A World War II Memoir in Letters
Your Loving Son, Ronie
Letters from the End of WWII
“A soldier’s life revolves around his mail.” — Bill Mauldin, WWII cartoonist
424 letters. Two years.
One memorable voice.
The voices of World War II are almost completely silent, 80 years after the war’s official end in September 1945. But in this collection of 424 long-lost letters, written between March 1944 and July 1946, we hear the distinctive voice of one young soldier ring out clearly — by turns exuberant, bored, determined, even philosophical.
Corporal Ronald Francis Dick — “Ronie” to his family — quickly matures from a 17-year-old enlistee, rejoicing in milkshakes and struggling with trigonometry, to a savvy student of radio mechanics, able to impress even the stern WAC instructors. His letters carry us by troop train through Army Air Force technical schools in five states, then across the Pacific into the culture shock of “the land of mystery,” India — just as the war reaches its turning point.
“See: Jeweled images just like the ones Hollywood tries to imitate. Beggars and rajahs, a cross section of India… listen in to our broadcast of the Adventures of Ronald ‘Ripley’ Dick!”
— Corporal Ronald F. Dick, writing home from IndiaWe know how the war ends. Ronie and his family didn’t. Reading between the lines, we catch both their guarded optimism and their unspoken fears. In this book, readers discover an under-documented period and theater of the war, experienced by thousands of young men and the families who waited, worried and wrote.
More than letters
Ronie’s Own Cartoons
Tucked into envelopes alongside the letters, his hand-drawn sketches bring daily Army life to life in pencil, ink and wit.
Snapshots & Ephemera
Photographs, postcards and memorabilia enclosed in many letters form a vivid collage of wartime years in America and in India.
Voices from the Home Front
Letters from Ronie’s parents, sisters and friends document the Home Front’s quiet struggles — rationing, long hours in wartime workplaces — but also the lighthearted moments: Girl Scout trips, family musicales, even dancing lessons at Arthur Murray.
Five Rich Appendices
Hundreds of quick explanations: military training and slang; insights into life outside Calcutta during the war; movie, book and radio references; and dozens of places and bases across America.
Found in a shoebox,
saved for 80 years
A letter’s best quality is its ability to last — to speak to its reader the day it was received, then again the next week, the next year. These 424 letters did exactly that, folded away in ordinary, dusty shoeboxes, stored across three states, untouched for more than 75 years.
When author Laura Cameron cleared her late mother’s house, she found the first box almost by chance. Inside: her father’s letters home, his cartoons, and the small “junk” of military souvenirs he’d sent back for safekeeping — matchbooks from Truax Field, flattened zinc pennies, rare “Jai Hind” notes, even an Australian leaf preserved as a souvenir of a brief call ashore. A year later, a second box emerged from a trunk, beneath his field jacket, tissue-wrapped medals, and a dozen narrow khaki neckties. It held the other side of the story — the letters to him, from his parents, his sisters, his friends.
Sitting down to write a letter is unlike making a telephone call, with its think-on-the-feet immediacy. It is unlike the text message, terse by nature. But a letter’s best distinction is its ability to last, to speak to its reader the day it was received, the next week, the next year.
A letter is also tactile, willing to be unfolded, smoothed out on a sunny table or a lamp-lit pillow, over and over again — then obediently returning to its envelope, and thence to its keepsake box…
— from the Preface, by Laura CameronThese hundreds of letters offer a rare insight into two years of both military and daily life as the Allies achieved victory in Europe and over Japan, achieved just after Ronie landed in India. Their letters record it all — a health crisis weathered, beef and gasoline rationed, but also birthday parties, camping trips and Sunday musicales that kept ordinary life alive. Put together, they provide excellent primary source material for scholars and students of the period, and a richly rewarding read for anyone intrigued by the closing years of WWII.