A collection of letters : 1952 - 1973

 Christmas 1973 was my best Christmas ever!

I had finished my Higher School Certificate exams, my sister had completed her School Certificate exams, Mum and Dad had saved incredibly hard and paid for four return airfares to London for us to meet our many cousins, aunts and uncles, and extended family. Up to that time, they had just been names to my sister and myself, but we were finally to meet them face to face.

All that happened in our six week England trip, is enough to fill a number of blogs. But that is for another day.

What I want to write about now is a collection of letters.

Just to give a little background, Dad's brother and his new bride, came to Australia in 1950 as part of the Ten Pound Pom immigration scheme. Dad's brother wrote to Dad after a year or so, saying "Australia really is the land of milk and honey. You should think about coming too."  Dad applied to Australia House, was successful and arrived in Sydney in March 1952. Dad's parents had lost their eldest son in WW2, and now their other two sons planned to make their lives on the other side of the world.  So when Grandpa retired in mid 1952, they too decided to sell up and move to Australia.  Towards the end of 1952, Dad wrote to Mum (still in England), who he had worked with, played sport with, and dated a few times, and proposed to her. She accepted, and so in March 1954, she too arrived in Sydney.

Back to 1973....

We were to spend our second full weekend in England with Dad's first cousin and his family, in their home in Norwood, South London. On a dark and cold Friday afternoon, we caught the bus from central London to South Norwood. Uncle Philip, Auntie Monica and their three children gave us a wonderful welcome into their home.

After dinner, Uncle Philip stood, and asked Dad to stand too, and said he had a special presentation to make. From the sideboard, he collected a bundle of blue papers, about 10 centimetres high, tied with the most beautiful burgundy velvet ribbon. I instantly recognised the papers as aerograms - at the time, the most common form of correspondence between our family in Australia and our English relatives. (I can vividly remember Mum's and Grandma's excitement when our postman delivered an aerogram to our letterbox. Before they even opened it, they knew it would contain details of their loved ones back in England, and a glimpse into the life they had left behind.)

Unbeknown to us, until that Friday evening in December 1973, Uncle Philip and Auntie Monica had kept all the letters from Australia, and were now formally returning them to us - a time capsule of those early years of an immigrant family in Sydney.

The first letter is dated 18 August 1952, and the address - S S Otranto, in the Australian Bight.

The last is dated 18 November 1973.

Now, as the self-appointed family genealogist, these letters are one of my most treasured possessions.

I have to confess, that I still haven't transcribed them all, or even read them all, but of those that I have read, I know they contain wonderful snippets of our family's life, as they settled into their new country.

Not only is there family news, but also news of Australia v England tennis and cricket matches, Royal visits, and much more - a real treasure trove, and a wonderful addition to our family history archives.

In addition to the content of the letters, I also find it wonderful to have records of my Grandfather's handwriting (he died when I was ten), my Grandmother's, and Mum's and Dad's, as well as Mum's impeccable typing!

The precious letters, flattened ready for reading.
The burgundy velvet ribbon is long gone.