A. Barb & Stan – 1st, 2nd & Last Two Love Letters
1 Introduction. These letters are to give the background of Barb’s and Stan’s love for each other, to help our children and friends. It aims to show how we gradually got together, loved each other and suddenly our relationship changed but not end.
They are the only ones that Stan could find as there had been many more. Barb’s wartime letters to a sailor are held by Alex and not opened by Stan.
It should be noted that in those times, customs and living was different and both of us were shy – all quite different from today and that virtually all of our formative years were during WW II when things were abnormal and major changes were taking place around the world. Letters, usually delivered by hand, were the main way of communicating when not face to face.
For a little more on our background see “Barb’s Eulogy” given below.
Copies of actual letters are shown on ambrosemob web as:
2 Stan-1st and 2nd Love Letters 4/12/1942 & 22/9/1945.
3 Barb -1st and 2nd Love Letters 21/7/1947 & 21/7/1948
4 Barb – Last 2 Love Letters./7/1991 & 17/7/1991
5 Stan – 2nd Last Love Letter ie Barb’s Eulogy 25/7/1991
6 Stan – Last Love Letter. 1993
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B Stan-1st and 2nd Love Letters 4/12/1942 & 22/9/1945
(ADD copy of 1st)
Stan’s 1st. – 4/12/1942 This letter should have been written 5 years earlier when Stan had fallen in love with Barb. It was done when 16 and 3 days after an end of school party that Barb and I had been invited by one of her girl friends. There I wanted to kiss her but was too shy and Barb was not happy with me being an hour late. I had hitched hiked, trained, trammed and run 3 kilometers from Omeo in Eastern Victoria. My trip home with Bill Elrick was delayed – a hazard of hitch hiking.
Barb was to start 1943 in a bank and me in the Public Works Department as a clerk and to join the Air Training Corps.and then the RAAF.in 1944. Then WW II was at a critical stage and AU had been attacked and at high risk of Jap invasion.
ADD 2nd copy
Stan’s 2nd Love Letter – 22/9/1945. This letter was just over a month after the end of WW II and after some leave from the RAAF at home when I had seen Barb. We had only met on a few occasions and I was very unsure she loved me. Hence this is only a half love letter. It starts as a love letter “Bubs darling,”but does not say the words intended in the end (…….).I❤️U.”
ADD photo and. “Barb sent this to me as I asked, showing her sitting with a friend on a stile at Warburton near where she worked at the rehabilitation centre for wounded servicemen”
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C. Barb -1st and 2nd Love Letters 21/7/1947 & 21/7/19
ADD 1st copy
1st Love Letter 21/7/1947 This letter is on my 21st birthday after we had got close about the end of 1946 when I first kissed Barb in the moonlight at the Coburg Lake on the way home. I half missed and it wasn’t very romantic but I felt terrific as she didn’t object and I took her home with us both happy. Years later her great friend Dot told me the Barb realised she loved me after I got badly smashed at Aussie Rules in September 1946. In December I also had jumped a big hurdle in passing 1st Uni. and things looked good and our world getting better.
ADD 2nd copy
2nd Love Letter 21/7/1948. This was written for my 22nd birthday and about 7 months before we married. We were almost inseparable except for Barb’s bank work and my 3rd year full Uni. year.
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D. Barb – Last 2 Love Letters. 15/7/1991 & 17/7/1991
ADD Copy of 2nd last letter
Barb’s 2nd Last Love Letter 15/7/1991. This was written on the Tuesday when she entered RPAH for preparation etc for her final operation.
ADD Copy of last letter – typed
Barb’s – Last Ever Letter 17/7/1991. This was written the night before her fatal operation and to me showed how scared and brave she was. Barb never told me she was worried but her 3 photos taken in 1991 don’t show he typical smile and I think what she wrote to me is how she was. – not noticed by me.
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E. Stan – 2nd Last Love Letter – ie Eulogy for Barb 25/7/1991
ADD Typed copy presented by Geoff. (To be supplied )
I was RS and couldn’t stop my eyes watering a bit when writing this Eulogy which was typed and delivered nicely by Geoff M. It would have been a disaster if I tried.. still keeping Barb’s stoma cofidential I did not mention it
F. Stan – Last Love Letter 4/9/1993.
ADD the 4 pages including the picture of the dead lovers.
This was written when I started to recover a bit and try to tell Barb how I felt. It was triggered by the story I read and shown on page 4 , of two young lovers senselessly shot and killed by Bosnian snipers with the girl who had crawled to her lover to put her arm around him as she died. To me war and such killing is madness.
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