War correspondence

Roger Mortimer (1909-91), later the Sunday Times racing correspondent and author of the Dear Lupin letters, was captured by the Germans in Belgium in 1940. For five years, he was incarcerated in four different prisoner-of-war camps. There he wrote a series of charming letters to Peggy Dunne, an old friend

OFLAG VI/B, Warburg, north-west Germany 12th June 1942

My dear Peggy,
We had the first radishes from our room garden today: the lettuce is rather backward but the spinach is full of promise. I’m ashamed to say we have been too materialistic to indulge in flowers and quite rightly I expect you’ll think the worse of us for it. Actually, we have planted a few rows of marigolds on the grave of our cat.

I’ve been interested in Irish history ever since I used to spend the summer there nearly 20 years ago. My uncle lives in Co. Wicklow and quietly loses money at farming, breeding horses and being an MFH. I am very fond of him and his entire family and have spent a good deal of my leave there and been far happier there than anywhere else. I like the informality and the leisured pace of life there: the country is lovely and I am very fond of the people. I was very touched that the village burnt candles for me, a Protestant Englishman when they thought I was killed!

I’m afraid it will never seem quite the same again as my cousin, David Mitchell, the only son, was killed aged 20 a year ago. Love, Roger

PS: I have no moustache.

24th August 1942

The flower garden outside our hut has been most successful. The ground was completely bare to start with, but two large triangles of grass were planted, the sides being from 25 to 50 yards long.

With some difficulty, people were induced not to walk on it in the spring, and the results have repaid the inconvenience. The triangles are edged with long beds of massed cornflower, poppies, marigolds, zinnias and clarkia – the cornflowers being particularly effective in a place so singularly lacking any colours but grey and brown.

I had no share in this, but have had much pleasure and good results from a small vegetable patch, the young carrots and onions being a pleasant change.