Note: Some of the envelopes are postmarked earlier than the letters, but I have kept the envelopes with the letters that they contained. These letters are over 75 years old - I don't know who may have read them over the years.
"4 August 1946
My very dearest Ellen,
I guess my correspondence has slipped a bit in the past few weeks but please bear with me for a while and it will improve, I promise. The heat is terrific and combined with the humidity out here it just saps all the inspiration and ambition out of me. Sometimes I think that I am just plain lazy but to circumvent that impression I'll stress the heat angle. Seriously though it gets stifling hot at 7 AM and continues that way until eight or nine at night. All our water is pumped from a well and is stored in a huge tank atop one of the hills that surround the base. The sun is so hot that it heats the water hot. Not lukewarm but hot. We don't get cold showers out here until midnight or later. Sleeping isn't bad as we all begged, borrowed or stole enough electric fans to help us out. I am about to establish a ritual and go swimming every night right after supper. I've been swimming once or twice since I got here one of them being a midnight affair at Awase when we all gassed up and put up our Aquacade from midnight until two in the morning. When you get wound up as we did their isn't a dive or a stroke that can't be done. I know as I tried but the results were hardly worth it as I wound up the next two days with stomach cramps that had me really worried. My new aquatic venture will be strictly legal and sober I promise you. They just cleaned a beach for the guys so we'll have to put it to use. They are going to put it in commission this afternoon with a beer party for all hands. The beer party I'll miss but I'll be around to enjoy the swim. The whole trouble is that you have to wear trunks and you can't go native. I guess it's reasonable but it seems nonsensical as the natives swim fifty yards away completely as nature created them to swim.
Don't get any foolish impressions as it's strictly the juvenile element of the native populace that ventures forth unclad. Sometimes I think they are half fish the way some of them take to the water. Last night as we were looking the swimming hole over we saw three or four brown youngsters no bigger than a fire hydrant splashing about like a couple of seals. It reminds me of the time when my brother Frannie was a baby and being his guardian I took him up to our old swimming hole at Milton. I guess he was about three or four and when he saw all the kids jumping off the wall onto the water he followed suit. I didn't miss him for a minute then I looked into the water and saw him fully clothed floundering around. After being pulled out sputtering and spitting out all the water he swallowed he commenced to laugh as though he really enjoyed his near drowning. I don't think he remembers it but I'll never forget it as it scared the life out of me. While on the subject of drowning I can't say that I'm immune. When I was about eight or nine a bunch of us went swimming at the Cunningham Gym outdoor pool and your beloved walked off with the prize of the day or maybe it was for the season. I almost drowned twice, once in the morning and once in the afternoon. To make it ironical it happened at exactly the same spot each time. It was good fun as I knew what was going on all of the time and the water was only a foot deeper than I was tall. Don't worry about me out here as you have to walk halfway to California before the water gets over your head. Who knows maybe someday I'll swim all the way back. We have a native that swims out to one of the islands once a week and you can just about see the island from shore. I'm not quite that good yet but give me a little time, say a century or two and I'll be able to do likewise.
I'm using an advertising folder under my perspiring hand and as I write I keep seeing out of the corner of my eye an outstretched hand holding a crystal ball with the image of an automobile grill visible. 'There's a Ford in your future' is the caption and I'm wondering if it's for me or will I be forced to revert to my Plymouth as of old. Right now it doesn't mean much but the future will tell. The Army is sending civilian workers out here and they are bringing their automobiles out. Why, I'll never know as this coral dust will ruin them in a matter of months. They do look swell though, the cars I mean and they seem so different after looking at jeeps all this time. How did you enjoy your weekend at Falmouth and did you pick up that ambition that you lost down there on your vacation? I'll have to give that place the once over when I get back to see what it's like. Speaking of Falmouth a chief came in a few weeks ago that spent a little time at Otis Field at Camp Edwards. I'll have to see him and find out how he liked it. I guess they have closed it up by now as it was only a training site for the carrier planes from Quonset. I guess I'll have to write to my Congressman and have them set up a field at 6 Green Street to help me out when I get home. That would really be something come to think of it.
Well honey I'll have to close for now and I'll write you again this afternoon for sure. Please take care of yourself as I love you with all my heart and miss you terribly so help I do. I must close for now so until a little later when I write letter two - all my love to you
Always and Always
John."
Hot Cargo was a 1946 romance drama about two discharged service men who go to Northern California to help the family of a fallen buddy keep their business.
"7 August 1946
My very dearest Ellen,
Back once again as promised but slightly peeved at condition in general especially chow. To begin with please get your cooking training under way immediately because if anyone ever puts cold cuts in front of me when I get back to the states I'll sock 'em and sock 'em good, so help me. During wartime conditions warranted an occasional serving of cold cuts, the men have their own name for it. Now with the war over we get the stuff three or four times a week and are forced to scrounge meat out of the butcher shop in order to survive. Oh just wait until I get home. I'll eat nothing but steaks until the horns show. I'll buy a side of beef, crates of eggs, sides of bacon and gallons of milk and eat like a horse until they hitch up a wagon to me.
I remember, oh so well, the steak my mother served up for me the last time that I was home. It almost covered the kitchen table and like a good little boy I didn't make a hog of myself as I should have. Oh how I wish that sweet occasion would only arise once again. That steak would last at the most thirty seconds. At night we big deal some meat out of the butcher shop and slice it into steaks to take the place of our already diminished diet. I've seen my mother put better meat into a stew than what we make steaks out of. But nevertheless, a little meat, a lot of imagination a bottle of beer and you're sitting on top of the world comparatively speaking. I can see it all now - : Breakfast consisting of about six or seven eggs over light, about two pounds of bacon, coffee et al with maybe a side order of hot cakes. Dinner would be steak steak steak with baked potatoes and other accessories while supper would have chicken roasted boiled or cooked, just as long as it's chicken. What wishful thinking but honestly honey it does my morale a world of good nevertheless. So please get moving along those cooking angles of yours or else I'll be a very very disappointed man when I get home. Speaking of night steak fries we have a huge jug of vodka in the ice box for Saturday's disposal. That's the stuff that helped the Russians win the war. It sneaks up and knocks you cold after a few quickies. I'll be forced to be cautious with it, extremely cautious. How goes the world back where your at? I guess it must be the same all over; just plain confusion. It's raining out now so I guess I'll miss out on my swim for sure now, pleurisy or no pleurisy. Well honey I'll close out for now and will drop you a line again in a day or two as things are getting dull out here. I wish I were home and could go on a fling together to build up my morale or spirits or whatever it is that's low. I'll close with all my love to you always and always. I miss you so much but I can't quite find words to express it as I want to. I love you and will
Always
John."
"8 August 1946
My very dearest Ellen
How are you today? Right now I am trying to shake off the affects of a case of pleurisy that I picked up somewhere or another. It ain't bad except when I take a deep breath or try to roll around while I'm lying down on my back. This is the third day that I've had it and since it's been rainy and damp for the past few days it's been pretty difficult to shake it. I saw the doctor about it and he gave me a few pills to take. I guess they have more or less a psychological effect than a curing one. I took the past couple of days off attempting to catch up on my lost sleep and did surprisingly well considering the noise and commotion that prevails thru out the day. I think I picked it up after going thru my exercise period of punching a punching bag and after getting all heated up standing around in the draft created by the fans. The only setback is that it interferes with my swimming routine that got off to a good start Sunday nite and came to a screeching halt the same night. When the aches and pains are all over I'll go to it again. The water incidentally is swell out here but it's terribly salty. You have to get accustomed to it. Sunday night it blinded and gagged me and when I looked in the mirror when I got back here I resembled an avowed drunkard with bloodshot eyes and all. In a couple of days everything will be okay once again and I'll be back to the old routine as usual. The incoming mail situation is getting really drastic out here as none has come in for quite a while I guess everything is bogging down all over. Since I have no alternative I'll just have to wait and see what the future holds in store for me as far as mail goes. I hope mine is getting back all right as it would never do for both of us to miss out. By the way I finally got your Boston Post with the picture of the Louis-Conn fight. I think they must have sent it by way of Egypt. Honey, if you get any more stuff like that just clip out the pages and send them out in an envelope - it's an awful lot cheaper and so much faster also. I have a chief with me who comes from Dedham and his folks clip out the sports page and send them to him every week. I guess it costs either twelve or eighteen cents air mail and they get here pretty fast when the mail is running on schedule. Speaking of home and newspapers it seems every magazine or pamphlet I pick up concerns Boston some way or another. The latest 'Look' is slamming the hell out of the Boston School Committee and the sport pages are building up the Red Sox. I guess with Curley the mayor anything can happen and it usually does. To make the year complete all they would need is the Legion Convention and have Notre Dame play at Fenway Park. This is really one year that I wish I was back home as I'm missing all the fun and I'm missing you in particular. Woe is me. At times I think I am a very lucky guy and at other times I think misfortune is following me around but I guess I'll have to take good with the bad until I can once again do was I please. I figure I'm not doing too bad when I run into guys who have spent only three and four months in the States in the past four or five years. Well honey I'll close for now and I'll write to you again during the day. I love you with all my heart and miss you terribly - All my love
Always ~ John."
"11 August 1946
My very dearest Ellen
Oh happy day! Today I received four letters from you and was I glad to hear from you. It seemed like a month since I received your last letter and I have been really sweating these four out. Our Air Mail situation is going to be quite rough from now on in as our mail flights have been cut from twice a day to three times per week. All the pilots are getting discharged so the only alternative is to cut down on flights. Our morale is pretty low now but if the mail gets any slower I'm afraid morale will be a thing of the past. The longer I stay out here the more disgusted I get with it all. I don't know whatever happened to the good officers we once had in the Navy but out here they have an awful mess of lunk heads. They haven't the common sense of a baboon nor the initiative of a corpse. I'm happy over your letters so let's forget the situation out here for the time being. Okay?
The first letter that I opened was your four Manhattan inspired masterpiece which considering the circumstances was really nice. It took me by surprise at first but after a while I got a boot out of it. I remember the time I saw you kind of high coming home from Nantucket so after four Manhattans I can imagine. I agree with you when you say a few drinks are supposed to make you forget but sometimes as you found out the whole theory backfires. Maybe that's why I took up the vogue. To forget in a little way how much I missed you but it never really worked out at all not until you get really stupid drunk and then you don't remember anything at all. When you wake up the next morning though you remember twice as much of what you were supposed to forget. It's confusing but it's nevertheless true. I'm not mad at you taking a couple of drinks as that's your privilege. You're no longer a child and you're old enough to know what your doing and why you're doing it. My only suggestion is that when you do drink please take care of yourself. I know how you miss me and I miss you just as much, believe me. The only thing I can do for any diversion to alleviate the situation is to constantly do something to forget it, otherwise I'd go berserk. I'm just as anxious to see you as you are to see me but there isn't anything that I can do about it. I'm just sitting and waiting for someone or something to move in one direction or the other. I love you so very very much and miss you so much that it's hard or I should say impossible to write about it. I guess I'm in about the same boat that you are in. Well honey it's time for lights out so I'll close out. I'll answer your other letters tomorrow as there is a terrific challenge in one of them. Till then I'll love you and miss you.
Always
John"
"12 August 1946
My very dearest Ellen,
Well last night I answered your inebriated transcription so tonight I'll pull another letter from my file and proceed to answer that also. Maybe in a day or two I'll be caught up once again, I hope. This is your letter of 29 July that I am about to answer so please stand by. I'm sorry that things are so dull for you back there but I guess we are both leading very dull quiet and secluded lives. As I said before I'm getting disgusted with this joint and tonight built up my anger. We played a little baseball and then it rained. Needless to say we had to quit and when we went to take a shower there wasn't any water. We filed over to the movie area at quarter to eight waited fifteen minutes and then they told us that there wouldn't be any movie tonight. Well here I am and if at times this letter seems to beat a tinge of anger I guess you'll understand all the makings. Now to get down to brass tacks and the big issue of the letter, namely my impulsive experiences or as you put it and my lack of same. If you want to know everything I ever did or said I'd be writing and talking to you about it for years. So just say that I had a common ordinary childhood with a few escapades now and then that caused my rear end to be thoroughly whaled strapped and quite reddened. I met my first 'love' when I was a mere eight or nine and when she moved away I thought my poor little heart would break in two. A few years later I was involved in a confused sort of triangle as two girls were 'madly' in love with me and attempting to keep both of them happy in my own crude sort of way - ahem - they discovered my objective and they in turn spurned me. I really had some 'gay' times in my younger days but the passing years haven't been unfruitful either. The whole trouble is that as I grow older I didn't fall in love with them as I did when I was a child. The moonlight swims were the best. Since I met you I've been on the straight and narrow pretty much as I came to the conclusion that when a guy is going to take himself a wife he can't afford to do much messing around as it isn't quite a healthy thing to do. If you advocate the idea that I gather a little marriage bed experience this is a hell of a time to let me know when my only alternative is some scrawny Red Cross character whose price is too high and some buck-tooth, scabby-legged gook who I would mess with of any price. As for your going out getting a little experience, well your a big girl now kid so do as you like. If sex was all that was running thru my brain and my only reason for marriage it would be most unprofitable what with all the 'love me and leave me' girls running around. Why buy a cow when milk is so cheap! I love you too much for that believe me honey. As for our honeymoon, well, I don't know where we'll spend it. As conditions are so rugged back there at present I don't know what to do or where to go. As things straighten out maybe we'll reach a conclusion as to our destination. Please keep me posted and pass on your suggestions, after all we're going together. Well I'll close out for now so please take care of yourself. I love you with all my heart and will
Always
John."
"14 August 1946
My very dearest Ellen,
Well, today is the first day of the second year of peace. To be brief it's the first anniversary of the now famous cessation of hostilities between us and the Japs. About this time last year I was at Ulithi Atoll just south of Guam or on my way into there. It was indeed a joyous day then but just another day in the work out here. I'll give the powers that be a small plug as they gave us the afternoon off while the army had all day off. Maybe I'm griping about it a little to heavy but I'll get over it. Seeing that tomorrow is Assumption Day I guess that would mean an early rising to go to Mass. From what I've heard so far Mass is it seven in the morning, which is half a day prior to my rising. I guess I can sacrifice one mornings sleep for the occasion. Well, I guess that's enough for current events on Okinawa, let's get back to the things that appeal to me; you and the states. I've been reading over your last few letters, including your ?Masterpiece? and see that you really do love me sober or otherwise. Well honey, I'm afraid I must confess that my feelings are mutual as when I get a little 'high' I think of you and us and out here my first thoughts are if I wrote to you or not. It usually winds up that I didn't and by the time I get around to it I sit in my sack and fall asleep thinking about it. See, I haven't you around here to prod me on toward the righteous road. Soon though, maybe. I hope so anyway because if it isn't I'm going to go stark raving mad. You keep praying and hoping back there and I'll do the same plus keeping my fingers crossed out here. Agreed?
I hope my mail is getting back there before its age old if not, I'll file a complaint with the Post Office Department.
I'm sorry to hear that Annie is still in the hospital. That is a pretty tough condition to get rid of but I honestly hope that she clears up soon. Living at home in Mattapan I saw lots of patients from the Sanitarium, some who had been there for years. I hope Annie never get that bad.
Speaking of reading, I'm third on the list to read Errol Flynn's new book 'Showdown." After I get thru I'll give you all the dope on it. It's supposed to be pretty good but I won't believe it until I read it. Well honey I'm going for a swim as the surf is high for a change. It's usually flat calm so maybe riding the surf ashore will be a diversion. I love you with all my heart and miss you terribly – honestly – I do and will.
Always.
John."
"18 August 1946
My very dearest Ellen,
Another Sunday is here and almost gone so all I have to look forward to is another week of toil and strife. It's really monotonous but I am still managing to hold onto my sanity. To remain sane and sound sometimes becomes quite problematical but I still persevere. Things get worse by the day if it's possible and now our mail is getting a mauling. Our Naval Air Transport Service is going to the dogs and mail planes will come to Okinawa only when a pilot is available. That goes for outgoing mail also. If you don't get mail from me very often please don't blame me blame demobilization. I wrote a letter a couple of days ago but since no planes have come to pick it up you will undoubtedly receive the both at the same time. Everything is working the same way. They have stopped sending men home on rotation for the time being and they are now sending men home whose enlistments are running out. They are running one ship in here a month so I guess we are just forgotten people at present. Time alone will tell.
How is everything back home with you? According to the last letter that I received from you Peggy is running around like mad in preparation for her big day. I guess by the time you get this letter she will have taken the fatal step so please give her my very best wishes and all the best of luck always. I guess it will take me a while to realize that she is married but I guess everyone winds up that way sooner or later. I guess you and I being in the later category. Please don't give up as our day will come along someday and when it does we won't take a back seat from nobody. The whole trouble is that it is getting around soon enough for me. I'd like to get married in the summer time and spend two or three week at some resort where everything is peaceful and quiet and where there is plenty of good food. But since service life is so unpredictable I guess we'll have to get married at the first available opportunity and figure out our plans from there. There will never be a dull moment as I don't think we'll know what will happen from one minute to the next. I'm getting quite impatient for that opportunity to arrive. Well honey, I'll make this a 'shortie' for tonight and will continue tomorrow. I love you with all my heart and miss you terribly. Please take care of yourself. I love you.
Always.
John."
"23 August 1946
My very dearest Ellen,
Here I am once again but I'm afraid that I'm a couple of days later. I've received a few letters from you this week, three in fact. I was going to write to you last Wednesday night but I got stuck with a watch that kept me going until eight the next morning. To keep from getting too many watches we stand our watches from four in the afternoon until eight the next morning. It's pretty rough but we have the next day off to rest up. It takes a whole day off to rest up I've found out. This way though we wind up with one watch a month so that isn't too often to knock yourself out. I remember back in the states when I used to be able to stay awake all night and then go to work the next day. Out here, I no can do. I guess I am out of shape or just out of practice. Well I lost a couple of my buddies since I wrote to you last. A bunch of guys went home yesterday as their enlistments were up. Somehow or other I can't get used to saying goodbye to guys I've known for any length of time. Maybe it's my Irish sentimentalism (?) or something but that's just the way that it is. The guys I knew in the group I have known almost a year and we used to get looped and raise hell together both here and back at Awase. One guy I'm glad went home though not that I didn't like him but because he became slightly involved with a native girl and wanted to marry her. I thought I had convinced him against it, but three days before he left he went up and saw the Chaplain about marrying her. If he had stayed a month longer on the rock he would have married her. I couldn't understand him at all but I guess that's human nature. I was glad to see them go as (it) reassured me of the fact that ships are still sailing out to this part of the world. I was beginning to feel that we were all to be abandoned. Another ship is scheduled in November to take men home on rotation. That will take quite a few men out of here but I'll just about miss that. They are sending the men home from twenty two to thirty days before their rotation is up, rotation being allowed after 18 months. If things run according to schedule I should be eligible the ninth of January. That will be the earliest I can leave unless these people get extremely generous which seems to be an impossibility from any angle. My only certainty is that I'll be home sometime but I hope that I'll be young enough to enjoy it.
Right about now we are sweating out a typhoon. The wind has picked up considerably. Last week a terrific typhoon swept over Iwo Jima, and only missed us by an eyelash hitting Japan instead. The one that is hanging around now is centered between here and the Philippines. Everyone is hoping that it hits and blows the base away so that we can get to hell out of here. I can smell the perfume or powder whatever it is that comes from your letters and I'm getting a terrific urge to up and swim home. It makes me fiercely homesick and lonely for you. I miss you very, very much as you know and love you with all my heart. Someday my luck will change for the better and we'll not be separated as we are now. Until then I guess there isn't much that we can do about it for the present.
Well honey I'll have to close for now and will write again maybe later tonight or tomorrow afternoon. Please take real good care of yourself as I love you with all my heart now.
And always
John."
"29 August 1946
My very dearest Ellen,
I received two letters from you today and as usual was very glad to receive them. They were postmarked Aug 20-21 respectively so you can see that they wasted no time in arriving here. I don't know that the trouble is with my mail unless it's the plane situation as I explained in a previous letter. The condition hasn't changed one bit as these mail planes are about as dependable as a rainy day out here. They may come in and they may not but they do arrive eventually about twice a week. I hope you get my mail soon as I honestly worry as much about your receiving it as you do. Writing on week-ends and maybe once or twice during the week I sometimes feel guilty after receiving so much mail from you and so very often. I'll never get over thanking you for your efforts and if you do slip off once in a while I have no complaint to lodge whatsoever. You have been wonderful and I mean it from the bottom of my heart. With baseball and other evening activities plus running around like a dog after his tale all day I lay in my sack and debate whether I should write or postpone it till the following day and before I can decide I'm fast fast asleep. It seems I am thinking of you in my dreams more often and last night really topped it all. I went on a stag party prior to our wedding and after many distractions I wound up dressed in a sheet with a blindfold. When I was turned loose and the blindfold removed I was in a steam bath with a bunch of naked women all sizes shapes looks and descriptions. I don't know how long I stayed there but when I woke up I was covered with sweat. I don't know what caused the sweat the heat or the steam bath. I will admit that when I did wake up it was with a great deal of reluctance on my part. By the way in the steam bath I didn't see a thing as usual. I guess I mustn't be the observing type or so it seems to be.
We have a couple of Christian Science Monitors and the past couple of days I've been scouring them as far as resorts are concerned. You see I haven't deserted our honeymoon as yet. It is uppermost in my mind but getting married is foremost. As far as my coming home is concerned well it will probably be two or three ships more. The next ship is October the first and at least one a month after that. It's getting nearer and nearer all the time so don't give up yet. I'll keep praying and hoping and soon maybe the eventful day will arrive. Keep your end up and between the two of us we'll be able to swing the deal. I guess by the time you receive this letter Peggy will be able to give you a little advice on married life and its likes and dislikes such as they are. Give her my vey best wishes for success & happiness and maybe before too long they will reciprocate. Well honey I'll close now and hit the sack with the hopes of picking up that dream where I left off. It seems I'm missing everything these days but I'll give them a good looking over tonight. All my love to you
Always & always
John."
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