In 2015 I asked the archivist at the George HW Bush library if they had any love letters from HW to Barb. To my surprise, weeks later, I was sent copies of Bush'e original love letters to Barbara after they met at a dance while he was serving as a pilot in the Navy.
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The letters are beautiful.
"My Darling Bar,
This should be a fairly easy letter to write— words should come easily and in short it should be simple for me to tell you how desperately happy I was to open the paper and see the announcement of our engagement..."
"My Darling Bar,
This should be a fairly easy letter to write— words should come easily and in short it should be simple for me to tell you how desperately happy I was to open the paper and see the announcement of our engagement..."
"I love you, precious; with all my heart & to know that you love me means my life. How often I have thought about the immeasurable joy that will be ours some day. How lucky our children will be to have a mother like you— So the days go by, the time of our departure draws nearer"
"For a long time I have anxiously looked forward to the day when we would go abroad and set to sea. It seemed that obtaining that goal would be all I could desire for some time, but, Bar, you have changed all that. I cannot say that I do not want to go—for that would be a lie..."
"We have been working for a long time with a single purpose in mind, to be so equipped that we meet and defeat our enemy. I do want to go because it is my part. But now having present[ed] itself not as an adventure but as a job, which I hope, will be over before long..."
"Even now, with a good while between us and the sea, I am thinking of getting back. This may sound melodramatic, but if it does it is only my inadequacy to say what I mean. Bar, you have made my life full of everything I could ever dream of—"
"my complete happiness should be to hear of my love for you."
Barbara replies that she is so excited to see Bush that her knees are "knocking."
"Dear Poppy-
I think it was perfectly swell of you to invite me to the dance and I would love to come or go or whatever you say."
Barbara replies that she is so excited to see Bush that her knees are "knocking."
"Dear Poppy-
I think it was perfectly swell of you to invite me to the dance and I would love to come or go or whatever you say."
"I wrote (illegible name) yesterday or the day before and, rather logically, I haven't heard from her but I'm sure she is going to let us come or go etc. I really am excited but scared to death, too. If you hear a big noise up there, don't worry it's just my knees knocking."
An American love story.
They are now together again.
They are now together again.
