January 29th 1940

Monday January 29th

After a fortnight in Gloucester Infirmary having X-ray treatment, I have been home for a week. The weather, no doubt as a result of the earthquakes in Turkey, has been amazing. Iron frosts and heavy falls of snow have broken down trees and entirely dislocated traffic.

As a result of the weather, the enemy has been fairly quiet this month. He can’t get out and we can’t get in. But in Finland there has been tremendous activity. The Finns' resistance has been little short of miraculous, but the Russians have now taken to acts of terrorism from the air, bombing hospitals and machine-gunning civilians wherever they are visible.

The Vatican wireless, a not altogether unexpected ally considering the recent Papal encyclical*, has been broadcasting authenticated accounts of the hideous persecutions in German–occupied Poland. Never since the Jews were carried away captive into Babylon has there been such a story. No crime seems to be too horrible for the Gestapo and the worst elements of the German army to commit. 18,000 of the most influential people in Poland - doctors, professors, priests, leaders, intellectuals of all sorts - have been murdered.

One’s mind simply boggles at it. One would think that even the Gestapo could sicken of the bloodshed after all that frightful murderous campaign. The only desolate cry of Poland, which five months ago was a prosperous country with thirteen or so million inhabitants is “How long, O Lord, how long?” Put in terms which one can assimilate readily by comparison, the Nazi form of persecution amounts to this?

Under such domination in England, the effect on one’s own family and friends would be something like this. If Theo** and Father had not been killed in the war, they would doubtless be shot because they belonged to the “Old reactionary army”. Mother and Auntie Madge**, Mrs Wise**, the Mebblethwaites, the Misses Jeeves would be spared because they have no qualifications outside the home, and make no pretension to leadership. Uncle Percy** would be put in a concentration camp, Dr Chapman and the Rural dean would very likely be adjudged too well known and be shot. Margaret, being a force for good and a person who attracts others to her would be “eliminated”, likewise Uncle Percy L**, Diana, Arthur and I as “intellectuals” would be shot or imprisoned according to the degrees of our danger to the state. In fact one can imagine that the mere fact of having been an inmate of Girton and taken a university degree would serve to sign one’s death warrant. Lord Halifax*** might well say that he would rather die than see such a regime set up in England!


*On the unity of human society, October 20th 1939 - text available at http://www.vatican.va/content/pius-xii/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-xii_enc_20101939_summi-pontificatus.html

**Lorna's family members mentioned here that we can identify are: Theo - her brother; Mrs Wise - the mother of the wife of her Uncle Arnold (the second of her father's four brothers) and, as wife of Thomas James Wise, Lady Mayoress of Bristol in 1932, whose maiden name was Wise; Uncle Percy - the widower of her Aunt Beatrice (the second of her father's four sisters); Auntie Madge - Uncle Percy's second wife; Uncle Percy L - the fourth of her father's four brothers.

***Edward Wood, 1st Earl of Halifax - see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Wood,_1st_Earl_of_Halifax