Chris,
Your story brought a tear to my eye too. We really don't know we're born these days.
On the subject of correspondance my grandmother Elsie Bourne lived in Greet in Birmingham durring WW1. She was born in 1900 so was just a teenager when her Uncles went off to fight. Uncle Ben never came home and died in Flanders 1916 but Uncle Bill would write when he could and she used to look forward to his postcards. She also lost a sweetheart in the fighting but never spoke much about it so I don't know what happened. She didn't marry till 1933 as so many men never came home. My grand dad was five years her junior and too young to have been a soldier during the war.
View attachment 84985View attachment 84986View attachment 84987View attachment 84988View attachment 84989 William Bourne left on first photo