The Townend Family Letters

1943 October

Family letter from LJT No 38

Dunfallandy House.
Johannesburg.
Oct 2nd 1943.

My Dears,

This is one of the weeks when there is much to tell and little time in which to do it. My head is full of all we saw at the Gold Mine yesterday, and I’d like to get my ideas sorted out on paper. Before I try to do that, I will try to give you some small impression of how we have spent the week. Herbert has been content because he has not had to rush about a lot, but has been able to sit in the garden or the comfortable house, and read or write as the spirit moved him. At breakfast & in the evenings, Peter (as C J is always called, though it is not his name) talked most interestingly about all sorts of things. His range of knowledge is big, and he seems to take great trouble to find out the real facts about things that interest him. We were sorry when he went off on Thursday for a few days fishing. We were warned of this when we suggested a visit on these dates.

We had had a good deal of talk about the conditions of native labour in India and in Africa, and he said he would like us to see one of the big mine compounds, but was not sure whether it would be feasible for a woman to go round. He brought back word that the Manager at “Robinson Deep” would be pleased for us to see all we wanted to, and the visit was fixed for Friday morning. It was most interesting, and gave us an excellent impression of the care taken of the natives in feeding, housing, and medical attention. I’ll probably describe it in detail later, for some who get this letter may be interested to know about this subject. We were at the manager’s office at 9.30, and it took the best part of two hours to see the compound, the married quarters and the hospital, and to have a glance at the office work behind all this organization. We got back to the manager’s office about 11.30, and were then handed over to another man, who took us to see the processes of the recovery of the gold after the ore comes up from the mine. We did not have time for this on the occasion when we went down the shaft. It was interesting and we had the thrill of seeing eight bars of gold, worth £78,000, lying, apparently quite casually, on a wheelbarrow. The amazing thing is that under present conditions on the Rand, for every bit of pure gold produced, one million times its weight of rock has to be moved and worked: -- and yet, its worthwhile!

I suppose most of you have seen the film “Mission to Moscow”. We found it good, though its obviously looking on all the best sides of things Russian, and that is as obviously to counter-balance the amount of gossip in the U.S.A. and Britain, which does the reverse. The cinema in which it is being shown is a most attractive, in fact the most attractive house I have ever seen. Somehow an effect has been achieved which gives a real feeling that one is under the night sky, spangled with stars. The tops of the walls above the galleries look like high old fashioned houses, with lights in their windows. I dont know what the seating accomodation is, but it must be large, and comparable to the big London movie theatres.

On Tuesday evening, Vidie had to attend an amateur theatrical performance which was been given by some rather odd folk in aid of war funds, of which the Navy War Fund was one. As she is president of the N.W.F. she felt bound to go, though she said she knew that it would be dreadful. H. and I volunteered to go with her. The play chosen was “The Lake”, a morbid Ibsenesque affair, without any of his genius, and the performance was probably the worst that has ever been seen. It was so bad that it really became quite interesting and remarkably funny. The trial was one had to save all the laughs for afterwards. The audience were mostly of the same sort of class as the performers and probably thought the thing quite good.

Edward Groth had rung up from Pretoria on our first evening here, and it was arranged for me to go over to spend the day with him and the Pierneefs on Wednesday. By chance I had heard that a bus runs every 2nd hour to Pretoria, taking only 1 ¼ hours to do the journey, which is only 36 miles by road against the 45 of the railroad. The road goes straight ahead over the hills. The railway fetches a big half circle to get through a gap in them. Peter dropped me in time to catch the 9 o’clock bus, which delivered me outside Polly’s Hotel at 10.20, and there Mrs Pierneef met me. We drank tea at the hotel and she told me about the new flower shop venture. Then we then went to see the shop, which she was taking over in two days time (I.E. the end of the month). Later we drove out to Elangeni, where the servants, the dogs and the cats all gave me a warm greeting. Up in the studio, Mr Pierneef had the pictures he has been working on since he came back from the veldt a few days before, scattered about and he propped them up for me to see. He is doing lovely studies of the white flowering so-called “wild pear” (really a dombya) and of thorn trees with the fresh spring green and wild figs and others with the new foliage in shades of pink and brown. He plans to do some big pictures of the spring time veldt.

Edward came out to lunch, which we all ate in his house. Other guests were a Dr & Mrs Coin Steyn, Minister for Justice and his wife. Stout, homely pleasant people, who did good justice to Edward’s American lunch, which included waffles cooked on the side-board, and “corn sticks” which Sante has learnt how to make excellently out of the maize flour, known as mealie meal in this country. It is the staple food of the natives and not used by Europeans. It was good to see Edward again, but I almost wished he had not got the other guests there, so that I could have talked more to him instead of giving my attention to them. Luckily he had to go over to Jo’burg in the evening, so I stayed with the Pierneefs for tea, and they took me to the Legation at 5.30, and Edward and I left a few minutes later. Its a pretty drive over open rolling country, and that evening it looked specially fine, for there were heavy thunder storms rolling about, making magnificent lights and shadows over the landscape. I felt very sad at having said good bye to the Pierneefs probably for the last time. Now that she has got the shop, he has given up the idea of having a show in the Cape early next year, and will probably have one in Jo’burg instead.

4.9.43. I have been busy packing this morning, and we go off after dinner to-night. I want to finish this off and post it before we go, but I must be brief.

We spent a good part of Saturday with Edward and Judy Magill. They lunched with us in town, and then we went to flower show at the University, which was not very good. From there we walked to their flat for tea, and had to hurry away directly afterwards, as we were due to start out for dinner with Harvey and Gertrude Jones at six o’clock. They live about ten miles out, and have a lovely house and garden. Poor Vidie had to go to bed with a frightful headache and sent us with the chauffeur. We had a very nice evening, with time to see the garden before it got dusk. Gertrude is Canadian and she and Harvey told us a lot about Halifax, and showed us some photos and pictures.

Sad to say the dinner must have been a bit too rich for Herbert for he had a disturbed night. I made him stay in bed in the morning, in spite of the fact that we were to go to “morning tea” with some people we met at Jatinga, and then to lunch at the Country Club. I just went alone. The day in bed and very simple things to eat did the trick for Herbert and he was pretty well recovered by the evening and able to get up for dinner.

After dinner Vidie showed us some of her colour films of animals in the National Park. They are amazing! I have not seen better professional ones. She is evidently very clever with a movie camera. Her pictures of lions are what the younger generation would call “wizard”. I wish I had more time to tell you about them.

I have been to see Dot Bromley once or twice, but she is still far from well poor dear. She is so stuffed up in the head. I think she has got sinus trouble, but unfortunately she wont see a doctor.

The weather has been heavenly all week, except for those few storms on Wednesday. Africa, or rather this part of it, seems to jump straight out of winter into summer.

Herbert wont be writing this week
Best love to you all
LJT

Hand written addition at bottom of letter:

Darling Annette

Did I thank you for your AG of Sept 1st? You have been my only link with home for several weeks now. Mails are few and far between – Love and thoughts – Mother

Air Graph No 20 from LJT to Romey

Townend.c/oStandard Bank.Cape Town.    7th Oct 1943

My darling Romey.  Letters from you at last!  Nos 112 & 113 of 7/8 & 13/8.  Its very good to have news of you again, but sad to say 109-110 &111 have not come yet.  I do hope they are not lost.  There is no indication in these letters of what your future plans are.  What with broad-casting and demonstrating you have made quite a nice addition to you income.  Our visit to Jo’burg was a great success.  We liked Vidie & Peter Carleton Jones v. much.  Though their house is luxurious, they, in themselves are simple, & Dad was quite happy with them.  During the week there we saw several friends, had lunch At The Country Club, & spent a morning going over a mine compound, to see how the treatment of native labour compares with Indian, & then saw over the gold recovery plant which we had not had time to visit previously.  All most interesting.  We also went to see “Mission to Moscow”, which, on the whole, we thought quite good, once it is granted that it is frankly propaganda.  I went to Pretoria for a day, travelling the 36 miles there by bus for 1 1/4 hours.  Mrs Pierneef met me at Polly’s Hotel where we drank tea & talked much.  Our at Elangani Mr P was waiting & showed me the work he has been doing since we left.  We all lunched with Edward G. & it was grand to see him again.  I spent the afternoon with the Ps who took me into the Legation at 5.30, as Edward had to go to Jo’burg & drove me home.  Dad was happy in the C-J’s house and lovely garden, with lots of books to read.  Vidie has 11 Pekinese of all sizes and shapes: she calls them a “snort” of Peeks.  They are really most amusing.  She has taken marvellous colour films of animals in the Game Reserve.  We much enjoyed seeing a few of them.  I do wish you could do so.  The railway put us on to the slower of the two trains to Cape Town.  It goes for a different route for the first two-thirds of the way, & it turned out to be v. lucky for instead of passing the splendid mountain scenery at the edge of the Karoo during the night, as we did going up, we saw it all yesterday morning, & reached Cape Town at 2.30.  The wild flowers were beyond description!  I had read of arums growing wild, but to see them filling every ditch and lots of the scraps of waste land everywhere was wonderful.  There were heaps & heaps of other things too.  It seemed nice & home-like coming back to Cape Town, though it was a pity to find one of the typical South-Easters blowing when we arrived.  Its not quite died down yet.  We have a nice room at the Settlers Club.  Two possibilities for future accomodation have cropped up, but both are so vague at present that its not worth describing them.  Its Dickie’s twenty-sixth birthday to-morrow.  Sometimes I get a little gleam of hope that he may still be alive.  What a long time it seems (& is) since that last week end in Oxford, just five years ago, when I said good-bye to you.  Dad seems to be inclining to-wards the idea of trying to get home next April or so, whatever happens.  I do hope we shall be lucky in getting passages.  Its bound to be v. difficult.  It’s a month since we had an English mail.  I hope one has not been lost.  Dad was v. well at Jo’burg & has stood the journey here satisfactorily.  Love  (Mrs H.P.V. Townend)

Air Graph from LJT to Susie Cowan

Townend.c/oStandard Bank. Cape Town    Oct.7th   1943

Dear Susie, Many thanks for your air-graph of Aug 22nd.  Its specially welcome since no letters had come from Canada for so long.  Yours of 9/8 has not yet turned up.  So glad to hear that H. is looking well & hope you managed to get away for a holiday in spite of the main walking out on you!  You will be wanting news of Ed & Judy.  It was so nice to see them again, though I am sorry to report that Ed is looking a bit tired & Judy has had some trouble with her heart, & really ought to go slow.  Her firm cant find anyone with her training to take her place, & she seems to think that she must not let them down.  We did our best to persuade her to resign in spite of that, for nothing is worth knocking health to bits.  Ed & I compared notes, & came to the conclusion that Herbert & Judy have something the same temperament.  They just go flat out at a job & don’t realize at the time, that they are going to be completely exhausted, when it finishes.  Ed says he is feeling quite fit, but had just had his night on duty for the Civil Defense Guards (That’s not what they are called exactly.  I cant remember it) when we saw him.  He looks to me as if he is not out of doors enough.  He says it is difficult, since all his work is indoors, and there are no gardens near the flat.  Perhaps now that the summer weather has come, they will be able to be out more.  We liked the Carleton & the Harvey Jones v. much.  Unfortunately there has been a little misunderstanding of which the Jones family are quite unconscious.  It seems that Ed wrote to tell Peter C-J that he was getting married & had no reply.  Both he & Judy were so hurt that they have not been near either family since.  Peter is completely oblivious that he has done anything unkind.  Either the letter did not reach him, or got pushed aside.  He is an enormously busy man, but one of the kindest of people.  His wife, Vidie, is a strange character; very downright & casual, but we liked her.  Directly we arrived, she said we must see if Ed & Judy would come in to dinner, & it was difficult making excuses for them.  We put it on to Judy’s health.  Ed would probably be annoyed if he knew I had told you this.  I also told Harvey’s wife, Gertrude, who is such a warm hearted creature.  She is going to try to get in touch with Judy & heal the breach.  I think it will be a great pity if Judy & Ed don’t bury the hatchet, for the Jones brothers might be able to give them all kinds of help, as well as the pleasure of going to their v. charming houses.  Peter & Harvey are both interested in their own & the Stairs & Morrow families, & told lots of amusing tales about their young days in Halifax.  Peter is keen on Canadian history, and is one of the most interesting men I have met.  He has so many things he is keen on, and takes so much trouble to get at the real facts of any subject.  I don’t wonder that he has made a big mark in the world.  I am sure he would be most distressed if he knew he had hurt Ed’s feelings.  I told him I though perhaps Ed felt a little diffident about coming round because on the score of income they live in such different worlds.  Peter said “If that’s so, its silly, for I started on £3.10 a week.”  I till you all this, for its hard to explain why Ed does not see them otherwise.  Love

(hand written note added at end of carbon – AG with Christmas Greetings to Susie – sent about mid November)

Air graph no 20 from HPV to Annette

H.P.V. Townend I.C.S. c/o Standard Bank of S.A.  Capetown. 8th Oct.43

Deputizing for Joan who is out giving breakfast to soldiers.  Richard’s birthday.  Our visit to the above-ground portions of Robertson Deep last Friday was most interesting: not merely to ???? methods of recovering the gold from the ore but to compare the treatment of the native labour with that of similar labour in Bengal.  Verdict: South Africa wins.  There is no comparison really; not only is the pay three times that of unskilled Indian labour but rations and housing are thrown in, & they must in themselves be worth nearly as much as the pay.  The standard in the hospital is far higher than anything that I have seen in India.  So far as gold-recovery goes, one comment only; we saw 8 bars newly smelted, worth £75,000, lying on a wheel-barrow casual-like, and regarded them with no sort of desire or envy.  A sign of virtue – or of dull imaginations? ------  On the Wednesday when Joan went to Pretoria, I had Edward and Judy to lunch at one of the large shops, chosen by them; on Saturday we gave them lunch at a hotel, much better.  Both looked tired; she is shy and is a bad mixer; but the meals were gay.  On Saturday we went out to dinner with the Harvey Jones (he is brother of Carleton Jones) who proved most friendly; they speak of themselves as poor but his pay is about £3000.  The food was too rich for me and next day I had to spend in bed; but recovery was quick.  Carleton Jones was away fishing from Thursday onwards, leaving us a great parcel of books to look through; about the Stairs who annexed the Katanga district of the Congo for King Leopold in 92 or 93 and died on his way down to the coast, and about the various relations in Nova Scotia descended from American loyalists and so on.  The actual Stairs were not expelled from the States after the revolution but collaterals were.  He is a mine of information on such matters.  We left Johannesburg on Monday (4th) and found next day that although we had booked a month earlier they had put us into the leisurely train that goes via Bloomfontein instead of that which goes via Kimberley in 8 hours less.  Very annoying thus to be diddled; but it was greatly for the better.  Not only did we see some new country on the first day but we passed through the lovely Hex River valley by day-light instead of by night; and it was a thing not to miss.  Rugged mountains, some with a little snow, and masses of wild flowers.  Arum lilies, called here Pig Lilies because pigs like them, in thousands; streams lined with them and acres of damp ground covered with them.  A veritable glory; but South Africans despise them as common.  It was like coming home to get to Cape Town.  Great the pleasure of hearing that the lying and dishonest proprietor of the hotel in Sea Point where we stayed before was now in a lunatic asylum – yet I am sorry for it.  We are for the moment well off in the Settlers’ Club.  But what we’ll do afterwards, when our six weeks are up, is not fixed.  Various hopes have come to nothing.  Letters awaited us here, including one from Rosemary; it looks as if three of hers had gone astray.  Yesterday there came in one numbered 23 from Grace; let her know of this.  Letters from India too; news of the Bengal famine most depressing.  We had two men in yesterday seeking information about it; for discourses to the army.  I have been to the dentist who has altered my false teeth, to the great improvement of my chewing.  Strange, the weather is cold; it should be for my good.  Many have welcomed Joan and I get the benefit of it.  Much love from both of us.  Dad

Family letter from LJT No 39

“The Settlers’ Club”.
Cape Town.
Oct 9th 1943.

My Dears,

Cape Town greeted us with a South Easter, and the Mountain had its table cloth spread over it. There is a pleasure in coming back to familiar places. We saw the Hottentots Hollands Mts with pleasure, and then the square block of Table Mt. It seemed quite home-from-homelike. When we discovered that the railway authorities had put us on the more leisurely of the two Cape Town trains, that is the one that loops round by Bloemfontein and takes 42 instead of 36 hours, we were annoyed, for we had written for accomodation on the train a month before. We soon realized that we were lucky. The food and attention on the train were infinitely better than on the more direct one. There were scarcely any military people traveling by it, so that it was possible to sit in the dining car between meals. On the other train it was always full of men smoking and drinking beer. You may wonder why one wants to sit in it. The reason is that the windows are so small and so badly placed in the carriages that visibility is poor from them. I spent most of the daylight hours either in the refreshment car or standing on the little platform at the rear of the coach. The greatest score was the chance to see the magnificent scenery of the Hex River Valley, where the Karoo gives way to the mountains which separate it from the coastal plain. Its a drop of something in the nature of four thousand feet, and its a grand bit of country. High, steep, rocky mountains rise steeply from the valley, the floor of which as it widened out, held comfortable looking houses set amongst vineyards and orchards. As the railway curled down the side of the valley, we could see masses of flowers in bloom, though we travelled just too quickly for it to be possible to recognize what many of them were. There were masses of a brilliant magenta bush mesembreamthemum, and plenty of other things in yellow, mauve, pink, blue, and white. As we got down into the valley, we realized what the arum lilies are like in this country, “pig-lilies” as they call them. They fill the ditches and the swamps; grow out of the edges of hedges and woods, and push themselves up on any spare bit of ground they can find. They are of such splendid quality too. In the damp places they grow three or four feet high, bearing huge blossoms, as good as anything I have seen under careful cultivation. There was still snow on some of the peaks, and white clouds moving across the sky, which gave an added beauty of light and shade to the landscape. We must have been about three hours going through the mountains, and even when we emerged on to the open Cape country, we had mountain ranges close on the east of us till close to Cape Town, and always masses of flowers. Far up in the mountains there were scattered groups of golden wattle in bloom, and their scent flooded into the train. In the lower regions the railway was often bordered by them for miles and acres of land were covered by them. They were a lovely sight. We passed through the famous wine making town of Paarl, and the university town of Stellenbosch, where Smuts took his degree. We looked up the French Hoek Valley, which was settled by the Huguenots long, long ago, and which is said to be still French in character.

Just after breakfast I got into conversation with an Air Force major (in the African Army they seem to hold ordinary military rank). He turned out to be an old friend of Harvey and Carleton Jones. He is an architect and designed Harvey Jones’ very charming house. He went to India with Lutyens and Baker when they were building New Delhi, and has recently designed the new Government buildings in Northern Rhodesia. Altogether he was a most interesting companion and we talked to-gether most of the morning, while looking at the scenery. He has the, to us, strange sounding name of Hoogterp. The g is pronounced like the Scotch ch, and the final p is dropped, so that spoken it is not so odd as written.

We arrived in Cape Town only about ten minutes after the 2.30 p.m of the schedule, but had to hang about to get our luggage from the van. The time was usefully occupied by helping a Belgian family from the Congo, who could speak very little English. Having deposited the luggage at this Club, where we have a comfortable room, I ran off to see Mrs Harvey at the Navy League depot where she works, and left Herbert to rest.

The wind was still blowing pretty hard on Thursday morning, but it dropped later, and was a lovely day. It is much colder here than in Jo’burg. It is definitely early spring, and after another good day yesterday, its pouring with rain to-day.

Time has been well-filled since we arrived. There has been unpacking, letters to write, lots of telephoning to do. Eileen Forsyth rang up, & asked us to go out to tea with her at Seapoint. We went a bit early in order to go for a walk by the sea before tea, and turning into her house to drop our coats, we picked up Thalassa, the eleven year old daughter, who rapidly supplied us with all the news of what had been going on in her world since we left, such as the doings of the dog and the cat, the joys of fishing for crayfish, and picnics on the Lion’s Head. She has the same sparkle of interest in everything and the same excited flow of words as her mother. Seapoint was looking nice, with all the grass lawns between the houses and the top of the beach, beautifully green, and few people about compared with summer time. We made a slight detour to go past Graham Lodge, where we stayed. It is a hotel no longer, but has relapsed into being three private houses. Eileen tells us that the old proprietor became so peculiar that he has had to be sent to a mental home!

Oct. 10th 1943

I stopped yesterday afternoon because Herbert wanted to have a sleep, and as the weather cleared somewhat after tea, we went out for a walk. When we got back, it was too cold to sit in the bedroom. Its a heavenly morning now, and my inclination is to rush out into the gardens, which are just across the road, but we are going out to lunch at Kenilworth with Mrs. Smuts (my friend of the office days here) and then we spend the afternoon with the Harveys, and if Herbert is not too tired, we might call on old Mr Harry Currey, who lives only a few yards from the Harveys.

I must pick up the thread of yesterdays writing:-
Eileen Forsyth had come home from her committee meeting when we got back to the house, and with her was a lad who had just arrived from China, where he has been for the last eighteen months with a “Friends’ Hospital Unit”, working on the upper stretches of the Burma Road. He had to leave on account of health, and he looks very delicate, but such a gentle charming boy. With a little questioning he opened out and told us some interesting things about his experiences. One or two other people came in, including Mrs Compton, wife of Professor Compton, President of the Mountain Club, who took me up Table Mt. She was ill at that time and I did not meet her. As she had just come off duty as a Naval Transport driver, she was in her car, and gave us a lift home. She is such a nice person, and I was specially glad to meet her, for I wanted to get in touch with him again.

Edward Groth’s friends, Dr and Miss Gill rang up and asked us to lunch with them at the Civil Service Club on Friday, & they kindly asked another of Edward’s old friends to meet us. They are such nice people, and we were awfully pleased to be with them again. I had been up early that morning, as the Secretary of this club undertakes to supply six people for the breakfast shift at the Soldier’s Club on Fridays. That means being there at 6.45, and hard at it till about 9.30. It was such a busy morning that we did not have time to get any breakfast ourselves, except a bite of toast and a sip of coffee, so we tucked into tea, toast and marmalade when we got back.

After the lunch with the Gills, I called in at my old office, but the Replacement Section’s work has so fallen off that they now only function in the mornings. However I fell in with some of the people in the Hdqts Office, with whom we always had a lot of dealings, and was hauled in there to give and get news of my doings and of theirs. They say there is lots of work for me if I will work there, which I should very well like to do.

Oct 11th On Saturday morning I spent a long time ringing up various hotels & service flats, always to get the same reply:- “Absolutely full”. It seemed as if we should have to make up our minds to go to George, if indeed we could get accommodation there. After dinner last night I wrote a letter to the hotel that had been recommended to us there, when by chance someone who had come in to see the people who share a table with us, mentioned that she had heard of a tiny flat which might be available close to this club, but as it consists of only one bedroom and one sitting room, it was not large enough for their requirements. I asked if there was a chance that we might see it. The party went out of the lounge a little later and almost immediately one of them ran back and said that the woman who wants to let the flat was even then in the hall, and if we would like to see it, she would take us along right then. Off we went in the bright moon-light. The woman who wants to let for four months has the flat on a furnished sub-let from a woman who is doing a war job out of the town, and she has to get her final consent to passing it on to other people for a time, but apparently she already knows that there is no objection if suitable people are found! The present occupier seems to think we should fill the bill, so if we can get it, we will take it, and my letter to George remains unposted. I do hope that this deal goes through. It would be a joy to be in a place of our own again, even if it is tiny, and it would be a relief to have plans settled for some time ahead.

It will be time enough to describe the flat if we get it. The position attracts me. It is at the back of a big quadrangular block, on the ground floor, with its front door and windows opening out on to a wide paved raised terrace, beyond which there are gardens and a tennis court belonging to the flats. It faces east - a good aspect for summer months. It has a back entrance emerging into Queen Victoria Street, exactly opposite the main entrance to The Gardens, which are Cape Town’s equivalent of St. James’ Park, though not so big. Its only about five minutes walk through the Gardens to the top of Adderley Street, which is the hub of the city, and the office where I shall work if we get the flat, is just where the street joins the gardens. The Cape Town Library is only a few blocks down Q.V. Street, and a trolley-bus goes past the main entrance to the flats in Long Street, which goes up to the skirts of the Mountain, and country walks, in a few minutes. The drawback is the small size of the rooms and lack of storage space, but there is store belonging to the flats, where boxes can be put, which would ease things a bit.

We had a pleasant outing to Kenilworth yesterday, but found old Mr Currey ill in bed. His son, on leave from Pretoria greeted us and we stayed for a chat with him.

On the wet Saturday morning, we went to the Museum and spent an hour looking at the natural history section, birds and animals of S.A.; very well set up and looked after. Much the easiest way to learn about birds is from museum specimens, I think. We were interested to see that many of the beasts we saw in the Game Reserve, are a great deal bigger than we thought them to be. We took a hurried walk through the Art Gallery to look at Mr Pierneef’s picture, and I noticed another picture “Presented by -- Bevington. President of the S.A. Society of Arts.” Mrs Smuts with whom we lunched says he was quite a well known man in Cape Town, but she is not sure whether he is still here. I must find out. Perhaps he will turn out to be a cousin too.

We were awfully glad to get Grace’s letter No 23 after a gap of more than a month, and hope that the missing previous letter will turn up . It was a joy, too, to get letters from Romey, and we also hope that her missing three will come sometime. There evidently have been developments in her life that make the present letters difficult to follow in places.

It’s a glorious morning, but still quite cold, in spite of the sun, and there is a very big difference in the power of the sun between this place and Jo’burg. I really prefer the more temperate climate sunshine.

Herbert had to take his false teeth back to the dentist, who has remodeled them slightly, with good effect. They are now more comfortable, and a better chewing machine. He stood the long journey from J’burg well, and seems pretty fit. He is going out to have a massage treatment from the chiropractor on Wednesday, just to see that all is well with his back, so he should start our temporary sojurn in Cape Town in good trim.

Best love to you all,
LJT

(Handwritten addition at end of letter) – My darling Annette – The mails seem to be all over the place – and with three letters missing from Romey, its amusing to try to figure out what she is doing. “Og” seems to be filling a large place in her cosmos at the moment, and someone called “George” has suddenly appeared. I cant recollect having heard of him before. Cousin Susie writes that Romey did well at her broadcasting and after sounding a trifle nervous, got into her stride and seemed quite at ease. Susie thought the girls much better than the boys.

I am always sorry to think of winter coming round again to war-time England – not to mention all the troops fighting in different parts of Europe. I wonder how long it will be before Germany cracks – This push on by the Russians across the Dneiper is wonderful and – to many of us – unexpected news.

I am on tenterhooks to get a message about the flat. It will be amazingly convenient if we can get it – Best love - Mother

Family letter from HPV

c/o Standard Bank of South Africa,
Cape Town.

October 11th. 1943. Monday.

My dear Annette (name handwritten)

The seediness which prevented me from writing last week did not last long; it was the result of a certain presumption which led me to think that I might with impunity try food richer than my wont and of a politeness which forbade my telling our hostess that I feared it. I am frequently running into difficulty because when for the moment my health improves I am a little too confident. As when last night I made my dinner chiefly off bread with salad, since fish was “off” and meat forbidden; standard bread condemned by South Africans as indigestible and apparently really so to me though I like it. Result much waking during the night and swollen-ness which is ignominious to one beyond the age for Dill-water – and anyhow I doubt if such water would be of avail to one lacking acid.

I have changed the ribbon in my typewriter with the result that it doesn’t reverse properly of itself; and this riles me much. Probably I have put the new one in wrongly.

It seems ages since we left Johannesburg. My chief memory of the house is of Pekes innumerable; thirteen in all of all ages, two or three sexes, many colours, degrees of noisiness and more or mostly less uncontrolled habits. Especially the dwarf pup, most amusing otherwise, who had a corner of a rug in the drawing room to be uncontrolled upon; to me unpleasing but Vidie said better this than going out into the cold night and getting fatal chills.

When this happened the others sooner or later felt that the example was one to follow; and on occasion they also brought up food. However, as Vidie remarked, it gave the servants something to do and they were not overworked.

You remember how at the Mountain Inn I was reduced to taking bits off my hair with nail scissors? It was a triumph when visiting a barber’s in Johannesburg I found him preparing to usher me out of the chair when he had done no more than trim my hair behind a bit; I told him that I liked my hair cut on top too and he replied that it was short enough there and evenly cut. And I cannot tell you why at this moment there comes into my memory a saying repeated in a book (very bad, I thought) on French Indo-China “as worried as a pregnant nun”; it is an Annamese proverb, and expressive.

Habits differ in different countries. For example you see in England a man with a hammer walking along trains in stations or sidings and hitting wheels or feeling axle-boxes; but here in South Africa a man stands beside the line and with two hammers whacks the wheels of the train as it draws slowly into the station. A neat job; but trains are not so fast here - at any rate during wartime.

My likeness to St. Francis must be less apparent to animals in this country; for a large mongrel rushed upon me while I walked in Johannesburg, from behind, and made me jump. I felt its teeth but luckily it did not damage my trousers which it would not be so easy to replace as skin. Also the Pekes paid no attention to my calls when I felt responsible for them, and galloped fast in the direction of the swimming-pool where they were in danger; if they fall in their coats get so heavy with water that they cannot keep afloat.

Vidie had certain stories which amused. For example one of the native servants is entranced by the cuckoo clock in the hall; she found him bowing to it at each stroke of the hour and replying softly “Cuckoo, cuckoo”. Like Death and the Dancing Footman. A friend of hers told a new recently-from-the-krall native girl that when she was waiting on guests she must have a clean apron; and the result was seen when the girl turned round - her behind was bare. Another native servant told to serve a large fish on a dish with a lemon in its mouth appeared at the table with the lemon in his own mouth and the dish in his two hands. Perhaps I shouldn’t add to this a tale of a Dutch woman who insisted on sitting on a seat in a train upon which a guard had placed Vidie’s bags (although there were lots of empty seats in the carriage – a suburban carriage with seats arranged tram-wise) and who when rebuffed by the guard on appeal to him left the room in her seat out of sheer anger.

It looks as if Peter Carleton Jones was not right when he said that Stairs took the Congo for King Leopold; he led an expedition to a small area only, Katanga, where the Mineral belt lies. Stanley had done the main job several years earlier.

Many interruptions for adjusting the ribbon winding; but I cannot get it right. Only two of the mistakes in this letter are not due to this.

Much love
Dad

Air Graph No 20 from LJT to Aunt (GCT)

Townend.c/oStandard Bank.Cape Town   Oct 13th 1943

Dearest Grace: thanks for No 23 rcd on Richard’s birthday.  I, too, still get waves of hope that somehow he may have survived.  Romey’s missing July letters turned up, & an A.G. of 9/9.  I hope we soon hear whether she is allowed to go to the U.S.A.  We have had a great bit of luck.  Through overhearing a conversation in the hotel lounge, we have got a tiny flat from 22/10 till 1st March, & possible we shall be able to keep it on till 1st March.  We are putting in applications for passages any time after 1st March.  Heaven knows when, or if we shall get them.  We probably shant know ourselves till 24 hours before, so we shall have to cable you that we are leaving Cape Town, and then descend on you out of the blue!  Oh!  I do hope we are lucky enough to get home sometime in the spring!  To return to the flat.  It is only a bed-room, not very big, & a nice sized sitting room, with little kitchen & bathroom.  It is completely furnished, including ‘frig, phone & wireless.  Very central & yet quiet.  Only one block away from this club.  It is ground floor facing on to a wide raised terrace, with garden & tennis court (belonging to the block of flats) beyong.  The entrance to the Botanical Gardens is opposite: the Public Library 3 minutes walk, and the main street of the city, five minutes, so we shall have no bother with crowded trams.  We are amazingly lucky, for flats are practically impossible to get.  I think I shall be able to take on a maid who will work in the mornings, & I shall have to try my hand at cooking for our evening meal.  It will be a joy to be in a place of our own again.  H. went to the chiropractor this morning, & the vertebrae which were out of place before & corrected, are misplaced again now.  This was what I feared when H suddenly had such a set back in health after helping to uncrate a lot of furniture at White River.  I am sure he gave a twist to his spine then.  Let’s hope Stobie is able to put it right again.  Edward Groth arrived on his leave a couple of days ago, & is as happy as a boy out of school.  We met at tea with his friends Dr & Miss Gill on Monday, & lunched with him to-day.  On Sunday I am hoping to climb Table Mt with him and the man he is staying with.  H. will probably come part way with us.  We have seen a lot of people since we came back, & have been quite busy.  My old office is not doing much work, since “replacements” are not taking place to any great extent now, but the head office of the S.A.W.A.S. would like me to work there, so as soon as I know whether I can get the part time main, & how long my household duties will take me, I can volunteer to work for so many hours a day.  The office is only five minutes walk through the gardens, so I can easily come home to lunch, & go back in the afternoon.  There was a South-Easter blowing when we arrived & it blew all the next day.  Another one started the evening before last, & is still blowing.  The tremendous wind is trying.  This is the worst season for these violent winds, just as summer is coming.  Best love to you all.  We shall think of you on the 18th.     (Mrs H.P.V.Townend)

Family letter from LJT No 40

The Settlers’ Club
Cape Town
Oct 17th 1943.

My Dears,

Herbert has been a dear & written the real family letter this week, while I have had a lovely day gadding about the Mountain. I left here before 10. a.m. and got home about ten minutes to six, so it would have been too long a day for Herbert. Though there was a fairly high wind blowing and “the tablecloth” spread over the top of the Mountain, so that it was useless trying to climb to the top, it was glorious skirting the base of the final cliffs. The flowers were glorious. There were masses of a bright mauve michaelmas daisy, a lovely small flower of true gentian blue, quantities of pelargoniums, all sorts of daisies, yellow and white, large and small, and most fascinating of all, a little pale pink gladiolus, only about eight inches high, but carrying three or four perfect blooms. There were big clumps of lilac mauve and of brilliant magenta mesembrianthemum, and heaps of other things. The mountain side was like a flower garden. We boiled a “billy” and made tea at lunch time, and took a good siesta amongst the rocks. We finished up by crossing the slopes of Lion’s Head and having tea in Mr Murray’s flat at Sea-point, where Edward Groth is staying with him. It seems to hang on the cliffside above Bantry Bay, and is most attractive.

It is a great joy to us that we have got the little flat near here, for three months. I have seen Herbert’s letter, and I think he gives a false impression of the size of the bed-room by saying there is only room for one bed in it. It has besides a big half hanging, half shelf cupboard, a chest of drawers, a dressing-table, and a tiny chest of drawers beside the bed. There is room to put in another shelf/hanging cupboard, which we are doing, but a second bed would make it very crowded, so I am happy to sleep on the divan bed in the sitting-room. Though it seems extravagant to spend money on some extra furniture, everyone prophesizes that we shall get our money back on it in three or four months time.

Tomorrow I go round to take the inventory and find out all details, and we move in on Friday.

The next thing I have to do is to supply myself with a cookery-book. The stove is gas, which suits me, for the little cooking I have done has been with gas.

I am glad to say that Grace’s missing letter No 23, and Romey’s missing series of July letters have all turned up, plus an air-graph from Romey dated the 3rd Sept, in which she was still waiting for news about permission to go to the U.S.A. It was nice to read Grace’s account of the beautiful harvest fields. The first copy of the weekly Statesman has come from India and interests Herbert greatly.

Edward Groth is so happy to be having a holiday! He is just like a boy out of school! We are planning to go up the Mountain by an easy route one day, even if it has to be a week-day, and Mr Murray cant get away. Its a wonderful feature of Cape Town that there are such lovely places to go right on the edge of the town, and its rather astonishing how few people take advantage of any of those they cant get to by car or bus.

Old Mr Currey, who was not well when we called last Sunday, called on us on Thursday, while we were out at Kirstenbosch (The Botanical gardens, but not to be confused with the small old Botanical gardens which we look over here). He rang me up in the evening and invited us to go to lunch with him next Tuesday. He hears and speaks as well over the phone at the age of eighty-three as lots of people at twenty-three or any age you like.

We had a busy morning shift attending to the breakfasts at the Soldiers’ Club on Friday. This Club always supplies the morning waitresses on Fridays. We have to be there at 6.45, and get away soon after 9.30, but during that time we are hard at it. As I spent the rest of the morning going round furniture shops, I felt quite tired by lunch time. It’s funny how much more tiring that sort of thing is than straight forward walking or climbing like I have been doing to-day.

It was nice to see Dot Bromley at an At Home given to the delegates to the Y.W.C.A. Conference, who have come from all over the Union and Rhodesia. I did not get as much chance to talk to Dot as I should have liked for she was so much in demand, but she may be staying in this big house in Kenilworth for a week or two after the conference is over. She needs a holiday very badly.

I can see this sheet is coming to an end, and I am not going to write a second this week. I have not even managed to write an account of our visit to the Mine Compound yet! Best love to you all LJT

Family letter from HPV

Settlers’ Club,
Cape Town.
October 17th 1943, Sunday.

My dear Annette (name handwritten)

Joan has told me to write a lot this week since she has not done anything yet towards her letter and will not be able to do much today or tomorrow. She has gone out on a walk with Edward Groth and Mr. Marechal Murray with whom he is staying and they will picnic somewhere. The idea was to climb Table Mountain; but there is a strong South Easter blowing and the cloud is thick over the mountain so that it might not be too safe to climb and it would certainly not be worth doing, for there would be no views.

The difficulty about writing news is that I keep no diary; normally Joan does the news and I merely chatter about trifles. Having broken off for morning tea I set myself to making a day by day list of the doings and failed to recreate the week. It will have to be by subjects and not by each day in turn that I arrange my letter.

The chief item of interest, already announced to some by airgraph, is that we have taken a small flat for three months which may perhaps extend to four. Lady Syme and her daughter who shared our table (or we their’s) had a visitor in after dinner – on Sunday or Monday perhaps. They asked her if she knew of any flat that might suit them and she said that the only flat likely to be going among her friend was much too small for them. Joan struck in with a request that we might be told about it; and shortly afterwards she came in with news that the owner was in the Club at that moment and would show it to us immediately if we went round. It is very close to this place and so is conveniently situated for anyone who wants to be near the centre of Cape Town. Tiny; a sitting room with a small bedroom holding one bed only; a bathroom and a kitchen. On the ground floor with a door onto a stoop overlooking a tennis court on one side and a door onto a courtyard and the street on the other. Telephone, wireless, frigidaire; gas-cooking. A couch in the sitting room is used as a bed when there are two in the flat. The present occupier is a woman from Malaya, oldish; reluctant to stay on in it by herself, now that her co-sharer has moved into this place where she is helping the Secretary. The owner has moved out in order to be near her work in a hospital near Wynburg, one of the suburbs behind the mountain. We decided to take it if we could but it was several days before we heard that it was available; the owner had to be consulted and was not accessible. Luckily she knew us, having met us when we were here before, though we did not recognize the name. We take possession next Friday. There is no difficulty about our leaving this place earlier than we intended.

On Friday Joan went round a lot of furniture shops looking for a wardrobe and a writing table. Lack of accommodation for clothes promised to be a difficulty and the only table in the flat was a bridge table. New furniture was all of the cheapest and commonest wood; and of poor workmanship. She eventually decided that it would be an economy to buy secondhand things although they were not cheap; and we clenched the bargain yesterday, buying as well two arm-chairs, total £28-10 reduced to £27 as a result of a half-hearted attempt to bargain. Not good at bargaining either of us; and it was difficult to set about beating the man down when we knew that he could easily get the price asked under present conditions.

Was it this week that we went to tea with the Gills? Edward Groth had arrived meanwhile. The Minister made it as difficult as possible for him to take his leave at the last moment; first saying that certain news that came by telegram made it doubtful if the leave could be given and then refusing to make up his mind if the taking of it was justified. However Edward announced that as the choice was being left to him he was going; and go he did. A telephone message came for him the other evening to say that there was a telegram waiting for him at the Cape Town Consulate; he refrained from ringing up that night in case it was to recall him, but it turned out to be news that he was an uncle. Not really, but that nice Mrs. Richards, the wife of a junior at the Legation, had had a girl; Edward had postponed his leave so that Richards should be free from office at the time of the event.

It was a pleasant tea, though Miss Gill is an anxious hostess and makes one feel that the whole thing is a strain to her. She showed us some of her coloured woodcuts which are charming. She had to work out most of the technique for herself, as it is little known outside Japan and the only book describing it omits essentials such as the method of damping the paper before printing. She has been experimenting with different kinds of South African wood and has found that they give trouble eventually. Several of the blocks on which she had worked with apparently good results have gone out of shape in store after the first set of prints had been taken satisfactorily. Not warped, for they were in presses; but the lines have thickened and there has been a certain amount of sideways swelling which has made it difficult to get the blocks adjusted properly when the different colours are being printed one after the other. It looks as if she made a good deal less out each picture for a given amount of labour than if she painted and sold the one copy. It is so much trouble to get the printing from the seven or eight blocks done accurately; and she prints quite a few at a time. If she printed off 100 or whatever number the blocks can give without deteriorating and sold through an agent, instead of printing one of each sort when an order comes in for it, she would surely do better. Also it looks to me as if she could easily get some intelligent youth or girl to do the actual printing with all its tedious preliminaries of damping the paper and mixing colour; the Japanese artists in this line, she says, left the cutting of the blocks even as well as the reproduction to mechanics.

On Thursday we went out by the 9.15 bus to the botanical Gardens which are a marvel of colour just now. Superb wild flowers. Masses of refulgent blossom. A strange thing; many of the colours are in themselves hideous almost; magentas and mauves such as I dislike: but the total effect is delightful. It was very hot. Before long I left Joan to go off and explore the heaths which were as it turned out not yet in flower on any large scale; and I had tea at the refreshment place. We were really to have tea at the House of Professor Compton but I felt shame to drink the three or four cups which I favour at this hour of the morning after no drink at breakfast and before no drink at lunch. In consequence of failing to meet at the place arranged (Joan relied on my seeing her red hat easily but it was invisible against all the blossom) we were late in gettingup to the house which is at the top of the gardens. A site with a splendid view over the gardens and toward the distant mountains, with False Bay blue in the distance again to the right. The house has a huge Great Dane, who lives in a small Rondavel of appropriate size thatched by the Professor with his own hands. Agreeable talk preceded their running us down to Mrs. Cramer Roberts where we lunched; then I returned by train to Cape Town while Joan stayed on to wash up and to talk.

I have been twice to the cheiropractor. He declared that I had given my back a twist (to Joan’s satisfaction, for she has been sure of it) and he gave me a proper doing the second time, on Friday. I came away feeling quite tired out. It was perhaps unfortunate that we have arranged to go out to Sea Point for tea with Edward, though it was excellent tea and the flat which looks out over the sea, being built into the cliff, was delightful, and afterwards to Mrs. Forsyth’s for drinks. As often she had a crowd in; too much for so small a room, which lacks sufficient chairs and which echoes so that one cannot hear the talk when many talk at once. I ended by being dead beat and failed to get to sleep till well after two. Yesterday was not much of a day for me; but I slept for three hours in the afternoon. Joan went off to a Y.W.C.A. garden party to see Dot Bromley, after first visiting Mrs. Harvey. Incidentally she went round to the Museum in the morning to see Dr. Barnard, the Curator and the Secretary of the Mountain Club, and found that he was the Barnard who was at Irving’s with us in Camberley.

Stobie says that he sees no reason why I should diet so carefully and he disbelieves the suggestion made by the Pretoria doctor that I have never had any acid in my insides. He adds that the best doctor in Cape Town at the moment is a homeopath from England. Maybe. But I am going to have my money’s worth out of the Pretoria man by following his advice for a season.

Item, we had lunch with Edward Groth one day. At the Navy League place.

Tale told by a woman at Mrs Cramer Roberts’ lunch; from Alexandria. Her small boy was much devoted to the local zoo’s elephant. It died; and to console him the nurse suggested that it had gone to Heaven. Some days later he was heard sighing “I am sorry for God all alone up there with that old elephant”.

I replaced a ribbon on this machine so clumsily that I had to take it round to the agents’ to get the reverse mechanism repaired; and meanwhile the new ribbon was quite spoilt. A setback. A humiliation.

Much love
Dad

Air Graph No 21 from LJT to Annette

Townend.  c/o Standard Bank, Cape Town   Oct 20th  ‘43

My darling Annette.  Its almost your birthday.  I hope some of our greetings reached you about the right time, & I hope we shall see you before another birthday passes.  I am hurrying to write to-night, because tomorrow we move all our belongings into the flat, & go into residence there on Friday morning.  The maid will stay till after lunch, but says she has previously only cooked for her own family, & she does not know whether I will think her cooking good enough.  I say it will be a good chance for us to improve our knowledge to-gether.  I have bought a large cookery book, which seems to give detailed instructions about how to do even the simplest things, so I hope we shall manage without too many mistakes.  There is a little restaurant just up the road if we do make too bad a muddle any time.  It will be fun to have a place of our own again!  Dad seems in pretty good form, & we have done some nice walks & expeditions.  The flowers in the wild Botanical Gardens at Kirstenbosch, (half an hour’s drive by bus from the town,) are a marvel to behold.  The wild flowers on the mountain are splendid too.  Edward Groth is staying with his friend, Marischal Murray who was going to take us up the mountain on Sunday, but a mild s-easter was blowing, & the top was in cloud, so we only went up to a track at foot of the cliffs on the N-W face, where we were sheltered, & had a lovely day out.  I thought of you many times & wished you could be with us.  Dad & I have been out with Edward again this afternoon.  He borrowed a car, & so we were saved the short but tiresome journey by bus up on to Kloof Nek, which is such a good starting point for walks on the Mountain.  I spent part of the morning going round to the various shops in this neighbourhood, making arrangements with them for food supplies.  Butter is a great difficulty now.  There is a shortage right through the Union: nobody seems to know quite why it should be so, or why there should be a meat shortage too, but one meatless day is coming in to vogue at the end of this month.  That we shall not mind at all.  We have been out to meals with various old friends.  Yesterday we lunched with dear old Mr Harry Currey, the cousin with whom we got into touch just before we left Cape Town.  I got him to talk quite a lot about Rhodes, to whom he was private secretary for many years.  It was interesting.  Mr C. is a wonderful old man.  At 83 he does not appear either mentally or physically to be more than sixty.  We were glad to get Romey’s missing July letters & an A.G. of Sept 3rd. I hope we shall soon hear what her future plans are.  I shant attempt to start war work next week.  I must see first what the maid is capable of.  My first duty is to see that Dad is properly fed!  He is benefitting from the chiropractor’s treatment, though not to the extravagant extent Dr Stobie promises.  Did you listen to Smut’s speech in the guildhall yesterday?  I am glad he put the Russian war effort into its due perspective with the Allies.  Some people are so apt to lost all sense of proportion over it.  Best love   (Mrs H.P.V. Townend)

Air Graph No 21 from LJT to Romey

Townend.c/oStandard Bank.Cape Town.    Oct.20th 1943

My darling Romey.  The missing July letters have come & the A.G. of 3/9.  Many thanks for them all.  I do enjoy them!  You seem to have had quite a merry & interesting summer in Winnipeg, & a profitable one too.  We should have sent an A.G. at least a week ago to reach you on your birthday, but my mind was so full of house-hunting that I let time slip by unnoticed.  Sorry!  I can only say “Better late than never”, & hope you know our thoughts are always you on such occasions.  I also hope that my letter on the subject of a present reached you in time, & that you got yourself something nice.  The fortnight since my last A.G. has been rather exciting, notably because we have got a tiny flat for three months & ten days, after almost giving up hope of getting any accomodation in Cape Town.  The flat is only a bedroom sitting-room, bathroom & kitchen, but its furnished, including silver & bedlinene, and its most conveniently situated, close to this club.  It looks over garden & tennis court belonging to the flats, & its side entrance is opposite the very charming Gardens, through which it is only about five minutes walk to the central street of the town.  A maid who comes at 8 A.M. & is willing to stay to cook lunch for us, (though she says she has only cooked for her own family) goes with the flat, so we should be comfortable, & I hope I shall be able to take up a job in my old office as soon as I see whether the maid is satisfactory.  It will be such a joy to be in a place of our own after living for just on a year in hotels or other people’s houses.  Dad will find it much more restful.  I forgot to mention that we have wireless & a phone and ‘frig’ thrown in.  This is such a lovely time of year in C.T.  The famous Cape flowers are at their best.  We spent a morning in the wonderful Wild Botanical Gardens at Kirstenbosch (Half an hour’s drive by bus) We have been walks on the mountain & everywhere the flowers are beautiful beyond words.  The days have been full.  We have seen many of our old friends, who have invited us for meals.  Edward Groth is down on leave, & we have been doing lots of things with him.  He is so happy to be on holiday, & adores his beloved Sea-Point, which was his home when he was stationed in C.T. years ago.  He is with a very nice friend there now, who has welcomed us to his enchanting flat which hangs on the cliff-side above the sea.  Dad is having some treatment from the chiropractor, who found that he had put his back all out of adjustment again.  I am sure he did it when he helped to open furniture crates at White River.  We are applying for passages to England any time after the 1st March.  Dad does not think we have much of a case for getting on the list, but I think that not having seen our children for five years is a good enough reason in itself.  E.Groth says he thinks a good friend of his, George Fuller, is still in the U.S.A. Consulate at Winnipeg, doing the commercial work.  He recommends that you find out, get in touch with him, give him Ed’s greetings, & see whether he can be of any help to you in getting down to the States.  Best love    (Mrs H.P.V.Townend)

Family letter from LJT No 41

6 Victoria Court.
Long Street
Cape Town.
Oct. 26th 1943

My Dears,

It seems almost unbelievable that we are in a home of our own for a few months, and its nice to be alone and independent, though the cares of even a tiny flat take a good deal of time when one is new to it. This is the reason that I am late with my letter this week. We moved in on Friday (Annette’s birthday). The Cape Coloured woman, Mrs Engels, could only come for a couple of hours that morning, as she used to do for Mrs Gerrard, and really started to work with us on Monday, so I had to do all the marketing and cooking on Saturday and Sunday, as well as the small amount of housework necessary. I have done so little cooking, and it is so many years since I did any, that I am terribly slow, and have to have one eye on the cookery book most of the time. Mrs Engels turned up yesterday morning and I cooked with her, for she says she has only cooked for her family before, and does not know how we like things done. Also she had never used a gas stove. She seems to have found her feet alright, and is cooking the lunch to-day, without any advice or assistance from me, except for directions after breakfast. Marketing is not too easy. The shops are very independent, and not, I am afraid, very honest. Prices of fresh produce vary a good deal from one to another. The shop keepers in Long Street, which might be compared for shopping purposes to a street in any country town, are mostly Coloured people, Afrikaners or Indians. None of them like starting accounts for new temporary customers, and no one delivers the goods unless it is a very big order. There is a great shortage of butter, and I have had a bother to get even half a pound a week, which would be alright if one could get decent margarine, but the only marge they sell in this country is very nasty. I used some to make buttered eggs, and it made them taste most queer. No doubt a week or so’s practice will make things much easier. As far as space and general comfort is concerned, we fit into the flat nicely, and its a really charming little place.

We have letters to thank for. Romey’s Nos 114, 115, 116, of 22/8, 29/8 & 5/9, rcd the day we moved in here. This morning we got an A.G. from Anne, written on 2/10, and were specially glad to get it, as nothing from her had come through for some time. We have also had a nice bunch of letters from friends in N.Z. and Austrialia. Letters give me even more pleasure than they used to do. I am looking forward to reading Romey’s big batch through again. I feel I scarcely took them in at one reading.

Looking back at my diary I see we had lunch with Mr Currey early last week. I still find it hard to believe that he is over eighty. He is so marvellously active both in body and mind. He asked a couple from India to meet us. Sir Thomas & Lady Bristow who have always been in South India. He designed, & built, the harbour at Cochin, and is an interesting and amusing talker. Herbert went home after lunch, but I met Mrs Harvey, who lives quite close to Mr Currey, and we went on by electric train to the Eastern suburbs on False Bay, which I had not visited before. We passed through Muizenburg, the resort of the wealthy Jews, and often spoken of as Jewsenburg, and then through St James’ and Kalk Bay to the little old fishing port of Fishoek. There we left the train, and walked about a mile to Sunny Cove, which was somewhat sheltered from the strong south-east wind. There we had tea in a nice little place, looking across False Bay to the Hottentots Hollands Mts about fifteen miles away. On the way back we jumped on to the train at the little Halt at Sunny Cove and descended at Kalk Bay, walking a mile or so & catching the next train, about 40 minutes later, at St James’. All these sea-side places nestle under the mountains on the eastern shore of the Cape Peninsular, which makes the western end of False Bay. They are pretty and the bathing there is much warmer than at Sea Point on the western side, for people say the sea is the Indian Ocean, whereas on the west it is the Atlantic. In spite of that they are too much the regular sea-side resort for my taste. Hout Bay on the Western side, to which we were taken on Friday afternoon, is much more to my taste. Those kind people, the Gills, took us there. Miss Gill rang me up on Friday morning, saying that it was such a lovely day, that she and her brother felt like chucking work early in the afternoon, and taking Edward Groth and ourselves out in the car. They called for us at 2.30 and we had a glorious drive through Sea Point and Clifton, past the spots which came so familiar to us last year, when we used to go as far as possible by bus, to get away for fresh walks. Beyond the bus terminus, the road became more and more beautiful, cut out of the mountainside, above the sea, which, on that lovely afternoon, was the brilliant blue-green that one so often sees below the Cornish cliffs. At this time of year when the mountainsides are covered with flowers, there is added beauty and interest. Hout Bay is fifteen miles from the city, and from the beach one can just see the Light House on Cape Point. Hout Bay has only two hotels and a small number of houses. It seems quiet and remote. The best and oldest hotel is an old-fashioned looking place, where three oak trees grow up through the paved terrace and provide a green shade. They also provide accomodation for a number of weaver birds, whose nests hang in large numbers from the branches: - - “Interesting, but not veery clean”, as the Belgian manageress remarked! While we sat on the terrace sipping our tea, two mules and a donkey strolled in, and took a drink from the lily and goldfish pond in the middle of the gravel sweep. It was all very pleasant and rural, and we felt that it had been worth while to abandon our unpacking for a few hours. We went out again after supper to a meeting at the Mountain Club rooms. A member gave a talk and showed pictures on a recent trip to the Belgian Congo. There was interesting material, but poorly arranged and delivered. A friend who was with him on the trip then showed some very good black and white films but the show had dragged on rather too long. Herbert was tired, and everyone wanted to hurry off home, so there was none of the social part of the meeting which was always a feature of such occasions at the Himalayan Club. I had hoped to meet and talk to, some of the members. I forgot to mention that on Monday of last week, having heard that the Curator of the Museum, is also the Secretary of the Mountain Club, I went to call on him. Dr Barnard greeted me warmly, and we talked about mountains and climbers, when he suddenly said “May I ask you a personal question?” Not being able to imagine what it could be, I assented. He said;- “I have never come across the name of Townend since I was at prep school, and I was at Camberly School with three brothers, Frank, Herbert and Roy”. Great pleasure on all sides! Herbert went off to see him the next day, and more meetings are to be arranged.

The week has been rather full of outings. On Wednesday I lunched early with Edward Groth at the Red Cross Market, and we went to a lunch-time concert by the Symphony Orchestra at the City Hall. They played the Overture to Lohengrin, the Unfinished Symphony, and the “Warsaw” concerto by Addinsell. Neither of us had ever heard it before. Edward liked it very much: I, only moderately. It has been immensely popular in Cape Town, ever since the film “Dangerous Moonlight” was here. The Municipal Orchestra is good, though people say not so good under its present conductor as it was under the last one. Its a great asset to the city, and now we have a wireless in the flat, I can at least listen through it, even if I dont manage to go to the concerts. They have concerts every Thursday and Sunday evening in the city Hall. Another thing which is fast becoming a feature of Cape Town is the Ballet School performances. I had heard about them and seen them advertised, but rather feared to go. However Marischal Murray, with whom Edward is staying, invited us to dine with him at the Civil Service Club on Saturday night and I went on to the ballet with him and his sister and Edward, while Herbert when home to bed. The ballet school don’t try to do the big ballets that have been done by the various famous Russian Ballet companies, but create their own, strictly as far as I could see, in the correct tradition of the steps and movements. I thought them really very good. To give you some idea of the standard, I should say that they had no ballerinas as good as Markova, nor any men in the same class as Anton Dolin, but that the Corps de Ballet were a good deal better. I enjoyed the evening very much.

After the lunch-time concert on Wed, Edward said he wanted to back to the place where we picnicked on Sunday, as he had lost his knife. He had borrowed a car from the Consulate, in which we could get along a road, which would bring us fairly close below our lunch place. He asked whether Herbert and I would go along with him. We had already planned to take a certain Dr Bevin of Cyprus walking on the mountain, so we all joined in and had a lovely afternoon, finishing up by leaving the car at Kloof Nek on our way back, and walking to Sea Point across the West side of the Lion’s Head. I had taken Herbert that way on Monday, for I wanted him to see the flowers before they faded. They change every few days. This afternoon we did part of the walk we did on the Sunday of the picnic, and quite a different series of flowers are out and others gone in the ten day interval. I did not mean to let this spread out so much, but don’t want to start another page, so just send my love. LJT

(handwritten on two small bits of paper)
Oct 27th 1943

My darling Annette

It was good to get your AG – but I am very sorry to hear that Miss Millauro has not made a good job of the new eye. I hope you have not gone on wearing the unsatisfactory one and I think you should let us pay all expenses connected with your eye, so please ask Aunt for any money you need in connection with it. By the way, did cutting the lashes of the good eye make them grow?

We were out at Hout Bay with Dr and Miss Gill and Edward Groth on your birthday and drank your health in tea, sitting on the terrace under the oak trees. Its odd that there is something French in the Character of that hotel – and I dont think it is just the fact that the present manageress is a Belgian – for its much more in the building and surroundings which are much much older than her connection with the place.

I am interested to hear of your talk with Frank – It will be a good thing if he and Joyce become a little more mellow in their views.

Sorry I have done so little in the way of personal letters lately – and now I am rather hurried. I am making rather heavy weather of my first few days of housekeeping but some sort of method is taking shape and I hope I shall evolve a practical routine for doing things, within a few days. There is no doubt that marketing and cooking for 2 people only is frightfully wasteful of time. I would like to do all my shopping say twice a week, but with a tiny kitchen, no larder and a very small ‘frig’ its not possible to keep much in the house. No one calls for orders or sends stuff in these days, and its all rather nonsensical for there are complaints that so many people are out of work in Cape Province that natives should be sent back to the other provinces. Everything points to the fact that shops and dealers are just squeezing the last possible farthing out of the situation and the politicians will do nothing but talk hot air, because they want support. Everything is such a tangle in the country! Its pleasant news that the Vic Wells Ballet is so improved –

Best love Mother

Family letter from HPV

c/o Standard Bank of South Africa, Cape Town.

Victoria Court Flats.
Cape Town.
October 27th 1943. Wednesday.

My dear Annette, (name handwritten)

Joan’s letter has told all the general news. We are now in a fair way to being settled in the flat. One of it special features is a head-smacking device above the bed; a light switch on a flex, hanging just where it catches one a crack if one sits up inadvertently. A thing which Joan declared improbable when first I commented on the arrangement; but which happened to me not very much later in the middle of the night. Turning over in bed is now a thing to be done elaborately; since the time when the cheiropractor declared that it twists the neck to turn over without lifting the head of the pillow.

I went to him half a dozen times. He worked away with vigour; but I do not know that there has been much result. However he announced the course to be complete on Monday instead of encouraging me to return and put money in his pocket. I am somewhat depressed about the prospects of getting stronger since Friday’s setback; true, I was on the go from 2.30 till 7 and from 8.30 till well past 11, after doing a good deal in the way of chores about the flat in the morning (I made my bed, swept out the flat and did off jobs on the Saturday morning when the maid did not come; but how I managed to be so busy on the Friday morning I cannot think) and so the day was a long one; and it was at the expense of my afternoon lie-back that I ventured on the Hout Bay trip. But even so the fatigue was disproportionate, considering how assiduously I have been nursing myself these last few months. No: I cannot claim that this time the cheiropraxy has led me to any lightness of body – or to keenness of appetite.

Is it remembered that in the hope of confuting the gentleman who demanded £6 for remedying fallen arches I did on-the-toes-rise exercises 50 times night and morning for some four months? religiously. Joan urged me to show my feet to the cheiropractor, so as to be assured of the benefit that had resulted: and I did. It was an anti-climax. He said “They are quite all-right; except of course that you have fallen arches.” Which means that my efforts were in vain. One Monday he applied an electric vibrator to the outer corners of my eye-sockets; to raise blood-pressure. It felt rather like having teeth drilled.

Nothing came of all the eye-exercises either. These I did religiously also the whole time while we were at White River. Probably I merely strained. Doing harm, if I did. Now I toy with the idea of buying a book. I should not need one, seeing that I read and understood the gist of that on which I based the enterprise: but there is much to be said for re-reading and re-reading a book on how to do anything, ad nauseam. A little more sinks in each time. Witness the success of constant reference to the New Way to Better Golf.

Finally it is to be confessed that since I left White river I have not done any of the spine exercises on which the cheiropractor set such store; so too, since we came to the flat, I have done none of the Muller which I took up again (and perhaps with benefit – but how measure such small degrees?) while at the Mountain Inn. The bathroom which would otherwise be amply large enough for such pranks has an enclosure in the inner corner round the sanitary arrangements; and so there is no room for exercises.

This flat is the ultimate whatnot for electric flex trailing in all directions. We tried to plug in for the electric heater last night; and there was at once a great spark in the switch, which at once went out of action (owing to a bit of solder melting and solidifying again so that the thing could not engage), and a most suspicious-looking flex justified the suspicions by bursting. I must confess to being not so adroit with such little jobs as I used to be; less enthusiastic maybe.

Talking of explosions I had a long letter from Mr. Gifford, the old astronomer in New Zealand, about the Nova in Puppis as to which I gave news in a letter last November and in others later. He sent me four or five pamphlets discussing why stars explode in this way; one of them mentions that the Nova in Puppis was the third brightest in the past 100 years, something quite exceptional in fact; I was lucky to have seen it. Judging by the data in the pamphlets which give a day to day account of the observations over two months, it was at its brightest when I saw it. I feel some satisfaction also for that I compared it to Procyon; and the man who first discovered it in N.Z. (and apparently the absolute first) compared it to Procyon on the third day. There appears to be a lot more interest in New Zealand in regard to Novae than in South Africa; any number of men were observing the Puppis one there, whereas here the thing was treated as a matter concerning those who dealt with it at the start in America or Sweden.

Saturday’s dinner at the Club (name forgotten) where we have twice lunched with the gills was quite gay. I was tired to start with after my Friday’s activities and was glad to get back early and do nothing. Mrs. Jolly, the sister of our host Marischal Murray, told me that she had written a detective story in Africaans and I her that I should undoubtedly learn that language in order to be able to read it; which was untrue and knew it to be so. She cannot reconcile herself even after years of married life to being called Jolly; to any South African, she says, it seems absurd.

The best thing at Houts Bay was the soaring of the seagulls with wings motionless on a current of air up from a cliff thousands of feet into the air. They flashed like white flames at the sun caught them when they canted. I held forth to Dr. Gill about transparency of sea water and the use of underwater spectacles in New Zealand and Australia (as in the movies of Florida) and this led him to interesting talk about the bathysphere and Boebe and, via remarks of mine about the Arcturus Adventure, to a description of a sea-rip off the coast of West Africa like a narrow river full of marine life of all kinds with a rough sea on one side and a calm on the other. Has the family ever read Boebe’s books? – If not, let them so so. Lots of them; much of a muchness perhaps, but a good muchness.

The Dr. Bevan, from Cyprus, who accompanied us on the walk in search of Edward’s lost pocket-knife (which eventually turned up in the flat of Marischal Murray) is a T.B. specialist; and is interesting when he talks shop. He has a bright eye and talks to match. But Eileen Forsyth says he is cracked and so does a woman from Cyprus.

The roses in the Town Gardens opposite us have been a miracle of beauty these last few days. Superb specimens. Moreover they have been grown with compost and not with artificial. Though it is to be said that the Curator told me as a secret that they are flourishing not on account of the compost but on the hoarded virtue of last year’s fertiliser. I told him that he was not on the right lines about compost; for he had said that they could not make it here because of the smell and the fly-nuisance. Neither of which there should be, if our experience in Bengal can be trusted. Besides the roses (and other flowers) there are many squirrels. Now I carry monkey nuts for them. I laughed to see a trio of them which an old lady on a bench had been feeding attempt to soften the heart of an old man sitting near after she had moved on; they advanced close and sat up gazing on him, then one jumped on the bench beside him and another touched his foot. He gave a spasmodic jerk with his foot as one might do whose toe-nails are being eaten by cockroaches (vide Doctor’s Odyssey) so that the toucher fled; and then leaning toward the intruder on the bench he spat at him again and again, while the squirrel receded slowly as if horrified by such lack of manners. The little beasts are overbold; one ran up the bare leg of a girl who sat on a bench and scared her, which did make us all merry.

I have joined the Library. The girls at the reception office and at the counter where books are taken out are most maternal; and condescending. Now I am ashamed to take out detective stories, for they have devilish memories, and instead I am reading such things as Decisive Battles in American History and the “Farmers for 40 Centuries” for which I have been looking for a couple of years. The former dull but good; it has destroyed the good repute of Lee, Jackson, Lincoln (as a war-President) and Sherman, by criticizing shrewdly; and I feel that I have wasted much good sympathy on them in the past. The latter book is about farming in China; much about compost. Fine stuff; both the rading matter and the compost as such.

Our walk yesterday along the foot of the Table Mountain cliffs as of the finest possible. There can be few better anywhere; and I speak as one who has walked in quite a lot of beautiful scenery. To the beauty were added sundry Dassies. Nine. One sat aloft and gazed upon us for minutes; close; we must have seemed to him dangerous, but after a little he could bear it no longer and closed his eyes for a bit. Since I recognized the likeness between the Dassies and Brigadier Tute, I feel vastly benevolent toward them. But the walk which with the tram drives took us 2 ½ hours tired me a good deal, and today I have not done much.

(handwritten addition at end of letter) Much love. Thank you for the airgraph and for your sending French books. But it is heresy to suggest that anything comes up to the “Dame”.

Yours Dad

Air Graph from HPV to Romey

c/o Standard Bank, Cape Town     October 28th. ‘43

My dear Rosemary,

The idea of this is to send my birthday greetings, with my love, but Joan says that there is no prospect of its reaching you in time.  None the less accept them.

You letters 114, 115 and 116 reached us on the 22nd. on which day we moved into this flat.  It is proving a success; but Joan finds that the work in connection with it ties her down.  The maid not accustomed to cooking needs a lot of directing, and the shopping, under war conditions takes a lot of time.  Prices in shops vary greatly; and to get some things, like butter, means going from shop to shop.  She has gone out to lunch & tea today.  There have been various doings. – On the day we moved in, the Gills took us out to Hout Bay, a beauty spot 15 miles away, by car with Edward Groth; it was a marvellous day and the wild flowers were a marvel.  There followed drinks in the flat; they left just before supper-time and after supper we went down to a magic-lantern and movie show with lecture on the Congo, at the Mountain Club; interesting but long, and by the end I was dead beat.  Joan went to a midday concert on Wednesday with Edward who fixed up the loan of a car afterwards to take us up the first part of Table Mountain; the object of the walk was to find his pocket-knife, lost on a picnic the previous week and though this failed (he found it later at home) we had the incidental benefit of a lovely walk.  Joan & I went up again much the same way two days ago; nine dassies and a howling cold wind with bright sun; I have been rather dim since.  On Saturday we went out to dinner with Marischal Murray, Edward’s host, at his club and the others went on to see the local Ballet (amateur) which they found good.  I returned to early bed; it was the day after the Hout Bay trip and the late night.  We have had some visitors but not to meals other than tea, for there is a shortage of table things; and the only table is a card-table, not suitable to entertain guests at.  Sundry tribulations with electric light flexes make up the sum of our doings; unless I add regaling ourselves with the sight of the roses in the Public Gardens close by and the feeding of squirrels on monkey-nuts there.  I have joined the Library, and read an agreeable book about Chinese agriculture.

We had an airmail letter from Mary Ow lamenting that she and her mother had forgotten when they planned your visiting them that there was nothing to do in Florida in the off season and the heat was horrid though to them after years of the tropics pleasant enough.  Irrelevant; the purpose of your visiting them would have been to see them and to enjoy the delights of their company, as I shall tell her.  We were grieved to hear of your being thrown; looking back I seem to have been thrown off more than most and Joan bears a scar from such a downfall on the Portsdown Hills.  But if you were one of our American friends you would certainly go to a cheiropractor on the off-chance of some upset.  Mine has dismissed me; but I do not know that I am much the better for his attentions.  Your news of your applications re study at Jackson interested us greatly and we await the outcome with keen expectation.  As regards your suggestion that I might arrange for payment in the States instead of Canada, there is nothing doing.  The remittances are made to Susie and to suggest a change now would mean delay and perhaps a cessation of the whole thing.  It might be different if the arrangements were made in this Country but to fix up anything in India from so far away in hopeless.  Sorry the alignment of all this which have gone so wrong: yet I had the machine adjusted quite a short time ago.

All our love

Dad

Airgraph from LJT to Grace Townend (addressed to Mrs. A.B.S. Townend. Highways. Great Leighs. Nr. Chelmsford. Essex. England)

Oct 30th 1943 No 21

Dearest Grace: My A.G. is late this week. It is eight days since we moved into the flat, & I have been busy finding my way about the shops, & trying my hand at cooking, as well as unpacking our trunks, which have been in store & getting things arranged. My “help”, Mrs Engel, only knows the simplest bake, boil & stew, but is biddable & anxious to learn more. We are necessarily slow, for we have to work by the book, & the small size of the kitchen with shortage of pots & pans & other equipment, does not make for speed. A week or two’s practice will no doubt improve our ability a good deal. Next week I hope to work in the S.A.W.A.S. office from 2.p.m. till 4.p.m., & later when Mrs E. can be left to cope with the cooking on her own, perhaps I shall be able to put in a couple of hours in the morning too.

On the very day we moved into the flat, we played truant all afternoon. Edward Groth’s nice friends, Dr & Miss Gill invited us to go with them & Edward by car to Hout Bay, fifteen miles down the West coast of the peninsular. It was a most gorgeous drive on a perfect day. The steep mountain side out of which the road is cut, was covered with flowers, & the sea below was brilliant blue-green as it is below the Cornish cliffs. We strolled & sat on the beach & had tea at the charming old hotel. It was a delightful outing. We were with the Gills & Edward again yesterday afternoon when the Gills showed us a lot of beautiful colour films of African scenery, birds & flowers. I wish I could bring some such things home to show you.

Had I not been a householder I should have been up the mountain to-day with Edward & nice Dr Bevin from Cyprus, but they were starting about 7.30 a.m. & I had too many jobs to see too. “Why” said E. “give Herbert a can of beans & let him hot it up for his lunch”. Things are not quite so simple as that when you have other folk to consider. We were out on both our first evenings in our new home. On the Fri. we went to a lecture at the Mountain Club, & on Sat. we dined with Edward & Marischal Murray at the Civil Service Club & they & I went on to see an excellent performance by the Ballet School, while H. went home to bed. We have had several visitors including dear Mrs Harvey, who has always been so helpful to us, & on one afternoon we had an early cup of tea, caught the 4.p.m. bus to Kloof Nek, from where we had a glorious walk along the face of the mountain. Its wonderful to be able to climb out of the town in about twenty minutes & then a few minutes walking takes you on to rough hill-side that might be a hundred miles from anywhere (except that from the north face one sees the city below.) Although our meals are rather a picnic, eaten off a bridge-table which is subsequently folded up & put away, Herbert is glad to be away from hotels I think. We have unpacked his books & papers, & he has been messing about with them. His focus of interest is still definitely in India, & I think he would like to write about the mass of work he did on irrigation, rain-fall & crop returns. Perhaps it would be a good thing for him. We have had more letters from Romey & an A.G. of 2/10 from Anne. Best love to all Joan (Mrs H.P.V.Townend)