Thursday 17 February 2022

More Home Front World War II Diaries



 

 

Back in October I wrote about this book which I'd borrowed from the library, read and enjoyed


 and I said that it would be good to have a copy to add to my other Home Front WWII diaries - and I had more than I realised!

 

What I forgot about were these other two which were on another shelf with books that I was hoping to read soon. Both had been around for several years waiting to be read.

And I've read both since the start of the year

Esther Rowley - Dogs, Goats, Bulbs and Bombs;Wartime Diaries of Exmouth and Exeter. Edited by John Folkes. and published in 2010.These diaries were found in an auction by the editor and thanks to a letter found among the pages could be attributed to Esther, a single woman who was in her 30's and lived with her mother in a large house in Exmouth. It's a fascinating look at the life of those who had money at the time and were able to purchase things that many found difficult to find. Esther is in the ATS at the beginning of the diaries in 1940 but later has to leave to take care of her elderly mother. She spends lots of time out and about walking her dogs, visiting neighbours and friends for tea, playing tennis, swimming in summer and having picnics.Gardening is her main pleasure and there are good details of all the plants she buys - things I didn't think were available during the war. A completely different war experience to people living in London or other cities. 

Joan Strange - Despatches From the Home Front; The War Diaries. Non Fiction. Edited by Chris McCooey. Published originally in 1989.  From January 1st 1939 to the end of the War, Joan Stange kept a diary. From the dramatic happening in other parts of the world to the local problems in Worthing. The book also includes a few newspaper  cuttings which are interesting.

I found this about her online 


Papers of Joan Strange (1902-1994)

Joan Colebrook Strange was born at Worthing in 1902. Her parents were George, a local draper, and Emily, and she had two sisters, Mollie and Kathleen, and a brother, Ken. She attended Worthing High School for Girls from 1913 to 1920, and subsequently trained and worked as a physiotherapist. Shortly before the Second War, she became involved in running the Worthing Refugee Committee, which was established in January 1939 to help people, mainly Jews, escaping from central Europe. During the war she kept a diary, which has been published as Despatches from the Home Front (1989). After the war, her work on behalf of refugees continued, raising money for displaced persons in Europe and fugitives from the Eastern Block countries. She made several visits to camps in Germany, which are recorded in detail in the scrapbooks and diaries listed below, regularly gave talks, and appeared on the popular radio show Woman's Hour in 1952. Some of the individuals and families she helped built new lives in England, and the Europeans of the 1940s and 1950s were later joined by Vietnamese and Ugandans in the 1960s and 70s. Many of them leave their mark among these records, in photographs and letters of thanks. Joan Strange died in 1994

 And then I still have this to read, another that's been around a while....waiting for the right mood.

It won't be read this month as I have all the library books to enjoy, but I will get to it eventually.

 Some other WWII diaries that I've read over the last 20 years but don't own are these.............

The View from the Corner Shop: Diary of a Wartime Shop Assistant: The Diary of a Yorkshire Shop Assistant in Wartime


 These Wonderful Rumours!: A Young Schoolteacher's Wartime Diaries 1939-1945

Love & War in London: The Mass Observation Wartime Diary of Olivia Cockett

The Milk Lady at New Park Farm: The Wartime Diary of Anne McEntegart June 1943 - February 1945

 Dorset in Wartime: v. 15: The Diary of Phyllis Walther 1941-1942 (Dorset in Wartime: The Diary of Phyllis Walther 1941-1942)

 


Sand In My Shoes: Coming of Age in the Second World War: A WAAF’s Diary 


I reckon there aren't many more to be read unless other diaries are found in attics, or discovered in the Mass Observation Archives.....you never know.

Back Tomorrow
Sue

28 comments:

  1. I confess that the only diaries I have ever read are Anne Frank which touched me deeply, Adrian Mole which made me cackle and my own from my now horror filled teenage angst years! Oh the poor boy I had a crush on at the time. The amount of time me and my friend strolled past his house ( she fancied his friend ) these days you would call it stalking and his Mum would have been within her rights to get a restraining order!
    You have certainly whetted my appetite though as an adult to look for some of these reads. I have some audible credits so may find a diary on there to have a go at!

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    1. I find diaries fascinating because there are no rose coloured specs - it's all as it happened.

      We did Anne Franks diary at school - so that was spoiled for me.

      I loved the Adrian Mole Diaries - poor fella!

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    2. Alan Bennett's Diaries are amongst the best diaries ever written.

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  2. What a lot of wartime diaries! But then I guess people needed some outlet for their fears and curtailed daily lives back then.

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    1. I think more people wrote diaries back then but probably many were just thrown away when folk died, Hope there are more discovered in attics although I didn't realise I'd read so many!

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  3. Gosh, what a haul - both owned and read. I imagine you have a pretty good idea of what life was like across quite a broad selection of people and professions. I hope still more are found.

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    1. The difference between cities and countryside was huge. I'm going to do more looking online to see what others I've not read

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  4. I love wartime diaries and have several on my shelf. My favourite, and one I've read many times is Mrs Milburn's Diary.

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    1. When I eventually run out of diaries to read, I shall start over and read mine again

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  5. Long may they be kept. I love reading about a time my parents had to live through and in Dads case fight through. I know he wanted me to write about something, something he must have witnessed and knew it wasn't their fault. During my final visit to him he was insistant I should make the truth be known...alas about what I shall never know. He must have remembered that I have had writing published and it was his only but confused hope I would understand. x

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    1. How frustrating to be left wondering. Hopefully there are still some diaries tucked away waiting to be found and published

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  6. I am with you and find diaries fascinating to read. I read the View from the Corner Shop one recently as Dewsbury is not far from us. It certainly sounded a different war from the one experienced by family down in Sheffield only 28 miles away and that is what is quite intriguing about them.

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    1. My parents were in school in Suffolk during the war and not a lot happened here at all - except for rationing and clothes shortages. Would have been completely different in a city

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    2. I beg to differ. Think of the Americans here and the many taking off on daily missions, crashes, rationing, daily life in war time, and the 1942 bombings in our counties. What are your diaries telling you? That nothing happened outside London?

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  7. You have a brilliant collection, I have read some of them but not all. The diary of Esther Rowley sounds fascinating. I would love to find one that was about Manchester during the war years, I should maybe do a bit of research.

    I do find diaries, especially the wartime diaries lovely to read and easy to read too as you can read a few days entries as and when you have time. That's one of the reasons I think I whizz through them so quickly as it really keeps me in reading mode. I also loved Anne Frank's diary ... and of course the fictional ones Adrian Mole, Bridget Jones Diaries all have their own merits.

    I've just had a thought, I wonder if our blogs will be discovered many years in the future when blogging and vlogging are no longer 'a thing' and be poured over by future generations. Now I've just typed that out I'm starting to doubt it!!

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    1. I'm cross that some of the ones in the photos of read but not owned I actually DID own at sometime - and now I have room for them again - I'd better make a list!

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  8. I read free books to review from Netgalley on iPad Kindleapp…I have read tons of WWII books recently…I get them months before publication…

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    1. How good that you get them so quickly - I don't read online at the moment. Only a paper copy works for me

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  9. Living through war and/or enemy invasion has to be forever life changing. The diaries must be interesting but often sad as well. A friend's older brother went to Vietnam and upon return to the US, he was never the same. His war time story was very sad.

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    1. The diaries I have are mostly about life for those on the home front. For those who went and fought it's a whole different story.

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  10. It was such a remarkable time. I suppose the blogs of today are the equivalent. I wonder what they will tell about us in a 100 years.

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  11. Wonderful recommendations - I must look for some of these!

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  12. I've got the Simon Garfield one. Arilx

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  13. I will have a good look at those titles as I love diaries. I do have all the ones edited by Simon Garfield (war observation diaries).

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  14. A friend's family only found her grandfather's WWI diary after he died. The family had no idea that he had been a stretcher bearer during the Gallipoli campaign; a campaign that is very important to we Aussies.
    He had never disclosed it to anyone, and one has to wonder what horrors he had stored away inside his head. He was the kindest, most gentle man you could ever hope to meet.
    One also has to wonder how many of these diaries exist, not known about, or that families are quietly keeping. So much history unshared.

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  15. That is quite a collection you have there. I would imagine it is good to read and compare them. The similarities and differences in the books would give you a wider view of the time period.

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  16. I wonder if there are any diaries specific to Canada. I will have to take a look, you have made me wonder.

    God bless.

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  17. Wow you have quite a few of them! My mum was a young girl during the war and would share stories of what she remembered. I should write them down so they aren't lost.

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