Saturday · Dec. 26, 1942
You have competition, honey.
Kitty writes almost as often as you do.
Dec 26, 1942
My Darling Wife
I got some more mail today—Your letters of Nov 11 and Nov 16. I also got an Xmas card from Kitty mailed Dec 12. You have competition honey, Kitty sends me almost as much mail as you do. Yesterday afternoon, Xmas Day, I got a package from the City Attorneys Office—a carton & 2 pkgs of Phillip Morris, 5 cans of pipe tobacco, a corncob pipe, chewing gum, candy a necktie (a real [London Scarf man?]) and a pair of socks, 2 bars of ([bathe sweet?]) soap, and some good toilet paper for packing. Despite all that mail I am sadly neglected. Lt Burke got 21 letters the day before Xmas and nine more today. He also got some pictures of his wife which made him very happy
In your letter of Nov 16th you told me about your trouble and your being underweight Honey I hope you are better now, but by all means get some meat on you and take care …
… of yourself. I want a wife with some nice curves when I get home—not a bag of bones
The vitamin pills you sent have not arrived. Nor have the cables you sent arrived. As to cashing that travel check, I think you can give it to the bank for collection attaching a copy of the power of attorney.
I wish I could be there to see Linda running around the house on her tricycle—reading the paper and doing all the other cute things. I’m glad to know she knows she is my little princess. Her “Hi Jo” would be enough to startle anyone. Where could she have picked that up?
Honey, it makes me awfully low to hear of all the things at home—of you and Linda—and I can’t be there to enjoy all the things I love so much. I love you darling I hope I can get home soon to you.
Incidentally, read the NY Times of Dec 13. They tell me it has an article about us. And as to Guth—he’s in the thick of it here. We have a comparatively nice set up now and hope it will continue. Goodnight sweetheart
All my love
Your John
About this letter
The day after Christmas, John opens a box from his old office in Glendale and answers his wife’s November letters.
THE BOX FROM THE OFFICEPhilip Morris cigarettes, pipe tobacco, a corncob pipe, gum, candy, a necktie, socks, soap “and some good toilet paper for packing.”
READING CLOSELY
“I wish I could be there to see Linda running around the house on her tricycle—reading the paper and doing all the other cute things.” Linda, his daughter, was two.
Kitty worked in the Glendale City Attorney’s office.
He had been told the New York Times of Dec. 13 had an article about his unit.
The Big Picture
A hard Christmas
On Christmas Eve, Admiral Darlan was shot dead in Algiers by a Frenchman opposed to Vichy. Darlan had made the deal that brought French forces over to the Allies. On Dec. 27, Gen. Henri Giraud was named to replace him.
The same day Darlan died, Eisenhower called off the attack on Tunis. On Christmas Day the Germans retook Longstop Hill. Mud would stop any new attack in the north for about two months.
The race for Tunis was lost. But Hitler was now sending troops and planes to Tunisia that he needed elsewhere.
Where he was
Near Oran, Algeria, now on the 3rd Battalion staff as intelligence officer (S-2). The 1st Division was still training around Oran while British, American and French troops held a line in the hills west of Tunis, more than 500 miles to the east.