George Llewelyn Davies Birthday!

[Dani1923]

Today is George Llewelyn Davies birthday! George is “the one who started it all”.
To celebrate his birthday I want to share my favorite letter from JM Barrie to George which is the last letter he sent to George a few days before George’s death in World War I.

My dear George,
      I don't know when news from quite near you may reach you - perhaps later than we get it - but we have just heard that your uncle Guy has been killed. He was a soldier by profession, and had reached a time of life when the best things have come to one if they are to come at all, and he had no children which is the best reason for caring to live on after the sun has set; and these are things to remember now. He certainly had the du Maurier charm at its best -  the light bright smile. There was always something pathetic about him to me. He had lots of stern stuff in him, and yet always the mournful smile of one who could pretend that life was gay but knew it wasn't. One of the most attractive personalities I have ever known.
      Of course I don't need this to bring home to me the danger you are always in more or less, but I do seem to be sadder to-day than ever, and more and more wishing you were a girl of 21 instead of a boy, so that I could say the things to you that are now always in my heart. For four years I have been waiting for you to become 21 & a little more, so that we could get closer & closer to each other, without any words needed. I don't have any little iota of desire for you to get military glory. I do not care a farthing for anything of the kind, but I have the one passionate desire that we may all be together again once at least. You would not mean a feather-weight more to me tho' you came back a General. I just want yourself. There may be some moments when a knowledge of all you are to me will make you a little more careful, and so I can't help going on saying these things.
     It was terrible that man being killed next to you, but don't be afraid to tell me of such things. You see it at night I fear with painful vividness. I have lost all sense I ever had of war being glorious, it is just unspeakably monstrous to me now.
                   Loving,
                   J.M.B.

Happy Birthday George!