Dan and Ethel – Love Letters

He was declared a gentleman by an act of Congress. She was a tailor’s daughter. They met at a June Ball at the US Naval Academy in Annapolis. Forbidden to marry by Navy Regulations, they wrote to each other every day. Sometimes twice a day.                               For 7 years. When war was declared he was sent on a Secret mission in the North Atlantic. Lieutenant Daniel Deckelman was the gunnery officer on a Q-ship looking for the Ace submarine commander, Reinhard Hardegen. 400 miles off the coast of Virginia, each found what he was looking for: An apparently unarmed freighter, the USS Atik, found the German U-boat it was sent to trap and sink. And Reinhard Hardegan in U-123 found an apparently unarmed freighter, the USS Atik. He’s in for a surprise. He will write in his log that he was “like a bloody schoolboy,” fooled by a U-boat trap. March 26, 1942       Midnight firefight on the cold seas of the Atlantic… MORE

Read their stories:

                                                                                                                                           Would you like to read their love letters? Soon to be posted here.

Copyright © Damon Delston 2013