This letter was sent by 12 year old Ivy just before Christmas 1939. She had been evacuated to Newby Bridge in Cumbria, from Salford, Lancashire and she asks about going home for Christmas and will there be a party like last year! The teachers have told them that if they go home for Christmas they won’t be allowed to return! I’m not sure whether that was regarded as a threat or a promise as Ivy was miserable to be away from her family. Her underlined pleas in several of her weekly letters, “Write Soon” in bold letters and underlined several times are evidence of her unhappiness.
The letter was sent to my mother and her husband from her young sister, Ivy, and I found it among Ivy’s possessions when she died.
I also enclose the letter sent to Ivy’s mother, from Stowels Memorial School, advising her of evacuation proceedures.
