There is a great book I have been reading. Diary Of A Spitfire Pilot by Granville Allen Mawer. I think it's fascinating. I accidentally read a few exerts on Amazon a while ago and was so interested I bought it. If you are interested here is a link :
https://www.amazon.co.uk/diaryofaspitfirepilotpaperback
I don't want to spoil the ending, but there is just something I can't get my head around and explaining it involves spoilers. So if you don't want to know, stop reading this now.
Allen (as he is known) has an affair/relationship with a serving woman whilst he is serving in Britain. She is British. He is Australian. They do not use protection at all. He is there for several months, maybe more than a year. I didn't really notice. Surprisingly she does not get pregnant. He says to her that if it happens he will marry her. I think they loved each other, but he had ideas about saving himself for a woman back home who he was exchanging letters with. Eventually there is a situation where either him or one of his friends will get to be sent to a destination unknown. They toss a coin and Allen's friend wins. Instead of choosing to go his friend opts to stay in Britain and be with the woman he has been seeing. (They later marry). So Allen gets to leave. Turns out he is going back home to Australia. The journey takes many months (or weeks, again I cannot recall which) The last night he spends with his British girlfriend something happens which he is never made aware of. After returning home the engagement with that other woman breaks down. Allen serves in the Australian air force at home. Once his British woman realises she is pregnant she writes to him several times. The letter were sent to the bank where Allen worked before enlisting. From there they were forwarded to his house. His dear beloved mother not only opened and read the letters but she hid them and did not send them on to her son. Allen then dies in a training accident about five weeks before his 24th birthday. He never knew about his son.
I just can't get over his mother's reasoning. What on earth did she think she was doing? What terrible thing was she trying to protect him from by denying him knowledge of his son? I have no doubts he would have married that woman just like he promised had he known, or tried to. The logistics might have been awkward but he would have tried at least. He was young but he had a great sense of duty and responsibility and of doing what was right when it really mattered. His British woman named the boy after Allen. I don't even know why his mother opened the letters. She could have just sent them on to her son. Perhaps there was a return address complete with her name and she just couldn't let her curiosity go. Last time I checked mail is private. Perhaps I have a greater sense of personal privacy than they did. After Allen died his mother felt bad enough about things to contact the woman and let he know he was dead. The woman had eventually married someone else and had a daughter with him. She was unhappy and in the end got a plane ticket and took her children to Australia. She lived with Allen's mother till the elder woman's death and Granville Allen Mawer II was brought up having a close relationship with his uncle. The wonderful brother of the father he never knew.
It's so tragic and sad. You couldn't make up something like this. Maybe Hollywood will tell his story in a movie one day. That would be marvellous. No, sorry, I mean (as Allen would say) that would be wizard.
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