War Log Archive

Page 7

Page 7

This book belongs to W/O DD Cleary RAF, 222494
Stalag IVB, Muhlberg on Elbe, Germany

Page 8

Page 8

35 Squadron, Pathfinder Force. In the “Oasis” the Sgts Mess Bar. Graveley
Offord & Buckton Station
When going up to town for the day from Graveley.

Page 9

Page 9

Air crew badges
Halifax Crew of A – Apple PFF
Pilot: P/O L Lahey, Nav: F/Lt D Bland, B/A: F/Lt J Annetts, W/OP: F/Sgt D Cleary, F/E: Sgt W Sutton, MU/G: Sgt L Such, R/AG: Sgt J Hogg

Page 10

Page 10

“The skipper (Laurie) and myself”
Lionel (Beatrice’s other brother) when an instructor in Canada. (Killed in action over Bay of Biscay July 1944 with Coastal Command)

Page 11

Page 11

35 Squadron’s own mixed ‘bathing’ pool
(Hemingford Grey Mill, Huntingdonshire)
Schola Regia Eliensis
The Western Approach to Ely Cathedral

Page 12a

Page 12a

1290709 F/S Cleary DD
17/5/45 On orders from Office
Promotion to W/O confirmed from Air Ministry backdated to 24/7/44!
Bags of shekels!

Page 13

Page 13

Dear F/Sgt Cleary,
Many thanks for your postcard of May 9th, and I am indeed glad that you were able to save your life with an Irvin chute.
I have much pleasure in welcoming you as a member of the Club, and in sending you your membership card with our best wishes.
Yes I am afraid it is very doubtful whether we shall be able to obtain your Caterpillar pin until after the War. However if one is available before you return and I hear from you, I will obtain your home address from Air Ministry and send it to your family.
Yours sincerely,
Leslie L Irvin

Page 14

Page 14

Pictures

Page 15

Page 15

Letter from girlfriend Beatrice, “The first of many”

Page 15a

Page 15a

My Dearest David
You cannot imagine what joy here when we knew you were all safe. Firstly through Wilf’s letter to Ann, then we had a card from you. These five weeks my darling have been terrible, but none of us lost faith for a moment, we knew somehow that you were all safe. I immediately telegraphed your brother and he has cabled your mother and aunt. I received a very sweet telegraph from your mother last week and John & I have been corresponding regularly.
Lionel & Sammy[?] are home this week and of course we celebrated the news suitably. I think we all went mad, we were and are so very happy. Are you all together or separated? I don’t expect Laurie and Johnny are with you as they are officers. By the way —CENSORED— We are getting in touch with the Red Cross to send you parcels etc… I hope the address of this is OK only you haven’t a POW number or a Camp number.

Page 15b

Page 15b

I love you very much and you are never out of my thoughts. As for my prayers you know they are all for you, and I will wait for you no matter how long it is for you are my life dearest. Everyone send their best wishes and we hope to see you soon. Keep smiling darling. Beatrice

Page 16

Page 16

Excerpts from “After dispersal” and other poems by Ellis Wynne Evans [this is David’s poetic alter ego] “Regret” (April ’44) For any Bomber Command Gens
The last ten minutes told
While the summer seen
Cast a parting glance
Over a Cambridge wold.
A restful silence spun
An aura of finality…

Page 17

Page 17

Why? (January 1944) ‘In durance rule’
We are men of a world circumbound by wire
Our minds sift the ashes of time half forgotten
Small egos burn slowly on the fire
Unmourned, unwanted putrefied and rotten
Purblind and glazed we plumb the depth of things;
And as clouds through a twisted window pane…

Page 18

Page 18

‘Bonded Pagliacci’ (March ’44) For first ‘Empire’ [camp theatre] Show “Muhlberg Melody”
Hard faces laughing and a broken melody
Letting on the beds of dried up sentiment
Forgetting all the cycling wheels of destiny
Outside their world, their firmament.
Tremendous urges stirred by reminiscence,
Laughter that the tired heart longs…

Page 19

Page 19

“Limbo” (Dec ’44)
Free friends that are alone to stray, In some lost unfathomable place. You do not see as I now see, Or feel as I can numbly feel, Beauty of a sick and weary world, And stray along the labyrinthine lanes, Of seasoned hopes and loyalties, Your ichor is the fancy of the moon, Your consciousness the benison that flows. From the iris of a myriad flaming suns, And depth of day not faulty shown, Upon the changing shadows of your eyes
We lived swift lives in closest hand, With limits of that nocturnal steel, Mined in dreamlike caverns of the clouds, Where weave the shrouds of centuries. We laughed long with the morning sun, That often was our evening star, When cooling dew was all we felt, Through wispy threads of nearness, As bedward over fields we strolled. Contd.

Page 20

Page 20

How fine a thing was she who lay, Shimmered with the morning heat, Who had soul in plated steel; She who one with us by night, Measured the depth of night’s repose, In one chaste screaming song, While somewhere slept in troubled beds, The audience of our troubled masquerade.
And we not think of easy bed? Feel smooth and lost caresses of the loves, That were no loves but anodynes to mock, To serve for that we might not live to have? Oh it was full the life we led: When ripened corn in open fields, Bent to the urgent whispers of the evening breeze, We caught ourselves alone without verses; And just because we longed for plenitude of life, We’d throw a sigh into the evanescent stars, That were not temporal as our quietude.

Page 21

Page 21

So friends that are free and disembodied ,Bathed in the shivered wreath of stars; You who were but men who laughed, And laughing living through short years. Have now become the voices of the night, The whispers heard before the dawn, Shaking the pendant slumbers of the trees, Oh the last apparent thrust that brings, A poet’s measure to the wing of truth
Oh friends that are so free and have your home, In linked regions of the great invisibles, Perhaps you lived too short a while, too deep, To langour in the timeless arms of your celestial sleep.
Wartime Dance Halls Nov ’44 (a fragment)
A hall where shadows are weary, Of the limped passes of love, And heat curled veneer, Of passion hearing sofas, Whose lovers prematurely old and weary, Stupefy the ancient virgin fear, With limped passes of love

Carmine lips and the taint of lucid eyes, “may I have the pleasure?”, There are winds in quiet skies; Your hair might be a faded treasure, A distaff of lovely feminine lies

Page 22

Page 22

“Fur Kriegsgefangenen” (Oct ’44)
Flat sand-blown flats echo;
With mounting clouds that curl away
And streams that even blow
Over against and empty town
Bearing our breathed air to flay
The segmented pines…

Page 23

Page 23

We laugh beneath the roofs of friends
When we are free
We scintillate upon the trends
Of civilised society
We sparkle bravely as we waive
The faith of centuries…