'Your Loving Son': Letters of an RCAF Navigator (review)

The story of family loss in war transcends the experience of any specific war. It is a story as old as biblical times and as current as contemporary news stories. Dr Stephen King relates the sense of pathos and loss from the Second World War, in his book 'Your Loving Son': Letters of an RCAF Navigator.

King discovered a set of letters from his uncle George McCowan King, to his family in Summerberry, Saskatchewan. George King's career as a Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) navigator ended when his plane was shot down over Germany in September 1943. King wanted to publish the correspondence to share the sense of loss experienced by his family.

This edited book of letters appears in a coffee-table format that chronologically follows the career of George King from the time he left for Europe until his death in 1943. The introduction provides an overview of George's pre-war life and an account of the agony experienced by the King family from the time of George's first disappearance until the naming of 'King Creek' as a memorial to the fallen RCAF navigator in the 1990s.

The 130 letters are arranged on pages that are approximately two-thirds letter and one-third margin. In those margins are various family and military pictures and explanatory notes. On the positive side, the images and notes help the reader to develop a personal connection with the deceased serviceman. Unfortunately, the margin notes interrupt the flow of the text, and readers may need to read the book at least twice to get the full story. As well, individuals mentioned in the letters are not always identified each time they are mentioned. The book could have used two appendixes: the first explaining all the individuals mentioned in the book, and a second explaining the numerous acronyms used.

The reader experiences a vicarious glimpse of the experience of war through George's letters, newspaper articles, and the diary of fellow airman Doug Wylie, who served on the same plane. After George King's death, Wylie's wife, Mae Wylie, typed out her husband's diary from 23 August to 21 September 1943 and sent it to the King family. She hoped to help them cope with their loss and to provide a deeper glimpse of King's daily life in the month before the final tragic flight.

Many ideas and events are repeated in numerous letters. Often this reiteration becomes a strength of the book. For example, the story of an unfortunate drunken encounter with a light pole appears in two letters - one to his brother Jim and later to his parents. Other letters, especially after George's death, seem to be included to fill space. It might have been useful to cull some of those letters and to include, instead, George's letters from his time training in Canada.

The book is not an academic treatise, but additional basic research was needed to explain events to a general audience. For example, all Canadian servicemen killed in the Second World War are listed at the Commonwealth War Graves Commission web site, http://www.cwgc.org. Similarly, the editor seems not to have researched beyond asking another former RCAF navigator the meaning of the acronym of 'U.T.' An inquiry either to the raf or the RCAF could have filled in the information. A lack of external research beyond Stephen King's family and friends is unfortunate, especially as he takes an unjustified swipe at academic historians. King says that his book takes into account 'the human costs of war that more academic histories often overlook.' To imply that Canadian military historians such as Terry Copp and Tim Cook, or international military historians such as Lyn Macdonald and John Kegan, do not care about the experiences of the actual soldiers is...