From Dawsey to Juliet
2nd April, 1946
Dear Miss Ashton,
Having fun is the biggest sin in Adelaide Addison’s bible (lack of humility following close on its heels), and I’m not surprised she wrote to you about Jerry-bags. Adelaide lives on her wrath.
There were few eligible men left in Guernsey and certainly no one exciting. Many of us were tired, scruffy, worried, ragged, shoeless, and dirty—we were defeated and looked it. We didn’t have the energy, time, or money left over for fun. Guernsey men had no glamour—and the German soldiers did. They were, according to a friend of mine, tall, blond, handsome, and tanned—like gods. They gave lavish parties, were jolly and zestful company, possessed cars, had money, and could dance all night long.
But some of the girls who dated soldiers gave the cigarettes to their fathers and the bread to their families. They would come home from parties with rolls, pates, fruit, meat patties, and jellies stuffed in their purses, and their families would have a full meal the next day.
I don’t think some Islanders ever credited the boredom of those years as a reason to befriend the enemy. Boredom is a powerful reason, and the prospect of fun is a powerful draw—especially when you are young.
There were many folks who would have no dealings with the Germans—if you said so much as good morning, you were abetting the enemy, according to their way of thinking. But circumstances were such that I could not abide by that with Captain Christian Hellman, a doctor in the Occupation forces and my good friend.
In late 1941 there wasn’t any salt on the Island, and none was coming to us from France. Root vegetables and soups are listless without salt, so the Germans got the idea of using seawater to supply it. They carried it up from the bay and poured it into a big tanker set in the middle of St. Peter Port. Everyone was to walk to town, fill up their buckets, and carry them home again. Then we were to boil the water away and use the sludge in the bottom of the pan as salt. That plan failed—there wasn’t enough wood to waste building up a fire hot enough to boil the pot of water dry.
So we decided to cook all our vegetables in the seawater itself. That worked well enough for flavor, but there were many older people who couldn’t make the walk into town or haul heavy buckets home. No one had much strength left over for such chores. I have a slight limp from a badly set leg, and though it kept me from army service, it has never been bad enough to bother me. I was very hale, and so I began to deliver water around to some cottages.
I traded an extra spade and some twine for Mme. LePell’s old baby pram, and Mr. Soames gave me two small oak wine casks, each with a spigot. I sawed off the barrel tops to make moveable lids and fitted them into my pram—so now I had transport. Several of the beaches weren’t mined, and it was an easy thing to climb down the rocks, fill a cask with seawater, and tote it back up.
The November wind is bleak, and one day my hands were near numb after I climbed up from the bay with the first barrel of water. I was standing by my pram, trying to limber up my fingers, when Christian drove by. He stopped his car, backed up, and asked if I wanted any help. I said no, but he got out of his car anyway and helped me lift the barrel into my pram. Then, without a word, he went down the cliff with me, to help with the second barrel.
I hadn’t noticed that he had a stiff shoulder and arm, but between those, my limp, and the loose scree, we slipped coming back up and fell against the hillside, losing our grip on the barrel. It tumbled down, splintered against the rocks, and soaked us. God knows why it struck us both as funny, but it did. We sagged against the cliff- side, unable to stop laughing. That was when Elia’s essays slipped from my pocket, and Christian picked it up, sopping wet. “Ah, Charles Lamb,” he said, and handed it to me. “He was not a man to mind a little damp.” My surprise must have showed, because he added, “I read him often at home. I envy you your portable library.”
We climbed back up to his car. He wanted to know if I could find another barrel. I said I could and explained my water-delivery route. He nodded, and I started out with my pram. But then I turned back and said, “You can borrow the book, if you’d like to.” You would have thought I was giving him the moon. We exchanged names and shook hands.
After that, he would often help me carry up water, and then he’d offer a cigarette, and we’d stand in the road and talk—about Guernsey’s beauty, about history, about books, about farming, but never about the present time— always things far away from the war. Once, as we were standing, Elizabeth rattled up the road on her bicycle. She had been on nursing duty all that day and probably most of the night before, and like the rest of us, her clothes were more patches than cloth. But Christian, he broke off in mid-sentence to watch her coming. Elizabeth drew up to us and stopped. Neither said a word, but I saw their faces, and I left as soon as I could. I hadn’t realized they knew each other.
Christian had been a field surgeon, until his shoulder wound sent him from Eastern Europe to Guernsey. In early 1942, he was ordered to a hospital in Caen; his ship was sunk by Allied bombers and he was drowned. Dr. Lorenz, the head of the German Occupation Hospital, knew we were friends and came to tell me of his death. He meant for me to tell Elizabeth, so I did.
The way that Christian and I met may have been unusual, but our friendship was not. I’m sure many Islanders grew to be friends with some of the soldiers. But sometimes I think of Charles Lamb and marvel that a man born in 1775 enabled me to make two such friends as you and Christian.
Yours,
Dawsey Adams
From Juliet to Amelia
4th April, 1946
Dear Mrs. Maugery,
The sun is out for the first time in months, and if I stand on my chair and crane my neck, I can see it sparkling on the river. I’m averting my eyes from the mounds of rubble across the street and pretending London is beautiful again.
I’ve received a sad letter from Dawsey Adams, telling me about Christian Hellman, his kindness and his death. The war goes on and on, doesn’t it? Such a good life—lost. And what a grievous blow it must have been to
