* LOVE LETTERS

The human side of war

By Zoe Christodoulides Published on July 11, 2010

ZOE CHRISTODOULIDES speaks to a man who exchanged over 800 love letters with his future wife during the course of WWII, some sent from Cyprus. They are now to be published and launched at the Imperial War Museum.

Is it really possible to be certain that someone is the one you will spend the rest of your life with when you’re forced to be apart for three years after meeting them a mere few times? The story goes something like this. Tony and Joan met in September 1943 on Britain’s west coast in the midst of WWII when they were both 22. A few weeks later he was posted to the Mediterranean on anti-shipping operations and they agreed to keep in touch, but things weren’t quite as easy as they might be today. With no telephone, they had to rely solely on hand written letters, which sometimes took three weeks to arrive.

Their letters started by describing their day to day activities but soon became warmer until they realised they were deeply in love. In total they exchanged a rather astonishing 675 letters and kept every single one of them.

They would not see each other again for nearly three years. But their love grew stronger as time went on and they were married three weeks after Tony returned to England in 1946. Their marriage lasted 60 years, until Joan died in 2006, soon after their Diamond Wedding Anniversary.

With Tony having published his touching love letters in a new book, Dear Joan… Love Letters from the Second World War, it will be launched at the Imperial War Museum on September 2. What’s really interesting is that many of these letters were sent to Joan from Cyprus, with Tony being posted on the island for a year during his service.

The now 89-year-old speaks over the phone from his current home in South West France. In a markedly refined English accent, he goes down memory lane and talks of the day that he first met his life time love. Rather computer savvy, all the letters exchanged between the couple are now filed month by month on his computer as he goes through them to jolt his memory.

“I was very shy and I was walking along the beach one day from an airfield to the mess with a friend. We passed by two girls and he called out hello. I was very shy and would have never spoken to them if he hadn’t.”

It just so happened that Joan’s house was nearby and the boys were then invited round for coffee. “So many things combined to bring us together. We saw each other for a couple of weeks after that but if I hadn’t decided to take a walk that day and hadn’t been with my more daring friend we certainly would never have spoken!”

One month later Tony managed to return to England on 48-hour leave and took Joan out for a night out at theatre. As they said goodbye in the taxi they shared their first kiss; something that Tony would never forget. “It didn’t happen like it would these days,” he says with a chuckle. Part of the RAF ever since the age of 18, Tony hadn’t been in a relationship with any girl before he met Joan.

“I soon wrote to tell Joan that I loved her but she was fairly non committal and certainly didn’t say the same back,” he recalls. “But as time went by we fell deeply in love through our letters.” And how did he know she was ‘the one’ for him? “We both liked art, ballet, the countryside - we found that we had the same tastes in everything.”

A few months later, it’s obvious that Joan’s feelings began to deepen, with a letter sent to Tony dated February 1944: “I dream so much of your next leave. And after the war, Tony, when we go to London you know what I would like, for you to give me flowers. Pale Parma violets and dark sweet smelling ones, and beautiful red rosebuds from the flower girls in Piccadilly. How carefree we shall be then and how happy. It is three months since you left England, and yet it seems so long. I miss you so much although you were near only a little while. Come home soon, soon, soon, Tony…”

Tony then writes back with the same adoration. “I try to see beauty in everything now so that I shall be able to tell you about it - I know that you love beautiful things so much. You would love the Mediterranean, Joan, especially around the Greek islands - we must come after the war - it is impossible to describe the loveliness of it all - you must see it for yourself. Please keep happy dearest and write to me about your dreams and hopes - it brings you so close to me.”

At this point Joan was busying herself at home as a permanent Civil Servant, a Fire Guard Section Leader, a Land Army volunteer (often digging potatoes by hand in deep mud as Tony points out) and a Red Cross worker in an American Canteen. Tony was going through hard and lonely times, describing one of his toughest moments when he was stationed in tents in the desert 300 miles from Cairo.

Almost always writing his letters sitting in a tent with a hurricane lamp by his side, somehow he knew they would both be united one day despite all the turmoil of war. One letter dated March 1944 from Tony to Joan reads: “I do love everything about you - not merely your smile and your beauty - but you yourself. Nothing shall destroy that love, Joan, I promise you. I was so very happy merely to be near you and now your letters help me to recapture that happiness. And so it will be again, dear. I shall come back safely and soon - nothing can happen to me - I have so much to live for now…”

But at one point that very same month, reality hit home with the squadron suffering very heavy losses. Tony then wrote a touching letter to be given to Joan in event of his death, sealing it with wax and leaving the necessary instructions. It remained sealed for many years after the war until Joan found it and insisted on reading it.

His written words speak for themselves. “I loved you dearly, Joan, and to my sorrow did not realise how deep that love was until I had said goodbye to you after that visit which was destined to be our last meeting... I hope you do find someone else to love, Joan, and know you will be happy - you could not possibly be otherwise - you love the beautiful things of life too much - the lovely sunsets we used to watch, the countryside and all the things that go to make our England… Yet I am selfish enough to hope that you will think of me sometimes and know that somewhere I am still with you - for I cannot believe that Death will end my love… goodbye my sweetheart, my thoughts are always with you.”

“If anything happened to me it would be ridiculous for her to spend all her time thinking about me; she was still so young,” he now explains. Fortunately Tony remained safe and sound and part of his service then included spending the better part of a year based in Nicosia. Dedicating a chapter to this experience he has named the ‘Enchanted Island’ he explains about how very pleasant he found the people here and describes his “lovely” climb up to the top of Mount Olympus.

An extract from a letter dated December 1944 gives some brilliant descriptions of his time here. “We cross a wide bridge across the old moat and we are in Nicosia, Chief Town and capital of the island. The streets are very, very narrow and the pavements practically non existent. And the chief fascination - the cyclists. Everyone on the island seems to have a bicycle and they ride in and out of traffic with completely reckless abandon… The real beauty of Cyprus, though, lies away from the towns and villages so let us recall our driver and continue our quest of the Golden Fleece of loveliness… the road takes us almost to the summit of Olympus and we climb to the peak. The whole of the island lies at our feet - the fertile valley and hills beyond to the north, the mountains rising from the sea to the west, the beaches on the southern shore and to the east our only rival - lofty Mount Adelphi…

My darling the time has come for us to part once more, but on this ancient hill I promise that I will come back to you soon and pledge you my love, now and forever…”

Tony then wrote of the many countries he visited across the Middle East and his varied and increasing responsibilities. He was then responsible for organising the gradual return to the UK, and demobilisation of the thousands of men no longer required in the Royal Air Force.

With the marriage arranged shortly after Tony’s eventual return to the UK in 1946 he explains that they both decided they would get married through their letters with Joan’s certain doubts about the possibility of their characters clashing eventually clearing with the passing of time. Soon after the wedding Tony joined the Shell oil company and took up a job in London with the couple moving into their own home and Joan giving birth to their son Christopher four years after they wed.

Future jobs then led the couple all over the world in a marriage that Tony describes as a truly happy one. “We appreciated each other because we had been apart for so long,” he says. But what does he believe was the key to their successful marriage? “We started off completely honest in our letters and shared all our thoughts on marriage, divorce and bringing up children. She wrote a list of what she thought were all her failings and I did the same.”

As Joan fell sick in the last few years of her life (by this point the couple had moved to France to be close to their son), Tony spent much of his time by her side, eventually spending nights sleeping next to her in a private room of a French hospital as she got weaker and weaker. “The loss is still instilled in me. I can’t get over it and although my son lives nearby here in France I still live with sole silence. It’s very quiet without anyone to talk to,” he now explains.

The last letter that Tony wrote was written after Joan passed away. “It is now three years since you left me and the pain and loneliness are as sharp as ever. When we were apart you often wrote of your wonderings. Where was I? What was I doing? What was I planning for us? Wonderings are now all I have to bring you back to me again. Where are you? Are you still aware of me? Do you forgive my shortcomings? And, most of all, shell we ever meet again?...”

Never having imagined that all the letters would have been published in a book, Tony was talked into doing so by a close friend who is Director General of the Imperial War Museum. “He said they show the human side of war and I think Joan would approve because half of the proceeds are going to charity and the other half are going to our son.” As our conversation trails to an end I ask Tony what he would perhaps pinpoint as the very best thing about being married to his first and only love.

“Oh I’d say so many things without wanting to sound trite. I’ll have to get back to you on that one.” A few days later I receive an email from Tony explaining that over 60 years, the intensity and nature of feelings and relationships inevitably change from youth to old age. But the answer to my question is a poignant one. “It was having a companion in whom I had complete trust, who had the same hopes, worries, tastes, in whom I could confide anything, knowing we had the same unquestioning love and support for each other.”

Dear Joan…Love Letters from the Second World War can now be pre-ordered from most online booksellers.

http://www.cyprus-mail.com/living/human-side-war/20100711