Reference
AU10/102/4/11
Title
Handwritten Letter
Date free text
29 January 1955
Production date
From: 1955 To: 1955
Scope and Content
Letter heading: "Kingsgate Castle, Broadstairs, Kent".
"Dear Miss Ira-Smith,
Many happy returns of the day! (I remember your birthday well, as it is the day after my dear mother's. I shall remember her tomorrow. The years have passed on: she would have been 83 if she had lived). I wonder how you have been faring in the wintry weather last week. I just got back to it in time from a short ski-ing holiday at Arosa! You can imagine how I longed to be back in the sunshine again. Somehow Switzerland seems to be the only country where snow looks right. Certainly they welcome it there, if only for the sports. However, my quarters here in the Castle are warm and cosy. I am on the sheltered side, away from the sea: so I do not get the east winds. It is certainly a delightful place to live in, and I would not wish to be anywhere else. I have not been long in finding some work to do. The Vicar of Walmer - lower down the coast - is in great need of someone to help him. He has two churches, so I am assisting him on Sundays. He wants me to go there and take on the job permanently: but for the present I am going to do what I can from here. Actually there is another parish just outside Broadstairs, where I am taking early services during the week, where the Vicar is a very sick man, and he too would like me to help on Sundays. So I do not think I shall rot out here for lack of work!
I wonder if you have seen these verses of John Betjeman? You will enjoy reading them to your mother. From all I hear, Ampthill is changing rapidly, especially in the Ampthill House area. When I went there in 1933, it still retained the shape it had for centuries - four roads converging on the market-square: now, with new roads being cut, and new estates going up, in a few years time I shall hardly know my way about! But I am glad the new road opens opposite the church. I always thought the church seemed isolated from the town. Will it be any nearer for you?
I often think of Ampthill, and of my visits to you, with the car parked on that triangle of grass in the road! I think the church is happier now than in the Waddy days. The Rector wrote last year inviting me to come and preach at the Patronal Festival: but I had to refuse as I was on the move then. Now I am rather off the map as regards the Midlands, and I have no car nowadays.
With all good wishes and kind remembrances to you both. I shall look forward to hearing your news.
Yours sincerely,
John Hillam"
Format
letter headed paper
Level of description
item