World War II in the Words of My Uncle: 24 Nov 1943 "Waiting--A Normal But a Stressful Issue" (Post #12)

11/24/1943 V-MAIL Northern Ireland

Dear Mother,
At last the waiting is over. I know it has been a long wait for you wondering where I was but tonight I received your V-MAIL letter written Nov 11 saying you had heard from me. I also got one from sister Helen and one from Pauline. Gee Mom you don't know how much better I feel. (Tension from both sides. Parents don't know where their son is and a son concerned his parents didn't know where he is.) Wish I could have seen you when my letter arrived. Got the three letters after coming in from a little duty. Never can write anything what we are doing or how the weather is on any one day but all I can say is rain, rain, rain--mud, mud, mud. ( Imagine not being able to share what you are doing during your day or what the weather is for a day. We would have called that chit-chat, but in a war these small pieces of information become important issues. Life and death issues.) (Back to the weather.) Ha, ha it's kind of a joke but you should have seen me today. We were doing something and as I came on the double I stopped to give a little fat fellow a hand as he was trying to lift a little too much. I slipped, down I went with the little old boy on top. He got up without anything on him, but me, gee I looked just like a mud pie. I won't try to write much news here as I've already sent quite a few letters and by now you must have received a few of them. Please try to answer all the questions I've asked.....You could write half the size you did on the v-mail and still could be read. The last half of your letter was darker thats much better. You made me think when writing about the cold and the heavy snow. How is the wood pile? (That sounds just like my Uncle Charlie. Always concerned how is parents were doing and making sure they were taken care for. Was hard for him to be away and unable to help his parents. It was a big deal for my uncle.) You write alright on that paper and when you want to write a short letter I'd like you to use v-mail. Mom can you tell me why Helen wanted to know where I was? I wish--you said you've written every night like my last letter from McCoy. You're faithful Mom and don't think I don't realize it. You've never let me down yet.
Give my love to Dad and all. Love and a Kiss to Mom, Charles.
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V-mail, short for Victory Mail, was a hybrid mail process used by America during the Second World War as the primary and secure method to correspond with soldiers stationed abroad. To reduce the cost of transferring an original letter through the military postal system, a V-mail letter would be censored, copied to film, and printed back to paper upon arrival at its destination.
V-mail correspondence was on small letter sheets, 17.8 cm by 23.2 cm (7 by 9 1/8 in.), that would go through mail censors before being photographed and transported as thumbnail-sized image in negative microfilm. Upon arrival to their destination, the negatives would be printed. The final print was 60% of the original document's size, creating a sheet 10.7 cm by 13.2 cm (4 ¼ in. by 5 3/16 in.).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-mail