Chapter 56
Vanaver Mainwaring to Grace Mainwaring May 26, 1938
… The interview at EAJ-1 Barcelona wasn't too bad. Fortunately, I only had to answer a couple of questions about Lionel. Having to admit to all of Spain that my brother is a conscienceless profiteer at the expense of Hitler's victims was painful. The chance to promote the Popular Front and condemn the Nonintervention Pact was much more satisfying.
Grace Mainwaring to Sally Henry May 27, 1938
… Hub was so tall and handsome in his black graduation gown. Max was beaming with pride as he held out the diploma in its black folder. As I watched, I sent a silent prayer of thanks to God for sending him into the lives of Honey and my niece and nephews after Jack died. This moment owes a lot to the kindness and devotion he brought to all of them.
I just wish that my brother could have been there to see his son's accomplishment. He would have been so very proud. I couldn't help but remember his own graduation. I know you do too. The Great War was raging in Europe. The next day, Jack and nearly all of the male half of his high school class, including your brother, went to the recruiting station to volunteer.
From the Journal of Honey Sutton May 26, 1938
I just can't believe that nineteen years have come and gone since Hub came into the world. It hardly seems like any time at all since his tiny baby fingers were trying to pull off my wedding ring. Tonight, I saw that same hand hold a diploma placed there by his father. My little boy is almost a man.
Libby Dean spoke to Max and me for a minute at the reception held afterwards for the graduates in the gym. She thanked Max for helping Alec pass history with a respectable C+. Max was his usual modest self. Helping Alec was his pleasure. There are few things as rewarding as seeing a young mind learn not just facts and dates, but the value of knowledge.
Libby admitted that Alec's attitude towards history had changed since Max took him in hand. He no longer sees it as boring memorization of people and dates that won't ever matter to him once he gets out of school. He understands now that history is the reason why the world around him is the way it is and why he is the person he is. He even started to spend time in the library when he didn't have a school assignment.
Nonetheless, Max wishes that Libby could accept that her son doesn't want to go to college. Maybe he's throwing away his future by becoming a miner instead. Maybe he's only settling into the place in life where he really belongs. Who can say? Either way, he isn't a little boy anymore. He's a young man who has a right to make that decision for himself whether it's right or wrong.
I can't help feeling for Libby. It isn't easy for a mother to accept that her son is all grown up and about to go out into the world on his own. When I shared this thought with Max, he assured me that Hub isn't alone. He'll have friends and teachers, and God watches over him as he does all of us through good times and bad.
I can't believe that Grace is right in her belief that another war is coming if fascism is victorious in Spain. If she is, Hub and his entire generation will need all the care and vigilance that Our Father can provide. I can hardly bear the thought of Hub and Henry or any mother's son risking their lives the way Van is risking his now. Dear God, let there be peace, if not forever, at least in our time.
Vanaver Mainwaring to Grace Mainwaring May 28, 1938
I have finally rejoined the Mackenzie-Papineau Battalion. They are in a new headquarters at [censored] after a couple of weeks in reserve near the fighting at Lerida. It was good to see Harry and Oscar again. They both look thinner than I remember but are otherwise healthy. Harry had good news and bad news about his cousin Gottfried.
If the letter Harry has already sent the Schmitzes goes missing, as some letters to and from my comrades and their loved ones have lately, please, tell them that Gottfried survived the retreat to the Ebro. Unfortunately, he was captured by the fascists and is in a prisoner of war camp near Burgos.
… My comrades were surprised when I opened up the boxes of cigarillos and small crate of brandy that I brought with me and very appreciative when I shared them out. I explained that I may normally be an evil capitalist exploiter, but every so often, I feel moved to redistribute some of my ill-gotten wealth to the proletariat.
From the Memoirs of Grace Bailey -
… A spring of constant defeat slowly gave way to the last summer of the Spanish Civil War. The Republic began to find secure footing from which to turn and defend itself. Franco's drive southward towards Valencia stalled against strong defenses in the low but rugged ranges of the Sistema Iberico. Concentric lines of trenches and bunkers were designed to resist bombing and artillery. They were manned by disciplined regulars well supplied with the arms and ammunition then pouring across the French frontier.
Infantry assaults against them routinely ended in bloody catastrophe for the attackers. Any success was minor and purchased at terrible cost. Some defenders and supporters of the Republic began to believe that the dispute with Hitler over Czechoslovakia might force the democracies to stand up to the fascist powers and come to their aid. If the Republic could only hold on long enough, it might be possible.
I wanted to share their enthusiasm but found it difficult. The democracies, except for France, still maintained the nonintervention farce. Even France only allowed the Republic to bring arms and supplies purchased by the Republic or its well-wishers across the border. There was no thought of supplying the Republic with arms itself, or fliers and soldiers as Hitler and Mussolini did for Franco. Then, in April, British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain's contemptible Anglo-Italian Pact recognized Mussolini's conquest of Ethiopia and gave his army and air force a free hand to fight alongside Franco in Spain until the end of the Spanish Civil War.
Even at that early date, I was certain that Chamberlain had all the backbone of a butterscotch pudding when it came to the fascists. Still, with my husband about to risk his life again on the hazards of war, I just couldn't bring myself to believe that all possibility of victory was gone. I told myself that somehow, somewhere, there had to be at least a shadow of a chance. Our goodbye on the pier where Van's ship waited haunted me. I could still hear his reply to my plea to tell me that we would see each other again.
"I'll come back to you, Grace." He spoke soberly but with a fierce underlying conviction. "If I have to crawl out of hell, I'll come back to you."
In the frightening days to come, I clung to those words. Sometimes they were a comforting beacon of hope. Other times it felt as though they were all that kept me from being dragged down into a raging whirlpool of doubt and terror.
Next Week: Fledglings spread their wings. A soldier and his comrades. A mother and her troubles.