I LONG FOR YOU, DARLING
Tragic WWII love letters found after 80 years
THEY describe in tender detail the yearnings of a Second World War airman and his sweetheart.
These handwritten love letters were uncovered by builders renovating a seaside hotel in Scarborough, North Yorkshire, last week – 80 years after being penned by the devoted couple.
‘You are always in my thoughts night and day,’ the woman writes. ‘Wherever you may go my darling don’t ever forget that I love you more than anything else on earth. I am longing for your leave.’
To which he replies: ‘Oh darling I am so lonely without you.’ The Scarborough Archaeological and Historical Society put the letters found at the Esplanade Hotel – requisitioned by the military in the war – on social media and appealed for help in identifying the lovers.
But yesterday it emerged there was no romantic reunion after the war.
Tragically, the male author was likely Scottish RAF Sergeant John McConnell, a 19-year-old air gunner. He was killed when two Lancasters crashed into each other on take-off from RAF Grimsby, just nine months after the letters were written, on Christmas Eve, 1943. Fourteen servicemen died in the accident.
Death notices placed by Sgt McConnell’s parents in their local paper match the return address on the three-page letter written by his sweetheart, leading to speculation she had been staying with his family in Motherwell before he was posted south of the Border.
However, the identity of the mystery woman, who signed her letter ‘M’, remains unknown.