Document Type
Personal Letter
Keywords
Katherine Trickey; WWII
Rights Management
All rights retained by Bryant University
Abstract
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28 Mar 1945
2.00 PM.
Dear Folks,
It is quiet in the office today and we are all caught up for the moment. I am very sleepy but I’ll try to finish this without actually dropping off.
I had a nice day Sunday – got up for breakfast then washed – then played 3 sets of tennis with Drake – got terribly beaten of course but it was lots of fun. – Donald Goodness from Brewer, who is most thru his training here, came up to the WAC Mess hall for dinner with me. He seemed to enjoy it, and I’m glad I could have him. He will be going overseas very shortly.
Marj & I went to see Sonja Heinie’s [Henie] (1) latest picture. Some very good technicolor scenes
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but a rather cheaper plot and picture than her others have been.
Monday evening, we went to hear Erika Mann, a woman war correspondent just back from Europe. She is the daughter of Thomas Mann.
She was very interesting with a pleasing personality, - an able lecturer. She has somewhat of an accent as she is a German Refugee, but it was an interesting accent and made her voice more delightful to listen to. She told of her experiences as a war correspondent – the hospital conditions she had seen – the life she had shared with Army Nurses – her trip as one of two correspondents to be with DeGaul[l]e’s party on his trip from Cherbourg to Paris. – The conditions in the liberated countries -. During the question period at the end, some one asked her to tell us her experience in rescuing her father’s Manuscript from their home in Germany.
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It seems that when the fireworks started in Germany her father was in Switzerland on a holiday and was unable to go back to Germany & their house was confiscated. Her father had been working on a book that was most completed. He had written it long hand. –
She went skiing up near the border and skied over into Germany. When she got to the house and went in at 1.30 in the morning she found it occupied by SS troops but fortunately they were asleep upstairs and she got the manuscript and got out [of] the house without waking them, but admitted she was nearly scared to death. She was able to get out of the country again and deliver the book to her father.
We got back from Macon about 1 AM – then last night I was on duty in the orderly room all night
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and didn’t go to bed until 1.30 and then I slept very little down there – so you can see that I really have reason to be sleepy today.
I called the Red Cross last night and asked them to check for me to see if Vera Fenlason is still at Charleston S.C. If she is and if she is able to have visitors, the Major says I may have Monday off to go to see her. I thought she might like to see someone from home after all this time and it is only a 12 hr ride each way from here.
By the way, I figured out furloughs here in the office and I’m not going to be able to get mine until the last of July or 1st of Aug as far as I know now but nothing is definite and won’t be until the last minute anyway – but I don’t see how it can be earlier than that.
Love
Kay
P.S. I just received a call from the Red Cross saying Vera has been transferred to the Fitzsimmons General Hospital, Denver, Colorado. So I shall not be seeing her. They are going to let me know more about her when they hear from there. So I’ll be doing KP Sunday instead.
(1) Sonja Henie was a Norwegian figure skater who later became an actress. She won gold medals in the 1928, 1932, and 1936 Olympics.
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