along through the bushes at the edge of the garden to the appointed spot. They belong to Idris’ cat and are white with tabby tails, and a few tabby spots on them -- rather queer looking!
Yesterday I was given a red cross armlet--to wear if we should have an Air Raid alarm, for I have volunteered for duty on our office First Aid post. This has encouraged our typist, Miss Jacob, to do the same. She has been a Girl Guide and has also taken the First Aid course fairly recently.
Our petrol rations have been halved, bring our supply from 12 gallons a month down to 6 gallons, so it will be difficult to pay many visits to Harry and Winsome out in Alipore. We are lucky for we are very central and most people pass close to us on their way to or from office, so we have a good hope of getting people to drop in on us.
I wonder what effect the war with Japan is having on you in Winnipeg. It will be very interesting when we get your letters telling us what the reactions have been.

Best love my darling,
From Mother

From LJT to Annette No 2

8 Theatre Rd. Calcutta
Jan 25th 1942

My darling Annette,

Here’s a short little letter to thank for yours of October 8th, written from Highways, and for the second of your photos, enclose in Aunt’s letter of a later date. I like this photo of you very much. I have stuck it temporarily into a little frame. When I have got them all, I may have them all done in a single frame. Thank you also for drawing a sketch of a Recorder. I like to know just what it is like. I find myself beginning to take quite a lot of interest in the instruments of the orchestra, and wish I knew something about them.

We have just been to an excellent film, with an unpromising title, “It began with Eve”. Charles Laughton and Deanna Durban. She is developing into a good actress and seems to have had the strength of character to avoid sacrificing her personality to mere clothes.

Best love, dear daughter
Mother

Your copy of family letter goes by sea – Mother -

Family Letter from LJT No 2

8 Theatre Rd. Calcutta
Jan 25th 1942

My Dears,

This has been a red-letter week for news from home. Apart from quite a number of letters from friends, we got Grace’s letter No 21 dated Oct 25th, Richard’s d. 19/10, one from Bous, d. 5/11, and one from Len d. 30/9. Besides these we had the long letters from Barney and Alice, telling us the details of poor Gerald’s death. We were grateful to both of them, for writing at such length and giving us so much detail, sad though it made us to think of it all. When we were watching pictures of manoeuvers some time ago, I kept on thinking that it must be impossible to carry out practice on such a realistic scale without having a lot of serious accidents. How little one thinks on such occasions that any of ones own people will be the victims. It was extremely bad luck that both Bous’ letters to me last year were lost, as really comparatively speaking so few have failed to arrive. Unfortunately the main Christmas mail from England to New Zealand at the end of 1940 was “lost by enemy action”. There are two letters from Grace missing now, both written during October presumably, which should carry the numbers 19 & 20. For those who write regularly, it is satisfactory to number letters, for it satisfactory to be able to check whether any have been lost. To all those who have written, our most hearty thanks. Letters in these times are even more precious than during the normal years of peace.

We have had one or two interesting things happening this week. On Monday evening we went with Louise Ranken to see a short play of hers being broadcast. It seems that she has written ten of these short plays, illustrating the growth of American history and political thought. They have been acted by a company of amateurs, mostly people belonging to the Standard Oil Co, and all the profits are given to the War Fund.

I had never been inside a broadcasting station before. The setting has a certain romance. The studios are enshrined in an old house in what used to be the smartest residential district of Old Calcutta, but which has long since been given up to the business world. Turning off a street lined with modern business offices, and driving down a narrow and rather slummy lane, one passed into the courtyard of an old house, of the sort to which Warren Hastings and Phillip Francis, and their ladies, attended formal dinners and great parties. The old world atmosphere ceases sharply at the door-step. There one passes into the immediate present, stretching into the future. The walls are lined with sound proof materials, done in delicate pastel shades, and the lighting is all of the concealed description giving a general radiance in the rooms. Ceilings have been lowered for the sake of the air-conditioning. The decorations and furniture are all in the most modern styles of chromium plate and such. We were taken round to see several of the studios, where nothing of the mechanics of the thing are apparant except an innocent-looking microphone, and the group of coloured light signals over the door. We saw neighbouring rooms equipped with the gramaphone records responsible for the noise effects, and the control rooms and so on. We listened to a man we happen to know, giving a short talk on A.R.P. work, and looked into the studio where an Indian orchestra play regularly. Its sad to reflect that the Indian instruments which are so pretty to look at, make, on the whole, such unpleasant sounds. Louise, meantime had been busy with her cast. We joined them a few minutes before they were to go on the air, and found it most intriguing to see how the play was given. One typical young American amused me especially, for he threw every ounce of himself into getting his part over. I think the sketch was well done. I wished I could have gone away and immediately heard it done again, listening from my own home. We picked up Everard Ranken at the Bengal Club, and they came back to dinner with us. They are people whose company I always enjoy.

The following evening I went to a little “drink” party, which I enjoyed. There were about eight of us there, all with some mutual interest, and wanting to talk, as opposed to feeling compelled to make conversation. Our hostess’ husband, who is a professor at the Calcutta University, has just been called up for military service. She has been working for a long time for the Bengal Chamber of Commerce, and has decided that it is up to her to stay on doing her job, rather than attempting to follow her husband round from place to place.

It has been a busy week in office, for Idris went off on a ten days tour of all the Ordnance Factories on Friday morning, leaving Mr Hughes in charge of the office. There were great scurries in getting him to give orders on all sorts of urgent matters before he left, and collecting the papers he wants at each factory, into separate folders. He is flying himself in his plane, and there were lots of things to do with his arrangements about permits and petrol and so on. He did get away alright on Friday morning, and Mr. Hughes and I have been manageing so far (Or so we think!)

On Thursday I had an appeal to take in a woman who had just arrived on a ship from Rangoon, with her small three-year old daughter. They are going on to Africa fairly soon. They had settled in the Grand Hotel and it was too late to move them that evening, so they came on Friday morning. As I could not be here to meet them, I arranged with Phyllis Gurner to do so for me, and with Mrs Wright Nevill, who is living only just around the corner, to come and have lunch with Mrs Maconakie. Mrs W-N has a small daughter of five with a nice ayah, and by a great stroke of luck this ayah produced a friend, who has just left another friend of mine, and she has accepted a week’s temporary work with Mrs. Mackonakie. It is a great boon both for the mother and for us, for Elspeth, though a nice little girl, and very like early pictures of Queen Victoria, is a bit of a handful.

We had an interesting evening yesterday. A man came to dinner, who spent about a week-end with us at Chinsurah in the late Cold Weather of 1939. He was then collecting material for a book, under the auspices of Sir Herbert (?) Schuster. He rang up on Friday evening, and said, “Do you by any chance remember a man called Wint?” We did, and asked him to come along to dinner yesterday. He explained that he could not wear evening dress, as his dinner jacket was being worn by a Jap. It appears that he was in Hong Kong when the war with Japan broke out, and came away on a destroyer, abandoning most of his luggage. He is a Government Servant in the Diplomatic Service, on a temporary war footing, and is now passing through Calcutta on his way to Delhi on some sort of liaison work. As far as he knows he will be travelling to and fro from Chunking to India at intervals of a few months, for some time to come. It was interesting to hear something at first hand, of what life is like in Chunking, and something of affairs in China as a whole.

With the much restricted quantities of petrol, we find it difficult to get out to see Harry and Winsome, but enjoyed a visit from them this morning. Winsome likes to go to the 8.30 Service at the Cathedral, so Harry drove with her so far, and then walked on here, and Winsome followed him later. They both look well, and not weighted down in any way by the weight of their responsibilities. Harry did not bring the dogs because he had word of the cat and her five kittens who live in the garden, and to whom Herbert gives food each day. The cat is becoming fairly tame, and walks about halfway from the shrubbery to the tea table on the lawn, meowing loudly for food. When Herbert walks over to the edge of the bushes she ventures to within about a foot of his legs, but the kittens are still a bit shy.

A spell of cold weather has been giving us a lot of pleasure, and probably increased good health. I always feel that every really cool day helps us to store up a little more energy to last us through the hot and damp days.

Herbert goes away on tour for a week or ten days to-morrow. He is going to rather a nice place in the Sunderbands, on the bank of one of the great mouths of the Ganges, but it wont be very lively I expect, for there are no British Officials there, and I dont know that the Indians there are specially good types like some were in the Districts of the Burdwan Division.

Herbert sends his love to you all, but wont write this week as he has a lot of work to finish up before he goes off to-morrow. His days’ rest last Sunday did him a lot of good, and he has been pretty well all the week, but working rather too hard the last few days.

With my best love to you all
LJT

From LJT to Romey

8 Theatre Rd, Calcutta
Jan 26, 1942

My darling Romey,

What an excitement it will be when we get letters from you again! I do wonder how long it will take! Mails from England have been coming in the most peculiar way lately. During the last few days we have got letters with dates as far apart as Sept 30th and Nov 25th.
How terribly sad it is about Uncle Gerald’s death. When I saw cinema pictures of the army maneuvers, I said that it looked as if there were bound to be serious accidents. How little did I think that such an accident would carry off poor Gerald.
How quickly this year seems to have passed in some ways. I am looking at the photo of you standing outside the house in the snow, which was taken about a year ago, but still seems like a new picture to me. Oh, I do so hope your new photos have not been lost!
The reason I did not write a personal letter to you yesterday, was that Mr. Hughes, who was staying here last week, asked me to go round with him to see a flat he thinks of taking. Then he came back to tea here, and took Dad and me to the pictures. We saw “It Began With Eve”. We thought it an excellent film, and thoroughly enjoyed it. It was a nice surprise too, for the silly title, added to the fact that so many of Deanna Durban’s recent films have been silly, made us fear we were going to be rather bored. Have you seen the picture? Charles Laughton is excellent! I think he is as good in it as I have ever seen him.
Tell me, when do you sit for your finals? Will it be this year? It will be funny if you have got a Degree before you are nineteen.
Some of Annie’s photos have come, and I am so delighted to have them. She looks so well and happy in them. She is not quite so fat in the cheeks, but the loss of a little flesh there makes her better looking. Did you hear the tale told by Peg, of Richard in uniform, dancing madly in the yard with the dogs, while Michael’s batsman cleaning boots, looked on solemnly, determined not to be surprised at anything?
When we were at broadcasting house last week I thought of Helen. You have quite often watched plays and things being sent over the air, haven’t you? It seemed to me an odd sort of atmosphere. In some ways one got the feeling of being detached from the world, but in reality one is in touch with more of the world than at any other time, I suppose.
Dad is becoming a slave to the garden cat and her kittens. They arrive regularly at tea time now, and Puss advances across the lawn crying loudly for food. Dad almost grudges hot toast or sandwiches to himself or to me, as he feels that the kittens have greater need, as indeed I think they have! It is a pity they are mostly white, for Calcutta’s soot is rapidly making them a dirty grey.
My poor guest from Rangoon is sitting alone on the verandah, so I must go and talk to her I think. Sad to say I find her very dull, poor woman. The little daughter, Elspeth, aged about two and a half, is rather the same type of little girl as you were, square and determined! She is a nice little thing, but a bit stand-offish with strangers.
My letters are not very good these days. I suppose letter-writing is really a thing that demands plenty of leisure. I don’t know when I was wrote to Cousin Susie and to Helen, but I often think of them. Give them my love, and with lots and lots to yourself.

Mother

From LJT to Annette No 3

(Pencil note at top of letter: The cheque makes over weight so is sent by sea LJT)

8 Theatre Rd.
Calcutta.
Jan 31st 1942

My Dears,

There have been more lovely letters this week. Grace’s Nos 19 and 20, which I had mentioned as being missing last week, have arrived and make the series complete. Then there was one from Annette, written the end of Sept, and two from Richard, as well as one from Mokes with a little present, and a book from May. To the senders of all these many thanks, if I dont manage to write personal thanks to each this week. Oh yes! And thanks to Joey for one as well.

Mrs Maconikie and her little daughter are still here, but leave on Monday. I am glad to have been able to help them, but find her a bore I am afraid. She is one of those rather typical military wives, with a narrow circle of interests. She eats very slowly, and likes to indulge in a lot of trivial desultory conversation at meal times, which I find especially trying at breakfast. Unfortunately for the greater part of this week, I have had a sore throat which has made talking an effort, so that I would gladly have rested my voice at home. Yesterday evening I took refuge in my room, when I came back from office, saying I was going to inhale and rest my voice, and I greatly appreciated a few hours of my own company. Our previous visitor, Mr Hughes, who was with us for a week, never gave me this feeling. I suppose the reason was that when he talked he said something that was worth listening to. Luckily Mrs Maconikie has quite a lot of friends here who have come from Burma, so she has been foregathering with them most days, and one or two of my friends have taken her out too.

Herbert went off on Tour on Mon-day. He will be back on Tuesday I think. Idris is still away and we expect him on Thursday. We are missing him rather badly in the office, for things are cropping up in the office which it is difficult for Mr Hughes to deal with after so few days at the job. Mr Hughes is nice to work for and with, and we are a happy family in our little section.

In Herbert’s absence I took the opportunity of having a small dinner party on Tuesday. Perhaps it was talking too much at that which gave me my bad throat, for it was the next day that I could scarcely speak. Except for that, and for taking Mrs Maconikie to see Sonja Henie in “Sun Valley Seranade”, I have not engaged in any social doings I was to have gone out to dinner yesterday, but did not feel like it, and enjoyed my quiet evening at home instead.

Coralie Taylor and her husband came to my late tea in the garden on Tuesday. Bobbie Taylor has been transferred to Chinsurah, and they are debating whether Coralie should not stay in Calcutta and carry on her job with the Women Voluntary Drivers. If she does, she will stay here, and I wanted her to see the rooms I can give her. I am fond of both of them, and should not a bit mind having Coralie in the house, especially as I can let her have a little sitting-room of her own.

The women’s war work here is scarcely organized at all at present, except for Red Cross activities, but I think we are on the verge of something being done. Delhi has got ahead of us, and we hear that they have got a lot of women into khaki there, to take the place of men in office and many other jobs. There is quite a big corps of women drivers here and it seems silly to me not to have them in uniform, and properly organized.

A good many refugees are arriving in Calcutta from Siam, Hongkong and other places where the Japs have made themselves too much of a nuisance. We had two men from Siam in the office this morning. Unfortunately neither of them will be any use to us as one is a civil engineer and one electrical. I think the army will want them both as a matter of fact, and I sent them along to the Staff Officer Recruiting, in the Fort. They say they only got away from Bangkok just before the Japs were in, and just shoved a few things into hand bags leaving everything else behind. It seems as if everyone was prepared for war to break out at any moment when we flew through these parts in August, but expectations were lulled while negotiations were going on with America.

I am not going to attempt a second page this week, as I have nothing much to tell about, and also I hope to write decent personal letters to several of you

Best love to you all
LJT