Secret Letters

by John Willis

  100Lowestoft Journal February 22 2016

  101Memoirs of Margot Myers translated by her daughter, Anne

  102Audrey Mallett, University of Concordia thesis 2016

  103The British blockade was part of the economic war with Germany. It used the Navy to try to block supplies of essential items like food, metals and coal.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  March 17 1941

  My Family,

  My excitement is unbounded. You are coming home. You are really coming home. John has phoned me through a telegram. You expect to leave on Monday and be at Lisbon at the end of the month. Oh Joy of Joys. All the heaviness that has been pent up in me is dispersing. My little Robert, perhaps I shall see you soon. You will be a boy now. All the baby part of you will have disappeared. A little man of many travels. My darling Anne, I have tried to imagine you growing and have looked into the last little face your Mummy sent me a year ago when you were photographed on the steps at Beaurepaire. You are lovely, my little daughter.

  Oh my Lovvy, you are bringing the children home. They will go back one day to see their Grandmother who has had to see them go. I have found a little house for us, and for perhaps a short respite we shall be able to live together again. I am overwhelmed by a great joy.

  In Lyon, Margot, Robert and Anne were given the necessary travel papers by the Americans and she was able to buy train tickets from Thomas Cook, who were still operating. They had been staying with Madeleine at La Busserie for three months now. Margot was filled with a mixture of sadness, relief, gratitude and fear for what lay ahead, as the family finally left their refuge. Madeleine went out of her way to ensure that the Myers family would not go hungry on their long journey, baking cakes and even killing a chicken.

  The train tickets that Margot Myers had obtained were for travel to Madrid via Toulouse. The first leg of the journey was uneventful despite having to find a hotel in Toulouse in the dark. In Barcelona, they were amazed to be met by a man from Thomas Cook in a magnificent cap who looked after them well. The onward journey to Madrid the next day, however, was a nightmare. The train was packed to the rafters with people piled on top of each other. Some people were even sleeping in the luggage racks. People argued about seats and her children always seemed to need the toilet. The ticket collector had to climb over mountains of people to check their documents. When Robert urgently needed the toilet, Margot found a woman squatting on it who resolutely refused to move. After what seemed an interminable wait, the woman finally succumbed to pressure but, once Robert had relieved himself, she swiftly squatted back down again, to the utter frustration of the rest of the queue. Despite the terrible overcrowding, on the whole, the other travellers, all equally desperate, were kind to her children.

  Margot was very disturbed when she encountered Jewish refugees on the way. They all looked deeply anxious. At the border she was frightened when she was rudely searched by a Spanish official. ‘An old witch had the assignment of frisking me. She had me enter a little booth and searched me all over, even under my skirts.’104 But Margot had nothing to hide and was allowed on her way. As the overcrowding eased the journey became more comfortable and the children were in good spirits. Robert still has a childhood memory of Spanish children begging in Madrid, ‘Anne and I gave them our sandwiches, all the food we had left.’105

  Margot, however, was fearful that something could still go badly wrong.

  In Madrid she met with the Daily Telegraph correspondent who gave her some reassurance. Finally, Margot was able to send a cable to her husband in England telling him that she was safe and heading for Lisbon. Geoff had booked his family plane tickets from Lisbon to London but they were ‘preference’ tickets not ‘priority’ tickets. Margot was horrified when she learnt there were already scores of people in the priority queue. ‘I was so excited when the Air Ministry said that my family was a priority but I soon realised that others were Priority Plus.’106 She understood that she would never get on a plane and that the only route back to Britain was by sea.

  Margot felt stranded, trapped in Lisbon. The consular authorities told her that a boat home was her last chance. If she didn’t take that opportunity, the consul could no longer take any responsibility for her and her family. It was a difficult decision. About half the convoys were being sunk at the time, but being stranded without consular protection was equally perilous. Margot sent an urgent message to her husband asking for advice. Myers made enquiries. The risk of staying in Lisbon without support was significant but so was the hazardous journey home by sea.

  The Daily Telegraph correspondent and his Spanish wife became good and helpful friends to Margot. Unfortunately, the Myers children fell ill. Robert was particularly sick and Margot was worried that he would not be fit to travel. As he recovered from one illness, he suffered from another, this time a serious ear infection, ‘I was terribly worried because he was in pain and I feared the worst.’

  Margot just did not know what the safest plan was, ‘Portugal would not want to keep us indefinitely and there was always the German menace. What to do? I knew that ships were being sunk every day. But refusing to leave meant burning our bridges.’107

  Eventually she received a telegram from England, ‘Geoff, who had at first been as worried as I was, advised me to leave all the same.’

  News came through that a boat for the ever-growing number of stranded British subjects was finally available. But then the boat was cancelled and all British subjects were told to wait for two further months. Instead of disappointment, Margot felt relief. Now there was a good chance that Robert would have time to recover and be well again, and that the family could catch the delayed boat.

  The children got better as they waited. They lived in a tiny pensión in Estoril and Margot made friends with women from France, Spain and England who were all, in their different ways, waiting, just as she was.

  June 28 1941

  My darling,

  It is just three months since you arrived in Lisbon. Now I am sure you are on your way home. I am again full of hope, confident that I shall soon be seeing you. My feelings are like the waters of a shallow lake. I am only able to glide along the surface, not daring to dip my paddle below for fear of stirring up the muddy bottom. I am trying to suppress my excitement and keep my equanimity.

  I will not tell the family that I am sure you are on the sea in a convoy from Gibraltar. They need not go through unnecessary worry. They will know when you are back. It has been wonderful to write you letters which you have received for the last three months. Our letters have been freely written, but there are hundreds of questions I want to ask you, hundreds of things I want to say.

  I have had to damp down my feelings for so many weeks now that I am determined not to let them bubble over until you are home. The period of deferred hope is over.

  Dangers were ever-present and Geoffrey often heard bad news about pilots he had met earlier in the war. Hugh had been the shy twenty-year-old worried about his wife at the social events in Coltishall.

  Hugh has been killed in a flying accident. His little wife will be crying her eyes out tonight. I am seventy miles away and can do nothing. Hugh was posted from the squadron to an operational training unit where he seemed safe. He was upset at leaving the squadron but his wife was delighted. She had four months’ happiness with him. They danced every night at the mess. She loved dancing. Now he has gone, and I can’t do anything for the girl.

  I have been praying for your safety, and praying too, to be as brave as you are.

  God bless You and the Children.

  Eventually the Myers family left Lisbon on the SS Avoceta, a small, former British-built cruise ship built in 1923 and bound for Gibraltar. The journey was full of alarms. Once, soon after departure, Margot was sitting peacefully in the lounge in a seat from which she could see her cabin door, having just put the children to bed. It was eerily quiet. A woman suddenly burst into the lounge exclaiming they were under attack.

  Margot desperately hu
rried to the cabin and, with great difficulty, dragged the sleepy children plus their life jackets to the dining hall. Robert still remembers being scared, ‘Everybody crammed into the dining hall. Dead silence. Then Anne woke up and began screaming. They had trouble calming her down. I apparently sensed the danger and was very quiet but remember being very frightened’.108

  They had been attacked by an enemy aircraft, but working out the exact truth was difficult. Rumours circulated fast on the small boat and the crew were under strict orders not to say anything. All Margot knew was that her children were in danger.

  Fortunately, they arrived safely. ‘I have forgotten the exact details of our arrival. All I can remember is the long wait and our climbing down into the launches that would take us to the big ship. I was much moved when a group of young British men and women began to sing gravely in honour of the captain who had piloted us to safety. Years later I learnt that the Avoceta had sunk during one of her subsequent voyages.’109

  Indeed, Margot, Robert and Anne had been very lucky. On September 25 1941, just a couple of months later, the SS Avoceta was attacked near the Azores and sank. 123 people on board lost their lives. It was one of a twenty-five strong convoy, HG-73, from Gibraltar. All told, nine ships in the convoy were sunk; one of the worst losses of the entire Atlantic campaign.

  The second ship from Gibraltar, the Scythia, was an altogether grander affair, much larger and more comfortable. It was a liner for the Cunard company. But Margot was wise enough to know that size merely made the Scythia a more attractive target for the enemy.

  Two weeks after Margot had arrived a convoy was finally formed in Gibraltar. Before they set sail for the United Kingdom all passengers spent two weeks being trained for the worst. A sergeant major relentlessly, sometimes brutally, drilled everyone, including children, in evacuation procedures in case the boat sank. Some of the passengers could not speak a word of English. It was a very nerve-wracking journey. Bomb scares were a regular occurrence and the risk of mines or attacks by submarines was obvious to Margot. In case the family was separated, or worse, she fastened waterproof plastic bags round the necks of the children which contained their identity and addresses.

  One very refined elderly English woman summed up their predicament when, in a cut-glass accent, she said, rather curtly, to the bullying sergeant major, ‘If I understand you correctly, we run the risk of an air attack, a submarine attack, or we can be blown up by mines.’110

  Myers knew that boat travel was very risky. He had seen or heard of enough convoys being attacked by Germans to know that the passage home was not assured.

  July 1 1941

  I have not been able to tell you what I have been going through during the past months. It would have been foolish to dwell on it. Every time that my hopes of your return were dashed I thought of you, my Tite, and your courage. I have also thought of all the others who were going through torture and misery without hope on earth. I then felt ashamed. Now you are on the sea. I have learnt my lesson.

  I used to have a smug and comfortable feeling when thinking of Beaurepaire and the safety that it afforded you in all circumstances, but the war swept by there when I thought that no such thing could happen. Now you have left that place, which once spelt security for me, and you are on the sea.

  His colleagues were not always sensitive to the dangers the Myers family were facing at sea.

  A colleague at Group, whose French wife is still in occupied France, asked me whether I had agreed to your going by sea. I told him I had. Then he started saying, ‘I wouldn’t do that. It is so dangerous by sea… torpedoes and things…’ I interrupted him, saying, ‘Goodnight. I’m off,’ and left him.

  What else did he think I had in my thoughts? Of course I have followed the statistics of enemy sinkings and I can’t get the danger of it all out of my head. Whatever happens, my Family, I feel we were right in deciding to take the risk. If we all go under in the venture I will go on believing in God and accept what comes. You have helped me face things fearlessly, my Love. I am almost calm.

  Before the end of the letter there is a reminder that the RAF were still in a bitter war.

  The Polish squadrons have just lost their wing commander. He was a favourite among the British pilots too. On an offensive sweep two days ago his aircraft was hit by anti-aircraft fire and he crashed in flames into the sea. He had been waiting for twenty months for news of his wife he had left behind in Poland. Only last week he had received a message saying that his wife had escaped from Poland to Siberia and was on her way to join him.

  This was one of the constant reminders of the value of leadership. Having seen the impact of poor leadership under Harkness, and the positive difference made by men like Tuck, Brothers and Blatchford, it was an area whose significance was now fully understood by Myers.

  The American Eagle Squadron [one of three squadrons populated by American volunteer pilots] is with us now. The politicians realise their propaganda value. They are not yet a good squadron… they need an energetic and bold squadron leader but they have got a tired man who knows what is wanted but cannot make them do it. He is a kind man, full of consideration for his pilots, who has a look of sorrow at the back of his eyes. He is a thinking man. Possibly he thinks too much.

  Sometimes, too, it was as if Fighter Command had learned none of the lessons from the inadequacies of Squadron Leader Harkness and a handful of other leaders. A year after the Battle of Britain, the squadron they shared the aerodrome with was going through very similar problems. Like Harkness, their squadron leader had been transferred from a training squadron to an operational unit. Their desperate intelligence officer told Myers the story.

  The squadron leader was too vain to notice that the pilots despised him. He insisted that he knew all about flying tactics and would not listen to suggestions. He went up with his squadron on a practice flight. The squadron took off in ragged formation. An hour later they came down, white with rage and shaken. One sergeant pilot had dived from 4,000 feet into the sea. His aircraft had disappeared. There was no hope. The pilots started cursing under their breath, ‘What a clot Maclean is. We won’t go up with him again, no bloody fear. It’s suicide… he’s crazy.’

  The next day, Maclean was relieved of his command. Myers could not help thinking back to the early days of the Battle of Britain and of the pilots that 257 had lost under the command of Harkness. But his family, now on the precarious escape route home, were always in his thoughts. He still had not told the rest of the family in Oxfordshire.

  I have not told them that you are on the sea. It would be unnecessary worry for them, especially for Mother. This evening, while I was at the farm next door, the telephone bell rang and everything in me hurt, especially my throat. I had to steady myself while the call was being answered. I thought it might bring me news but it was a local farmer ringing up. Perhaps I will have to wait for a fortnight before receiving news. I will be patient and I will remember what others are going through.

  Margot, Robert and Anne were already on their way when this letter was written. They left Gibraltar one late evening during a blackout. It was a very mixed group of people on board – Polish, French and Italian as well as British. All of them had a British connection but not all could speak the language.

  The journey was tense and difficult. The boat was so crowded there was very little space. Passengers ranged from refugees and injured servicemen to elderly, aristocratic spinsters who had been living on the Riviera.

  The ship was very hot but there was a chronic water shortage and it was rationed. The wealthy spinsters from the Riviera, relatives of the Duke of Westminster, were desperate for a bath, water rationing or not. Margot heard the steward say, ‘They should be on their hands and knees saying their prayers and here they are, clamouring for their baths.’111

  At night, Margot would not get undressed in case there was an emergency alarm and she needed to be ready at a moment’s notice. Early in the voyage from Gibraltar, the alarm had gone off a
nd there was a general sense of panic and heightened anxiety. ‘We had put on our life preservers and were waiting. The children were good. We heard some muffled explosions and I thought I heard the boat shudder.’112

  The two refugee ships that had left Gibraltar sailed in parallel. They were escorted by an aircraft carrier, the Furious, and two or three destroyers and, after the alarm at night, which had been caused by increased German submarine presence, a cruiser was added to the convoy. ‘Looking through the porthole I saw, sailing beside us, a magnificent cruiser. It was the Edinburgh. Its presence comforted me.’ The convoy avoided submarine lanes as best as it could. Planes from the aircraft carrier warily circled overhead, almost continuously.

  Despite the pressure, everyone helped each other whatever their background. They were all facing the same risks, the same uncertainties. Anxious though she was, Margot felt lucky in some ways when she looked at the injured servicemen or thought about those who spoke little English and had nowhere to go when they reached Dover. One Polish woman with an English husband had five children. They were, Margot thought, a strange crowd of people all thrown together by the randomness of war. One day she heard an English sailor, gazing at the refugees, say coldly, ‘To think we are risking our lives for these people.’

  Inevitably, the Scythia seethed with gossip. There were rumours of spies on board. One night, Margot returned to find her cabin a terrible mess. The authorities had been looking for a secret radio transmitter.

  Myers, meanwhile, had been following the convoy with concern. He heard it had been attacked. He vividly imagined his wife and children were at the bottom of the sea. He desperately rang whoever he could think of, to find out more. Geoffrey was relieved to discover he had been badly misinformed about the name of the ship that his family had left Gibraltar on, and that he had been unnecessarily distraught.

  July 10 1941

  Talk about being flattened out! Last night I thought that you must have actually arrived at either Liverpool or the Clyde. It all happened because I phoned a friend at Group asking him if he could give me information about your ship. I imagined that you had left Lisbon about the 19 and I gave this date. A few days ago, he asked the naval liaison officer at Fighter Command about the ship. The news was grand. The convoy was north of Ireland and would split into three. You were due to dock at Liverpool, Carlisle or Oban in two- or three-days’ time.