Description
Object description
An interesting and substantial collection of her wartime papers, comprising 4 volumes of a diary kept while an evacuee in Cheltenham (1939 - 1940) and as an art student in Birmingham living with her parents in the Harborne area of the city (1940 - 1946); correspondence with her parents during her evacuation, during her 1942 school camping trip to Lower Wick in Worcestershire to help with the fruit harvest and during her preliminary nursing training in Malvern the following year; correspondence with her brother, Pilot Officer Dennis Knight, during his training as a fighter pilot from 1939 until his loss in operations off Malta while serving with No 261 Squadron RAF Fighter Command in January 1941; correspondence between her parents, Gladys and Fred Knight and Dennis (1939 - 1941); letters sent to her by two of her brother's close friends during their service in the Fleet Air Arm (based mostly in the Royal Naval Air Station HMS Goshawk in Trinidad) and the RAF (at a photographic section in Italy and Austria) respectively (1939 - 1946) and from a neighbour serving as an Air Bomber with No 83 Squadron RAF Bomber Command (1943 - 1944); a series of love letters exchanged with her future husband (1945 - 1946); letters of condolence received by the family after Dennis's death, papers relating to the memorial medals introduced in his memory at his old school and correspondence and printed material relating to her mother's attendance at the unveiling of the Malta memorial in May 1954; an edited ts transcript (394pp) of her diaries and correspondence, compiled in 2002 and reproductions of a number of photographs. The collection as a whole provides a vivid record of one Midlands family's experiences during the Second World War both in the services and on the Home Front and of the impact on the conflict on the lives of their close friends and neighbours. Of particular significance are the letters written by Fred and Gladys Knight during 1940 and 1941 and Pat's diary entries for the same period, which contain some graphic descriptions of the German air raids on Birmingham.
Content description
An interesting and substantial collection of her wartime papers, comprising 4 volumes of a diary kept while an evacuee in Cheltenham (1939 - 1940) and as an art student in Birmingham living with her parents in the Harborne area of the city (1940 - 1946); correspondence with her parents during her evacuation, during her 1942 school camping trip to Lower Wick in Worcestershire to help with the fruit harvest and during her preliminary nursing training in Malvern the following year; correspondence with her brother, Pilot Officer Dennis Knight, during his training as a fighter pilot from 1939 until his loss in operations off Malta while serving with No 261 Squadron RAF Fighter Command in January 1941; correspondence between her parents, Gladys and Fred Knight and Dennis (1939 - 1941); letters sent to her by two of her brother's close friends during their service in the Fleet Air Arm (based mostly in the Royal Naval Air Station HMS Goshawk in Trinidad) and the RAF (at a photographic section in Italy and Austria) respectively (1939 - 1946) and from a neighbour serving as an Air Bomber with No 83 Squadron RAF Bomber Command (1943 - 1944); a series of love letters exchanged with her future husband (1945 - 1946); letters of condolence received by the family after Dennis's death, papers relating to the memorial medals introduced in his memory at his old school and correspondence and printed material relating to her mother's attendance at the unveiling of the Malta memorial in May 1954; an edited ts transcript (394pp) of her diaries and correspondence, compiled in 2002 and reproductions of a number of photographs. The collection as a whole provides a vivid record of one Midlands family's experiences during the Second World War both in the services and on the Home Front and of the impact on the conflict on the lives of their close friends and neighbours. Of particular significance are the letters written by Fred and Gladys Knight during 1940 and 1941 and Pat's diary entries for the same period, which contain some graphic descriptions of the German air raids on Birmingham.
History note
Cataloguer AAM
History note
Catalogue date 2003-08-04