A loving couple, (the girl saying goodbye to her sailor boyfriend?) features on this week's Sepia Saturday prompt.
As we mark Valentine's Day, I like to look back again on the cards my grandfather William Danson (1885-1962) sent from the Battlefields of World War One to his wife Alice, at home with their four young children in Poulton-le-Fylde, Lancashire.
This first card below was posted on 7th ebruary 1918, and I like to think it was sent to Alice for Valentine’s Day.
I never knew my grandmother who died when I was a baby. Grandad was a taciturn countryman, who was working as a cattle man at the local auction mart when he was called up in 1916. He was not given to flowery language, so the emotions expressed through these cards seemed out of character, but revealed his closeness to Alice. In contrast the pencilled messages on the back were very prosaic.
Field Post Office - Feb. 7th 1918
Dear
Alice, received your letter allright. I have landed back at the Batt.
and am in the pink. I have had a letter from Jennie [sister] and am glad
they have heard from Tom [brother]. Your loving husband, Billy XXX.
The "In the pink" phrase seemed to be a favourite term that William used in other messages as well.
"Batt" - I take it to mean the battalion.
"Batt" - I take it to mean the battalion.
"Blighty" in
the address was used as a nickname for Britain, or often specifically
England. It was first used by soldiers in the Indian army in the 19th
century and was popularised in the First World War. According
to the Oxford English Dictionary, the word derives from "bilayati", a
regional variant of the Urdu word " meaning "foreign", "British",
"English" or "European." or "Anglo-Indian".
A "blighty wound" was a wound serious enough to require recuperation away from the trenches, but not serious enough to kill or maim the victim - it was hoped for by many, and sometimes self-inflicted.
Field Post Office 29 April 1918
Dear
Alice, just a line to let you know I am in the pink and hope all at
home is the same. There is nothing that I want. Will write again shortly. Your
loving Billy, xxxx.
My aunt thought this was a very "risque" card, and totally unlike her father!
More cards to his children:
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My grandmother Alice with her daughters Edith and my mother Kathleen, young Harry and baby Billy - taken 1916/
I
don't know when the card below was sent, but it was in the family
collection and again the love my grandparents shared shines through.
Inside verse
"Oh, Can you read the secret of my heart?
You surely must, dear wife
??? of myself, you are the better part,
Companion for my life.
The secret is, wherever you may be,
No power on earth can change my love for thee,
Your loving Billy XXXX
William and Alice, c.1916
The Danson family, c.1941 - Edith, Peggy, William & Alice, Harry and Kathleenwith son Billy, serving in he navy, absent. Youngest daughter Peggy was born after the First World War.
Like
many of those who had experienced the horrors of the First World War,
Grandad would never talk about this time. He lost two brothers during the
war - John and George.
The cards, kept for over 100 years stand out as a symbol of love and remain amongst my family treasures.
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A happy ending 23 years later in 1941, when my uncle, William's youngest son, namesake Billy, a sailor in World War Two, married Louisa Cerrone.
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Image courtesy of Pixabay
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Sepia Saturday give bloggers an opportunity
to share their family history through photographs.
A lovely tribute to William & his love for his wife & children. Happy Valentine's Day. :))
ReplyDeleteBeautiful cards, especially the embroidered ones. Yes, seeing a man without a shirt hugging a woman as a photo would certainly lead one's thoughts to risqué activities. What's love all about, anyway?
ReplyDelete