BR TO CONSTANCE MALLESON, 21 JAN. 1940
BRACERS 19809. ALS. McMaster
Edited by S. Turcon. Reviewed by K. Blackwell

212 Loring Avenue,
Los Angeles, Cal., USA1
21.1.40

Dearest Colette

I got two letters from you2 together, one written Dec. 31 and one Dec. 20. I was very glad to get them and the enclosures. I now take the New Statesman, and had read the letter from “A Finn”3 with complete approval, thinking he was a vigorous fellow. I am glad to know he was you.

The papers here have more about Finland than about all the rest of the war put together. Everybody except a handful of communists sympathises whole-heartedly with the Finns — Radicals for sound reasons, and Conservatives because they hate Bolsheviks. Since Thermopylae and Salamis,4 there has been nothing so amazing and magnificent as the Finnish resistance.

Let me know if you get out to Finland. It will be dreadful and yet I rather envy you for being able to do something. We go nearly mad from feelings with no outlet.

My immigration difficulties got themselves arranged after infinite red-tape fusses. John5 and Kate6 are probably here for the duration, unless John is required for military service. John is at the university7 and comes to my lectures.

We all suffer terribly from home-sickness, and from being among people to whom the war is not serious. The people with whom we feel most at home are German refugees, who want Hitler beaten but of course don’t hate Germany.

I feel the highest respect for all that you are doing.8 Doing nothing about the war is dreadful, but here there is nothing that English people can do, except perhaps to talk about what sort of peace there should be. All my love.

B.

• 1

  [document] Document 200815. Colette marked and underlined parts of the letter.

• 2

  two letters from you There is a letter dated “Thursday before Xmas”, i.e. 21 December (BRACERS 98422); the December 31 letter is dated “Sunday: last of 1939” (BRACERS 98423). In that letter Colette wrote that she had had “a mass of letters in Statesman; T & T (Time & Tide); M.G. (Manchester Guardian) etc.”

• 3

  the letter from “A Finn” Colette had written on 21 December 1939 (BRACERS 98422) that she had published a letter in the New Statesman and Nation critical of the Dean of Canterbury for being willing to cede Finnish territory to Russia. In fact it was not published until 2 days later as “The Invasion of Finland”, New Statesman and Nation (23 Dec. 1939): 928–9. Colette passed herself off as a Finn. The content in the published letter matches Colette’s letter. It is signed “Virtaneimi”.

• 4

  Thermopylae and Salamis Battles in 480 BC in which the Greeks were greatly outnumbered by the invading Persians but still won victory.

• 5

  John John Conrad Russell, born 16 November 1921 to BR and his wife Dora.

• 6

  Kate Katharine Jane Russell, born 29 December 1923 to BR and his wife Dora. Her surname became Tait upon her marriage.

• 7

  at the university The University of California at Los Angeles.

• 8

  all that you are doing Colette was collecting money to send to the Finnish Red Cross; she had also sent her furs, sledging coats and rugs to the Finnish troops. She was working on propaganda for the Army Blood Supply Depot in Bristol. She was also setting up a Blood Transfusion Centre in Blagdon, Somerset where she lived.