BR TO CONSTANCE MALLESON, [23 OCT. 1917]
BRACERS 19232. ALS. McMaster
Edited by S. Turcon. Reviewed by K. Blackwell

<London>
Tuesday1^, 2^, 3

It was a joy my Dearest to find your letter4 when I got home this afternoon. I am glad of what you say — I do believe I shall get more as I want to be in time — but the winter is a bad time — after Xmas when I get rested I shall come to life again I believe — Meanwhile I wish to keep on seeing you — and I don’t want to lose touch with your life — I am full of affection towards you — it is only passion that is dead just now — Do let us go on being as intimate as we can be — I have not the faintest hostility towards anything in you now.

I had a wonderful meeting at Bradford and quite a good one at Darlington.5 But oh are they tiring and horrible. I hate speaking.  My hosts at Bradford6 had about 12 people in the evening to talk — they turned out to be as civilized and advanced as any people one could find in London — their talk was admirable — Now I am off —

Goodbye my Love — you are angelically patient and good and I feel a brute. My thoughts are with you always.

B

• 1

  [document] Document 200219.

• 2

  [envelope] The Lady Constance Malleson | King John’s Farm | Chorley Wood | Herts. Replaced by: 31, Upper. Brook St | London | W.I. Replaced by: 6 Mecklenburg Sq. | W.C. Pmk: LONDON S.E. | 5.15 PM | 23 OCT 17C

• 3

  [date] The date is taken from the envelope postmark.

• 4

  your letter None of her letters from 16 to 26 October are extant. She had gone to Hertfordshire with an old school friend and then joined her husband in Manchester (“Letters to Bertrand Russell from Constance Malleson, 1916–1969”, ts. in RA).

• 5

  wonderful meeting at Bradford and quite a good one at Darlington In Bradford BR met with both the local UDC and ILP and on 21 October spoke to the ILP on democracy vs. militarism in the war (“A Crowded Meeting for Bertrand Russell”, Labour Leader, 14, no. 43 [25 Oct. 1917]: 6 [B&R D17.02]). In Darlington he spoke to the local UDC on 22 October.

• 6

  My hosts at Bradford Unknown, but possibly they included William Leach (1870–1949). He chaired BR’s speech and on 30 May 1917 he had written to arrange another meeting in Bradford (BRACERS 77958). Leach, a pacifist, was an editor on the Bradford Pioneer and a became member of the first Labour government.