The Diaries of Howard Leopold Morry, 1939-1965, Vol. 07 (Feb 1, 1946 - Aug 10, 1947)

• Format: Book
• Language: English
• Subjects: Newfoundland; Newfoundland studies
• Online Access: http://collections.mun.ca/cdm/ref/collection/howardmorry/id/874

This seventh volume deals with a different kind of diary than the first four volumes in the series, which together constituted a serialised version of Howard’s life story in four parts. The current volume is similar in some ways to volumes 5 and 6. The fifth and sixth diaries were more of a traditional daily diary, with day by day observations on current events, the weather, the fishery, births, marriages and deaths, and normal and unusual occurrences. But they also included some reminiscences of Howard’s earlier life. In view of the timing of those diaries, they also covered in two parts the momentous days of WWII. Needless to say much of the information conveyed pertained to the progress of the war from the perspective of a Newfoundlander with two sons overseas, one in the Royal Navy and the other in the Royal Artillery. It goes without saying, therefore, that those accounts were not given from an unbiased perspective. Now in the seventh volume we see Howard following the same methodology, but his subject matter is now the lean period which immediately followed WWII. As in the case of Volume 6, each entry follows in strict chronological order the one previous, and it is not necessary to attempt to discern in which year the events of those entries unfolded. The diary of which this volume represents a strict transcript covered precisely the days and months between February 1946 and August 1947. With one exception. There was one pivotal period between April 19 and June 20 1946 for which there were no entries made in the diary. Howard explains that this was a hectic time in Ferryland with the beginning of the fishing season for that year and he was therefore distracted and unable to maintain his normal routine of filling in the events of the day in his diary. And indeed it is true that the beginning of the fishing season in outport Newfoundland was a very busy period. But this never prevented him making his meticulous notes in the diaries of previous years at this time of year. There were other personal events ...