Like John Crace’s father (Digested week, 7 December), my father rarely talked about his war service, but it stayed with him until he died aged 87.
He served in Holland, Belgium and France, and was evacuated at Dunkirk. For the rest of his life he suffered the after-effects, now labelled PTSD, and was never free of bouts of depression and insomnia/nightmares. How I wish I had understood what had happened to him. It was only while watching the BBC’s World on Fire that the full horror of it all struck me. Above all, the sound of non-stop gunfire, shelling, shrieks, and the burning.
None of my generation fully understood what our fathers, uncles and brothers experienced. It was John Crace’s final sentence that finished me off, and I can only echo his words: “Like so many, I took what he had suffered for granted.”
Ann Gordon
Romford, London
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