Stan and Grace

2364226 Sergt. S. Bristow Headquarters 15 L of C Signals Cen Med Forces                                                                            168. 30 Jun 44 My Very Own Darling, What a hellish day it has been to-day!   The hottest day we have had this year and quite up to the African standard.   Consequently I have been very irritable and the lads in the office here had rather a bad time today.   (Just see what you have to put up with when I come back to you & we get married). Probably my bad mood was as much due to the fact that I have felt very tired today, due to some unaccustomed ...

G.H.N.                                                                                                142 29.6.44      My Own Precious Darling, I intended writing this letter to you yesterday but I was so tired I fell fast asleep on my bed and the next thing I knew was Kit shaking me and telling me that it was time to go on duty.   You see the previous night we had a dance here and I was just ready to go to the dance when I was told that I would have to go on duty at 1 a/m. However, as I was ready for the dance I decided to go....

Letter addressed to the Nurses’ Home but forwarded to 3 Briar Bank Terrace, Edinburgh 11 2364226 Sergt. S. Bristow Headquarters 15 L of C Signals Cen Med Forces                                                                            167. 28 Jun 44 My Very Own Darling, I suppose that by the time you receive this you will have started your holiday & will no doubt be at Grimethorpe. As I lay on the silvery sand of our swimming beach this afternoon in the sunlight I was thinking how perfectly heavenly it would have been if you could have shipped over to Italy and stayed with me for a month. I must hav...

 Letter addressed to the Nurses’ Home but forwarded to 3 Brae’s Bank Terrace, Edinburgh 11 - This is the address of Grace's Scottish friend, Nan. 2364226 Sergt. S. Bristow Headquarters 15 L of C Signals Cen Med Forces                                                                            166. 26 Jun 44 My Very Own Darling, I am feeling in a very good mood tonight.   I had another letter from you today and tonight I have been to hear a lecturer who was convinced that the war in Europe will be over by Sept of this year, so you can well imagine how I feel!!   Hope he’s right, for the only thi...

2364226 Sergt. S. Bristow, Headquarters 15 L of C Signals                                                                            165. Cen Med Forces 25 Jun 44 My Very Own Darling, Six days without a letter – things were beginning to get serious – but one turned up this morning to brighten up my Sunday!   Actually, your letter was written on the 16 th and I was just in the middle of a juicy speech about what they ought to do with the APO for taking so long to deliver your precious letters, when I noticed that it wasn’t posted until the 19 th !   Did you give it to someone to post for you, Dear? ...

Stan and Grace seem to have become synchronised with their letter-writing.  Here are yet another two letters written on the same day. G.H.N.                                                                      (141) 23-6-44 My Precious Darling, Only one more week and then my holiday, though I must admit I am not feeling very excited about it, as yet.   I feel ready for it but there is a difference in feeling ready for a holiday and in getting excited about one, isn’t there? I do not think I told you in my last letter that Kit and I are not going to Scotland after all.   Nan’s Mother is very ill.   We have not made up our...

2364226 Sergt. S. Bristow Headquarters                                                                       164. 15 L of C Signals Cen Med Forces 20 June 44 My Very Own Darling, Your letter written a week ago arrived to-day to shed a spot of brightness on to the proceedings.   However did you manage to write it with such opposition as that which must have been provided by three females all sitting on your bed and talking!!   I have written to you under difficulties, but none quite so bad as that! I am pleased to hear that at last you have got some soldiers to look after.   Now you have lots to do I suppose you have l...

2364226 Sergt. S. Bristow Headquarters                                                                       163. 15 L of C Signals Cen Med Forces 18 June 44 My Very Own Darling, Something has gone wrong with the organisation!   Sunday has come and almost gone & the Army Post Office haven’t delivered a letter from you.   It's the first Sunday for quite a long time that I haven’t had a letter from you and I have felt quite lonely. Its been a “muggy” sort of day today & has tried hard to rain once or twice.   Even now as it is getting dark there’s hardly a breath of fresh air and although I am sitting under my m...

G.H.N.                                                                                (139) 16-6-44    My Precious One, I would give anything at this moment to be sitting right beside you – wherever you may be.   Maybe it's the mood that I am in but I must admit – I am often in that mood. I love you and miss you so much my Darling.   Usually it is at night when I miss you the most. You said in one of your recent letters that sometimes you feel so alone.   Yes – I too often feel that way, even though I am in the midst of a large community.   I guess that i...

  Grace saved this press cutting, probably from the Nottingham Evening News, showing some of the soldiers being treated on Seely Ward in Nottingham General Hospital.  There is no date on the cutting but a Council notice on the back bears the date 12 June, 1944, so it is likely to be shortly after that date.  The wounded from the Normandy campaign are clearly being brought back to the UK and cascaded across the country where space has been made in hospitals to receive them. The nurse in the left-hand photo is the Ward Sister.  The nurse on the right is looking down and could, possibly, be Grace but I don't think it is. Can you imagine a nurse happily lighting a cigarette for you on a ward in hospital today? #1940snursinghistory   #1940snurse    #nursing1940s   #nursinghistory     #Nottingham1940s  

2364226 Sergt. S. Bristow Headquarters,                                                                     161. 15 L of C Signals Cen Med Forces 13 June 44 My Very Own Darling, Just received your letter written on Invasion Day.   It was funny, you started your letter with exactly the same words as I did on mine to you.   Yes, it certainly was a momentous day, falling as it did on the 6 th . I knew you would be excited, Dear, for it brings the end of the war much closer.   Progress is a bit slow at the moment, but I think that it will speed up a bit once we get the better of the Jerries engaged in the immediate surroundings of ...

2364226 Sergt. S. Bristow Headquarters,                                                                     160. 15 L of C Signals Cen Med Forces 11 June 44 My Very Own Darling, It’s Sunday once more & feeling very energetic this afternoon I am spending the time swimming.   Wish you were here to join in the fun!    It's a pleasant little cove I am writing in with a short stretch of white sand – the only piece for miles along this rocky coast - & consequently it is quite crowded.   Quite a few civilian girls & members of the women’s services amongst the people, too.   If only you were here things would be qui...

Nurses Home General Hospital                                                                            (137) Nottingham              My Very Own Darling, I thought that I would write you a sea letter as I have not written you one for some time.   I am afraid that my sea letters are never as long as yours and that this one will not be an exception as I have not much news for you. It is quite cold today so the “powers that be” condescended to let us have a fire, so here am I, sitting at the front of a blazing fire, writing to you and listening to Victor Silvester on the wirel...