Love Bomb

Love Bomb

Postmark: 14 February 1945, reply through station commander only.

My very own dearest Vera

First I must apologize to you for my silence. I know I promised before I went away that I would write to you every day. It’s just the war got in the way. I am thinking of you every day, every moment, it has not been possible to write for a while. I also promised I would never have secrets from you, but the war has got in the way of that too. Two sentences,  two broken promises already. I promise as soon as the war ends I will tell you everything. For now, all I can say is that even though it is Saint Valentine’s Day you won’t be the only person reading this letter.

I want you to know I am safe and well but we have been so busy recently, let’s  say my feet haven’t touched the ground.  Now, my sweetest darling, you may, or may not be pleased to know my flying days are over. At least for the foreseeable future. It seems a strange situation to relay to you, especially as the second proudest day of my life was the day you came to the station when I was awarded the bar to my DFC. You caused quite a buzz among the chaps, I can tell you, chocks away skipper they said, well, among other expressions that would only make you blush. The proudest day of my life was of course the day you condescended to agree to marry me. The war got in the way of that too. Talk about war crimes!

I don’t want to alarm you but I have been allowed to write one letter to you to tell you I have been taken off the active service list and placed on a charge. This one letter is for now all that is allowed under military law.

I can give you some details darling as it is now after the event but this must go no further than your own peachy lips.

A few weeks ago I was asked to lead a group – pathfinders we call them – to drop markers over a major German city. Of course I flew the sortie as always. The mission was deemed a success and I was asked to lead another group, a bigger group to a bigger city. I can only say to you that my observations were – and are – there was no specific military target to this city. It is a strategy known in the trade as area bombing. My markers laid the way for special bombs to do this job.

I have refused to repeat this mission therefore am now under arrest in a military detention centre. The charges against me are serious but the CO, you remember the old boy when you were here that spring day , now seeming so long ago – I digress, the CO has told me to tell you the DFC will count in my favour but beyond that there is not much he can do for me. Chain of command and all that.

I’ll wager this isn’t the most romantic letter that stunning you has ever received on a February 14 but I want to know something, one thing. One reply is all that is permitted,  one word  is all I need, imagine your letter slipping through the bars of the cell like a blue bird, a card, a picture, something to show  you are with me, that I am not alone in what I, without you, decided was right to do. Do that if you can, if it is within you, and all will be well.

Next year, roses, red, I promise. Vera. The truth.

Your very own

Harold.

Ilkley writers 1/2015  abc

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