“Love and War – From the Front and the Home Fronts – The letters of Lt. Col. Dr. Charles Pinch & Lt. Nursing Sister Gretta Hope - 1940 to 1944.” My father, a physician, joined the 11th Field Ambulance out of Guelph Ontario and my mother, a nurse from Guelph, joined the 15th General Hospital out of Toronto in 1939. Their story takes place in England, North Africa and Italy. The letters are between my father, his parents, and to my mother while she was in England, North Africa, and back in Canada. Letters from his parents to them are also included. These 476 letters portray the “ordinariness” of everyday service in the military medical corps during wartime. Between battles when treating casualties was their main function, their everyday work included illnesses, accidents and other challenges the troops experienced. These letters highlight the joy, sadness, excitement, tragedy and horror that many serving couples experienced during World War II.
 
My parents were the first Canadian military couple to be married in England during the Second World War. Although they were never able to live together after marriage their love grew into an ever-tightening bond, even with my mother’s deployment to North Africa and my father’s deployment to Italy. My mother returned from North Africa heading to Canada via England without seeing my father whose ship passed hers in the Mediterranean on his way to Italy. In 1944, he returned to Canada with a life altering illness contracted in Italy with a shortened life expectancy.