Dart writes two letters today. The first one describes how he skipped his liberty last night to catch up on all his laundry. Now he faces 5-6 days of duty because he’s filling in for Hite who is off to see his “baby and the baby’s mother.” Hite will return the favor so that Dart can have a 72-hour liberty for Burke’s leave. With all his duty hours, he may not be able to call her on Sunday, after all,

In her recent letter Dot asked why Dart continues to write censored letters. He answered that to write an uncensored letter would result in a summary court martial and a stint in the brig, making little rocks out of big rocks. Sure, he’d like to stay out of combat, but that’s not the way to do it!

He grumbles a bit about the mail service. Her air mail letters take as long to get from Greenwich to where he is on the eastern coast of the US as they took to reach him in Guam, Pearl Harbor, or any other place he’s been. It seems as though his sour mood is still upon him.

It would be a shame if she doesn’t get to see Lake Sunapee again this year. Whatever her plans turn out to be, he’d like some advance notice. That way, if he doesn’t get a leave soon, he’d try to get to Greenwich on a 72-hour liberty.

He writes that when he got her letter today, he got the same sense of impending doom he described the other day. Is she okay? Has she broken any bones? How he wishes for a letter assuring him that all is well. He sure hopes she had fun horseback riding. (Did he somehow sense her near disaster with the horse Belle?) His doctor at Great Lakes told him it would be years – if ever- before his back would be up to riding a horse.

He can’t wait until letters become unnecessary between the two of them, and he agrees that the words  “See you soon” rank second only to “I love you.” He may be happy when the letters end, but my mother asked me just a few weeks ago what we would do when the letters stopped. I told her I thought I’d just start back at the beginning and re-blog about them from the start. We’ve both come to treasure our daily visits to the past.

And now for a very special letter, which I’ll copy verbatim. It needs no further comment.

My Darling Dorothy,

The big news has just broken. The War is over. I got to the ship just after the word was passed.

If you think a Navy yard can’t celebrate, think again. Every ship has a bell, a whistle, a siren, and a G-Q beeper. Every ship is using all of these to the best advantage. Add the yells of the personnel, the clanging of the bells and gongs, the resounding ring of pieces of steel hung from cranes and struck by mallets, and you have an idea of bedlam.

Waste paper baskets are dumped from the top of ships’ smokestacks, and the ascending stream of hot gasses carries a tower of giant confetti high into the air. Ships which didn’t receive the “no pyrotechnics” order are shooting off their signal fireworks.

What wild joy prevails! No more dawn alerts! No more G-Qs in the middle of the night or the middle of a meal. No more depth charge attacks when we expect to be torpedoed any instant. No more hours spent gazing at a glaring sun, waiting for the bogeys ‘out there’ to come diving in to destruction. No more watching the carriers launch their planes, and waiting painfully for the one which never comes back.

Oh! It’s really over! Can it be true? Yes, it must be true! But is it possible that last week, yesterday even, we were fighting, expecting a long fight ahead?

Arms grow tired of hammering metal, and new arms take over. Gaily-colored flag hoists are strung from the yardarms, proclaiming the day! The American flag, victorious again, waves proudly in the evening breeze.