Darling Ivy

Shortly after his marriage to Ivy Ross in 1938, aged twenty six, Ken Bridgewater was drafted into the Royal Air Force. This was the first of many enforced separations; even after demobilization the need to find work that would support a family brought about lengthy trips away from home, leaving Ivy to cope with the frustrations of raising their four daughters in a Britain still plagued by wartime shortages. From the early days of their courtship Ken wrote almost daily to the woman he loved whenever they were apart and his letters, many of which Ivy kept, were found by their daughters after her death in 2006. Recording everything from day-to-day concerns to the witnessing of friendly fire, the rebuilding of Germany after the war, the people he met, his wonder and curiosity at the places to which he travelled and his determination that his family should share the experience, the letters create a fascinating, intimate and moving portrait of life during this time of social and political transition.