GI Brides: The wartime girls who crossed the Atlantic for love. Duncan Barrett

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СКАЧАТЬ Margaret’s turn to speak. She took the stand shakily and was sworn in, and was asked to explain her relationship with Lawrence.

      ‘I met Lawrence Rambo on 25 December 1942, and we married in October 1943,’ she told the court. ‘Our daughter was born in December.’

      ‘What did you know of his financial situation?’

      She hesitated. ‘I knew that his financial troubles were worrying him, because he couldn’t sleep and he drank too much.’

      ‘And how did he seem to you in his state of mind?’

      ‘He was restless and nervous,’ she said. Then, fighting back a sob, she added, ‘He seemed to be a different man from the one I knew.’

      ‘Thank you, Mrs Rambo. That will be all.’

      She returned gratefully to her seat.

      Lawrence had failed to enter a plea in response to the charges, and Margaret wondered what on earth he was going to say to explain himself.

      As he took the stand, he looked contrite and his brown eyes glittered as if he might be about to cry. He read from a written statement, admitting all the charges against him and throwing himself on the leniency of the court. Lawrence explained that during his years in the Canadian Army earlier in the war, he had fallen into drinking heavily and spending more than he earned. He had got his family to send him money several times from his bank account in Georgia. When he left the States, there had been $2,000 in the account, but now it was all gone.

      ‘I have never been a particularly good manager of money matters, and I can now see very clearly that I simply weakened under the strain of three years of living under conditions of excess drinking and both domestic and money troubles, and although it was very wrong and very foolish, I began to default on debts,’ he said. ‘It was then that I cashed the cheques listed against me in the charges in this case.

      ‘I have made a terrible mistake during the past several months, and I fully realise it. I do not know whether my nerves were affected, or what happened to my judgement, but I can thoroughly understand how it must appear to anyone who has not experienced the pressure caused by my personal finances.

      ‘Unfortunately for me and for my family, I have a wife and a four-month-old baby who will suffer more than I will. I hope that some punishment can be assessed against me that will enable me to remain in the Army so that I may immediately have a chance to begin paying off the money represented by these cheques, so that my wife and daughter will not be made to suffer for what I have done.

      ‘I appeal to the mercy of the court, but I stand ready to meet whatever sentence it adjudges against me with a humble and contrite heart, and regardless of the sentence, with a firm resolution that I shall never again give way to the temptation that put me in such difficulties.’

      It was a moving speech, and Lawrence seemed genuinely regretful. Despite her shock and anger over what he had done, Margaret couldn’t help feeling sorry for him as she thought of the mental anguish he had been going through.

      Nevertheless, the judge decided not to grant his request to save his job. Lawrence was found guilty, and sentenced to be dismissed from the Army. He was to be repatriated as soon as possible.

      ‘I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,’ he told Margaret at the end of the trial. ‘Can you forgive me? I told the judge I would never give way again, and I meant it. I’ll never touch another drop of alcohol. If you come with me to Georgia we can start afresh – as a family. Promise me you’ll follow me to America. Promise me.’

      Margaret had no idea what to do. How could she trust Lawrence’s words after what he had done? But then, what kind of life would she have if she stayed behind? She had no one in England to support her, and now with another baby on the way, who knew what would become of her? She didn’t want to end up like her mother, raising her children alone, and she couldn’t bear the thought of telling her father that her marriage had ended in failure.

      Lawrence’s dark eyes looked at her earnestly. Maybe he just wasn’t cut out for this war, she thought. Back in Georgia, with his family around him, things would be different. She had to hope so.

      ‘All right then, I promise,’ she said.

8

       Gwendolyn

      Early one morning towards the end of May 1944, Lyn woke to a rumbling noise outside her window. She leaped out of bed and flung open the curtains.

      In the street below, an endless column of American tanks trundled along at a glacial speed, while dozens of jeeps were parked up on the pavement.

      One was sitting right in Lyn’s front garden, and when she went out to investigate, the driver smiled at her. ‘Want a doughnut?’ he asked, gesturing to a Red Cross van up the street.

      ‘Yes, please,’ she replied.

      The man went and fetched a couple of doughnuts, handing one to Lyn. She had never tried this particular American delicacy before, and the moist, sugary dough tasted like heaven.

      She learned that the young man’s name was Eugene Gidcombe – ‘from Hermiston, Oregon, ma’am’ – and that he was passing through the town on his way to a staging area further down the coast.

      From the build-up of troops and vehicles in Southampton it was obvious that the long-awaited D-Day was imminent, although officially the plans remained top-secret. Lyn knew that Eugene would soon be fighting in France.

      ‘Are you scared?’ she asked him.

      ‘Of what?’

      ‘Going to war.’

      ‘Yes, ma’am. Were you scared when the Germans bombed Southampton?’

      ‘Not really,’ Lyn replied honestly.

      Eugene laughed. ‘Hey, do all limey girls talk funny like you?’

      ‘You’re the ones who talk funny!’ Lyn replied.

      They sat chatting for a while, until the time came for him to move on. ‘Can you do something for me?’ he asked her.

      ‘Of course,’ Lyn said.

      ‘Scratch your name on the side of my jeep. It’ll give me something to remind me of you when I’m on the other side.’

      Eugene offered her a pocketknife and she carved a shaky ‘Lyn’ on the side of the vehicle. He took down her address and promised to write to her.

      Lyn waved goodbye to Eugene and he went on his way, but she found that every new jeep that stopped outside her door contained a young man equally eager for a little conversation before he went off to face the war. Soon Lyn had given out her address to half a dozen GIs, all of them promising to write.

      As the vehicles trundled out of Southampton, she wondered if she would hear from any of them again.

      On the morning of 6 June, the sky above Southampton was filled with planes heading towards the Continent. Meanwhile, a body of men and machines comparable in size to the city of Birmingham was making its way across the Channel.

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