#18

March 21, 1944

Dear Archie:

I will be back in London tomorrow, just in time to meet up with the crew before returning to the station. I don’t know whether to go with them or not. I was certainly busy the last week. Twice I was up all night on the flare path. There always has to be an officer on this to shoulder responsibility if anything goes wrong. Usually it is quite straight forward but once I had a lot of kites come back from a nav exercise all about the same time and these added to some kites doing circuits and bumps gave me a busy time. It is awfully difficult to decide when it is worthwhile to change the direction of the f. path. This takes rather a long time and by the time you are through the wind is probably back to where it started.

I wonder, when you are sailing, if you ever had any trouble picking up the moorings. If so you will have some idea of my difficulties particularly if there is not much wind. It comes with practice though.

This place I am in is always very effectively blacked out and yet every time there is an alert all the lights are switched off. It seems rather stupid to me. One night we could hear aircraft of both sides stooging around and also the noise of the ack-ack.

I have met two people here who where at university when I was. Interesting chaps these—one a war correspondent who was in on the first landing at Sicily and then on to Italy. I think he has a touch of malaria.

If I am fortunate and do work my way up to getting a chance at a captain course, such would be at Pat. Bay I imagine.

I wonder if I will be able to meet up with Dick in London. Last time I saw him he said he had been in Iceland some years ago which was news to me.

Yours truly, Tony.

[Editor’s note: Transcription provided by collection donor.]