I think everyone has been moved by the simple but brilliant idea of filling the moat at the Tower of London with 888,246 ceramic poppies, each standing for the life of one man killed during WWI. At this one hundreth anniversary it added an extra dimension of feeling which seems to have reverberated throughout the land.
On the subject of another day, another war, I was contacted a few days ago by a relative of the late John Bufton RAF who had served during the war flying Hampden bombers. Back in 2002 I had directed a production of Terence Rattigan's masterpiece, Flare Path, and in a blogpost in 2006 entitled Read it and weep! I reproduced a letter from young John Bufton which I had discovered in Max Hasting's excellent book Bomber Command. On this 'day of days' I thought it appropriate to reproduce the letter again:
Jenny, Darling,
At last, a spot of time to sit back and answer your last two letters! I can hardly read one of them 'cos I was reading it in the bath after a hard day's work on Friday and I was so tired that it fell in the water and got badly smudged!
I wonder if you were very disappointed at getting my telegram and letter about the weekend? I was mad having to send them, but there was no way out. Maybe we'll have better luck next weekend. Trouble with us here is that weekends are precisely the same as any other time now.
Poor Jenny, I'm so sorry you were upset by my last letter. Perhaps I shouldn't have been so blunt in what I wrote, but I only wanted to put things to you as fairly as I could. You've got such wonderful faith, dear, in my chances and I mustn't upset you by being pessimistic - I've rarely felt happier and more set on a job in my life, and my chances are as good as anyone else's. But I'm not ass enough to assume I'm going to be OK and everyone else will be unlucky, as it's a sheer gamble in the game, but damn good fun whilst it lasts.
Way back, Jen, my idea of the future was pretty idealistic. We've talked about it so often in peace time, and were agreed on what we wanted out of life, and it was a grand outlook. But now it seems such a myth! Like one of those dreams that can't possibly come true. We'll get married and be awfully happy - I know you'll do everything to make it seem what we both want - but there'll be a cloud over it all for both of us, dear, a cloud we can't hope to brush aside. For you, it will be the realization that you've given everything in your life to give me fleeting happiness, and that in accepting I'm condemning you to great unhappiness ahead, when you could have been almost as happy elsewhere, otherwise, with a future both safe and bright.
If the chances were very good, I wouldn't dream of writing like this, but I'm no dreamer, Jen, and the facts are that immediately ahead is the winter, with all the danger that filthy weather invariably brings to flying (your pullover will help immensely there!). Despite this, our bombers are bound to become even more active than they have been in the summer months, and we'll hit harder and wider and more often than ever before. We're the only active force operating against Germany and as it's the only way of striking directly we'll be exploited more and more, especially as the force grows. The RAF, fighters and bombers combined, will undoubtedly win this war in time, but the end isn't nearly in sight yet, and before it's all over the losses will be enormous. I wonder how many people ever wonder what the average flyer's outlook on life is in these times? In most cases it's vastly different from what it was a few months ago. It's almost entirely fatalistic. There seems no point in making plans about the future. The present is all that matters, and in this day-to-day existence there are three things that occupy one's energies most of all:
(1) Intensive attention to one's machine and equipment, ready for the next trip, so that nothing is left to chance.
(2) Getting enough sleep and exercise.
(3) Getting a "social glow" in the Saracen's Head and keeping mentally fresh.
Doesn't sound very ambitious, but I'll bet anything that 95% of the RAF take these as their guiding principles, because only by doing so can they have the most chance of hitting the target and getting back OK ...
Why am I writing all this, Jen? Well, it's the answer to what you asked in your letter: you say 'Do I really want to marry you?' Yes, darling, 'course I do, and we'll go through with it in that spell of leave that may come through when I've done enough trips to qualify. But I don't feel much of a man taking you up on such a bad bargain, lovely tho' it'll be for me. In the meantime, darling, you'll make me easier in mind if you'll promise this - until we're married, if I should be unlucky enough to go up as 'missing', don't wait too long ... if I could only be sure, Jen, that your future would be assured I'd be content, whatever happens.
If anything happens to me, I'll want you to go and have a perm, do up the face, put the hat on and carry on - it'll take a lot of guts but I know you'll tackle it in the right way. And remember that I'd be wanting you to get happily married as soon as you could. And don't worry for me these nights more than you can help. It may buck you to know that I'm bung full of confidence in my own ability, but if I'm unlucky, well I'm prepared for anything. Over the last three months I've got used to the idea of sudden accidents - they've happened so often to friends and acquaintances that the idea doesn't startle one much now. Realizing fully what one is up against helps one along a lot. I'm not really windy about anything now. Anyway, there's too much to do to get windy. I'm longing to see you again, jenny, and we must make it soon! Keep writing, and when you come up, wear your hat, please, and the smile that cheers me up!"
John Bufton never married Jenny, he was killed a month after that letter.
