tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5502671101756463249.post4565856937529708146..comments2024-03-23T12:38:46.260+00:00Comments on The History Girls: What's in a Letter by Julie SummersMary Hoffmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06241989732624913706noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5502671101756463249.post-88834772079202147322016-05-04T21:44:55.790+01:002016-05-04T21:44:55.790+01:00I love letters, old and new. I have some of the le...I love letters, old and new. I have some of the letters my great grandmother wrote to her mother in Athens, describing her new babies, in the 1860s. To save paper she wrote horizontally and then diagonally across the page. She was a poor vicar's wife and couldn't afford photos, so from her description I know that my grandfather and his siblings looked just like my own babies. Pinky-blonde whispy hair, blue eyes and rosy cheeks. Janie Hamptonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03474227107768216646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5502671101756463249.post-44352278581044554642016-04-28T10:30:19.313+01:002016-04-28T10:30:19.313+01:00Lovely post, but it surprises me by how unrepresen...Lovely post, but it surprises me by how unrepresentative it is of my family, who were working-class Black Country.<br /> None of their children were evacuated, despite the B-C being reguarly bombed.<br /> Various uncles spent time as PoWs, but I've never heard of any letters being exchanged. My family didn't write letters - they were for Bad News, bills and officialdom. I've been told that the first they knew of my uncle Arthur coming home from Burma was the official notification from the War Office.<br /> My Dad liked to tell the story, with some pride, of how he first came home from National Service after 6 months away - his first time ever away from home. No one in his family owned a phone and there had been no letters.<br /> As he neared his house he saw his father on the other side of the street, walking to work. His father saw him, his eldest and only son, gave a polite nod of the head, and walked on. My father nodded back, and walked on to home. The underlying message was: that's how we do things. No fuss.Susan Pricehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07738737493756183909noreply@blogger.com